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This Drummond entry is lacking in continuity. Most of them have their elements of silliness, the postponed wedding, and so on. However, this has an endless series of events occurring in near darkness as the characters run from one place to another. The house seems more like a city. There's also Leo G. Carrol who is such an obvious suspect who no-one seems to even look at. He is a stranger and acts rather suspicious, but Drummond and the folks don't seem to pick up on anything. Still, it as reasonably good action and a pretty good ending.<br /><br />I know that Algie is supposed to be a comic figure, but like Nigel Bruce in the Rathbone Sherlock Holmes flicks, he is so buffoonish that it's hard to imagine anyone with taste or intelligence being around him. Is there a history behind him that will explain how he and Drummond became associates?
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A woman borough a boy to this world and was alone. They both were alone because a boy had a gift and a curse in one package - he was capable of withdrawing sword from his arm. There was always a wound on his wrist in the cause of this "gift" - the wound of the deadliest weapon inside of his body. First he kills his constantly drunk stepfather who hurts his mom every time. Then he grows up and decides to find his real father. Just as simple as all the time for a superhero - he reaches the justice....but the society decides this justice is not necessary and dangerous which is indeed right 'cause it is not like in Hollywood movies that the character does not try to kill anyone - Sasha (he is the main hero acted by Artem Tkachenko) kills if the person who in his opinion deserves to die but gets blames from authorities and runs. In such a runaway from authorities and Mafia he meets a girl (acted by Chulpan Hamatova) and falls in love with her. Everything else is to be watched...not told. Be aware that this film is more about feelings and emotions but not about actions. This film is full of pain of the main character full of him and his vision of life.
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I got subjected to this pile one Wednesday afternoon when my mother-in-law was watching it. I can't get over someone basically doing a remake of a crappy high budget Hollywood flop ("the CORE" with washed up actors like Luke Perry). If the HIGH budget one flopped, what makes people think doing the SAME movie 2 years later with NO budget would go anywhere? I was laughing through most of the movie because of how insanely similar it was (in fact I am shocked it's not held up in Legal rather than airing on TV), and how it was basically the script of the CORE just redone badly, which if you have seen "the Core", you know why doing it worse is funny, since the CORE was ALREADY so bad it was funny.<br /><br />If you enjoy getting a laugh out of REALLY bad movies, this one will be right up your alley. The only thing I can say, is that I wish Luke Perry was able to have a career, because he isn't a horrible actor.. he just lands horrible roles. Crappy made for TV movies that will only run on daytime television is pretty much one step closer to the end for him, if it wasn't for 90210 he would have a career.
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I know everyone said this movie was utter crap and I agree with them. I spent a few years after seeing it telling other people it was crap. I recommended they not see it. But when it came on TV, we saw the ad. I turned to family and said: "I know this is sad, but I'm thinking of watching it". My sister turned to me and said: "Yeah, me too." And you know what? It was funny.<br /><br />By no means is this a good movie. It's absolutely a waste of time. But it's a good waste of time. You may still think it's crap and fair enough, but I thought it was a really funny slapstick comedy. I didn't like a couple of bits, like when the fish got hit by the car, but apart from that I thought it was good. I loved sitting there and picking out all the famous Australian faces: Flacco, Elle McFeast, Garry McDonald etc.<br /><br />So, if you like to waste your time, watch this movie. Otherwise, see a drama or something.
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...instead, watch it as a great coming of age tale about African American males in the mid 1960's in the ghettos of Chicago. For all of you out there under the age of 50, "What's Happening" was a light-hearted rather quirky sitcom with very few serious moments that lasted four years (1975-1979) concerning a group of young African American high school kids living in a working class neighborhood. I liked it a great deal - it just has no real connection to this film. "Cooley High" started out as being the basis for "What's Happening", but its serious nature did not register well with test audiences, so it was redone as a comedy, even though the credits on "What's Happening" still read that it was based on this movie.<br /><br />This film starts out light, but touches many aspects of life unique to the turbulent 1960's and also some other aspects of growing up that are timeless. The guys deal with sex, betrayal, joblessness, hopelessness, and even early death. The ending is quite powerful and serious, and the film has a great Motown soundtrack. Highly recommended. Unfortunately, this film is not new enough to be played on premium cable channels and not considered old enough to be considered a classic movie and played in the few venues for those films either.
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In my opinion, this movie's title should be changed from "Only the Brave" to "All About Lane". I went to a screening of this film a few months ago and was quite disappointed with the outcome. Although, I appreciate that the director made a movie about the men of 442nd - a subject matter that long deserved addressing in the film industry - the acting in some parts of film was quite stale. The performances of Marc Dacascos, Tamlyn Tomita, and Jason Scott Lee were all great. However, the director should have NEVER put himself as the main character in the movie. Sorry Lane, you are just not a film actor. Stick to what you're good at - theater acting. Gina Hiraizumi's performance in this film was also horrible. She should never have been given a speaking role and her looks were unfit to play the part of a Miss Nisei queen. There were other young actresses in the film who were naturally beautiful and whose performances were wonderful... Why weren't they cast for that role? Another major problem with this film were its action sequences. The Japanese-American soldiers don't look like they were fighting German soldiers... let alone anyone. Granted this was a low budget feature, but since this was a war-based film, isn't it important to show some actually fighting? This film was a worthy attempt, but definitely not worth a major distribution.
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Obviously the previous reviewers here are not fans of this genre, but I think this one is done quite well.<br /><br />It's twistedly cute clever & dark. This story brought back memories of the types of girls I was in love with as a child.<br /><br />Also, it makes me want to check out some of Nadia's other movies, many youtube comments about how hot she is in this video. <br /><br />Sure there is some Burton influence here, but I wouldn't say this Brad is trying to rip him off.<br /><br />He is just jumping in & adding his talents to a genre that I can appreciate. I like what he does & he does it well, nuff said!
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While Disney have been THE animation studio for the past 70 years, there have always been rivals to their supremacy. When this review was written in 2009, for example, companies like Dreamworks and (to a lesser extent) Warner Brothers and Ardman, were bringing out animated movies that could be said to challenge the Disney dominance. Back in the beginning, in that late '30s and early '40s heyday when Disney was serving cinematic banquets like Snow White, Dumbo and Fantasia, the competition was provided by brothers Dave and Max Fleischer. Despite releasing two very commendable films, they never quite cornered the market many attribute their downfall to the commercial failure of Mr Bug Goes To Town, released the same week as the attack on Pearl Harbour (which gave the American public something more significant to think about than going to the cinema to watch a cartoon!) That this film has faded into relative obscurity is a travesty.<br /><br />In a patch of overgrown garden in the city a bunch of bugs are in dire danger. Humans use the land as a shortcut, discarding litter and cigars, and other hazards, right on top of the bugs' homes as they go. Honey-shop owner Mr Bumble (voiced by Jack Mercer) fears that the future is bleak, and wonders how he will ever be able to raise his daughter Honey (voiced by Pauline Loth) in more secure surroundings. A highly unscrupulous creature, Bagley C. Beetle (voiced by Tedd Pierce), offers to provide her a safer place to live if she will accept his hand in marriage, but Honey is much more interested in her childhood sweetheart, the perennially cheerful and optimistic Hoppity (voiced by Stan Freed). Hoppity believes that everything is about to be resolved for the better, but is left looking foolish when Bagley Beetle and his pair of comical sidekicks manipulate the crisis to their own devious end. Only at the very end, as their patch becomes the foundation for a huge new skyscraper, do the bugs switch loyalty back to Hoppity as they look to him to lead them a new, safe home away from the destructive influence of humans.<br /><br />What really works in this film is the delightful characterisation all the bugs are cleverly developed and designed for maximum audience appeal. The bumbling villains Swat the fly and Smack the mosquito (hilarious names, if you stop to think about it) are particularly memorable. Equally admirable is the storytelling drive even the youngest of children can enjoy this story, while at the same time it skillfully conveys a message for older audiences about the way human carelessness can impact upon the survival of wildlife. Time has inevitably dated some aspects of the film, and when viewing it the audience needs to accept (and forgive) these occasional signs of general age and wear. But on the whole Mr Bug Goes To Town is an accomplished, funny and very slickly presented animation with a worthy message to boot.
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I was very pleased to go and see a "Milanese" film shot in Milan. Alessandro Alatri is a Roman director who has understood properly and fortunately printed in a film the Milanese philosophy.<br /><br />Film tells the story of a standard -in career- Milanese couple, starting from "the birth" to the death. The birth-wedding is so typical out of any scheme that becomes original and involves all the wedding guests in a flash back story of how the couple came to each other and felt in love. Life is hard in the "urbe" of Milan and after the sweeties old days became tougher and tougher, then finally the product: a child, who instead of strengthen further the couple relationship it weaken because "the selfish effect" typical of a nowadays "metropolis" personality. The advertising environment with all the "creative" under stress atmosphere helps to get well involved in the plot. We are losing the life values and this is well and deeply reflected in this nice and sharp movie from the Senza Pelle's director.<br /><br />The actors are well chosen, Stefania Rocca nice and well characterised, and a positive surprise, an unexpected good Fabio Volo, well known by the "trash" TV serie: Le Iene.<br /><br />Rating: 7/10
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In this film, made JUST as the production code was being enforced, Jean Harlow is Eadie, and Patsy Kelly is the wisecracking, man-chasing sidekick "Kitty". Girl from Missouri starts out with the girls getting on a train, with Eadie making a promise to herself to earn money while looking for a millionaire husband, staying whole-some in the process. It doesn't take her long to meet up with Frank Cousins, (Lewis Stone, was the kindly Doctor in Grand Hotel, as well as Judge Hardy in the "Andy Hardy" films.), but all is not as it seems...The censors must have LOVED Harlow's line "A girl couldn't accept an expensive gift like that from a gentleman unless she was engaged." Later, someone says "You know we've never been alone together" and Eadie replies "Yeah, and we're not going to be!" Lionel Barrymore is T.R. Paige, another rich, uppercrust who comes to her rescue when trouble comes looking for Eadie. At one point, Paige declares "You oughta scratch me off your list - I'm not a ladies man".... I wonder what that line would have been just a couple years earlier before the Hayes code came rolling into town. What was he really saying? Carol Tevis seems to be the high-pitched "Baby Talker" as listed in the credits on IMDb. Looks like she was only in showbiz from 1931 - 1939, with "Munchkin" in Wizard of Oz being the last part she played. Fun, cleancut romp as the girls chase men around the country. Look for Nat Pendleton as the lifeguard, who was an Olympic Wrestler 1920 (silver medal winner) turned film star (he was in many of the Dr. Kildares, and would appear in four of Harlow's films.) Mistaken identity, plot twists, a young Franchot Tone, love stories, even Jean Harlow in a bathing suit in "Palm Beach", although the outdoor scenes of downtown appear to be a backdrop.
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At first,this movie seems so bad that i almost fell in a trance the first time i saw it.It was like a bad dream.A cosmic bore.But i gave it a second chance,then another and another,etc...I finally got addicted to this film,due to it's dreamlike slow pace,wonderful natural sets,bathed in a mellow autumn light and especially the musical score,which is made of some 70's progressive rock and absolute exquisite folk songs by actor/singer/songwriter Derek Lamb(the Troubadour).You should notice the song about hazel wood,silver trout and lady vanishing in the air...,heard in the middle and near the end of the film.There are some carnal scenes in the beginning ,wich allow us to appreciate the natural charms of Elizabeth Suzuki.If that movie had been made by some "repertoire" directors like Bergman,Lars Von Triers or Jean-Luc Goddard,critics would have rolled on the floor,raving about that movie as if it were a cosmic masterpiece.I personally think this film is one million times superior to any of Fellini's cinematic sh#¤@t!Definitely not for the pretentious.
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My mom brought me this movie on a DVD. A guy in a rental recommended it. But in fact, this might be the worst movie I've ever seen. You know, I didn't expect much from this film, but it didn't have a good story, it wasn't even funny and it was senseless. I was looking forward to see Christine Lakin in this movie because I loved Step by step. Even she was a huge disappointment. The story was completely unreal. One of the party guys is dead (he wasn't dead in fact, he woke up later), the house looks like there exploded a bomb and there are 2 guys who have 3 hours to handle everything. But then there comes a homosexual, policeman... There is a total mess till the end and the guys managed to tide up and everything in like 15 minutes??? Come on, just be realistic at least. Waste of money. Really...
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The photography is accomplished, the acting is quite good, but in virtually every other department The Greek Tycoon is a dreary bore. Taking its inspiration from the real-life love affair of Jackie Kennedy and Aristotle Onassis, the film is a glossy but absolutely empty soap opera of the kind that can be found on TV all day long. Viewers who embrace the whole "celebrity magazine culture" (paparazzi photographs and gossipy stories about the rich and famous) will undoubtedly find much to whet their appetite here. But those who prefer films with a bit more substance and craft and quirkiness will find the 107 minute running time a butt-numbing slog.<br /><br />American president James Cassidy (James Franciscus) and his beautiful wife Liz (Jacqueline Bisset) are in Greece on official business. A ridiculously wealthy Greek shipping tycoon, Theo Tomasis (Anthony Quinn), catches sight of Liz at a party at his elegant manor. Despite the fact that both of them are married to someone else, there is an immediate attraction between them. Later, at a private party aboard his yacht, Tomasis makes his desires known to Liz. Some while later, President Cassidy is assassinated whilst out strolling on a beach. Liz is shocked and saddened by his death, but it isn't long before she seeks comfort in the arms of her Greek lover Tomasis. Eventually the two of them are married and their love affair becomes a favourite talking point for the world's newspapers, magazines, photographers and wags.<br /><br />It is somewhat amusing to note the vigour with which the producers of this film denied that it was a dramatisation of the Kennedy-Onassis story. They wanted the film to be seen as an original story, rooted in fiction. But anyone with a brain can see from where the movie is drawing its inspiration. Even Aristotle Onassis himself knew The Greek Tycoon amounted to his love-life getting the Hollywood treatment (if rumours are to be believed, he actually had a hand in approving Anthony Quinn for the Tomasis role!) J. Lee-Thompson isn't really the right sort of director for this type of movie he's better suited to action fodder like The Guns Of Navarone and Ice Cold In Alex but he marshals the proceedings with an uninspired, professional adequacy. Quinn is very watchable as Tomasis; Bisset looks lovely as the object of his desires; Franciscus uses his toothy smile and a façade of integrity to make for a believable politician. Their performances are good on the surface, but there's little for the actors to do on any deeper level. Similarly, Tony Richmond's photography gives the film an elegant surface sheen as it moves from one exotic locale to the next, but the merest of scratches proves that there's nothing behind the film's glossy exterior.
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"Dick Tracy" is one of our family's favorites -- the actors are great -- the art direction is exceptional -- the music is magic. It's not supposed to be "To Kill A Mockingbird" -- it's a fun experience.<br /><br />Stephen Sondhemim's songs are stellar: "Back in Business" is energetic, "Sooner or Later" is just right, "What Can You Lose" is haunting -- even tunes like "Live Alone and Like It" add to the story<br /><br />Got to love the giddily over-the-top performances of Al Pacino, Dustin Hoffman, Glenn Headly, Charlie Korsmo, Mandy Patinkin, James Caan, Dick Van Dyke, supporting villains... The list is far too long. And, yes -- even Madonna and Warren Beatty are awesome. Written with a smile a minute (how many times have we looked at each other and said, "Wait a minute -- I'm having a thought -- it's gone!"?).<br /><br />However, one of most telling things about in this film is that everyone involved seems to be having a good time -- and that above all adds to the enjoyment for the viewer. So, if you haven't already, why not give "Dick Tracy" a chance -- accept it for what it is -- a Sunday comic strip brought to life -- and in a wonderful way!!
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I was not really a big fan of Star Trek until past 2-3 years. Thanks to the advent of Netflix and post 2000 video technology distribution, I am able to embark into the past of all the great Star Trek episodes. For those that don't really watch every single episode and know them by heart, through TNG, DS9, Voyager, etc., general popular consensus will say -- "I like The Next Generation" the best. That's because Captain Picard and his crew were fresh when they first appeared after decades of Star Trek starvation. But to be quiet honest, I appreciate the creativity of Voyager's episodes more than TNG. Voyager's episodes also progresses through time unlike TNG. Granted Data from TNG is great but it eventually gets old but Voyager's doctor -- now that's creativity! Instead of making artificial intelligence awkward and jerky, give him the freedom to express beyond anything you imagined. Not only is Picardo such a great actor but the premise setting for his expansive, self growth, as a doctor, self realization now that is science fiction at its best! Endgame portray him as a husband married to an "organic", inventing neuro-implant transceiver for human-machine interface, and even -- in the episode before Endgame, to disobey Captain's order and make "human" mistakes. Unlike DS9 which are blessed with 2 beautiful women right from 1st episode, Voyager has to survive 3 seasons without Jeri Ryan and I believe it is Picardo that carried them with his personality. Of course the rest of the Voyager's cast chemistry just flows effortless, Harry Kim and Tom Paris -- very natural. I love Tuvoc occasional humor, despite being a Vulcan. Finally, I'm so glad they got rid of that original female captain -- oh, if you get to watch the rare footage -- thank God for Kate! She has developed through the 7 years into an extremely confident, believable, and respectable female captain. What a GREAT job! Thank you Star Trek for making Voyager, I enjoy every episode, the creative exploration of possibilities, of morals, and of our Cosmic expanse.
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In all truth, this really isn't a "movie" so much as an extended final episode; by this I mean that, had you NOT followed the TV series (Homicide: Life On The Street) I suspect that you would have a hard time following this made-for-tv movie. Having said that, "Homicide: The Movie" is still a great watch. I think it says a lot about a television production that EVERY single cast member would return, many after years of absence, to once again portray their characters and bring closure to an incredible program. The movie brings out that sense of "family", not only amongst the characters, but amongst the actors, as well. It's all very bitter-sweet knowing that this will be the LAST time we will see them all together again under the title of HOMICIDE. Story-wise, I found this film somewhat lacking. Giardello's mayoral candidacy seems particularly contrived, and I felt his shooting could've been dealt with within the parameters of his regular position, as Leiutenant. Also, Det. Bayliss's extreme plot twist, which was left hanging at series end, is finally resolved, but I, for one, NEVER felt that it needed to be; I enjoyed being left with a mystery (let us recall that the very first episode's first case also went unsolved for the entire series run!). As a DEVOTED fan of the TV series I can love this movie, and the fact that it even got made after H:LOTS had been canceled, but I would not recommend it to anyone who hasn't had the slightest exposure to the series. Now, if they'd just release it on DVD...
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OK, I didn't have high expectations but this film descending into depths I could not imagine.<br /><br />The plot, as it were, involved a priest of an obscure 2 member order investigating the death of the founder of the order by a Sin Eater. The Sin Eater allows for Catholics to achive salvation outside the authority of the Church and is yet another immortal in film with loads of ennui. Nevermind that this makes no sense since then a Baptist could give you salvation....we'll move on.<br /><br />I'll layout the plot w/o giving much away: the priest goes to Rome with his buddy to investogate. He brings with him a mental patient (I'm not making this up) who shot him during an excorism and who loves him (not one lick of this BTW is explained), a drunk Irish priest and Peter Weller as a Cardinal. They get to Rome, find some creepy kids who do nothing in the film, meet with a bondage gear S&M anti-pope that the drunk Irish guy knows (not explained) and who gives information by killing people (oh, BTW, he's a bad guy so he has an industrial/techno soundtrack) and then...umm, seriously, I'm not sure. the plot meanders about. Heath chills with the Sin Eater, flies to New York with the Sin Eater for an overnighter and then some other stuff happens and then (all off camera) the anti-pope falls and the film ends.<br /><br />About 1 hour into the film one really wonder if anything has happened. By the end something has happened but you can't be at all certain that it matters and since most of the drama takes place either before the movei or off-scren you're really feeling cheated.
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My wife and I rented this movie because some people had drawn parallels between it and "Office Space". Blockbuster and IMDB even had it as an "also recommended" selection if you liked "Office Space".<br /><br />Now, I've seen Office Space probably 15 or 20 times. I love it. It's probably one of my 10 favorite movies. Witty, humorous, and featuring characters that remind me of people I've worked with over the years. "Haiku Tunnel" is similar to "office Space" in that they are both films. That's where the similarity ends. We sat through probably the first 50 minutes of HT, giving it the benefit of the doubt, hoping, nay, *praying* that it would get better. It didn't. We couldn't take it any more, and stopped the tape. Thank GOD it was a free rental. I'd have been p***ed if we'd actually paid for it. We should be reimbursed for having to sit through it. Now, since we didn't see the end, perhaps it miraculously comes together and redeems itself. I doubt it.<br /><br />Haiku Tunnel is so bad it's hard to believe it ever got produced. The movie is SO unfunny it's painful. Just mail the friggin letters already!!! The premise is asinine. The jokes are awful. We got as far as the "printer doesn't work" scene and had to stop. We couldn't take it anymore. This film is an EMBARRASMENT for Josh Kornbluth.<br /><br />If you are a fan of Office Space......don't waste your time with this turd. 0/10
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In 1993, "the visitors" was an enormous hit in France. So, the sequence was inevitable and unfortunately, this sequence ranks among the worst ones ever made. <br /><br />This is a movie that doesn't keep its promises. Indeed, it's supposed to tell a sole story. Jean Reno must go in the twentieth century and take Christian Clavier back in the Middle Ages so that time can normally follow its course. The problem is that Clavier feels completely at ease in the world of the twentieth century, and so make him get back in the Middles Ages is rather hard... Instead of this, the movie goes on several other stories without succeeding in following the main plot. As a consequence, the movie becomes sometimes muddle-headed, sometimes a bit of a mess.<br /><br />But the movie also suffers from the performance of nearly all the actors. Reno and Clavier fall into the trap that however they could avoid in the first movie: they're going over the top and become annoying. Then, why did Jean-Marie Poiré the film-maker engage Muriel Robin in the female main role? He made a mistake because she seems ill-at-ease and is absolutely pitiful. The other actors aren't better: Marie-Anne Chazel is nonexistent and Christian Bujeau, unbearable.<br /><br /> Of course, the movie contains a few good moments with efficient gags but it often falls into vulgarity and easiness. Certain sequences and dialogs are affected. It also appears hollow because Poiré takes back elements that secured the success of the first movie. Thus, a young girl takes Reno for a close relative of her family and asks him to take part in her wedding.<br /><br />A labored and disappointing follow-up. Anyway, what's the interest of this movie otherwise commercial?<br /><br />
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I, also having endured hundreds of children's movies in the past, consider this to be one of the worst I have ever seen.<br /><br />1) I resent in this day and age having to explain to my children that Russia is not "the bad guys". Also, that mocking Russian names like "Poopchev" is inappropriate.<br /><br />2) The grandfather fly's birthday party scene contained a quasi-sexist joke in which he implied that males drink beer and women talk on the phone. Two other flies also needlessly use the word "crap" twice.<br /><br />3) The whole movie largely smacks of 1950's stereotypes and propaganda that I thought we, as a nation, were proud to have risen above.<br /><br />In all it's just crude, badly animated, even more badly written and not worth wasting the time to view.
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Certain filmmakers can do no wrong in the eyes of national critics, which is one reason you should never pay attention to them. This film is a perfect example. The critics like director Eric Rohmer.<br /><br />This movie is a boring soap opera about a woman and a teenager ("Pauline") she's taking care of for the summer, and the relationships they have with a few men. It's talk, talk, talk and more talk. <br /><br />For those looking at the cover and hoping to be titillated, there are a few quick nude shots and a couple of swear words but otherwise this is a harmless French morality play. A friend of mine loaned me this tape. He thought he was getting some sexy French film, and was disappointed. I was just as disappointed because it also was so boring. <br /><br />How this gets such great reviews is almost unfathomable.
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The primary aspect of this film which most people miss is that Luhzin lives his life as a chess game. So many people have seen this film and just don't get it, and I don't understand why. While watching this film I was taken on a private journey which floored me. I will try to explain this without any spoilers, but be forewarned, I do talk about things that happen in the movie.<br /><br />**** Possible Spoilers **** Be Forewarned!****<br /><br />His is a life of "large moves" versus "small moves". He chooses Natalia to be his Queen, and he and she behave as his Aunt first described the King and Queen and their moves when she introduced him to chess as a boy. Listen closely to that description.<br /><br />When someone asks him a question, he flashbacks to the past as if reviewing past moves. (The flashbacks are beautifully lit, by the way.) The flashbacks are quite interesting as well, for they give not only his point of view as a child, but the point of view of the other character as well. It's stunning.<br /><br />Various characters become either his helpers or his enemies, pawns, bishops and knights, their actions enlightening you as to who's side they are on. Even their placement in a scene is pivotal to understanding what is going on. Beautifully done.<br /><br />I will not comment more on what happens to the character of Luhzin, but I hope that this will illuminate what is actually happening at the end.<br /><br />This film is constantly working on many levels, which is why I endorse it. It was a treat and a joy to watch.<br /><br />If you like this film I would recommend a film called Fresh. The only way that these films are similar is the use of chess and the characters being treated as pieces.<br /><br />
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Absolutely nothing. The movies that are great in this world are not recognized unless they are filled with gunshots, explosions, and death. This movie is filled with a man talking about showing you a more complex character than has been seen in many movies.<br /><br />When a movie is incredibly fast paced but stays mostly in one location it has to be the work of a genius. Surprisingly enough, it is, this movie is directed by Oliver Stone and therefore is one of the best directed films of our time.<br /><br />This movie's screenplay was co-written by Oliver Stone and Eric Bogosian (Barry Champlain, main character.). With Oliver Stone's help, the screenplay was created as a seamless, rolling script which keeps you interested the entire time if you have any amount of intelligence. If you have an open mind about any subjects, and the wit to comprehend others, then this movie is something which you should find some way to watch, immediately.
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Beginning with the poster (featuring only Morgan Freeman and Kevin Spacey), the entire movie was a fraud. One stereotype after another, this movie was about nothing - or nothing new, at least. After 10-15 minutes, you realize that you've just paid to see Justin Timberlake and LL Cool J recite their way through another cop-flick.<br /><br />Basically, the story is about the corrupt system in some city, all secretly supported by the backbone business and in town, under the watchful eye of some hot-shot politician. The almighty and above-the-law organization is called FRAT and guess what? they've got a kick-ass loony cop shooting and beating at will - suspects, girlfriends, you name it. FRAT cops are corrupt and greedy, so they end up making mistakes that get discovered by a young and talented (!!!) journalist. One hour later, after a series of unbelievably bad-made shooting scenes and more stereotype lines, everything ends happily and we get served the final line : you can't beat the system. Bah! Don't see this waste of film roll. Freeman and Spacey barely have 10 min altogether!
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I've seen enough of both Little Richard in interviews and in performances and enough of poor Leon pigeonholed into these 50s/60s musical bio pics to know that Leon was not the right actor for this role. Leon was so right as David Ruffin in The Temptations, but fails utterly to capture the essence of Little Richard in this film. <br /><br />Actor Miguel Núñez who played Little Richard in "Why Do Fools Fall in Love?" was a much more suitable choice, having pulled off the musician's powerful but effeminate persona. <br /><br />If the performances are unconvincing then the film will be as well. And this is what has happened here. Glossed over or missed entirely are LR's forays into homosexuality and voyeurism. What "The Temptations" did so well in capturing the rise of the group, warts and all, this film misses by a wide mark.<br /><br />What is going on with director Robert Townsend who started off so well with "The Hollywood Shuffle"? He's a talented, funny guy but hasn't delivered anything near that first effort.
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in this movie, joe pesci slams dunks a basketball. joe pesci...<br /><br />and being consistent, the rest of the script is equally not believable.<br /><br />pesci is a funny guy, which saves this film from sinking int the absolute back of the cellar, but the other roles were pretty bad. the father was a greedy businessman who valued money more than people, which wasn't even well-played. instead of the man being an archetypal villain, he seemed more like an amoral android programmed to make money at all costs. then there's the token piece that is assigned to pesci as a girlfriend or something...i don't even remember...she was that forgettable.<br /><br />anyone who rates this movie above a 5 or 6 is a paid member of some sort of film studio trying to up the reputation of this sunken film, or at least one of those millions of media minions who can't critique efficiently (you know, the people who feel bad if they give anything a mark below 6).<br /><br />stay away...far away. and shame on comedy central, where i saw this film. they usually pick better.
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While researching Susan Harrison (The Ballerina) in reference to a Bonanza Episode, I was reminded of this gem.<br /><br />This episode is the inspiration for Dylan's "All Along the Watch Tower" (Hendrix's cover is probably as well know and is one of his best) which is one of HIS best.<br /><br />Thus this episode is responsible for several 'bests' - not bad for approximately 22 minutes of television.<br /><br />But this is "The Twilight Zone". Further comment of the series is unnecessary.<br /><br />'5 Characters' is typical Serling. Intense, dramatic, barreling toward an end that is as inevitable in hindsight as it is surprising the first time you see it.<br /><br />This episode is spoiled in one sentence and is too good to spoil for any who have not seen it.<br /><br />But you will feel ambushed. And you will never listen to Hendrix with the same ears again.
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It's a mistake to refer to any film of this era as a horror film. Most early German films with supernatural themes are not so much horror films as they are dark fantasies borrowed from the works of early German Romantics like E. T. A. Hoffman and others. In Fritz Lang's "Der Mude Tod" (also from 1921) Death personified takes a young man away from his sweetheart, but in Lang's film the characters' destiny cannot be mitigated by behavior. Neither of the young lovers deserves to die, but they are destined by circumstances to be reunited only in death.<br /><br />In Victor Seastrom's "Korkarlen," however, repentance is always an option. Destiny can be altered - and death deferred - through the characters' choices. Although scenes of the Phantom Carriage collecting souls are genuinely eerie, these horrific images of Death as the great leveler are compromised by Death's offer of redemption to the real monster of this tale, David Holm, a brutal drunk who, because of a perverse hatred of humanity, spreads tuberculosis and emotional misery to everyone he comes in contact with.<br /><br />One New Year's Eve Holm is struck down in a fight with a drinking companion. As the first person to die on the stroke of midnight Holm must become the driver of the Phantom Carriage and collect souls during the new year. The Phantom Carriage, driven by an old acquaintance who had started Holm on his road to ruin, comes for his soul and takes him on a journey of self discovery. Along the way Holm sees the horror he has inflicted on his family and the people who tried to help him.<br /><br />Perhaps my disappointment with the film's ending is a criticism of the Selma Lagerlöf novel on which the film is based. But I would have preferred to see David Holm unable to escape his destiny, and to see his repentance come too late to prevent his wife from poisoning his two children and herself, and to see Holm suffer for the consequences of his sins by being made to collect their souls. It would have been a fitting punishment and a horror more immense than witnessing the abuse he inflicted on others. In the film, however, the unalterable nature of destiny isn't the message; redemption is. The driver of the carriage allows Holm's spirit to return to his body, and he rescues his family in the nick of time. His repentance smacks of Scrooge's repentance in "A Christmas Carol." <br /><br />If the trite and sentimental ending does not offend you, there is still much to admire in the film's images. The special effects are astonishing when measured by the standards of the day, and still hold up, which is more miraculous when you consider that these double exposures were created inside a hand-cranked camera. Also, the restored film on Tartan's new DVD looks fabulous.
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This movie made me think....of how I could write something about it without personally dissing the director and all the actors, who, as an Australian, I am proud of for actually getting out there and making a film.<br /><br />But the movie itself? Let me tell you a story....<br /><br />Found this DVD in my local rental shop yesterday and had vague recollections of the reviews at the time of cinema release here, so I thought I would give it a go.<br /><br />For some reason, I decided to watch the 'special features' before I watched the actual movie, not something that I usually do. Turned the 'making of' off halfway through, as I'd had enough cringing at the 'aren't we so wonderful for putting together such a hard hitting film with such a raw script' attitude.<br /><br />The movie? Ugh. Full of clichés and pathetic character development. The actors? Well done guys, you are Aussies and I applaud you. And, just like a footy team is only as good as the coach that directs them, you unfortunately did NOT have a great script to work with.<br /><br />I felt that the movie actually trivialised so many of the subjects that it seemed to want to cover. I have seen many reviews here that refer to it as nothing more than a soap. Agreed.<br /><br />Finally (and forgive me if I don't phrase this correctly), I was extremely disappointed that there were no optimistic overtones at all. Yes, we all know that life is full of hard stuff, and yes we know that things such as incest DO occur, but I really find it hard to applaud a movie that has not one piece of joy in it. I believe that a director has a responsibility to put it in there SOMEWHERE. Otherwise, the movie is all about THEM and THEIR feelings, they have created it for themselves, not for an audience.<br /><br />Which I think is the basis of why this movie isn't so great. The special features mention that the director wrote the screenplay in a 36 hour sitting, the day after he himself tried to end his own life. Well, it may have been cathartic for him to do this, however the movie reeks of self-indulgence when you know the story behind why it was written. "I feel horrid, I'm going to write a movie about feeling horrid". (Note: I have read the interview with Andrew Urban, and understand WHY Thalluri needed to write something to help him through his own issues, but I believe there is a line in film that cannot be crossed - the line of making a movie purely for your own emotional needs, and I feel that this is what has unintentionally happened here)<br /><br />By his own admission, the director had no technical experience at all, and sadly, this makes the movie come off looking like nothing more than a year twelve media project.<br /><br />As for any recommendations that this movie should be studied at school, or that all teenagers should watch it - not sure there either. Because there is a VERY dangerous line at the end. I too have been in a place where I have thought that someone who no longer has to 'face life' is 'lucky', but as an adult, I do worry that this line could be influential on a young viewer that was in a vulnerable frame of mind. Might be in there to promote discussion, but again, it reflects no possibility of redemption or joy in this story as a whole. In fact, it almost indicates that there is more sadness to come.<br /><br />I haven't seen Elephant, but I just might go find it, given all the comparisons here.<br /><br />Nothing personal here guys, I do hope you can make another movie someday, and we all have to start out somewhere, so forgive me if I've been too harsh. I am glad that you are proud of what you created, which in the end is what life is all about. It's not a movie I would recommend though.<br /><br />Oh, I DID like the way the time-frames often collided, thought that was an interesting way to film. <br /><br />But the whole "Its the quiet ones you have to watch" - we already know that.
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actually, it was pretty funny... in a "god, how the hell did this movie get made" kind of way. if you life making fun of movies... which i kinda do... go ahead and watch it... but if you're actually thinking "is this a good movie?" eff off.<br /><br />this movie sucked from the very beginning scene with the worst acting i've ever seen in any movie.... usually they get five minutes into it before you realize "this movie might suck".. but no, you know right off the bat. this movie talks about edgar allen poe... never tried to explain it though, to people who haven't memorized poe's life story... so i don't know if any of what was said is fact.<br /><br />this movie is about a writer "ethan poe" hookin up with his cousin "ann".... they're both descendants of edgar allan poe... or are they?!? apparently, people give a what their ancestors did. this guy ethan poe is actually ethan "usher", who is supposed to be descendants from the story "the house of usher" that was written by edgar allen poe. ann's brother shows up sometimes to try to rape her... ann's also being stalked, at one point in the movie, by three different people on the same street (seriously, three... they're like right behind her glaring at her and she doesn't even realize). the characters that are being murdered throughout, show up at the end to try to save the day.... but they can't. at the end, ann shoots ethan while he's trying to kill her best friend. of course, before she shoots him she has to scream out "nevermore!" this movie should be seen nevermore!
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This frothy romantic comedy is based on the kind of story I loved as a teenager, but now find rather distasteful. In the case of May-September attachments, doubtless what is on the mind of the elder party is either lust, or an inability to face the reality of aging, or both. And the younger is most likely looking for the kind parent that she (or he) lacked as a child. These underlying agendas seem more pathetic than romantic to me now; there is also something rather predatory about them.<br /><br />Dick Powell looked a bit embarrassed--as well he should--at playing the elder lover in this silly story. He was, at fifty, attempting the role of a thirty-eight-year-old man romancing a teen-ager. But young Debbie Reynolds was a knockout--pretty and saucy and full of vinegar--as a misbehaving seventeen-year-old presented as a kind of "gift" to the morally upright and honest screenwriter, as a subject for him to study. Her spirited performance wrung from me a better rating than this film would otherwise deserve. Anne Francis was cast as Powell's beautiful, but brittle fiancée, and handled her small role deftly.<br /><br />Some of the dialogue was quite amusing, too, so it's not a total washout.<br /><br />5/10
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i LOVED THIS MOVIEE well i loved the romance part with COlby and the girl...Rachel (?) 4got her name....i honestly was only interested in those too. i loved them in the movie i want to see more movies like that. but please no more sad endings where they cant be 2gether! =( it made me cry! but the romance between them. the plot the trauma everything was great. =) i just was more into Colby and Rachel. ha ha =) everything about this movie was thrilling the kind to keep you glued to your seat. because i sure was. Honestly my only personal want would be more focused between the couple (Colby and Rachel) and at least a decent ending. I hated the ending, a better one could have been more thought out, not the fact of forcing COlby to his death and Rachel having a son. The ending would have killed the movie.
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There is this private campground in Plymouth, Massachusetts, that's been around since 1959. My grandparents were among its founders, my parents had a site starting in 1965, and my two brothers have sites there now.<br /><br />(This doesn't have anything directly to do with the movie; bear with me.) <br /><br />I spent summers at Blueberry Hill from when I was five years old to when I was eighteen, and it is to people like me to whom this film speaks: the ones for whom a group camp in the woods was, as my fiancée tells of me, "the good and happy place." If you've never experienced the lifestyle, Indian Summer will probably be lost on you; don't bother. It's not quick-paced, it doesn't have rapid cuts, the plots aren't in the least bit convoluted, it has no explosions, such dramatic tension as exists is mild, there aren't any A-list actors, there are no rapid-fire quips just to show off how clever the scriptwriters are (other than, perhaps, Kimberley Williams' killer line about how her fiancé shouldn't "overwind his toys." That is not the least degree what this movie is about, any more than The Godfather is a slasher flick just because it has a lot of on screen gore.<br /><br />But Indian Summer is Godfather's polar opposite. If you have experienced the lifestyle, see this movie. Don't read any more, just do it.<br /><br />For me, this is a 9/10 film.
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David Arquette is a young and naive home security alarm<br /><br />salesman taken under the wing of Stanley Tucci. Arquette is a<br /><br />golden boy, scoring a big sale on his first call- to widow Kate<br /><br />Capshaw and her dopey son Ryan Reynolds. Things are going<br /><br />well for Arquette, he is appearing in commercials for the security<br /><br />firm and he is falling in love with Capshaw.<br /><br />Then Tucci and his right hand woman Mary McCormack let him in<br /><br />on a little secret- they sometimes break into the houses of their<br /><br />clients in order to scare them and to get their neighbors to buy<br /><br />security systems from the firm. Arquette decides not to get<br /><br />involved, taking Capshaw to meet his family, and going through life<br /><br />with a goofy smile on his face. Then, someone breaks into<br /><br />Capshaw's home and murders her and her son. Arquette suspects Tucci, and sets a series of traps, resulting in a gun to his<br /><br />boss' head as Tucci pleads his innocence.<br /><br />Based on a stage play, "The Alarmist" is not opened up well. The<br /><br />scenes where Arquette takes the Capshaw to meet his parents<br /><br />are badly played and completely unfunny. They are also out of line<br /><br />with the character Capshaw is playing, as she gets drunk and tells<br /><br />sexually explicit stories to Arquette's mom Michael Learned. Other<br /><br />than these scenes, Capshaw is not given much to do, but she<br /><br />does a lot with the little she is given.<br /><br />Stanley Tucci, looking just like Terry O'Quinn, is a riot as the<br /><br />security firm owner. He is a creep who really does not understand<br /><br />Arquette's moral revulsion. However, when he turns into a<br /><br />sniveling whiner after Arquette kidnaps him, he is hilarious. Mary<br /><br />McCormack seems to have been groomed for a bigger role, but<br /><br />she mostly stands around and agrees with Tucci. Ryan Reynolds<br /><br />is too old to play a dumb teenager, but he is funny, especially<br /><br />telling his own explicit sexual story to Arquette.<br /><br />The screenplay lurches from romantic comedy to dark comedy too<br /><br />soon. Capshaw meeting the parents is completely unmotivated,<br /><br />except to give her a reason to get out of town so someone can<br /><br />break into her house. Capshaw and Reynolds are in the film just<br /><br />to give Arquette a reason to take revenge on Tucci.<br /><br />Arquette, who has proven he is a good actor, is awful here. He<br /><br />relies on the constipated mugging that got him through those<br /><br />AT&T ads, and he is not a strong enough presence to build this<br /><br />weak film around. Actually, Reynolds might have been a better<br /><br />choice in the role.<br /><br />Dunsky's direction is good, nothing that will win an Oscar soon.<br /><br />Christophe Beck's light jazzy score recalls the type of film noir this<br /><br />film tries to be, and it is really catchy on top of that.<br /><br />Despite the pluses, Arquette's failure as a lead and the script's<br /><br />schizophrenic quality sinks the film. I do not recommend it.<br /><br />This is rated (R) for physical violence, gun violence, some gore,<br /><br />strong profanity, brief female nudity, sexual content, strong sexual<br /><br />references, and adult situations.
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my friend and i rented this one a few nights ago. and, i must say, this is the single best movie i have ever seen. i mean, woah! "dude, we better get some brew before this joint closes" and "dude, linda's not wearin' a bra again." what poetry! woah! and it's such a wonderfuly original movie, too. i mean, you don't usually find a slasher film where every single murder is exactly the same. i mean, exactly! now that's originality. and almost all the transitions between scenes are these great close-ups of the psycho in the ER scrubs. how cool! the acting is so wonderful to. the dad was just brilliant. must have studied REAL DADS before filming. and how many movies do you find that just don't make any sense? not many. but this is one of those gems. i mean, how cool is it that one guy waited outside for like six hours to pull a prank, while his friends were both inside? that's really cool. overall i'd say this is the single greatest film of the genre, nay, in the world! *****
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Highly recommended to all those who appreciate watching movies. Great acting, perfectly surreal awkward humor, requisite prison sh-t, accurate depiction of the male condition. Music is also spot-on. I think the artist is "Dip" but not sure. The short loop of the title credit song on the DVD menu is well-timed, and sounds like Slint. (one thing to know is that IMDb maintains a ridiculous policy of a MINIMUM comment length based on, not CHARACTERS, not WORDS, but rather LINES. Measuring post quality and quantity based on LINES in the bold era of UNICODE and flexible, web-based typography, is like smoking poles.) ! Your comment does not contain enough lines - the minimum length for comments is 10 lines of text. Please see the guidelines. Attempts to pad the comment with junk words can result in your account being blocked from future submissions.
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Don't listen to the many acerbic and derisory comments heaped upon this film.....simply put, as regards ninja movies, this my friends is about as good as it gets! <br /><br />Yes it's silly, yes the acting and script are admittedly absolutely atrocious, but by gum - it's so much bloody fun! In fact, as is often the case with B-Movies, the horrendous 'acting' (which in the case of the movie in question, is truly amongst the worst I have ever had the joy to behold!) and ridiculous 'plot' actually only serve to elevate the enjoyment level ten fold.<br /><br />Obviously the fight scenes are the main attraction in this though and for the most part I'm pleased to say, they're very well choreographed, especially the final showdown (during which we witness that ninja are not ostensibly constrained by the normal laws of gravity....) <br /><br />Trust me on this, if you are a fan of ninja movies and you have not yet seen Sakura Killers, then you are truly missing out on what is in my opinion, one of the true jewels in the crown of the genre.
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I'm not sure what it is but there seems to be some curse when it comes to films about the elusive Bigfoot. There has yet to be a film that intelligently approaches the subject, nor one that creates any real suspense. Both "Legend of Boggy Creek" (1972) and the first film entitled "Sasquatch" (1978) have become minor cult classics, but neither were very memorable. Both films were targeted at family friendly audiences, thus inhibiting themselves from actually trying to scare anyone. "Harry & The Hendersons" (1987) was the first big budgeted film to use Bigfoot, with a terrific creature design by Rick Baker. However, they too chose to aim for younger audiences, but this time as a comedy (as did "Bigfoot" in 1995). I've long awaited for someone to tackle the subject as a thriller, perhaps in the vein of "Jaws" or "Predator". When I saw this at my local video store I thought my dream had come true. Boy, was I wrong! Lance Henriksen plays a billionaire who leads an expedition into the pacific northwest in hopes of finding his daughter as she was on board a small plane when it crashed in the mountains. The premise is interesting and sounded promising. The truth is it never builds any real suspense. I never found myself at all interested in any of the characters as each of them were very two dimensional and rather bland. Even the always dependable Henriksen seems to be phoning in his performance. Every time he appears on screen he looks plain bored. He should be as there is no action to speak of for the first hour of the film. As for the creature, where do I start? I figured at the very least we would get a cool looking monster running around in the woods, but instead we get this bald (yes, I said "bald!") man with pitch black skin and patches of fur here and there. Picture a cross between "Swamp Thing" and Chaka from "Land of the Lost" and you'll get the idea. Nothing like the artwork on the cover box I assure you. Sloppy editing and careless direction also adds to the confusion as half the time everything seemed out of sequence, while the other half of the film was constantly used up with these long, slow fade outs (which made no sense or served any purpose). They even stole the whole infra-red vision P.O.V from the creature in "Predator", which just looked too silly and out of place to be effective. Maybe all this proves is that Hollywood should just forget about trying to make anymore Bigfoot films, as they have yet to make one that works. So far each one has been as scary as an episode of "In Search Of" 3/10
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The first time I watched Cold Case was after it had run for about a year on Danish television. At the time it came to the TV it nearly drowned in 4 or 5 other American crime shows aired roughly the same time.<br /><br />I saw it and I was bored to death. The substandard actors with the self righteous faces and morals were a pain in the behind. The entire premise that so much money was given a team of investigators to solve murders dating back 10-20-30 or even 60 years seems so unlikely.<br /><br />The time is also a factor as they only have 50-60 min to tell the story which means that they get a break through just in the nick of time to solve the case and bring justice to surviving family members, if they are still alive. This combined with the "personal" problems and relations of the investigators which there HAS to be time for leaves the show a complete lackluster.<br /><br />I give it a 2-star rating because of the music i the end which is really the only reason for watching it....which you then of course won't do as that is TOO lame a reason for watching this crap.
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Army private Gene Kelly, who's also a talented trapeze aerialist, comes under fire for doing daring stunts without a net and alienating his high-wire cohorts; meanwhile, there's an elaborate 'camp show' to put on for Army soldiers and personnel, and the whole studio of M-G-M has shown up to join in the fun. Mickey Rooney plays M.C. (unctuously), introducing acts like Kay Kyser and His Orchestra, Bob Crosby, Benny Carter, and the M-G-M Dancing Girls (who appear to be dressed as vegetables). Red Skelton does a cute bit with Donna Reed and Margaret O'Brien, but the other comedic bits suffer from an apparent vacuum between the performers and the allegedly-live audience (they're awfully silent until the editor cuts to them for exaggerated reaction shots). Judy Garland sings an inappropriate song about a jumpin' night at Carnegie Hall (improbably accompanied by classical pianist José Iturbi, whom Judy calls 'hep'). The production is glossy, but the manic energy feels false, fabricated. ** from ****
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I`m in two minds about FOLLOWING , the film debut of Christopher Nolan . Part of me admires it for costing 6,000 dollars to make but part of me hates it for being too art house . In many ways it reminds me of the cult movie PI , a film I disliked , and I can`t get my head around the central plot of a man who wants to be writer following people around . Wouldn`t it be more logical for someone wanting to be a writer to sit in front of a keyboard and write ? <br /><br />Oh well I guess FOLLOWING gives indie film makers hope that just because they made a no budget movie costing $6,000 over two thousand IMDB members will vote for it and over five hundred members will comment on it , but you have to wonder if this movie would be so well regarded if it wasn`t made by the director of MEMENTO ?
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SPOILERS Edgar Rice Burroughs's famous character was adapted thousand of times for the screen til one's thirst is quenched, notably during the thirties and the forties by Hollywood. Its productors made Tarzan one of the most successful cinema characters. Several years later, Hugh Hudson decided to make a more ambitious version of the monkey-man and it's a more natural, more wild and more down-to-earth Tarzan that he gives away here. Hudson skilfully avoids the clichés that you usually grant to Tarzan such as his famous scream or his friendly pet, Cheetah. Not only, are we far from the designed and invented character made by Hollwood but we are also far from the film set used to make his stories. The movie was partly made in Africa (more precisely in Cameroon). The movie introduces two obvious parts: the first one which takes place in the jungle where Tarzan lives among his adoptive friends, the apes and considers himself as their lord. But he ignores his real origins. The second one in England where Tarzan discovers the English society. Ian Holm epitomizes the link between the two parts and Hudson avoids all that could make the movie falls into the ridiculous thanks to a clever screenplay. Indeed, Holm teaches Lambert basic rules of manners so as to behave correctly in the English society and the result works. Moreover, in the second part, no-one ever laughs at Tarzan and he's even really appreciated. As far as the end is concerned well it's a both bitter and happy end. Happy because Tarzan comes back to the jungle and meets again his adoptive close relatives. But bitter too, because this homecoming means that the Greystoke line won't be ensured and is condemned to disappear... Christophe Lambert finds here, his first (and last?) great role. Sadly, he'll never equal the achievement of his performance in this movie and he'll play in poor and insipide action movies. Nevertheless, as I said previously, a clever screenplay, a performance of a rare quality, some impressive natural sceneries (both the jungle and the English country and we get a gorgeous movie. It's also an excellent rereading from a popular novel. So why is it only rated barely (6/10)?
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1st watched 1/1/2003 - 3 out of 10(Dir-Henri Verneuil): Sober drama about a well-to-do Doctor who gets into trouble carrying on a relationship with a younger woman, whom his family brings in to live with them, as well as being married to another in the same household. His searching for happiness is not clear, but they do bring out the reason for his unhappiness rather well by displaying the overbearing trait of the females in his wife's line. Well played, but predictable drama.
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*Spoilers and extreme bashing lay ahead*<br /><br />When this show first started, I found it tolerable and fun. Fairly Oddparents was the kind of cartoon that kids and adults liked. It also had high ratings along with Spongebob. But it started to fall because of the following crap that Butch Hartman and his team shoved into the show.<br /><br />First off, toilet humor isn't all that funny. You can easily pull off a fast laugh from a little kiddie with a burp, but that's pretty much the only audience that would laugh at such a cliché joke. Next there are the kiddie jokes. Lol we can see people in their underwear and we can see people cross-dressing. LOLOLOL!!! I just can't stop laughing at such gay bliss! Somebody help me! But of course, this show wouldn't suck that bad if it weren't for stereotypes. Did you see how the team portrayed Australians? They saw them as nothing but kangaroo-loving, boomerang-throwing simpletons who live in a hot desert. But now... Is the coup de grace of WHY this show truly sucks the loudest of them all... OVER-USED JOKES!!! The show constantly pulls up the same jokes (the majority of them being unfunny) thinking it is like the greatest thing ever! Cosmo is mostly the one to blame. I hated how they kept on mentioning "Super Toilet" (which also has a blend of kiddish humor in it just as well) and Cosmo would freak out. And who could forget that dumb battery ram joke that every goddamn parent in Dimmsdale would use in that one e-mail episode? You know, the one in which every single parent (oblivious to other parents saying it) would utter the EXACT same sentence before breaking into their kid's room? Yes, it may be first class humor to some people, but it is pure s*** to others.<br /><br />If I'm not mistaken, I do believe Butch Hartman said something about ending the show. Thank God! Everyone around my area says it's, like, the funniest Nickelodeon show ever. I just can't agree with it
I think it's just another pile of horse dung that we get on our cartoon stations everyday, only worse.
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Highly enjoyable, very imaginative, and filmic fairytale all rolled into one, Stardust tells the story of a young man living outside a fantasy world going inside it to retrieve a bit of a fallen star only to find the star is alive, young, and beautiful. A kingdom whose king is about to die has said king unleash a competition on his several sons to see who can retrieve a ruby first to be king whilst a trio of witches want the star to carve up and use to keep them young. These three plot threads weave intricately together throughout the entire picture blended with good acting, dazzling special effects, and some solid sentiment and humour as well. Stardust is a fun film and has some fun performances from the likes of Claire Danes as the star(I could gaze at her for quite some time) to Michelle Pfeiffer(I could gaze at her at full magical powers even longer) playing the horrible witch to Robert Deniro playing a nancy-boy air pirate to perfection. Charlie Cox as the lead Tristan is affable and credible and we get some very good work from a group of guys playing the sons out to be king who are constantly and consistently trying to kill off each other. Mark Strong, Jason Flemyng, and Ruppert Everett plays their roles well in both life and death(loved this whole thread as well). Peter O'Toole plays the dying killer daddy and watch for funny man Ricky Gervais who made me laugh more than anything in the entire film in his brief five minutes(nice feet). But the real power in the film is the novel by Neil Gaiman and the script made from his creative and fertile mind. Stardust creates its own mythology and its own world and it works.
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I watched this film when I was a kid, and I thought it was terrible then. Now that I'm older, I found it just as terrible. Universal could have done better than this. They merely decided to make the most money they could out of using all their monsters at once. To me, that was a cheap shot. These characters were capable of holding their own in their own movies, and the choice of actors was deplorable. Dracula needed to be Bela Lugosi, Frankenstein's, monster needed to be Karloff.<br /><br />In my mind, it was the Disney squalid sequel sequence done decades ago, and it was not appreciated. Umiversal started out with something great and original, and then thought they could pander to the masses with the schlock which is extremely evident in this film.
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Okay, sure, this film will never win an oscar. Citizen cane this film is not... BUT why does every film have to be scrutinized? when was the last time you saw a film that was funny not becuase it was good, but because it was goofy? doesn't anyone remember roger corman, king of exploitation?<br /><br />well, I had fun. I liked the cheese. just go in not expecting to think, and prepare to throw popcorn at the screen.
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This movie features a gorgeous brunette named Danielle Petty. She has stunning green eyes, and is in the first few scenes and the last scene. She is the only thing about this movie that is not repulsive. She may not have a future as an actress, because this kind of movie is the kind of offensive disaster that kills careers.<br /><br />The movie itself has absolutely nothing to recommend it. It is not a good horror film, or a good fake journalistic report, or remotely well done. There is no skill apparent in it's production. It is like a bad student film. The story's horrific elements do not make you sick, it is the fact that it is so poorly done that makes you sick. I would give this movie ZERO stars if I could.
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'Thursday' is a good movie but we recognize too much from other movies in its genre and therefor it lacks originality. If you have seen 'Goodfellas', 'Reservoir Dogs', 'Pulp Fiction' and a bunch of other movies that were inspired by that last one you have seen almost every part from 'Thursday'. There is a scene that involves torturing that has even the same dialogue as in Tarantino's 'Reservoir Dogs'.<br /><br />Still, it is a good movie. Because not every part is taken from the same movie the complete thing has some new ideas and some nice touches. The opening sequence to begin with, is quite impressive. We meet Nick (Aaron Eckhart), Dallas (Paulina Porizkova) and Billy Hill (James Le Gros). They get into a fight with a clerk in a gas station over a cup of coffee and it ends with the death of that clerk and the arrival of a cop. We've already glimpsed at a suitcase with a lot of money in it.<br /><br />Then we meet Casey (Thomas Jane) in Houston. He is married to Christine (Paula Marshall) but used to be working with Nick. She doesn't know a thing. Then Nick gives him a call and says that he is coming. We learn that he has screwed his friends over and the problems are about to start.<br /><br />What happens exactly is not for me to reveal but we meet some other characters, all interested in the money or the drugs Nick also had with him. Casey has flushed those down the drain.<br /><br />Very funny moments, a lot of blood, a very funny sub-plot involving actor Michael Jeter and some surprises (although if you really think about it you see them coming) this is a good movie with some very fine performances, nicely directed by Skip Woods.
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I can't believe we watched this total piece of crap but we did and I feel obligated to warn others to avoid it at all costs. When one of the main characters announces that he's gay twice in the first five minutes, don't ignore it as typical PC nonsense and figure it has to get better because it won't. If his faggoty boyfriend hanging all over him doesn't make you sick, then be thankful the freak who wrote and/or directed this grossout is somehow attempting a little restraint. I mean, get real. It's one thing for there to be a gay character appearing in a movie in such screwed up times as these but quite another to have it continually slapped on the screen and examined up close and personal when the the liner notes clearly state the flick's supposed to be about a mother seeking some sort of "closure" over the sudden death of her daughter. What does one thing have to do with the other, one might be tempted to ask? Apparently, the two issues are inextricably interwoven. And if that weren't bad enough, there's the bearded lady at the ice cream parlor. I mean, seriously, hasn't that poor woman ever heard of electrolysis? Why must she go around like that? At the very least, how about shaving the ugly thing off, and while you're at it, have those horrible moles removed, too. Would YOU slurp up some ice cream she just served you? I think not. It must be a New Jersey thing. <br /><br />You'd think Diane Keaton might save this piece of drek, but think again. Was she actually trying to put lipstick on a corpse? I don't even wanna think about it. So what if the body was supposed to be that of her own dead daughter. This grotesque excuse for cinema is slop from the word go and that's all there is to it. One wishes that each of these characters would simply walk out into the waves and just keep going. None of these flaky people even remotely gain our sympathy for an instant. Trust me -- pass this piece of crap up. It's not about death, a mother who inadvertently suffocated her daughter, or even the other much more unsavory issues it keeps bringing up no matter how little you want to hear it. It's a load of perverted trash from a misguided and talentless director.
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| 2,595
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You got it right! Bobby was Mike's imaginary friend through the whole movie, even at the beginning when on their way to California. His mother knew of Bobby and didn't discourage Mike leaning on Bobby since imaginary friends are common with young children.<br /><br />That's why they both got stomach aches at the same time. That's why the boys' were so close.<br /><br />At the end Mike was letting Bobby go. The "King" was arrested. Mike could go on without Bobby. It's also why Mike's mother didn't seem disturbed when Mike received the postcard (Mike had written & mailed) from Bobby the Ol' West tourist stop and the other postcards from all over the world. You noticed Mike's mother turned the first card over and looked at the postmark. What a great mom doing the best she could in the late sixties.<br /><br />A 9 out of 10 for me. Brought back memories...
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This is one of the best movies I have seen in a long time. All of you who regard this movie as absolute sh*t obviusly are not intelligent enough to grasp all of the subtle humor that this movie has to offer. It shows us that real life and "ficticious" action can produce a winning combination. Also, as a romantic comedy, it has one of the most clever ways for two people to find each other. Name me another movie where you can see all of that as well as Donald Sutherland singing a song like "They're Going to Find Your Anus On A Mountain On Mars."
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I was blown away when I saw "The Best Years of Our Lives". The acting, script, and Master William Wyler's Direction(winner of Best Director in 1946)is Brilliant.<br /><br />The film is about Three World War II veteran's who come home together on a plane and all by chance live in the same town. They all are reunited with their families.<br /><br />The first man Al Stephenson(Played by Fredric March in his Oscar winning role) has to adapt to his wife Millie(played by Myrna Loy) and Children Peggy and Rob(played by Teresa Wright and Michael Hall) being different than before he left for the war.<br /><br />The second man Fred Derry(played by Dana Andrews in an excellant role) has to find a good job and adapt to a wife he had only been married to 20 days before he left for the war. He begins to find out that she is not the same.<br /><br />The third man Has a much more harder adaptation to make. Homer Parish(played by Harold Russell in his excellant oscar role)He has lost his hands in the war and must deal with his family's and fiance' Wilma's(played by Cathy O'Donnell) reactions to the hooks he has instead of his hands. All of these men and their families are reunited in the film in different scences. The stories of these men are all interwoven beautifully together.<br /><br />This film truly defines the meaning of a "Classic". This unforgettable drama(winner of best picture in 1946) is a film that everyone should see.<br /><br />If I was asked to pick a favorite film I would pick this one.<br /><br />Out of 10 I would give "The Best Years of Our Lives" An 11.<br /><br />So the next time you rent a movie rent this one you won't regret it.
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| 18,268
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This is one of the movies one has to start watching with an open mind. One knows it's going to about a mute, one could look forward to or be afraid for a lot of sentiment.<br /><br />Well, forget it. The movie starts with a little black humour, and then gets started. From then on its takes you on an ever frightening ride through the dark centers of Moscow. All right, it must be said: the unexpected twists are expected, and the mute is mainly used as a plot tool or fear builder. But this movie doesn't let you go.<br /><br />It's like the old gangster movies, but then without any glamour at all and in Russia. And that's one of the most important aspects of this movie: it's situated in Russia. This does have a great impact on the movie, according to me it makes it better. Everything becomes simple and basic, life is without nonsense. This could be a great potential for more movies in the future, gangster movies about the Russian mafia.<br /><br />It is a beautifull and terrifying movie. It's horror, but you can't feel but sympathy for the little mute. One last advice: don't look this too late in the evening if you want to sleep well.
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Seriously, I can't imagine how anyone could find a single flattering thing to say about this movie, much less find it in themselves to write the glowing compliments contained in this comment section. How many methamphetamines was Bogdonovitch on during the filming of this movie? Was he giving a bonus to the actor that spat his lines out with the most speed and least inflection or thought? The dialogue is bad, the plot atrocious, even for a "screwball" comedy, and claims that the movie is an homage to classic film comedy is about the most inane thing I've ever heard. The cinematography is below the quality and innovation of that exhibited by the worst made-for-TV movies, the acting is awful (although I get the feeling that the fault for that lies squarely in the lap of the director), and speaking of which, did I mention the direction is so haphazard and inscrutable that it defies the definition of the word? The whole thing is a terribly unfunny (even in the much-beleaguered world of so-bad-it's-funny clunkers), soul-sucking, waste of two hours of your life that you'll never get back. Be afraid, be very afraid...
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I watch many movies, but presently my genre number one is Asian horror. I have just bought this DVD and I initially found "Janghwa, Hongryeon" an intriguing but confused film, since I had not understood many parts of the story. But I saw in IMDb Board a message titled "Explanation of a Masterpiece (all your questions answered) Faster load", written by opiemar, and I was really impressed with the high quality of the explanations this user provided to viewers like me that missed points of the story. I would like to congratulate opiemar for his excellent work and suggest him to write a correct summary of this movie in IMDb to help and guide other viewers.<br /><br />In the end, I agree that "Janghwa, Hongryeon" is a great Korean film, but I do not give ten in my vote because very few people can afford to see the same movie more than once, like this film demands, and without the great support of opiemar, I would not be able to understand the story as a whole. I intend to see this movie again in a near future. My vote is eight.<br /><br />Title (Brazil): "Medo" ("Fear")
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I just watched this film this morning and I found it to be a great showing of the richness of faith. Babette gave them another way to look at life; not a replacement, but an enhancement. She shared all that she had with those who gave what little they had to her. I see the story of God in here. He sent his only son to man. Man could not possibly give anything that would equal that. So, for our small sacrifice, we are given an ultimate treasure and are transformed because of it. In this film the bickering townspeople have so consumed themselves with a small interpretation of God. Babette showed them that life and God can indeed be beautiful in it's fullest sense. The love that God's son showed to man is the love we should show to one another and our lives will be the richer for it. Even the film is a metaphor. It seems slow in the beginning, but the investment of time and attention to detail is rewarded in the end. It was truly a feast.
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Director Paul Verhoeven's American vehicles are of varied quality, but most of the films he made in his native country are indisputable masterworks. This is the story of alcoholic (and bi-sexual) writer who moves in with a beautiful rich and very strange woman. But the lady does not know that he is only interested in meeting the woman's handsome male lover. In the meantime, the writer is plagued with strange visions - at first they look like hallucinations triggered by alcohol abuse, but he soon begins to realize that he is actually experiencing some kind of premonitions. Fascinating Hitchcockian thriller, very original and provocative. I love films that make you think they are about something, but then you realize they are about something completely different. This is one of those movies; a thriller during the first half, and a quasi-religious surrealist saga during the second half. Very erotic, original and blasphemous, not for kids or people that go to church every Sunday. Great cinematography by future director Jan de Bont. Highly Reommended!
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I watched this movie a couple of weeks ago and must say: I was not impressed, not at all. I do side with the other posters when it comes to the fine performances, but some good performances do not make a good movie.<br /><br />On the discussion board, I found a review by an anonymous poster that captured some of the main points. It says: "'Deed Poll' is a movie that raises many questions but hardly answers even a few; a movie that is disturbing and above every attempt at categorizing; an experiment and a very conventional sexual drama despite some shocking scenes. The brilliant acting of Barbara Kowa and André Schneider, the partly very impressive editing and the good camera work (Steffen Ritter) make up for gross plot holes and some technical slips (especially in sound). However, the boredom the audiences have to deal with for 40 minutes remains." Unfortunately, this is true. I wasn't intrigued by the story at all. The protagonists are cold, ambition-less people. They do a lot of drugs and have a lot of (incestuous) sex. So what? For many times, the direction seemed to be virtually non-existent, not to mention the technical aspect: the poor sound quality was enormously disturbing.<br /><br />What's the point of the movie? What's the message behind it all? The anonymous reviewer said: "Somehow Biermann failed to make a clear point and so the movie remains hanging in mid-air without a message. Thus the boredom I blame on the movie. The movie is reserved and emotionless, cold, almost neutral and it doesn't take long to see the flaws: for long stretches the characters of Sean and Ivy are not credible (they clearly have difficulties with the English pronunciation), the character of the mute brother is not developed very well. Some moments are very promising though - in the scene where the call boy is skinned (the one and only true love scene) an intensity is reached that one would love to see the whole movie long. As a spectator one has to regret the chances given away." Again, I must agree. I did like the final scene, especially because of the beautifully captured faces of Gianni Meurer and André Schneider, but it was nothing compared to the boredom I had to suffer for the first thirty minutes. (The sex scenes, though, were aesthetically staged and perfectly edited.)<br /><br />All in all, "Deed Poll" was not my cup of tea - a good, controversial idea wasted -, but it was a interesting to see how a movie can be made with practically no money. Maybe if they had a bigger budget and a more experienced director, this would have become a better movie.
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Yep.. this is definatly up there with some of the worst of the MSTifyed movies, but I have definately seen worse. Think Gremlins rated R. Well anyway, I met Rick Sloane at some sci-fi convention, that amazingly, he was lecturing at! It was one of those really low budget conventions, where everything goes, an everyone brought in something (if you want to see crap, you should have of seen what some friends and I brought in).<br /><br />He seemed like a very nice guy, he was very cool about my questions and comments on Hobgoblins, and he even told me not to take it seriously, and said he loved the MST3K version!<br /><br />All in all, Rick Sloane knew what he was doing. And I think was meant to bad like Mars Attacks. So I guess I'm standing up for this movie and giving it a 5, and betraying all my fellow MSTies. Sorry guys.
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This movie is definately one of my favourite movies in it's kind. The interaction between respectable and morally uncorruptable characters is an ode to chivalry and the honour code amongst thieves and policemen. It treats themes like duty, guilt, word, manipulation and trust like few films have done and, unfortunately, none that I can recall since the death of the 'policial' in the late seventies. The sequence is delicious, down to the essential, living nothing out and thus leading the spectator into a masterful plot right and wrong without accessory eye catching and spectacular scenes that are often needed in lesser specimens of the genre in order to keep the audience awake. No such scenes are present or needed. The argument is flowless and honest to the spectator, wich is an important asset in a genre in wich the the suspense is often achieved through the betrail of the audience. No, this is not miss Marble... A note of congratulations for the music is in order A film to watch and savour every minute, not just to see.
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A true anomaly in the French cinema ,this despairing work has no equivalent in the contemporary production.One would rather have to look on the side of Louis Malle's "le feu follet" (1963)(the fire within) to find something not completely unlike Harel's effort.Wry and cynical,having lost all his illusions,the hero ,a computer scientist,has got no more reason to live.Absolutely none.Estranged from the human race,he seems to live his life as some kind of entomologist,studying his colleagues.One of them catches his attention:Tisserand-José Garcia plays the most demeaning part of the decade-.Then Tisserand will become some kind of prey:all his pessimism will rub off on this poor man.The scene is the night-club climaxes the strange relationship:the hero tells his victim that his life will always be unfulfilled unless he.... Well now the movie takes a more conventional turn so to speak (Clouzot's misanthropy maybe)but just for a while.<br /><br />The form is weird beyond comment There are two voices-over,one for the narrator who always refers to the main character as "our hero",one for the aforementioned hero.The story takes place,now in Paris,now in Rouen ,Guy de Maupassant's town.In a scene with his shrink ,the hero says the writer's madness was only the expression of his disgust for Man and he draws a parallel between his despair and Maupassant's one.<br /><br />This depressing movie is only suitable for an informed audience.Not for the very short excerpts of X-rated movies,but because after watching it,you may be feeling down in the dumps.
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This was/is an incredible movie, with incredible cast, music, singing, story, etc. It is a tragedy that some arrogant families (the Gerswhins or Premingers) can keep it from being available to generation after generation. I have wanted to see it again all of my life. I just found this site and read why it has not been available. Shame on these families for their pettiness. My wife is from Germany and she has never seen the movie. Neither have my step-children or my grandchildren. It is very sad that a movie of this depth and quality is not available for them to see. Where do these families get off making such a conceited, self-important, egotistical, condescending decision to prohibit generations from enjoying this film, these stars, these performances, this music! Release the video and let them world judge and enjoy!
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A Delta Force Army unit, assigned to find a batch of missing Green Beret bad-asses not known for going completely missing, will be in a fight for survival against a cloaked skeleton man, the supposed spirit of an ancient Indian warrior who was revived when archaeologists disturbed his grave. The Skeleton Man rides a horse and has the ability to propel to and fro using a type of dimensional portal, and seems unaffected by bullet-fire and explosives. The Skeleton Man's horse leaves no hoof prints and he can ride from behind and around his prey silently. The film's point-of-view through the Skeleton Man's eyes looks at his prey with a different color. In other words, he's not seemingly human, so how can Captain Leary(Michael Rooker, as grizzled and intense as ever)and his gang of would-be commandos stop this menace? For some reason, the Skeleton Man murders employees of a nearby chemical plant. What are the Skeleton Man's motives for slaughtering endless human beings? And, why is a blind Indian living in the forest our commandos inhabit spared if the Skeleton Man, as a human, slaughtered his entire tribe to prove himself? <br /><br />As completely stupid as it sounds. Just unbelievable horrible. This is the kind of film that can deaden brain cells. Casper Van Dien gets second billing in the credits just under Rooker, yet is saddled with a ridiculously underwritten character who exits the film quite early. Rooker deserves better than this. If I were an actor, I wouldn't want this movie in my resume. The Skeleton Man is a reject Templer Knight from a de Ossorio film. He has a spear which can merely knock certain people down while exploding the head of a woman on impact. An arrow shot from the Skeleton Man's bow actually destroys the propeller of a chopper plane. For nearly 99 % of the film, bullets are shot at the Skeleton Man and he can go in and out of that portal thingee yet, at the end, all of a sudden, he becomes vulnerable to attack. Oh, and the horses also change as the Skeleton Man freely moves through the forest from that portal.The film is written and edited by clowns. The attack scenes are poorly constructed and the characters, who are supposed to be experienced pros, make really bad decisions throughout this film. The mind boggles with this film. Good for some laughs, and some gore scenes make this hunk of pure crap watchable as a trash movie.
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SPOILERS<br /><br />Tom and Jerry is a classic cartoon, with a flawless idea, and almost every single short is a gem. While I must say that this is definitely an inferior short compared such other classic Tom and Jerry shorts, there is not way you can hate this cartoon. Sure, it is understandable to say that this is one of the worst of the first Tom and Jerry episodes, and I can say that I agree, but the fact of the matter is that all Tom and Jerry episodes are great, but some are just better than others. Well, this would fit into "others." <br /><br />Here is the plot of Fraidy Cat. Tom is listening to an old scary radio broadcast, and becomes easily frightened. Jerry observes how scared he is, and tries to scare him even more than he already is. He creates scary dilemmas for Tom, and Tom becomes scared out of his wits, and his lives. Jerry then puts a sheet over a vacuum cleaner and controls it, thus making it look like the vacuum is a ghost. Tom finds out that Jerry did all of this, and chases him. Tom then accidentally bites the house maid. However, at the end Jerry ends up the one becoming scared after he sees his reflection in a flour cup.<br /><br />Overall, this is far from the best Tom and Jerry short out there, but this is still a fun and entertaining piece of time. It makes me wish that there was more cartoons like this. The slapstick and gags in this that make Tom and Jerry famous are as good as ever in this short, but it felt like something was missing in this. It felt slower than most Tom and Jerry shorts. Anyway, this is a good short that does not quite live up to some other Tom and Jerry cartoons, but it is still nice.<br /><br />7/10
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Academy Award winner Robert Redford (Best Director. Ordinary People 1980) captures the majesty of the Montana wilderness and the strength of the American family in this acclaimed adaptation of Norman Macleans classic memoir.<br /><br />Craig Sheffer stars as the young Norman, and Brad Pitt stars as his brother Paul, an irresistible daredevil driven to challenge the world.<br /><br />Growing up, both boys rebel against their stern Minister father (Tom Skerritt).<br /><br />While Norman channels his rebellion into writing, Paul descends a slippery path to self-destruction.<br /><br />Also starring Emily LLoyd as wild-hearted Jessie Burns.<br /><br />The film won an Academy Award for Best Cinematopghaphy in 1993.
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After a long hard night being partied away at the Walkabout in Islington, I needed a pick-me-up. My throat hurt, my wallet was empty and I ended up chatting to a drug addict at a bus-stop trying to sell me some petrol. Today, I watched "Red Sonja" and I can honestly say that I felt much better last night than I do right now. Brigitte Nielsen leads a bunch of ass-kicking warriors in various shapes and sizes to recover a green rock from some evil queen whose motives are never fully explained. Yep, it's that good.<br /><br />"Red Sonja" isn't in a genre known for great films until Peter Jackson came along with a certain Oscar-winning trilogy. In fact, the best swords-and-sorcery film I could think of before "Lord Of The Rings" was George Lucas's kiddie-friendly "Willow". Perhaps, in view of this, one should go a little easy on this film. But I can't - it's poorly written, badly acted (with the exception of Paul Smith, who's just average) and dreadfully put together. The film is as convincing as an episode of the Flintstones, with costumes and scenery seemingly lifted straight outta Bedrock. Considering the comic-book source material, it is easy to forgive the various plot inconsistencies. Why Sonja insists on saving the most annoying kid, in this world or that one, is bewildering. His personality seems to flick from spoilt brat to polite gentleman at the flick of a switch. Schwarzenegger displays less charisma than a field full of cows and just goes through the motions, a perfect actor for his breakthrough role in "The Terminator".<br /><br />It's simple to kick a film when you're down but the fact remains that this is not a good film, by any stretch of the imagination. When Nielsen mourns the death of her sister and Schwarzenegger tenderly places his hand on her shoulder to comfort her and then blurts out, in that distinctive Germanic accent, "she's dead" then you know you're in for a rough ride. A few smiles were raised at inappropriate points, such as the priestesses of a temple who, when sent plunging to their deaths in a hole in the ground, seemed to enjoy the experience - at least, judging from the orgasmic moans that seemed to echo around the place. If you have to watch an Eighties fantasy film that wasn't porn, watch "Willow" (but never take that as a ringing endorsement). For the real thing, take yourself to your local multiplex and show Peter Jackson what a great job he did with "Lord Of The Rings". Trust me, 11 Oscars really does mean it's a great film - unlike bloody "Titanic".
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I will always have a soft spot for this Disney flick, another of their part live action/part animation entries that sought to recreate the success of "Mary Poppins" and never quite made it. When I was in grade school, every once in a while we would have a movie day, where the whole school would crowd into the cafeteria, and a movie would be projected the old-fashioned way, multiple reels and all. At the time, it seemed like a momentous occasion whenever this day arrived, and "Bedknobs and Broomsticks" is one of the movies I can remember seeing this way.<br /><br />And from what I remember, it's quite charming. Angela Lansbury never put her name to anything that wasn't at least competent, and she's winning here as a witch with a magic bed (boy, that could be misconstrued, couldn't it?) who can take her and a couple of young kids on magic adventures to far-off places. Come on, what kid wouldn't want a bed like that? <br /><br />Grade: A
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Thanks to silly horror movies like "Troll" and the indescribably atrocious cult-favorite "Troll 2", it has become practically impossible to take movies with kobolds, gnomes and various other types of little green hobgoblins seriously these days. Only just recently I watched the 70's made-for-TV movie "Don't Be Afraid of the Dark", which is basically a quite terrifying and serious-toned film about domestic little goblin monsters, and yet I still couldn't help thinking back about the laugh-inducing potato headed critters dressed in garbage bags that were running amok in "Troll 2". Same thing happened to me now. As much as I tried going into "Inhabited" with a clear mindset, unconsciously I kept comparing the supposedly creepy and menacing garden fairies with the badly sculptured goblins of Nilbog! Still, even without all the prejudices, "Inhabited" is a remotely entertaining albeit unmemorable straight-to-video horror flick. It's a cheesy, soft and politically correct pastiche of family drama and Northern Europe mythology. The annoying and murderous little creatures in this movie aren't your plain average goblins; they are "The Huldre": wicked little Norwegian demons that live underground and attempt to chase happy families out of their houses through influencing the youngest children. This overcomes the Russell family as they move into their ramshackle dream house in a remote little town. The cherubic blond daughter of MILF-actress Megan Gallagher starts to behave strangely whenever she hangs out in the cute play house in the back of the garden. She claims her friends are fairies, and even though the sinister handyman also warns for strange occurrences in the past, Gina's parents simply think the girl has troubles adjusting to her new neighborhood. When she keeps rattling about fairies, they arrange an appointment with the acclaimed psychologist Dr. Werner whilst "The Huldre" are slowly coming out of their botanical shelter. Not much special to mention here. The pace is acceptable and the attempts to build up suspense are pretty cute. You understand this is a family-friendly horror movie, so no bloody murder sequences are graphically being shown here. Heck, even the cadaver of the family's pet cat is kept off-screen. This is the umpteenth nonsensical horror movie in which Malcolm McDowell pops up and he practically always depicts an unreliable, greedy and self-centered authority figure.
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Latest attempt to revive the series actually based on a pretty good idea but without the required gore fx/violence for this type of thriller - and thus... BORING!! Good special fx, sets, costumes, etc. but the film comes of just plain silly and a near-waste of time... hopefully the next installment will correct this problem.
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Watched this last night and was bowled over by the heartfelt story line, the excellent character development, and the good karmic vibe emanating from the acting and movie as a whole.<br /><br />Without giving away too much of the plot, it begins with an ordinary joe who commutes to his office job every day who becomes inspired to take dance lessons. Along the way the protagonist and the assorted characters he meets in his quest to be smooth on the dance floor learn lessons about others and about themselves. <br /><br />The story has a prologue about what dancing in Japan symbolizes sociologically, so it isn't exactly as simple to learn to dance in Japan as it is here in the U.S. <br /><br />The film is lighthearted; you'll laugh out loud at some of the sight gags. Yet it is also dignified in a way hard to describe. All of the film's characters are taken seriously, as they are, and none are diminished because of their "imperfections."<br /><br />I've been thinking about taking social dance classes with some friends. It just so happened a friend lent me the video on learning to dance. Is this synchronous or what? I think so because now I'm really geeked to give it a try. <br /><br />Watch this wonderful family film (small children might not get it, but teens certainly would) and smile at the genuine caring you see shown in it time and again.<br /><br />Why they would make a remake of Shall We Dance is a mystery, as it is perfect as-is.
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This is without a doubt the most stunning and amazing documentary I have ever seen! The images that are shown are absolutely breathtaking and stunning. On top of that, it is a wonderful learning experience. I'm not one for educational documentaries, but this one grabs hold of you and doesn't let go until the end. You'll be so hooked and entranced by what you are watching that you'll forget your at home watching TV! This series is available to buy on DVD and I HIGHLY recommend picking this one up! With all the evil and death in this world, this documentary series gives us proof that life is beautiful and worth saving and preserving.
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So you think a talking parrot is not your cup of tea huh? Well, think again. Paulie is a wonderful film filled with touching moments.The characters are all lovable especially Paulie as he enters the lives of many people on his journey.It is journey worth experiencing. Don't miss it! It is available on home video.
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The Shanghai Cobra starts out like gangbusters, with a rain soaked diner scene straight out of Shack Out on 101 or Gun Crazy (the first one). Unfortunately the film then proceeds to plod its weary way through a standard Chan formula that is only barely enlivened by the always wonderful Mantan Moreland. It's as if director Karlson blew half his budget in the first five minutes, just getting the set up the way he wanted it. Watch the beginning and think about The Phenix City Story.
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In Iran, women are not permitted to attend men's sporting events, apparently to "protect" them from all the cursing and foul language they might hear emanating from the male fans (so since men can't restrain or behave themselves, women are forced to suffer. Go figure.). "Offside" tells the tale of a half dozen or so young women who, dressed like men, attempt to sneak into the high-stakes match between Iran and Bahrain that, in 2005, qualified Iran to go to the World Cup (the movie was actually filmed in large part during that game).<br /><br />"Offside" is a slice-of-life comedy that will remind you of all those great humanistic films ("The Shop on Main Street," "Loves of a Blonde," "Closely Watched Trains" etc.) that flowed out of Communist Czechoslovakia as part of the "Prague Miracle" in the mid 1960's. As with many of those works, "Offside" is more concerned with observing life than with devising any kind of elaborately contrived fictional narrative. Indeed, it is the simplicity of the setup and the naturalism of the style that make the movie so effective.<br /><br />Once their ruse is discovered, the girls are corralled into a small pen right outside the stadium where they can hear the raucous cheering emanating from the game inside. Stuck where they are, all they can do is plead with the security guards to let them go in, guards who are basically bumbling, good-natured lads who are compelled to do their duty as a part of their compulsory military service. Even most of the men going into the stadium don't seem particularly perturbed at the thought of these women being allowed in. Still the prohibition persists. Yet, how can one not be impressed by the very real courage and spunk displayed by these women as they go up against a system that continues to enforce such a ridiculously regressive and archaic restriction? And, yet, the purpose of these women is not to rally behind a cause or to make a "point." They are simply obsessed fans with a burning desire to watch a soccer game and, like all the men in the country, cheer on their team.<br /><br />It's hard to tell just how much of the dialogue is scripted and how much of it is extemporaneous, but, in either case, the actors, with their marvelously expressive faces, do a magnificent job making each moment seem utterly real and convincing. Mohammad Kheir-abadi and Shayesteh Irani are notable standouts in a uniformly excellent cast. The structure of the film is also very loose and freeform, as writer/director Jafar Panahi and co-writer Shadmehr Rastin focus for a few brief moments on one or two of the characters, then move smoothly and effortlessly onto others. With this documentary-type approach, we come to feel as if we are witnessing an actual event unfolding in "real time." Very often, it's quite easy for us to forget we're actually watching a movie.<br /><br />It was a very smart move on the part of the filmmakers to include so much good-natured humor in the film (it's what the Czech filmmakers did as well), the better to point up the utter absurdity of the situation and broaden the appeal of the film for audiences both domestic and foreign. "Offside" is obviously a cry for justice, but it is one that is made all the more effective by its refusal to make of its story a heavy-breathing tragedy. Instead, it realizes that nothing breaks down social barriers quite as efficiently as humor and an appeal to the audience's common humanity. And isn't that what true art is supposed to be all about? In its own quiet, understated way, "Offside" is one of the great, under-appreciated gems of 2007.
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Unfortunately, this movie is so bad. The original Out of Towners was manic and very funny, of course they used the script written by Neil Simon. For some reason Neil Simons script is not used in this film so it falls flat time and time again. Even the audience I was with never laughed. The direction is very slow and tedious and when there is a joke it is given away so the joke dies i.e. The couple having sex in the park. They announce it is a lighting ceremony for New York, well we all know the lights are going to come on and we will be able to see cute and mugging Goldie & Steve do a bit of slap stick. The whole movie winds up being like this...a joke is set up and given away. Why isn't Goldies hair ever even messed up in the movie. You will also notice every close up of Goldie (they use a very intense soft lens). I suggest you rent the original with Jack Lemmon and Sandy Dennis, that's if you want to laugh.
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I participate in a Filmmaker's Symposium, and this film was shown after we had already seen a not so great film and participated in a 40 minute discussion. Even though it was incredibly late and we were weary, the entire audience really enjoyed it.<br /><br />Personally I thought the film was hilarious in all the right spots, and I loved the quirky cast of characters. They really grow on you in the film.
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This film is superb, it has the same low-budget first film feel of 'Pi' and 'Clerks', but has the style of 'Memento' (also by Writer/Director Christopher Nolan). The score, sound effects, photography and editing are almost 'Memento' prototypes, and the story shows that Christopher Nolan is best when Writing and Directing. Don't be put off by the low-budget look and acting, or even the short length of the film, and just watch it!
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I remember seeing this one in the theatres when it came out, having no idea what it was going to be about and being so pleasantly surprised that I vowed to buy the video when it came out. <br /><br />While I won't go too far into dissecting this film, I will say that I gave it an 8/10, for all the reasons you can read in the other user's reviews.<br /><br />What I will say is this: <br /><br />The first 10 minutes of this film are incredible. It's as close to a textbook audience grabber as I've ever seen. I once put this movie on at a party, where everyone was winding down and getting ready to leave. I just wanted to see what would happen if I showed them the first ten minutes.<br /><br />Everyone, who watched the opening, stayed to the end.
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Dr Mordrid is terrifying. I would not recommend any adult or child see this unless they are rampaging murderers already. There is so much filth in this movie it hurts my yes. Speaking of eyes, there are eyes in the sky, against a backdrop of stars. Only the devil himself could have imagined such a wicked thing. I rented out every copy i could from local video stores and crushed them with a 5 pound crucifix. That movie should remain locked in a cellar behind the 4th dimension with all the other disgusting beasts of hell. That is where this movie belongs. I suggest if you want some scandalous entertainment, go and rent All Dogs Go To Heaven, or Angels In The Outfield. Those movies are worth seeing. If you want to commit a sin and love terrible movies, you need to see Dr. Mordrid.
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"Kramer vs. Kramer" is a terrific drama about an unhappy woman who walks out on her husband and young son. The husband now has to take up the responsibilities of taking care of the boy. As he does, they get to know each other better. But then, the mother and wife returns, and she wants custody of the boy. "Kramer vs. Kramer" has lots of drama with some wonderful bits of comedy thrown in for good measure. Dustin Hoffman won his first Best Actor Oscar for his brilliant performance here. Most people say his performance in "Rainman", which won him his second Oscar, is his best. He was great in that film, but I disagree that its his best. In my opinion, the best performance of Hoffman's career is in this movie. Scene after scene shows us why Hoffman is one of the best American actors working today. He's also funny at times. Also giving a terrific performance is Meryl Streep, who wasn't as well known when she made this film like she is today. Streep, like Hoffman, also won her first Oscar (for Best Supporting Actress) for her work in "Kramer vs. Kramer" as the wife and mother who tries to find herself after walking out on her family. Justin Henry, who was only 8 years old when the film came out, is wonderful as Hoffman and Streep's son. He won an Oscar nomination for his role here, and still to this day he is the youngest performer to receive an Oscar nomination in a competitive category (Best Supporting Actor). Jane Alexander is also fine as a conserned family friend. She too got an Oscar nomination (for Supporting Actress where she lost to co-star Streep). "Kramer vs. Kramer" is a great film from start to finish. Writer-director Robert Benton has made a film that's absolutely unforgettable. <br /><br />**** (out of four)
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solid documentary about edgey kids who first surf then skate in the face of the american dream. sadly some of the youngest and most gifted succumb to the lure of drugs while others become slaves to the crass marketing of their go for broke instincts. few come out on top. but the die is cast and fruit of it all is the new national pastime, skateboarding (the New York Times notes that "it was once considered a snub to authority. Now, however, skateboarding has its own summer camps, video games, magazines [actually it always had these] and corporate sponsors.") commercialism co-opts another kid birthed cultural node.
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I watched Pola X because Scott Walker composed the film score and I admire his music a lot. Frankly, I expected a somewhat pretentious and possibly incoherent French movie. I was wrong. The vision of the film quickly managed to engage my attention to the fullest - starting with the opening sequence, which shows black and white footage of military airplanes throwing bombs at graves at the sounds of music and Scott Walker's beautiful wailing voice. The film explores the identity crisis of Pierre (Guillaume Depardieu - a brilliant choice for the role) and his consequential (self-)destruction. The story is divided into two parts the first depicts Pierre's carefree life in a beautiful house in the French countryside and the second follows his utter personal disintegration after he abandons everything and moves to Paris to live in squalor with his supposed half-sister. Both parts contain some amazingly stunning photography the first very colorful and bright, the second utterly gloomy and nearly apocalyptic - adding up to a true aesthetic feast. Pola X is a fascinating and quite unique movie experience.
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Like his elder brothers, Claude Sautet and Jean-Pierre Melville, Alain Corneau began to cut his teeth in French cinema with a series of fine thrillers: "la Menace" (1977) and "Série Noire" (1979) among others. "Police Python 357" is a good example of how Corneau conceived and shot his works at this time of his career. They had a splendid cinematography, painstaking screenplays and a sophisticated directing elaborated for efficiency's sake.<br /><br />The police superintendent Ferrot (Yves Montand) is a cop with unconventional methods who usually works all alone. He makes the acquaintance of a young woman Sylvia Léopardi (Stefania Sandrelli) and becomes her lover while ignoring that she has another lover: his superior Ganay (François Périer). When the latter learns it, he kills her in a fit of anger. Ferrot has to investigate the murder and all the clues are inexorably against him...<br /><br />One could deem that this kind of far-fetched story isn't exempt from glitches and sometimes, one can see right through it but Corneau's pedantic directorial style helps to conjure up a stifling, dusky atmosphere. The first part of the film before the night of the murder might seem uninteresting and however, it is crucial for what will follow this key-moment. Corneau falls back on a sober treatment with rather sparse moments and short appearances by secondary, minor characters whom the viewer will see again during the investigation. In spite of drawbacks, Corneau and his scenarist Daniel Boulanger penned a deft story. Ménard (Mathieu Carrière) who sometimes expresses his surprise because Ferrot keeps a relatively low profile during the investigation. But his superior knows that he usually works alone. Actually, Ferrot has to find solid tricks to muddy the waters and so to exonerate himself. Eventually, the chief idea of the film concerns Ferrot himself. He's a cop who bit by bit loses his identity and finds himself in the heart of a terrible depersonalization. It is epitomized by the moment when he throws himself acid on his face so that witnesses won't recognize him when he is brought face to face with them.<br /><br />The backdrop of this thriller, Orléans is efficiently enhanced by Corneau's camera and helps to inspire this eerie thriller its pernicious charm.
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Something surprised me about this movie - it was actually original. It was not the same old recycled crap that comes out of Hollywood every month.<br /><br />I saw this movie on video because I did not even know about it before I saw it at my local video store. If you see this movie available - rent it - you will not regret it. The suspense builds throughout and the twist ending is excellent.<br /><br />
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***SPOILERS*** With a gathering of family members and servants of the late Christopher Dean, John Carradine, to hear his last will and testament they get somewhat of a surprise in that the Dean fortune, some 140 million dollars. The money is to be divided between them but only after they successfully spend a week at the Dean mansion. There seemed to have been a mix-up in the story when we later find out that it's really an overnight sleepover, not a weeks vacation, at the mansion for the guests to qualify for Dean's money since almost everyone ends up dead by sunrise.<br /><br />The first victim of the Dean Curse have nothing at all to do with getting and money from the departed Christopher Dean estate the local sheriff Dan Garcia, Rodolfo Acosta. Acosta has his head chopped off refrigerated and then served on a platter to a shocked group of guests. Later that evening cute little Chin Greg and Laura's,Jeff Morrow & Marry Anders,little pet pooch is found dead outside floating in the pond.<br /><br />The movie has all the people staying at the Dean Mansion being picked off one by one until it's revealed who the killer really is. We then have what seems to be a double-twist in the story where the original killer is suddenly killed together with two of the last remaining guest. The real killer ends up not only getting all the loot, 140 million dollars, but then ends up not having to split it with his accomplice by doing him, or her, in by giving him a poisonous cookie that kills him on the spot.<br /><br />Nonsensical who done it, and haunted house, movie with a cast of such immoral and unlikable characters that even a mother, much less the audience, would have trouble liking. There's everything you can possibly think of in the move involving the selective guests that includes incest S&M sadism and of course double-dealing and back-stabbing not even counting murder. You just couldn't care less who of the guests survives to collect the Dean fortune at the end of the movie hoping against all hope then none of them do.<br /><br />Even the big surprise at the end isn't really that much of a surprise since the killer's identity is divulged with the film-maker having forgotten to keep his face in the shadows so you actual see who he is even before he reveals himself! We then have a plot-twist that eliminates the killer together with a number of remaining guest just to make the movie a little more confusing then it already is. The final plot-twist, that you can see coming from as far as ten miles away, was just to show how smart the very obvious killer was which fooled almost nobody watching the movie.
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Not even 'lesser' Hitch, but simply a bad movie. The cinematic equivalent of a dirty-old-man. Ugly in every way: unimaginative script, static point of view, putrid clothing, ghastly hair, unlikable actors, and one truly gratuitous rape-and-strangulation scene. The director's perverse sense of humor is present, but it is not applied consistently; the movie comes alive only in its cruelty. The women fare especially badly; 'Frenzy' could be used as proof the director was a misogynist, though a better explanation to me is that perhaps beginning with his TV series and 'Psycho'- which he himself described as an exercise in thrift, an experiment to see if a television crew could shoot a passable feature -Alfred Hitchcock had pretty much abandoned art and settled for commerce. In 'Frenzy' the great master seems to be bowing to convention, trying to go with the times and give audiences what he thinks they want- in the form of unappealing nudity, nudge-nudge winks, and general nastiness. I don't begrudge an old man his rest, but I don't want to remember him tired and lazy and pandering- time to watch 'Vertigo' again!
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Out of all the Princess stories Disney has put out there, Cinderella probably has the most enduring appeal. I can't really say why, but for some reason, generation after generation thrusts her to the top of their lists. As a little girl, I wanted nothing more than to be Cinderella with her glass slipper- it was my absolute favorite costume.<br /><br />Honestly, I don't think there is any story that more realizes the longings of the human heart than Cinderella. Who has never wanted to run away from the drudgeries of daily life and find someone who sees you as no one else ever had? The story is older than the English language and somehow it still rings true.<br /><br />As for the characters, if nothing else, Disney can make a wonderful villain. Lady Tremaine is evil to the T, in a wonderfully calculating, not overtly physical way. Her cutting tongue and eyes do the work for her- she doesn't need staffs of lightening to strike fear into your heart. The animal friends tend to grate, especially that idiotic Gus. I would have cheered had he met his fate in Lucifer's jaws. Cinderella herself was no pushover- making some justly catty remarks at times. However, she just lacked the drive to make her entirely sympathetic. Sure, she was nice and fed animals, but what was keeping her at that place? We never know. Even if she only became a maid in another house, at least she's be getting paid and have a shot at respect. It seems the only reason things work out in the end for Cindy is that everything sort of falls to place in her lap. She never works for her dreams that she sings so fondly of.<br /><br />Which brings me to the music, which is lovely, as ever. Ilene woods has a lovely, rich voice, probably my favorite of any Disney heroine. Some big standards originated here- A Dream is a Wish Your Heart Makes, So This is Love, Bibbidi Bobbidi Boo...<br /><br />Cinderella is a wonderful heartfelt story with a ton of musical highlights. While it is lacking in some character development, it does provide some classic villains and excellent voice work. If you are feeling sick at heart, pop it in- it'll warm you up and make you hum Mmm Mmm Good!<br /><br />Quote of the film:<br /><br />-Surprise! Surprise! -Duh duh duh- Happy Birthday!
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"Xizao", is the tale about the clash of modern life and ancient traditions, and its effects on a family in China. Da Ming (Quanxiu Pu), is a businessman who returns home when a letter sent by his brother Er Ming (Wu Jiang) makes him believe that his father Liu (Xu Zhu), has died. He founds that his father is still alive, as well as his old neighborhood and his father old business, the public bathroom.<br /><br />The movie centers around Da Ming's family, and how he has to learn the importance of his father's job, something he always had considered an old tradition that had to die soon. Also, the movie explores his relationship with Er Ming, who is mentally challenged, and the problems of the small community and how the bathroom is a place that purifies not only their bodies, but also their souls.<br /><br />The two main themes of the movie, the family and the problems of progress, are incredibly well handled, and the movie never loses the point it is trying to make, both themes are very good developed and we get a glimpse of Chinese society and customs.<br /><br />The director, Yang Zhang, tells his tale in a simple way, letting the characters characters do the job. It is a very simple approach, but it fits the movie perfectly, and I highly doubt that another style would fit the movie this good. Zhang has enormous potential, as he can tell a story without the aid of visual flare or camera tricks.<br /><br />The acting is outstanding in its naturalistic approach, everyone acts in a very natural way and it almost looks as if they were real persons being filmed. The three lead characters give remarkable performances, and Wu Jiang as Er Ming surely steals the show.<br /><br />Even when the movie could had sticked to a patronizing "old days were much better" message, instead it takes an attitude of equilibrium, like saying that progress is good, and we must move on, but we must not forget where we came from, and keep an equilibrium between modern life and the traditions of old.<br /><br />An awesome, and touching film. 8/10
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Laurence Olivier, Merle Oberon, Ralph Richardson, and Binnie Barnes star in "The Divorce of Lady X," a 1938 comedy based on a play. Olivier plays a young barrister, Everard Logan who allows Oberon to spend the night in his hotel room, when the London fog is too dense for guests at a costume ball to go home. The next day, a friend of his, Lord Mere (Richardson), announces that his wife (Barnes) spent the night with another man at the same hotel, and he wants to divorce her. Believing the woman to be Oberon, Olivier panics. Oberon, who is single and the granddaughter of a judge, pretends that she's the lady in question, Lady Mere, when she's really Leslie Steele.<br /><br />We've seen this plot or variations thereof dozens of time. With this cast, it's delightful. I mean, Richardson and Olivier? Olivier and Oberon, that great team in Wuthering Heights? Pretty special. Olivier is devastatingly handsome and does a great job with the comedy as he portrays the uptight, nervous barrister. Oberon gives her role the right light touch. She looks extremely young here, fuller in the face, with Jean Harlow eyebrows and a very different hairdo for her. She wears some beautiful street clothes, though her first gown looks like a birthday cake, and in one gown she tries on, with that hair-do, she's ready to play Snow White. Binnie Barnes is delightful as the real Lady Mere.<br /><br />The color in this is a mess, and as others have mentioned, it could really use a restoration. Definitely worth seeing.
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Ok let's start with saying that when a dutch movie is bad, it's REALLY BAD. Rarely something with a little bit of quality comes along(Lek, Karakter) here in holland but not often. Costa! is about 4 girls going to Spain to go on vacation, party, get drunk, get laid (u know the drill). It's also about the world of Clubbers or Proppers. Pro's who're trying to lure the crowd into their club.<br /><br />I'm not sure how long it took to write the script, but i suspect somewhere between 15 minutes and 20 minutes because you're watching a bunch of random scenes for 90 minutes long. Nothing, and i mean nothing is believable in this movie. It's almost too riduculous for words what happens with the storyline. Suddenly the movie transforms into a sort of karate action thing. With a one-on-one fight with 'the bad guy in black' and cliche car chase scenes trough a watertank-car (can it be more cheesy). Also the words character-development and casting are unfamiliar to the makers.<br /><br />After having seen "Traffic" 3 days before this, i fell from sheer brilliance, from a piece of art to this. This is film-making at it's saddest. And don't start about low budget. Because even with a low budget you could write a better script. It almost seems that the film-makers were too busy partying themselves to make a decent movie.<br /><br />Anyway the chicks in the water at the end made it up a little bit, but for the rest of it, don't waste your money on such garbage.
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This is just a very bad film. Miles looks as if she is in pain during the sex scenes and the acting is wooden. It also drags on slowly and never really finds a point to it all. One of the worst films that I have ever seen!
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Great piece of fiction played as if factual. Tonight I was looking at the Birdman of Alcatraz. Robert Stoud was not a model meek prisoner and he was in jail because he was pimping and a customer did not pay up. Once he got into jail he was so uncontrollable he spent most of his time in solitary confinement or in the prison hospital. Killed a few people in prison too. This movie reminds me of the Birdman of Alcatraz but even worse. Robert Stroud did write books and he did contribute to society in someway. And the BOA had some hints of Strouds lunacy. BUT this guy Henry Young who Murder in the First is suppose to be about was a a known bank robber who took hostages and beat them up in more then one robbery. He wasn't some poor guy who stumbled into a grocery store which just happened to be a post office and took some money. This man was a hard core criminal. He also killed a person 3 years before he went to Alcatraz. He killed another person in jail not because of the solitary confinement which ended over a year before the murder. The real story of his life would of been more interesting. They did not even get the warden thing right. You can't be a warden in 3 different prisons at the same time. And by all accounts the warden in the movie was a pretty stand up guy as wardens go. Plus if my math is right the Warden played by Karl Malden in the BOA is suppose to be the same warden in this movie. Oh Boy. Not only that, in this movie we are to think poor Henry committed suicide. And he wrote the word Victory. Not true..he might be alive right now. He was sent to Springfield where Robert Stroud was also a medical center prison then Walla Walla for another murder he committed and then was released and jumped parole in 1972, never to be found. Maybe he is hanging out with that CB Cooper guy who jumped out that airplane in Washington state after committing a bank robbery lol. Now the acting was very good. Kevin Bacon is in that class of actors which include Jeff Bridges and Dennis Quaid, the vastly underrated actors club. Gary oldman well they just might of made-up the warden part so he could play it because he was great. Christian Slater still somehow sounds like Jack Nicholson, I am not sure if that is a good thing or not. Bacons wife Kyra Sedgwick was in the movie I think just because she is his wife. I like her though but not in this flick. For some reason I felt this movie when it first came out was suppose to be a special project for Kevin Bacon. I feel he could of taken a person who is truly a victim of the penal system, there sure is enough of them and spread some light on their plight. Other then picking a psychopath to show as a victim.
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I remember when skateboarding had it's rebirth in the 70s. I begged my parents for money to by a second-hand skateboard from a friend. It was a piece of junk, complete with clay wheels and everything. I also remember reading Skateboarder Magazine and being both completely impressed and totally terrified of the Dogtown crew. Skating never became a way of life for me, but in some ways it has always been a part of my life, whether it is using a board for transportation or just having a bunch of friends that skate.<br /><br />This film is a brilliant documentary of the real birth of modern day skating. Watching this crew turn skating from the flat boring hobby it was into the vertical lifestyle it has become had me sitting slack-jawed for 90 minutes. <br /><br />It's amazing that enough footage from this period still exists to have created this film, and thank god for that. The footage is brilliant. It gave me the feeling of watching an old Buster Keaton film: I've seen some of the tricks Keaton did repeated countless times in other films since then, but when you go back and see the first person to perform that trick it's amazing that, not only were they the first person to try it successfully, but that they lived through it and made it seem effortless. That's the feeling this film gave me. Yeah, I've seen people skate pools before, but to watch the FIRST people skating pools and inventing the tricks that eventually became the basics of modern skating is like watching the facade of the house fall on Keaton, leaving him standing safely in the frame of a window. It's absolutely brilliant to watch something that, up until that point, had never been tried before, but since, has been tried by almost everyone.<br /><br />This film is beautiful to watch and incredible to listen to. The soundtrack is one of the best I've ever heard in a film. This is a film that will appeal to people whether they like skating or not. I've talked to a couple of friends of mine who made their girlfriends sit through this film after heavy protest, and they all said that their girlfriends were mesmerized by the end of the film and loved it as much as they did. <br /><br />As for the previous comments on this board that complain about the film being too self congratulatory, I think that's an unfair disparagement. I liked seeing these guys get excited about their past. They created something that influenced their sport and changed it forever. They have the right to pat themselves on the back. They were stars for doing what they loved to do. Most of these guys/girls never achieved the staggering success Tony Hawk enjoys today, but that kind of success wasn't available to skaters then. Sure, they had some success, but more importantly, they have been able to live a life doing what they love to do, and, as we see in the end, almost all of them still surf, skate or work in the surf/skate industry. How many of us can say that we have been able to live our lives and have been successful by breaking all the rules and doing what we love to do? They can. My hat's off to the Dogtown and Z-Boys for being themselves and changing the world of skateboarding forever.
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I liked this show a lot - we got the first and only, it would appear, series in the UK on channel 4. The characterisation was right on the money - a bit like the Simpsons in that all the different facets of small town populace were represented.<br /><br />There was no laughter track - I hadn't seen this on an American TV comedy at the time except for on Larry Sanders and it really worked well here, heightening the suggestion that these wacky cops were really like that, and not just hamming it up for the cameras.<br /><br />All in all, a quirky little number that tickled me just right: I can't help but think that maybe it missed it's mark with certain audiences. I think it would have been a cult hit in the UK had it been shown at an acceptable hour.<br /><br />I'll round this off with my standard comment: Where the hell can I get hold of this to watch it again? Any ideas?
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I saw this movie on the shelf at Blockbuster and thought it looked cool. The DVD case touted so many great actors and I wondered to myself, "Why have I never heard of this movie?" Then I turned over the case and saw the director, Lee Tamahori, and thus the answer began to explain itself. <br /><br />First of all I want to defeat the idea that a great cast equals a great movie, but more importantly, I think I should explain why this movie is so terrible. Okay, the script is awful and full of one dimensional characters. This is the worst role I've ever seen Chazz Palminteri play and I'm surprised he would do something this ridiculous. However, under-appreciated yet talented actors must earn their money. Palminteri plays a one dimensional police detective who comes off about as dumb as a C-movie mob henchman. Him, along with the lead detective (the poorly directed Nolte), the great but simple Michael Madsen, and the late Chris Penn (whose role along with Madsen's was completely thrown away) make up an elite squad of LA detectives tasked to rid the city of mobsters sometime in the late 30s or 40s. The movie introduces this squad as cops who will break every law to make sure those who think they're above the law don't operate in their city. At the beginning of the film the cops rough up a local restaurant, grab an alleged mobster (William Peterson) and take him to a place they call the Mulholland Falls. They toss him off one of the cliffs on Mullholland Drive and this is supposed to demonstrate how serious these guys are about ridding the city of crime. Whatever. This was nothing more than a cheap excuse to use a crappy title that's designed to make you think of LA and its famous sites. Somewhere later on they find the dead body of Jennifer Connelly and the plot begins. <br /><br />On to the direction which was nothing short of amateur and WEAK! Aside from the fact that the characters were B-movie quality, the overacting by those such as Treat Williams, the guy who plays the chief of police, and the awful Daniel Baldwin are just a few highlights that made this movie seem like it was Lee Tamhori's first film. There's not one good performance in the movie aside from maybe Melanie Griffith, who some might argue was the worst in the movie (she won a Razzie for this film). In the end, it was her character that was not that great and she really didn't have much to work with. <br /><br />As with any bad movie, it all begins with the writing, and this script was no gem. Plot is formulated simply on the basis of setting up the next scene and never takes into consideration characters' motivations. The way the characters behaved was unbelievable. Cops taking the law into their own hands is believable within the right circumstances (see LA CONFIDENTIAL) but in this case it looked like these guys could get away with anything, including murder, and never bat an eye about cleaning anything up. I guess we as an audience are just supposed to assume that no one saw anything and that people won't ask questions. Everything about the story is predictable and is spoon fed so well that we understand everything that's going to happen a good while before the characters do. However, it doesn't make us feel smart, but rather makes us angry at how stupid the hero is, despite the fact that there aren't any heroes in this movie. <br /><br />In the end, the best component of the movie was the great score by David Grusin. From the beginning, it invoked a since of CHINATOWN, which quickly faded when I realized how unbelievable just about everything in the film was. It didn't surprise me to learn that it made a whopping eleven million in the box office. What I will say is that this film is worth watching for a few laughs. Nick Nolte's acting is like an unsuccessfully domesticated junkyard dog and I laughed every time he tried to be serious. I also nearly fell on the floor at each of the slow motion shots used in the film (I think there are three with one during a key fight scene). When you have to use slow motion in the heat of a dramatic moment, you clearly have some problems. So, even with my negative criticism, I will recommend this movie solely for the purpose of enticing laughter, that is, if you appreciate the good movies like LA CONFIDENTIAL.
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This movie is truly amazing,over the years I have acquired a taste for Japanese Monster movies and am well aware that early examples of this genre can be poor. However this one reaches a new low, as it follows the adventures of Johnny Sokko(?), a young boy who controls a Giant Robot, and his fight against the evil Gargoyle Gang, who seem to have an endless supply of horrid giant monsters at their disposal.
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Heya Denver fans! The animation is a cartoon's classic & one of my favorite too (and yes, it was broadcast in Europe as well. Including my tiny central-European country, Slovenia! =:) Oh, how I miss the 80's cartoons!! Honestly, they were way better than today's children shows. More imaginative, creative, full of fun with good morals, more substance, great storyline and excellent character voices. Computer animated shows of today lack all of these features. So all of you, who agree and want to bring back all the shows so that the kids of today's generation would see the entertainment that these cartoons brought to us, please log on the side posted bellow and sign a petition for a rerun of the 80's best cartoons! <br /><br />http://www.thepetitionsite.com /1/we-want-an-80s-child-cartoon-kids-show-channel<br /><br />Carpe Denver! =) <br /><br />Lejla
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I recommend watching this film with your significant other if you're planning a romantic evening with him/her. The chemistry between Johnny Weissmuller and Maureen O'Sullivan as Tarzan and Jane is so steamy it could fog up your screen.<br /><br />After the original film, we begin to see how Tarzan and Jane have adapted to the jungle and to each other. Jane's skimpy jungle wear and Tarzan's protest when Jane covers up for their visitors illuminates that they are not just romantically, but also quite sexually in love.<br /><br />One's imagination can supplement the constant touching and love talk between Tarzan & Jane to portray how much Jane is actually teaching Tarzan about love emotionally, romantically and sexually. And Jane's student is not only embracing but also thriving with his previously untapped sexuality.<br /><br />The skin show in this film is off the charts. In addition to Jane's two-piece sexy midriff, leg, and hip baring costume, she also has an underwater nude swim with Tarzan. (although it is not O'Sullivan, but Olympic swimmer Josephine McKim who doubles for her in this scene) Weissmuller, also reveals a tremendous body and perfect pectorals in his barely there loincloth. The ladies will delight when Weissmuller emerges from the water after his lengthy fight with the giant crocodile and sounds his yell - with his water soaked loincloth practically falling off his hips.<br /><br />It's a shame that the over-protective censors toned down the adult nature of the Tarzan films after this entry. Although the Weissmuller Tarzan films would still prosper in the years to come, they would rarely approach the sex appeal of this movie.
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SPOILERS FOLLOW - and I haven't even seen it.<br /><br />Let me guess... the murder is related to the evil property developer wanting to develop the riverside, and Dickens was murdered because he was trying to uncover a similar dastardly plot. If anybody who's seen it could let me know if I'm half right, you'll have saved me the time it might take to watch something worthwhile and the rest of us will know to steer clear of both this film and its enthusiastic reviewers. On the other hand, it *sounds* intriguing; but if it was any good would it *really* be given away with a Sunday rag? And what sort of track record does Foley have anyway?<br /><br />...So, as a public service, I managed to sit through it. It's worse than 'Swept Away'. Really. I've read stories by eight-year-olds with more drama than this. Truly awful. And I was half right.
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