Mad Max: Fury Road by George Miller, 2015 (R)

with Tom Hardy, Charlize Theron, Nicholas Hoult, Hugh Keays-Byrne, Rosie Huntington-Whiteley, Riley Keough, Zoë Kravitz, Abbey Lee, Courtney Eaton

The desert wastelands inhabited by the Road Warrior are still rife with motorized gangs in this fourth chapter of the Mad Max legend. When Max encounters a group of refugees fleeing for their lives, he joins them and their fiery leader, Furiosa.

Utu-Noranti (Grandma) and Grunchlk are in Mad Max !!! Just for that, it deserves the watch :) (Farscape fan...)
But then again, you have to have been on a lot of coffee or something. Because the movie is loud, fast, doesn't give any second break, it is pretty much a two-hour pursuit. They could almost call it an action-road trip. In fast forward.
Of course, as usual, Tom Hardy needs subtitles... Sorry I had to make the joke because no matter how hard I try, I always wind up with them. Theron is good, Hoult is crazy which I absolutely loved, and then the story, well, it goes very fast, so besides people hitting each others with cars, and a lot of sand, I didn't see much. But well, it Utu Noranti (Melissa Jaffer) is still with her collection of plants, I am good...

We're the Millers by Rawson Marshall Thurber, 2013 (R)

by Jennifer Aniston (Friends), Jason Sudeikis, Will Poulter, Emma Roberts, Ed Helms (Jeff, Who Lives at Home), Nick Offerman (All Good Things, The Men Who Stare At Goats, Miss Congeniality 2: Armed and Fabulous), Kathryn Hahn (Our Idiot Brother), Molly C. Quinn, Tomer Sisley, Matthew Willig

When a small-time pot dealer gets mugged, he needs to find a way to pay back his supplier. Agreeing to smuggle in a major stash from Mexico, he rounds up a fake family to act as his cover, and they head for the border in an RV.

That movie is stupid. Typical American blockbuster, with loud sense of humor, girls teasing the adolescent guy, guys teasing women because they don't know how to say they are pretty, or the right one. A little puerile after all. But... I gotta say the road-trip format, Jennifer Aniston, and that kid Will Poulter altogether actually make it work. Not a brainy movie, just a loud comedy, but it does the job.

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On the Road by Walter Salles, 2012 (R)

Sam Riley, Garrett Hedlund, Kristen Stewart (Tron: Legacy), Amy Adams (Julie and Julia, The Master, Trouble with the Curve, The Fighter, Man of Steel), Tom Sturridge, Alice Braga, Elisabeth Moss (Did You Hear About The Morgans?, Mad Men), Danny Morgan, Kirsten Dunst (All Good Things, The Virgin Suicides, Melancholia, Upside Down), Viggo Mortensen (A Dangerous Method), Marie-Ginette Guay, Steve Buscemi (Paris Je T'aime, Love in the Time of Money, The Messenger)

At the height of the Beat era, New York writer Sal Paradise, his freewheeling buddy Dean, and Dean's wife set out on a journey of self-discovery. Their cross-country quest for answers reflects the American character, attitudes and values of the time.
On the Road is based on a novel by American writer Jack Kerouac about the travels of Kerouac and his friends Neal Cassady and Allen Ginsberg across America. It is considered a defining work of the postwar Beat and Counterculture generations, with its protagonists living life against a backdrop of jazz, poetry and drug use.

Ehhh.... I cannot say this movie is good. Sorry. The story of Dean (Garrett Hedlund) is pretty unusual, full of life and contradictions, and the actor gives everything he has. The character of Kerouac on the other hand doesn't hold the story together, if feels like his lack of determination is leading the movie to its perdition, with a first half of the movie where nothing flows and the silent landscapes are not beautiful enough to make you travel... nor do the intense discussions that intercalate with the landscapes, perhaps because they lack of silence, which would allow to understand the characters. The second half of the movie gives more time to Dean and perhaps then, the movie starts taking off. Not enough tho, and too late.

Watch trailer:

Retratos en un Mar de Mentiras by Carlos Gaviria, 2010 (R)

with Paola Baldión, Julián Román, Edgardo Román, Valeria Fuentes, Ana María Arango

An emotionally engaging story about Mariana, who is practically mute, decides to travel with her cousin Jairo to claim an inheritance. But on the road back home she is continuously triggered to a past of childhood trauma, when Colombian paramilitary and guerrillas forced displacement. These flashbacks reveal her lost identity, family and love-breaking Mariana's silence and opening her heart to grieve and love again.

Interesting portrayal of a society through the journey of two, their instinct, their survival and their beauty. The cinematography is full of colors, the landscapes dangerous and amazing. I was surprised by the lack of explanation you have all along, and how well, in contradiction, you get to know the two. The universality of the quest is combined with a world so foreign to me that it took me a lot of thinking in perspective to understand certain reactions and behaviors, and sometimes even not comprehend. Fascinating.

watch trailer: