We watched an interesting movie tonight, for lack of a better word.  It is called Funny Games.  It wasn’t funny, and let me apologize ahead of time for the vague review – you’ll have to see the movie to understand why I couldn’t write too much about it.  I had never heard of it before, but it was a thriller, so my husband suggested it.  If you like thrillers, see it and then tell me what you think.  I don’t really know what to say about this movie.  It was captivating and VERY tense, so I was never bored, but I was disappointed with the way it ended.  For one thing, I did not understand the movie.

Let me back up and give a quick synopsis.  Naomi Watts stars as a mother who, along with her husband and son are held captive by 2 very well-spoken young men in their remotely secluded (of course it’s secluded – this IS a thriller movie!) vacation home.  As I said, the movie is very intense but only after what is a somewhat slow start.  I don’t want to spoil anything, so I will just say that are no words for what happened in the last 40 minutes of the movie.  Near the conclusion, it took a turn for the confusing, and what happened made me not really understand the entire movie.  It’s based on an Austrian film, and imdb.com said that the American guy who remade it didn’t change much from the Austrian version, so maybe it didn’t translate well?  I liked the movie, for the time being anyway while I was watching it, but I would really like some insight about a certain event that took place…  it might actually be a thriller I would watch again, which is rare, but I might want to see if I can get what I must have missed.  Like I said, if you’re a big fan of suspense movies, I would try this one, it’s definitely different from all the others!  And if you have seen it or do see it, make sure you try to fill me in on what I missed, cuz I just didn’t get it!

Hubby and I watched this movie last night.  Plot inconsistencies aside – it is a horror movie after all, so we weren’t expecting much – it was actually better than I thought.  I really enjoyed how they let the main characters keep slipping away from the Hitcher, the bad guy, only to be back in danger…  but I kept wondering, ok they’re safe now, but the movie can’t be over, so how are they going to get back in The Hitcher’s clutches?  The answers to these questions are an entertaining combination of extremely stupid and horrible decision making on the part of our “heroes” and also some pretty good plot manuvers on the part of the script.  There was also a lot of police involved in this movie, which, for a horror movie, is pretty rare.  Usually once the main characters encounter the police, they are safe, but without spoiling TOO much for you, this film is different from the norm.  Like I said, it was better than I expected.  Not super-great, but I was never bored or grossed-out, both of which I can’t say during my recent viewing of Saw IV – now that was an awful movie.  I think part of it is the pregnancy, but I just couldn’t handle the gore.  It never bothered me before, but I always did find it annoying when they use lots of gore just for shock value.  Now it’s both annoying AND so gross I can’t even watch it.  And what was with the casting of Saw IV?  They chose 2 actors who look exactly alike!  Even if I was making a serious attempt to follow the plot of the fim, which I wasn’t anyway since I constantly had to divert my eyes and ears from all the gore, I wouldn’t have been able to follow the movie because of the 2 identical actors they cast who were not supposed to be the same character but looked like it!  Anyway, back to The Hitcher – I liked it better than Gone Baby Gone, but then again, it’s a totally different kind of movie.  If it weren’t for some plot unbelievabilities and some of the STUPIDEST decisions I’ve ever seen main characters make, the movie would have been better.  In review, if you like horror / suspense movies, see The Hitcher.  By the way, I’m talking about the newer version, don’t know anything about the older version, maybe I should give it a try.  If you like pointless gore fests, I still wouldn’t recommend Saw IV – I wouldn’t recommend that movie to my worst enemy.  If you want to sit through a terrible movie, try The Night Listener – at least it has Robin Williams! 

On an unrelated note, for those of you who have read my Walmart rant, during my weekly visit today, the “magic price increase of the day” was yogurt – up from $.44 per container to $.46 each.  By the way, have you noticed that computer keyboards do not have a cents sign?  If I’m mistaken, let me know, I have actually gone to use them before!