4-movie Easter weekend

Try lending a DVD from Blockbuster in the US: You need to produce your US drivers license and a credit card even before you can look at the DVDs on the racks! And the late fees can kill, that you end up buying those DVDs. Netflix was a blessing, for the late fee part.

Now, I am here in Munich (in Germany, not the ones in US) and visited a DVD lending store near my hotel. In 10 minutes, I walked out with 4 DVDs (just 2 EUR rent each) with no deposit at all! It was a refreshing change from the ID and plastic driven contracts of the US.

So, here are the movies I watched over the Easter weekend:

Adapatation
Dir: Spike Jonze
Written by: Charlie Kaufman

The expansion of GNU (of the open-source league) is "GNU's Not Unix". This recursive stuff fascinated me, then. Like the Ouroboros. Snake thats eating its own tail. And Charlie Kaufman is one who makes a living out of this! Remember how John Malkovich enters his own portal in Being John Malkovich.
I picked this movie from the DVD rental store as I wanted to watch something I had not heard much about - about the plot or even knowing whether it was a hit or not or what the critics think about it. The only thing I knew about this movie was the director Spike Jonze and later the opening credits showed that the script was written by Charlie Kaufman (of Being John Malkovich).
The movie starts off from the sets of the movie Being John Malkowich showing real life characters (Malkovich, John Cusack etc.) and Kaufman himself (played by Nicholas Cage), who is the narrator and protagonist. Its a mix of real life characters and fiction and the movie is about making of the movie itslef - a bit complex to write this down:)
Its innovative, engrossing and refreshing. And its about flowers too.

Sideways
Dir: Alexander Payne

Thanks Aj again, for reccomending this! :)
It is interesting that the friends in this movie (Miles-Jack) and in The Big Lebowski (Dude-Walter) are so different in their behaviour and interests (except for one - bowling and golf!), they even hate each other for most of the things the other guy does, still they are buddies and always together.
Maybe I should buy a DVD.

Melinda and Melinda
Written and Directed by Woody Allen

Decided to check out a 00's movie of Woody Allen. This is much on the beaten track on how the plot can be made into a comedy or a tragedy, with both the stories running in parallel. Allen manages to keep us alert and entertained through out. The whole movie is about affairs, breakups and all kind of relationships and this would have looked like a TV soap, if it had been made by a lesser film maker. Allens gets the right characters, dialogue and the right music in!

Eternal sunshine of the spotless mind
Dir: Michel Gondry
Written by: Charlie Kaufman

Another Charlie Kaufman movie for the weekend. So, you all know what this movie is about. One good thing about this movie is that there are no technical eplanantions or jargons thrown out like other sci-fi movies. And this is no sci-fi movie either. Its a bit complex like Memento (the sequence), and I am not really into these kind of movies, but I enjoyed watching this.