inulro | [film review] Van Helsing, Flushed Away

Further in the "Things that don't suck" series. Things that do suck include being too ill to read this week; but I've worked on the backlog of films I need to see.

I know I'm in a minority here, but I absolutely lovedVan Helsing. It's a stupid cheesy anachrotech adventure, but one that tunes in exactly to my faux gothic medieval asthetic. I want to live in a village that looks like the one the vampires prey on. Anything with castles that over the top can't go wrong in my book, especially with secret passages and extra dimensions. Dracula is, not surprisingly, better looking than van Helsing. I gigled when the Baby vampires went pop. I wouldn't have thought that an amalgamation of the Frankenstein and Dracula stories could work that well. I know everybody else hated it, but I thoroughly enjoyed every minute of it, even though it was let down by some not top of the range CGI.

Flushed Away was a bit more predictable, but none the less enjoyable for that. It's cute and funny, and, as always with Aardman, the animation itself is pure joy.

Inside Man and Arlington Road are both good thrillers. Inside Man is the better made film with the cleverer plot; Arlington Road is Damn Suspenseful.

I have solved the problem of having more time to watch films but no money to rent them when I'm not working. Our DVD rental company periodically gives us the chance to pay for a year up front with a big discount. I have done just that, and upgraded our package so we can have more DVDs at home at once.