Twist Endings

I love twist endings. I love having my expectations for a film twisted in on themselves to reveal unseen truths about the characters and their previous actions. However, a twist ending is only good when the viewer is not expecting it.

Take for instance Frank Darabont's 1994 prison drama "The Shawshank Redemption". During its finale, the warden (and the viewer) discover that Andy (Tim Robbins) has not only escaped but that he had been digging a tunnel to get out for over twenty years, during which the film takes place. When I first saw the film, I had no idea that this would happen. Andy seemed very indifferent, spending his time reading books and making a chess set out of rocks from the prison courtyard. What he did and who he talked to seemed of no consequence. However, on repeat viewing I noticed how every word he said, everywhere he went, was to get himself closer to his goal: freedom. That's what is so wonderful about twists. They make viewing a movie for the second time even more enjoyable than the first.

Not all twist ending work out as planned. This is the case in "Wanted", a blood-laced and adrenaline-induced comic book adaptation with James McAvoy, Angelina Jolie and Morgan Freeman. Despite director Timur Bekmambetov's attempts to surprise the audience with McAvoy's sudden revalation that the man he was hired to kill is, this twist never took me. It seemed to me that in an already convulted plot, this twist seemed too routine to make an impact.

Film Scores

I'm obsessed with film scores. There, I said it. I am officially out of the film score closet. The reason I love them so much is that they give a film its of the emotion and pathos. If you have ever watched a movie on mute with subtitles on, you know what I mean. Without it, a film would be dull and boring.
Take, for example, M. Night Shyamalan's most recent film, The Happening. It was a marginal film with a really cool presence (plants are scheming to exterminate us!), and was very boring, sloppy (you could see the microphone dip down into the shot a few times). But worst of all, it was a suspense flick without the suspense! The reason, I propose to why this was is because of the score. Composed by James Newton Howard (King Kong, The Dark Knight) it lacks any moods whatsoever, turning instead to ambient noise that adds nothing to the drama onscreen. Even when the characters are in grave danger, Howard does nothing to try and increase the excitement and tension.
I am also secretly obsessed with disney movies.