The Nativity Story - The Christmas movie that actually has something to do with Christmas

 Since some of my lovely readers suggested me to review a Christmas movie, I have decided to do so. Every year around this time you are bombarded to bits by bland Christmas films. Happy American families, snow, sweets, Santa Claus and presents. I don’t  think that those Christmas movies reflect the original Christmas story, which is the birth of Jesus Christ. A movie which does is The Nativity Story.

The Nativity Story tells the annunciation and nativity of Christ. Teenager Mary is betrothed to Joseph. Mary is visited by the angel Gabriel who tells her that she will soon become pregnant of the son of God. When Mary becomes pregnant (the annunciation), nobody believes that Mary is visited by an Angel who told her she’ll become pregnant (which is kind of logical, when I tell a teacher an Angel told me not to make my homework, unfortunately nobody will believe me as well). Joseph eventually believes Mary (I wish my teachers would as well!) and they set off to Joseph’s birthplace Bethlehem, because Ceasar Augustus demanded that every man and his family must return to his place of birth for the census.

The film is mostly filmed in Italy. The wide open spaces of Italy with its rolling hills and olive groves are the perfect place for a film like this. This is exactly the image I thought of when I thought of all the biblical stories about Jesus.

Try another Christmas recipe this year and watch this amazing Christmas charm! Happy holidays!

Sleepy Hollow – A film that will keep you awake

 It’s a pity that a lot of the thrillers and horror films made nowadays mostly lack the charisma of true creepiness. Most horror films are scary, revolting or a mix of those. Sleepy Hollow is an exception to this rule. This is a film unlike any other. This film was the only film which could evoke that ‘true’ creepy feeling, the same feeling you had when you listened to scary stories during Halloween. Misty fields, trees with bare branches sticking out like a skeleton’s arm, maniacal laughter, squeaking doors, scarecrows standing still. That true mystical feeling is rare in movies nowadays. Luckily, Sleepy Hollow has the C(reepiness)-factor.

Sleepy Hollow tells the story of Ichabod Crane, a police investigator who is sent from the big city to a small place deep in the countryside: Sleepy Hollow. Strange events happen there, already three men have been decapitated by, as the townspeople say, a headless horseman… Ichabod is soon to find out if he can keep his cool in the chilling circumstances in which he finds himself…

If you are looking for an atmospheric, compelling tale of mystery and love in a lugubrious setting, this movie is just the right film to pick!

"Rear Window" - A window to perfection

Rear Window is probably one of the most creatively made movies. Made more than 50 years ago, this movie still thrills people all over the world to bits.

Photojournalist Jeff is doomed to spend a few months in his tiny apartment after breaking a leg (He'd wish his beautiful fiancée didn't say “break-a-leg” before Jeff departed to try to shoot some interesting pictures, haha). From time to time, Jeff is visited by his nurse or his fiancée Lisa. To kill the time between those visits, Jeff peeks on his neighbors using binoculars. When time passes, Jeff gets to know each one of his neighbors more and more. One of his neighbors, travelling salesman Lars Thorwald, has an invalid, nagging wife. One day, he suddenly doesn’t hear her nag. He starts thinking of scenarios in which Thorwald murdered his wife. As the film progresses the macabre truth is unraveled…

The entire story is set in the cramped apartment of Jeff.  The movie lasts for 112 minutes.

One setting for the whole story + almost two hour-lasting film = boredom, you might think. I can assure you that this is not true. Rear Window is far from boring. The Honorable Hitchcock, aka The Master of Suspense, aka Mr. SuperCreepz still manages to make this film more suspenseful than 99% of all the thrillers made today.

If you haven’t seen this movie yet, take a peek!

The Curious Case of Benjamin Button - Crashingly Clumsy or Beautifully Brilliant?

The Curious Case of Benjamin Button is an extremely well-made film. It tells the story of Benjamin Button who is born old and he dies when he is a baby. Everybody in Benjamin’s surroundings grows older while Benjamin ‘grows’ younger. This makes Benjamin’s story so intriguing. When Benjamin is seven, (take note that Benjamin looks extremely old because he is ‘aging down’) he develops feelings for a girl, Daisy, who is the same age as he is. (of course, she is ‘aging up’.) as Benjamin grows younger and Daisy is growing older, they realize they’ve fallen in love with each other….

This could have been an extremely cheesy love story with sticky one-liners and a lot of deep-in-the-eye-looking. Luckily, thanks to the great acting of Brad Pitt (Benjamin) and Cate Blanchett (Daisy), those clichés are avoided. Love is a prominent theme within the film, but time and aging are even more important in this movie. 

I would like to give a tremendous thumbs-up to the folks who fixed the make-up for Brad Pitt. There are only several minutes in the almost three-hour-lasting film in which Brad Pitt is seen without make-up. The rest of the movie, either Brad Pitt looks younger or older than he really is.  

This movie with its intriguing storyline, great acting and magnificent make-up will be considered as a classic art-house film in the future. Without any doubt.

Welcome to my blog!

Richards Razzling-dazzling Reviews - Your favorite blockbuster blogger

To all film fanatics and movie monsters,

My name is Richard Romeijn and I am a film fanatic! Films are my passion and my favorite way to spend my leisure time on. I loved watching films when I was a kid and I still love it nowadays. I try to watch diverse movies, so not just your regular B-movies you watch on boring Mondays to kill the evening.

Richards Razzling-dazzling Reviews is a blog about movies (if you haven’t noticed it yet). It’s a miracle that I have not started blogging about films before because I love talking about films just as much as I love watching them. I am going to review as much films as possible. Funny, interesting, weird, scary, sad, I will try to review them all! In this blog I am going to talk about why this film appeals or repulses me and why you definitively should (or should not) see it! I will share my experiences, thoughts and opinions with you! 

If you have suggestions for improvement, you can send me an email or comment in the comment section. I will try to answer as much emails and comments as possible.

I hope you will all enjoy my reviews, and I hope you’ll develop a passion for films (if you don’t feel passionate about films yet.) 

May the force be with you,

Richard Romeijn