How to make a cool flick--baby, it ain't hard, just rare

Rating: 8/10 (7 September 2012)

Yeah, Justin TImberlake can do it. He's talented and probably can do any of the related star turns in his general gestalt. Add him to a quality production where the writing takes a lesson from the cable model of writer-produced shows and it's a simple result—a movie worth watching, worth giving to. Not too many of these in cinema these days. The writer's touch is all over this with witty dialogue. Youth-market stuff is kept succinct and doesn't pander (too much). Craig Armstrong does good music, although not as good as his regular stuff. Really good electronic music is sooo powerful in film but rarely used. "In The Valley of Elah" is a good example with Mark Isham doing original stuff.
Andrew Niccol is the man here. I don't follow all the filmography (or discography), but as soon as I heard he wrote "The Truman Show" I (had to use IMDb... As Niccol is quoted Hollywood is reluctantly getting some real talent from abroad, esp the UK/empire. His earlier "Lord of War" was excellent, as was "Gattaca".
Enough can't be said of "The Truman Show". Masterpiece. As a metaphysician, this film plays with "the only new show in town". And gets it really right, not just partially like many Hollywood rewrittens. I guess they left his script alone or mostly.
"In TIme" is nothing like Truman, but shows how 'easy' it can be to write intelligently (and film the f'er). A handy analog of today's Occupy/Leftist story done really well. A good stock of UKish actors (how many of these Western pretties have they got over there eating bad cooking and staying thin? This is another invasion we need in Ad-America. He started in non- American commercials like the Scott bros (excuse all my ignorance where it shows, I have no resume for the "New Yorker" et al).
Several good leftist (truth) points made as the conceit plays out. Could actually be a great one season TV series if we traced the origin of the genetic plot and the cabal behind it, etc. Cillian Murphy and whoever played the head of the 'Minutemen' stand out.
This Niccol cat (New Zealand) reminds me of Christopher and Jonathan Nolan—INTELLIGENT. How'd they get into LA w/o being mediocre? Is a 'revolution' of some sort going on? btw, there's no end to what smarts can do with audio/video—guess how many genius scripts (as Mort Sahl once said) are in drawers in LA?