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World War Z

Zombies

Wittenberg
Wittenberg
27-07-2013
8

Triple A mediocrity

For a movie about zombies investing the world, people seeking shelter in save havens with high walls, and a hero finding a cure just in time, this one is very good.
8

Oppenheimer

A biography of the father of the atomic bomb

Wittenberg
Wittenberg
11-08-2023
8

A fascinating drama disguised as an adrenline action ride

A very intense and splendidly shot, acted and directed movie. But part of me thought Nolan was cheating, by presenting what is essentially a drama as an pumping action movie, using all of his film-making prowess. There was a dissonance beween what was actually happening and how it was presented.
8

Irreversible

Told in reverse order, a guy is out for revenge when his girlfriend is brutally raped

Wittenberg
Wittenberg
15-03-2022
8

Very distrubing and very well done

Why do people make movies like this? Why do I watch it? Why do I rate it favorably? It's hard to understand, but somehow it made sense. The audacious cinematography, the sickening feeling it evokes, and the acting in very long (albeit unbearable) shots are just unique and a a class apart.
8

Raid, The

Police squad in Jakarta raids a tower inhabited by criminal scum. It turns bad really quickly.

Wittenberg
Wittenberg
31-08-2015
8

Brutally refining

A really sweaty and hardcore fighting movie with a deep sense of pain and tired bones. It is unpleasant in a way, but it is also spectacular, amazingly well performed and choreographed and a genuine new benchmark for brawling movies - that had been going nowhere until this came along.
8

Die Brucke - Bernhard Wicki (1959)

There can't be enough anti-war movies
average 8.0

Wittenberg
Wittenberg
06-03-2023
7

a sad warstory, told well

After all these years, this is still a worthwhile movie, effectively painting contrast between the boys in their daily life and the pointless and violent war they end up in. Some remarkable cinematography for it's age, too.
7

hente
hente
10-10-2013
9

Armed conflict can infect us all

I saw this movie half a century ago and it is still impressive even without the usual mass scenes and shoot-outs. Make sure you watch the original version by director Wicki and not the later re-make with the same title.
9

Dead Center, The

Psychiatrist treates a patient that has risen from the dead

Wittenberg
Wittenberg
14-06-2021
8

An unpleasant surprise

Morgue-scenes, already my weakspot! But this movies doesn't solely rely on their creepy atmosphere. It has an intelligent, well constructed uncanny atmosphere throughout, and I love the natural acting and believable hospital atmosphere that was created. It really elevates the story.
8

Avatar: The Way of Water

When the evil skypeople return to Pandora, JakeSully and his family seek shelter amongst the water tribe

Wittenberg
Wittenberg
30-12-2022
8

Too much of a good thing is still a good thing?

My predominant emotion was that it was too much. Too many magical animals, too much action, too much family values, too much Pandora, too much awe. Make no mistake though; This is still a huge achievement and a unrivaled spectacle that is a feast for the eyes and ears.
8

Babadook, The

Widow is trying to get by with her needy son when she also releases a shadowy presence in her house by reading a strange childrens book

Wittenberg
Wittenberg
02-02-2019
8

Succesful on multiple levels

Even more than the restrained and tasteful horror story, I was impressed by the suffocating and agonizing experience of watching her slide into insanity, due to sleep deprivation, desperation and social seclusion. It's sad, original, scary and intense. Bravo.
8

Big Hero 6

Talented young inventor must befriend (and upgrade) a clumpsy medical robot in order to save the world from his own invention

Wittenberg
Wittenberg
26-12-2016
8

Excellent

A fantastic animation that is spot on with exiting action, great visuals, humor and it is not afraid to reach some deeper emotions as well.
8

Beau is Afraid

A scarred man is literally and figuratively going on a bad trip to his mother

Wittenberg
Wittenberg
27-08-2023
8

A wonderfully bad trip

To think that someone made up this story, somehow decided it was finished, and concluded it was ready to make a movie out of it is even more baffling the the movie itself. But here it is, and I am glad it is. A wild ride, bizarre, disorienting but also skillfully made, intriguing and unique.
8

Spy

Condemned to work in a basement supporting agents doing all the action, a CIA agent finally gets a change to do some fieldwork of her own

Wittenberg
Wittenberg
14-08-2016
8

Dare I say hillarious?

In a time where 'comedies' merely evoke a vague smile at best, I was delighted to find this genuinely funny movie that had me laughing out loud several times. Deliciously nasty and hysterical.
8

Mad God

stop-animation about a figure descending deeper and deeper into a bizarre, dark world

Wittenberg
Wittenberg
16-08-2022
8

A bad trip that comes highly recommended

Would this be better if I understood what was going on? Probably not - better to be engulfed by the mesmerizing, dark, beautiful, sinister and imaginative trip that this is. It can be hard though to keep focus with no story to focus on, and I thought better music would have lifted it more.
8

Zero Dark Thirty

The hunt for UBL

Wittenberg
Wittenberg
19-05-2013
8

ladies and gentlemen, she got him

Stylish and engrossing hunt for Usama.. which is quite an achievement since it apparently involved so much waiting and utter lack of progress. The movie ends with a nail biting assault on the man.
8

Soul

Just before a breakthrough live performance, a jazz musician has an accident and get assigned a quest somewhere in the afterlife

Wittenberg
Wittenberg
22-01-2021
8

Beautifully abstract and heartfelt.

Another bold Pixar endeavor that doesn't shy away from emotions, highly abstract concepts and symbolism. Apparently, kids get it instantly, but I needed some time to figure it out. Any which way, it is just lovely, beautiful and wonderful.
8

Top Gun: Maverick

Maverick is called back to train a team destined to do the most dangerous mission ever

Wittenberg
Wittenberg
06-06-2022
8

The people don't work for me anymore, but the flying does

I had some trouble buying into the somewhat desperate portrayal of these pilots as beautiful, perfect, witty, slick, hip beings and the insubordinate way they go about their briefings and missions - even if this is Top Gun. But hell yes, the air footage and final combat makes up for it.
8

Raised by Wolves

Escaping a war torn earth, two androids fly to a distant planet in order to restart humanity. But they are not the only ones.

Wittenberg
Wittenberg
16-04-2023
8

Even if it can't keep up the with the first eposide, it still is great

Although it looses a bit of momentum with every episode after to the majestic grand opening, this series had a lot going for it. Fantastic design that mixes medieval with ultra futuristic, a deep and interesting storyline and intense characters. And a splendid opening track to top it off!
8

Night House, The

After her husband commits suicide, the widow starts to experience strange things in the secluded house he built

Wittenberg
Wittenberg
24-01-2022
8

A subtle but very satisfying horror

Wow, this really worked for me. The horror elements are subtle and tasteful, the evolving mystery is enticing and the element of grief is mixed in well. But mostly, I was quite stunned with the lead actress, who totally nails it and makes everything work beautifully.
8

Bird Box

Woman tries to bring two kids to a save haven in a world overrun by a suicide pandamonium

Wittenberg
Wittenberg
02-01-2019
8

Original and exhilarating

My goodness: a highly original (not withstanding the similar 'The Happening'), strongly acted and nail-biting movie that is very well put together. Those are not easy to come by these days. It once again shows the strength of NOT showing or explaining everything and anything.
8

We Need to Talk About Kevin

A mother trying to cope with a son that hates her, and something horrific he is planning

Wittenberg
Wittenberg
13-08-2022
8

A bitter pill that is worth it

The helplessness, frustration and despair of the situation really gets to you. The way the movie gradually builds up to dreadful act of the kid, foreshadowed with flashbacks, his vague preparations and the look in his eyes is not pleasant, but most certainly very well done and well acted by all.
8

Camp X-Ray

Newbie MP soldier get stationed at Guantanamo, where she bonds with one of the detainees

Wittenberg
Wittenberg
05-03-2016
8

Honest little gem

A sober yet rewarding experience, with an awesome looking and playing Stewart and very good music backing it up. I sort of missed a beat in the transition of Lector turning into a genuine nice guy, but that's ok.
8

Im Westen Nichts Neues

Follows a few young German boys into the first worldwar trench hell against France

Wittenberg
Wittenberg
02-11-2022
8

An impressive and heavy warflick that ought to have hit harder

A film that impressive in many ways: The raw depiction of war, the insanity of trench wars in particular and the cinematography. But somehow it didn't fully manage to transfer the deep sense of fear or dread like some other war movie have. Perhaps I didn't really bond with the characters.
8

Solo: A Star Wars Story

Young Han is seperated from his girl, and goes through great lengths and cosmic adventures to get back and save her

Wittenberg
Wittenberg
03-06-2018
8

A welcome change

Contains just the right amount of Star Wars icons to make it connect to the universe, but never lazily riding it. By focusing on a small group of people, I felt a much more intimate connection than the main movies. The portayal of the younger Han actually worked for me. Funny and exciting, too.
8

Open Water

Scuba diving couple emerges to find the boat not there

Wittenberg
Wittenberg
06-08-2023
8

A nailbiter that kept reeling me in

I wanted to do something else but I could not resist this movie. My complements for making the simple plot and scenery not a limitation but a strength. The natural, almost amateuristic camerawork and non-sensationalist footage of sharks is also a masterstroke making everything up close and personal.
8

Zootropolis

Rabbit tries to make it as a police officer in the big city inhabited by all kinds of animals

Wittenberg
Wittenberg
19-06-2016
8

A matured quality animation

A wonderful tale that is brought to live with colorful charterers, a good sense of humor and a detective crime story that has an mature quality to it.
8

Get Out

Black boyfriend gets to meet his white inlaws for the first time, in a mansion where something weird is going on with the black personel

Wittenberg
Wittenberg
18-11-2018
8

What's going on?

The sense that something's not right but you can't quite grasp what it is has been done extremely well and carries this movie till the end. Together with the fine actors, this was a highly entertaining movie with a dash of horror.
8

Starship Troopers

Friends sign in to combat terror from space. Both their skills and friendship are put to the test.

Wittenberg
Wittenberg
26-08-2015
8

A brutal space fight that requires the right mindset

It all depends on whether you can appreciate the deeper meaning of incredibly cheesy barbie people have soap opera relationship quarrels - followed by dismembering fights with aliens.
8

Arrival

Linguist is asked to crack the language of the aliens who landed and ask them: why are you here?

Wittenberg
Wittenberg
17-11-2016
8

Elegant, deep and sober scifi, just the way I like it.

My favorite movie themes combined: science fiction and deep mystery/mind benders that will have you pondering days after. Excellent and refreshing.
8

L'année dernière à Marienbad (1961)

Man meets woman, woman meets man, or perhaps they didn't

hente
hente
10-10-2013
8

Time and place are no longer certain

As we are constantly cheating our memories, actual life becomes a guessing game in this stylish movie. Ultimately, all movies are addressing space and time. This one adds to the mystery like a photo of a photographer. Over-aged? How can time be dismissed as being too old? Call it matured...
8

Boyhood

Movie portraying the ups and downs in the life of Mason and his family between his 5th and 18th year

RockmeNow
RockmeNow
20-01-2015
8

There are many good reasons why this movie is nominated for the Oscars

I was suprised by the excellent casting and makeup artists that convincingly managed to make the characters look older during the movie, until I realised (read somewhere) that it was filmed with the same cast over a 12 year period. Great acting and empathetic presentation of the targeted zeitgeist.
8

You Won't be Alone

In the nineteeth century, a young girl is turning into a witch, inhabiting different bodies as she goes

Wittenberg
Wittenberg
02-07-2023
8

A poetic, beautiful and unique witch movie

With numerous voice-overs pondering her faith, the dreamy cinematography and absence of viewer pampering, this felt more than a poetic essay, depicting witches more as misunderstood outcasts than malicious beings. I found it beautiful and a highly refreshing.
8

Kung Fu Panda 3

In order to repell a new threat to peace, Panda must resort to his Panda family to learn the power of chi

Wittenberg
Wittenberg
18-04-2016
8

A very mature and excellent episode

Some fatigue may kick in, as we can sort of predict how everything it going to turn out. But the humor, atmosphere, unique blend of 3d animation and traditional artwork, the loyalty to the characters and the depth of the story remain of a very high standard.
8

Chronicle

Found footage of teenagers developing superpowers

Wittenberg
Wittenberg
19-02-2013
8

Unique approach to what superpowers would be like

Real people with some superpowers are more exciting than superpeople with massive superpowers. Nice effects too.
8

Junji Ito Maniac: Japanese Tales of the Macabre

Collection of short horror manga

Wittenberg
Wittenberg
05-02-2023
8

Worthwhile collection of weird but effective horror stories

As usual, I needed time to adjust to some of the intricacies of Manga that always annoy me. But eventually I did, thanks to high tempo and the wonderfully weird, intense and sometimes quite scary stories. Most of them are open-ended or just end plain unhappy. Refreshing.
8

Lego Movie

The insignificant life of a lego nobody turns on it's head when he is the chosen one to act against evil plans that threaten lego world

Wittenberg
Wittenberg
16-02-2014
8

Fantastic frantic

Could have gone wrong in many ways, but did not. Loaded to the brim with action, jokes, fantastic visuals and brilliant 'real' animation. I did think it was a little to nervous and restless, and overcomplicated for kids to follow comfortably.
8

Lux Æterna

Actors and crew are trying to shoot a moviescene featuring the burning of witches

Wittenberg
Wittenberg
24-09-2023
8

Utterly strange, uncomfortable and intense

Even if this movie is mostly people cursing and shouting in chaos, and it remains unclear what the real problem is, there is something very intense about it. The anxious feeling of wanting to leave the place is deep. The finale will blast your senses, leaving you shellshocked on the couch. Awesome.
8

Still Alice

A woman is diagnosed with Early-onset Alzheimer's Disease and tries to deal with it together with her family

RockmeNow
RockmeNow
02-03-2015
8

Impressive

An eye-opener for everybody, including myself, who had not been directly confronted before with the devastating consequences of Early-onset Alzheimer's Disease. There are many good reasons why Julianne Moore won an Oscar for her role in this impressive movie.
8

Radius

A man looses his memory after car accident, and acquires a deadly trait for people getting too close him

Wittenberg
Wittenberg
26-08-2023
8

An exciting orginal

What a nice surprise this was. An movie with some fresh ideas, tightly brought to the screen and intriguing from the very beginning until the end. It's never sensationalist, but let's the script and actors deliver the thrills.
8

Edge of Tomorrow

A not so brave solider gets killed on a beach fighting aliens, but then gets to relive that day over and over again, get better at it each time

Wittenberg
Wittenberg
15-06-2014
8

Slamming scifi with a twist

A neat thrill ride based on a great story, cool action and splendid visuals. Maybe the story was over-centered at the main character and story, making it feel like the suffering of the rest of world wasn't an issue. But who cares.
8

Sinister

Writer and his family move into a house where horrible attrocities have taken place, so he can research these and write a book about it. To start him of, he finds a box with old 8mm films...

Wittenberg
Wittenberg
29-02-2016
8

Eerie

Didn't crawl under the skin as I thought it would (for some reason), but a very eerie, umcomfortable and stylish horror nevertheless. 8mm graininess is used to great effect together with really unsettling music.
8

Oblivion

Engineer is looking after droids doing their last business on earthbefore mankind heads for titan. But is it like that?

Wittenberg
Wittenberg
19-05-2013
8

pretty sci-fi mindmangler

Extremely beautiful and a pleasant SF mindbender. Some ideas we have seen before, and it maybe a bit sterile, but it blends very well.
8

Men

A woman retreats to an English cottage to proces a violent and traumatic divorce, but the local strange men only bring more horror

Wittenberg
Wittenberg
03-07-2022
8

A well thought out and intriguing horror

The simple setup gradually unfolds a lot of depth, symbolism and metaphors without being pretentious. Uncanny without cheap tricks, with a spot-on atmosphere. The finale is spectacular too; no matter how bizarre it was, it somehow made sense.
8

Enter the Void

Smalltime drug dealer in Tokyo experiences after death experience and reincarnation... while on drugs

Wittenberg
Wittenberg
13-01-2018
8

What a trip

I am assuming this is about the closest you can get to tripping out (or dying) in beautiful Tokyo without doing any drugs. The camera work, images an music are really extraordinarily done and it treats the 'expected' after-death events in a sort of believable way. Very long though.
8

I Origins

In a search for the evolutionary origins of the eye, the lovelifes of the scientists lead to an even more profound discovery

Wittenberg
Wittenberg
19-01-2015
8

A wonderfull mix science of spirituality

Appeared slighty pro-spirituality, anti-science, depicting scientist as strange, rigid, disconnected people. It's no big problem though, because it is still a very well done, nicely paced movie with an unsubstantiated premise that is nevertheless nice to see where it's going.
8

Alpha

Set in the stone age, a boy gets seperated form his group and must find his way home, but befriends a wolf along the way

Wittenberg
Wittenberg
16-12-2019
8

Beautiful and heartfelt

I like to think of this as perhaps the first domestication of wolfs, eventually leading to dog breeds. Extremely pretty, akin towards kitsch, but never crossing that line. The storyline is also gripping, making me care about this journey and swallowing tears near the end.
8

Saint Maud

Deeply religious palliative nurse becomes dangerously fanatical when she thinks she has performed a revelation on a patient

Wittenberg
Wittenberg
01-08-2021
8

Impressive and scary, with thick layers of atmosphere

An impressive psychological thriller with some horror and supernatural elements in a very tasteful, restrained and effective way. The atmosphere oozes of the screen, performances are great, especially Maud's of course.
8

All Is Lost

Solo sailer tries to survive when his ship is rammed by an adrift sea container.

Wittenberg
Wittenberg
10-02-2014
8

Intimate and gripping

Very good and very close portrait of a man struggling against all odds. The absence of dialogue is mesmerizing and effective. I felt guilty opening a beer while watching this. I think that's a good sign (but I still opened one nonetheless).
8

Nightingale, The

After unspeakable cruelty was done to a woman and her family, she chases down the perpetrators through the Tasmanian bush, with the aid of a native aboriginal

Wittenberg
Wittenberg
12-05-2020
8

Heavy, but very good

It covers a lot of heavy-handed subjects (racism, revenge, rape, murder, repression) and inevitably features some tough scenes. But it has all been done really well. I liked how during the revenge part she remained fragile and insecure, and didn't have sudden superskills that came out of nowhere.
8

Life

The crew of spacestation ISS manages to acquire a sample from mars soil... with life in it.

Wittenberg
Wittenberg
01-04-2017
8

Very good space horror

It is not perfect, but overall I found this to be very solid, exciting, great looking film that reconfirmed just how much and why I love space horror. The spacestation and camerawork floating through it are first class.
8

Hereditary

The death of a tyrant grandmother does not spell relieve, but drags a family into paranormal turmoil

Wittenberg
Wittenberg
15-07-2018
8

No cheap tricks, pure dread.

While I may not have been as shellshocked as many other reviewers, I do agree think this was remarkably good under-the-skin horror that uses some common themes but threats them in a much more adult, slow and agonizing manner.
8

Dune: Part Two

Paul joins the Fremen on Arakis. Some say he is the chosen one to lead their cause.

Wittenberg
Wittenberg
10-04-2024
8

An epic epic

This part spends more time on the characters and the tribe rituals, but there is also epicness in large quantities, making this a massive joy to simply experience. But I have to say, there's still something preventing it from truly knocking your socks off.
8

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