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Mammoth

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Mammoth (2009)

January. 23,2009
|
6.8
|
NR
| Drama Romance
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While on a trip to Thailand, a successful American businessman tries to radically change his life. Back in New York, his wife and daughter find their relationship with their live-in Filipino maid changing around them. At the same time, in the Philippines, the maid's family struggles to deal with her absence.

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ThrillMessage
2009/01/23

There are better movies of two hours length. I loved the actress'performance.

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Invaderbank
2009/01/24

The film creates a perfect balance between action and depth of basic needs, in the midst of an infertile atmosphere.

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Lollivan
2009/01/25

It's the kind of movie you'll want to see a second time with someone who hasn't seen it yet, to remember what it was like to watch it for the first time.

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Deanna
2009/01/26

There are moments in this movie where the great movie it could've been peek out... They're fleeting, here, but they're worth savoring, and they happen often enough to make it worth your while.

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tremendox
2009/01/27

Mammoth it's a smooth synopsis of the contrast between the societies that nowadays live on the same planet. On the movie we can see the life of two families from different levels: the life of and American rich family and the life of its maid, a thai family. The maid is an emigrant from Thailand that moved to US looking for cash to maintain her family. Despite the movie has a some criticism, it is extremely smooth compared with how much it can be. It's not a documentary, OK, but if you want to be criticize the differences between societies and make a drama, be truth and faith to the real world. Otherwise, the only thing you do is show the people the tip of the iceberg and they spectators continue being unworried about the problems. But the movie, instead of being focused on the society differences, it is more focus on one of the things that most really matters: the family. The movie is also critique with the people nowadays, they spend more time in their jobs working than with the family. , but when feeling bad or when need somebody, they feel alone, they need to share their sadness the only thing they have is the family, but it it's the last place they go to.

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OJT
2009/01/28

I've seen thousands of movies (literary!), and I have no troubles with watching movies which are different. What troubles me are boring movies. A film can be about everything without being boring. Even everyday life and work. But a film about everyday life needs a plot or a point to it. I guess this film is about world wide connections, and about the world and making money to fulfill people's dreams. In a sick world. And it's A film with lots of use of mobile phones. More or less pointless. Maybe there's a connection I don't get here. I'm used to look out for details in film, proving to be important pieces of the film puzzle later on in the movie. Here there's much pointless things happening that it ruins the experience. The important thing here appends in the last half hour, and they are made almost unimportant. I find that almost provoking to both the viewer and to the actors doing their best in this.Still, I have to say I'm not that sure about the theme. Did I understand it? Because I feel more and more empty while watching this. The opposite of what I expected, and it annoys me. And it is getting worse and worse. The script might be confusing, or just uninteresting. I didn't want to watch a film witch could have been my own working day or holiday. I really don't buy that these people are so bored.This is absolutely a great idea, but it's not well made. The cutting rhythm is so annoying, that it seems unprofessional. The tedious focusing of the camera is a Moodyson trade marque, and it functions well in a couple of his movies, but here it's not that suitable.I've enjoyed some of Moodysons earlier films, but I found this very unfulfilled. Some of his work has been both good and important. But this is far off. The cutting is annoying, and so is the actors, and the music. Not a good way to start, but the worst is that the film music promises something exciting, which really never happens. The aim characters are living quite interesting lives, but we almost are bored with they're every day life.Mammoth is a film which should be buried in the ice like the Mammoths. Hope Moodysons gets well soon!

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choden
2009/01/29

There are many aspects that make this film special starting from the its use of clichés and the extent it destroys the popular images of this millennium. One significant and courageous point is the way it tears down the adorable Internet geek image. Recently, Hollywood has produced a great number of youngsters, a generation of movie goers who want to become a Mark Zuckerberg or Steve Jobs one day. Nonetheless, the other side of the coin is not that bright or desirable. Mammoth introduces Leo Vidales, the millionaire geek with all his immaturity and weakness, with his ultra shallow personality and his conscience per diem. Globalization rapes the world, devastates the life of the nanny, and enables a heartless brat like Vidales a millionaire live his life with a descent surgeon wife and a pretty kid. Actually, he is a kind of rapist when he talks about doing charity, when he talks about his fantasies of going to India or Africa with Cookie, when he wants to act like a free - souled hippie who he could never be. He rapes other people's dreams and innocent public images. However, after 2 hours we see him at his Manhattan home, safe and sound, enjoying the peace he himself never deserved.Mammoth of Lukas Moodysson runs for the cold truth. Except one detail, Salvador would have known. He would have known what could happen to kids when they talked to white foreigners out there. Every Filipino kid know without their grandmas telling. They watch the news on TV, they read the papers, and yes they have friends with sad and scary stories. Moodysson skipped this fact. Maybe despite all his good efforts, he is still too white for the realities of East Asia.

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random_avenger
2009/01/30

After the crass but bold anti-pornography pamphlet A Hole in My Heart, Swedish director Lukas Moodysson continued his career with the black and white "silent movie with sound" Container, which sounds interesting although I haven't seen it yet. His latest film Mammoth is a return to narrative story lines and more conventional techniques, and a pretty good portrayal of modern loneliness and the nature of family relationships.The plot deals with the Vidaleses, a wealthy family of three living in New York City. Leo (Gael García Bernal), the father of the family and a creator of a successful gaming website, has to fly to Thailand to sign a contract, while his wife Ellen (Michelle Williams) and their daughter Jackie (Sophie Nyweide) stay at home. Ellen is an emergency surgeon often working long hours, leaving Jackie to spend a lot of time with the family's Filipino nanny Gloria (Marife Necesito) who she has grown very close to. Subsequently all of the characters experience different kinds of loneliness in the absence of their loved ones and have to find ways to cope with their feelings over the course of the film.The title of the film refers to an expensive pen made from mammoth ivory that Leo receives from his business partner as a gift. Later on the pen comes to symbolize the flaunting lifestyle Leo wants to distance himself from, and economic inequality in general is one of the themes examined in the form of the Gloria character: she is working hard in America to provide decent life for her children in the Philippines, even if the separation from them is tearing her apart. Leo and Ellen may be oblivious to her feelings, but they are not free of worries either, even if the nature of their anxiety is vaguer and often seen as less understandable by the common public. The characters' inner similarities are also exemplified by the adoption of a "surrogate child" for every character: Gloria is affectionate towards Jackie, while Ellen becomes particularly caring about one of her young patients in the hospital and Leo wants to help out a Thai prostitute named Cookie (Natthamonkarn Srinikornchot).Moodysson is clearly criticizing the effects of globalization on poor families' means of making money and Mammoth is not devoid rather emotional scenes, but luckily the director favours a much subtler way of presenting his message than in, say, his prostitution-themed depressor Lilya 4-Ever (2002). A lot of the time the characters' states of mind are brought forward by haunting pop songs or shots of people looking out of windows by themselves, a style not unlike that of Sofia Coppola's masterful Lost in Translation (2003). Using or referencing many modern communication technologies like cell phones, Skype or MySpace further emphasizes the increasing relevance of the sense of alienation in life, an important theme that has been touched by numerous films and works of fiction.Even though the main idea behind the film doesn't provide major surprises, and neither does the story or the ending, the film is well made and enjoyable to watch as a functional sum of its parts. The nice Thai scenery and New York's urban landscapes look great and all the actors succeed in their parts, especially García Bernal as the pseudo-youthful Leo and the always good Michelle Williams as the stressed Ellen, but Marife Necesito also get through her diverse role without giving reasons to complain. Child actress Sophie Nyweide delivers a delightfully seamless performance as too. Since the music and cinematography have been skilfully created as well, Mammoth can safely be called one of the better films of recent years and recommended also to wider audiences who may not have appreciated Moodysson's previous two films as much.

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