I love ya Netflix.

I signed up for Netflix a week ago and have been on a movie kick ever since. Some short reviews:

• 'Violent Cop'
  
  I'm a big fan of Takeshi Kitano (aka Beat Takeshi), the Clint Eastwood/Lee Marvin of Japan. Known for his laconic tough guys from both sides of the law (cops and yakuza), 'Violent Cop' is his directorial debut. It showcases the Takeshi style: long, quiet takes, doses of absurd and silly humor, Japanese fatalism, and flashes of jarring violence. Not his best work (see 'Fireworks' and 'Sonatine'), but worth checking out.
  
  
• 'Chungking Express'
  
  It took me forever to finally see this movie. I'm ashamed that I didn't watch it sooner. A beautiful film about love and loneliness in a big city, Quentin Tarantino apparently cried through his first viewing. Not because it made him sad, but because he was "just so happy to love a movie this much." It's one of those rare films that successfully evokes emotion and mood through style and technique. Faye Wong just owns this movie.
  
  
• 'Memories of Murder'
  
  The film takes place in 1986, based on true events about South Korea's first serial killer. With so many criminal procedural shows on t.v. , most of us are familiar with modern forensic science. Well, these murders take place in a rural, backwoods town, where something like DNA testing is a distant luxury available only in the US. Clumsy and imprecise, the detectives rely instead on legwork, common sense, and beating the shit out of suspects. And for a flick about a serial rapist/murderer, there are a lot of laughs.
  This movie was a nice departure from the usual South Korean fare of silly romantic comedies, ridiculous melodrama, and hyper violence. Which leads us to...
  
  
• 'Sympathy for Mr. Vengeance'
  
  Park Chan-wook's first installment of his 'Vengeance' trilogy, 'Sympathy for Mr. Vengeance' is a stylish and disturbing examination into two related stories of revenge. Song Kang-ho, also the star of 'Memories of Murder,' gives another fine performance as a father driven by, um, vengeance. Revenge. Revengeance?
  As the installments are only related in theme and not story, I would recommend the excellent second film, 'Oldboy,' over this one. Park goes for broke, ramping up the operatic tragedy to excruciating, grisly heights. Just like I ramped up the pomposity in that last sentence.
  
  
• 'Croupier'
  
  A good modern noir film. Watching this movie, you can see why everybody pegged Clive Owen as the next Bond -- Cool, confident, smart, has his way with three women, handily wins a streetfight, loves vodka, and he wears a tux throughout most of it. Then you watch 'King Arthur,' and you suddenly don't understand at all.
  
  
• 'Serenity'
  
  A Joss Whedon feature length sci-fi flick born out of the cancelled Fox show 'Firefly'. Essentially a sci-fi western, 'Serenity' throws in an EPIC plot to stir things up -- Summer, a waify, mentally troubled psychic, knows a secret that'll bring down the monolithic Alliance. But can the crew of the Serenity evade the peerless, nameless Alliance assassin and the cannibalistic, subhuman Reavers? And can our reluctant hero, Captain Mal, keep his dysfunctional family of a crew together for the long haul? What's up with these stupid questions? Ah, just watch the damn movie. It's really good.
  
  
• 'Hustle & Flow'
  
  It was okay. Rags to almost riches story, kind of like the first 'Rocky'. Terrence Howard, who seems to be in everything these days, kicks ass though.
  
  
• 'The Constant Gardener'
  
  A love story disguised as a socio-political thriller. Or is it the other way around? I liked it, but was pretty annoyed with some early, manipulative story contrivances. Like 'Syriana,' it tries to shed light on Western profiteering at the expense of the Third World. Oil is replaced with medicine, which makes it all the more nefarious. After all, free or cheap medicine is supposed to be beneficial, right? But there's always a catch with charity. Rachel Weisz is vibrant, as usual.