A terribly overrated director

Rating: 6/10 (20 February 2001)

Aside from "Platoon", Oliver Stone has an annoying tendency to over "Oliver Stone-ize". For example, the freaky camera angles and background effects in "Natural Born Killers" almost made sense since the characters were on drugs most of the time (he certainly could have toned it down a notch or three though). But in "Any Given Sunday" and especially "Nixon" these effects occur far too often and usually for no apparent reason. This adds unnecessary length and confusion to what could have and perhaps would have otherwise been a much better film. I enjoyed both "Any Given Sunday" and "Nixon" for their stories and their actors but didn't rate them as highly as I would have liked because they were so overly Oliver STONED!