id int32 0 25k | text stringlengths 52 13.7k | label int64 0 3 | Generalization stringclasses 1 value |
|---|---|---|---|
5,375 | Although Robert "Knox" Benfer has his fans, I'm not one of them. His films are asinine and amateurish, and and just not very funny, unless you're a 14 year old with an underdeveloped sense of humor. <br /><br />He's certainly not famous, as him immature fans would like you to believe, by harassing people at Wikipedia, or stuffing the ratings votes here at the IMDb. He's certainly not been profiled by any major media outlets, which speaks volumes about his and his creation's "fame".<br /><br />Benfer does have some slight skill at limited animation, but he needs to get away from his young sycophants and learn to write some actual funny material before he'll be taken seriously as a real entertainer. As of this moment, though, he's just a kid with a camera, and it shows. | 0 | trimmed_train |
21,953 | "Hitler: The Rise of Evil" was shrouded in controversy before it ever aired, and that controversy may obscure the accomplishment of the film.<br /><br />Those who criticzed the film, which they hadn't seen, did so with good intentions, based on the misguided thought that it would be overly sympathetic to Hitler. However, they misunderstood the point: to humanize the evil Hitler is not sympathize with him. It is far more disturbing to realize that the unspeakable acts committed by one of history's greatest villains were committed by a human being. A sick, diseased maniac, to be sure, but a human being nonetheless. It is necessary to know the story of how Hitler was able to come to power to prevent it from happening again.<br /><br />"Rise of Evil" is highlighted by a brilliant, career best performance from Robert Carlyle, who makes Hitler a human being without ever redeeming him in any way. Carlyle flawlessly captures the look and mannerisms of the Nazi leader, while never letting the impersonation become cartoonish or distance us (something Anthony Hopkins was not quite able to accomplish when he portrayed Hitler in "The Bunker", another very good made-for-television film). While were are repulsed by Hitler's depravity and virulent ant-Semitism, Carlyle gives him a certain magnetism and power the real Adolf Hitler must have possesed. After all, while else would a nation have followed him?<br /><br />Of the various subplots, by far the most compelling features Matthew Modine as reporter Fritz Gehrlich, who makes it his life's work to draw attention to the reality of of Hitler and Nazism. While Modine's performance is a little stilted in part 1, by part 2 he seems to have settled in, the character gives us a real-life hero in a film full of villains. Peter Stormare and Liev Schrieber also give strong support.<br /><br />Part 1 of this two-part mini series suffered a little bit from being overly choppy, including a look at Hitler's childhood which lasts only the duration of the opening credits. And in part 2, sections detailing Hitler's relationship's with his niece, and his mistress Eva Braun, are less successful than the central plot, but do serve to give us further insight into his mental and emotional state.<br /><br />Ultimately, no film about Hitler can make us understand him. The average person is, thankfully, incapable of ever understanding a man who would try to exterminate an entire race of people. "Hitler: The Rise of Evil" tries less to make us understand Hitler, and more to make us understand how he came to be power. It is an important story that must be told, and it is impossible to believe anyone who has seen the film would accuse it of having anything but the best of intentions, and the capability of doing anything but good.<br /><br />9 out of 10. *** 1/2 | 3 | trimmed_train |
15,380 | This is a splendidly done simplistic film that explores a theme, and gives each viewer something different that they take from it. The premise is simple: an unnamed celebrity actor (Morgan Freeman) decides to research for an upcoming role by visiting a store and watching people. He takes particular interest in the cashier at the "10 Items or Less" lane (Paz Vega), who he finds an amiable, strong, and curious presence.<br /><br />Both actors play off each other brilliantly and bring solid dimension to characters in what is a character study. Not a conventional character study; they each represent entire worlds. The cashier's life is mired in a harsh and frustrating "real world," while the actor is so enmeshed in his fantasy existence that he can't do simple tasks like remember phone numbers. He readily admits he's putting on a face when he talks to people, and the whole point of researching real people shows he's not one of them.<br /><br />But not only is the actor inspired by real people for his work; we see the reverse process as well. Several characters recognize "Him," and make reference to how he has inspired them with his movie roles.<br /><br />The cashier's favorite song "Al Pasar la Barca," about how a girl refuses to hide behind beauty and prefers instead to pay (ie: do honest work) for boat passage, couldn't have been chosen better. It parallels with the Vega character, the only store employee with any brains or ambition, who is willing to work hard to succeed. (That's quite an aspiration, for somebody who looks like Paz Vega.) It's an odd little film, probably made on a shoestring. If you don't mind slow pacing and a "talky" approach, this film will entertain. The characters are perfectly contrasted, and the effective acting makes them endearing. A nice watch. | 1 | trimmed_train |
10,462 | First: I bought it at the video store. Second: I watched it. Third: It was boring. Fourth: It was not funny. Fifth: Most of the antics were lame. And last, but not least: It's not only a bad movie, it's a total fiasco.<br /><br />I am a huge Adam Sandler fan despite this disappointing and forgotten film. I pity it because it was his first movie. Even if you are a huge Adam Sandler fan, don't bother watching this movie. Instead, just take the video, board a yacht, and throw it overboard. | 0 | trimmed_train |
13,223 | Robert Altman is my favorite American director. I must admit that I have enjoyed the films that are usually scorned: "Quintet", if only for giving me the pleasure of seeing a grown-up and beautiful Brigitte Fossey, who was unforgettable as the little girl in "Forbidden Games"; "HealtH", for having Lauren Bacall, Carol Burnett, Alfre Woodard and Glenda Jackson, all in the same cast; "Popeye", for that splendid and surreal world, Shelley Duvall's Olive Oyl and the wonderful Malta locations; "O.C. & Stiggs", for its proposal of an anti-"adolescents flick"; "Beyond Therapy", for all its lunacy and for the presence of Genèvieve Page, who for all her effort to look Parisian chic is taken for a travestite... I have even enjoyed his one-act TV movies, like "The Dumb Waiter" and "The Laundromat". When there is not much plot to develop in his films, you have wonderful performances, from Burnett, John Travolta, Kim Basinger or Jane Curtin. I perceive and enjoy the different approach and description he makes of the many different cultures of the United States. It is a pity that his genius is seldom appreciated, and that he is always forgotten when the time comes for giving out American prizes and awards. He is not your typical mainstream purveyor of fantasies. He is more of a maverick. So it is not surprising for me to find so many bad comments posted here about "The Gingerbread Man", his most 'mainstream' effort to date and to my knowledge. I did not know there were so many people who thought like Leonard Maltin, who does not like Altman at all. In this case, one may dislike "The Gingerbread Man", but for me the reason has more to do with Grisham than with the director-screenwriter. Some of Altman's trademarks are here: improvised dialogue, great performances, a funny lawyers' office with typical irreverent receptionist and secretary. While some people find it boring, I found the first act fascinating, thanks also for the great cinematography by Changwei Gu, the man who shot "Red Sorghum", "Ju Dou" and "Farewell My Concubine". He has a way of showing us the same things we see in other American movies, but under a different light. Through his "foreigner's gaze", almost everything seems new and different. In this first act, things were so logical and true! Wait until you get older. You may get in trouble if you fall under the spell of someone younger and beautiful as Embeth Davidtz. I know for myself what I have done fascinated by someone who is younger than I am! Then you have Robert Duvall's repellent, menacing and mysterious character, while that Geraldo storm is threatening Savannah. The second act gets a little phony and even funny, because Altman may have conducted it with a grin. I remember laughing aloud in several instances with his ironic remarks. I think he was applying a bit of Brecht, distancing us, preparing us for the third act, which is plain Hollywood pastiche. Altman does it with expertise. Being a wise man, and an intelligent director, luckily he did not fall into the traps of today's action movies. He was directing a tale of lust, greed and death. I was not disappointed a bit with the movie. If I give it a nine instead of 10, it is because of Grisham. The American reader has turned him into a best-selling author. So why complain? Maybe we should thank Altman for showing us the seams in his stories, the dullness, the flatness and the silliness of them all. However, he does it with so much gusto and humor, that I cannot but disagree with the negative comments. For me, these persons saw another movie... And vice versa. | 3 | trimmed_train |
6,431 | For some reason, TV Guide gave this two and a half stars, plus Faye Dunaway is in it, so it definitely looked like something to see. My, oh, my, this may be the worst film I've ever seen. Ever. From its horrid acting (every time the girl asks the boy what's wrong with him, I shouted to the TV "I can't act!" When she asks what he needs, I yell "I need acting lessons!" to the unbelievably bad dialog ("Give me back my organs!").<br /><br />And the Brian DePalma wannabe ending, too, it was all just beyond awful. I wanted to like it. Dunaway is one of the best actors ever. And the production values were pretty good.<br /><br />But wowzers, this had me laughing, LAUGHING!, most of the time.<br /><br />Don't even bother out of curiosity, that was my first mistake. Staying with it was definitely my second, and third and fourth. | 0 | trimmed_train |
8,656 | If you appreciate the renaissance in Asian horror, don't bother with Gawi. The film scarcely deserves mention alongside A-list work such as Ringu, A Tale of Two Sisters, Cure, and Ju-On (or even such good material as The Eye or Inner Senses). Those films brim with subtleties, unexpected imagery, rich characters, and a decidedly non-Western take on what's frightening. Gawi is strung together with the leftover limbs and organs of everything that has made American horror lousy for the past twenty-five years.<br /><br />The film tries to blend Asian ghost story and Hollywood slasher flick, but it's a bad fit. One aesthetic is bound to smother the other; guess which? Having no story of their own to tell the filmmakers loot Ringu for an evil-child subplot, but the situation is hopeless. Clichés, crap characters, witless plotting, a dull ghost, ho hum. | 0 | trimmed_train |
48 | 0.5/10. This movie has absolutely nothing good about it. The acting is among the worst I have ever seen, what is really amazing is that EVERYONE is awful, not just a few here and there, everyone. The direction is a joke, the low budget is hopelessly evident, the score is awful, I wouldn't say the movie was edited, brutally chopped would be a more appropriate phrase. It combines serial killings, voodoo and tarot cards. Dumb. Dumb. Dumb. It is not scary at all, the special effects are hopelessly lame. laughably bad throughout. The writing was appallingly bad. The cinematography is real cheap looking, and very grainy sometimes, and the camera-work is dreadful. Again, what really does the movie in is how badly all the actors are. Cheesy. | 0 | trimmed_train |
1,245 | First of all, really Kim Basinger? Your rich banker husband leaves you alone in your beautiful, most likely paid in cash for home, and you can't even put on a decent shirt? I'm a woman, and yes, I'm going to come right out say it--clean something, starting with your hair. And while you're at it, it's Christmas Eve. Buy your kids some presents...or at least a Christmas tree. Don't drive 40 minutes to the crowded mall, park your car 3 miles away and cry about it the whole walk in, and simply buy wrapping paper. Also, the next time you decide to leave someone a nasty note, don't sign your name. I refuse to feel sorry for Della. Obviously, due to the fact that Kim Basinger is this masterpiece's executive producer, she wants you to feel bad for the poor white blond woman. We get it. Alec Baldwin is a jerk, but seriously, don't model horrible films after your own life. Also, you're in you 50s. You definitely wouldn't have 8 year old twins. AND THOSE NAMES? Terry and Tammy. Way to let your kids grow up with any decent chance of ever respecting themselves. It's also pretty fantastic to hear the characters in the film constantly call her beautiful or refer to her as a "girl"...obviously Ms. Basinger had some say about what goes in the script. It's also pretty awesome how none of the criminals can fight back. Apparently, Della's magical ninja skills are impossible to beat. Her driving skills are pretty nifty too. This film is so cliché, it hurts. Wahhhhh! They spelled your name wrong on the tea cup. Or your husband put a hole in the wall but all you can think about is buying nail polish when you're at the mall instead of maybe some plaster and paint. Or the woman you went to high school with bought the teddy you were looking at. Boohooo! The fact that she refuses to take off that BRIGHT trench coat while running through the woods screaming and breaking everything in her path proves my point--this woman is a moron. Who thinks to grab the toolbox out of the car, but not their purse, full of identifying artifacts such as your ADDRESS. I have never wanted the "bad guys" to succeed as much as when I watched this film. And did anyone else happen to catch the "African American" shirt the black guy was sporting? Oh yes, rewind and feast your eyes on perhaps the most racially stereotypical prop in a film yet. Don't waste and hour and twenty minutes of your life. Instead, go do what Della couldn't figure out how to do...take care of your kids, and maybe brush your hair. That powerful ballad at the end though was pretty impressive. Singing "I'll Be Home For Christmas" in the rain while your bloody arm clings oh so tightly to your wrapping paper is about as emotional as it gets. Thanks Della! | 0 | trimmed_train |
13,713 | ...dont read any plot summaries because in words the plot might seem trivial, brain-dead and pointless. The film is excellent, the acting by both Denzel and Dakota (she will go sky high, trust me on that)are just fabulous, and the plot is mind blowing. Actually "fabulous" is a small word to use for such talented actors. The film is just based on actual facts and some characters are not fictional, a fact that adds up to the shock that i was having during and after the film. If you are fond of both actors and of somewhat deranged films, you still haven't watched your favorite one yet...Trust me, in the end you will have a weird and inexplicable feeling. The film is awesome, see it, rent it, buy it or whatever...just don't miss it | 3 | trimmed_train |
23,845 | I remember hitch hiking to Spain at 25, getting a lift from, what turned out to be, two fleeing Italian small crooks. They were doing a lot outside the law, but from the other side carrying a little portrait of Jesus in the pocket for their protection...Just and unjust, good and bad, criminal and correct where here in a new combination, outside of the categories I used to know. 'Les Valseuses' gives me, although a film and not real life, a picture close to my own experiences: the intenseness of each moment as soon as you leave 'all behind' and go for the momentous, whatever comes your way, it's another state of mind and also 'dangerous' form of life, because, as we all know, there are people who are not ready for this and willing to persecute you for 'stealing' and so on...This film touches 'values', it's a story about 'what's right and wrong': morals. It's resurrection of the individual fighting him/ herself free against the 'false morals' and conformism...There's danger all the way, because, how far can you go with your own 'freedom' and crossing your own moral borders and that of other people? What to do with people who are willing to hurt you, put you in jail or even shoot at you for the things that you do, like "stealing" some petrol from a multinational oil company for you fifth hand car? Les Valseuses re-awakens these questions in me, because morality, in contradiction to the usual 'media message', is quite complex... | 3 | trimmed_train |
5,478 | How has this piece of crap stayed on TV this long? It's terrible. It makes me want to shoot someone. It's so fake that it is actually worse than a 1940s sci-fi movie. I'd rather have a stroke than watch this nonsense. I remember watching it when it first came out. I thought, hey this could be interesting, then I found out how absolutely, insanely, ridiculously stupid it really was. It was so bad that I actually took out my pocket knife and stuck my hand to the table.<br /><br />Please people, stop watching this and all other reality shows, they're the trash that is jamming the networks and canceling quality programming that requires some thought to create. | 0 | trimmed_train |
14,635 | Loved it! What's not to like?--you got your suburbia, you got your zombies, you got your family issues, you got your social dilemmas, you got yourself one Fine Retro-1950's-style Flesh Eating Under Class Held At Bay By An Uneasy Worried About Whether They're The Next Meal Upper Crust. You couldn't ask for more.<br /><br />Cast is superb. Carrie Ann Moss is absolute perfection as a debutante social climbing housewife. She's both wanton, and criminally conspiratorial. Every fellow's dream. K'sun is really great as the son just trying to be as normal as possible in this nightmare existence, and somehow succeeding. He's a genuine screen presence. Very photogenic, and natural. Without naming them all, the rest of the cast is wonderful. Henry Czerny plays a suspicious policeman with honed instincts and little squeamishness as if it's his everyday persona. Billy Connolly is delightful as Fido. A fine actor: I wish that he had played the title role in "Braveheart," with Gibson directing. My sense is that his William Wallace would have been closer to the actual character. His Fido is contained, yet accessible. A nice touch.<br /><br />In short, a great and marvelous satiric poke at morals, values, social pinnings, feelings, growth, coping in uncertain times, and compensatory adjustments to impossible conditions. A true reality show. | 3 | trimmed_train |
6,963 | Believe me, I wanted to like "Spirit". The idiotic comments people made at the time of its release about how quaint it was to see old-fashioned, hand-drawn animation again, as if the last pencil-animated cartoon had been released twenty years ago, and the even more idiotic comments about how computers had now made the old techniques obsolete, had got my blood up ... but then, the insulting, flavourless banality I had to endure in the first ten minutes of "Spirit" got my blood up even more.<br /><br />The character designs are generic, the animation (partly as a result) merely competent, the art direction as a whole so utterly, boringly lacklustre that you wonder how it could have come about (we know, from "The Prince of Egypt" and "The Road to El-Dorado", that there are talented artists at Dreamworks), and the sophisticated use of CGI is in every single instance ill-judged. (Why do they bother?) There's not a single thing worth LOOKING at. In an animated cartoon, this is fatal.<br /><br />But it gets worse...<br /><br />The horses can't talk, but they're far more anthropomorphised and unconvincing than the deer in "Bambi", which can. And it seems that, in a way, the horses CAN talk. Spirit himself delivers the prologue (sounding for all the world like a 21st-Century actor picked out of a shopping mall in California), and from then on his laid-back, decidedly unhorselike narration is scarcely absent from the soundtrack, although it never once tells us anything that we didn't already know, or expresses a feeling which the artwork, poor though it is, wasn't capable of expressing twice as well. That prologue, by the way: (a) contains information which Spirit, we later discover, had know way of knowing; (b) expresses ideas which Spirit would lack the power to express even if he COULD talk; (c) includes new age rubbish like, "This story may not be true, but it's what I remember"; and (d) will give countless children (the production is pitched, I presume, at six-year-olds) the impression that horses are native to North America, which is sort of true, in that the common ancestor of domestic horses, zebras etc. WAS native to North America - but all horse species on the continent had gone extinct long before the first humans arrived, and the mustangs of Spirit's herd (which allegedly "belong here like the buffalo grass") were descended from horses introduced by Europeans.<br /><br />So the prologue rather annoyed me.<br /><br />As often as Spirit talks, Bryan Adams sings, sounding as usual as though he's got a bad throat infection - and it's not THAT he sings or even HOW he sings, it's WHAT he sings: maudlin narrative ballads which contribute even less, if possible, than Spirit's spoken narrative, and which sound as though they all have exactly the same tune (although I was paying close attention, and was able to discern that they probably didn't). If only Bryan Adams and the guy-pretending-to-be-a-horse could have SHUT UP for a minute or two, the movie might have been allowed to take its true form: mediocre and derivative, rather than jaw-droppingly bad. | 2 | trimmed_train |
17,213 | I like the movie. Twisted Desire had Jeremy Jordan,one of my favorite and one of the cutest actors ever. Melissa Joan Hart is a good actress. I've seen most of her movies but all of Jeremy Jordan's. The thing i dislike about Twisted Desire is when "Nick" gets arrested and "Jennifer" rats him out. Twisted Desire is my second favorite movie. My first is The Goonies. But i still love Jeremy Jordan. | 3 | trimmed_train |
12,299 | Before watching this film, I could already tell it was a complete copy of Saw (complete with the shack-like place they were in and the black guy wanting someone to break his hand to get out of the cuffs). MJH's name on a movie would typically turn me away (ugh, can we say GROSS?!), but I still wanted to give it a try.<br /><br />Starting out, I was a bit interested. The acting is absolutely horrible and I found myself laughing at almost each reaction from the characters (especially the man that played "Sulley"). MJH was even worst, but I continued to watch.<br /><br />However, the ending was the biggest joke of them all! I seriously sat in shock thinking "THAT was the ending?! Is this a comedy?!".<br /><br />I thought this pile of crap was funnier than the "Scary Movie" spoofs and that is REALLY saying something! | 2 | trimmed_train |
20,286 | As the maker of "This Darkness," I admit we neglected 3 very important acknowledgments in our end credits. The omissions were over-sights that could not be corrected once committed, nor did the parties involved --- who saw the movie --- mention it at the time. On behalf of the excellent cast and crew of the film, I extend them an apology. Obviously, some criticisms posted here are harsh in light of their credit being accidentally. Our production values were negligible and our "special effects" were quite special indeed, but the plot is very strong and the cinematography by John McLeod is superb. We hope you, the reader, enjoy "This Darkness" and the efforts of those who worked their butts off for free. Thank you, Dylan O'Leary, Director. | 3 | trimmed_train |
4,682 | I really wanted to like this western, being a fan of the genre and a fan of "Buffalo Bill," "Wild Bill Hickok," and "Calamity Jane," all of whom are in this story! Add to the mix Gary Cooper as the lead actor, and it sounded great. <br /><br />The trouble was.....it wasn't. I found myself looking at my watch just 40 minutes into this, being bored to death. Jean Arthur's character was somewhat annoying and James Ellison just did not look like nor act like "Buffalo Bill." Cooper wasn't at his best, either, sounding too wooden. This was several years before he hit his prime as an actor.<br /><br />In a nutshell, his western shot blanks. Head up the pass and watch another oater because most of 'em were far better than this one. | 0 | trimmed_train |
5,853 | I have read the book a couple of times and this movie doesn't follow exactly as it should. I could let this slide, it is after all a movie. However I have serious issues with the setting of the movie. Nobody has seemed to mention that this movie and the book it is based on are based in actual events that happened in Nebraska. I live in Nebraska. I grew up in the town that this movie is supposed to be based on. First of all, the "small" town that is talked about as the setting, is the third largest city in the state. With a population of around 50,000. Grand Island is the largest city between Lincoln and Denver. Second the scenery for the movie is wrong. Grand Island is in the Platte river valley. Which is very flat with very few trees. I tried watching this movie, but it made me mad to see my hometown being treated so bad. This was a real event. Large sections of the city were wiped out. In the book they talk about riding bikes from Mormon Island to Fonner Park. I guess you could if you don't mind a 15 mile ride each way. For anyone who wants to know what really happened go here http://www.theindependent.com/twisters/ | 2 | trimmed_train |
5,133 | Until now, the worst movie I had ever seen was Ben & Arthur. You really should check the reviews for that movie instead of this one. The review statistics for this movie have been skewed positive through a relentless and unscrupulous push by some of the people involved in making it, evidence for which is fairly easy to uncover online. At least the people who made Ben & Arthur were honorable enough to let it stand on its own shaky legs, instead of unscrupulously promoting it so suckers like me would buy it.<br /><br />Everything about this movie is terrible, the script, the story, the casting, the acting, the direction, the photography, the editing, the music... what else goes into a movie? Whatever it is, here it's as bad as it gets. If it weren't so unpleasant it would be ridiculous. I kept watching it thinking it must get better, because I hadn't yet discovered that none of the positive reviews for it are reliable.<br /><br />It does not take a lot of money to make a great movie, nor does a low budget mean a movie has to be bad. My favorite example of a shoestring-budget masterpiece is Gus Van Sant's amazing Mala Noche, but there are many others. Sideline SecretsDirector's Cut or originalis bad not because the people who made it had no money, but because they had gigantic egos and no talent for anything at all except self-promotion. | 0 | trimmed_train |
6,160 | Quite possibly the worst movie that I have ever seen. When has Hollywood ever made a successful movie that attacked Republicans? Why don't they learn. The Dixie chicks haven't. These Lefties live in their own elite bubble interacting among themselves; oblivious to the fact that most of America is much further right than they are.<br /><br />The best Hollywood productions are not partisan and are rarely political at all.<br /><br />Dan Akroyd's imitation of Cheney was bad.<br /><br />I would have thought Cussack could have landed better movies.<br /><br />It wasn't funny. | 0 | trimmed_train |
5,734 | Wow, I knew this film was going to be bad but not this bad. Spoilerific comments ensue.<br /><br />Roddy Roddy Piper is sickly sweet retired cop (cliche!), helping out everyone - smiling like a post-op lobotomy patient through-out and lamenting over his dead son. His adopted son returns from Armed Forces "Special Ops" and because he's "seen things" - portrayed by clenching his teeth if anyone mentions anything about the past. Time to clean up the streets from another guy who once knew Piper and his dead son (who the bad lad killed) and his adopted son.<br /><br />Oh, the love interest is a pretty young lady who decides for no reason that she wants to jump the bones of the ex-Army bloke. This happens in about 2 minutes of 1 scene.<br /><br />The action could have saved this film, but it's even worse than the storyline and acting. It's all been done before, it's all been done much much better (Ong-Bak is a prime example). This is the worst film I've ever seen - and I've seen Waterworld, twice.<br /><br />Erm, the film is called HONOR (Spelt Wrong for the Americans) and the tag line has "from the makers of Bloodsport and Kickboxer" - check out Director David Worths other films and you'll soon realise why they put these 2 films on there, even though they are over 10 years old. Such classics as "Shark Attack 3: Megalodon" - says it all really.<br /><br />I'll give you £10 if you don't go to see this film.<br /><br />PS - Apologise for not know character names, tells you something though. | 0 | trimmed_train |
22,636 | I don't doubt that Victor McLaglen won his Best Actor Oscar for this film by dint of a three way split among the Mutiny on the Bounty leads of Clark Gable, Charles Laughton, and Franchot Tone who were all in the same race. But The Informer is still a fine film because John Ford wouldn't have gotten his first Best Director Oscar if it wasn't. No split involved in his award.<br /><br />The movie and the story by Liam O'Flaherty that it is based on involves a poor simpleton of a man named Gypo Nolan who was once a member of the Irish Republican Army. He was cashiered out of it for some imbecilic stunt he pulled and wants back in. He's down to his last pence and if he can't get back in, wants enough for passage to America. There's a twenty pound reward for information leading to the arrest of a former comrade named Frankie McPhillip played by Wallace Ford. In a moment of weakness he goes to the Black and Tan constabulary and informs on McPhillip.<br /><br />The IRA is pretty anxious to find out who ratted McPhillip out and they're pretty certain it was McLaglen. He hasn't the wit to really cover his own tracks. He does make a feeble effort to implicate another man named Peter Mulligan played by Donald Meek. He also picks up a hanger-on played by J.M. Kerrigan.<br /><br />The whole action of The Informer takes place in 1922 in Dublin from about six in the evening to early the following morning. Of a necessity it is shot in darkness and shadows, making it possibly the first noir thriller. Had it been done post World War II The Informer would have ranked as a great noir classic, like Odd Man Out or the The Third Man which it bares a lot of resemblance to.<br /><br />John Ford knew this world very well. He took some time off during the Rebellion and was in Ireland at the time and had a brother who was in the IRA. His real name before having it anglicized was Sean O'Fiernan.<br /><br />Preston Foster plays the IRA commandant Dan Gallagher. In the book Gallagher is a harder and meaner man than Foster has him here. My guess is that John Ford wanted him as a sympathetic character to give movie fans some rooting interest. He makes it clear that Foster has to eliminate the informer because the Black and Tans will grab him and get quite a bit more out of him and put the whole organization in peril.<br /><br />The IRA trial scene is the highlight of the film. When Foster asks Donald Meek whether he recognizes the authority of their court, Meek ain't in a position to say no. The King's justice and writ does not run here. It graphically illustrates at that point despite occupation by army troops and constabulary, the British are indeed losing their grip on the population.<br /><br />Of course The Informer a rather grim story has its John Ford touches, but rather fewer than you would expect. Even as McLaglen is spending his money on a drunken spree, the IRA is constantly in the shadows watching him and counting every farthing.<br /><br />The Informer is a tale well told about Ireland in a grim and dismal time. | 1 | trimmed_train |
17,646 | All the talent Mr. Sooraj Barjatya showed in his first 3 movies, I thought were all an accident because his 4th one Main prem ki diwani hoon was so bad. But I have to say it wasn't an accident. This guy is talented and the way he has done Vivah is just brilliant. Right from the first scene it affects you. the sequences between shahid and amrita are awesome. The chemistry between these two actors gives glimpses of that between srk and kajol. As usual Alok Nath as the good and loving father is fantastic, so is Anupam Kher. But its a Shahid-Amrita film.Amrita looks good in most scenes though shahid does look a little young to get married but he does a good job of a shy but yet morally strong groom. this movie will especially be liked by those who has gone through such beautiful moments in their life. All in all a brilliant film. hats off to Mr. Sooraj Barjatya... | 3 | trimmed_train |
991 | Not even worth watching this tacky spoiler ruins everything about 'Annie'. The characters seem almost cheapened by the poorly written storyline and they low quality feeling to the production. It was very clearly made for TV, yet if I found it on my television, I would flick it straight over. The children in the film do an alright job, yet the adults acting is unbelievable and so the movie fails to really draw you in. This film lacked the music/dance numbers thats made the original brilliant and truly does take the shine of the Annie we all love. Johnson, as Annie is at times annoying and over acted..you cannot convince yourself that she truly is Annie. The differences in character appearance continued to irritate me throughout the duration of the film. Sad to say this sequel was a total flop. | 0 | trimmed_train |
15,588 | I have seen this film numerous times and for the life of me, I cannot understand why some people compare this to BABE. This film is not about the secret life of ALL animals who secretly can talk. Instead, it is about a Parrot who learns to talk to help his owner, a little girl with a serious stammer, overcome her speech impediment only to be separated from her in a heart-wrenching scene early on. Then the great journey begins. Paulie the Parrot sets out to try and find his one great friend, Marie.<br /><br />Along the way, he meets several wonderful people and numerous nasty people. He falls in love with a girl parrot and loses her. He gets conned into a life of crime and then captured by a bad scientist who wants to exploit him.<br /><br />He recounts his tale to a sympathetic Janitor in the Lab who agrees to help him escape and find his beloved Marie.<br /><br />Tony Shaloub shines as the kindly Janitor who has an open mind and big heart and who determines to help little Paulie despite the risks. Jay Mohr plays the voice of the Parrot AND one of the seedy characters he comes across.<br /><br />There is a little suggestive language but this film is appropriate for most kids and even more so if the parents join in on the fun and watch too. It is a witty, clever, epic animal-adventure story and ultimately a great love story about a Bird and his little girl. He search for Marie ends with a quite an unexpected surprise for most people who don;t know much about Parrots.<br /><br />Kids who have seen the wild Green Parrot Tribes in Los Angeles and Pasadena will especially benefit from seeing this film and understanding that Birds, especially Parrots are not disposable pets. All children everywhere, will see that Pets form deep attachments themselves and that the love and loyalty of a dog or parrot is a gift to be treasured.<br /><br />so no BABE here, more of an incredible journey with a twist.<br /><br />Enjoy and try no to tear up during the sad parts. | 3 | trimmed_train |
14,589 | Have just seen the Australian premiere of Shower [Xizhao] at the Sydney Film Festival. The program notes said it was - A perfect delight -deftly made, touching, amusing, dramatic and poignantly meaningful. I couldn't agree more. I just hope the rest of the Festival films come up to this standard of entertainment and I look forward to seeing more Chinese films planned to be shown in Sydney in the coming months. | 3 | trimmed_train |
14,620 | I havent seen that movie in 20 or more years but I remember the attack scene with the horses wearing gas-masks vividly, this scene ranks way up there with the best of them including the beach scene on Saving private Ryan, I recommend it strongly. | 3 | trimmed_train |
21,859 | In Panic In The Streets Richard Widmark plays U.S. Navy doctor who has his week rudely interrupted with a corpse that contains plague. As cop Paul Douglas properly points out the guy died from two bullets in the chest. That's not the issue here, the two of them become unwilling partners in an effort to find the killers and anyone else exposed to the disease.<br /><br />As was pointed out by any number of people, for some reason director Elia Kazan did not bother to cast the small parts with anyone that sounds like they're from Louisiana. Having been to New Orleans where the story takes place I can personally attest to that. Richard Widmark and his wife Barbara Bel Geddes can be excused because as a Navy doctor he could be assigned there, but for those that are natives it doesn't work.<br /><br />But with plague out there and the news being kept a secret, the New Orleans PD starts a dragnet of the city's underworld. The dead guy came off a ship from Europe and he had underworld connections. A New Orleans wise guy played by Jack Palance jumps to a whole bunch of erroneous conclusions and starts harassing a cousin of the dead guy who is starting to show plague symptoms. Palance got rave reviews in the first film where he received notice.<br /><br />Personally my favorite in this film is Zero Mostel. This happened right before Mostel was blacklisted and around that time he made a specialty of playing would be tough guys who are really toadies. He plays the same kind of role in the Humphrey Bogart film, The Enforcer. Sadly I can kind of identify with Mostel in that last chase scene where he and Palance are being chased down by Widmark, Douglas, and half the New Orleans Police. Seeing the weight challenged Zero trying to keep up with Palance was something else because I'm kind of in Zero's league now in the heft department.<br /><br />Kazan kept the action going at a good clip, there's very little down time in this film. If there was any less it would be an Indiana Jones film. Panic In The Streets won an Oscar for Best Original Screenplay that year.<br /><br />Kazan also made good use of the New Orleans waterfront and the French Quarter. Some of the same kinds of shots are later used in On the Waterfront. In fact Panic In The Streets is about people not squealing when they really should in their own best interest. Very similar again to On the Waterfront.<br /><br />Panic In The Streets does everyone proud who was associated with it. Now why couldn't Elia Kazan get some decent New Orleans sounding people in the small roles. | 1 | trimmed_train |
14,361 | Picture the classic noir story lines infused with hyper-stylized black and white visuals of Frank Miller's Sin City. Then picture a dystopian, science fiction thriller, such as Steven Spielberg's Minority Report or Richard Linklater's A Scanner Darkly. An amalgamation of the above would be a suitable way of describing visionary french director Christian Volckman's bleak and atmospheric take on the future in his feature film debut. But although Volckman's work does unquestionably take reference from the aforementioned films and those similar to them, such a simplistic hybrid does not do Renaissance, Volckman's end result, justice - the film itself is a far more complex piece of work than that.<br /><br />Genre hybridity is usually a hit and miss affair, especially in a contemporary context, with the well of individuality appearing to be increasingly exhausted. As such, Renaissance is laudable as a cinematic experiment at the very least, with its unique interspersing of the gritty nihilism of the neo-noir detective thriller and the fantastic allegorical terror of the dystopian sci-fi drama, which serve to compliment each other's storytelling conventions in a strangely fitting fashion. The screenplay is a clever and intriguing one (although one gets the sense that many of the lines in the script would have been much more effective in their original french than the English translation - the film's title also becomes far more poignant) managing to stay one step ahead of its audience all the way through. Though many elements of the plot will seem quite familiar to those who frequent such science fiction thrillers, the script throws unexpected twists and turns in at exactly the right moment to keep the viewer on their toes, making for a truly compelling work.<br /><br />Volckman's film truly excels in its visual component, and the stunning black and white animation is easily the film's highlight - superbly moody and stylish, it goes to show what tremendous aesthetic effect the simple use of two shades can have. With tremendous detail paid to the composition and look of each shot, and superb use of very noir shadows and intriguing angles to accentuate the emotional tension of the scene, the film appears straight out of a Frank Miller comic, but with a twist, the end result being consistently visually sumptuous. <br /><br />The film's English rendition is also given added credence by its very fitting array of voice casting. The gruff voice of Daniel Craig is an absolutely perfect piece of casting for grim, stoic policeman Karas, and Catherine McCormack is a strong presence as the mysterious woman whose sister's disappearance he is investigating. Despite a wavering English accent, Romola Garai does great work as the frantic sister in question, and Jonathan Pryce is suitably menacing as the shady head of ominous mega-corporation Avalon. Ian Holm's reedy voice is also a strong choice as a mysterious scientist, and Holm makes a powerful impression in his brief scenes.<br /><br />All together, Renaissance boasts a visually stunning, unique and compelling futuristic thriller, just as intelligent as it is entertaining. Though the plot may seem familiar to those who frequent such fare and the occasional weak line may inhibit the film from being the moody masterpiece it set out to be, the superb animation in itself easily carries the film through its occasional qualms. For fans of either of the film's intertwined genres or the gritty graphic novels of Frank Miller, or those willing to appreciate a capably crafted, slightly less conventional take on the futuristic thriller, the film is without question worth a watch.<br /><br />-8/10 | 1 | trimmed_train |
6,905 | Who was George C. Scott? George C. Scott was a renowned actor. Practically any movie that he's been in is the better off for it. Now ol' George had absolutely NOTHING to do with this movie..., but he once said something that describes said movie to a T.<br /><br />I don't recall his exact words, but he basically said that Great Writing can Save Bad Acting, But Great Acting CanNOT save Bad Writing. Never has this little observation been truer than in "The All New Adventures of Laurel & Hardy: For Love or Mummy".<br /><br />The casting of the two leads was absolutely perfect. Bronson Pinchot (Laurel) and Gailard Sartain (Hardy) not only look the parts, but they do an exceptionally good job at mimicking the real deal (mannerisms and all). This movie should stand as a lasting testament to their talents. That said, this movie falls flat on its face when it comes to (you guessed it) WRITING.<br /><br />Aside from the opening dialogue between Pinchot and Sartain (which was very "in character") and a brief gag involving a taxi, this movie is an absolute chore to sit through.<br /><br />PROBLEM # 1: Too much time and effort went into the plot.<br /><br />I don't want to know why the mummy wants to kidnap the pretty British lady. What I WANT is to see Stan and Ollie (or at least, their stand-ins). Way too much screen time was devoted to explaining the plot or to the not-very-funny secondary characters that said plot revolved around.<br /><br />However, even if this movie had been all jokes, that would still leave us with...<br /><br />...PROBLEM # 2: Most of the jokes are what I would call "watered-down" slapstick. <br /><br />What do I mean by "watered down"?<br /><br />In slapstick, a character gets hurt in an exaggerated way for comedic effect (ala Looney Tunes, 3 Stooges...,or how about Laurel & Hardy?).<br /><br />In "watered-down" slapstick (as I define it), a character gets mildly hurt or inconvenienced, and the filmmakers play that up for comedic effect.<br /><br />Maybe an illustration would help:<br /><br />In Looney Tunes, Daffy Duck gets shot by Elmer Fudd. His bill falls off and he puts it back on. That is classic slapstick.<br /><br />In this "gem", Ollie accidentally bumps into some people. They turn around, tell him to be careful, and continue on their merry way. That's not slapstick. That's not even funny. That's just...boring...and this movie is full of these kinds of jokes. It's as though they're this movie's bread and butter. The writers and directors just take these dull moments and act like they're supposed to be funny. Granted, the example I just gave is the most extreme case, but I can only cut it so much slack.<br /><br />Long story short: The film just doesn't work because the script fails to capitalize on Pinchot's and Sartain's abilities to impersonate Stan and Ollie. Instead, the script capitalizes on plot exposition and lame jokes. Watching this movie is basically watching two excellent impersonators who were given no real material to work with.<br /><br />Not a good movie, but an incredible sleeping aid.<br /><br />I say give this one a miss and stick with the real deal (just so long as you steer clear of "Atoll K" and "Be Big"). | 0 | trimmed_train |
4,464 | **** SPOILER WARNING ****<br /><br />Absolutely without a doubt, one of the funniest comedies ever created for the screen. Totally impossible to take any of this seriously. It would take a major novel to list all of the comedy routines in it. During the glory days of her program, Carol Burnett and company, who often did take-offs on films, skewered this one in ways that were hard to imagine. Carol played Jenny who suddenly became ill with only a slight cough and immediately the treacly music came up and everyone looked around wondering where it was coming from. Harvey Korman played Oliver with flowing locks and almost look liked Ryan O'Neal. The only thing funnier than this bit, is the real film.<br /><br />What a death scene at the end. Jenny really looks like she's dying alright...dying for her make-up artist to come in and give her a little color. And of course, we all know how often hospitals encourage a loved one to get in bed with them during the patient's final moments. The ending scene with Ryan O'Neal sitting on a bench in the snow contemplating his future in the movie business is an instant classic. He had plenty to worry about. He never did recover from this. | 0 | trimmed_train |
17,713 | Madhur Bhandarkar goes all out to touch upon taboo issues and gives the most realistic picture of the modern society. One gets the impression of the director even from his earlier movies like Satta and Chandni bar. The issues just hinted on in the latter movie are explored and exposed in totality here. The casting is amazing and one can see the judgements on each scene from many angles. Mostly, the movie leaves you wondering on lots of facts around. As you start guessing the things, you end up at most being close, but missing the mark in many a scenes. It leaves a lasting impression in the end.<br /><br />Actors to watch are Konkana Sen Sharma, Boman Irani & Atul Kulkarni among others. The dialogues are well written and you feel you've lived around some of these people. There are still some scenes that make you think of more depths. The songs are in the background saving time and Lata's voice in a very meaningful song "Kitne Ajeeb" leaves you feeling you're left all alone in the midst of the modern society! | 3 | trimmed_train |
12,039 | Note to all mad scientists everywhere: if you're going to turn your son into a genetically mutated monster, you need to give him a scarier name than "Paul." I don't care if he's a frightening hammerhead shark with a mouthful of dagger-sharp teeth and the ability to ambush people in the water as well as on dry land. Give the kid a more worthy name like, "Thor," "Rock," or "Tiburon." Because even if he eats me up I will probably just sit there laughing, "Ha! Get a load of this!!! Paul the Monster is ripping me to shreds!!!!!" That's the worst part about this movie is, this shark-thing is referred to as "Paul" throughout the entire flick. It makes what could have been a decent, scary horror movie just seem silly. Not that there aren't other campy and contrived parts of "Hammerhead: Shark Frenzy." The scientists spend the entire movie wandering along this island, and all of a sudden one of the girls starts itching madly from walking in the lush forest, and just HAS to pour water on her feet to relive the itching, which of course allows "Paul" to come out of the water and kill her. The one thing SciFI Channel did right in this movie was let the hottie live. But that's a small silver lining in an otherwise disappointing movie. | 2 | trimmed_train |
21,719 | Based on a true story, this series is a gem within its kind. The slave that becomes queen by capturing the heart of the most powerful man in the village.<br /><br />In the diamond mining town of Tijuco in Brazil, the diamond commender--appointed by the king of Portugal--is the ultimate authority. Having grown up in the relative security of his house, the young and beautiful Xica da Silva finds her world threatened when he decides to sell her to a whorehouse in town, refusing to recognize that a black slave girl could be his daughter. In a desperate bid to save herself, Xica steals the diamonds collected by the diamond commender for the king, intending to use them to escape. The king's army arrives to collect the diamonds the very next day, however, and when the loot turns up missing, the diamond commender is led away in chains, his family dispossessed and thrown out in the street with only the clothes on their backs. Martin, the diamond commender's son, swears vengeance. Xica and the other slaves, however, are sold at auction, and Xica ends up in the home of the Sergeant Major, an old man who bought her solely to slake his lust. To the town of Tijuco, however, comes the new diamond commender, the elegant and ruthless Joao Fernandes. Immediately struck by Xica's beauty, he manipulates the Sergeant Major into selling her to him. And thus begins a love story, filled with danger, intrigue and passion, between a willful nobleman and a crafty slave girl who rises to one day become queen.<br /><br />The series is filled with rich details of the era's beliefs, superstitions, politics, fashion, etc. etc. And it really manages to captivate your attention for every minute. At times funny with a sarcastic and dark humor, full of suspense and unexpected twists. "Xica da Silva" is definitely a must. I wish I could buy the whole series on DVD. | 3 | trimmed_train |
11,857 | This is pretty much a low-budget, made for TV, type of movie intended to capitalize off of the success of the original. I'm a fan of b-movies, and this one might have been good had they not attached the name "Cube" to it, because as is, the director and plot of the original were better, and this movie just about ruined my taste for the entire series. The characters are annoying and clichéd, there are problems with continuity, and several outright production screw-ups. The story hardly gets a chance to develop because of superfluous dialogue and suffers from that. They more or less use the same horror gimmicks over and OVER throughout the movie, and because the first one was so good, this simply turns out as a disappointment.<br /><br />If this was a stand-alone b-movie, I'd probably give it about a four. The "1" rating I give it was pretty much a statement about how it utterly paled in effects and intelligence as compared to the first. | 0 | trimmed_train |
8,783 | "Sir" John Gielgud must have become senile to star in a mess of a movie like this one.;<br /><br />This is one of those films, I suppose, that is considered "art," but don't be fooled.....it's garbage. Stick to the "art" you can admire in a frame because the films that are labeled as such are usually unintelligible forgeries like this.<br /><br />In this masterpiece, Giegud recites Shakespeare's "The Tempest" while the camera pans away to nude people. one of them a little kid urinating in a swimming pool. Wow, this is heady stuff and real "art," ain't it?? That's just one example. Most of the story makes no sense, is impossible to follow and, hence, is one that Liberal critics are afraid to say they didn't "understand" so they give it high marks to save their phony egos. You want Shakespeare? Read his books. | 0 | trimmed_train |
19,630 | *****Spoilers herein*****<br /><br />What really scares you? Killer sharks, or maybe ghosts trying to bring back a message? Maybe a chainsaw wielding psychopath?<br /><br />Maybe. But those fears don't even compare to a horror which people dare not even speak of or consider--and that is the death of one's own child. "Pet Sematary" taps this base, primal adult fear, and then takes it to places that most could not bear to explore.<br /><br />I've read comments about this film that include poor acting, characters making stupid decisions, etc. I disagree. The acting is actually first rate for a film like this. Maybe it is impossible for many to imagine the desperation resulting from such a scenario. But the film's events are not only logical, they may be absolutely inevitable if such a scenario were possible. This is the true horror of "Pet Sematary": It isn't that pets and people come back from the dead as evil killers who hunt with knives and scalpels, it is that anyone who has lost a child could become so desperate as to commit the crimes that Louis Creed does. Despite warning, or even past history.<br /><br />The movie takes those willing to go with it to the depths of a desperate human heart. The heart of a protector trying to make up for not being able to protect. And the results are horrifying. In fact, when the film dives into slasher territory near the end, it's almost a letdown, although I believe it's perfectly logical how it got there.<br /><br />I am a true horror fan, and I contend that this is one of the scariest horror films ever made. If you don't think so, see it again after you have children. | 1 | trimmed_train |
19,964 | The pioneering Technicolor Cinematography (Winner of Special Technical Achievement Oscar) is indeed enchanting. Add an endless variety of glamorous costumes and a romantic cinema dream team like Marlene Dietrich and Charles Boyer, and you've got a rather pleasant "picture".<br /><br />Unfortunately the contrived plot as well as the over-blown acting leave much to be desired. Still, there have not been any more breathtaking Technicolor films before this one (1936), and very few since then, that can top this breathtaking visual experience of stunning colors. Cinema fans who have enjoyed the glorious color cinematography in "Robin Hood" (1938), "Jesse James" (1939) and "Gone With The Wind" (1939), will not be disappointed in the fantastic work done here. "The Garden Of Allah" will always be synonymous with brilliant color cinematography. | 1 | trimmed_train |
18,709 | by saying that,I mean that this is not a well made movie but it's a very good version of the real event and the best depiction so far.and if you are a WW2 buff then this is a treat for you,cause there are three out of four saboteur members playing roles in this movie. It's theater acting at best but then this is still as said before a semi documentary.<br /><br />Me personally am a die hard fan of our nearly over-human heroes of the second world war,and there should be hundreds of these movies showing us what they did so it won't get forgotten by next generations.Cause nowadays kids doesn't read books,they watch movies.<br /><br />So if you want a action extravaganza,rent Private Ryan,this is the truth about lingering pain,outrageous endurance and the will to fight when all seems lost. | 3 | trimmed_train |
7,895 | Man has been to the farthest reaches of the earth and now he is traveling to new worlds. But with new worlds come ancient evils... the vampires of space. And not just a handful but entire tribes. In this film (which I saw as "Bloodsuckers" but I guess also goes as "Vampires Wars") we see what happens when the imperialist earthlings meet the imperialist vampires.<br /><br />I will make this review very short because it's undeserving of a good review. The best I can say for this film is it has a good cast of b-list and upcoming stars. Natassia Malthe was Quintana, and was far more attractive here than in "Bloodrayne 2". Michael Ironside is Muco, and is always a fan favorite (as I say, he's the poor man's Jack Nicholson). And we even get Carrie-Ann Fleming as "Damian's wife", who horror fans will now recognize as the eponymous Jenifer from Dario Argento's "Jenifer". So this movie, as bad as it is, isn't without some names attached... but the same can be said of Uwe Boll's work.<br /><br />The concept of the military tracking and killing vampires in space isn't necessarily a bad idea, but it easily falls into the realm of "cheese" and this film falls hard. The acting, especially from the vampires, is over the top and I just didn't find the explanations of their existence very convincing. Worst of all, the vampire tribes have the names "Voorhess" and "Leatherfaces". I understand this was supposed to be a clever reference for the horror fans, but it wasn't clever at all. It just sounded dumb and out of place (unlike the much more subtle references in James Gunn's "Slither", such as naming stores after lesser-known horror directors).<br /><br />That's all I want to say. If you can stand lots of cheese (on this day I couldn't and I'm from Wisconsin) and want to see average actors with poor costumes fight vampires in space (although "space" looks a lot like any other forest on earth) check this one out, if you can find it. I don't personally recommend this when you can watch other cheesy vampires films (Jon Carpenter's "Vampires") or other cheesy space movies. Or maybe even some good ones. But, hey, do your thing. | 2 | trimmed_train |
12,935 | After seeing 'Break a Leg' in Vancouver at the release party I thought it was a very enjoyable film.<br /><br />I had a few outright belly laughs and some of the cameos (Eric Roberts in particular) were a scream. I haven't heard word about actual release date although I've heard it's close.<br /><br />The story is simple but is mainly a vehicle for the characters and situations. The script is smooth and seamless, the plot develops effortlessly and the acting is comfortable yet fresh. This film has won at least one award from EACH of the film festivals it's been in, which is around 10 - 15 or so.<br /><br />I highly recommend 'Break a Leg'. | 1 | trimmed_train |
2,471 | I remember a certain Tuesday, the morning of 18/6/02 to be exact. I was dozed off, trying to convince myself to get out of bed when a horrific explosion was heard. I went to the kitchen where I have a view of several neighborhoods in the southern Jerusalem and saw a pillar of smoke rising from a distant point, the sight of the smoke was followed a minute later by the waling of sirens. I remember rushing to my bedroom, taking out my binoculars, racing back to the kitchen and spotting the image of a glass shattered bus. The bus was still near the pick up station where a terrorist boarded on it and with a single click on a TNT device, murdered 25 passengers, many of whom were on their way to school. The wife of a good friend of mine, sat on the bus at the back row, a seemingly arbitrary and meaningless decision that saved her life.<br /><br />I'm sure that every Israeli has at least one terror-related memory he wishes he never would have had and it was only a matter of time before someone made a film about it. As it turned out, the movie was about to become a repressed memory of its own.<br /><br />The film is about a play-write on a dry run, Haim Buzaglo (portrayed by, hmmm, Haim Buzaglo who also wrote and directed the film) that spends the better part of his day conducting staring contests with his blank word processor page. In the meantime, his girlfriend, a field reporter for the Israeli commercial channel, decides to make a piece about a debt ridden ex-army officer. Buzaglo, bored and a bit paranoid due what is medically known as the "what on earth this hot babe is dating me" syndrome, asks a private eye to conduct a stakeout on his girlfriend.<br /><br />As the detective progresses in his investigation, his observations are permeating into the play and later on, to the lives of its actors. In the meantime, the play metamorphoses from a comic play into an indictment against the aloofness of the Israeli society. As for the movie, well, the movie becomes an exercise in frenzy editing, ensconced in its petty cardboard characters and unreliable dialogs while drifting miles away from the subject it was supposed to deal with in the first place.<br /><br />When I say "cardboard characters" I refer to the characters that under the writer/director's obsession for a "meaningful" film, were devoid of any genuine dialogs and any shred of reliability. I won't elaborate too much about it. Suffice to say that I'm sure that homeless barefoot male prostitutes rarely go the theater. With the intention to see a play, that is.<br /><br />This movie, according to Haim Buzaglo himself is the first part of a current agenda trilogy. I sincerely hope that the other two films will be derived from the experiences like the one I wrote about in the beginning of my review as opposed to the secluded world of characters that are anything but existent and a plot that is anything but compelling.<br /><br />4 out of 10 in my FilmOmeter.<br /><br />P.S. This movie was a landmark in austerity. It was shot in ten days, all the cast worked for free and the entire cost of the film was about 12,000$ (no, I didn't omit a zero or two, twelve thousand dollars). Makes you wonder why it took 34,000$ to complete Blair witch project. | 2 | trimmed_train |
15,763 | The film belongs to Inventor - Underdog genre. Jake Gyllenhaal, Laura Dern and Chris Cooper bring a little acting verve to story with several standard elements. Well filmed, well edited, with plenty of well acted secondary roles.<br /><br />Some have declared this movie to be classic American hokey. It is that and more. I agree with those who say "The movie celebrates the thrill of youthful inspiration." <br /><br />The film is a pleasant reminder that achievement may be born of ordinary roots.<br /><br /> | 3 | trimmed_train |
1,548 | Just finished watching, can't say I was impressed.<br /><br />It starts of quite good, the visual and the atmosphere gives a creepy feeling as this type of movie should. But it all ends when the first lordi monster appears. Not only do you recognize them from the band lordi, but they are seriously malplaced in the movie. Doomsday monsters with leather jackets and piercings are so 80's.<br /><br />As for the storyline, it starts of as similar horror movies, people trapped inside a hell hole. But there is no clear story on why and what is happening. The viewer is thrown some lines on possible reasons, but the lines never meet and end up to anything but a mess.<br /><br />With all the money spent on this film, with an intriguing start and some good effects, I had thought someone would have taken better care of the product. I wonder if lordi made this movie just to prove that their show costumes could be scary (except they aren't).<br /><br />So the movie gets cred for the visuals, i guess the money had to go somewhere. But the rest is an embarrassing attempt from a rock band to make their on-stage monster aliases scarier. | 0 | trimmed_train |
4,515 | "Semana Santa" or "Angel Of Death" is a very weak movie. Mira Sorvino plays a detective who is trying to find a killer who shoots arrows in people. Mira has an Italian accent which falters from time to time. Couldn't she just speak English? All the other characters have a forced Mexican\English accent which is distracting. The dialogue is very bad and the delivery of it is wooden. The cinematography looks nice, but that's not enough to save this tripe. THIS NEXT PART OF THIS REVIEW DOES CONTAIN SPOILERS!!!! <br /><br />During the climax it looks like the villain is going to get away, but then he comes back down stairs to get shot and do a cool stunt down the railing. That just shows this script has no originality whatsoever. AVOID! | 2 | trimmed_train |
11,190 | I saw this cinematic wretchedness in a dollar theater with a friend in 1979 (back when the tickets actually sold for $1). This is the only film I have ever walked out on (with my friend, while the idiocy that is the "Laser Bra 2000" sketch was on screen). Evidently, my and my friend's reaction to the film was a common one. It is not that I found the film offensive (either as an 18-year-old or now), but rather that it is mind-numbingly stupid and patently unfunny, devoid even of the unintended humor that makes a Ed Wood film watchable. This is the real reason why NBC refused to air it, rather than a failure to comprehend Mr. Mike's "vision" (unless, of course, his vision was to drive the film's backers into bankruptcy).<br /><br />I remained surprised to this day that this film does not seem to have made any published "10 worst films of all time" list. It certainly makes mine. You have been warned. | 0 | trimmed_train |
11,597 | This film came recommended as a good action film, which I don't really think it is. I found the story convoluted and not all that easy to follow. There really isn't that much action until the end of the film and it's pretty dark and hard to see what's really happening. I was sure hoping for something different, but, alas, didn't find it here. | 2 | trimmed_train |
22,130 | Just like Al Gore shook us up with his painfully honest and cleverly presented documentary-movie "An inconvenient truth", directors Alastair Fothergill and Mark Linfield also remind us that it's about time to improve our way of life in order to save our beautiful planet. "Planet earth" is also a wake-up call that the global warming of our planet has disastrous consequences for all living creatures around the world. Al Gore showed us the bleak future of planet Earth by presenting hard facts backed up by documented examples through long yet always interesting monologues. The creators of this documentary choose a different yet equally powerful way to accomplish this. They do not present us with a future representation of what might occur to our planet if we don't radically change things around, but they rather show us the genuine beauty of planet Earth in all of its amazing glory. We see places that we knew that existed but never thought they could be so beautiful. In this movie, we see a wide array of the most extraordinary places such as forsaken deserts, giant forests full of fauna and flora and icy-landscapes as far as the eye could see. And in all of those immensely different environments, we see the most beautiful animals trying to survive.<br /><br />This is exactly the kind of movie that had to be made, in combination with the one from Al Gore, in order to make us realize that our planet is too precious to meddle with. The voice-over by Patrick Stewart is always relaxing and thus very well done although at first it sounded as though I was watching an X-men movie instead! The cinematography is probably the most remarkable thing of this documentary. At times: what you see is so unreal that you tend to forget that a man with a camera actually had to film all of that delightful footage.<br /><br />In short: This is definitely a must-see for everyone since it concerns every single person on this beautiful planet Earth! The truth is: I never thought our planet was so astonishingly beautiful! | 1 | trimmed_train |
9,151 | This is possibly the worst of all the Columbo movies. Andrew Stevens' acting is poor as the villain, and the plot is weak. In fact none of the cast seem able to act other than Peter Falk, who puts in a creditable performance as the Lieutenant. | 0 | trimmed_train |
20,041 | Raggedy Ann & Andy is the first movie I ever saw in the theaters. My dad took my sister and I, and the funny thing is - when we got home, dad asked us "what do you want to do now?" and we said we want to watch Raggedy Ann & Andy again! lol, and my dad actually took us back to the theatre to watch it again -- at least that's how I remember it. I was five years old at the time.<br /><br />This movie was pretty scary for a five year old. The scene with the giant ocean of sweets, and the hypnotic camel scene.. i don't remember a lot from this film, naturally, the beginning was magical, and a few scenes -- I wish I could find it again, and will likely seek it out now.<br /><br />I remember I loved Raggedy Ann & Andy. | 1 | trimmed_train |
12,109 | This documentary is a reenactment of the last few years of Betty Page's(Paige Richards) career. The Tennessee tease was the most recognizable pin-up queen in history. Her most memorable work came in the 1950's and was fetish photos, bondage and cat-fight "girly flicks". Irving Klaw(Dukey Flyswatter)at his Movie Star News instructed Betty on what to do in front of the camera. There was no nudity in the famous photos or "stag films", but nonetheless, Klaw was charged with distributing obscene materials and was ordered to destroy them to avoid prosecution. It is no surprise that Betty had a cult following at the height of her career. The girl-next-door with jet black hair, blue eyes and an hour glass figure dressed in fetish gear or not would mesmerize for decades. After all, it has been said that she was photographed more than Marilyn Monroe and second only to the most photographed image in the world, Elvis Presley. Betty Page would disappear and devote her last years to religion. This movie actually could have been a lot better; but good enough to hold interest.<br /><br />Miss Richards is stunning in her own right. Bra, panties, garter belt and hose do not hurt her image in the least. Also in the cast: Jaimie Henkin, Jana Strain, Emily Marilyn and Julie Simone. Be advised this movie can change your heart rate. | 2 | trimmed_train |
21,071 | I loves this movie,because it showed that they were not killing for fun but to save the ones they loved! Heath Ledger and Orlando Bloom did a great job portraying Ned and Joe. It has a few quick inappropriate scenes but is all right other than that. The language is very mild and sometimes don't even know it is there. This movie shows that just because they are outlaws does not mean that they are vicious killers! I hope that people will watch this movie and learn about important times in history like this one. There is one thing that fascinates me about this movie is that they got their inspiration for their armor from a book Ned looked at! Also that that is how people remember them,from their armor. I hope that people will watch this movie and get interested as I have. | 3 | trimmed_train |
18,324 | This film seems to get bad critiscism for some reason. Probably just by the mass populace. Anyhow, this is actually a very interesting movie. The film is an under-budget sci-fi movie which actually works, due to an interesting storyline and well done scenes. <br /><br />This movie may not be for everyone though. If there are any Sci-Fi fans reading this, I truly recommend this movie if you like good ole science fiction. The film has crazy ideas. The setting includes nations going to war with GIGANTIC machines which the entire countries invest all it's money in! The world has been divied up into territories. Anyone can challenge anyone else to a war, or rather, a 'robot-duel'. The method of warfare is cleaner than nuclear war, since now everyone is wearing those breath masks. Definetly a movie that makes you think. Intelligent, well written, and good effects for the measly budget.<br /><br />I tend to like movies which have small budgets and actually work. | 3 | trimmed_train |
9,642 | I got all excited when I saw the ads for this movie because I recently read the book and really enjoyed it. The movie, however, did not meet my expectations. Having read the book recently prepared me for big let down as often happens when stories are translated into movies. The characters didn't seem to fit very well with the book. The direction was weak. I had a hard time getting into the characters. There wasn't a real connection with the viewer about what was going on. The dialog didn't explain adequately what was happening. It just seemed slapped together and rushed through. All in all I was very disappointed with the movie. I suppose if you haven't read the book, it might be ok by itself. At the very least, it might entice you to read the book, which you'll probably enjoy more.<br /><br /> | 2 | trimmed_train |
14,784 | Idiotic hack crooks, a babe, a safe, a plan and a baby. Add them all up and you get the best comedy you've never heard of. <br /><br />Even with some a-list star power (at least a-minus...okay, b-plus?) this movie got very little publicity.<br /><br />But that does not diminish its genius.<br /><br />Terrific writing, solid delivery and a believable group of characters. Some truly classic lines, and a fun twist at the end.<br /><br />This is not some watered-down "Nutty Professor" comedy. These are low-life bad guys. They speak low-life bad guy language and they do low-life bad guy things. But they do it for your amusement and entertainment, and they do that well.<br /><br />One of the best comedies I've ever seen. | 3 | trimmed_train |
19,200 | Lawrence Olivier and Merle Oberon did two movies together within two years. One is considered one of the great romantic films of all time, and the movie that made Olivier a great movie star (and gave Oberon her best performance role): WUTHERING HEIGHTS. The other is this film, made in England a year earlier. THE DIVORCE OF LADY X is a romantic comedy (as WUTHERING HEIGHTS is a romantic tragedy). Olivier is a lawyer, Everard Logan, who is a dynamic barrister, but is also a total misogynist. One night he checks into a hotel just ahead of a crowd of people. It is a very foggy night (the type of pea soup fog that London was known for up until a notorious "killer" fog in the 1950s), and the crowd (who'd been attending a party in the hotel) need beds. The management tries to get Logan to allow one or two socialite ladies to sleep on a couch and a day bed in his rooms, but he refuses. But he has not reckoned with Merle Oberon as Leslie Steele. The granddaughter of a high court judge, she manages to get into Logan's rooms and manipulates him to not only agree to her sleeping there, but appropriates his bed (he goes onto the couch - much to his discomfort).<br /><br />The next day they share a breakfast, and in the smalltalk it is evident that despite his mistrust of women Logan finds Leslie very attractive. But she kittenishly refuses to tell him her name. She is determined to learn more about him, and she finds his attitude toward women infuriating. In the meantime, Logan is approached by a wealthy nobleman (Ralph Richardson as Lord Mere) as a potential client. Mere suspects his wife Lady Mere (Binnie Barnes) of having an affair. In fact, he tells Logan her Ladyship was with her lover in the hotel that Logan knows he was in on the night of the fog. Logan (naturally) jumps to the conclusion that Lady Mere was his mysterious roommate that night. I will not go into the plot any further, except to say that Leslie eventually realizes what a mistake Logan has made, and decides to use it to teach him a lesson about women.<br /><br />The script has the feel of a Wodehouse novel, but is slighter. Still the performances of Olivier, Oberon, Richardson, Barnes, and Morton Selden (as Oberon's grandfather) are all splendid. It shows what a good cast can do with even the slightest of materials. Take a look at some of the minor scenes to see what I mean: Selden's first scene, complaining about his weak coffee to his butler/valet, who tells him off properly (they've been used to each other's personalities for years). Or Olivier dealing with a young clerk in his office, who is certain there were two Lady Meres in the office two minutes before (there were, but Oberon and Barnes left together), and ends up thinking the poor clerk is a simpleton. Or the waiter in the hotel who can't understand why the tenant in Olivier's room is constantly changing from a man to a woman to a man. As I said, a slight charming comedy - but it is very charming. | 1 | trimmed_train |
6,876 | I can't believe that this movie even made it to video, and that video rental stores are willing to put it on their shelves. I literary asked for a refund. Take away the fact that the movie has no historical truth it, and it is still the worse movie ever found in a video store. It is not even good enough to be called a B rated movie. Do not waste your money or your time on this movie. Just listing to the voice over and the horrible music made me sick. Anyone involved with this movie should be pulled from the union, gives the industry a black mark, but after watching most of this movie I really don't think anyone involved is a union member. | 0 | trimmed_train |
10,774 | As an engineer, I must say this show's first season started out very promising. Most of the applied mathematics were somewhat plausible, and the relationships portrayed between the Eppes brothers and father gave the show an interesting edge.<br /><br />But after the first season, the show started degrading, heavily. Most of the mathematics and technology used in crime solving is now utter gibberish and very laughable to all people involved in science & technology for real.<br /><br />The involvement from the actors still feels okay and I can imagine a fair amount of money is still going into producing each episode, but in the end, this has degraded to a very unpleasantly tasting dish which is a mix of a grade C action thriller and CSI style cop show.<br /><br />If you are gonna watch it, go for only the first season and possibly parts of the second. Thereafter I would not waste my time. Myself, I gave the show up midway through season 3.<br /><br />Season 1 - 8 stars Season 2 - 5 stars Season 3 - 3 stars<br /><br />Let's sum that up to 4 stars. Since Charlie doesn't know his math anymore, I won't bother with the correctness of mine either. | 2 | trimmed_train |
22,751 | This show was a landmark in American comedy as it was the first sitcom to star an all Afro-American cast. Sadly though it was never broad-casted on British TV.<br /><br />The Evans family are a poor Afro-American family living in a tower block. The Dad is called James, he tries to run the house, but his wife Florida always gets the better of him. The three children are the artistic JJ, the moody Thelma and the young intellectual child Michael. Always coming into the house is Florida's gossipy friend Willona.<br /><br />I watched two episodes of this show on youtube (Black Jesus and Sex and the Evans Family- the only two on the site). You may be thinking why has an English viewer watched a series that has never been shown or hardly heard of in his country. The answer is this. In 1976, Britains first all black sitcom came out called "The Fosters" Only two series were made and it now seems forgotten. But I watched an episode and was really impressed. Then I learnt that the scripts were identical to "Good Times". They were exactly the same characters but with different names- Sam Foster was the Dad, his wife was Pearl Foster and the three children were Sonny (a young Lenny Henry), Shirley and Benjamin. Pearl's gossipy friend was Vilma. (To read about The Fosters, I have wrote a review about that). Whilst watching "Good Times" only two things annoyed me. First off was the opening theme tune (awful) and secondly was the audience laughter. I like audience laughter, but in this somebody would say a slightly funny line and the audience would go mad and start clapping. Apart from that it was a very funny show. Let's hope more episodes turn up on youtube and lets hope that someone will release "The Fosters" on DVD in England.<br /><br />Best Episode: Sex and the Evans family- Series 1 episode 6. The Foster's episode of it was called Sex in the Black Community. The other episode I saw, Black Jesus was a title of one episode of "The Fosters" | 3 | trimmed_train |
23,101 | I Enjoyed Watching This Well Acted Movie Very Much!It Was Well Acted,Particularly By Actress Helen Hunt And Actors Steven Weber And Jeff Fahey.It Was A Very Interesting Movie,Filled With Drama And Suspense,From The Beginning To The Very End.I Reccomend That Everyone Take The Time To Watch This Made For Television Movie,It Is Excellent And Has Great Acting!! | 3 | trimmed_train |
80 | You can never have seen either film and still know that The Jerk Too is a disaster. The question is not, "How did it get made," because if you throw money at anyone and tell them to make a film, they will do so.<br /><br />No. The question is "Why, oh why, did Steve Martin allow it to be made?" I think he needed the money to fight a nuisance lawsuit and was determined it not cost him anything. He knew the sequel was going to be so frightful, that out of pride, he wouldn't even count it's royalties as income. <br /><br />The only way this sequel could not be an embarrassment is to have had Carl Gottlieb and Steve Martin revive the nation's favorite poor black family.<br /><br />And "dcreasy2001" (aka Mark Blankfield?): It's just transparently obvious that you worked on this film in some sad capacity, and the only way you can feel better about your involvement is to be the sequel's lone cheerleader as an IMDb user comment. I was praying for you to veer over into satire, but alas, you were really making an effort at spin. Why not 10 stars? | 0 | trimmed_train |
5,014 | Let's just say it in simple words so that even the makers of this film might have a chance to understand: This is a very dumb film with an even dumber script, lame animation, and a story that's about as original as thumbtacks. Don't bother -- unless you need to find some way to entertain a group of mentally retarded adults or extremely slow children. They might laugh, especially if they're off their meds. There's a special kind of insult in a film this ridiculous -- not only do the filmmakers apparently think that children are brainless idiots who can be entertained with claptrap that cost approximately zero effort, but they don't even bother to break a sweat inserting a gag here and there that an adult might find amusing. This film, frankly, ticked me off royally. Shame on you for stooping so low. | 0 | trimmed_train |
12,271 | For die-hard Judy Garland fans only. There are two (2) numbers that are really good -- one where she does a number with an older cleaning lady (you've all seen the pics), and a pretty good number at the very end. There are a couple of scenes where the lines are funny. But, basically, the script is so bad and the movie so dated that it's hard not to cringe at the awfulness throughout. But it's worth the 2.50 to rent the movie -- just be prepared to fast-forward it. | 2 | trimmed_train |
13,691 | Dressed to Kill understandably made a bit of a ruckus when first released in 1980: you had "Police Girl" in a role that was mega-erotic, as Angie Dicknson played a sexually frustrated housewife looking for good times in all the wrong museums (and there into apartment elevators), plus Nancy Allen as a call-girl, Michael Caine as Norman Bates's sophisticated New York cousin, and enough lurid imagery to last two movies of the period. Today it's slightly less incriminating by standards and such, though the unrated version has some of the most "hot" content of any of De Palma's films, at least in his quasi-auteur period of the 70s and early 80s, where he seemed to repeat themes over and over, ideas taken right off the film-reels of Hitchcock classics and given a tawdry uplift. It's a simple tale that one partly already saw in Sisters, and then again to an extent in Body Double, and also in Blow Out. Cutie Allen plays call-girl Liz Blake, who has to clear her name of suspicion of killing Kate (Dickinson, in full blown 'MILF' mode), after being found with a razor, the murder weapon from Dr. Elliott's office (Michael Caine, stone-cold performance most of the way).<br /><br />From the start, which De Palma seems to do as a way of setting up a dangerous sexual fantasy scene as a way of topping the opening scene of Carrie (which, perhaps, he does just in editing terms), we get a series of technical knock-out turns through the point of view of style itself: the tracking shots in the museum, meant to stir up more of a fascination with the process itself, of following and wanting to be followed, than any kind of tension; the chase through the subway (a precursor to Carlito's Way) is done with a precise level of suspense, meanwhile, with a slightly exploitation bit thrown in with the black gang; the character of Peter, Kate's son (Keith Gordon), who plays what is essentially a younger version of the real life De Palma as a kid (science geek, obsessed with Hitchcock and voyeurism). And it's all entertaining and entrancing as hell as something that comes close to a real synthesis of what makes De Palma's thrillers so unique while being so self-consciously untainted by a fearless attitude of film-making.<br /><br />On the other hand, that same self-consciousness ended up coming back to bite the director in the butt a few times in recent years, and somehow in Dressed to Kill it starts to become very erratic and disappointing as the story has to wrap itself up. As the Psycho themes come together even more apparently (man who wants a sex-change, doesn't even think he's killing as it is *she* who is doing it), there is an expository scene in the police station that makes the aforementioned Hitch film look like an astonishing psychological revelation. And the final scenes at Peter's house, also calling painfully into recollection a much more accomplished sequence in Carrie, are meant for a manipulation that even for De Palma is asking for it; the final shot especially, albeit a master's class in how to copy yourself. Yet there is a very deranged and, within itself, perfect scene at the mental hospital amid this confused denouement, where the doctor does some work on a nurse, to which all the other inmates act like animals in a zoo, and an over-head shot going up and up over the scene is one of the best shots of sexual/general perversion ever captured on film.<br /><br />A shame then that the film ends on such a strange and unsettling manner, where up until then it is a remarkable piece of pulp cinema, where class is all around in the technical aspects (soft lighting, intricate camera movements seemingly so simple) amid subject matter that should be found in the mix of paperbacks for 25 cents. It's no masterpiece, but I'd certainly take it over most of the director's recent thrillers any day. | 1 | trimmed_train |
17,870 | Though I can't claim to be a comic book fanatic, I have read my share, so I guess I'm part of the audience of this film, and I wasn't disappointed. It does run out of steam near the end, it's almost overflowing with ideas, and it seems like Lena Olin, one of my favorite actresses, was left on the cutting room floor. Also, a little of Hank Azaria's Blue Raja can go a long way. Still, it's easy to forgive all of these faults when you have a film which is this much fun. All the actors seem to be having a blast with their roles, especially William H. Macy as the straight-arrow Shoveler, and Janeane Garofalo as The Bowler. And unlike some, I found the design of the city to make the joke even funnier. I also liked how disco was the music of choice of the bad guys; somehow, it seemed appropriate. | 3 | trimmed_train |
7,873 | Watching Marlen Brando on screen is like watching a master carpenter chiseling intricate details into a piece of mahogany. Brando's acting is the ONLY thing that makes this movie watchable. The plot is inane and laughable (not comic). The other big name actors seem to be making desperate attempts to give the characters they portray some modicum of humanity... these characters have the humanity of wet cardboard. Everything about the technical side of this film is either mediocre or just plain awful. The director throws freeze-frame and slow-motion shots about with impunity. The incidental music is cartoonish and destroys any hint of dramatic effect. It's not something I really look for in a movie, but even the wardrobe was way off. The venerable Brando couldn't take focus away from the awful rags they had him decked out in. I've heard this movie called "David Lynch-esquire" and "irreverently funny"... it is neither. David Lynch films are borne of wicked creativity - this film was in no way creative. And don't confuse irreverence with stupidity. | 2 | trimmed_train |
3,374 | "A young woman unwittingly becomes part of a kidnapping plot involving the son of a movie producer she is babysitting. The kidnappers happen to be former business partners of the son's father and are looking to exact some revenge on him. Our babysitter must bide her time and wait to see what will become of the son and herself, while the kidnappers begin to argue amongst themselves, placing the kidnap victims in great peril," according to the DVD sleeve's synopsis.<br /><br />That acclaimed director René Clément could be responsible for this haphazard crime thriller is the real shocker. Despite beginning with the appearance of having been edited in a washing machine, the film develops a linear storyline. Once you've figured out what is going on, the engaging Maria Schneider (as Michelle) and endearing John Whittington (as Boots) can get you through the film. There are a couple of female nude scenes, which fit into the storyline well.<br /><br />**** Wanted: Babysitter (10/15/75) René Clément ~ Maria Schneider, John Whittington, Vic Morrow | 2 | trimmed_train |
14,869 | A wonderful film, filled with great understated performance and sharp, intelligent dialogue. What really distinguishes the film, however, is that undercurrent of sadness throughout. The story is underscored by affairs, loneliness, suicide, disappointment, the fear of losing ones job in a world where that had disastrous consequences. Most of all it was set in a world that no longer existed, having been ripped apart by the beginning of World War II. In fact, the film is barely a comedy at all if you compare the percentage of serious scenes to the comic scenes. Yet funny it is--listen to Margaret Sullivan's harsh dismissal of Jimmy Stewart and watch his pained expression as he replies that her comments were a remarkable blend "of poetry and meanness". It's funny, pointed, and sad all at once. A remarkable achievement and one of the ten greatest screen comedies ever made. | 3 | trimmed_train |
20,036 | am i the only one who saw the connection between the discussion of camus 'the myth of sisyphus' and mary's life? in camus version a man is condemned to spend his eternity with a giant boulder that he must roll up a hill. unfortunately every time he reaches the top the boulder slips and ends up back at the bottom for him to start. there may have been a buzzard pecking at his eyes, i'm not sure right now. in the movie mary spends her life struggling to get her life together, unfortunately every time she gains any footing she falls and loses everything. case in point would be the party she throws where she gets intoxicated, offends her falafel lover, and is practically attacked by liev schrieber. in case you question this theory, note how this scene ends with her attempting to climb a flight of stars while books fall from nowhere impeding her progress until ultimately she passes out. the next morning when she awakens she is still on the stairs, never having reached the top. | 1 | trimmed_train |
21,218 | This movie blows you off your feet. This debut movie from Tom Barman (known from the Belgian rock band dEUS) introduces you to 8 intriguing people, building blocks of a compelling movie mosaic. They each survive one day and one night in the metropole of Antwerp. Barman paints his characters with great deal of verve and competently interweaves their individual stories, a tour the force that reminds of the best work of Robert Altman and Paul Thomas Anderson. The patchwork of anecdotes surprises, moves, amuses; the dialogues are so natural, they seem to be improvised. Some great performances by Matthias Schoenaerts, Natali Broods and the extremely funny duo from Ghent, Jonas Boel and Titus De Voogdt. Sam Louwyck is the memorable "Windman", a bizarre guy dancing throughout the movie. Sam is also responsible for the stunning choreography, and of course Tom Barman himself took care of the ultra cool Sound Track. We were seriously impressed: Any Way The Wind Blows is a movie that blows you off your feet. | 1 | trimmed_train |
21,411 | If the screenwriter and director intended to open hearts with the movie as the musician wanted to do with his music, they succeeded with me. Commonplace human situations became original, personal and immediate so that I personally felt touched by each situation. I believe I would credit the power of music combined with the point of view of the person writing the movie. Without spoiling, I can say that I was very moved by the movie's approach to living. Haven't actually cried out of-what- joy? empathy? just deep emotion? in a very long time. I would love to find a way to show it to others. Saw it at Seattle International Film Festival. | 3 | trimmed_train |
12,521 | I was 10 years old when this show was on TV. By far it was my favorite. The actors were very credible. Alexandra Bastedo was just gorgeous.... I just order the DVD (15 episodes). They didn't have super-powers. They just had superior human skills (strength, hearing, sight). The 3 actors were very good in their rolls, very believable. There was a good story in each episode. At the time, there were no special effects or explosions everywhere, so the script was suppose to be good, and the characters performs were great. There was no fancy stuff, like in other shows. They didn't try to make a joke every 2 minutes to make a light show. I highly recommend this TV show to anybody that like good stuff. | 3 | trimmed_train |
6,424 | Why oh why don't blockbuster movies simply stick to their selling point? Everyone in the cinema, young and old, was there to see talking animals make jokes, and whilst they did that we were all happy... And then, as with Lost In Space, came the two killer blows - plot and sentiment. Who really cared what happened to the tiger or whether Eddie Murphy made up with his daughter? Not me, that's for sure. | 0 | trimmed_train |
8,961 | A truly dreadful film. I did not know initially that this was a Kiwi effort - but very soon I started to realize that all the characters were speaking with hardly disguised kiwi accents under the fake American ones. Why did it need to be set n America anyway? - it could have been set in NZ and then the actors could have used their normal voices. Surely someone in the production team could hear the dreadful attempts at speaking with American accents? A bad bad film. I am surprised it has lasted this long - how did it make it out of the can? It just seemed like a very poor attempt at a Segal/Willis type action man flick.A TOTAL WASTE OF MONEY! If there was any TAXPAYER money in this piece of trash, I would be leading a revolution to have all the money put back into the Treasury. I am still reeling (get it? pun, reeling!) at the absolute garbage I have just seen. Why did I continue to watch? Well, I am a movie fanatic and cant help ,myself! | 0 | trimmed_train |
1,899 | i know you've read that before, on countless other films no doubt if you're reading the comments here, but voodoo academy still stands as the absolute worst film i've been able to track down. no doubt the really bad ones aren't even available to buy or watch on tv, but even so i feel it's fair to qualify that i'm not just some dumb renter who picked badly.<br /><br />i've seen two thirds of the bottom 100 ranked films here on the imdb, and i'm ticking of the remaining ones with every chance. most of those stand head and shoulders above this... excersize in absolute monotony.<br /><br />i like to rate truly bad films (as in ones with no humour even in how bad they are) by how many people you need to watch it with to make it all the way through. if you can watch it by yourself, it isn't that bad. if you can watch it with one single friend... it's bad but could be a lot worse.<br /><br />it took 5 of us to make it all the way through voodoo academy. and not even the usually fun moments of watching bad films (spotting the boom mic for example, 3 times in this one if i'm not mistaken) could take away the dry taste in my mouth. yes i'd watched it, but i'd also forced 4 of my friends to watch it with me to achieve that end.<br /><br />i hope and pray we saw the directors cut... to think that there could be a version with 20 more minutes of big eyebrowed lugs with baby oil glands rubbing their torsos just scares the hell out of me. so much of the film centers around this.<br /><br />i do applaud david decoteau for managing to lens this film in two days on a short budget, just as i applaud him for convincing people to pay him to make what is no doubt a celluloid version of some of his fetishes. but it isn't a good film. the original shop of horrors was shot in the same length of time for a comparitive amount of money (considering inflation) and was an utter gem. it's not an excuse for how bad this baby is.<br /><br />spoilers ahead...<br /><br />it's not even worth picking apart the plot holes or cliched know it all hero characters... the pacing of the film... is insane... nothing... is interesting for the length of time decoteau dedicates to the pectoral self massaging. no matter what your alignment or sex... rubbing just cannot sustain that kind of screen time.<br /><br />the acting is cheese... but not overly amatuer... i've seen a lot worse in better films... but somehow it's the semi competent delivery of some of the worst lines you'll ever hear in a film, that really grates.<br /><br />rent this if, like me, you have a fascination with the worst of the worst, and only if you're going to watch it with a group of people who are prepared to work to get through it. this is no ha ha ha the set wobbled affair. it's an endurance test you probably want to skip.<br /><br />i'm sure there is worse... but i wouldn't be surprised if it has decoteau's name on it. | 0 | trimmed_train |
1,368 | Some 25 year olds behave like teenagers, coping with the death of a high-school mate, trying to find their purpose in live and love. The script is so lame that I had to force myself to even finish this movie. Stay away from it. 1/10 | 0 | trimmed_train |
2,709 | A typical Goth chick (Rainbow Harvest looking like a cross between Winona Ryder in Beetlejuice and Boy George) gets even with people she feels have wronged her with the help of an old haunted mirror that she finds in the new house she and her mom (horror mainstay, Karen Black, the only remotely good thing about this travesty) buy. The acting's pretty laughably bad (especially when Rainbow interacts with the aforementioned mirror) and there are no scares or suspense to be had. This film inexplicably spawned thus for 3 sequels each slightly more atrocious than the last. People looking for a similarly themed, but far superior cinematic endeavor would be well advised to just search out the episode of "Friday the 13th: the Series" where a geeky girl finds an old cursed compact mirror. That packs more chills in it's scant 40 minutes than this whole franchise has provided across it's 4 films.<br /><br />My Grade: D <br /><br />Eye Candy: Charlie Spradling provides the obligatory T&A | 2 | trimmed_train |
9,674 | A spoiler.<br /><br />What three words can guarantee you a terrible film? Cheap Canadian Production. THE BRAIN fits those words perfectly. Terrible script, idiotic acting and hilarious special effects make this a must for every BAD movie fan. The horror is hilarious. The post production team looks like it gave up. What makes THE BRAIN admirable is in the second half, it actually tries to be good! Can a bit of ingenuity and consistency save what is already a joke?<br /><br />It's around Christmas time. A mother and daughter are murdered by one of the funniest looking villains ever. The day later, a rebel teen gets into enough trouble that he is sent for a psychiatric analysis.<br /><br />If a cop 's head is chopped off and a stranger with blood on him and a bloody axe told you some kids did it, who would you believe? What begins as funny turns dull and tiring toward the end when THE BRAIN tries to be serious. A child cannot be frightened by the scary moments. THE BRAIN is too funny a concept to try and be gritty. The Psychological Research Institute is larger than major manufacturing plants! Our ugly villain and its cohorts get credit for pulling some of the worst acting I have seen. Viewer discretion advised heavily. | 0 | trimmed_train |
13,445 | As someone who was born to a German mother and English father (who spent five years in a prisoner of war camp) I come from unique position. One of having to deal with the various Nazis on one side of the family and the victors of WW2 on the other. This miniseries cannot delve into every single part of Hitler's psyche and must give the viewer a general flavor of the situation at the time and as best as one can Hitler's state of mind. In this the series does quite well. Carlyle is very good as is O'Toole, I would however liked to have got more information on the relationships with others in party Because Hitler did not do anything on his own. He had people around him that followed him to the letter often without question and certainly without question later on in his murderous career. What was going through Goebbels, Goring and Hess's mind? It would have been helpful to see more of these relationships. But I hope it will make people research the subject more. It might also make people understand why someone like Saddam Hussein cannot be allowed to continue in power. | 3 | trimmed_train |
17,997 | "Pickup On South Street" is a high speed drama about a small time criminal who suddenly finds himself embroiled in the activities of a group of communists. The action is presented in a very direct and dynamic style and the momentum is kept up by means of some brilliant editing. The use of a wide variety of different camera angles and effective close-ups also contribute to the overall impression of constant motion and vitality. Samuel Fuller's style of directing and the cinematography by Joseph MacDonald are excellent and there are many scenes which through their composition and lighting produce a strong sense of mood and atmosphere.<br /><br />Ace pickpocket and repeat offender Skip McCoy (Richard Widmark) gets into deep water when he steals a wallet from a young woman named Candy (Jean Peters) on the New York subway. She was being used by her ex-boyfriend Joey (Richard Kiley) to make a delivery to one of his contacts in a communist organisation and unknown to her, she was carrying US Government secrets recorded on microfilm. Two FBI agents had been following Candy and witnessed the theft. One of the agents continues to tail her back to Joey's apartment and the other, Zara (Willis Bouchey), visits Police Captain Dan Tiger (Murvyn Vye). Zara explains that the FBI has been following Candy for some months as part of their pursuit of the ringleader of a communist group.<br /><br />In order to identify the pickpocket, Tiger calls in a "stoolie" called Moe (Thelma Ritter) who after being given a precise description of the "cannon's" method of working makes a list of eight possible suspects. Once Tiger sees Skip's name on the list he's immediately convinced that he's the man that they need to track down and he sends two detectives to arrest him. When Skip is brought into Tiger's office, Zara tells him about the microfilm and Tiger offers to drop any charges if he'll co-operate with the investigation. Skip is flippant and arrogant. He clearly doesn't trust Tiger and denies all knowledge of the theft on the subway.<br /><br />Joey orders Candy to find out who stole the microfilm and then retrieve it. Candy pays Moe for Skip's address and when Skip returns from being questioned by Tiger, he finds Candy searching his home and knocks her unconscious before stealing her money. When she recovers, Skip demands payment of $25,000 for the microfilm. She tells Joey about Skip's demand and Joey's boss gives him a gun and orders him to recover the microfilm by the following evening.<br /><br />Skip and Candy are attracted to each other and it's because of their uneasy, developing relationship that a means evolves by which they are able to shake off the attentions of the police. It soon becomes apparent, however, that resolving matters with the communist gang will only be achieved by more direct action.<br /><br />The depictions of Skip, Candy and Moe as characters that inhabit a seedy world in which they are forced to face considerable risks on a daily basis are powerful and compelling.<br /><br />Moe's work as a police informer is dependent on her knowledge of the people in her community but also those people know what she does and any one of them could seek their revenge at any time. She appears to be cunning and streetwise but also has her vulnerable side as she describes herself as "an old clock running down" and saves money to be able to have a decent burial in an exclusive cemetery in Long Island. Her belief that "every buck has a meaning of its own" leads her to sell any information regardless of danger, friendships or principles and yet there is one occasion where she refuses and this proves fatal. Thelma Ritter's performance certainly merited the Oscar nomination she earned for her role.<br /><br />Skip is a violent criminal with no concern for his victims and having already been convicted three times in the past, lives under the constant threat of being jailed for life if convicted again. Despite this, he still continues with his criminal activities and strangely, is merely philosophical when Moe betrays his whereabouts and then later, he even ensures that Moe receives the type of burial she valued so highly. Candy is an ex-hooker and someone whose activities constantly put her in peril but behind her hardened exterior a warmer side gradually becomes more evident. Widmark and Peters are both perfect for their roles and like Ritter portray the different facets of their personalities with great style and conviction. | 1 | trimmed_train |
8,807 | The movie is plain bad. Simply awful. The string of bad movies from Bollywood has no end! They must be running out of excuses for making such awful movies (or not).<br /><br />The problem seems to be with mainly the directors. This movie has 2 good actors who have proved in the past that the have the ability to deliver great performance...but they were directed so poorly. The poor script did not help either.<br /><br />This movie has plenty of ridiculous moments and very bad editing in the first half. For instance :<br /><br />After his 1st big concert, Ajay Devgan, meets up with Om Puri (from whom he ran away some 30 years ago and talked to again) and all Om Puri finds to say is to beware of his friendship with Salman!!! What a load of crap. Seriously. Not to mention the baaad soundtrack. Whatever happened to Shankar Ehsaan Loy?<br /><br />Ajay Devgun is total miscast for portraying a rockstar.<br /><br />Only saving grace are the good performances in the second half. Ajay shines as his character shows his dark side. So does Salman as the drug addict. <br /><br />Watch it maybe only for the last half hour. | 0 | trimmed_train |
18,607 | Three sergeants in the British army stationed in India, are sent out to stop an uprising of a tribe of murderers known as the Thuggees. One of the sergeants, Cutter, leads away from the camp in search of a golden temple and is captured by the Thuggees lead by the sinister Guru. Gunga Din, the regiment's water boy, goes back to the camp for help and the other two sergeants go after him, but are also captured. Now the major sends a full detail out after the three, but do not realize that they are walking into a trap set by the Thugees. It is though, Gunga Din who saves the day. Excellently made buddy film, even though it is today politically incorrect. Grant, McLaglen, and Fairbanks do give very humorous and thrilling performances with Jaffe very well in the title role and Cianelli very sinister as Guru. Rating- 10 out of 10. | 3 | trimmed_train |
9,265 | Watching Josh Kornbluth 'act' in this movie reminds me of my freshman TV production class, where the 'not funny' had the chance to prove just how unfunny they really were!<br /><br />OBVIOUS is the word that comes to mind when I try to synopsize this wannabe comedy. The jokes are sophomoric and telegraphed. The delivery is painfully bad. OUCH!!!!!!! The writing is simply dorkish. It is akin to a Bob Saget show. <br /><br />Watching this movie is as painful as watching a one and a half hour long Saturday Night Live skit (post Belushi). <br /><br />I hated this movie and want my money back!!! | 0 | trimmed_train |
3,206 | I don't think this movie was rated correctly. I took my copy and blacked out the PG rating and wrote down R. I would NOT recommend this for anyone under 17 or 18, whatever the R limit is.<br /><br />Why? It contains a scene in the jungle with several topless Indian women. I don't know about you, but that's not something for little children to be watching. True, it might be the traditional "clothing style" of the African (?) Indians, but... I think partial nudity should give a movie an R rating.<br /><br />I haven't seen the movie recently, but I guess otherwise, it was alright. | 0 | trimmed_train |
9,246 | This effort was like a glitzy TV movie...I don't recall this ever being released in theaters...If so, it must've died a quick death. Watching the DVD, in the comfort of our bedroom, it was obvious this film was meant for not much more...Ed Lauter an art critic with a greed streak? What a fun turn that must've been...I haven't seen Ed since "The Longest Yard"...Everyone else pretty much acted by the numbers, led by Baldwin, except for Pompeo...She had zero charisma and seemed to be sleepwalking thru most of the picture...Pompeo's daughter had one dimension...she played every scene like a lovable little puppy...slowest line delivery of any 3 year old I've seen yet...<br /><br />The chase scenes gave my wife and I headaches...too much quick-cutting and angle-bashing...If you 're going to shoot a chase scene in Barcelona, you might want a few WIDE shots to exploit the beauty of your backdrop, right? The whole story was pretty implausible and far-fetched, but hey, we liked it better than "The Life Aquatic..." | 2 | trimmed_train |
17,874 | I thought this was one of those really great films to see with a bunch of close friends. I laughed and cried and laughed and cried at the same time. It was just really touching. Although not a new concept this was a very well made film. | 3 | trimmed_train |
10,255 | I wonder how the actors acted in this movie. Annette Bening was really herself, half in and half out, was she faking or being natural? It didn't make any difference considering that even if she had been walking on the ceiling it would not have changed the pattern of the film. Brian Cox acted really well. I almost thought that he had always acted this way, tricky, dishonest, in a dirty surrounding where nobody really cared about hygiene. As for Gwyneth Paltrow, the question is what she was doing in this film.<br /><br />This film is quite sickening and disgusting. Who would pay to see such a crap? | 0 | trimmed_train |
15,214 | This film speaks a universal language; one can relate it to the self, community, society or the wider world. It has a way of not only opening up several questions but also setting one in pursuit of discovering and asking the right questions in order to get to that point of self conviction / ownership. The portrayal of the stereotypes within the film addresses the archetypes around us which must be recognised as being the repeating cycle of destruction, the opposing force of innovation, creativity and growth. The factors which disturb the natural flow of things must be made apparent and tackled. The Idea, is definitely a film to be experienced and not just viewed as it taps into one's internal voice / conscience through the looking, it makes one feel as opposed to just watch. | 3 | trimmed_train |
12,533 | James Stewart stars in a classic western tale of revenge which ties in with the fate of the films other star the Winchester Rifle. Stewart is it goes without saying excellent adding some cold hard obsession to his usual laid back cowboy. The story follows the fate of a Winchester rifle and its owners after being won in a competition by our hero and stolen by the man he is hunting.<br /><br />We meet a selection of gamblers, gun fighters, Indian traders and bank robers as we follow the rifles path through Indian battles, bank heists etc. The supporting cast are all solid with Dan Durya standing out as Waco Johnny Dean the live-wire gunfighter with an itchy trigger finger. Also as a trivia note a very early appearance from Rock Hudson as an Indian chief.<br /><br />The end showdown is a classic a tense rifle battle fought at long range in and around a rocky outcrop. Throw in some good old western action, fist fights, shootouts and horseback chases it makes for a rollicking western adventure. 8/10 | 1 | trimmed_train |
444 | I bought this (it was only $3, ok?) under the title "Grey Matter". The novelty of seeing Sherriff Roscoe in a non-DukesOfHazzard role intrigued me. As the other reviewers warned, it's a pretty boring tale of a top secret government experiment gone awry.<br /><br />And yes, there are plenty of establishing shots, especially of a house with a pool in front of it. Some of the characters and interiors are so nondescript I guess the filmmakers worried we might forget who is who, so they keep tipping us off by first showing the outside of the buildings. It's actually kinda funny. After awhile the pool shot feels like a tv channel's station identification logo, reminding us that we are watching "Grey Matter".<br /><br />I also enjoyed two bouts of name-calling. At one point an angry test subject taunts somebody in charge by calling her a "Scientific b*tch!". It's just a very inadequate insult. Several scenes later a different subject lets off steam by muttering about that "scientific b**tard!". It just sounded very awkward to me.<br /><br />Someday this movie will disappear forever. Another decade from now it will likely be impossible to find any copies of it. Almost like it never happened.<br /><br /> | 2 | trimmed_train |
8,478 | As we all know Hollywood enjoys changing historical events around for our enjoyment, and 44 minutes is one of those hollywoodized movies. For example the bank robbers never did go back in the bank when they started shooting at the LAPD yet in the movie we see them go back inside twice! Another example is the number of LAPD officers who were shot near the end of the movie, this is far from the truth! But of course Hollywood must have a good bloody ending so they *add* some more blood and guts. Some events were combined and many of the lead actors played several different people but this is what Hollywood has always done so why complain? I guess the only sad part is that I have watched some one hour documentaries about the North Hollywood shootout on TLC that were far better then this! | 0 | trimmed_train |
15,018 | If you have any sort of appreciation for character and dialogue, and any sense of American cultural history, you will find a lot of very absorbing material in this film. It probably was originally a play, and that's why it's dialogue heavy, but I can't stress enough how these icons that we only have a shallow understand of are made into truly complex and wonderful characters.<br /><br />This film is better than any college course for telling you how to create a character-driven story.<br /><br /> | 3 | trimmed_train |
19,689 | this film was almost a great imaginative film. A mixture of shakespeare, pop, jazz, and faerie tales. This movie was an imaginative twist on the Cinderella theme. Featuring a strong cast, headed by the perfectly cast Kathleen Turner, this movie had everything going for it. Everything but production values. I almost never think that a movie needs special effects or big budgets, but with an over the top production like this, it came off with the same seedy quality as every other made for tv movie. Besides better cinematography, this film was almost perfect.<br /><br /> | 1 | trimmed_train |
16,478 | Greetings again from the darkness. 18 directors of 18 seemingly unrelated vignettes about love in the city of lights. A very unusual format that takes a couple of segments to adjust to as a viewer. We are so accustomed to character development over a 2 hour movie, it is a bit disarming for that to occur in an 8 minute segment.<br /><br />The idea is 18 love/relationship stories in 18 different neighborhoods of this magnificent city. Of course, some stand up better than others and some go for comedy, while others focus on dramatic emotion. Some very known directors are involved, including: The Coen Brothers, Wes Craven, Alfonso Cuaron, Alexander Payne, Gus Van Sant and Gurinda Chadha. Many familiar faces make appearances as well: Steve Buscemi, Barbet Schroeder, Catalina Sandino Moreno, Ben Gazzara, Gena Rowlands, Gerard Depardieu, Juliette Binoche, Willem Dafoe, Nick Nolte, Maggie Gyllenhaal and Bob Hoskins.<br /><br />One of the best segments involves a mime, and then another mime and the nerdy, yet happy young son of the two mimes. Also playing key roles are a red trench coat, cancer, divorce, sexual fantasy, the death of a child and many other topics. Don't miss Alexander Payne (director of "Sideways") as Oscar Wilde.<br /><br />The diversity of the segments make this interesting to watch, but as a film, it cannot be termed great. Still it is very watchable and a nice change of pace for the frequent movie goer. | 1 | trimmed_train |
9,391 | I have nothing more to say but it was awful. I cannot imagine why Helen Mirren and others were part of this degrading mess. And if certain actors don't want people to question their sexuality then perhaps they should refrain from making more of these films. There was at least one seen that left me curious. Just my opinion. SHUDDER to think what was going on that was cut from the film. SHUDDER to wonder what went through the minds of the actors who made this film. Shudder to think about the thought process and voyeurism that went on in the directors mind. Like I stated before its a degrading mess. Its not even funny. As Ebert said of the film Caligula with Malcolm McDowell, Its not a good film, not a good story and its not even good porn. YEESHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH............ | 0 | trimmed_train |
21,482 | I will never forget this film or the events that lead up to Jonestown in Guyana. It just seems so tragic but needs to be told. Powers Boothe give a commanding performance as the leader Rev. Jim Jones from obscurity until total madness. It would have won him an Academy Award easily if it was released in the movie theaters. It is the kind of mini-series you won't forget. You won't forget the images of the cult's brutality, control, and obsessiveness of it's leader. His rise and fall and the threat from the outside world to destroy what he considered to be paradise. The mass suicide is horrifying, almost unreal to anybody's imagination as to why so many people (900+) went willingly or resisted JOnes' orders. They don't make mini series like these anymore where we're left with out mouths open and hungry to know what happened to the others. | 3 | trimmed_train |
16,019 | This is a fan-made short film that pretends to be a preview for a new movie that pairs Batman and Superman! It's the sort of film that fans adore and watch at places like ComicCon and was made by the same person who made BATMAN: DEAD END, Sandy Collora.<br /><br />As far as this film goes, I could easily pick it apart. Sure the CGI effects aren't perfect and the costumes are far from perfect. BUT, this was made on a shoestring budget and for a fan film this is incredible. I was particularly impressed by the very buff Superman--he was no wimpy little guy! If only this were a preview for a real film--they'd have fans lined up from here to Omaha to see it. Great job. | 1 | trimmed_train |
14,044 | This movie maybe really bad, but it is alot of fun. The bad acting and poor direction enhance the film's hystericalness. The twins are very funny in their Conanesque roles. If you go into this film expecting the first Conan or Excalibur, than you will hate it. If you watch it while in a good mood and accept it as good, dumb fun you will have a good time. Watch for the scene where they try to hang the brothers, its funniest scene in the film. I wish Mystery Science Theatre 3000 would have done this!! | 1 | trimmed_train |
4,655 | No spoilers here but I have been a fan since Waking the Dead started but the last series, of which only 3 have been on so far is awful. The stories bear no resemblance to the original idea of the series. I found these 3 in the last series jaw droppingly ludicrous. As a BBC licence payer, after the show I rang BBC complaints to pass on my disappointment. I'm amazed that actors of the calibre of Trevor Eve and Sue Johnstone didn't object to the story lines. These actors have been with these characters for 8 seasons, surly they can see it's lost all direction. It's a good job it is the last series or the next series may start with the team investigating the death of Father Christmas!<br /><br />Paul Bentley, West Yorkshire, England. | 0 | trimmed_train |
Subsets and Splits
No community queries yet
The top public SQL queries from the community will appear here once available.