I've bought a few films I intend to see soon, or rather, as I know myself well enough, to see them during my life-time.

I got hold of the newly remastered version of "The Sting", yeah, the old trickster-film with Paul Newman and...that dwarfy guy. I can't understand how come it's #70 on the top 250-list at IMDb, but there you go. I just saw it with Mikaela, we both liked it. I even like the soundtrack, entirely consisting of Scott Joplin-ragtimes. I'd never listen to those tracks outside the film, though. Well, all in all, I love films where the underdogs fight to make rich criminals go FUBAR. The extra material accompanying this double-disc release is quite good, and shows how open and free Hollywood used to be; Paul Newman is seen saying how he and the director joked around a lot, the other actors, the guy who shaped the music, the production-designer, et.c. all say what a great atmosphere those days provided, as today, as Newman puts it, every day of production costs somewhere around 16000-18000USD. A rough number, but I'm sure it's even worse (i.e. more money involved) nowadays.

"Angel Heart" is another old, yet not as old as "The Sting", film I got. This one's very different, though, and deals with voodoo and New Orleans. Speaking of New Orleans and the recent storm that's shown us that 1) the USA cannot handle catastrophies even when they happen on their home turf (probably due to the government having shipped all of their military efforts internationally as they want to act World Police), 2) things would probably have gone a lot smoother and quicker had it happened to a state where most of the inhabitants are white and 3) it's good to see people care more about cats getting rescued rather than people. So oh yeah, the film. I don't quite share the massive amount of love a lot of people (mainly men, actually) have for Mickey Rourke, but as it involves a lot of mystique, it's got Robert De Niro in it (for a short while) and is directed by Alan Parker, I'm all in. The kicker is voodoo, of course. I'm prejudiced around that, of course, but I do love serpents, people chanting and going into fits, plus witchcraft. No, I know what you're thinking, and it does not mean I would vote republican if I lived in the USA.

I got myself "Der Untergang" which is a dramatisation of the last days of World War 2, almost entirely taking place at Hitler's bunker, where he committed suicide (if he did). As I've read a lot of how good Bruno Ganz, who plays Hitler in this film, acted, it all made me very weary and suspicious of how good he really would turn out to be, but I remember feeling in awe after I saw the film. He's not the only great actor, though; there's not a single bad player in this film, and it's beautifully made, without all that Spielbergish sloppy sappiness that made "Schindler's List" less of a film than it could have been.

Wim Wenders' "Paris, Texas" is another film I got, the same time as I got hold of Antonioni's "Blow-Up". I have seen neither of these films, but people with some sort of taste seem to like them, so they'll be interesting to see. I guess "Blow-Up" has quite a few things in common with "Peeping Tom", even though it seems, from its synopsis, to be more of a Dario Argento-film.

Thanks to this article (in Swedish) in DN today, I got word of Ang Lee's new film, "Brokeback Mountain", which is a homoerotic film with American cowboys. Well, as if all cowboy-flicks aren't quite homoerotic in their ways, this film looks to be something else. Jake Gyllenhaal (probably most famous for playing the lead role in "Donnie Darko") acts in it, and he's also going to be in David Fincher's "Zodiac", which I've ranted about before. Back to the story-board again: Ang Lee is a very exciting director, in terms that I think he's made some of the most interesting films to show relationships on film, since Ingmar Bergman. I mean, "The Ice Storm". Whoo! "Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon". Wee! Even "The Hulk" turned fairly interesting, in my eyes, partially because of a fresh cast but mostly because of the drama in it all, how The Hulk came to be, and most importantly, the childhood.

Speaking of children, "Zozo" premiered in Sweden a couple of days ago. This is the latest film by Josef Fares, who sprung into the Swedish consciousness with "Jalla! Jalla!", a film about everyday people living in Sweden. Even though that description is lofty, it's the best I can say except that Fares is the most exciting Swedish director next to Lukas Moodysson. Anyway, back to basics: Zozo is a ten-year-old boy who is living in Beirut when the civil war erupts. He escapes to Sweden and immediately gets hit with a completely different environment and a school-system where teachers don't seem to care about what happens in the school-yard in the totalitarian way Zozo experienced before. Judging from some of the verdicts, the film is a very good, quasi-biographical story that should push Fares further. Go, go, go!