Meyers and Zimmer Take On Love

Here ends my trilogy of blog posts. With Valentine’s Day a near distant memory, I thought it only right to write about my favourite collaboration in the world of Romantic Comedies. Nancy Meyers and Hans Zimmer.

As a script writer, producer and director, Meyers has her own unmistakeable style that makes her movies identifiable from the get go. The constant twists that she places on the classic romantic movie created by the combination of the love story and 21st Century life. The familiarity of the situations that her characters are placed in and the fairytale ending, warm a viewer’s heart with the explicit optimism that is woven throughout her movies.

An important aspect of the emotion behind Meyers’ movies is the collaboration with musical composer, Hans Zimmer. The renowned pianist and movie composer has worked with Meyers on multiple occasions to create Something’s Gotta Give (2003), The Holiday (2006) and It’s Complicated (2009). The first and last of the collaborative trilogy trivialise what post divorce life is like for the star casted characters. The Holiday as an exception the movies add humour to what happens next from at least one of the character’s perspectives. The main traits that Meyers gives to her female characters are gumption, liberation and an aspect of new found freedom. Which not only may have been in relation to her own experiences as a women, but this also gives the viewer a sense of support, understanding and does stand as great entertainment for the older woman that may be able to imagine the humorous scenarios created.

Nancy Meyer’s began her career in the movie industry as a producer and writer for the first fifteen years, she was introduced to the industry with her first written and produced film, Private Benjamin (1980). Following the success of the movie Meyers was presented with the Writers Guild of America Award for Best Original Screenplay and nominated for Academy Award for Best Writing (Screenplay Written Directly for the Screen). After a number of successful years as a writer and producer Meyers’ first directed film was in collaboration with Disney and ended up being a huge success until this day, the amazing and slightly nostalgia inducing The Parent Trap (1998). Although this film differs quite largely to the trilogy of movies that mark the collaborations between Meyers and Zimmer it put Meyers’ name on the map and began her clean sweep of amazing movies.

Hans Zimmer is a multi award winning musical composer with his creative collaboration on Disney’s The Lion King score with Sir Elton John and Tim Rice landing him an Academy Award, Golden Globe Award and two Grammy Awards for the animations musical aspects. Personally, my appreciation for Zimmer lies in his piano talents and his ability to depict a character through his music which is best/ explicitly outlined through the star studded cast in The Holiday. Jack Black’s character in the LA setting of the movie, Miles plays a character that for me synchronise Zimmer’s composition and musical talents with the character’s extremely similar vocation.

For me, there is something brilliant about Nancy Meyers’ movies that compliment Hans Zimmer’s music and visa versa. As a partnership they have created some of the most heart warming, realistic and optimistic movies that I will always treasure. Nancy Meyers teaches lessons of love for every age group and from every walk of life, Hans Zimmer teaches the viewer that “A soundtrack can carry a visual along, be an unforgettable addition to the film and sometimes really great, which exists as beautiful music on its own merit” and there are moments in all three of Meyers and Zimmer’s serene films that provide moments for the viewer where the music depicts all the emotions to be portrayed with the use of original compositions and “old school” pop music (my guilty pleasures).

Nancy Meyers’ newest release The Intern (2015) is available for download and on hard copy. The movie is a definite must see and recommended watch as it is Meyers return to the big screen after six years. The movie is in keeping with her star studded casts and a Meyers uniqueness that is fully understandable after watching. It is brilliant, so happy to have you back Nancy Meyers!

For The Love Of Tarantino

Quentin Tarantino, I struggled to find exactly where to start with this amazing writer and director. His portfolio of movies have become timeless to movie lovers worldwide and his classics are treasured and enjoyed by people throughout generations. The superb Tarantino’s edgy, violent and line-towing movies upkeep a specific style that is universal and exclusive to his work.

Unlike many others the lack of trend in his movies but the upkeep of his secret style runs through the films. The shady behaviour, the reliable exceptions of the fire arm, the neo-noir style or Tarantino himself, his movie cameos (which personally, I love) and the brilliant idea of an alternative universe that holds his characters, allowing a strong connection between his eight movies.

There is something about Tarantino movies that changed the way that films were made, he defies expectations when each time a film is created and released to the public. Tarantino’s first directed and written movie was Reservoir Dogs (1992) on the budget of $1.2 million the movie set a tone, style and expectation for Tarantino’s movies and he completely surpassed these when he followed this movie with the movie that is religiously quote, referenced unconsciously and respected as one of the greatest movies of all time, Pulp Fiction (1994). Tarantino more than quadrupled his budget and brought back the same style of film but this time he created something that still is a revolution in the movie industry. His star studded cast including Bruce Willis, John Travolta, Samuel L. Jackson and the return of Harvey Keitel- Tarantino’s favourite actor since his teenage years. After playing a lead role in Reservoir Dogs, Keitel was casted in Pulp Fiction with a role that he played was written specifically for his style of acting (I can’t see anyone else having played that specific role even the slightest bit better).

Tarantino chose to collaborate repeatedly with many of the same actors- including himself- to create a style and a storyline that held his alternative universe together with violence, brotherly love and complete, distilled craziness which some how combined has created a somewhat empire of artistic brilliance. He repeatedly works to create movies that supported his “black-comedy crime” genre of movie. The next movies to be released, with again another increasing budget were Kill Bill: Volume 1(2003) and 2(2004)- both listed as the forth films in his beloved series of eight-  featuring the familiar Uma Thurman that started in Pulp Fiction. The actress received a huge number of nominations and awards from her work with Tarantino as the infamous bride in the Kill Bill movies and the brilliant- slightly concerning Mia Wallace. The amazing Samuel L. Jackson has featured in six of Tarantino’s movies, which I personally consider to be Jackson’s best.

The next movie to follow and hopefully continue the unbelievable success for Tarantino over the first ten years of his career was Death Proof (2007) the movie didn’t generate as much profit as his pervious movies had although the budget was again nearly double of the last budget. Although this was the case the film was still added to the director’s success. Proven by referential use of the movie in Iggy Azalea’s Work music video. The extravagance of Tarantino’s movies have been tributes for year from music videos, to television advertisements and just everyday life. Tarantino’s support and followers is a huge system as his style of movies surprisingly manage to appeal to such a broad audience. Inglorious Bastards (2009) Django Unchained (2012) outline worldwide issues, (with the addition of the amazing Christoph Waltz) which was surprising in comparison to what we were used to with the gang crime common denominators of the previous movies These movies dug deeper into history, where holocausts we’re huge issues and he portrays these issues in his his own world where unrealistically the Jewish girl  was given the opportunity to create a life and the African American slave was respected in a certain sense of the word, but this was all in affect of the alternative universe that he has managed to create.

Tarantino has now created eight movies, The Hateful Eight (2016) commemorating his achievements of his ongoing success and ability to never disappoint. The movie was released on the 8th January 2016 and is still showing in selected cinemas. This is my next recommended watch, Tarantino movies never disappoint and he has honoured this legacy with the new movie.

Sam Mendes, Daniel Craig and James Bond

The 23rd and 24th Ian Fleming’s James Bond 007 movies defy gravity, realism and all prior expectations which is exactly what we love about Bond, isn’t it?

Sam Mendes the BAFTA Britannia Award winner 2016 and director of Skyfall (2012) and Spectre (2015) accomplished this with the release of Skyfall, giving a new style to the movies as James faces technology, “first world problems”. His guns became smarter, his cars became increasingly faster and his gadgets step up from the classic passenger seat “extract” button. The film was a huge change for James Bond fanatics to digest but really introduced a new generation of the technology obsessed viewers of the today. The subtle changes in the film bring the classic series into the 21st Century with Bond’s increasing wit and charm. The spin on classic lines by the movie’s writers Neal Purvis, Robert Wade, John Logan created space for the familiar to be humoured. My personal favourite being the spin on Bond’s shaken, not stirred Vodka Martini order, although in Skyfall he doesn’t really seem to be too bothered. James Bond changes in this storyline, compared to familiarities that generations have become a custom to for decades, Sam Mendes does a great job of ensuring that the well presented, mischievous, agent never goes out of fashion.

One of the greatest aspects, for me, is the use of transport, expectations are defied and these elements are never questioned because we all secretly like to believe that something or someone along the lines of James Bond -the perfect gentlemen- truly exists. Running the roof of high-speed trains and flying helicopters upside down are almost impossible to believe but, James does it. Mendes directed his second and his rumoured final James Bond with the most recent film adaptation of Ian Fleming’s novels, Spectre (2015). The opening scenes of this movie are the most precious, on location in Mexico, for the “The dead are alive” carnival, instantly giving the viewer a hint into what is in-store for the rest of the film. Although, only really in hindsight, the fact that I overlooked this helped me to enjoy the surprises that were to come. The film travels back (though not as fair a Skyfall did) into the past decade of Daniel Craig’s work as Bond, and all the villains that we hated to love from Casino Royale where Craig swaggered back on to the big screen as our new and iconic Bond, to the penultimate of the movies where he was faced with the extremely talented Javier Bardem, as his extremely creepy opponent. We are taken on a nostalgic journey of the films and their amazing -some what sinister- characters of our last three Bond movies, in a way that gives the viewer a sense of commemoration from Daniel Craig’s term in the phenomenal series. The idea of the Spectre outlines connections between Casino Royale (2006) with Mads Mikkelsen as La Chiffre, Quantum of Solace (2008) with Jesper Christensen as Mr. White and Skyfall (2012) with Javier Bardem as Raoul Silva only to relieve that they are all working in connection with Mendes newest villain Christoph Waltz as Oberhauser- who appears to be a version of a brother to our beloved main character. The amazing Inglorious Basterds (2009) and Django Unchained (2012) actor is the cherry on top of a Bond cake as a villain, his acting depicts the perfect and familiar villain for the similar target audience as Tarantino’s movies. The multiple award (including the prestigious Golden Globe) winning actor is given a grand and suspicious reveal in the movie, as is deserved. When we finally find that Waltz is the head of operations in Bond’s first scene of suspense. Mendes reveals the character in a way that almost shows pride and climax to his term and fingerprint on the movies. True to form Mendes leaves an explosive stamp on Mexico, Austria and London in the movie. Sam Mendes directs the Bond movies into a place that both remembers Ian Fleming’s the classic creation of the 007 character and his adventures and passes the torch to the next director, in a way that leaves the reader open and excited towards what ever it is that could possibly come next for Ian Fleming’s infamous character.

The collaborations between Daniel Craig and Sam Mendes go further than James Bond, Craig also stared in the Mendes’ Road To Perdition (2002) which is a perfect must see to follow the Bond movies.