Nathan S
Cinema Addict - 2396 Film Ratings
Member Since: Nov 8, 2006
Location: Oklahoma City, Oklahoma, USA
Age: 32
Bio: Since my early teenage years, cinema has been my primary form of education. A travelogue which has afforded me experiences I otherwise haven't had the opportunity of enjoying: different eras, locations, languages, cultures, methods of thought. It's a fulfillment damn near spiritual.
My ratings are divided into five points for a more generalized representation of quality. The less reliance on nitpicky numerology, the better. I have awarded a sixth point to films which have had the largest and longest lasting influence on my own cinephilia. They are my all-time favorites, hence a movie is never given a six on first viewing.
The filmmakers who are most important to me include Chantal Akerman, Woody Allen, Robert Altman, Paul Thomas Anderson, Olivier Assayas, Ingmar Bergman, John Cassavetes, Joel & Ethan Coen, Jules Dassin, Terence Davies, Robert Eggers, Werner Herzog, Alfred Hitchcock, Buster Keaton, Masaki Kobayashi, Hirokazu Kore-eda, Stanley Kubrick, Akira Kurosawa, Fritz Lang, Spike Lee, Sergio Leone, Sidney Lumet, David Lynch, Terrence Malick, Jean-Pierre Melville, Hayao Miyazaki, F.W. Murnau, Yasujiro Ozu, Michael Powell & Emeric Pressburger, Satyajit Ray, Nicolas Winding Refn, Kelly Reichardt, Jean Renoir, Eric Rohmer, Roberto Rossellini, Martin Scorsese, Isao Takahata, Hiroshi Teshigahara, Francois Truffaut, Ming-liang Tsai, Denis Villeneuve, Orson Welles, Billy Wilder, and Kar-Wai Wong.
My ratings are divided into five points for a more generalized representation of quality. The less reliance on nitpicky numerology, the better. I have awarded a sixth point to films which have had the largest and longest lasting influence on my own cinephilia. They are my all-time favorites, hence a movie is never given a six on first viewing.
The filmmakers who are most important to me include Chantal Akerman, Woody Allen, Robert Altman, Paul Thomas Anderson, Olivier Assayas, Ingmar Bergman, John Cassavetes, Joel & Ethan Coen, Jules Dassin, Terence Davies, Robert Eggers, Werner Herzog, Alfred Hitchcock, Buster Keaton, Masaki Kobayashi, Hirokazu Kore-eda, Stanley Kubrick, Akira Kurosawa, Fritz Lang, Spike Lee, Sergio Leone, Sidney Lumet, David Lynch, Terrence Malick, Jean-Pierre Melville, Hayao Miyazaki, F.W. Murnau, Yasujiro Ozu, Michael Powell & Emeric Pressburger, Satyajit Ray, Nicolas Winding Refn, Kelly Reichardt, Jean Renoir, Eric Rohmer, Roberto Rossellini, Martin Scorsese, Isao Takahata, Hiroshi Teshigahara, Francois Truffaut, Ming-liang Tsai, Denis Villeneuve, Orson Welles, Billy Wilder, and Kar-Wai Wong.
Recent Ratings
Check out Nathan S's...
| 4 74% | Skinamarink (2022) - Jan 24, 2023
"It's great that something so challenging and unconventional has garnered even a small measure of exposure. The jump scares are slightly cheap but so infrequent that the predominant feeling is the unsettling darkness in the door frames and corners of the ceiling."
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| 4 74% | The Orange Years: The Nickelodeon Story (2020) - Jan 17, 2023
"Only a cursory summary of adolescent relationship with media, more a nostalgic stroll down memory lane. In my case an easy target. I am this demographic. I was and am fond of the vast majority of the shows recollected herein. This makes the idealist in me feel warm and fuzzy, but still the cynic is sad and resentful at growing old. Those are strong reactions, even if they are borne out in a collage of archive footage rather than great documentarian insight."
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| 4 74% | Cure (1997) - Jan 17, 2023
"Inexplicable and fascinating. On a miasmic mass psychosis which seems to directly point the way toward Pulse."
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| 5 93% | The Cremator (1969) - Jan 04, 2023
"Karel fancies himself a romantic, speaking in heightened terms and ministering sacred rites, but in fact he is a lecher and a liar, so after all it's no big leap that his particular brand of intellectual dishonesty might be seduced toward fascism. What a strange and irreverent character piece: the associative editing, canted angles, and hypnotic rhythm are the essence of a demented perspective."
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| 4 74% | Light the Fuse... Sartana Is Coming (1970) - Jan 02, 2023
"It's impossible not to think of Kurosawa when viewing this, with its Rashomon-like flashbacks and Sartana manipulating all parties against each other Yojimbo style. Of course it boils down to little more than greedy scum seeking a stash of gold, so as with most of these films, it either lives or dies by its aesthetic cues and the ingenuity of its set pieces. This one is a lot of fun, with a couple of shining highlights being a prison break and a bathhouse brawl."
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| 3 45% | Bullet Ballet (1998) - Dec 22, 2022
"As an American, it's interesting to see firearm fetishism as an avant-garde anomaly and taboo, rather than standard par. Of course I love the industrial hum and clang, the strobing montage, and the absurdly exaggerated blood and bruising. Unfortunately it stretches thin during the second half, with unsatisfactory insight into character, connection, or impetus. I know poking the plot logic of a Tsukamoto film may be beside the point, but in this case it does disrupt the aesthetic adrenaline."
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| 4 74% | Brink of Life (1958) - Dec 21, 2022
"Is this less-considered little chamber drama actually the saddest and most painful film Ingmar Bergman ever made? In my estimation it's a contender at least. The austerity of a hospital serves to level the playing field and intensify the humanity: these women are temperamentally, economically, and spiritually unique from each other, but here they commiserate on common terms. This depiction of institutional influence, if not outright control of women's bodies will probably forever be relevant."
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| 3 45% | Ivan the Terrible, Part One (1944) - Nov 07, 2022
"A formal masterpiece, dwelling on ornamentation and ritual, deliberate and theatrical performances. The cinematography is as well composed as in any film I've ever seen. But even as someone who typically loves a highly mannered film as such, this fails to bring me any closer than arm's length. The entire thing feels like a preamble to greater depths of madness and treachery."
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| 3 45% | The Two Jakes (1990) - Nov 01, 2022
"I suppose I didn't expect the events of the previous film to play so significantly in this sequel, but after all it is largely about the looming presence of memories never really gone. It does feel a bit like an out-of-fashion hard procedural, a little dry and with some strange passages and punctuation, but generally I enjoy it. The combination of actors is fun, and the production design is really just as vividly detailed as in the first film."
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| 3 45% | Legally Blonde (2001) - Oct 03, 2022
"Its sincerity is plain to see and endearing, I just wish it were actually funny."
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