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tt1046894 | Black Widow | Mark Sherwin (Ayres) is driving in the country when he notices a man lying at the side of the road. Assuming the man is the victim of a hit-and-run, he stops to offer assistance, only to be coshed and left stunned while his wallet and car are stolen. On recovering his senses, he staggers towards a nearby farmhouse where he collapses. He is found by the farm owner, who summons a doctor. Meanwhile, the car thief comes to grief while speeding round a corner on a clifftop road, the car plunges over the edge and explodes in flames.
Sherwin regains consciousness, but is suffering from complete amnesia with no idea of his own identity or how he came to be found in such a remote location. The farm owner and his daughter agree to look after Sherwin while he recuperates. The police investigate missing persons reports but find no case to match Sherwin's age and physical description. Some days later Sherwin is on the mend, and happens to find in his overcoat pocket a ticket stub from a theatre in a town some 50 miles away. Hoping to find some clue as to his identity, he takes a train to the town and walks the streets to see whether anything will jog his memory.
He comes across a house which he seems to recognise and walks in through the unlocked door. Inside he finds a flower-covered coffin in the front room. A woman (Norden) enters and on seeing Sherwin, screams and faints. This jolts Sherwin's memory back into gear and he recognises the woman as his wife Christine, who has believed him dead since there was no reason for anybody to consider that the body found in the burned-out car was not his.
Sherwin is bothered by his wife's odd demeanour, particularly her excessive concern about whether or not anybody could have seen him in the street or arriving at the house. His suspicions aroused, he decides to continue to play the amnesiac. Saying he is going upstairs to rest, he eavesdrops on her telephone calls and soon realises that she is speaking to a lover of some time standing, the gist of the conversation being the need to dispose of Sherwin quickly before anyone else finds out that he was not the crash victim. Gradually, he finds out that Christine and her lover (Anthony Forwood) had been intending to sell the house and cash all his assets, and his inconvenient reappearance has derailed their plans. Aware now of Christine's true colours, he decides to play along with her schemes until he can engineer a suitable come-uppance for the pair. | murder | train | wikipedia | null |
tt0758751 | Grey Gardens | The film is based on the life stories of the eccentric paternal aunt and first cousin of Jackie Kennedy, both named Edith Bouvier Beale. The elder Edith Bouvier Beale was the sister of Jackie Kennedy's father John Vernou Bouvier III and was referred to as "Big Edie", her daughter was referred to as "Little Edie". The Beale women were members of NYC high society, but in their later years, withdrew from the New York City life, taking shelter at their Long Island summer home/estate Grey Gardens. The house eventually fell into a state of disrepair that gave the Beale women notoriety.
Phelan Beale (husband of "Big Edie" and father of "Little Edie"), eventually divorced "Big Edie." In the movie, "Little Edie" decides to move to New York to pursue a career in acting (as well as an ill-fated romance with a high-profile married man). "Little Edie" sadly and slowly realizes her fate is to remain her mother's companion at Grey Gardens. The two women become reclusive and known around town as the highly eccentric proprietors of Grey Gardens, which has become decrepit and full of stray animals taken in by the Beale women. The plot includes the filming of the documentary Grey Gardens by Albert and David Maysles as well as events in the Beales' past, including their arrival at the estate, the disintegration of Big Edie's marriage, Little Edie's failed attempts to have her own life, and events subsequent to the premiere of the documentary.
The movie ends with Little Edie singing "Tea for Two" at the Reno Sweeney cabaret in Greenwich Village, and the quote, "My mother gave me a truly priceless life." | sentimental | train | wikipedia | null |
tt0188453 | Birthday Girl | John Buckingham (Ben Chaplin), a lonely St Albans bank clerk, orders a mail-order bride Nadia (Nicole Kidman) from Russia on the Internet. John is uncomfortable and shy, but Nadia is sexually bold. Though Nadia cannot speak English and John cannot speak Russian, they soon bond. Later on, a man she introduces as her cousin Yuri (Mathieu Kassovitz) and his friend Alexei (Vincent Cassel) turn up to celebrate her birthday. Alexei soon shows that he has a temper. After a violent altercation, Alexei holds Nadia hostage and demands a ransom from John. John has grown to care for Nadia and is forced to steal from the bank where he has worked for ten years. After the ransom is paid, he realises that he has been the victim of an elaborate con. Nadia, Yuri, and Alexei are criminals, and Alexei is actually Nadia's boyfriend.
John learns that the trio have carried out the same scam on men from Switzerland and Germany, among others. They take him prisoner, strip him down to his underpants, and tie him to a toilet in a motel. He eventually manages to free himself and quickly learns that Nadia has been left behind after Alexei discovered she was pregnant. John gets dressed and subsequently gets into a scrap with Nadia, who later reveals that she can indeed speak English and that her name is not Nadia.
John takes Nadia to turn her into the police - hoping to clear his name as a wanted bank robber. Ultimately, however, he sympathises with her and decides against it. He leaves her at the airport, where she is kidnapped by Alexei – who now wants Nadia to have the baby. John rescues her, tying Alexei to a chair. They make common cause against the two Russian men. Nadia informs John that her real name is Sophia. John, disguised as Alexei, leaves for Russia with Sophia. | flashback, home movie | train | wikipedia | Roughly one part crime drama to two parts offbeat love story, `Birthday Girl' is a nifty little British film that gives Nicole Kidman a chance to strut her stuff as an actress.
Here she gets to play a Russian `mail order bride' (though, of course, in the modern world she is actually ordered off the internet) who's come to England to start a new life with John, a mild-mannered banker unsuccessful in the ways of love.
Then just as John and Nadia seem to be forming a close relationship (literally bonding over bondage), complications arise when two of Nadia's bizarre `friends' from Russia suddenly arrive on the scene.To reveal more of the plot would be unfair to both the viewer and the makers of this film, since much of the movie's intrigue arises from the frequent turnabouts in the plot itself.
Kidman, who speaks nary a word of English in the first half of the film (and only with a heavy accent thereafter), does a beautiful job conveying both the toughness and the vulnerability inherent in this woman.
Basically, it's about a low-key British male who sends away for a Russian "mail order bride" who winds up, with the aid of two Russian male friends, providing a couple of big surprises.Ben Chapin and Nicole Kidman co-star, and are very good as are Vincent Cassel and Matthieu Kassovitz as Kidman's Russian cohorts.
This movie really woke me up, like it wakes up the main male character of this bravely different movie from his life slumber.This guy John (Ben Chaplin) leads his mediocre safe life of a bank teller in a small provincial English town, until the stunningly gorgeous, wild, girl-to-die-for Nadia (Nicole Kidman), ordered by email from Russia, enters his life to become his beloved wife, by Johns plan.
Although calm and emotionless on the outside, John becomes so interested in beautiful Nadia that instead of using the full refund policy of the matching service, he buys her a dictionary to start the communication process.What happens henceforth in the plot really shakes poor John from his slumber of a decently-paid safe-feeling clerk into a decision-making decently thinking action figure, giving the viewer a subliminal message "you would have probably acted likewise".Kidman, Cassel & Kassovitz make a great team acting Russians and they are almost indistinguishable from the real thing, "almost" only due to the slight accent present in their Russian dialogues, however slight enough to amaze a native Russian by the hard work done to get the words sound right.
Nicole Kidman proves her talent once again by playing a character quite different from the previous roles, at least from the cultural background.The pace of the film is fast and captivating, and you certainly are not ready to quit watching when the end titles appear, you rather feel that you're in the middle of the plot, and are left with a desire to see the sequel as soon as it comes out.My advice is to go out and get this film immediately and watch it and enjoy.
until two hours of write this."Birthday Girl" is a passionate movie that makes me fall in count, at the same time, that Nicole Kidman is one of the best actress (Besides she is pretty and intelligent) that i have ever seen.
Not only is her Russian accent when she speaks English effective, but there are times when she carries on long conversations in Russian and if you didn't know it was Nicole Kidman, you would never question her authenticity.
Although her background is questionable and her English is fragmented, she's great in bed, so he has no complaints.However when her "cousins" appear at his door a whole new world of deception and violence opens up for John, pulling him deeper and deeper under.The premise for the film is fairly good, but the overall execution is just so-so.
Nicole Kidman gives a really good performance (worthy of a better film) but Ben Chaplin is just OK.
Anyone could play the role, so he's kind of stuck in a rut.The movie is grungy, dark and feels independent - it's hard to imagine Hollywood royalty Nicole Kidman signing onto it, but she is really the reason this film remains interesting and engaging.
Which was a great shame, because it represents British rather than American humour and should have been shown in Britain first.Nicole Kidman looks stunning and is a totally convincing Russian.
Ben Chaplin is the Dustin Hoffman character from 'The Graduate', and 'Birthday Girl' has at least 4 scenes which remind the viewer of that 1960s classic (despite being a totally different story!).Sure it changes tack a number of times from comedy to black comedy to thriller to adventure - but it's memorable, moving and a weclome breath of fresh air compared to the average mega-budget blockbuster.See it with an open mind!.
Birthday Girl has a not too bad premise- good old English chum decides out of lonliness and maybe something else to order a mail order bride from Russia.
It turns out, his order is not quite what he wanted, but she (Nicole Kidman) seems like a nice enough wife, until not what was planned happens in a series of events getting the english chum and his russian bride on the run.
This is a clever, funny, sexy movie that starts as a romantic comedy and then becomes an edgy thriller.Nerdy bank clerk, John Buckingham (Ben Chaplin) lives in a semi-rural town not far from London.
When he orders a Russian mail order bride over the Internet, she duly self-delivers herself to the airport in the form of Nadia (Nicole Kidman).
But as John drives her home, he realises that Nadia can't speak English - or seems not to.Although John at first desperately tries to contact the aptly named 'From Russia with Love' marriage agency to cancel the deal, the language barrier becomes far less important when he discovers that Nadia is sexually adventurous and encourages him to indulge his every fantasy with her.Everything seems to be going perfectly for John until Nadia's Russian cousin, Yuri (Mathieu Kassovitz), and his friend Alexei (Vincent Cassel) turn up and overwhelm his life.
His performance is both funny and engaging.Pretty, sexy, and slim almost to the point of fragility, Nicole Kidman's Nadia looks vulnerable, but as we discover as the story unfolds, looks are deceiving.
It deals with a shy thirty something bank clerk named John (Ben Chaplin who subsequently didn't have a successful career) from St Albans , he has his small-town life exploded by the arrival of his Russian mail-order bride named Nadia (Nicole Kidman who shows her high range), she doesn't speak English , but the two begin to talk the international language anyway .
Good performances specially by Nicole Kidman as mysterious and sexy online mail-order bride who reportedly learned Russian language for the movie , as she went to the Russian Embassy in Australia for help in speaking Russian , she didn't work with any other coach on the set except the woman from the embassy.
Mild-mannered bachelor bank teller near London advertises for a Russian wife on the internet, and is disappointed when the young lady who shows up at the airport doesn't speak any English (she's a willing sport in bed, however); when two of her Russian buddies show up at his house, the man realizes he's been set up to rob his own bank, yet still feels a connection to this strange, sexy woman.
It was obviously a labor of love for the group, and they could not have found better leads than Nicole Kidman and handsome Ben Chaplin, both excellent in their roles.
As a comedy, they could have got away with a preposterous plot and the equally preposterous ending, but as a thriller, it simply fell flat.Nicole Kidman can successfully play the sort of girl who could be a real head turner if she didn't dress like trash, combed her hair, got washed, and stopped lighting one cigarette from another.
Though this film may not be much to shout about, Nicole Kidman carries the film on her own the rest of the cast could quite easily be forgotten, though Ben Chaplin does do quite a good job of Hertfordshire Life with shots of St Albans & Hemel Hempstead town centre depicting the true essence of the area.
What starts outlooking like a regular episode of the popular British TV series"Heartbeat" soon turns into a gritty gangster getaway action flick.Nothing truly memorable happens in this simple small film and thus ends-up as fairly decent weekend entertainment.
John (Chaplin) is a guy whose life is plain and dull in his honest opinion; so bad in fact that he orders a girl over the internet to come and live with him; this premise is about as exciting as John's life is or was and for the record; doesn't make sense: he orders a 'mail bride' yet when she offers him the ring, he declines; there is no set up involving the company so we're sort of lead to believe that it doesn't exist but since it's on the Internet where millions can access it, it seems a little far fetched that Sophia or Nadia (Kidman) or whatever should show up on John's door when there are probably hundreds and hundreds of richer, more closer to home people she could go to.Birthday Girl is a sort of hybrid of 2005's Derailed and Almodóvar's quirky film from 1990: Átame!
The idea that a guy and a girl get involved when they shouldn't really be is toyed with in Birthday Girl since she's a mail order bride whereas in Átame, Banderas' character had been freed from a psychiatric hospital and in Derailed, the male and the female just hook up on a train Chaplin in this film even looks a little like Clive Owen.
Derailed gets a little nasty once Vincent Cassel (who's also in this) shows up and that propels twists, turns and a good character study of Clive Owen's Charles Schine and what to do but Birthday Girl just seems to lack punch, it lacks violence and it lacks that hard-boiled, noir undertone, revenge feel that I really wish it had.Birthday Girl has problems not only with its content and which way it's going to go but with its characters and their logic as well as the film's overall logic.
If they wanted him to steal money, they would've threatened him or perhaps HIS cousins.Like I said; instead of developing into a revenge film, it flags and bothers about with further character development between John and Nadia, who by this time you rather dislike, before giving him lungs of steel in order to chase down a taxi just when he needs to.
The presence of Armstrong and Miller is just another example of the uneven tone to the film the comedians both seem to be trying to inject a small bit of humour by their delivery, but it doesn't work and sticks out a bit like a sore thumb.Overall this has enough going on to keep you watching but it doesn't do anything that well, producing an uneven affair that only gets a bit better in the second half where the focus appears to settle down.
I can't quite decide which is worse - the script or the directing.We're slowly introduced to John (Chaplin), a mild mannered (the mildest EVER) bank clerk looking for a mail order bride from a russian website.
Nicole Kidman gives it her all as a Russian mail-order bride (get it, because it's "funny") and despite her recognizable star power she is actually pretty convincing in the role.
This movie doesn't seem like the usual big-budget things you would expect to see Nicole Kidman.
England always made FILM worst, even I know that England is have many good artist.I'm very disapointed with this movie, the story line is bad with no emotion think.
I'm not a big Nicole Kidman fan, given that her movies seem to be on the quirky side, but the trailer for Birthday Girl caught my attention.
Nicole Kidman definitely does a good job in the movie, but her acting can't make up for a poor storyI guess my fiancee and I just expected more.
Really Loved It. When I saw Birthday Girl I liked it so much I set out to see every Nicole Kidman film I could, only to find all of them a disappointment compared to it.
Modern, original, romantic story.Very good acting of both Nicole Kidman and Ben Chaplin.Miss Kidman does a nice job in imitating a Russian accent.
Doesn't Gel. BIRTHDAY GIRL is an example of a great idea not making a very good film .
" A man sends off for a Russian bride and gets more than he bargains for " Hey that's a great premise but things go very wrong very quickly with the casting of Ben Chaplin as the meek and mild mannered bank teller .
She deserves an Oscar nomination for her latest film, Destroyer, whilst in a Birthday Girl she plays a Russian mail order bride with no little acting prowess.
We don't here.The acting is very good, with Nicole Kidman extremely convincing as a beautiful Russian girl, Vincent Cassel and Mathieu Kassovitz do a good job as Nadia's friends.I would like to have seen this overseen or rewritten by John Cusack or someone of that ilk.
By that time the film is narrowed down to creating a relationship between Nicole Kidman and Ben Chaplin.
At this time and during Nadia's birthday party, two of Nadia's Russian "cousins" show up on Johns door step and after two nights sleeping on his floor, demand more than he had bargained for.The film was promoted either as a tense thriller, a romantic crime drama or even as a comedy/thriller .
The most outstanding (and best part of the film) coming from the excellently presented Nadia/Sophia played by Nicole Kidman.
The different elements she gives makes her warm and likable; even though she is a crook and a swindler, you want her to be happy and even fall in love with John as the film strives to an end.The two Russian accomplices ; Yuri and Alexei played by the French actors Vincent Cassel and Mattieu Kassovitz are also well done.
Lastly, Ben Chaplin looks relaxed, focused and delivers the comical tone with ease.After watching Birthday Girl, it was not what I expected and the appearance of the film was unforeseen.
Good acting is what makes watching this movie not a waste of time despite the poor script.
Nicole Kidman plays a Russian mail-order bride, silent or speaking only Russian for most of the movie.
I can understand the decision for the main part - the movie needs a name in the credits and Nicole Kidman is a very good marketing product, but there are really very good Russian actors out there, so you wouldn´t have to cast two French guys, who are very good actors (I like them both very much), but struggle to speak Russian.
Ben Chaplin (no relation to the legendary comedian) is a shy Englishman who hooks up with a Russian mail order bride (Nicole Kidman).
Strange to see Nicole Kidman in this film as it doesn't particularly seem like her style.She does well however, and her name I'm sure added a lot of weight to the film, which few may have heard of.Ben Chaplin stars opposite her, and convinces as a Middle-England bank clerk who is fed up with life alone, and so orders Kidman's Russian bride.
Great acting ; clever dialogue ; nice plot changes ; not liked by the mass market ; AND NICOLE KIDMAN !!!!
Any Nicole Kidman fan will love it,and any fan of interesting films should like it a lot.
It's interesting to listen to key points in the plot (in Russian), and not know what they are talking about.Nicole Kidman, who plays "Nadia" is great at speaking Russian throughout the film, until...
Nicole Kidman is actually quite good, as is her sad new husband, Ben Chaplin (god!
This is a pretty predictable movie, it's not quite a thriller, it's more like a dark comedy, I would give Birthday Girl 6.5/10.
How could Nicole Kidman's great acting skills be wasted in such a ridiculous movie like "Birthday Girl"?.
After making my favorite movie "the Portrait of a Lady", which is a movie that shows why I love Nicole Kidman, I never thought she'd do something as ridiculous and bad as "Birthday Girl".
There is nothing great about it, the plot is mediocre and uninteresting, the acting is good, but only because of Ms Kidman's Russian accent, which was somewhat convincing.
Overall, the movie is not interesting, it really doesn't have much going for it and there is nothing that can save this story, but Nicole's performance, although I never thought she'd have the nerve to do something like this.
The movie unfolded well, it started out as a sex film that turned into a surprising love story.
The movie stars Nicole Kidman (who seems to be getting sexier as she gets older, or am I the only one who thinks so) as a Russian Mail order bride.
We pity the poor British guy who was suckered into this little game while at the same time wanting to slap him for being so naive.There are also a few laughs to make the movie easy to watch and a few interesting shots of Kidman (including one really interesting shot of her bare backside).I give the film a thumbs up..
However she did a great job as the wild girl who really has a soft heart, Ben is terrific in this character displaying two totally different elements to the personality of John.I thought they could have emphasised the more romantic elements of the movie but overall it's a good watch.
If you want to spend a good time and admire the beauty and the talent of Nicole Kidman go and see that movie which deserves 7 out of 10 .Sputtosi. |
tt0015758 | Don Q Son of Zorro | Don Diego de la Vega (Zorro)'s son, Cesar (Douglas Fairbanks), is in Spain finishing his education. While Cesar is showing off to friends his remarkable prowess with the whip, he accidentally clips off the feather shako on the hat of Don Sebastian (Donald Crisp) of the Palace Guard. Although Cesar apologizes immediately, Sebastian is unforgiving. Their duel is interrupted by a runaway bull. Trapped on the ground with his sword belt tangled in his boot, certain to be gored by the bull, Sebastian is saved at the last minute by Cesar. This further infuriates him. The action is observed by Queen Isabella (Stella De Lanti) and her guest, Austrian Archduke Paul (Warner Oland); she requests Cesar's company immediately. Another friend of Cesar, Don Fabrique Borusta (Jean Hersholt), offers to bring him to Her Majesty.
Meanwhile, Cesar encounters Dolores (Mary Astor), daughter of his father's old friend, General de Muro (Jack McDonald), as she poses for a sculptor. It is love at first sight. But Sebastian, who comes from a poor family, has set his sights on Dolores and her family's wealth, and is determined to win her. Later, the Archduke invites Cesar to paint the town, with Sebastian as their "duenna." In a local tavern the Archduke offends the patrons, all seeming ruffians, by flirting with the dancer. Sebastian contrives his and the Duke's escape, but locks Cesar in the tavern to defend himself against the cutthroats. In the carriage that takes them away from what he is sure will be Cesar's death, Sebastian declares he has a meeting with Dolores. The Archduke invites himself along. While Sebastian asks the General for his daughter's hand, the Archduke sees Dolores serenaded by Cesar, who escaped (easily) and even acquired a guitar as a souvenir. Seeing the reactions of the young couple, the Archduke knows Cesar has won Dolores's heart.
Although penniless, Don Fabrique has designs on succeeding in society. He glues together a discarded invitation to the Archduke’s Grand Ball, and crashes the party. At the ball, Cesar and Sebastian sit on either side of Dolores, both seeming frustrated in their efforts to woo her. The Archduke summons her to him. When Cesar sees the Archduke caress Dolores's cheek, Cesar becomes jealous and goes to confront him. But the Archduke assures him that he is working in Cesar's favor, and proves it by dragging Sebastian to another room to play cards while Cesar and Dolores dance together. Cesar pulls Dolores to a balcony for ardent lovemaking. Fabrique sees them; when the pair are interrupted by Dolores’s father, General de Muro, who recognizes Cesar and is ready to give his blessing, Fabrique believes they are about to be betrothed.
In the card room, the Archduke declares that Sebastian is as unlucky at cards as he is in love. Franque tiptoes in, and tells the Archduke that he saw Cesar and Dolores kissing: surely they will be married now. The Archduke summons Cesar to congratulate him, to the horror of Sebastian. When he enters, Cesar is offended at the impropriety of this news, and learns that the source was Fabrique. Such bad manners should not go unpunished. He informs the Archduke that someone here doesn't belong, and asks if he should remove him. Archduke Paul nods, and Cesar pulls Fabrique out of the room by tugging his nose.
The Archduke continues to taunt Sebastian, a foolish move when Sebastian, enraged by jealousy, pulls his sword and stabs the Archduke before he realizes what he has done. He hides when Cesar, hearing something, enters, then strikes Cesar unconscious. He frames him for the Archduke's murder, then casually leaves. With his last dying energy, the Archduke pulls a playing card off the table and writes on it: Sebastian assassinated me. Archduke Paul.
Fabrique enters, finds Cesar unconscious, finds the playing card and, miffed at Cesar's insult, takes it. Shortly thereafter he confronts Sebastian with his demands: to be appointed Civil Governor. Both stand by while the Guard arrests Cesar for the murder and orders his immediate execution to prevent an international incident. But General de Muro offers Cesar a gentleman’s way out by giving him a dagger. Cesar pretends to stab himself and falls to the moat below the castle.
Months pass, while Cesar hides in the ruins of the old family castle. He pretends to be Don Q, for "a trick must be answered by a trick!" Fabrique has become Civil Governor, receiving regular pay-offs from Sebastian. Fabrique has even taken over Carlo's servants, and maidservant Lola (Lottie Pickford), seeing how Sebastian behaves around Fabrique, runs to tell Cesar that although gossip says they are close friends, in truth Sebastian is afraid of Fabrique. This will prove the leverage Cesar needs to establish his innocence.
After months of mourning over Cesar, Dolores is pushed to marry Sebastian. Just as she is about to sign the marriage contract with Sebastian, Cesar appears at the window. He is alive! The Queen orders Cesar’s arrest. The best man to find him: that one-eyed ferret, Colonel Matsado (Albert MacQuarrie). But when Matsado stops at a country inn on his way into the city, Cesar waylays him, steals his uniform, and impersonates him. Back in the city Cesar as Matsado pretends to beat his (now Fabrique's) old manservant Robledo (Charles Stevens) for information on Cesar's whereabouts, then convinces Fabrique to accompany him to the ruins where Cesar has been living these past months. There he is determined to find what hold Fabrique has on Sebastian.
In a whirlwind finish, Sebastian and the real Matsado track Cesar to his lair, as do his father, Zorro (Fairbanks), who with the mute faithful family servant Bernardo (Tote Du Crow), has sailed from California to Spain to help. On the way to the ruins they pass Dolores and her mother along the same road. Finally, as all gather at the ruins, Zorro and Don Q battle the soldiers, Fabrique confesses, Sebastian is beaten, de Muro recognizes his old friend, the villains are arrested, and Cesar and Dolores reunited. | good versus evil, romantic, action, flashback | train | wikipedia | A really GOOD sequel!.
Film sequels were a novelty in 1925, when DON Q, SON OF ZORRO marked a big profit for United Artists.
Then and now, it is considered to be a better film than the original, THE MARK OF ZORRO (1920), which made star and producer Douglas Fairbanks the personification of the Swashbuckler five years earlier.Since his screen debut in 1915, Fairbanks had always been cast in contemporary comedies as a fun-loving, never-say-die, go-getter who gets the girl and catches the bad guys all the while exhibiting his athletic prowess and bravado.
He was a major film actor, but his popularity was beginning to wane due to the monotony of his roles and vehicles.
The formation of United Artists Corporation in 1919 gave founders Fairbanks, Mary Pickford, Charlie Chaplin and D.W. Griffith control over their own projects.
Fairbanks chose this opportunity to risk reinventing his image by starring in this film adaptation of The Curse of Capistrano.
The serialized novel written by Johnston McCulley had been published that year in a popular pulp magazine.
It introduced the character of Zorro to the world.
The magic of the movie assured Zorro's place among fictional super-heroes.
The character lived on in several more film versions as well as books, comics, cartoons, Halloween costumes, toys, and in the popular 1950's television series starring Guy Williams.In THE MARK OF ZORRO, set in early 19th century California, Fairbanks came up with an ingenious concept showcasing his likable contemporary stock character into an action/adventure period costume picture.
He plays Don Diego Vega, the milksop son of an affluent rancher who, like the Scarlet Pimpernel, dons a disguise to defend the impoverished townsfolk from the tyrants in power.
His alter ego Zorro's, (Spanish for fox) trademarks are the black cape and cowl mask he wears and the master swordsmanship he displays.
He is known to brand his victims with a "Z" made with three fast strokes of his blade.
At the end of the film, after Zorro's greatest triumph, his identity is revealed.
He throws his sword into the air.
It lodges into a high spot on the wall, as Zorro shouts, "Till I need you again!" Though it was probably not Fairbanks' intention at the time, this line was a prime set-up for a sequel if there ever was one.
After the tremendous financial and critical success of ZORRO, Fairbanks continued to give the public what it wanted the charismatic Fairbanks persona in lavish period epics.
THE THREE MUSKETEERS, ROBIN HOOD and THE THIEF OF BAGDAD were all released in the years between the two Zorro epics.As one can easily discern by the title of this follow-up, Doug is back as Diego's son - namely Don Cesar, aka "Don Q." The screenplay is based on the novel "Don Q's Love Story" by Hesketh Prichard and Kate Prichard which had no relationship to Zorro at all.
But by making Don Q the offspring of the famous hero, it cashed in on the audience's familiarity with the original and made it possible for Doug to play a dual role as both father and son.In the family tradition, Don Cesar is sent to Spain to continue his education and learn the traditions of his ancestors.
His high-spirited ways and showmanship with a bullwhip make him a favorite of the Queen's cousin, Archduke Paul of Austria (Warner Oland).
Cesar also makes an enemy of surly Don Sebastian (Donald Crisp), a member of the Queen's guard, and both men fall for the beautiful Dolores de Muro (Mary Astor).
After Cesar is framed for murder, he fakes suicide and goes underground until he can prove the guilt of the real killer.
Meanwhile, in California, Don Diego receives word of his son's predicament.
He retrieves his sword from where it had stuck thirty years before, digs out his mask and cape and travels to Spain to help rescue his son.
Father and son take on 15 soldiers in a sword fight during the film's exuberant finale.
Audiences and critics alike loved DON Q even more than the original.
Film-making technique and technology had improved rapidly since 1920.
The sequel had a stronger plot, higher production values and better pacing.
What's more, Fairbanks has fine-tuned his swashbuckler persona to perfection.
He was never was he more cocksure, flamboyant and amusing than he appears here.
Though already 41 years old, he easily got away with playing a much younger character in no small part due to his physical fitness.
He is shown to great advantage, engaging in sword-play, jumping on a horse or his specialty in this film - cracking a whip.
Well known for performing his own stunts, Doug reportedly spent six weeks learning fancy whipmanship.
He uses it to light a cigarette, extinguish a candle, slice paper, lasso a bull and swing onto a balcony.
He also shows himself to be a dandy on the dance floor in a parody of a Valentino tango.Donald Crisp, best known for his chilling performance as Lillian Gish's cruel father in BROKEN BLOSSOMS, does double duty in DON Q as both co-star and director.
He plays Fairbanks' dastardly nemesis Don Sebastian while directing one of his best films.
Crisp directed more than 70 films, including the Buster Keaton classic,THE NAVIGATOR.
He got his start in the movies in 1908 with the Biograph Company and appeared on screen for the last time 55 years later as Grandpa Spencer in the 1963 film SPENCER'S MOUNTAIN that starred Henry Fonda.
Crisp died in 1974.
The New York Times thought so highly of DON Q, SON OF ZORRO, that they named it one the 10 best films of 1925.While enjoyable on TV or home video, the movie is twice the fun when watched with live accompaniment and an audience as I was fortunate to experience at Cinevent 2006..
Son lives up to his father's pedigree.
Sprightly, only slightly less appealing sequel to Fairbank's first outing as Zorro.
Here as Zorro's son, we also get some neat whiptricks and the sight of 2 Fairbanks (as Zorro and his son) in addition to the usual acrobatic stunts.
The plot concerns Don Q being sent to the "old country" to study.
He ends up framed for a crime by the corrupt officials of the Queen (who are made jealous when Don Q saves their commander from a bull with his whip, impressing the Queen with his courage).
Zorro must come over to help him prove his innocence and defeat his enemies in battle..
The Son Also Rises.
Dashing Douglas Fairbanks (as Don Cesar de Vega) is the son of the legendary "Zorro", in this spectacular sequel to Mr. Fairbanks' own "The Mark of Zorro" (1920) *********.
The younger Fairbanks has been sent to Spain, where he cracks his whip, and soaks up local color.
There, he falls in love with pretty Mary Astor (as Dolores de Muro); watch out for the great introduction to Ms. Astor's character, as Fairbanks places wings on her silhouette.
You know trouble is brewing when dastardly rival Donald Crisp (as Don Sebastian) is spurned by "belle of the Archduke's ball" Astor.
In a fit of anger, Mr. Crisp assassinates Archduke Paul (as Warner Oland), and frames Fairbanks for the killing.
Then, Fairbanks fakes his own suicide, and sets out to prove his innocence; eventually, he receives help from father "Zorro" (Fairbanks, in a dual role)."Don Q, Son of Zorro" is a tremendous sequel, from Fairbanks and company, who wisely viewed follow-ups as a chance to equal, or improve upon, earlier hits.
Not surprisingly, it lacks the spontaneity of the earlier film, and it is, perhaps, a little too long.
However, the overall production is superior, and the storyline refreshingly unique; as "Don Q", and his story, are quite different than the original "Zorro".
Crisp is very helpful, as both villain and director.
And, Henry Sharp's photography is top notch.The cast is terrific: alongside the aforementioned, you have Fairbanks regular Charles Stevens (as Robledo) in one of his more showy roles, otherwise humanitarian Jean Hersholt (as Don Fabrique) playing Crisp's blackmailing nemesis, famous sibling Lottie Pickford (as Lola), and Albert MacQuarrie (as Colonel Matsado) gets to ask Fairbanks: "Who the hell are you?".
Fairbanks Forever!.
Like his father a generation before, a young Californian caballero must fight against treachery & evil in high places.DON Q SON OF ZORRO was Douglas Fairbanks' rousing sequel to his previous hit film, THE MARK OF ZORRO (1920).
Much more expansive & elaborate than the first film, Fairbanks shows what he's learned about producing silent swashbucklers in the intervening five years.
Mixing history, spectacle & lots of action, Doug always gave his audience their money's worth.By this point in his career, Fairbanks was the absolute master of the swashbuckler.
Whether romancing a fair señorita, fighting off hordes of enemy swordsmen, or jumping all about the architecture, his infectious grin & superb athletic prowess never fail to charm the viewer.
And here he gets to charm twice, playing both father & son very nicely.Doug is given wonderful support from three excellent character actors: Warner Oland as a silly Austrian Archduke whose foolish behavior precipitates the movie's crisis; Jean Hersholt as a social climbing buffoon who gets more than he bargained for; and vile Donald Crisp (who also directed) as the villain who wants both Fairbanks' life & sweetheart.Although given little to do, Mary Astor is still a lovely heroine worth the fighting of several duels.But this remains Fairbanks' film.
His powerful personality & spectacular stunts not only dominate the movie, but also have ensured him an unassailable niche in Hollywood history..
The Fairbanks action-adventure formula at its most streamlined.
After his artsy fantasy "The Thief of Baghdad" freaked everyone out, Doug got back to basics with this sequel to his first swashbuckler, "The Mark of Zorro" -- and concocted a meticulously designed, take-no-chances star vehicle.
The sets, cast, and screenplay are all impressive but, as always, it's the Fairbanks persona -- an odd combination of pragmatist and dreamer, magician and acrobat, lover and fighter, rogue and moralist -- and his endless bag of tricks, gags, and stunts that sets the film apart from, not only 1920s action spectacles, but those of his successors: Jackie Chan, James Bond, and Indiana Jones.Of his later pictures, perhaps only "The Gaucho" tops this one for sheer excellence in filmmaking..
A great sequel to a great original.
The Mark of Zorro to me is one of the Douglas Fairbanks classics, and its sequel Don Q Son of Zorro is just as great and even on par with it.
It looks spectacular with sets that look lavish and expensive and photography that positively sweeps.
The music score rouses the spirits well enough and there is a sense of humour that has a strong presence and in a way that is still fresh.
The story is well-paced and compelling with thrills, fun and adventure galore.
It's conventional for a film starring Fairbanks and as an adventure film as well in a sense but not to a routine or simplistic degree, it is always easy to follow and still offers enough surprises.
The action is full of energy and rousingly choreographed, never too much or too little and they move the story forward rather than slowing down.
If you are looking for stunts that will leave you in awe, as you often find in Fairbanks's films, you will not be disappointed in Don Q Son of Zorro, they're unmistakably Fairbanks but don't feel rehashed.
Donald Crisp directs with a deft and imaginative touch, and the characterisations are vivid enough, with the exception of Mary Astor who doesn't have a lot to do and comes across as bland as a result(shame as she has done a fair amount of stuff that I like).
Crisp is especially good in support, he has rarely been more malevolent though not in a blatant way, and Don Sebastian is easily one of the nastiest villains of any Fairbanks film.
Warner Oland is solid too if occasionally resorting to histrionics.
Douglas Fairbanks is the most impressive though, the athletic stunts look so effortless when he does them and the gallant charisma and infectious smile makes him a most likable hero.
To conclude, Mark of Zorro is still a classic and one of Fairbanks' greatest but Don Q Son of Zorro is just as great.
9/10 Bethany Cox. Was this the first sequel?.
As an early Zorro movie, well, an early movie period, this was fairly good.
I will admit that some of it was kind of dumb.
The plot is that Zorro's son has been framed for a murder.
This happens because someone forges the murder victim's signature saying he was the killer.
How could anyone be fooled into thinking someone wrote down who their murderer was?
Was this a thing back in the 1920's?
The Zorro costume does in fact appear, but unfortunately it's only in the last ten minutes.
With all that being said, this still is by no means a bad movie.
The original Zorro movie was better.While this was before color, I really was impressed by the tints of this movie.
I guess they don't count as colors, but this really was a nice looking movie.
The atmosphere is probably the strongest point, because this is a movie that's very nice to look at with great sets.
It's so nice to see how well they hold up after nearly a hundred years!
I like the idea of Zorro having a son, but this was interesting because he wasn't just taking on the persona of Zorro.
He really was becoming a new character in his own right.
Sequels shouldn't just repeat what the original did.
It's great to point out the flaws in such an old movie.
While not a classic, it's fine.
The Man with the Whip.
A sequel to one of Doug's best pictures that rousingly maintains the high standard of the original with much of the action played for laughs as Fairbanks effortlessly sees off the opposition while nonchalantly cracking a whip (even snapping a cigarette from Donald Crisp's mouth at one point!), mounting horses and performing other exhilarating feats of derring do.
Amidst all the macho brawling Lottie Pickford and Stella DeLanti (as the Queen) both make lively impressions in relatively brief roles; the latter early on, the former towards the end..
A case where the sequel is about as good as the original..
Due to the success of "The Mark of Zorro", Douglas Fairbanks returned to the screen for this sequel—a film about the brave son of Zorro.
Instead of taking place in California, however, the narration explains that all first-born sons in the Vega family travel to Spain for an education.
So, we see the whip-wielding Don Q making friends and having a heck of a good time in the mother country.
After meeting the Archduke of the Austria-Hungarian Empire (I guess he, too, was there for an education or to meet some senoritas), the two become fast friends.
However, when Don Q begins to woo a lady (Mary Astor), the evil Don Sebastian (Donald Crisp) concocts a plan.
He kills the poor Archduke and frames Don Q!
So, during much of the film, the son of Zorro is a wanted man.
Only after some cool action and help from his Daddy (how did he get from California to Spain---I mean, it's literally half a world away!)—and you then get to see two Douglas Fairbanks in a rousing finale.While this is a derivative film, it is fun.
Plus, how can the film help but be wonderful—it IS a Fairbanks film during his heyday in Hollywood.
Excellent action, acting and script combine to make this one as good as the original Fairbanks film.By the way, look at the runaway bull scene where Don Q supposedly stops a bull from the bullring on a wild stampede through the streets.
It's clearly NOT one of the Spanish cows bred for the ring but some old dairy cow!
I can see why they didn't want Fairbanks to risk his life in such a scene, but they used a dairy cow—and that gave me a bit of a laugh..
Zorro has a sequel!.
SYNOPSIS: A young Californian blade at loose in Madrid is accused of murder by his rival for the hand of a pretty girl.NOTES: A sequel to The Mark of Zorro (1920).COMMENT: Unlike most sequels, this one is actually much more entertaining than the original Zorro, thanks not only to the large amount of money lavished on this production, but for the more engaging performances all around.
True, the costumes, sets and hordes of colorful extras certainly engage the viewer's attention, but not more so than our dashing hero himself, so personably portrayed with such consummate high spirits and athletic prowess by the charismatic Fairbanks who, in addition to his mastery of swordplay and balcony leaping demonstrates a new skill to enthrall all his fans here, namely a dazzling display with a stock whip.
In my youth, we often wondered whether actor Donald Crisp was a good director.
Here's the answer: He's not just good, he's brilliant-and not just in handling his players, all of whom (including Crisp himself) contribute eye-catching characterizations.
In fact, Crisp's entrancing visual style is one of the picture's mainstays.
He gets the pictorial best from every shot.
AVAILABLE on DVD through Delta.
Quality rating: 10 out of ten. |
tt1150934 | Anacondas 4: Trail of Blood | A baby anaconda, which was captured at the end of the previous film, is being used for experiments by a man named Peter Reysner, who creates a hybrid of the blood orchids from Borneo that enabled the anaconda to grow so large and live so long, and creates a serum for cell regeneration. After the test seemingly works for the baby anaconda to regenerate, Peter burns it. When he disappears, the long anaconda escapes from the cage and kills Peter in a mine filled with blood orchids. J.D. Murdoch, a billionaire suffering from bone cancer, sends his assassin Eugene and his team of henchmen mercenaries to find Peter and the serum Peter created so that it can cure him. He also tells them to be careful of Dr. Amanda Hayes, and to kill her if needed. Dr. Amanda Hayes, the sole survivor of the previous snake attack, and two officers also go in search of Peter, determined to destroy the serum and kill the snake.
On the way they meet Alex, a trekker who appears lost in the Romanian Carpathians, while doing a pathology project. When they discover the blood orchids in the mine, Amanda sets the explosives to destroy the orchids, but she is attacked by the anaconda that kills two officers, but manages to evade it. As Amanda and Alex leaves the mine, Amanda is knocked unconscious and Alex escapes to get more help. Meanwhile, two groups encounter more people (Scott, Jackson, Patrick, Wendy and Heather) who are looking for the base camp of fellow scientists but get dragged into the search for the snake. Due to the serum, the anaconda can no longer die without significant damage to its internal organs. Heather falls ill due to a spider bite. The next day, most of the people are attacked and eaten by the snake. It first kills one of the hunters working for Murdoch. When Eugene and his henchmen find Hayes and Jackson's group, they capture them. Eugene shoots an already injured Patrick shotts in the snake but snaked attacks, who was wounded by the snake, and also shoots and injures Wendy for trying to escape.
The snake finds them and devours Leila and Hakeem. Amanda and Jackson are forced to find the serum, and are accompanied by two henchmen of Eugene to find it. They put up at Peter's house. There the two find the serum but keep it hidden. The anaconda strikes the house and devours one gunman, and while the other is trying to fight it off, Amanda and Alex escape. Jackie corners them, but is taken by surprise by Jackson. The snake attacks Jackie and he accidentally blows himself up with a grenade while trying to destroy the snake. It then chases Amanda and Scott. Scott sacrifices himself to the snake to buy time for Amanda to run. In an attempt to destroy the snake, Amanda throws a gasoline tank at the snake and blows it up, but the snake regenerates after she flees.
Back at the base camp, Murdoch appears, but is in for a rude shock when he sees that his arch enemy Vasile is also there, and that Eugene has joined ranks with the latter. Seeing the melee they are in, Jackson stabs Eugene, makes him shoot Murdoch's rival and then fights Armon, but Jackson gets shot and Amanda shoots Armon to death. Murdoch arrives, demanding that Amanda give him the serum. As they do that, he keeps his word and allows them to leave. As the remaining survivors leave in the jeep, Murdoch injects himself with the serum and discovers that it works, but the snake eats him. As Amanda finally destroys the orchids for good, she, Jackson, Alex and Heather try to escape in a jeep as the anaconda pursues them, but they are attacked by Eugene, who had clung on the back of the vehicle. Amanda kicks him out of the car with two grenades in hand. While the snake devours him, it is blown to bits. As Amanda, Jackson, Alex and Heather leave, the anaconda who seems to have regenerated, and slithers into the forest. | flashback | train | wikipedia | null |
tt0088885 | The Care Bears Movie | Mr. and Mrs. Cherrywood are a middle-aged couple who run an orphanage. Mr. Cherrywood tells the orphans a story about the Care Bears and Care-a-Lot, their home in the clouds. In the story, Friend Bear and Secret Bear travel looking for people to cheer up. They meet Kim and Jason, two lonely orphaned children. Friend Bear and Secret Bear introduce themselves and remind the children of their ambitions, but neither of them are interested.
At an amusement park, Tenderheart Bear spots a magician's apprentice named Nicholas. While unloading a trunk of goods for his master, the "Great Fettucini", Nicholas finds an old book with a diary-style lock. When he unlocks it, an evil spirit appears as a woman's face, and starts corrupting him. With his help, it lays waste to the park, and begins a quest to remove all caring from the world.
Back at Care-a-Lot, some of the other bears are working on their new invention: the Rainbow Rescue Beam, a portal that can send any bear to Earth and back. The two Care Bear cubs belonging to Grams Bear, Baby Hugs and Baby Tugs, interfere with it and bring forth a group of unexpected visitors: Friend Bear, Secret Bear, Kim, and Jason. The bears introduce themselves to the children, and give them a tour of their home. Tenderheart Bear returns on his now out of control Rainbow Roller just before a "Cloud Quake" caused by the spirit, which ruins Care-a-Lot. He informs the others of Nicholas' troubles on Earth. Using the Rainbow Rescue Beam, he sends Kim and Jason to the park, along with Friend Bear and Secret Bear. They end up in the Forest of Feelings when the portal malfunctions. From a nearby river, the rest of the bears begin searching for them aboard a cloud ship called the Cloud Clipper.
Within the Forest, the children and their friends are introduced to Brave Heart Lion and Playful Heart Monkey, two of the Care Bear Cousins. Later on, the other bears discover more of these creatures, among them Cozy Heart Penguin, Lotsa Heart Elephant, Swift Heart Rabbit, and Bright Heart Raccoon. During their stay, the spirit attacks them in several disguises: a spearfish, tree, and eagle. After the Care Bears and their Cousins defeat it, they venture back to Earth to save Nicholas from its influence.
At the park, Nicholas obtains the ingredients for his spell against the children and the creatures. After he casts it, the Care Bears and company engage in a long battle. The bears shoot beams of bright light on him, forming their "Stare"; the Cousins help with their "Call". As the creatures' power drains away, Nicholas and the spirit briefly regain control. After Kim and Jason assist him, he finally realizes his misdeeds. With Secret Bear's help, he closes the spirit's face back into the book and saves himself, the park, and the world. He thanks the group and reunites with Fettucini, while Tenderheart Bear inducts the Care Bear Cousins into the Care Bear Family, and Kim and Jason find new parents who take them to one of Nicholas' shows.
As Mr. Cherrywood finishes his story, it is revealed that he is actually Nicholas, and that his wife is Kim. Tenderheart Bear, who has been listening from outside a window, returns to Care-a-Lot in his Cloudmobile. The film ends with every member of the Care Bear Family waving good-bye. | good versus evil, revenge, storytelling, romantic | train | wikipedia | null |
tt0102484 | Murder in New Hampshire: The Pamela Wojas Smart Story | The film opens to the actual murder. Three teenage boys are holding a knife to the throat of a man. They are demanding his wedding ring, and he is begging for his life. The boy holding the knife says "he can't do it." Another boy draws a pistol, says "God Forgive me", and shoots him to death. The three boys run out of the house to a getaway car. The scene then cuts to a courtroom. The prosecuting attorney explains to the court that Ms. Smart coerced the boys into the murder of her husband. The scene then cuts to a flashback, where Gregg Smart calls the home of his then-fiancee Pam. He tells her that he got a job at a New Hampshire insurance company, and that she should pack her bags. When he arrives, she notices that he has had his hair cut, and expresses her disapproval. The next scene shows their wedding. As they are about to drive off, she tells her new parents-in-law that she is thankful that they have been so good to her. Pamela soon applies for a job at a news station, but is turned down. She then gets a job as a media director at a high school, where she begins an Anti-Drug campaign. For the drug campaign, she meets several students, including Billy Flynn and Cecelia Pierce. After the meeting, she drives Cecelia and Billy home, dropping off Cecelia first. When Billy and Pam are alone in the car, they learn of their shared fandom of Van Halen, and Pam says she used to work on a radio station, & met the band then. Later on, Billy, Pam, and Cecelia learn of a contest to make an advertisement for orange juice, which has a cash prize and a trip to Florida. They decide to make a music video for it, Billy being the cameraman. Soon after, Cecelia expresses her interest of going into a similar field to Pam, who offers to let her be her intern. Cecelia accepts, and tells Pam that Billy has a "major crush" on her. On one occasion, Pam and Billy go to a nightclub together, despite Billy's mother's disapproval. One day of filming the music video, Pam asks Billy if she could shower at his house, he says that was okay. Afterward, Billy and Pam talk in his bedroom, & they soon begin to kiss each other passionately. Pam soon pulls away and tells Billy that she's married. However, soon Billy is at his friend's house. He tells his friend that his mom believes he is sleeping over there, so if she calls he should pretend he can't come to the phone, but in reality he is going to Pam's and that her husband is out of town. When asked if they plan to have sex, Billy says "I hope so." At Pam's, they do end up going upstairs and having sex for the first time. When Pam is driving Billy home one day, she tells him they have to break up. Billy asks her why, and she says that Gregg rarely goes out of town like that, and that she wants to be with Billy always. She tells him that the only way they could be together is if he murders her husband. Billy suggests that she divorce Gregg, but she says that all they own is made out to him, and he would get all of it. He also has had a history of beating her, and is afraid for her safety if she leaves him. She tells him that he will also pay his friends $1,000 to kill her husband. On two separate occasions, Billy says he and his friends will kill Gregg, but both times he doesn't, and Pam reacts with anger, and threatens to tell Gregg of the whole situation. Billy tells his friends that he would commit suicide if he lost Pam. On the third occasion, they succeed in killing him. When questioned by the police and media, Pam adamantly claims that her husband was not a violent person, nor was he involved with illegal drugs. Meanwhile, an anonymous caller tells the Police that Cecelia knew about the plot. The police immediately question Cecelia, who eventually admits to the story being true. Billy & his friends are arrested, as is Pam. Billy is offered a reduced sentence if he testifies against Pam, and his friends talk him into it. The movie ends in the courtroom again. The jury finds Pamela to be guilty, and she is sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole and Billy is sentenced to life in prison with the possibility of parole after 28 years. | murder | train | wikipedia | She's A Bad Mama Jama.
98 I was a freshman in college when the Pamela Smart trial was all the rage on television, radio, newspapers, etc.
I followed the proceedings with great interest, and when the TV film "Murder In New Hampshire" premiered on CBS, I watched with anticipation.
I wanted to know what drove this young woman to be so treacherous.
For those of you not familiar with this true story, 23 year-old Pamela (Wojas) Smart married her college sweetheart, Greg Smart.
They resided in Derry, New Hampshire.
Pam's and Greg's parents lived nearby.
Exactly one year after Pam and Greg were married, Greg was found dead in the couple's home.
He was sprawled out on the carpet, having been brutally shot to death.
Pam gets her just desserts as this bizarre (but true)story ends.What followed was a sad saga.
Pamela Smart, who came from a wealthy family and was always popular, arranged the murder of her husband Greg by hiring four teenage boys to proceed with the murder plot.
Billy Flynn was 15 years old and was a student at Winnacunnet High School, where Pam was employed as "media director." Pam encouraged Billy, along with teens Raymond Fowler, JR Lattime, and Patrick "Pete" Randall, to murder Greg.
Another student, Cecelia Pierce, 15, worked at Pam's office for school credit and knew all about the murder plot but was skeptical because Pam would just matter-of-factly fill her in on the details as if it was one big joke..
What was her reason???.
I enjoyed this movie and even bought it for my collection.
Remember Billy was only fifteen years old and was experiencing his first sexual encounter.
He was, understandably, easily manipulated by an "older" woman.While I liked Helen Hunt's portrayal of Pam Smart, I still do not understand what was her reason for getting rid of her husband.
According to the movie, Greg wasn't cruel or abusive to her, he seemed to love her very much, they lived in a lovely condo, and was supportive of her career decisions.
His parents also seemed to love Pam like a daughter.
Pam was crazy about Greg when he was a Van Halen look-alike but when he cut his hair and started to dress corporate (to work for an insurance company)did her feelings for him start to change then?
She was very into heavy-metal but was she afraid that her "rocker" husband was transforming into Mr. Yuppie America?
I went ahead and bought a paperback about this case and hope to find out what has driven Pam to this extreme..
Movie was excellent 2 thumbs up!!!.
This was an excellent re-enactment of the Pamela Smart story.
I have been wanting to see it again for years and up until a few minutes ago I was unaware that it could be purchased.
I can't wait to add it to my video library.
I think everyone in the movie did an excellent job.
I think that a lot of people misunderstood the movie.
If u followed the story at the time the movie was pretty much factual to what went on.
In fact i just watched American justice last night and it was a documentary about the greg smart murder it got me thinking about that movie again and thats why i looked it up on the internet and i saw someone elses comment about how horrible the movie was and i felt i had to make a comment because i totally disagree.
To anyone out there who hasn't seen it I definitely recommend it..
Lame movie.
This movie about what at the time was considered one of the most horrific murders ever because of the circumstances, was a waste of time.
Helen Hunt was game in the role of Pam Smart, but everything else in this movie was so terrible.
Chad Allen as her teen lover was an embarrassment, I couldn't see any reason why they would go head over heels for each other in real life by the way these two actors went pedestrianly about their way.
A very big waste of time for anyone who watches this after reading this review..
Helen Hunt as a nasty sociopath.....
she does quite well in this made for TV film.
She certainly provides the audience with the personality of a hate-worthy narcissist, who, once she cannot get her way, and rise to stardom on TV news, decides the way to solve her career problem is to have her husband executed.Pamela Smart apparently was able to manipulate a student, Billy (well portrayed by a young Chad Allen).
She worked as media director at a high school, but that was not good enough for her lofty aspirations, so she manipulated Billy and his friend to murder Greg Smart, promising them insurance money as pay-off.
There is actually an amusing scene after her husband has been murdered, and Pamela Smart is worried about how she will look on the 6PM news.Hank Stratton as Gregory Smart is a bit too innocent, but we do feel sorry for his fate.
Seems an odd question, but did Pam Smart ever hear of divorce?.Howard Hesseman is not in the film long enough, but offers a good performance, and the courtroom scenes are thankfully left to a minimum.
Michael Learned and Ken as Greg's well-meaning parents.Overall a decent docudrama which has probably been elevated to cult status by now, as Pamela Smart in real life is now petitioning for yet another appeal.
It was real, it was good but not real good..
The movie was a typical TV movie of the week.
The actors did well with the script they had to work with but they really didn't have much to work with.
I wouldn't rate the movie as high as I do if Chad Allen didn't look so cute in it.
All in all I'd say it was a pretty average to slightly above average made for TV movie..
Ho-Hum, ZZZZZ.
Although I really do appreciate Helen Hunt as an actress in other films, I feel that she was a wrong choice for playing the part of Pamela Smart in this picture.
Hunt is too soft for this role which one can see by watching Pamela Smart on the television show 'American Justice'.
Also, the movie didn't go by all the facts, even though these things were small in nature - for example, Billy Flynn was not a blond guy, he has brown hair and certain things in the film were altered from the true facts that were reported on national television when Pamela Smart was on trial for the murder of her husband, Greg Smart.
I think a lot of trouble with the picture had to do with the script - there just wasn't enough passion (not in the love sense, necessarily) in any of the scenes like when Smart (Hunt) is talking to Flynn (Chad Allen) about killing her husband, etc.
They might as well have been talking about going and getting a cup of coffee or planning on going on a picnic together.
I was thoroughly disappointed in this film and therefore rated it a 1 out of 10 because it didn't have any suspense about it at all and the acting was terrible as well..
Excellent Movie!.
I loved this movie.
It's too bad that Pamela Smart does not take any responsibility for any of her crimes and actions.
She is as guilty as anyone can be.
I'm glad she ran out of appeals and legal options and that her pardon was denied.
She took them to the Federal level.
She says she deserves leniency because she's been good in prison.
I don't know about you but I think people are supposed to be good in prison.
Chad Allen was great in this movie.Reasons Pamela smart is guilty: 1.
She had an affair with a teenage boy.2.
She is a sociopatic liar.3.
She is cold hearted.4.
She did not show any emotion when her husband was murdered.5.
Denial.6.
Knew everything about the crime.7.
Jury and evidence found her guilty..
Enthralled..
High school kids can be pretty dumb.
When I was a sophomore I couldn't understand why I had to take orders from some of the teachers, since I could outrun all of them.
As far as the Other Side of the Cold War was concerned, we wondered what all the nonsense was about talking.
Why not lay down the law, and if they violate it, let's let 'em have it.It was a Newtonian world.
It depended entirely on mechanics.
Adolescence, for a boy, was like one long weight-lifting contest.
Judging from the kids in this docudrama, things haven't changed much.
If anything, they're even dumber.
In a recent survey of college seniors, only 23% knew James Madison was "the father of the Constitution" but 98% knew that Snoop Doggy Dog was a rapper.
Shameful.Well, I'm done scolding.
Someone help me down off this soap box?
Thank you.
Four high school kids -- three boys and a homely girl -- are seduced into murdering the husband of a prize-winning insurance salesman by the guy's wife, who is in charge of the high school's Media Center.
They shoot the guy in the head and she pays them ten thousand dollars and makes herself into a sexual receptacle for the handsomest boy.
I would never have done anything like that in high school.
The fist fights were tough enough.
Of course, none of our teachers were as fluffy and sexy as Helen Hunt.
Not that the young art teacher, Miss Elaine Cohen was a slouch, but it just wouldn't have happened.
If Miss Cohen had made herself available and asked me to off her boy friend, I wouldn't have done it.
I don't think.The plot sticks pretty close to the historic events.
It's kind of clumsy, the way real life is clumsy.
A good dramatic structure would have the kids succeeding on the first try.
But, as often happens, these kids are scared by the magnitude of the crime and they fail the first two tests.
They're all ready to go -- until it's time to go.
Then they "get lost" or the timing was off.After each failure, a disbelieving Hunt remonstrates with the kids and withholds her sexual favors from the best-looking kid.
She finally makes the arrangement that works, while warning them to use only the pistol -- no knives, because knives are sloppy and get blood all over the furniture and carpets and it never comes out.
And lock the dog away before you do it.
"The last thing I want is a traumatized dog," she mutters in all earnestness.Helen Hunt handles the role well.
She's alluring in a curious way, with an oddly shaped nose and drooping epicanthic folds.
Nicely built, too.
The kids aren't as good.
Actually, they're pretty bad.
The "handsome kid" can act about as well as you or I can.
The girl is a bit more convincing in projecting a character with the intelligence and moral sensibilities of a rather mature head of broccoli.Hunt's motives are left murky.
Was she jealous of Greg's success?
Not likely, because she'd just gotten a promotion herself.
Another lover somewhere?
Nah. Greg was faithful, and she was only manipulating the kid she was banging.
Money?
Money?
It's not mentioned.
The reason we're puzzled is that we sometimes treat life as if it were a coherent and easily grasped fictional narrative, something out of Agatha Christie.
It's difficult for us to understand that the exercise of power can itself be a powerful motive.
The ability to bend others to your will.
It's one of the reasons people want to be president, even though they make less money than a professional ball player.
It's the only reason Charles Manson organized his family.
Another motive is related to Munchausen syndrome by proxy.
Everyone will shower tears and affection on the poor bereaved widow.
Also a good murder will bring a few moments of excitement to a boring marriage, while at the same time ending it.
If you want to see an excellent, if fictionalized, dramatization of the Pamela Smart story, see if you can find "To Die For." Nobody is more seductive than Nicole Kidman as Pamela Smart -- and no one could be more stupid than Joaquin Phoenix as the handsomest boy..
Uninteresting Drag.
Largely disappointing film which does a terrible job of accounting the shocking and brutal murder of a young newly married New Hampshire man at the hands of his wife's school boy lover and his teenage friends.Neither Joyce Chopra nor her screen writing team have made any attempt to emotionally involve their audience, and any attention to the details of this tragic case is completely non-existent, thus leaving the viewers frustrated and starved of information.The entire cast are all very ordinary and uninspiring which results in a potentially fascinating and aggravating true story (although claimed to be fictitious in the end credits) becoming an uninteresting drag.
Watch an old "Colombo" re-run instead!Thursday, August 4, 1994 - T.V. |
tt0841032 | The Perfect Holiday | Benjamin (Chestnut) is an aspiring songwriter who attempts to break into the music business by giving a copy of his recording track of a Christmas album to a rap artist named J-Jizzy (Charles Q. Murphy). Nancy (Union) is a divorced mother, who is too busy taking care of her three children to take care of herself. Her daughter Emily (Khail Bryant) overhears her mother say that she wished for a compliment from a man, and the daughter tells the local mall's Santa Claus about her mother's wish.
The Santa Claus turns out to be Benjamin, who notices Nancy. Later, while sitting in a Starbucks after his shift as Santa, Benjamin and his friend Jamal (Faizon Love) see Nancy go into a dry cleaners. Benjamin borrows Jamal's jacket, pretends to drop it off at the cleaners, tells Nancy that she's a very attractive woman (granting her wish), and leaves. Eventually, the two start to date and end up falling in love—without Ben realizing that Nancy's ex-husband is J-Jizzy.
Things take a turn for the worse, however, because Nancy's oldest son, John-John (Malik Hammond) is jealous of Benjamin going out with his mother and plots to break up the relationship. What follows is a series of funny and touching scenes that show viewers what "family" is really about.
Queen Latifah and Terrence Howard play omniscient roles in the movie. Howard is a mischievous and sly angel named "Bah Humbug", while Latifah is the kind, thoughtful angel, called "Mrs. Christmas". | romantic, prank | train | wikipedia | null |
tt1375710 | El Dorado | Cole Thornton (John Wayne), a gunslinger-for-hire, is hired by wealthy rancher Bart Jason (Ed Asner) to help him in a range war with the McDonald family in the town of El Dorado. The local sheriff, an old friend of Thornton, J. P. Harrah (Robert Mitchum) gives Cole more details that Jason had deliberately left out, including the possibility of having to side against Harrah. Unwilling to fight his friend, Thornton quits, to the relief of saloon owner Maudie (Charlene Holt), who is in love with Thornton (and was for a time a romantic interest of Harrah's).
The McDonalds learn of Thornton's presence in town. Fearing that he might come for them, Kevin McDonald (R. G. Armstrong) puts his youngest son, Luke, on guard. When Thornton passes by on his way back from rejecting Jason's offer, Luke (Johnny Crawford), who has fallen asleep, wakes and fires a wild warning shot whereupon Thornton reflexively shoots him. Luke is still alive when Thornton finds him, but he refuses treatment based upon the belief that a gut-shot man wouldn't have a chance anyway and commits suicide when Thornton turns his back on him.
Thornton subsequently brings the boy's body to the McDonald ranch and offers an explanation. The only McDonald daughter, Joey (Michele Carey), impulsively rides off before Thornton can finish his story and ambushes him shortly thereafter. Her shot is not fatal, but the bullet lodges next to Thornton's spine and in time begins to trouble him by occasionally pressing against the spinal cord, causing temporary paralysis of his right side. The local doctor, Dr. Miller (Paul Fix), does not have the skill to remove the bullet and Thornton soon departs El Dorado for a new job.
Several months later, Thornton runs into another gunslinger-for-hire named Nelson McLeod (Christopher George) and a young greenhorn with a peculiar hat called Mississippi (James Caan), who has come for revenge against one of McLeod's men for the murder of his old friend and mentor, Johnny Diamond. McLeod has been hired by Jason for the same job Thornton turned down and Thornton hears from McLeod about how Harrah has turned into a drunk after an unhappy love affair. Thornton decides to return to El Dorado, hoping to save Harrah from being gunned down by McLeod and his men. He is followed by Mississippi who also wishes to help, despite his lack of experience and terrible aim with a gun.
Once Thornton and Mississippi arrive in El Dorado, they hear more of the story behind Harrah's change. The two men then join with Deputy Sheriff Bull (Arthur Hunnicutt) in order to get Harrah sober and cleaned up. Mississippi contributes an old folk recipe for a hangover that he learned from Johnny Diamond, promising it will make any man unable to drink liquor for a while. The concoction proves to be violently effective, and leaves Harrah sober and furious. Within a day of their arrival, McLeod and his men also come to El Dorado and are hired on by Bart Jason. When one of them shoots one of the McDonalds, Thornton, Harrah, Bull and Mississippi chase the shooter and his friends into an old church and then into Jason's saloon. Harrah arrests Jason and takes him to the jail for his part in the shooting of one of the McDonalds. Later that night, Thornton and Mississippi decide to patrol the town in the hope of keeping the peace and are deputized by Bull. There is another shootout with McLeod and his men, which results in a minor leg injury for Harrah.
The next day, Maudie sends a message to Thornton and his friends, stating that McLeod's men are frightening her and her patrons. When Thornton and Mississippi go to help her, they are ambushed and Thornton has an attack that leaves him partially paralyzed and captured by McLeod. Subsequently, McLeod trades the injured Thornton for Bart Jason, a trade to which Harrah agrees, despite knowing that doing so will mean that nothing will stand in the way of McLeod going after the McDonalds.
Sure enough, McLeod and his men shortly thereafter kidnap one of the McDonalds in order to force Kevin McDonald to sign over his water rights to Jason. Thornton and the others are forced to quickly come up with a plan to rescue Kevin McDonald's son and neutralize Jason and McLeod. Despite Thornton's paralysis and Harrah's leg injury, the two of them, along with Bull and Mississippi, return to town on wagons. While Thornton distracts Jason and McLeod outside of the front of the saloon, Mississippi, Harrah and Bull attack from the rear. The kidnapped McDonald is rescued, with a little help from Joey McDonald. Jason, McLeod and his men are killed, and order is restored to El Dorado. Thornton also begins to imply that he may discontinue his wandering ways in order to stay in the town with Maudie. | murder | train | wikipedia | Making up for a poor script with an abundance of stunts and chases.
I am a total sucker for adventure movies.
I have watched all the best of them; Indiana Jones; Romancing the Stone; National Treasure; The Da Vinci Code; King Solomon's Mines; Jewel of the Nile.
And now I have watched one of the poorest attempts at replicating them: El Dorado.As it say's in my headline summary "El Dorado" is based on a very poor script where the "archaeology" plays an extremely small role.
Because of that it seems that the director has decided on filling the very obvious plot holes with endless and pointless chases, shoot outs and ever changing hostage and blackmail situations.
The problem is that no matter what happens and how many twists are used to try to confuse or shock the viewer we always know what is going to happen long before it does and all of the smoke, screens and mirrors never really cover up the fact, that there really isn't much of a story to engage in.These shortcomings are furthermore enhanced by the very poor acting displayed by the majority of the actors.
Some of the minor supporting actors are actually quite good, but they just can't carry the weight of the rest of the cast and the very poor script.Add to that the lacking of either skill or vision (possibly both) in the special effects/CGI section of the production crew.
The CGI portions of the movie (especially the ending) are so bad, that most people would expect more from the graphics of a 10 year old, cheap PC game.On top of all these shortcomings comes the ending of the movie which I will not reveal.
I just want to say that it is bad.
Very bad.
In fact so bad and so badly thought through, that you can't help but wonder how (in actual history) the Incans could have possibly lost to the Spanish when they had such great powers on their side.
It seems to me that the best part of the movie is actually the stunts and chases which are rather imaginative and well performed, so if you like that, you might like the movie - it's actually the reason why I gave the movie 3 instead of just 1 star...So just to sum it up, El Dorado is a very bad movie, based on a very bad script, with rather bad actors, containing very bad effects and CGI and with a very bad and unfulfilling ending..
Like a humourless A-Team/Airwolf episode..
A-Team and Airwolf are much better than this though!
Adventure Movieslike Indiana Jones work, because you never know whats coming next with the situations the characters find themselves in - there are many plot twists interlaced with 'fish out of water' characters who react with emotional range to their various situations - for example being trapped against a dead end wall in a temple with the Nazis/Baddies after them, Jones and his companions would show panic and terror before accidentally grabbing the right spot on a nearby sculpture which reveals a hidden door, perhaps by the woman trying to hit him for getting him into this mess!
In Indiana Jones characters are highly antagonistic to each other, providing not only humour but dramatic opportunities and interest for the viewer.
You become involved in the characters and the basic pantomime 'good and evil baddies and myth' story works.NOT THIS MOVIE THOUGH!
This has none of the above - cardboard cutout characters are stuck in place with a total lack of reactions and humorous situations.
The plot flies from basic pantomime 'good and evil baddies and myth' A to B, the goodies chased by the baddies without any emotional interest for the viewer.A scene typifies the whole film - the characters are trapped against a dead end wall with the baddies after them, Jack, the female lead and his geek sidekick are seemingly trapped and dead.
But of course they are not.
Jack simply hits the right spot so the wall raises and then comes down and hides them.
There is no explanation how he knows to do this.
But you knew that is exactly what would happen, being used to it from watching the simple plot and scriptwriting.
It's rather boring.There are no real problems for the hero, Jack in the script - unlike Jones (played as a character with human faults) he is played as a alpha male real man who can simply do anything.
The squeaky geek sidekick will of course never get any serious attention of the woman while a realman like Jack is around.
Jack is played as a deadpan character with few emotions who can always push the right lever or button.
The woman is strong willed but always falls in place next to Jack.
All this is set in stone from the start.
There is little in the way of antagonism or any dynamic between the characters while the baddies are after them, and for all these reasons a total lack of interest from the viewer.
Add in a few explosions and helicopters like in the A-Team/Airwolf episodes and there you have it.
Fast-paced adventure....
"El Dorado: Temple of the Sun" is an adventure movie in the likes of "Indiana Jones", "The Jewel of the Nile" and "The Librarian".
Set in South America, the movie kicks off in high speed and never really slows down.The story is pretty much similar to what you would find in the afore mentioned movies.
A treasure/relic hunter is looking for an ancient artifact (or in this case, the City of Gold), and being chased in hot pursuit by someone wanting the very same thing.
So it is pretty much textbook script here.
But despite it being an "Indiana Jones" clone, the story did work out well enough.
Only one thing did puzzle me; who was the 'bad guy' working for?
And truth be told, at the end when you find out, I was shaking my head in disbelief, because that was a bit ridiculous.
But you will see for yourself...Being set and filmed in South America was great, because it was like you were there yourself, running around in the jungle looking for treasure.
And the sets throughout the movie were nice as well.One thing always amuse me, and that is how poorly bad guys are at shooting when trying to hit the main characters of the movie.
It is so wrong.
When they shoot at other non-important people, such as the native people, they have perfect aim, but once the guns turn towards the heroes, the aim becomes way off.
That is so old and so cliché that it just doesn't work anymore.The cast in "El Dorado: Temple of the Sun" was pretty good, and most memorable were Shane West (playing Jack Wilder), Luke Goss (playing Col. Sam Grissom) and Natalie Martinez (playing Maria Martinez).If you like adventure movies, then "El Dorado: Temple of the Sun" is definitely worth checking out, because it is action and adventure from the very start and till the very end..
Beautiful scenery, Abysmal Sound editing, and obvious CGI.
As Audio Engineer, the sound team should be fired!
Episode one was watchable.
I could only stand the first few minutes of Episode two, the audio was so terrible I couldn't bear it.The scenery in Peru is beautiful!
The several elements of CGI were so obvious - sad.
I didn't have a problem with the acting for the most part, and the story was fun although I really wanted the bad guy dead from the very beginning.But all of the acting and wonderful scenery becomes moot if you can stand to listen to it.
I gave it 3 stars primarily for the scenery..
Complete Utter Fail.
Worst movie I've seen this year...Bad acting, bad screening, everything's bad about it...
CGI from the stone age...
I really can't find my words to describe such a fail of a movie.
And I thought Indiana Jones was lame...
Shane West, Oh God!!!
He doesn't have the slightest idea about acting...
everything he does is completely foreknown by any ten year old child watching.
It is so obvious that he is "performing".
And the other sidekick, Elden Henson, worse than everything you can imagine...
However, I would recommend you to watch it, C-movie section.............
.. Well worth the time.
The idea of creating a storyline around the Incan Empire, especially with the secretiveness of Atahualpa and the fall after the arrival of Francisco Pizzaro.
This mini series brings in historical facts with a science fiction twist.
It also has a "Indian Jones" feeling to is as Jack Wilder has training in archeology though has been trained to use it for treasure hunting.
However, his training in both comes in handy with the amount of people after him and what he's searching for..
The story has them traveling to some amazing historical places in the Incan Empire making anyone who has ever been curious about that civilization deeply involved in journey.
Great storyline..
very entertaining!.
Collection of clichés.
Small Indiana Jones.
With each piece of clock in perfect place.
Charming hero, beautiful girl friend and dusty companion.
South America as arena.
Subject - mythical city of gold.
So, a nice puzzle.
Bad guy - part of a conspiracy.
Corrupt army general.
Wonderful images.
And running, gun fires, old machines for protect artifacts, dusty story and victory of good guys.
A tale with well known lines.
But not boring.
For the meeting of elements from a way to rebirth adventures in a gray world.
For the errors , many childish of script.
For the large eyes front of spectacular fight scenes.
For the ambiguous line between good and bad.
And for Luke Goss in the role of without soul brute, for a Shane West as a kind of James Dean the explorer.El Dorado is perfect excuse for this action movie..
Lead over gold.
Jack Wilder (Shane West, "Nikita") teams up with Maria Martinez (Natalie Martinez) and the computer expert Gordon (Elden Henson, "Mockingjay") to search for El Dorado, the city of gold.
Mercenary Grissom (Luke Goss) is supposed to stop him by all means, because the gold owners fear for a drop in value of their gold if a huge additional amount gets on the market.
This is not making any sense, because historical artifacts would be locked into a museum, not molten and sold on the regular market, but anyway, it gives the villain the big advantage that he needs not to steal the artifacts, only destroy them, which allows more firepower.
Grissom tries a partnership with General Mata (Julio Oscar Mechoso), Jack Wilder also gets an offer he can't refuse, and soon we have at least 4 different parties pursuing and fighting each other over the gold before it's even been found...In the first half, they try at least to set up a story, but in the second half they give up and fill the time with explosions, gun battles and car chases.
Given the poor effects and poor acting (especially Shane West seems to be limited to staring at a certain angle which makes his forehead look impressive), entertainment at a very mediocre level.
If you are looking for a good Indiana Jones rip-off, look elsewhere..
Loved it!
Fun and Entertaining Story!.
I really enjoyed this one.
It's been a while since an excellent adventure story has been made and this one is definitely it.
Great story-telling, the acting was excellent and the cinematography was great.
unlike the last Indiana Jones film this film portrayed authentic Peruvians, with the correct music and factual data.
The last Indiana Jones movie confused Peruvians and Mayas and Aztecs and basically overlapped them all making it an insult to many Peruvians.
It was good to see someone actually did the research and used authenticity.
Good job to the director and the special effects were better than I thought they'd be.
Great job Shane West and cast, this was truly a fun adventure..
nothing unexpected.
if you do not ignore than "El Dorado" is part of a precise genre, the film is more than decent.
the recipes is used in right manner, the ingredients are the classic ones, the charm of Shane West is enough for a sort of Indiana Jones with great virtues or sins,Luke Goss did a not bad job and the adventure is pretty nice.
the adventure, the massacred myth and the fight for treasure.
nothing surprising.
like each film with so precise target, it is easy to say than the disappointment is yours fault.
because the acting or the special effects or the story are reasonable and it is bizarre to expect more.
so, new version of a sort of story so well known.
sure, in better versions..
El Dorado.
El Dorado.
I watched the two episodes last night and I thought they were great.
I wanted to be entertained and I was.
Exciting story; yes very similar to Indiana Jones but any treasure/artifact hunting film will be.
The story was good and well thought out, exciting while not being in the realms of the ridiculous.
I enjoyed Luke Goss's performance.
He is charismatic and those penetrating blue eyes riveting.
He does not get enough credit for his performance in this film.
It is the first time I have seen him act (only remember him in Bros!).
The locations up in the Andes, the jungle and coast were truly spectacular, wonderful to see, especially for an armchair traveller like myself.
I do not hold with the view that a film has to be 'Oscar' standard to be highly entertaining and in my opinion these two installments provide one with an excellent evenings viewing..
Disappoints where it counts.
Jack Wilder is a modern wannabe Indiana Jones that unfortunately doesn't come close to the original.
In this story Jack and his girl Maria has found a clue leading to the fabled city of gold, Eldorado.
But if that much gold would flood the market, the gold price would plummet and fortunes be lost, so a shady consortium of Wall Street traders send their mercenary Grissom to stop Wilder.
But when both a corrupt army general and the head of the drug cartel also show an interest in the gold, things get really chaotic.It is a good idea, albeit not an original one.
The search for treasure, and Eldoroado especially has been done so many times before.
In part, that is due to that the basis of the story is sound and allows for many opportunities.
Treasure, love, hidden artifacts and ancient legends combined always makes a good story.
But without anything extra, it is just one of many.
El Dorado is just one of many.And unfortunately, El Dorado disappoints when it really counts.
Action scenes and especially special effects are really poorly made, considering it is so recently made.
The CGI looks more like made in the mid nineties.Not very long, which is good, and not very memorable.
But not overly boring either.
It is just that there are so many much better treasure movies to see...4/10.
Very violent, not very adventurous.
With all the adventure films that have been made it's hard to be original.
One could opt for strong story lines, great acting or humour.
El Dorado has opted for violence.
And a lot of it.
The story is quite simple (finding gold) and the way to do that is apparently with the help of guns.
And riffles.
And more guns.
And shoot anybody who gets in the way.The acting and directing I find very, very sloppy.
I do like Shane West but in this film I think he's terrible.
In one scene he and his friends are strolling towards a village.
Then a dialogue starts and Shane's character (Jack) starts panting.
To make him more butch?
Someone must have told him it looks manly.
It sounds like Jack has asthma.
And Jack makes a habit of panting his way through his scenes.
There's a scene in a library and the hero and heroine are looking at some papers that are over 400 years old.
Normally one would handle these documents with care and respect whilst wearing gloves.
Nope, not here.
Like they hold yesterday's newspaper: opening and folding and throwing it about.
Most peculiar.
There are some special effects, very clever done yet totally misappropriate in this film.
Kids will love it, I think.
But then again, total body count is over a 100 (give or take a few) so you might think twice before you let your little ones see this picture.O well, it was a rather cold and rainy summer evening when it was aired in The Netherlands.
Ideal circumstances for this film. |
tt0036860 | Gents Without Cents | The Stooges are small-time song-and-dance performers who are having trouble rehearsing due to loud tapping that is going on one story above them. When they go to give the rowdies a piece of their mind, three lovely ladies named Flo (Lindsay Bourquin), Mary (Laverne Thompson) and Shirley (Betty Phares) come to the door. It turns out the girls are performing their tap dance routine. The six become friends and go to a talent agent, Manny Weeks (John Tyrrell), to show of their stuff. However, he is at first unimpressed with the Stooges' act, but hires them anyway to perform at the Noazark Shipbuilding Company to entertain defense workers.
The Stooges, as "Two Souls and a Heel", slay the audience with their hilarious "Niagara Falls" routine ("slowly I turned, step by step, inch by inch..."). When the boys receive word that the headliners (The Castor and Earl Review) have to bail, they and the girls offer to take their place. Weeks is so enthralled with the boys' performance that he offers to send the trio to Broadway.
The Stooges nearly leave their ladies, but end up getting married first with a honeymoon planned for — where else? — Niagara Falls. | comedy | train | wikipedia | null |
tt0102103 | Impromptu | Since getting divorced, Baroness Amantine-Lucile-Aurore Dupin, previously Baroness Dudevant, the successful and notorious writer of sensational romance novels now living under the pseudonym George Sand, in Paris, has been in the habit of dressing like a man. In her romantic pursuit of the sensitive Chopin, whose music she fell in love with before seeing him in person, George/Aurora is advised that she must act like a man pursuing a woman, though she is also advised to avoid damaging his health by not pursuing him at all. With this advice Sand is deterred by a fellow countrywoman who pretends to be smitten with Chopin, the mistress of Franz Liszt, the Countess Marie d'Agoult. Whether the Countess is really in love with Chopin is unlikely; she seeks only to prevent a relationship between Chopin and Sand.
Sand meets Chopin in the French countryside at the house of the Duchess d'Antan, a foolish aspiring socialite who invites artists from Paris to her salon in order to feel cosmopolitan. Sand invites herself, not knowing that several of her former lovers are also in attendance. A small play is written by Alfred de Musset satirizing the aristocracy, Chopin protests at his lack of manners, de Musset bellows and a fireplace explosion ensues.
Chopin is briefly swayed by a beautifully written love letter ostensibly from d'Agoult, a letter actually written by, and stolen from, Sand. Eventually Sand wins over Chopin when she proves that she wrote the letter, reciting its words to him passionately, and after buying a copy of her memoir he finds the text of the letter in the book.
Chopin is then challenged to a duel by one of Sand's ex-lovers. He faints during the face-off. Sand finishes the duel for him and nurses him back to health in the countryside, solidifying their relationship.
Near the end of the movie, Sand and Chopin dedicate a volume of music to the countess, although this only suggests that she has had an affair with Chopin, causing a falling-out with her lover Liszt. Sand and Chopin depart for Majorca, relieved to escape the competitive nature of artistic alliances and jealousies in Paris. | violence | train | wikipedia | But the core of "Impromptu" explores love, jealousy, and the process of artistic creation in ways that keep the film captivating for the most jaded modern viewer.Judy Davis capably assumes the mantle of convention-bucking authoress George Sand, providing a fiery counterpart to Hugh Grant's self-deprecating (and effective) Chopin.
Emma Thompson's hilarious cameo as a dense provincial duchess itself provides almost enough reason to watch the film."Impromptu" boasts a great ensemble cast, witty dialogue, balanced humor and pathos, luscious period costumes and scenery, and the music of Chopin playing all the while -- what more could one want?
I just loved the story and the acting-I thought Judy Davis and Hugh Grant were fantastic.
Any film that puts Bernadette Peters and Mandy Patinkin together is a winner in my book (those of us who are theatre junkies are aware of their previous marvellous collaborations), but this film manages to include Emma Thompson, Judy Davis, Julian Sands, and Hugh Grant.
The film is a comedy solidly anchored in historical and biographical data and impregnated with a deep love for Chopin's music as well as an understanding of the complex relationship between him and Sand.
Witty, almost farcical comedy alternates with most delicate, expressive, sober dialogue - witness Judy Davis' face when Sand tells Chopin what the reality behind her free love propaganda is.
The story was well written and the acting was outstanding.George Sand (Judy Davis) a very independent character falls for Frederic Chopin (Hugh Grant) a sensitive basket case who is a genius when it comes to the piano.
Instead it looks like they achieved exactly what they intended, enabled by a gifted cast (especially the marvelous Judy Davis), a witty script and quite adequate (though not luxurious) production values.
A wonderful comedy romance with an outstanding performance by Judy Davis as George Sands.It is also interesting to note how closely the plot of this movie resembles that of Renoir's classic "Rules of the Game": 1) group of romantically and socially inbred cityfolk go to the country, 2) romantic and social inbreeding continue in the country, 3) people slipping from room to room, 4) mistaken identity, 5) hunting in the woods, 6) big hunting scene, 7) gender-bending, 8) poking fun at the upper classes, and 9) climactic theater performance chock full of satire and causing some conflict.
If you like any of the following, you will like this movie: Chopin music, comedies, Judy Davis, romance, cross-dressing, Hugh Grant, period films.
It really is a delightful piece to watch, inspired by the long romance between authoress, George Sand (Judy Davis), and composer, Chopin.
Judy Davis' role as George Sand is strong, and she delivers her character with the perfect amount of gusto.
These great actors really come close of BEING the Sand, Liszt, d'Agoult & Chopin you think you know after reading and listening as much as possible about them.It's a costume drama which is nicely tuned down, no need for grand sets when the principal & supporting cast is so flamboyant and magnificent.Of course, the music for the soundtrack is a pure delight too.
Thank you Judy Davis, Bernadette Peters, Julian Sands, Hugh Grant, Randy Patinkin; and of course Sand, Liszt, d'Agoult, Chopin, Delacroix....
The whole script is like one of the wonderful, rich piano pieces by Chopin or Liszt -- loaded with details that the actors and director have exploited to the full.
As someone who has never been especially fond of classical music or French literature (bite me, Proust), I wasn't exactly drooling when my roommate cajoled me into watching an art film about the romance between Frederic Chopin and George Sand.
First off, ignore the Parisian drag, this is a British sex farce -- witness the cast (Hugh Grant, Emma Thompson, Judy Davis) and the screwball plot (an aggressive woman who enjoys wearing men's clothes tries to win the heart of a shy, mild-mannered man).
One forgets that Hugh Grant was actually a good actor before he started playing Hugh Grant in all his movies, and he makes Chopin an utterly charming wimp.
The dialogue is superb in this, the character of George Sand (portrayed by an amazing Judy Davis) is one of the best I've ever had the pleasure of watching.
he has a bit of an accent which i'm not sure is realistic but sounds okay to me.julian sand and bernadette peters make good foils for grant and davis.
julian sand's liszt is a man in love with his music and his mistress.bernadette peters is very good as an abrupt, jealous sometimes-friend of davis character.emma thompson was hilarious as a bubble-headed aristocrat.
I think this is definitely his best performance; this is the only Hugh Grant's movie I've liked so far.
Impromptu (1991),a very enjoyable period romance/biotic/dramedy based on the real events, portrays truly famous and even legendary figures of 19th Century culture such as George Sand, nee Aurora Dupin, Frederick Chopin, Franz Listz, Eugene Delacroix, and Alfred De Musset.
The main heroine (or the hero) of the film is George Sand, who is equally known for her Romantic novels and her quite scandalous at the time way of life.
Her contemporary, the Russian ex-patriot, famous novelist Ivan Turgenev said about her "What a brave man she was, and what a good woman." That's exactly who Judy Davis is playing in the little known but witty, intelligent, charmingly silly and believe it or not historically accurate movie called "Impromptu".
It tells the story of the romance between strong and full of life George Sand and very talented romantic composer, Frederic Chopin whose music made her fall in love with him even before they met in person.
It is difficult to imagine together two people more different than a delicate fragile Chopin who died young at the age of 39 from the lung illness and fiercely independent, notorious and unorthodox George/Aurora but their romance which was the union of two lovers, close friends, and eventually more like mother - son relationship is the historical fact.
Actually all cast of the movie is delightful, Mandy Patinkin (Alfred de Musset), Jules Sands (Franz Listz), Bernadette Peters (Countess D'Agout, Listz lover, muse, and mother of his children who believed she could be even better muse for Chopin), and fabulous Emma Thompson who brought much appreciated comedy as Duchess D'Antan, rich aristocrat who sees herself as a patron of Art and the friend of the Artists.
What the artists think of her is the different story.Needless to say that the film is filled with the captivating music, charming costumes, and gorgeous locations.
Thank George Sand, I think.The one really dire problem is that they used his piano music without regard to whether it would have been then written.Ted's Evaluation -- 3 of 3: Worth watching..
Judy Davis, sexy,strong and dynamic as Sand, Hugh Grant very low key and real as Chopin, JUlian Sands, arrogant and proud as Franz Lizt, the always wonderful Bernadette Peters, charming and duplicitous as his mistress.special mention must be made to Mandy Patinkin's scene stealing role of Alfred DeMussett.
No matter she plowed ahead, despite the interference of her best friend (Bernadette Peters)and ...well, I won't tell you if she succeeded as that would spoil it wouldn't it.With Hugh Grant, Mandy Patinkin and Emma Thompson helping Peters support Davis, this film had all one could wish for.
I enjoyed it more than she did, I think, but my enjoyment was tempered.First, I don't know much about the personal history of Sand or Chopin, so the story was unknown to me, and I didn't watch the movie to learn about them.
Except for the romance between Chopin and Sand the events in the film are mostly fictional the real story of Chopin is much more interesting having said that I have to say the usual depressing enervating dark and austere retelling of this story is totally flipped here, it is energetic bright and even humorous and the pulsating music pulls the viewer into the photogenic haunting French country side perfectly, there are great performances, some bad dialogue aside, but as a whole this is enjoyable and well worth watching it's a bit of fine fluff and there's nothing wrong with that especially if it creates an interest in the actual persons depicted here, even the
actual story of George Sands Children and their relationship with Chopin that is almost non existent in the film is very interesting and extremely influential to Chopin in later life...
Judy Davis is perfect as George Sand and couldn't be better, so you wonder if she really could have been that good in reality - her reputation and reports tell a slightly less flattering story.
It's a wonderful play all through, and the most astonishing bit is perhaps how good Hugh Grant is as Chopin - you never expected such a character out of him, but he even makes it convincing.
The plot revolves around acerbic author George Sands (Judy Davis) and her relationships with fellow artists Frederic Chopin, Franz Liszt, and Alfred DeMusset.
Even Bernadette Peters, a quite decent actress, can't do much as Judy Davis' rival for Chopin's affection in a terribly written part that wants to be Glenn Close in "Dangerous Liaisons", but only achieves one of the bad-guy cheerleaders in "Romy and Michelle's High School Reunion".Cohesiveness is another problem, as the film jumps around too much and never either explains itself or goes anywhere.
It can be a disconcerting experience watching determined feminist George Sand pursuing such an insecure object of desire after the freethinking French author goes weak in the knees for the heavenly music of young Frederick Chopin.
Judy Davis gets plenty of mileage out of Sand's confident iconoclasm (ignoring the low moment when she tries to win the composer's attention by exchanging her trademark trousers for a lacy dress patterned after the Polish flag), and her lively performance goes a long way toward overcoming the inadequacies of a script that is less witty than it would have us believe.
This movie is about a George Sand, a woman with enough testosterone for two men, trying to seduce Chopin, a gay man with tuberculosis.
Which are nice but dang there are a lot of those, I wish for every single super hero movie that made bullocks of money we would get 10 intimate lil' indies!But anyway, this is definitely worth it if not just for the contrast , the stark contrast betwixt Chopin and Sands , very very interesting and gratifying film..
The story of Madame George Sand, the writer, and her meeting of the music instructor and composer Chopin.With a supporting cast that is as amazing as can be imagined, this story explains the life and times of the various artists and musicians of the day.
You will learn what life was like for them and the women and men who loved them, and the nobles who supported them.It is also one of the funniest movies you'll ever see!I saw this in the theater before I knew who Hugh Grant was.
I already loved the wonderful Judy Davis and the handsome Julian Sands.
I saw this movie IMPROMPTUIt was based on George Sand (Judy Davis) - a pseudo name of a novelist woman named Amantine Lucile Aurore Dupin who did everything to seek LOVE of a French pianist and composer Frederic Chopin (Hugh Grant).More importantly than the movie the understanding and portrayal of the character of George Sand was intriguing to say the least.She was a tom-boy.
Among all men - her affair and liaison with Frederic was most passionate and that is why much has been written about it and even songs, lyrics, poems, plays and movies made on them.Frederic Chopin was a shy, timid, feminine person, and his first meeting with George Sand was not at all cordial.
It's pleasing to reflect that Chopin and Liszt - the two greatest pianist-composers of all time - were actually good friends rather than petulant enemies as might be expected, and any film about either of them has a bit of a warm glow from that.
"Chopin is not a man, but a woman" Sand's friend the Duchess (Bernadette Peters) tells her, "He has to be wooed".
Even the performances that don't really work fail in a good-natured way: Hugh Grant as the sickly Chopin does diffidence better than he does intensity, and Julian Sands looks the part of Liszt far better than he speaks it.There's lashings of ironic humour on the absurdity of high art being subservient to base emotion, and the idea that genius has a foot in two worlds, one of them less noble, was well worth playing around with..
With Hugh Grant playing Frédéric Chopin, Impromptu seems an unlikely film to be, as some critics have called it, the best film ever made based on the notorious writer George Sand and her pursuit of the Polish-French composer whose attitude toward amour frustrated the daylights out of her.
Grant plays Chopin as a handsome but delicate soul, and Judy Davis turns in another magnificent performance as the hyper-aggressive Sand.
If you are looking for a definitive biographical film of Frederic Chopin's life, Impromptu is not it.
The actor who played Liszt (Julian Sands, "A Room With A View") resembled the real Chopin much more than Hugh Grant did.That said, the film was passable as modern entertainment and might just inspire people who view it to learn more about Chopin's gorgeous music (not highlighted here as well as it could have been), or more about the love relationship between Chopin and Sand, which surely in real life was mostly platonic and artistic, even when they briefly lived / traveled together.The script could have been better too; I'm sorry, but I don't find much humor in watching a horse enter a parlor and defecate on a table.
If I said that our highly regarded (at least by some people I know)and under talented leading man spends the entire movie looking like a terrified rabbit caught in the headlights of a speeding juggernaut, cowering with fear every time someone speaks to him and almost expiring with blind panic whenever George Sand is in the same room, my integrity and reputation as an honest man would be beyond doubt.I don't know who Hugh Grant based his performance on, or if he even took the trouble to research his character, but what he ends up showing us is a kind of consumptive, cowering, idiot who could no more compose, or indeed play, some of the most exquisitely ethereal and beautiful music known to man than I could eat the Eiffel Tower.
I doubt whether this preposterous character could play a triangle without quivering in fear, let alone a piano.But never mind.The movie is actually an entertaining take on the famous love story, presented by a who's who of (mostly) British actors in a beautifully designed and photographed period piece to a soundtrack of heavenly music.
And an unintentionally laughable piano player.Anyway, it's nice to see Hugh Grant in yet another comedy role.Any other actor would have portrayed Chopin as a sensitive, soulful and talented composer..
Impromptu could have been better, the ending was abrupt, the transition from Chopin's avoiding of Sand to loving her was rather rushed and underplayed and Lapine's direction was a mix of over-eager and stodgy at times, not always knowing what to do with the story.
You won't be disappointed by the music either, Chopin wrote some of the most beautiful and soul-searching of any composer and it is placed and played in Impromptu in a way that those involved know that.
The story is witty and charming on the most part and the characters are engaging and not too distorted in personality(though admittedly Chopin and Liszt are not quite as complex as they actually were), Georges Sand's character is the most interesting and Mandy Patinkin's character was so much fun that you wish there was more of him.
Hugh Grant gives a nuanced performance as Chopin(if at times too healthy), while Emma Thompson is alluring and hilarious and Bernadette Peters gleefully portrays a character that is very easy to hate.
Director James Lapine has amazingly gathered a very talented cast of actors/actresses like Hugh Grant, Mandy Patinkin, and Emma Thompson, to carry his film, but what shames me to say is that it does not create cinematic perfection.
Either way, even with the greatest players having fun with their roles, Impromptu slowly flushes itself down the period-piece toilet because it focuses itself to greatly on the actors while sinking the rest of the story.To begin, as I mentioned before, the greatness of the actors giving nearly 100% to their characters is a charm that is missed in so many other period piece films.
Music Brought Them Together: George Sand And Chopin.
Impromptu (1991) Starring Judi Davis, Hugh Grant, Bernadette Peters, Ralph Brown, Julian Sands, Mandi Patinkin..Directed By James Lapine Judi Davis is doing what I feel is an Oscar winning performance as French feminist radical cross-dressing author George Sand, who is ultimately a woman who belongs to no one and who lives life to the fullest.
It's a romantic comedy, it's a historical piece and a colorful introduction to the music of Frederic Chopin, Franz Liszt and the life and writings of Madame George Sand Aurore Dudevant.
She had many lovers, including Alfred De Musset (who is played in this film by Mandy Patinkin)and her most famous lover, Frederic Chopin.
Stars Judi Davis as George Sand, Hugh Grant as Chopin and Bernadette Peters as the Countess Marie D'Agoult.
Great scenes: Judi Davis must woo Hugh Grant as a man wins a woman (gender role switch because Chopin was very frail and feminine) and Sand was more aggressive.
Judy Davis, as Georges Sand, is wonderful, a real powerhouse.
Hugh Grant, is surprisingly very good as Chopin, the brilliant pianist who is taught by Sand how to live.Mandy Patinkin, Bernadette Peters, and Julian Sand are all quite good as well. |
tt0087692 | The Master of Ballantrae | At the Durrisdeer estate in Scotland in 1745, Jamie Durie (Errol Flynn), his younger brother Henry (Anthony Steel) and their father Lord Durrisdeer (Felix Aylmer) receive news of the Jacobite rising. Their retainer, MacKellar (Mervyn Johns), recommends that one brother join the uprising while the other remains loyal to King George II, so that whichever side wins, the family's status and estate will be preserved. Both brothers want to go. Jamie insists on tossing a coin for the privilege and wins, despite the opposition of his fiancée, Lady Alison (Beatrice Campbell).
The rising is crushed at the Battle of Culloden. Evading British soldiers, Jamie falls in with an Irish adventurer, Colonel Francis Burke (Roger Livesey). They return secretly to Durrisdeer to obtain money for passage to France.
When Jamie's commoner mistress, Jessie Brown (Yvonne Furneaux), sees him kissing Lady Alison, she betrays him to the British. Jamie is shot by Major Clarendon and falls into the sea. Henry becomes the heir to the estate on the presumption that Jamie is dead.
Believing his brother betrayed him, a wounded Jamie and Burke take ship with smugglers to the West Indies, where they are betrayed by their captain McCauley and captured by pirates led by French dandy Captain Arnaud (Jacques Berthier).
Jamie goes into partnership with Arnaud. When they reach the port of Tortugas Bay, they see a rich Spanish galleon captured by fellow buccaneer Captain Mendoza (Charles Goldner). Arnaud agrees to Jamie's proposal that they steal the ship. However, once they have seized the galleon, Arnaud turns on Jamie. Jamie kills Arnaud in a sword duel and takes command. They sail for Scotland.
Jamie returns to the family estate, rich with pirate treasure, to find a celebration in progress for Henry's betrothal to Alison. Unable to contain himself, Jamie confronts his brother, despite the presence of British officers. A fight breaks out, in which Henry tries to aid Jamie. The unequal fight ends with Jamie and Burke condemned to death.
Jessie helps them escape, at the cost of her own life. Henry also assists them. Jamie tells his brother of the location of some treasure which Henry can then use to pay off Jamie's gambling debts. Alison elects to go with Jamie to an uncertain future and she, Burke and Jamie all ride off together. | action | train | wikipedia | I love it!.
Okay, I disagree with all previous comments.I find this "Master of Ballantrae" a memorable, exciting and effective adaptation of the novel, and much closer to the book than the previous version with Errol Flynn.
Sure, some of the accents sound forced, and some of the acting is melodramatic and over-the-top--but that suits the subject.
Normally, providing a happy ending for a story that normally ends eerily and tragically would be jarring, but it really works, here.The characterization is excellent, and you really get three adventure movies in one for your money, here: the love-triangle, rival-brothers and family inheritance story (Michael York is perfect as unreasonably beloved, ill-intentioned James, and Richard Thomas (always an under-rated actor) as long-suffering Henry) , swashbuckling pirate combat, and North American Wilderness quest for buried treasure.I have cherished the copy I made from the Hallmark Hall of Fame tv broadcast--twenty years ago, now!
and only wish that someday it would be available on DVD.
Because the location cinematography, settings and costumes (who'd have thought there were that many types of plaid!) are all stunning.
Too bad it seems to be unappreciated and forgotten.
It will remain one of my favorite films forever..
You Can't Make a Silk Purse Out of a Sow's Ear..
The previous reviewer has commented,and quie rightly so,that this is a convoluted,hard-to follow screenplay.Well,it's really essential that one consider the original story.It's NOT a swashbuckler,but,rather a character study in a swashbuckling setting.The 2 brothers shown in this tale are actually the 2 sides of a total personality,seeking integration.(THAT was the entire point of Jeykll and Hyde.)It's been set during a perod of historical turbulence,in order for the drama to proceed.
There was an earlier production,filmed in 1953 or so,that was designed as a vehicle for Flynn.And,to be perfectly frank, that was about all that it was good for.It was a historical romance-pirate movie.This one at least makes some attempt to follow the original plot.And the cast does a good job with some confusing material.
HISTORICAL NOTE:The real Captain Teach(also known as Blackbeard)had been dead for almost 28 years before this story opens.So,it's not accurate historically.But Mr. Blessed has so much fun with the character,playing hims as a psychotic version of Orson Welles,that it's immensely enjoyable..
The Better Version of Stevenson's Classic.
While nothing can approach reading the actual novel, this television film version of THE MASTER OF BALLENTRAE is far better than the 1953 film version.
At the very least it managed to recreate the real personality problems that appear in that egoist James Durrie.
Michael York is shown to be an amoral, selfish human being from the start, when he is carrying on an affair with a poor girl of the local village - an affair that leaves the girl with a child that his family has to help support.
York never shows any redeeming quality in his James Durrie.
In fact one moment I recall (which is not in the novel, but should have been) is when he and his friend Col. Burke (here Timothy Dalton) are commenting on requests from the Durrie family to try to economize while they are living in Paris.
York smiles and laughs that they will stop drinking so much brandy and only drink champaign from now on.Richard Thomas plays Henry far better than Anthony Steel did.
Steel was too young in the role - he never grew into the money obsessed ant to York's spendthrift grasshopper that Thomas could grown into.
But the writers watered it down a little, allowing Thomas to be a bit warmer than Henry is in the novel (and allowing a genuine affection to grow between Thomas and his wife).
It is a bearable change in the story.Similarly commendable is the worldwide scope of this film version: there are scenes in the novel in the Caribbean, Europe, and India, which are picked up on as we watch James traveling around the world with Burke.
The only difference here is that Burke dies in India (but significantly his death barely fazes his so-called friend James).
The pirate section in the Caribbean is also changed because the pirate is Blackbeard (called Captain Teach - Brian Blessed in a nice performance).
I don't think that Blackbeard would have killed off his own crew as Blessed did, but it was an interesting section of the film.The finale of the novel in the upstate section of the colony of New York maintains the fantastic trick that Stevenson used in the novel - a trick which may be too fantastic.
However, it's results are also watered down here, as only one fatality results.With all these alterations the story's bitterness is handled quite well.
It certainly is a worthy addition to the films that have appeared based on Stevenson's works in the movies and on television..
great flick.
we thought this was a great film at our house.
we have a large movie library and enjoy this film very much.
we found the acting fine.
The vistas are breath taking the musical score is excellent the relationship between characters comes off well.
the plot moves along at the proper speed not to fast or slow i am not generally a richard tomas fan but i like him in here, he stretches his usually simple acting to something new and good.
The movie and its message are profound.
People who pan it i think do not understand it.
the Errol Flinn version i do not care for at all.
this has all the meat without the fluff.
wish it would come out on DVD.
Embarrassingly bad in every way.
This version of the film, which gets about everything from the novel wrong in spite of a competent cast and some good location shots, is one that all of its participants -- all who are still living, that is -- seem never to mention.
Michael York in particular goes through the whole thing with an ironic smugness that suggests no one was really taking Stevenson seriously.
That's a pity, because it could have been a good old-fashioned action flick in the manner of its predecessors, but with an added cachet of great color and wide Scottish vistas.
Truly a disappointment..
Small wonder this is the first comment.
Looks like an all-star cast, doesn't it?
Forget it.
This confusing pseudo-spectacle cannot survive Robert Louis Stevenson's wretchedly convoluted and improbable plot.
The only reason I'm commenting is that I'm a sucker for 18th century movies and found this one horribly disappointing.Since there is also no plot summary, an aristocratic family with two sons in constant contention with each other experience various adventures.
The "good" son who is not so good succeeds in exiling the "evil" one who is not so evil, but the latter keeps coming back to haunt the former.
But every turn of plot, if you want to call it a plot, suffers greatly from lack of credibility.Poor Stevenson.
He wrote long adventure stories for boys that were designed to make money.
Then he occasionally showed his real talent, as he did in the long short story The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde.
But even there he was not well served, for most of the movie versions want to substitute a monster story for a true psychological thriller..
1984 version of The Master Of Ballantrae is average.
I watched this movie again a few days ago and I marvel at the settings and the huge excellent cast of the 1984 version of The Master of Ballantrae.As far as the writing or the screenplay of this classic,it is not very good.The movie rambled and was a bit confusing at times.Put that aside and watch the movie because of wonderful actors like Michael York,John Gielgud,Finola Huges,Timothy Dalton to name a few.I just watched Michael York,Richard Jordan and Jenny Agutter in the 1976 science fiction classic "Logan's Run".Back to The Master of Ballantrae I give a thumbs up for the costumes,sets,location scenery and the actors.I have this movie. |
tt0805619 | Stir of Echoes: The Homecoming | Ted Cogan (Rob Lowe) is a United States National Guard captain commanding a National Guard unit in Iraq. When a van pulls into his checkpoint, he orders it to stop, but it does not. He orders his men to fire a warning shot, but they shoot up the van instead.
A few booms and crackles later, an Iraqi girl comes out of the van, then the whole thing catches fire, and Ted finds that they have just killed an innocent family. Ted tries to save the girl, but the vehicle explodes and Ted's unit is attacked, leaving Ted in a coma.
Two weeks later, Ted wakes up and gets to return home to his wife Molly (Marnie McPhail) and teenage son Max (Ben Lewis) in Chicago, but he is suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder complicated by the extreme guilt he feels about the Iraqi family's deaths. Little does Ted know that the terror has only just begun. He starts having visions of a burned man who wants him to right a wrong.
As Ted begins to lose his grip on both his sanity and his family, he seeks medical support for his post-traumatic stress disorder, but his financial situation does not allow him to pay for a treatment, and the government denies him. Ted enlists the aid of an equally unhinged psychic named Jake Witzky (Zachary Bennett) to help him understand his terrifying and relentless dreams. Jake encourages Ted to figure out what the burned man wants.
Max's girlfriend Sammi (Tatiana Maslany) and their friend Luke (Shawn Roberts) get killed in a car crash that injures Max. This leads to a series of messages from the spirit haunting Ted, which reveals itself as the spirit of Farzan (Vik Sahay), an Arab-American college student who was beaten up and then set on fire. Farzan wants Ted to find his killers—whose identities shock Ted to the very core.
Sammi and Luke were devastated and extremely angry about the deaths of their fathers in Iraq. Max was angry about what happened to Ted in Iraq. That resulted in them becoming furious at Arab people. Farzan asked them for a jack so he could fix a flat tire one day, and they took that fury out on him by brutally killing him.
After a lot of thought, a heartbroken Ted turns Max in, against Molly's wishes. Max is locked up for a period of time, and Ted visits him. | murder, flashback | train | wikipedia | null |
tt0102951 | Soapdish | Celeste Talbert, the long-time star of the daytime drama The Sun Also Sets, is targeted by her ambitious co-star Montana Moorehead; Montana connives to supplant Celeste as the show's star by promising sexual favors to its producer, David Seton Barnes. To make the audience hate Celeste's character, Montana and David come up with a last-minute plot change in which she will accidentally kill a young, destitute deaf-mute, played by the newly-cast Lori Craven. Despite the strong objections of head writer Rose Schwartz and Celeste herself, the scene plays out, but is interrupted by Celeste's recognition of Lori as her real-life niece. Network honcho Edmund Edwards sees potential in the relationship and makes Lori a regular cast member.
Montana and David seek to further unnerve Celeste by bringing back Jeffrey Anderson, an actor who Celeste arranged to be fired from The Sun Also Sets decades before, after his romantic relationship with Celeste went sour. Bitter at being reduced to performing dinner theater for uninterested seniors in Florida, Jeffrey relishes the chance to needle Celeste. Outwardly despising Jeffrey but perhaps still harboring some feelings for him, Celeste becomes unhinged when Jeffrey and Lori seem to be about to begin a romantic relationship, seemingly from jealousy. However, when Lori and Jeffrey are about to enact a scripted onscreen kiss, Celeste stops them by revealing that Lori is actually her daughter by Jeffrey. On camera, Celeste explains that she was responsible for getting Jeffrey fired because she was distraught about the pregnancy. Then she went home, passed Lori off as her niece, and had her parents raise Lori, all due to pressure from the network. This incites disgust and scorn from nearly everyone on the show towards Celeste, but the scandal ignites renewed interest in the show, causing the ratings to skyrocket. A board meeting between the show's staff—including Rose, who speaks out in Celeste's defense—takes place thereafter, where David insists that she be fired, but he is quickly overruled as the situation has not only resulted in positive press for the show, but has generated a great deal of public sympathy for Celeste.
The next day, after an unpleasant exchange with Lori, Celeste goes to Jeffrey and pleads with him to speak to Lori on her behalf. Jeffrey is resistant at first, but after Celeste gives him advice on how to approach her and break the ice, the conversation leads to Celeste and Jeffrey embracing. Just when it seems the two are about to reconcile, Montana interrupts them and claims that she and Jeffrey slept together the previous night. Disgusted, Celeste storms off, leaving the situation between her and Jeffrey even worse than before. The dilemma is further inflamed when Rose—who by now is no longer angry with Celeste—shows her a tabloid newspaper proclaiming that Montana is pregnant with Jeffrey's child. After an explosive exchange between the three of them takes place over this, Celeste, Jeffrey and Lori go to the head of the network with their concerns and demand that some action must be taken to solve the problem. But it's Lori who delivers an ultimatum stating, "It's them or me--that is the bottom line here! They go or I go!"
A decision is made by the network, and the actors head into a live episode still not knowing who will be written off the show. They will read their lines from a teleprompter so that the secret will be kept until the last minute. It is revealed that Lori's character has "brain fever" and will die; still hoping to be rid of Celeste, Montana ad-libs and suggests that a brain transplant can save her. Lori is shocked by the revelation, but in character, Celeste immediately plays along, offering her own brain for the operation. Touched by the sacrifice, Lori asks Celeste and Jeffrey not to leave the show, and softens to her newfound parents. Montana, desperate to stop them, reiterates that she is pregnant with Jeffrey's child, but she is publicly ruined by Rose who, with the help of vengeful Ariel Maloney, who wanted Jeffrey for herself, reveals the secret from a high school yearbook that Montana is actually a transsexual named Milton Moorehead. David is shocked and Montana flees the set, screaming in horror. Later, Celeste, Jeffrey, and Lori win soap opera awards while Montana is relegated to performing dinner theater at Jeffrey's former venue. | revenge, comedy, satire, melodrama | train | wikipedia | null |
tt0029118 | The Last Gangster | During Prohibition, gangland kingpin Joe Krozac (Edward G. Robinson) returns from Europe with a new wife, Talya (Rose Stradner), who is unaware of his criminal background. The Kile brothers have muscled in on his territory in his absence, so he orders their assassinations. Three are killed, but "Acey" Kile (Alan Baxter) survives. Soon after, Talya soon becomes pregnant, much to Krozac's delight.
However, Krozac is sent to Alcatraz Federal Penitentiary for ten years for income tax evasion before their son is born. After Talya visits her husband with their child, reporter Paul North (James Stewart) plays a dirty trick on her, putting a gun in the baby's hands for a photograph. When Talya goes to his newspaper to plead to be left alone, his editor refuses to do so, but Paul is so ashamed of himself, he quits his job and strikes up a relationship with Talya. She gets a divorce and marries Paul. They move away and change their names to start a new life.
When Krozac is released from prison, he is determined to take his son, now named Paul Jr., and punish his former wife. However, his old assistant, Curly (Lionel Stander), persuades him to take charge of his old gang first. It turns out to be a trap. Curly and the others only want to learn where Krozac hid his money before going to jail. When Krozac resists their torture, the gang kidnaps his son to apply pressure. Krozac gives in. The gang drive off with the loot (only to be killed by the police), leaving Krozac and his son on foot.
He is unable to convince the boy that he is his father, but they get along all right on the journey home. After the boy is reunited with his parents, Krozac has a change of heart and leaves without his son. However, Acey Kile is waiting for him. Acey taunts Krozac at gunpoint, saying he is going to tell the newspapers who the boy's father really is after he guns down Krozac. To stop that, Krozac rushes him and manages to kill Acey before dying. | revenge, depressing, murder | train | wikipedia | null |
tt0119731 | Murder at 1600 | In a restroom in the White House in Washington, D.C., a janitor finds White House secretary Carla Town (Mary Moore) dead. Metropolitan Police homicide Detective Harlan Regis (Wesley Snipes), whose apartment house is awaiting demolition in favor of a parking lot, is put on the case. At the White House, Regis is introduced to U.S. Secret Service Director Nicolas "Nick" Spikings (Daniel Benzali), U.S. National Security Advisor Alvin Jordan (Alan Alda) and Secret Service agent Nina Chance (Diane Lane). Spikings assigns Chance, a former Olympic gold-class sharpshooter, to keep an eye on Regis.
Parallel to this, the White House has to deal with an impending international crisis: U.S. President Jack Neil (Ronny Cox) has been trying to deal with a situation where Americans are being held hostage in North Korea, and some people—including several members of his inner circle, led by Vice President Gordon Dylan—think the President is not handling it the right way. Some people think Neil should send troops to North Korea to rescue the hostages; he does not want to start a potential 2nd Korean War, and is disgusted that a high-ranking military official says that the main reason to act decisively is to send a message to North Korea's only ally, China.
White House janitor Cory Allen Luchessi (Tony Nappo) was apparently unaccounted for on the night of the murder and had once attempted to make a pass at Carla; he is arrested and questioned, but his testimony and a clearly set-up piece of evidence lead Regis to suspect that the Secret Service may be involved. That night, Regis finds his apartment burglarized; the culprit escapes, and in a subsequent search, a hidden bug is found.
In a picture of Carla, Regis sees Secret Service agent Burton Cash (Nigel Bennett), the Secret Service agent assigned to Kyle Neil (Tate Donovan), the son of President Neil and First Lady Kitty Neil (Diane Baker). Regis figures out that it was Kyle who had sex with Carla on the night of the murder. At the dance club, Regis talks to a young woman who says that Kyle once bragged that he shared Carla with his father. Carla's uncle's company, Brookline Associates, is President Neil's leading East Coast fundraiser and Brookline also owns the apartment Carla lived in.
Regis eventually discovers that Chance once used to be Kyle's bodyguard herself. When he confronts her, Chance explains that one night, she heard noises coming from Kyle's apartment, went in, and found Kyle beating up his girlfriend. The Secret Service covered up the beating for Kyle so he would not be arrested for assault and battery, and Chance asked to be reassigned and was replaced by Burton Cash. This sparks Regis's suspicion that Kyle may actually be Carla's murderer.
Regis confronts Kyle with his suspicions, who claims that he did not murder Carla, but is able to provide a special piece of information: among the bookings she made, Carla has supposedly also ordered a car - with the only hitch being that she had had no driver's license. Later on, Regis and Chance discover that the most recent entries in Carla's appointment book were forged. With some clues left by Alvin Jordan, Regis manages to find out that Spikings has withheld several surveillance video tapes from the night of the murder. Regis goes to Spikings' residence to question him, and Spikings is willing to show him the tape but is suddenly killed by a sniper.
Regis and Chance escape the gunfire with Spikings' tape, and when it is played, they discover that Jordan is behind everything. Things get more difficult for them as the National Security Advisor has now framed the detective and the agent as traitors. Jordan wants Neil to resign so Dylan (Chris Gillett) can take over as President, because Dylan would not be afraid to send troops to North Korea to rescue the hostages, and Jordan believes that Neil's refusal to rescue the hostages by force makes Neil unfit to be President.
Regis, Chance, and Regis's partner and friend Stengel (Dennis Miller) enter the White House tunnels while Jordan still tries using fabricated evidence to blackmail Neil into resigning as President. In the tunnels, the sniper who killed Spikings for Jordan pursues them and wounds Stengel, but Chance manages to kill him. Pursued by the Secret Service, Regis just barely manages to get in contact with the President and present him with the evidence of Jordan's conspiracy. Jordan attempts to shoot the President, only for his shot to be intercepted by a handcuffed Chance, and he is killed by the Secret Service.
Chance and Stengel are brought to a hospital, where they recover from their injuries. In gratitude for his rescue, the President promises Regis to look into the commission who bought Regis's building. | suspenseful, neo noir, murder, violence | train | wikipedia | Beach and Hodgin have also humanized Regis: he is about to be evicted a fact that is quickly introduced in the film's opening sequence and he and his fellow tenants' problem is solved in a refreshing way.Diane Lane plays a Secret Service agent, Nina Chance, who begins to suspect a cover-up at the White House and assists Regis.
This will depend on whether the establishment will come to its senses about its ageist attitude toward actresses.The cast is ably supported by the menacing Daniel Benzali; Alan Alda comes to Snipes's aid as the National Security Adviser to the President; Ronny Cox is a president in crisis as American troops are held hostage in North Korea; Tate Donovan as the president's playboy son.
Every character, with the exception of Snipes's sidekick played by Dennis Miller, has a part to play in the plot; thanks to a better-than-usual casting job by the duo of Amanda Johnson and Cathy Sandrich (often good with mysteries) the roles are very well filled.And refreshingly for Hollywood, we do not have a male European-American hero saving the day with his African-American sidekick.
The race issue is never played in this film: director Dwight Little treats each character as a regular person, just like in real life where the majority of us don't give an iota what colour or creed someone is.Some parts of Christopher Young's score are not terribly fitting although on the whole he does a good job.
Then, as the movie progresses, it gets better and better, thanks to a fast pace and lots of exciting action scenes.'Murder at 1600' focuses on the discover of a brutally-murdered intern in the White House.
Two detectives (Wesley Snipes and Dennis Miller) are assigned to the case, with White House security personnel limiting the detectives with classified information which may be useful to the case.
Lucky for them, a dedicated Secret Service Agent (Diane Lane) reluctantly helps.Although it gets predictable at times (especially at the end), it's still a fun little thriller.
MURDER AT 1600 came near the end of Wesley Snipes' theatrical career, before he went STV, and it is a decent-enough, Canadian-lensed thriller about the discovery of a young woman's brutally murdered body in the White House.
Snipes is in tip top shape here and is surrounded by several great character actors: Ronny Cox as the president, Harris Yulin as a hawkish general and Alan Alda as a presidential adviser.
Besides, I'm interested in the presidency and like films that purport to give you a behind-the-scenes look, even if it is fictional, so I gave 'Murder at 1600' a chance.Of course, if the movie is going to be longer than 15 minutes, you have to allow it some license.
For some reason, she is not given credit here on IMDb for the work that this film is based on.As to the movie itself, I would agree that in certain ways it would be somewhat implausible, yet I still find it quite entertaining, and easy to watch any time it pops up on TV, these days in High Def, looking far better then it has in years.
This movie undoubtedly has one of the best pairings of movies in late 90's,that of Snipes and Lane.Diane Lane is at her most beautiful and enchanting here and i liked her performance.Snipes is as always very cool and strong and shows depth.Its amazing how someone can show depth in action and criminal movies as he does.Blows my mind.Film has a decent story and issue.It has already been worked up by Eastwood in "Absolute power".Its about people in key positions who use their power to achieve their own secret goals and do what they like.Alan Alda is very good as the stern villain who secretly works against the president played equally well by Ronny Cox.Benzali and Donovan make good supporting roles.But what is the best thing with this is the chemistry between lead stars.Even if Wesley and Diane dont get involved romantically,their relationship makes it worth to watch even without the love scenes.They have quiet strength and strong charisma.And their bond is a great one.This is a good 8/10..
The plot starts well but gets a little ponderous at times and perhaps requires more than a little suspension of disbelief at times (a point where Snipes breaks into the White House through underground tunnels and walks round dressed as a cleaner is perhaps a step too far!).
The role of National Security Advisor is well played by Alan Alda - he does a good job, but I did have a problem at the start of the film because I don't think of him in this type of film (Manhattan Murder Mystery - Yes, any other genres - not really), however once I got past this I was fine.
He doesn't have much to do and again it just never feels like he's comfortable with the role - contrast with his characters in things like Robocop and Total Recall to see the difference in his performances.Overall this is a standard thriller that isn't very memorable but will pass the time easily enough.
The cast is made up of some good actors: Diane Lane, Ronny Cox, Alan Alda.
Harlan Regis (Wesley Snipes) is a homicide cop, Nina Chance (Diane Lane) is a secret service agent; when a murdered victim is found in the white house they are left trying to piece together the real truth behind the murder, finding plenty of smoke and mirrors that are trying to disguise the truth.Murder at 1600 is a good solid thriller, with an interesting premise and a strong cast, and even though its an enjoyable ride; it somehow seems to captivate less than it really should.
A good movie.Ok, the story is old - a cop which has to solve a case.The only originality in the movie - if so can be defined - is that the Murder was commited at the White House.
Detective Harlan Regis(Wesley Snipes) will solve the case with the help of Nina Chance (Diane Lane).The cast : I like Wesley Snipes - he's terrific when he plays a cop.
The cast all does a pretty good job, especially Diane lane and Wesley snipes.
Secret Service Director Nick Spikings (Daniel Benzali) is resistant and assigns agent Nina Chance (Diane Lane) to handle Regis.
Wesley Snipes does it again....yet another crap film...it seems like he's batting a thousand...Passenger 57, U.S. Marshalls...I mean really...Stop the Insanity......And Alan Alda....what is wrong with you?.....Alda is arguable the greatest television actor of all time, and gave great performances in Mad City and all those Woody Allen films...but he just falls flat here....completely unconvincing....But the film's problems are not just the actors' fault...the writing was horrendous...I'll never undestand why films like this actually get beyond the idea stage..........
Wesley Snipes(Detective Harlan Regis),"Blade II,'02, went to work immediately in the White House Ladies Room and avoided all the RED TAPE that Daniel Benzali(Nick Spikings),"Screwed",2000, could throw at him.
The shoot out scenes in the tunnels under Washington, D.C. were simply great and the magic of Diane Lane (Nina Chance),"Mad Dog Time",'96 with Detective Regis got very HOT, both actors put their complete talents to work in this film.
It's interesting but not totally engaging.Wesley Snipes however is in fine form as a cop Harlan Regis, a cop who's assigned to investigate a murder that happens to take place at the White House.
Regis, with a little help from Secret Service agent and award-winning sharpshooter Nina Young (Diane Lane, also pretty good), tries to get on top of the case, with suspects that include the president's son (Tate Donovan), the White House staff and President Neil (Ronny Cox) himself.The climax and the conclusion has a few surprises, and there are a number of very good performances, but this is still fairly pedestrian territory.
MURDER AT 1600 is not a bad thriller, and the film promises some few good scenes and a fine lead by Snipes, but with more potential than they got, it could have been better.Rating: **1/2 out of 5..
(Many 90s films couldn't shake off 80s cop maverick and were used not as a plot point or moment of hilarity like its predecessor, but as a quick ploy for character emphasis, only never to be used again throughout the movie.) Then a bombardment of clichés; Nina revolts against the Secret Service, Chief Spikings is heavily secretive and dismissive towards the detectives and Harlan is a 'man of the streets' with own problems but always gets the job done.
They are called in by White House National Security Adviser Alan Alda who wants due diligence and as much help as possible in solving the murder.
And Daniel Benzali plays one creepy head of the White House Secret Service detail.As for Alan Alda those of you who know and appreciate Alan Alda as Hawkeye Pierce from MASH, you will see an Alan Alda in this film who would probably have Hawkeye shot as a traitor.I recommend Murder At 1600 very highly, try to catch it when broadcast..
Having said that, it is an intriguing way to pass a couple of hours - assuming you haven't figured out the killer too early.Wesley "Not Denzel Washington" Snipes (my girlfriend always gets them confused so that's for her benefit) plays DC Detective Harlan Regis, about to be evicted from his block of flats and assigned to investigate the murder of a young secretary within the White House.
Monitored by secret service agents Nina Chance (Diane Lane) and Nick Spikings (Daniel Benzali), Regis quickly finds that the White House seem keen to cover up the whole incident while the President (Ronny Cox) struggles with a hostage crisis in North Korea.
But Regis isn't about to be put off from bringing the killer to justice, even if it threatens to bring the administration down.Snipes seems to have an uncanny ability to appear in movies that, while technically sound, rarely achieve massive popularity and "Murder At 1600" is another one of those films.
Having said that, this is a very old-skool cop plot even if Regis feels less like a cop and more like a paranoid fugitive.If you like your cop films with a twist but little else in the way of excitement or originality then "Murder At 1600" will satisfy your needs.
A murder of a beautiful female staffer in the White House leads to a strange and confusing case for D.C. cop Wesley Snipes and Secret Service Agent Diane Lane in this lame would-be-thriller.
It WOULD take a murder to get Wesley Snipes into the White House....
Wesley Snipes is always a convincing action hero but he can not perform such miracles as making this movie look good and original.
Rip-off of Clint Eastwood's "Absolute Power" has investigator Wesley Snipes getting caught up in a murder mystery involving the President of the United States of America.
The North Koreans are on the warpath, and the president is being pressured to go to war, Alan Alda and Harris Yulin are among the president's advisers, and Diane Lane plays a Secret Service agent who teams up with Snipes to solve the murder.
Movies like this were a staple of the 80s, and there's nothing really new here But with Snipes in the lead, MURDER AT 1100 makes for a fun time..
The story about a conspiracy to get rid of a President (Ronnie Cox) who is not a right-wing nut job like Alan Alda is interesting, and there are interesting characters along the way like Diane Lane (Unfaithful, The Perfect Storm), Daniel Benzali ("Murder One"), and Dennis Miller (Bordello of Blood).You won't go wrong here as Snipes shows the best character yet..
The story about a conspiracy to get rid of a President (Ronnie Cox) who is not a right-wing nut job like Alan Alda is interesting, and there are interesting characters along the way like Diane Lane (Unfaithful, The Perfect Storm), Daniel Benzali ("Murder One"), and Dennis Miller (Bordello of Blood).You won't go wrong here as Snipes shows the best character yet..
This movie would have been much better if the FBI was in charge, and the local city cop, who had no business being there, had to fight against both the Secret Service and the FBI to obtain justice for the person being framed.Second, the Secret Service agent assigned to help Regis did not realize the First Family was in the White House at the time of the murder until the movie was almost over.
How about a little love story at least to make her character somewhat interesting!Also, it was too bad that Alan Alda's good name had to be soiled with such a bad movie.
(That's the White House.) There is a jurisdictional dispute between the Washington, DC, police force, represented by Wesley Snipes, and the Secret Service, represented by Diane Lane.
The President is only a few minutes away from announcing his resignation when the dynamic duo of Snipes and Lane, having squirmed their way through the White House maze of underground tunnels, show up and shout, "Mister President, your son is innocent and here is the evidence on this secret tape!" Alan Alda was behind the whole thing.
i mean it i have seen many films like these where only American president is at risk someone will assassinate him common.why not just choose other countries president there are so many countries.i have no problem with patriotism shown in films but this is too much.the most boring Wesley snipes movie this was.i told you the plot already some people must save presidents ass.but American films always have Russians as enemies this one got one of them own inside the white house.no action no real sex no nothing.it bored memy rating is 1/10 just forget murder at 1600 its another stupid film.
This White House thriller sees top detective Wesley Snipes investigating the murder of a young blonde woman found dead in one of the toilets.
Diane Lane makes for a pretty foil, and there are some distinguished actors in the cast, although Ronny Cox is unwisely underused as the good-guy president; I would have preferred to see him playing another weaselly villain a la ROBOCOP.
Always love me some Diane Lane and do like Wesley Snipes a lot.
Always reminds me of the fantastic 24 television show.The rundown is a murder does, in fact, happen in the White House and Detective Westley Snipes Regis is trying to dodge a bunch of government cover-ups to solve it.
Murder at 1600 (1997): Dir: Dwight Little / Cast: Wesley Snipes, Diane Lane, Dennis Miller, Alan Alda, Ronny Cox: Disappointing thriller about timing and skill, which is something not demonstrated here.
This entertaining murder mystery contains plenty of drama, action and interesting characters and a police investigation that quickly reveals the presence of a number of suspects, a potential sex scandal involving the President and his son and a great deal of interference from the White House Chief of Security.Washington Homicide Detective Harlan Regis (Wesley Snipes) is called in to investigate after the dead body of an attractive secretary is found in a White House toilet cubicle.
Spikings orders Regis to be removed from the premises and this is only prevented by the intervention of National Security Adviser Alvin Jordan (Alan Alda).Spikings assigns Secret Service Agent Nina Chance (Diane Lane) to work with Regis and keep him informed of any developments.
When information comes to light about President Jack Neil (Ronny Cox) and his son Kyle (Tate Donovan) possibly having had intimate relationships with Carla Town, they both become potential suspects.Things start to get more sinister when the Secret Service set up a White House janitor to be the fall guy for the murder and then bug Regis' apartment.
The entire cast is top class in this movie but Alan Alda and Daniel Benzali really stand out in their supporting roles as two men who are not as straight-forward as they originally appeared to be."Murder At 1600" is well directed by Dwight H Little who successfully generates a great deal of tension at times (e.g. the sequence in which Chance goes into a storage room where some important records are archived) and the ways in which the characters develop as the story unfolds is also particularly enjoyable to watch.
Diane lane is perfect as the secret service agent, who at first, begrudgingly helps snips uncover a murder plot within the white house.
Taut thriller with Wesley Snipes investigating a murder at the White House.The picture becomes much more engaging then first realized.
This is a very good film, that has a great cast, and a good story, with a cool twist ending, Wesley Snipes and Diane Lane were awesome together!.
This is a very good film, that has a great cast, and a good story, with a cool twist ending, Wesley Snipes and Diane Lane were awesome together!.
All the characters are great, and it has some good action scenes as well, plus Wesley Snipes and Diane Lane are simply amazing in this!.
Ronny Cox is great as the president, and while the film may not be all that original, it's still pretty entertaining to watch!, plus The ending was very amusing!.
This is a very good film, that has a great cast, and a good story, with a cool twist at the end, Wesley Snipes and Diane Lane were awesome together, highly recommended!.
While there is some action, this film relies more on good old nail biting suspense and mystery.The plot: Wesley Snipes is a DC homicide cop called in when a Whiet House staffer is found murdered in a washroom.
The Secret Service chief doesn't want a city cop on his turf and assigns an agent played by Diane Lane to keep an eye on Snipes.
Good Thriller....Wesley Snipes' best Movie.
The acting is pretty good and the story moves quickly so, other then the over-saturation of chase scenes, your never bored.I think the story itself was great and the movie fast paced, well cast and fun to watch. |
tt0063297 | A Midsummer Night's Dream | The play consists of four interconnecting plots, connected by a celebration of the wedding of Duke Theseus of Athens and the Amazon queen, Hippolyta, which is set simultaneously in the woodland and in the realm of Fairyland, under the light of the moon.
The play opens with Hermia, who is in love with Lysander, resistant to her father Egeus' demand that she wed Demetrius, whom he has arranged for her to marry. Helena meanwhile pines unrequitedly for Demetrius. Enraged, Egeus invokes an ancient Athenian law before Duke Theseus, whereby a daughter must marry the suitor chosen by her father, or else face death. Theseus offers her another choice: lifelong chastity while worshipping the goddess Artemis as a nun.
Peter Quince and his fellow players Nick Bottom, Francis Flute, Robin Starveling, Tom Snout, and Snug plan to put on a play for the wedding of the Duke and the Queen, "the most lamentable comedy and most cruel death of Pyramus and Thisbe." Quince reads the names of characters and bestows them on the players. Nick Bottom, who is playing the main role of Pyramus, is over-enthusiastic and wants to dominate others by suggesting himself for the characters of Thisbe, the Lion, and Pyramus at the same time. He would also rather be a tyrant and recites some lines of Ercles. Bottom is told by Quince that he would do the Lion so terribly as to frighten the duchess and ladies enough for the Duke and Lords to have the players hanged. Quince ends the meeting with "at the Duke's oak we meet."
In a parallel plot line, Oberon, king of the fairies, and Titania, his queen, have come to the forest outside Athens. Titania tells Oberon that she plans to stay there until she has attended Theseus and Hippolyta's wedding. Oberon and Titania are estranged because Titania refuses to give her Indian changeling to Oberon for use as his "knight" or "henchman," since the child's mother was one of Titania's worshippers. Oberon seeks to punish Titania's disobedience. He calls upon Robin "Puck" Goodfellow, his "shrewd and knavish sprite," to help him concoct a magical juice derived from a flower called "love-in-idleness," which turns from white to purple when struck by Cupid's arrow. When the concoction is applied to the eyelids of a sleeping person, that person, upon waking, falls in love with the first living thing he perceives. He instructs Puck to retrieve the flower with the hope that he might make Titania fall in love with an animal of the forest and thereby shame her into giving up the little Indian boy. He says, "And ere I take this charm from off her sight,/As I can take it with another herb,/I'll make her render up her page to me."
Hermia and Lysander have escaped to the same forest in hopes of eloping. Helena, desperate to reclaim Demetrius's love, tells Demetrius about the plan and he follows them in hopes of killing Lysander. Helena continually makes advances towards Demetrius, promising to love him more than Hermia. However, he rebuffs her with cruel insults against her. Observing this, Oberon orders Puck to spread some of the magical juice from the flower on the eyelids of the young Athenian man. Instead, Puck mistakes Lysander for Demetrius, not having actually seen either before, and administers the juice to the sleeping Lysander. Helena, coming across him, wakes him while attempting to determine whether he is dead or asleep. Upon this happening, Lysander immediately falls in love with Helena. Oberon sees Demetrius still following Hermia and is enraged. When Demetrius goes to sleep, Oberon sends Puck to get Helena while he charms Demetrius' eyes. Upon waking up, he sees Helena. Now, both men are in pursuit of Helena. However, she is convinced that her two suitors are mocking her, as neither loved her originally. Hermia is at a loss to see why her lover has abandoned her, and accuses Helena of stealing Lysander away from her. The four quarrel with each other until Lysander and Demetrius become so enraged that they seek a place to duel to prove whose love for Helena is the greater. Oberon orders Puck to keep Lysander and Demetrius from catching up with one another and to remove the charm from Lysander so Lysander can return to love Hermia, while Demetrius continues to love Helena.
Meanwhile, Quince and his band of six labourers ("rude mechanicals," as they are described by Puck) have arranged to perform their play about Pyramus and Thisbe for Theseus' wedding and venture into the forest, near Titania's bower, for their rehearsal. Bottom is spotted by Puck, who (taking his name to be another word for a jackass) transforms his head into that of a donkey. When Bottom returns for his next lines, the other workmen run screaming in terror: They claim that they are haunted, much to Bottom's confusion. Determined to await his friends, he begins to sing to himself. Titania, having received the love-potion, is awakened by Bottom's singing and immediately falls in love with him. She lavishes him with the attention of her and her fairies, and while she is in this state of devotion, Oberon takes the changeling. Having achieved his goals, Oberon releases Titania, orders Puck to remove the donkey's head from Bottom, and arranges everything so Helena, Hermia, Demetrius and Lysander will all believe they have been dreaming when they awaken. Puck distracts Lysander and Demetrius from fighting over Helena's love by mimicking their voices and leading them apart. Eventually, all four find themselves separately falling asleep in the glade. Once they fall asleep, Puck administers the love potion to Lysander again, claiming all will be well in the morning.
The fairies then disappear, and Theseus and Hippolyta arrive on the scene, during an early morning hunt. They wake the lovers and, since Demetrius no longer loves Hermia, Theseus over-rules Egeus's demands and arranges a group wedding. The lovers decide that the night's events must have been a dream. After they exit, Bottom awakes, and he too decides that he must have experienced a dream "past the wit of man."
In Athens, Theseus, Hippolyta and the lovers watch the six workmen perform Pyramus and Thisbe. The performers are so terrible playing their roles that the guests laugh as if it were meant to be a comedy, and everyone retires to bed. Afterwards, Oberon, Titania, Puck, and other fairies enter, and bless the house and its occupants with good fortune. After all the other characters leave, Puck "restores amends" and suggests that what the audience experienced might just be a dream. | psychedelic, fantasy, romantic | train | wikipedia | There were little jumps and quirks in this production by the Royal Shakespeare Company - but in reality they merely added to the otherworldly and ethereal overall effect.
The cast was superb - and for those who only know Judi Dench as dowdy or as Queen Elizabeth, in this film she plays the queen of the fairies, Titania, in a costume consisting only of three small leaves!
If one does not understand the play by reading it, one will surely understand it after watching this film!
This is also a perfect film to see Clive Swift do some other acting other than his extraordinary performance upon "Keeping up Appearances"..
The Bard, and How to Get Him. Yes, it's clear that director Peter Hall was influenced by Richard Lester in his filming of Shakespeare's classic comedy/fantasy: the hand-held camera, jump cutting, etc.
And while one could quibble with some of his derivative directorial choices, there's no arguing that this is the best-acted "Dream" on film available.There's hardly a weak link in the cast, with the exception of David Warner and Michael Jayston as the male half of the quartet of lovers.
Jayston is competent, but dull and colorless.But the rest of the cast is marvelous, with special kudos to Helen Mirren, Diana Rigg, Ian Richardson, and Judi Dench as a very sexy Titania.
Ian Holm's snake-tongue bit as Puck gets old, but his somewhat malevolent rendition of Puck is well done.I'm surprised that no one has made more out of Paul Rodgers superb Bottom, by far the best I've ever seen on stage or screen.
It's not only pictorial, but contributes greatly to the spontaneous, irreverent, slapstick-esquire approach to the whole production, which Peter Hall and his marvelous actors worked so hard to achieve.
The locations are also ideal, given the modernized, anglicized look of the production.Director Hall's interpretation of the play comes as close to 'perfection' as an enthusiast of the Bard could possibly ask for.
He refuses to reduce the play to an erotic fantasy, as so many other have done (i.e. the 1999 film), and he rejects the even more common temptation to turn it into a loud, garish costume-ball.
In other word, Hall presents the play as Shekespeare wrote it.It relies for its appeal on marvelous words and gestures, not on costumes and special effects.As for the cast, one only need to look at the big names on the list to see that this production was literally one-of-a-kind.
Actually the least famous major player in this company is the one most worthy of note: Paul Rogers, a wonderful character actor and a frequent collaborator of Alec Guinness, is quite possibly the best Bottom that most of us (in this day and age) are ever likely to see.
One of the best Shakespeare films ever!.
The superb service given by director and cast to Shakespeare's language and characters far more than make up for any shortcomings.
The Bard and the Royal Shakespeare Company fight the Swinging '60s to a respectable draw in this production, which does feature nearly all of the text of the play, splendidly _ if often frenetically _ delivered.
Director Peter Hall couldn't quite come up with a film equivalent of his famous stage production, which featured modern dress, a stark white set, and imaginative use of trapezes.
(Of course, perhaps some of this was the result not of artistic decisions, but merely of haste and a tiny budget.) It's somehow a very '60s Athens _ Hermia and Helena wear cute miniskirts, the four lovers get so twig-torn and mud-spattered that they look like refugees from Woodstock, and the fairies look like green-skinned members of a back-to-nature commune.
The two standouts are Diana Rigg (Helena) and Judi Dench (Titania) _ and this is your one and only chance to see the former sucking her thumb and the latter wearing an outfit (consisting mainly of body paint and flecks of vegetation) that Blaze Starr might have found drafty..
Not only do we get a treat to Diana Rigg's Helena in her pre-Emma Peel days but look at lovely Helen Mirren's delightful Hermia.
The youths, David Warner and Michael Jayston are great, twirled and swizzled by Ian Holm's delightful Puck messing up the good intentions of the bug-eyed Ian Richardson's Oberon.
This movie looks like it was hastily committed to film by high school students.
The costumes were trendy then but look rather silly now.The virtually uncut script, an advantage for students, has the disadvantage of occasionally slowing the action to a near stop.It's a pity because these are great performances by an amazingly talented cast.
Helen Mirren's Hermia, less strident than most, Ian Holm's doglike Puck and Judi Dench's near naked Titania are standouts certainly.
This spectacular film is currently experiencing a rebirth on cable TV this month, I've seen it listed several times, in its' completed version, without having the aggravation of commercials or editing.
A fresh and youthful Judi Densch is spectacular, along with the always sexy David Warner, but Diana Rigg's performance is the one that hammers home the reason why this stunning and statuesque actress was the darling of the 60's and 70's in the acting community in Britain.
I'm sure so many of these performers, who'd already made a name for themselves in the Shakespeare community later became absolute legends in film and stage.
Best Acting for any Midsummer Night's Dream adaptation.
Peter Hall's use of the hand-held camera keeps the movie very interesting and constantly moving.The cast is unmatched in any other Midsummer production with Diana Rigg, Ian Richardson, and Judi Dench.
So many future stars a decade before they would finally hit it big-- Ian Holm, David Warner, Helen Mirren as an ingénue, Judi Dench in the nude?!?!?!Hopefully the BBC saved the negative or at least a decent copy of this so that someday they release a decent copy of this..
Incredible cast, many who went on to greater things: Ian Holm, Ian Richardson, Diana Rigg , David Warner, Helen Mirren, Judi Dench.
A fine, and sadly forgotten, version of Shakespeare's most amusing play.
The camera angles were also rather ridiculous, and the constant shaky-camera effect gave me a headache and made me not wish to look at the screen.Another thing (though perhaps this is just me being difficult), but did the fairies really have to be green?
Diana Rigg, Judi Dench, Helen Mirren, and Paul Rogers are especially fine.
How do you take a play by Shakespeare, a talented cast, and then stage, shoot, and edit it so horribly?
I saw this film in streaming video from a print that looks as if it had been decaying in somebody's dank basement for the past 40 years.
But this Royal Shakespeare Theatre Company production, directed by Peter Hall, contains amazing performances by Diana Rigg, Helen Mirren and Judi Dench (as Helena, Hermia and Queen Titania) when all three were young and beautiful but already capable of displaying the talent that subsequently carried them to fame.
Despite the poor quality of the film itself, you will surely wait a lifetime to see a version of Midsummer Night's Dream in which Helena and Hermia are dominant players, and you may never see a Titania as sexy as gorgeous or as outright sexy as Judi Dench.
Fortunately, there was another showing later in the day.To my surprise, the beautiful Titania was none other than a youngish Judy Dench.
Diana Rigg also appears as Helena, the spurned lover, who joins three other young people for the familiar comedy of errors.Besides the fairies, the actors dress in modern garb...casual: Button-up shirts, mini-skirts, go go boots.
The first thing to be said about this version of the Dream play is how really mediocre the DVD transfer is--it is very much in need of restoration--jumpy, often dirty, and terribly faded; that said, perhaps the effort of restoration could be better alloted to something like Von Sternberg's Shanghai Gesture or the original Front Page--something more worthy.It's amazing how much more dated this version of Shakespeare's romp is than the often stunning 1935 version with it's perfect Puck in Mickey Rooney and its lush dreamlike imagery.
This version attempts to be far too 1960's "with-it" using hand-held cameras, jump cuts, mini-skirts, featuring children that look as if they were plucked from the cast of Hair.The positives--and very positive: Seeing a very young Helen Mirren, Judi Dench, and Diana Rigg, all totally competent even then, interacting with a mostly able cast, and a script which clearly utilizes almost all of the dialogue.
I would only recommend this movie to people who would like to see a laughably horrible version of a great play.
Surprising, considering the movie takes place in Ancient Greece, or, at least, it's supposed to, but the director decided to say it was in Athens, when all the costumes and sets look like the Victorian times.
I have seen many versions of the play in my life, both on stage and screen.
Maybe this is just too delicate a comedy for the movies and needs to be seen live to be appreciated.But Judi Dench...
THere are three British dames in this film adaptation: Dame Judi Dench, Dame Diana Rigg and Dame Helen Mirren.
While the cast is outstandingly directed by Sir Peter Hall, the costumes appear to be weak and cheaply made.
When Titania played by Dame Judi Dench kisses a horses' behind, you can see his eyes.
The costumers dressed Titania as a green fairy which was just painted on like silly.
The William Shakespeare play is a festive comedy for the light-hearted and entertainment of its audience.
Everybody in the cast has been part of the Royal Shakespeare Company and are veteran actors by now.
THe play does entertain and I can poke fun at the cheap costumes and lack of expense towards the production.
Dame Helen Mirren is also cast as the young Helena who seeks to be in love.
Shakespeare's A Midsummer Night's Dream (1968) was directed by Peter Hall for the Royal Shakespeare Company.
It features some truly great actors: David Warner as Lysander, Diana Rigg as Helena, Helen Mirren as Hermia, Ian Richardson as Oberon, Judi Dench as Titania, and Ian Holm as Puck.MND is a perfect play for film.
That's probably how people saw it in Shakespeare's time, and that setting will always work.
So, seeing the women actors in miniskirts and go-go boots looks really, really funny.Most of the play is set in a forest, and the young actors get lost, stumble about, fall into streams, etc.
We can't really see them anyway, because of the print, but what we can see looks like Diana Rigg and Helen Mirren prepared for a commando raid.
Was it really necessary to hide the actors' faces?The movie is true to the text, which is good, but there's so much hand-held camera work, and so many jump-cuts, that nothing hangs together.
Strong direction and a superb cast make Peter Hall's 1968 version of William Shakespeare's comedy A Midsummer Night's Dream my favorite version of the film, and one of my favorite Shakespeare adaptations of any film.
The film is performed by the Royal Shakespeare Company and the cast is composed of superb actors, many of whom did not become stars until years later.
These include: including Judi Dench as the Fairy Queen, a scantily clad Tatania, Diana Rigg as Helena, a young Helen Mirren as Hermia, the lover of Lysander (David Warren), Ian Holm as the inimitable Puck, Paul Rogers as the most believable Bottom I've seen, and Ian Richardson as the Fairy King Oberon.While the film had a limited budget, the clarity of its presentation may be one of the few adaptations of the Bard that doesn't need subtitles to fully appreciate Shakespeare's poetry.
The supernatural is the essential element that runs throughout the play and Shakespeare uses magic both to confuse the characters, and then resolve their bewilderment.
In this play, Shakespeare suggests that the world of the magical fairies is not separate from nature, but a part of it, even though Hall separates the fairies from the rest of the characters by depicting them in shades of green.
Shakespeare is also interested in the actual workings of dreams, in how events occur without explanation, time loses its normal sense of flow, and how the impossible occurs as a matter of course.
One aspect of the play, not often noted, is how Shakespeare's depiction of women challenged the convention of the time.
Hippolyta's first words in the play evidence the prevalence of dreams ("Four days will quickly steep themselves in night, / Four nights will quickly dream away the time"), and various characters mention dreams throughout (Act 1, Scene 1).
In spite of being a product of the 60s with its mini-skirts and boots, A Midsummer Night's Dream has a fresh and contemporary look and audiences of today would feel right at home with the film's use of jump cuts, and and-held camera (presumably a debt to director Richard Lester).
1st watched 5/25/2002 - 4 out of 10(Dir-Peter Hall): Well-intentioned attempt at silly Shakespeare play with some good acting, makeup, and set design, but a muddled mess of a movie.
A big piece of fluff from such a serious playwright as Shakespeare just doesn't seem to work and despite some good performances this version I thnk will be forgotten eventually..
Granted, so was the rest of the Royal Shakespeare Company circa 1968, an impressive list (Ian Holm, David Warner, Helen Mirren, Judi Densch, etc.); and this is a difficult play to do well because its plot is so hoary, and the play-within-the-play so tedious, that these actors can hardly be held accountable for the bard's sins.Not that they don't make enough of their own, however.
Add to that budgetary problems Puck, Oberon, and gang appear as green-tinted hippies, with their faces not even matching the hue of their bodies and you have a production that is easier to laugh at than with.Most of the actors give it their all, but most of them appear miscast.
I did like Warner's Lysander, who appeared the most natural of the four young lovers, and Ian Holm's Puck, but it's impossible not to enjoy a Holm performance.I tend to think Shakespeare movies tell you more about the period when they are made rather than when they are set (much like the plays themselves), and this one is no different.
It's interesting as a novelty piece to look at where Shakespeare presentations were, and where they were aiming to be, four decades ago; certainly we have a different emphasis now, as actors forty years from now will no doubt reinterpret the bard in their own fashion (android Iago?).
For all but a die-hard fan of any of the regulars or of Shakespeare's work, though, this film is a pass.
This adaptation of "A Midsummer Night's Dream" seemed like it was trying to be a liiiittle too arty.
The females were all wearing extremely short mini dresses, making it very clear that the movie was made in the 60s.Puck, Titania, and Oberon are running around naked and green.
People simply don't get that muddy walking in the woods!When we did this play at the school, it was stressed that we should USE our body gestures and hands, and so after having that pounded into my mind, the actors' almost completely inanimate bodies really bugged me, and Oberon seemed to be telling himself "Must not move face must not move face must not move face..."Puck's tongue thing was really odd, and the way the spirits teleported around...priceless!
All the actors were good - it's just that the film was put together so strangely.
My first exposure to Shakespeare was through the classic 1990s animated series "Gargoyles" in which Puck, Oberon and Titania were all recurring characters, as were Macbeth and the Three Witches.
Made by the Royal Shakespeare Company, it has one of the best casts of any film that I have ever seen: Judi Dench, Ian Richardson, David Warner, Helen Mirren (who also appeared in the 1981 BBC adaptation, though as Titania rather than Hermia), Diana Rigg, Michael Jayston and Ian Holm.
The strongest performer is certainly Judi Dench, whom I consider to be the best living actress.
However, she is just as good in the scenes in which she is required to be softer such as those with the fairy children (two of whom are played by her nieces Clare and Emma) and those in which she professes her love to Bottom after Puck has given him the head of a donkey.
For much of his later career, he was typecast as sinister characters and was and is excellent at that but it's always great to see him play a gentler character (for the most part, anyway).The rest of the film's cast is just as strong, particularly Paul Rogers as Bottom (who also played the role in a 1958 TV adaptation), Sebastian Shaw as Quince, Derek Godfrey as Theseus, Barbara Jefford as Hippolyta and Bill Travers as Snout, who was one of the then best known actors in the film in spite of his fairly small role.
I wonder if the exasperation felt by Quince whenever Bottom made a suggestion came from Shakespeare's own experience working with difficult actors.
The scenes with Judi Dench in which Titania fawns over Bottom are the funniest in the entire film.In spite of the strength of its cast, however, the film is not perfect.
Peter Hall may have been a great theatre director and the British theatrical world owes him a huge debt for founding the RSC but he was not a good film director.
Laurence Olivier and Kenneth Branagh's versions of "Hamlet" and Zeffirelli's "Romeo and Juliet" were all beautiful looking films but, in spite of the location work, this seems more like a filmed stage play rather than a film adaptation of one.
As much as I loved Bottom, the scenes featuring the entire acting troupe were the least interesting of the play. |
tt1711478 | In Harm's Way | John Wayne stars as U.S. Navy Captain Rockwell "Rock" Torrey, a divorced "second generation Navy" son of a career Chief Petty Officer. A Naval Academy graduate and career officer, Torrey is removed from command of his heavy cruiser for "throwing away the book" when pursuing the enemy and then being torpedoed by a Japanese submarine after the attack on Pearl Harbor. Torrey's executive officer, Commander (later Captain) Paul Eddington (Kirk Douglas), is a wayward sort who resigned as a naval aviator and returned to the surface navy because of an unhappy marriage. His wife's affairs and drunken escapades have become the talk of Honolulu and her death during the Pearl Harbor attack—in the company of an Army Air Corps Officer (Hugh O'Brian), with whom she had a wild fling on a local beach—drives Eddington into a bar brawl with a group of other Army Air Corps officers, a subsequent stint in the Pearl Harbor brig, then exile as the "... officer in charge of piers and warehouses ..." in what he calls a "backwater island purgatory."
After months of desk duty in Hawaii and recuperation from a broken arm he suffered in the attack, Torrey begins a romance with divorced Navy Nurse Corps lieutenant Maggie Haynes (Patricia Neal), who tells him that his estranged son Jeremiah (Brandon De Wilde) is now an ensign in the Naval Reserve on active duty, assigned to a PT boat, and dating Maggie's roommate, a Nurse Corps ensign. A brief and strained visit with Jeremiah brings Torrey in on a South Pacific island-hopping offensive codenamed "Skyhook," which is under command of overly cautious Vice Admiral B.T. Broderick (Dana Andrews). On additional information from his BOQ roommate, Commander Egan Powell (Burgess Meredith), a thrice-divorced Hollywood film writer and Naval Reserve intelligence officer recalled to active duty, Torrey guesses that the aim of Skyhook is to capture a strategic island named Levu-Vana, whose central plain would make an ideal airfield site for Army Air Forces Boeing B-17 Flying Fortress squadrons. Maggie informs him that her unit is to be shipped out to the same area in preparation for the offensive.
Maggie's roommate, Ensign Annalee Dohrn (Jill Haworth), has been dating Torrey's son. Jere is arrogant and conspiring with a superior officer, former congressman Commander Neal Owynn (Patrick O'Neal), to do as little as possible in combat. Dohrn's romance with Jere ends and Eddington develops an interest in her. In the meantime, Torrey's loyal and resourceful young flag lieutenant, Lieutenant Commander William "Mac" McConnell (Tom Tryon), uses a 30-day leave to get reacquainted with wife Beverly (Paula Prentiss), a civilian observer for the Navy who worries that Mac will be killed in action and wants a child.
Come the summer of 1942, Torrey is promoted to rear admiral by the Pacific fleet's commander-in-chief (Henry Fonda), who then gives him tactical command of Skyhook, an assignment requiring the same sort of guts and gallantry he previously displayed as commanding officer of his cruiser. Torrey personally selects Paul Eddington to be his Chief of Staff, and infuriates Broderick by immediately planning and executing an operation to overrun Gavabutu, an island to be used as a staging base for the invasion of Levu-Vana. Owynn is now Broderick's aide, with Jere still by his side.
The Japanese have withdrawn their garrisons from Gavabutu, making it an easy capture. But as Torrey turns his undivided attention to Levu-Vana, his attempts to secure more material and manpower are frustrated by General Douglas MacArthur's simultaneous and much larger campaign in the Solomon Islands. Reconnaissance aircraft prove especially difficult to come by, and surface combatant forces amount to little more than several cruisers and destroyers, including Torrey's former command. When the mission succeeds, Jere recognizes the disloyalty of Owynn and Broderick and gains a new regard for his father.
Eddington's instability drives him to rape Dohrn, who is now engaged to Torrey's son. The traumatized nurse, fearing she might be pregnant, tries to tell him but he doesn't believe her. She then commits suicide with an overdose of sleeping pills. As the truth is about to be revealed, Eddington—still a qualified aviator—commandeers a North American PBJ Mitchell patrol bomber and flies solo on an unauthorized reconnaissance flight to locate elements of the Japanese fleet. Engaged, shot and killed by Japanese Zero fighters, he goes down in a fiery death in a redeeming act of sacrifice, finding and giving advance warning of a large Japanese task force centered around the super-battleship Yamato, on its way to blast Torrey's much smaller force off the islands.
Despite the new seaborne threat, Torrey nevertheless mounts the invasion of Levu-Vana and proceeds with a nothing-to-be-lost attempt to turn back the enemy force. Tragically, his son Jere is killed during a nighttime PT boat action when he is rammed by a Japanese destroyer. The following morning sees a pitched surface action off the shores of Levu-Vana, with the Americans drawing first blood and the Yamato decimating much of the U.S. force in response. Many lives are lost, Powell's among them. Severely injured at the height of the battle, resulting in the amputation of his left leg, Torrey is rescued by his flag lieutenant, LCDR McConnell, and is returned to Pearl Harbor aboard a Navy hospital ship under Maggie's care. Expecting to be court-martialed, Torrey is instead congratulated by CINCPAC for successfully repelling the Japanese advance and allowing his Marines to take Levu-Vana. Although Torrey has lost a leg, he is told by CINCPAC he will get a peg leg and then command a task force and "stump his way to Tokyo" with the rest of the Allied forces. CINCPAC and McConnell leave Maggie and a drowsy Torrey. Maggie pulls the blinds which slightly surprises Torrey who calls out "Maggie!". She responds in a calming voice "I'll be here, Rock" and Torrey lapses into sleep. The last shot is of Maggie warmly smiling back at him. | revenge, suspenseful, violence | train | wikipedia | Dull, simple, predictable, boring. Dull, simple, predictable, boring. Another low rent production, predictable plot, etc., all in all comes to a waste of time. Indie movies are sometimes good but this one is pure low ball values, no real script, plot, low budget, etc. Low budget is no barrier to good work, but in this case, it is. Someone thought cool music tracks, "cool" visuals would cure a bad, low quality film production. Not so. Bad, bad, bad. Nothing to see here.. I just wanted to help him.. The bad guys are introduced by FBI (?) agents to a room of fellow agents we don't see. We get a Cliff Note's version of the bad guys and never see those agents who are after drug dealer J. Markeaur (Brandon Van Vliet) but instead we see a woman agent after them and later a couple of assassin characters they pull out of the blue, bring hired by another guy we really don't know. However, the story centers on Michael (Nathan Tymoshuk) the guy not introduced. He is brought in by Ian (Michael Borka) to be the fall guy for the murder of Markeaur's cousin. There are double crosses with deals and characters we have no ideal who they are either. The plot was not well constructed. The acting wasn't there, with supporting characters being downright "so bad it is good" funny. Ryan Kiser has done better. The bad guy lives on his own island and has a party where pretentious faux-famous people sit around and do coke all day. The entire film had that low budget "fakeness" to it, like when adult film stars pretend they can actually act and get into a real role. It seemed forced.I did like the soundtrack which didn't match up too well with the film.Guide: F-word. No sex or nudity on party island. |
tt0082361 | Der Fan | Gaurav Chandana (Shah Rukh Khan) is a Delhi-based die-hard and obsessive fan of Bollywood superstar Aryan Khanna (also Shah Rukh Khan); Aryan is Gaurav's whole life. Gaurav's face bears an uncanny similarity to Aryan's, which helps him win the local talent show competition impersonating Aryan. He then embarks on a journey to meet Aryan in person.
When Sid Kapoor (Taher Shabbir Mithaiwala), a fellow actor, expresses harsh sentiments about Aryan to the press, Gaurav gets furious and invades Sid's cabin. He holds him hostage, beats him, and makes him apologise to Aryan while he records it. The video is uploaded to the internet, where Aryan sees it. He considers Gaurav's actions a crime and gets Gaurav arrested. In jail, Gaurav is mercilessly beaten, and Aryan comes to meet him. Gaurav is delighted, but Aryan angrily reprimands him and declares that Gaurav is not his fan. He reveals that he was the one who got Gaurav arrested, and tells him to forget they ever met. Shattered and disillusioned, Gaurav returns home and burns all of his Aryan memorabilia, vowing to get revenge against Aryan for turning his fan away.
One year later in London, Gaurav heads to Madame Tussauds wax museum, impersonating Aryan and purposely creating a havoc situation in which he triggers the police. The real Aryan is then arrested despite declaring that he is innocent. Aryan is bailed out and departs to Dubrovnik for a show. He gets a call from Gaurav, who warns him to apologise or he will destroy Aryan's stardom. Gaurav disguises himself as a crew-member to get into Aryan's show; though Aryan instructs his personnel to look out for him, they fail to catch him.
Aryan is next scheduled to perform at a billionaire’s wedding. Gaurav poses as Aryan and molests the billionaire's daughter. The billionaire berates the real Aryan and makes him leave the event. Outside, Aryan spots Gaurav and gives chase, though Gaurav escapes. The molestation incident gets all over the news, resulting in a tarnished reputation and fans boycotting Aryan's shows. In a press conference, Aryan explains that someone else is impersonating him and asks for time so he can prove his innocence.
Back in India, Gaurav invades Aryan’s home and vandalises his trophy collection. Aryan visits Gaurav's parents and meets Neha, Gaurav's crush. He then devises a plan to impersonate Gaurav and declare his love to Neha at the local talent show. This provokes Gaurav, who shoots at Aryan with a gun. Aryan chases him and subdues Gaurav after a bloody fight. He asks Gaurav to stop this and live his own life. Gaurav says that his life is nothing without Aryan and flings himself off the roof, dying with a smile. A horrified Aryan watches him fall.
Aryan’s name is cleared from all the controversies, but the ordeal still haunts him. On his next birthday, when he goes out to the roof to greet his fans, Aryan sees a hallucination of Gaurav smiling up at him. | pornographic, murder | train | wikipedia | null |
tt0120530 | Wong fei hung VI: Sai wik hung see | Wong Fei-hung, Clubfoot and "13th Aunt" cross the Pacific Ocean to America to visit Bucktooth So, who has opened a Po-chi-lam clinic there. While traveling by carriage through the wilderness, they pick up a friendly cowboy named Billy, who is almost dying of thirst. When the party stops to have lunch, a bunch of hostile Native Americans ambush them. Wong, Clubfoot and 13th Aunt escape unharmed but their carriage slides off a cliff and falls into a river. 13th Aunt and Clubfoot are rescued and taken to Bucktooth So's clinic. However, Wong hits his head on a rock and loses his memory as a consequence. He is saved by a Native American tribe.
Back in town, the mayor makes oppressive rules with the intention of causing trouble for the Chinese people living there, while Billy tries to stop him. Meanwhile, the tribe that rescues Wong encounters a more powerful rival tribe. The rival leader, a fearsome warrior, injures Fierce Eagle (the chief's son) on Wong's side. However, to everyone's surprise, Wong defeats the rival leader and half of his men with his kung-fu, causing the rival tribe to flee in fear. Wong is eventually brought back to the town where his companions attempt to help him recall his past.
When Wong finally regains his memory, he forgets everything that has happened during the period when he suffered from amnesia. In the meantime, the mayor is in debt and decides to hire a Mexican bandit to help him rob the bank, so that he can abscond the town with a ton of cash. The robbery is successful and the mayor frames the people in Po-chi-lam for it. Wong and the others are arrested and almost hanged. Just then, the Mexican bandit discovers that the mayor has paid him US$400,000 less, so he returns to town to claim his money. In the ensuing fight, the mayor is killed and Wong manages to capture the bandit to clear his name. At the end of the film, Billy is elected as the new mayor while Wong, 13th Aunt and Clubfoot return to China. | cult | train | wikipedia | Excellent martial-arts movie..
This is one of the best movies in the "Once upon a time in China" series.
Funny once in a while with its goofy Chinese humour and filled with fast fightingsequences that are beyond us "normal" people.
:) The synchronized sound is, as usual not the best, but it does the trick...
Enjoyable hokum.
The sixth film in the series, and the welcome return of Jet Li after a break in parts 4 and 5.
This time around Wong Fei Hung and his cohorts take a trip to the wild west, a reasonable idea but ultimately one of the weakest of the films.
The plot limps along rather pointlessly, although the frequent fight scenes (choreographed by Sammo Hung) are as exciting as ever.
Their power is somewhat diminished, however, as at no point do you feel the characters are in any real danger.Jet's cool bullet-dodging in the climactic fight is fun, but only real highlight is the scene where Fei Hung's loyal comrade Seven attempts to cure his master's amnesia by fighting him in the styles of villains from the previous films.The supporting cast are a painful bunch of stereotypes, and their acting ability leaves a great amount to be desired, but if you can get past that this is enjoyable enough hokum..
Widescreen not-dubbed Mandarin version is much improved..
It is understandable that some reviewers got such a poor impression of this film, because the commonly available China Star DVD (found at Best Buy et all) has a horrid Cantonese dub language track, and for some odd reason also has a poor Mandarin dub.
It is also cropped badly (pan and scan).
But the language problem is the most glaring enjoyment inhibitor, totally ruining the humor and timing of this very enjoyable western spoof/martial arts action flick.
This film was actually filmed with live mikes right here in Texas, in live Mandarin, English, and some Cantonese.
This original track is only found in the rare official Taiwan DVD from Thunder Media.
The action and stunt-work in this film is almost the eighth wonder of the world.
The things Jet Li does with his fighting and acrobatic skills are truly amazing.
Great story, too.
Very humorous in places- also being a spoof of the Once Upon a Time in China series in general.
Since many of the stunts are rather large scale, the widescreen really helps also.
Plenty has been said here about the story itself, so I don't need to add much.
I agree this is not on the same level as the first two Once Upon a Time in China movies, but really neither is the third.
I would rank this almost as good as OUATIC3, if viewed with the original soundtrack and aspect ratio..
Entertaining entry in the series.
Jet Li returns as Wong Fei Hung in this great epic series of China's history.
With Sammo Hung at the director's chair, one can expect some high-quality choreography.
And good fights are not lacking in this movie.
I thought that the characters were more defined and likeable then in OUATIC 4.
I thought that the epic quality of the story and themes weren't there, but setting that aside, the movie is fun to watch.
Sammo proves that he's one of the best choreographers, and Jet Li proves that he's one of the best on-screen fighters..
Comical, but good..
This movie kind of makes you wonder if he wants to hit that niche that Jackie Chan has in China.
The fighting is not only off the wall, but it's comical as well.
Don't expect to see the serious Jet Li that you're used to though, otherwise you'll be disappointed.
The best thing about this movie is; you didn't have to see any of the others in the series to know what's going on.
Most Chinese sequels tend to leave anyone who hasn't seen the first movies in the dark.
If you just take it for what it was meant to be, you'll enjoy it immensely.
You can tell that Jet Li was making an attempt to start making his presence in America.
I would highly recommend this movie to anyone who's a fan of Jet Li..
Stick to the first 3, don't bother with any of the rest, including this one.
After watching the first 3 in a two period to see what was so good about the series, I decided to watch this as an off-chance.
I was horribly disappointed.
While it might have come out before Shanghai Noon, this was just plain unbearable to watch with painfully BAD stereotypical dialogue with a plot thrown in around the last 2/3rd of the movie.
Do yourself some justice and skip this movie if given an option.
Only watch it for morbid curiosity, but you'll only be disappointed.
I feel like this horrible film tainted my eyes after watching the first 3, which were full of movie magic.
The action scenes in this one didn't even keep my attention at times..
Saw this dvd and was completely distracted by the soundtrack that was about 10 seconds behind the actual words that were spoken.
For a Jet Li film I thought it was good but I would like to see a repaired version.
I see about 2 or three martial arts films a week and this was the worst subtitled yet..
Not one of Jet Li's Best.
Jet Li reprises the role that he was born to play as Wong Fei Hung.
This time, Master Wong is in America to set up his clinic Po Chi Lam there.
But things go wrong as he gets amnesia and lives with some Indian tribe.The story was okay, but the rest of it wasn't.
First of all, the fight scenes were poorly filmed.
I couldn't tell what was going on since it was blurred and/or sped up.
This is too bad since I wanted to see Jet Li's physical talents.
Also, the sterotyping of the Indians were pretty bad too.
The American actors' lines were horrible and cliched, and the American actors themselves were pretty bad (of course, they could have been bad because of the bad lines they got).
There were some good scenes, but a couple of good scenes doesn't make a medicore movie any better.
This movie is worth a rental if there is nothing else to rent..
Waste of time!
Review: It's been such a long time since I have seen a movie which is full of huge pixels.
For a film that was made in the late 90's, I really can't see why the camera work so so terrible, and the movie wasn't that much better.
The acting was appalling from the Red Indians and the weird looking blonde guy and the storyline was all over the place.
The music sounded like it was done on one of those old, small casino organs but some of the fighting scenes weren't that bad.
I'm glad that I didn't have to read subtitles through the movie because the script was really bad and the dubbing wasn't much better.
On the whole, it's not a movie that I will be watching again in a hurry.
Terrible!Round-Up: This has to be one of the worst martial arts movies that I have seen in some time.
The sad thing is that Jet Li actually isn't that bad in it.
I do wonder how people can watch the screening of a movie and think that it's OK to release utter rubbish.
I also can't see were all of the budget went.
Anyway, I will just put this down as a bad day at the office for Jet Li.Budget: $12million Worldwide Gross: HK$30millionI recommend this movie to people who are into their Jet Li movies about a group of natives, trying to make a new life for themselves in the Wild West.
terrible.
i really liked the first two, and the third one was ok, but this one is terrible.
the plot is crap, the actors are bad (except the original ouatic cast) and the camera work pretty much ruined it for me, the shaking of the camera and too fast cuts ruined the action scenes, that could have saved the film..
Sammo Hung Should Stay In Front of Cameras.....
I'm going to be blunt: This is not a good movie.
There are two major flaws holding it down.
First, the direction is horrible.
The regular dialogue scenes are shot well enough, but when it comes time for the fight scenes the camera becomes jittery, it's in way to close to the action and the angles are completely off.
This is a shame because Jet Li and Xin Xin Xiong are amazing martial artists and their talents are completely wasted here.
Which brings me to the other problem.
The villains are...bank robbers?
Jet Li fights the English and corrupt officials in the first two films and now he's got to fight bank robbers?
Besides that, (minor spoiler) the main villain doesn't even put up a fight.
Wong basically kicks his @$$ all over town.
There is no dramatic intensity whatsoever.
(end spoiler)On a side note, the Tai Seng DVD release has terrible subtitles.
They're out of synch with the dialogue and the only get worse as the movie goes on.
At the end of the film they show up a good 6-7 seconds after the person has spoken making things a bit confusing.
My Film Rating: 3/10.
Undemanding eastern western with plenty of action and goofiness.
Jet Li's last appearance in the ONCE UPON A TIME IN CHINA film series is a straightforward East-meets-West adventure that offers some fun martial arts sequences and a storyline that's been done about a hundred times already (indeed, the martial arts western premise had already been exhausted by the time it first appeared in the early 1970s).
This time around, Tsui Hark stands in as producer and brings sure-hand director Sammo Hung on board to lens the proceedings.
Sadly, it appears that Hung's artistic vision was somewhat constrained on this movie, which has a kind of bland, glossy look and is far from the nitty-gritty action seen in his '80s offerings like MILLIONAIRE'S EXPRESS and EASTERN CONDORS.Jet Li, who only made one more Chinese flick, Hit-man, before upping sticks to America, is good value for money, as always, but he does look a little bored with the material.
Things do tend to get rather silly, especially when he joins a Native American tribe who nickname him 'Yellow' (a little racist perhaps?).You get the impression that Li was looking for a little more substantial material which is fair enough.
Others returning from the third film in the series include Xi Xi Xiong (as lightning-fast as ever) and Rosamund Kwan, who looks a lot older, and is pretty much unrecognisable from her glory days in the '80s.
The only other recognisable cast member is Richard Ng, better known as 'Sandy', who seems to have aged about twenty years since we last saw him.The storyline is definitely episodic with one or two engaging stunts, including a spectacular carriage crash which has to be seen to be believed.
The final drawn-out battle with a gang of bandits is a lot of fun, especially Li's showdown with Joe Sayah, a really weird looking guy who gets bottles and all sorts smashed over his head.
Although the film never reaches the heights to which it aspires, it passes the time amiably enough if you're in the mood for non-demanding fare..
Once Upon a Time in China and America.
Once Upon a Time in China and America.
As this film opens Wong Fei-Hung and his fiancée 'Aunt Lee' are travelling through the American West in a stage coach, they stop to pick up Billy, a man lost in the wilderness, but they don't really get a chance to get to know him as their group of wagons is attacked by Indians as they stop to eat.
They survive the ensuing fight but Wong Fei-Hung hits his head in a river and when he comes to he is with a group of Indians and has no memory.
Aunt Lee and friend Seven join up with friends who have settled in America then set about finding Wong Fei-Hung; who has become friends with the Indians after helping them beat a rival tribe
he is now particularly close to one of the women.
When his countrymen finally find him he still doesn't know who he is so Seven must fight him till his memory returns!
That isn't the end of their worries though; the mayor of the town is making life difficult for the Chinese population and frames them when the bank is robbed; to prove their innocence they will have to survive hanging and fight the real robbers!.If you are looking for a serious western then this isn't the film for you; however if you want some laughs and over the top kung-fu action then this is a lot of fun.
Cliché is piled on cliché as we have marauding Indians, amnesia, corrupt officials and diabolical villains; the leader of whom just happens to know kung-fu!
The action scenes are well choreographed for the most part although occasionally they look hilariously fake
the early wagon crash being most notable.
When I watched this I had no idea that it was actually the sixth instalment in a series of films but that doesn't really matter; the cast are introduced in a way that means you don't have to have seen earlier instalments; the only real confusion was the title as we never see them in China!
The Chinese cast do well; as one would expect Jet Li's action scenes are great as are those of Xin Xin Xiong, who plays Seven, Rosamund Kwan is also likable as Aunt Lee. The western cast aren't so great though; they aren't terrible but it is of no surprise that none of them are well known
or known at all for that matter.
Overall this is a lot of fun if you want plenty of action and plenty of laughs
sometime unintended laughs!.These comments are based on watching the subtitled version of the film; strangely everything is subtitled including the English dialogue
which sometimes doesn't match what is said! |
tt0213117 | The Neverhood | The titular Neverhood is a surreal landscape dotted with buildings and other hints of life, all suspended above an endless void. However, the Neverhood itself is bizarrely deserted, with its only inhabitants being Klaymen (the main protagonist and player character), Willie Trombone (a dim individual who assists Klaymen in his travels), Klogg (the game's antagonist who resembles a warped version of Klaymen), and various fauna that inhabit the Neverhood (most infamously the 'weasels', monstrous, crablike creatures that pursue Klaymen and Willie at certain points in the game). Much of the game's background information is limited to the 'Hall Of Records' which is notorious for its length, taking several minutes to travel from one end of the hall to the other.
The game begins with Klaymen waking up in a room and exploring the Neverhood, collecting various discs appearing to contain a disjointed story narrated by Willie. As Klaymen travels the Neverhood, he occasionally crosses paths with Willie, who agrees to help him in his journey while Klogg, who is spying on Klaymen from afar, tries to threaten Klaymen into giving up his quest. Eventually, Klaymen's quest directs him to Klogg's castle, and for this Klaymen enlists the help of Big Robot Bil, a towering automaton and a friend of Willie's.
As Bil (with Klaymen and Willie on board) marches to Klogg's castle, Klogg unleashes his guardian, the Clockwork Beast, to intercept Bil. The two giants clash and Bil proves victorious, but as he forces open the castle door for Klaymen to enter, Klogg gravely injures Bil by firing a cannon at him. Klaymen manages to get in, but Bil loses his footing and falls into the void with Willie still inside. Alone in Klogg's castle, Klaymen finds a terminal, and should he collect all of Willie's discs, the full extent of his tale is revealed; the Neverhood itself is the creation of a godlike being named Hoborg, who created the Neverhood in the hopes of making himself happy. Realizing that he was still alone, Hoborg creates himself a companion by planting a seed into the ground, which grows into Klogg. As Hoborg welcomes Klogg to the Neverhood, the latter tries to take Hoborg's crown, which Hoborg forbids Klogg from doing. Envious, Klogg manages to steal Hoborg's crown, rendering Hoborg inert in the process, and the crown's energies disfigure Klogg. With Hoborg lifeless, any further development of the Neverhood ground to a halt.
Having witnessed this, Willie (himself and Bil being creations of Hoborg's brother Ottoborg) discovers that Hoborg was about to plant a seed to create another companion. Willie takes the seed and plants it faraway from Klogg, with Willie hoping that whoever grew from the seed would defeat Klogg. That seed in turn grew into Klaymen. Afterwards, Klaymen manages to reach the throne room, with Klogg and a motionless Hoborg waiting for him. Klogg tries to dissuade Klaymen from reviving Hoborg by tempting him with Hoborg's crown. From here, the player may choose to take up Klogg's offer or take the crown to revive Hoborg. If the player chooses to take the crown for himself, Klogg gloats at his apparent victory, only for the crown to disfigure Klaymen similarly to Klogg. The now-villanous Klaymen overpowers Klogg and declares himself the new ruler of the Neverhood.
If the player chooses to revive Hoborg, Klaymen distracts Klogg and manages to put the crown atop Hoborg's head, reviving him. As Hoborg thanks Klaymen, Klogg attempts to ambush them both, only to set off his own cannon which blasts him out of the castle and into the void. Returning to the building where Klaymen first started, Hoborg continues populating the Neverhood and orders a celebration when he is finished. However, Klaymen remains sorrowful over the loss of Willie and Bil, and Hoborg decides to use his powers to save Willie and Bil (to Klaymen's delight). The game ends with Hoborg telling Klaymen "Man, things are good". | psychedelic | train | wikipedia | Only two words can describe this fantastic frenzy of a fun and frisky form of gaming: "Wow" and "Excellent".I can't describe it to its full extent.
The creators of this game put so much time, effort, and ability into creating Klaymen's world that, although I have played through the game literally five or more times over, I am still amazed.
While the game lacks a solid story when you start, it builds up as if the storyline stretches out to the past and the future.
Klaymen learns of the past as he continues ahead (on to his and the Neverhood's fate).When Klaymen's ultimate journey begins, there is no plot.
There is no story.
There is no big bad guy.
There is exploration and there are puzzles, and plenty of them.
These puzzles are not extremely hard, as in a similar game, Riven.
They are challenging but not beyond total confusion.
One puzzle links to something elsewhere within the world, and when Klaymen figures it out, everything fits together.The plot is excellent (once it quickens), the characters are deep and intriguing, and the gameplay is excellent.
Not to mention the cinematic sequences every so often.
In all, the Neverhood is a must..
In all, the Neverhood is a must..
A fantastic surreal experience.
The Neverhood is one of the most challenging single player games I have ever played, and it hurts me to admit that I never did manage to finish it by myself.
Perhaps this is because it is so different to any kind of game I have ever played and it takes a great deal of logic to unlock its many puzzles and mysteries if you expect to get anywhere in the game.
Nevertheless, this is a fantastic wacky achievement by Dreamworks Studios, featuring childlike claymation and interface but adult-level difficulties in game-play, all interwoven with quirky elements.
No one can successfully capture the mood or style of The Neverhood in a few sentences, but think Wallace and Gromit claymation meets Tim Burton's Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, with a touch of Salvador Dali surrealism.
In other words, this is a wacky, colourfully creative mess.
We follow Klaymen as our first-person player on his quest to explore Neverhood (a neighbourhood) and the more puzzles and tasks he completes, the more we get to know about the plot of the game in the form of his mission.
Klaymen collects stone-chips which he can insert in TVs which will then play for a bit to give more history of Neverhood.
Very soon it is evident that the world of Neverhood is an unusual one and the people (creatures) he encounters may not be what they appear to be.Aside from featuring an involving and puzzling plot, The Neverhood is the funniest game ever to hit PC platform.
A game sequence that has stuck with me is when Klayman finds and rewinds a musical box and it shifts to cinematic mode.
A happy jingle starts playing, and Klaymen continues to wind it and suddenly it awakens this huge spider-like monster who comes barging through the wall OUT OF NOWHERE and starts chasing Klay and it is just the ugliest creature I have ever seen in a video game.
This cinematic is absolutely hysterical.
No description will ever do it justice.
You need to play this game now.
Although it may appear to be, I don't think that this game is for children.
I say this because it genuinely freaked the hell out of me at several points and there is just an eerie, almost horror-like feeling shadowing the mood of the game-play.
To emphasize this, there is also a weird out-of-place musical score by Terry Scott Taylor that sounds like it either belongs in a fun-house at a carnival, or it simply sounds like nothing you've ever heard.
Sure, you can laugh at most of the sequences -- but this is best enjoyed by adults or teens, especially since it is so damn difficult.
The Neverhood is a gloriously entertaining, freaky PC platform game that I highly recommend.9/10.
A challenging game with fun stuff.
If you are good at memory puzzles and into a game that is all clay you will like this game.
This game is action packed and a little bit comedy to make the setting.
If you are able to beat the game you can chose two endings a good one or a bad one.
Overall it is a good game and you should but it..
The neverhoOd is at number 1 of my favourite games of all time.
Created in a klay world called the Everhood that may never exsist!
The Neverhood!The creator Doug TenNapel has also created; EarthWormJim, Gear, Soloman FX and Koghead and meatus.
He is a great christian with a band called TRUCK..
I'm a proud owner of an original CD-ROM of the Neverhood, and I have to say, it is one of the best games I have played to date.
I first found the game when I was scuttling through an old demo CD, packed with boring games like pinball, and Ace Ventura, when I came across a game with a man made of clay.
After playing ten minutes through, I set out to get a copy for myself, and ended up scoring one on eBay for 80 bucks (from Israel).
This game is VERY HARD.
So much so that I got to a point in the game where I thought you could go no further.
So I left it for a few days and went back to playing.
I was not even 1/4 of the way though the game.
This game is full of adventure, fun, and humor that'll keep you glued to the computer screen for days on end.
It does more than break the mould.
It does more than break the mould.
It shatters it.10/10.
It shatters it.10/10.
Greatest video game ever made.
No one does zany, abnormally creative artwork quite like Doug Tenapel and his crew, and this piece is living proof.
If you can find this amazing PC game anywhere (like eBay, seeing as it is so rare) you really should buy it.
I've never seen claymation taken to such a great extent before!
It's not a big-budget production and it doesn't have a very common look and feel to it like most other games might (seeing as how it takes you through the adventure in a first-person, puzzle-solving perspective format) but it is fun, intelligent, hilarious and insanely innovative like no video game has ever been before (not forgetting the awesomely offbeat soundtrack by musical genius Terry Taylor.) The only reason I even chose to stop and give this title a comment on this site in the first place is because it's so much more like a movie than a game anyway....
Fanciful game for Windows done with Claymation.
The Neverhood is, in my humble opinion, the best puzzle game for the IBM PC platform ever developed.
It was developed by Doug TenNapel and company and took years to produce.
There is mischief but very little violence.
It is most definitely not a shoot-em-up, nor is it tame.
The music, which reminds one of Leon Redbone on Lysergic Acid Diethylamide, is worth the effort of finding a used copy of this long out-of-print title from 1996. |
tt0861350 | Header | Imprisoned for involuntary manslaughter during a carjacking, Travis Clyde Tuckton is released from prison in 2003, and shacks up with his disabled grandfather, Jake Martin, in the old shoemaker's secluded West Virginia home. Jake elects to teach Travis everything he knows, starting with the family tradition of "headers"; the act of having sex with a hole drilled into a person's skull. Travis picks up a hitchhiker, and as Jake supervises, loses his "head humping" virginity to her. After killing a relative of a neighbor who had gotten into an argument with Jake, Travis vows to take revenge on all those who have wronged his family, declaring "An eye for an eye, and a head for a head!"
A parallel story concerns ATF agent Stewart Cummings, who has resorted to trafficking drugs in order pay for his girlfriend Kathy's medicine. The plotlines intersect when Stewart investigates the mounting pile of header victims, with the evidence eventually pointing to Travis. After killing and robbing the two dealers he was carrying drugs for, Stewart picks up a hitchhiker, and asks her about Travis. The hitchhiker tells Stewart that Travis may be living with his grandfather, and gives him directions to Jake's cottage.
At the cottage, Travis kills Thibald Caudill, a man Jake claimed stole valuable land out from under their family, and killed Jake's parents (making it look like a car accident). Stewart walks in on Travis giving Thibald a header, and shoots both Travis and Jake. Stewart rushes back to his office, where he is told he is being arrested for murdering the drug dealers, one of whom was an undercover officer. A struggle ensues, and ends with Stewart shooting his superior and the arresting officer.
Stewart returns home, and discovers Kathy doing cocaine and having sex with her doctor, having been faking her illness to get drug money this entire time. Stewart snaps, kills the doctor, shoots Kathy in the knees, and gets a drill in preparation of giving her a header. | cult | train | wikipedia | null |
tt1994577 | The Pastor's Wife | Mary Winkler is a housewife and mother of three daughters who is married to Matthew Winkler, a pastor who is admired by many in his community for his friendliness and his views about family values. To many in town the Winklers are seen as a perfect family with Matthew as a perfect husband and wonderful father and Mary as a dutiful wife and mother. However, early one morning at the Winkler's home, a shotgun blast is heard by the Winkler children. Mary takes the children away in the car on a sudden trip, with the children wondering what happened to their father. Concerned neighbors investigate the Winkler home that night, finding Matthew dead in a bedroom with a shotgun wound. Fearing the Winkler family has been kidnapped, the local and state authorities and FBI issues an Amber alert for the Winklers. Eventually a patrol car finds Mary and her children but they also find a shotgun in her car and apprehend Mrs. Winkler. Later the shotgun is identified as the murder weapon. At the station, Mary admits she may have shot her husband, which shocks the community and her parents-in-law. At first Mary refuses to divulge more about the incident and refuses to say anything negative about her husband. But her lawyer convinces her to reveal a darker, hidden side of Matthew.
Mary reveals that Matthew, despite his kind pastor image, was an angry and abusive man who engaged in physical and emotional abuse when she did something that angered him. She had never revealed this to anyone because her religious beliefs led her to silence. Matthew threatened to hurt or kill her to make her keep quiet. Mary also revealed Matthew tried to tax cheat the money she won in a lottery in order to pay their bills by having her put it in an account at another bank under her name. When the bank calls and asks her and her husband to meet them due to suspicions about the money, Mary tells Matthew about it on the night before he is murdered, but Matthew has no intention to follow her to the bank, citing since the account was under her name, it was her problem to deal with it. Mary refuses to reveal more of the abuses she suffered from Matthew to her lawyer, but upon learning her parents-in-law have not given her daughters her letters over what happened, making her eldest believe she murdered their father in cold blood, Mary finally reveals it in order to not lose custody of her daughters.
Mary reveals to the court that Matthew was a hypocrite who forced her to dress up like a hooker before they had sex and made her watch online pornography so they could reenact it even when she didn't want to. The years of abuse and financial situation was gaining its toll on Mary's mental state and what finally broke her was when hours before Matthew was killed, he tried to suffocate their baby daughter as he was unable to sleep due to the baby's cries. Unable to stand it any longer, in the early morning hours, Mary brings out the shotgun and pokes it on her sleeping husband at their bed to wake him up as she wanted to have a serious discussion with him about stopping the abuse. However, Mary was standing on a slippery rug which causes her to fall and accidentally pulls the trigger and shoots her husband. Upon realizing what she has done, a confused Mary decides to run away with her daughters. After this revelation, she tells the jury that despite the abuse she suffered, Mary still loves Matthew and never wanted to kill him, she just wanted him to stop mistreating her. After jury makes their decision, the jury finds Mary not guilty of murder but guilty of involuntary manslaughter, much to Mary's lawyers and supporters joy.
Throughout the film, various people who knew or met the Winklers are interviewed about their opinions of the case. While some refuse to believe that Matthew was an abusive man and Mary was guilty and got away with murder, others believe he was and Mary was innocent and was only defending herself and her children. Even Matthew's parents are interviewed who each have their different opinions. While his mother doesn't believe in Mary's story that Matthew was abusive, Matthew's father however believes he was but thinks Mary didn't kill Matthew accidentally but purposely as revenge and is willing to forgive her if she confesses the truth. | murder | train | wikipedia | The Pastor's wife.
I was a member of a Baptists church for over 2 years.
The Pastor's Wife portrays a fairly accurate account of the women in my church who firmly believe that the men in the family have the final say.
The wedding vows too are fairly accurate in as much as the 'love, honour and obey' that were originally 'standard' vows.
The pastor (or minister) in my church, although young was not (to my knowledge) violent, nor abusive.
However he had little or no knowledge of domestic abuse as he had been raised in a non-violent atmosphere.
His views were outdated though, because he constantly informed me that no matter how I was treated (or ill-treated), my role as wife was to be submissive, understanding and non-judgemental.
My ex treated me okay (in public) behind closed doors, I too was subjected to verbal abuse both by him and his parents.
The minister in my church did inform me that if I chose to 'abandon' the marriage, I too would be ostracized by the church.
I chose to leave and (as promised) was ostracized..
The last line in this movie makes it a certain winner!.
A riveting drama based on true events.Pastor with wife and kids seem to be the perfect family.
the wife shoots her husband to death.But there is more to the story then meets the eye...Rose McGowan gives a show stopping performance in this classily crafted and compelling real life drama:8/10..
I'm still not sure what to think of this one.
I'm still not sure what to think of this one.
It's trying really hard to be more than just another Lifetime movie about either a crazy woman who knocked off her husband or a male S.O.B. who got what he deserved when his wife shot him.
The film has a lot of good aspects, notably the way it establishes how the authoritarian beliefs of the Church of Christ conditioned the events -- how the husband could literally believe his wife should submit to him and meekly accept him even when he hit her for trivial reasons, and also why his dark side would reveal itself in surfing for porn on the Net and ultimately in making his wife dress like a hooker before he could have sex with her (all those religious hang-ups about sex being only to make babies, not to have fun!).
I also liked little bits like the woman prosecutor saying, when she receives notice that the wife and her attorney are going to present spousal abuse as a defense, "I wonder what took them so long." (Since the movie is already more than half over before this happens, I wonder what took screenwriter Robert Freedman and director Norma Bailey that long, too!) At the same time, there are just too many lapses into familiar Lifetime clichés for this to work as the atmospheric neo-noir it was clearly meant to be, and Rose McGowan simply looks too young to have been married for 13 years and have three children, the oldest a teenager.
(Then again they may have wanted a young-looking actress because Freedman's script contains a lot of flashbacks to when Matthew and Mary Winkler were dating and Mary was still just a teenager herself.) The story deserved a better movie, but this one isn't bad, and Michael Shanks is marvelously understated as Matthew even though Lifetime did the abused-wife schtick much better in "Black and Blue" (in which the authority figure the wife didn't dare report as a spousal abuse was a cop instead of a minister)..
lots of stereotypes.
As a member of the Church of Christ I have to disagree with the other reviewer.
There is no conditioning in the church for wives to be underlings and take abuse.
That is hogwash.
My mother is a preacher's wife and she is very strong and outspoken.
I also hated the scene of their wedding.
Those vows they said I have never in my life heard at a wedding.
That too was Hollywood hogwash.
I also noticed some of the background music made me think of Deliverance.
That's what Hollywood thinks of Southerners!
All our women barefoot and pregnant and the men chewing tobacco holding a shotgun.
I didn't really keep up with this trial, but I wonder how much conjecture and untruths were added to this film.
But, nobody but Mary knows the truth about what happened and evidently,the jury bought her story..
Surprisingly good Rose McGowan.
This true life case appeared in the news a lot - Mary Winkler a young mother of 3 daughters shot and killed her seemingly kind loving pastor husband in the back in bed.
She claimed abuse.
She got a very short sentence.
This puzzling case captured a lot of attention.Rose McGowan is convincing as the enigmatic Mary.
She looks shell shocked and is quite appropriately spaced out.
The blank stare looks a lot like what we have seen on the news.It's quite well done how they show the public witnessed version of events first and then gradually the alleged private version where the abuse took place.The murdered pastor Matthew Winkler is played by Michael Shanks who gives quite a convincing performance especially explosive in the alleged abuse situation.Leaves one with an unsettled feeling whether the abuse actually took place and he was a perverted abuser or she got too lightly away with murdering him in a huge miscarriage of justice. |
tt0242994 | Va savoir | After three years away, the actress Camille returns to Paris in an Italian troupe run by her lover Ugo, who is touring Europe with an Italian-language production of a minor Pirandello play. Camille is nervous because she still has feelings over leaving her lover Pierre, who she tracks down in a park. He seems unchanged and has still not finished writing his doctoral thesis on Martin Heidegger.
Ugo meanwhile is pursuing his private search for a lost play by Goldoni and in a library meets the attractive Dominique, who tells him to try a collector. The collector sends him to the private library inherited by Dominique's mother, who warns him that books have disappeared. She is happy for him to browse and Dominique helps him. When she takes him to her bedroom, however, her jealous half-brother Arthur intervenes (it is later revealed that he is her secret lover). Dominique warns Ugo that it is Arthur who steals books to sell.
Pierre asks Camille and Ugo to dinner at his flat with his lover Sonia, which proves a disaster as the nervous Camille drinks too much and the jealous Ugo mocks Pierre. When Camille goes round next day to apologise to Sonia, the two women begin to form a rapport. However Sonia is being pursued by Arthur and in a bar Camille sees him trying to embrace her. In fact he is taking an impression of her very valuable diamond ring, which he later replaces with a worthless duplicate.
In despair at this deceit, Sonia asks Camille if she will help. She goes round to Arthur's flat and offers him a simple deal: she will either spend the night with him or walk out on the spot. He opts for the night and, once he is asleep, she searches until she finds the ring in the kitchen. Now able to be friends with Sonia, Camille is still worried that she has not closed things with Pierre. When she goes to see him, he locks her in a room and she escapes by a skylight. Ugo then calls on Pierre and challenges him to a duel, place and weapons to be his choice. When Pierre accepts, he finds that the place is over the flies in the theatre and the weapons are a bottle of vodka each. As Pierre is the first to fall over, Ugo wins.
In the meantime Dominique has found the Goldoni play, not in the library but in the kitchen among her mother's cookbooks. When she brings it to Ugo, roaring drunk after his duel, he says it is so valuable that she must keep it and just give him a photocopy. Camille turns up with the ring and offers it back to Sonia, who says Camille has earned it and must keep it. Reunited and now rich, Camille and Ugo look forward to the next stop on their tour. | absurd, intrigue, romantic | train | wikipedia | Having read many of the comments of "Va Savoir" here, (admittedly mostly from the other side of the Atlantic), I was surprised by the amount of hostility towards this film.Whilst I admit that it may have benefited from a little judicious editing, perhaps down to around two hours, this seems to me to be a well acted and entertaining slice of french life.
Initially, I found her portrayal cold and unemotional, but this I believe was intentional and as the film progresses, she is revealed as a complicated and enigmatic character, capable of intense emotions but also of granting sexual favours just to create a diversion.There is also a fine performance from Sergio Castellitto as Ugo, entirely convincing, except perhaps in his refusal to bed the truly delicious "Do" played by a ravishing Hélène de Fougerolles, (surely another French actress destined for greatness).
Indeed, Jacques Rivette seems to have nurtured excellent performances all round.Whilst this is not a perfect film, it offers more than enough to warrant a few short hours of your time.
The film's heroine, Camille, a French stage actress left Paris three years ago and found success in Torino, Italy where she became a lead actress for the theater company.
She returns back to Paris with Ugo and his company to act in Italian as a main character in Pirandello's "As You Desire Me", the play that explores the mysteries of identity and memory.
I found Camille's character (as played by Jeanne Balibar, the stage actress and a dancer) very interesting.
She may not be likable in a beginning but she is talented and every character in the movie after watching her performing at the stage leaves with the feelings that they've witnessed something very special.
Ugo tries to find in the Paris libraries the lost but existing play by the Italian dramatist of 18th century, Carlo Goldoni and is helped by an intelligent and beautiful young student, Dominique or Do and they both seem to have developed some special feelings for each other.
Of course I've not seen that many French romantic comedies, but I can state that were this in the hands of an American 'Hollywood' director it would be an entirely different film.
Some years ago Sophie Marceau explained her move to Hollywood in more or less the following terms: I am tired of doing the same French movies where all in all there is a love triangle and in the end the three of them have dinner together.
Except for the brother-and-sister duo who are kind of stereotypical and possibly present the spectator with the cliché of male and female libertine Parisians, the other two couples arouse our curiosity with their insufficiencies: Camille is a little too absent-minded to be completely sane, Pierre is a typical academic dork who falls into furies of sophisticated frustration, Ugo visibly carries the burden of his unattractive appearance and compensates for it with his thick Italian accent, while Sonia obstinately tries to keep to the level of those intellectual pricks and prove how much more she knows about real life.
Throughout the film, there is a huge amount of feeling going back and forth, but we all (together with the director, the movie cast and the crew) watch it all happen as if it's not even happening.
In this sense, this movie is either very successful and it gave me the exact feeling, or maybe I am overly empathetic : )It did take me 3 days to watch, with numerous interruptions of daily life, and I even stopped watching now and started writing this review.Yes, I do not know the ending yet.
The story revolves around a French actress in the troupe who is married to the director of the theatre group who is returning to Paris for the first time in years and still has unresolved feelings for an ex who resides in the city.
Having said this I could not help but feel the whole thing was somewhat slight and the payoff in time (it is or seemed like a very long movie) was somewhat unjustified.
In some ways the characters seemed almost distant to me, they were real but I couldnt get inside their head, which in some ways is a silly criticism because life is like that and that is not necessarily a detraction for the film but I felt as though they were drifting through a series of set pieces with not all that much at stake.
While in Paris in a tour of the Italian play "Como Tu Mi Vuoi", the lead actress Camille (Jeanne Balibar), who is living with the director Ugo Bassani (Sergio Castellitto), recalls and misses her former love Pierre (Jacques Bonnaffé).
Meanwhile, Do's smalltime crook stepbrother Arthur (Bruno Todeschini) seduces Sonia to steal her expensive ring.I saw "Va Savoir" with great expectation, but I was quite disappointed with this pointless film.
Still, thelegendary Jacques Rivette is known for his l*o*n*g running times;he probably considers this 2 1/2 hour film to be a short.
Other than that he's OK.)My suggestion--don't go to this film expecting "Rules of the Game," but see it because it is French, it is directed by Jacques Rivette,and it gives ample screen time to three excellent female actors..
It's a cerebral movie, as are most of the best French films going back about 80 years or so.
From the opening scene (where the subtitles were not working on my DVD) all the way till the final moments of the film, we have to follow four of the dullest characters in cinematic history.
We, the audience, were forced to follow a lot of assumptions in this film, and whenever we felt that we fully understood and connected with a character, Rivette would pull us further away.
I had trouble understanding the play that was happening throughout the film, thus causing me to care less about the characters.
A light Rivette; Va Savoir (2001) is a film that features many of the director's most recognisable traits and characteristics familiar from the unwieldy and progressive films that he made in the late 1960's and early 1970's, but done in such a way as to suggest a more frivolous or throwaway tone with the emphasis placed more squarely on the elements of comedy and farce.
This doesn't necessarily mean that the film is bad, or that it fails in some way to compare to the more iconic likes of Paris nous appartient (1960), L'amour fou (1969), Out 1 (1971) and Celine and Julie Go Boating (1974) - all of which are referenced here - but rather, that it shows a process of simplification; with Rivette taking his chosen themes - such as performance, miscommunication and the battle of the sexes - and allowing the characters to take precedence over the story, as opposed to the experiments with the film-making form.
Along the way we have the usual self-reflexive comments on the nature of performance and of film-making itself, with the story revolving around an Italian-language production of Luigi Pirandello's "As You Desire Me" that the central couple are appearing in.
As with those particular films, Va Savoir offers a narrative in which the subtle juxtaposition of the characters thoughts, feelings and social interactions creates a comedy of errors to undercut many of the more dramatic or self-consciously self-reflexive elements of the film.As ever with Rivette - or at least the work of his that I've so far seen - the film moves perfectly between the various characters and their roles and interactions, as the skillful sense of choreography between the different layers of the narrative and the impeccable comic-performances of the cast help to draw us in to the story and lead us towards that quietly brilliant final act.
I can certainly understand why many would dislike the film; it's long, deals exclusively in character interaction (on at least two separate levels) and creates a world that is stuffy and intellectual, no doubt seemingly horribly pretentious to those unwilling to spend more than thirty minutes with these characters or the world that Rivette creates.
Regardless, I personally think that Va Savoir is a fine film; both intelligent and entertaining and with that spark and spirit so recognisable in the director's work from Paris nous appartient to the celebrated Celine and Julie..
Ten years later, Rivette is even more riveting with an astonishing screenplay working again with long-time collaborating writing team of Pascal Bonitzer & Christine Laurent.Va savoir (2001) - aka Who Knows?
However, as we advance in the story and see the main character quirkiness, hopes, fears and dreams and feel the tension of their past, present and future love interests intertwine we enter an alluring drama way beyond conventional clichés of performing art in cinema.A lot of details are in the screenplay with funny twists and turns, discomfort, joy, questioning and dismay.
Aronofsky' Black Swan (2010) also come to mind but for dance.Va savoir (2001) has so many interesting elements with side stories of a life that lead to prison or the central search for a unpublished and never performed play.
There are many sexual and emotional tension building between the strong central and secondary characters over the course of two and a half hours and an unexpected funny and fitting finale.Rivette's choices make the situations intense and bring the viewer into an in intellectual, emotional and physical experience of high calibre that is not quite like any other.
The only time I felt anything for one of the characters here was near the beginning, when Camille, the lead actor in a Parisian production of a Pirandello play, a French woman speaking in Italian, has trouble remembering her lines (she is pre-occupied by a past love affair which had taken place in that city).
There are some nice moments, especially when Ugo fends off temptation from the lovely Dominique, and the duel scene between Ugo and the prat of a philosopher who was once his partner Camille's lover, but the whole thing takes far too long (2 hours 20 minutes), lacks tension and above all calls for minimal involvement on the part of the viewer.
"Va Savoir (Who knows?)" is for Eric Rohmer fans, though it's even slower and with less humor than Rohmer's intellectually romantic talk fests.Director Pierre Rivette is a contemporary of Rohmer's whose penchant for long, slow films has hampered his success in the U.S. And I guess this is his most accessible film, as the last half-hour suddenly becomes sweeter and filled with coincidences so the interplays of three couples become intertwined almost in a drawing-room comedy.But first are all kinds of references that went way over my head as I hadn't realized until late in the movie that the play that we keep seeing long chunks being performed in Italian by one of the couples is a Pirandello piece, with the gimmick here that we sort of see it backwards, mostly from the last scene to the start, so I missed some points.
I think this is a typical French author movie (read: pleases only its author :) where part of the audience will walk out, part will stay totally annoyed, and some will love it thinking it's of the greatest insight, overall not generating much revenue.Plot: A small troupe of Franco-Italian actors present a new theater piece in Paris, with moderate success.
There are also unusually funny moments in the movie that provide for a breath of air since the film is not very fast paced and long.
The character of Camille during the first hour of the film seemed mentally disturbed--constantly talking to herself, so why am i to think that any man should find her attractive.
This film aside from being pointless was toooo long, i wanted to walk out on numerous occassions but feared, the moment i did would be when the movie suddenly made sense, so much for that.
If you don't have a great script that brings out great insights into the nature of your navel, don't write about your navel.Second, Rivette, who probably has lived off of government grants for much of his adult life, focuses on lead characters who can afford to stay in a luxurious hotel in Paris even though their play is failing and they're broke.
If there's supposed to be some thematic connection between the Pirandello production involving two of the film's characters, of which scenes are shown throughout, and the story in which they are contained, it escaped me...no, wait....The Pirandello play in question, "As You Desire Me," (as the title is usually rendered in English) may be connected.
Think Sheridan, Congreve, Marivaux--any 18th century farce where style is its own reward.I found Sergio Castellitto very funny and moving as Ugo; Jeanne Balibar continues to impress me as Camille (she was the only good thing in Desplechin's messy, overlong Ma vie sexuelle); Jacques Bonnaffe did a great job as the pedantic professor who can still rise to the challenge of a duel--the funniest duel I've ever seen, fought with vodka bottles up in the flies of the theater.Curtain..
You probably won't until the second hour of this typically lengthy and longueur-y Rivettean opus, which spins a very conventional Marivaux-meets-twentieth-century romantic minuet out of the unlikeliest of materials: scenes between emotionally battered lovers that suggest that Rivette, long esteemed as a conceptualist, really has the chops in his direction of actors to make explorations of the heart on a par with Pialat, Cassavetes and Bergman.The central performance of Jeanne Balibar, also, is endlessly fascinating: one cannot quite tell whether her self-regard is her own or her characters, whether her tics are hideously mannered or charming, whether she exerts a tidal attraction or a clammy, cold-palms repulsion.
In one sense it revolves around Camille (Jeanne Balibar) a French actress back on French soil for the first time in three years via a European tour of Pirandello's As You Desire Me. Camille is, in fact, the first thing we see as a pin-spot picks her out of the darkness reinforcing the theatrical quality we are in for.
Ostensibly an item with Ugo (Sergio Castellitto) the director of the play and leading actor opposite her, Camille has it in mind to look up her ex-lover, a Professor of Philosophy who, in the interim has married and become a devoted husband.
The only thing that really had me laughing was the ending when the vodka duel ensues, and the film ends up on stage like a play.
But the way that leads to that ending is a hard one, and has the problem with the main character which looks terribly unadjusted with all the other normal people around her.
I caught this film on HBO West on a snow day here on the US East Coast, and found that after the first half hour, I started understanding the French dialogue without the subtitles, because the actors kept repeating OVER AND OVER AND OVER!
Seeing that most Americans commenting on this film didn't like it, I suppose it's at least partly because the film does not really tell a story, well, not in a good straightforward way at least.
Also, being a theatrical production we watch being performed, it is played with a different intensity than the rest of the film.Camille and Ugo are lovers.
Ugo, who also acts in the play, is determined to find a rare Carlo Goldoni's play, "Il Destino Veneziano", which might have been written in Paris in the eighteenth century.A few days after the opening, Camille goes to a park where she knows she will find Pierre, a man whose habits take him to the same places all the time.
The last half hour makes more sense as all the different conflicts come to a head and the film becomes alive, especially the funny 'duel' between Ugo and Pierre at the theater.
Sergio Castellitto, one of the best Italian actors working in movies these days, is perfect as Ugo. He can be intense, vain, or playful, yet he doesn't stray from betraying Camille.
I did like all the actors especially Jeanne Balibar who is the central character but I would like them even more in a more interesting film and the main problem comes from the fact that the script doesn't really let viewers know who these characters really are and instead the focus is just on their immediate problems.
Jacques Rivette's "Va Savoir (Who Knows?)" is one such film, running at two-and-a-half hours, without any real purpose or entertainment value for the first two hours (!).
The acting is up to par with that in an American romantic comedy, and is edged slightly higher due to the flawless bilingual dialogue of leads such as Jeanne Balibar (Camille) and Sergio Castillitto (Ugo), who are involved in an Italian theatre production.
Fine performances in particular from the somewhat neurotic, insecure actress Camille (Jeanne Balboni) who reminded me of some of Diane Keaton's classic characters in her personality and also her put-upon-and-pressured-and- stressed-wants-to-do-the-right-thing-but-it's-not-easy director and co-star in their production, not to mention her boyfriend, Ugo (Sergio Castellito) who seems like a fundamentally good guy who is, as I mentioned, stressed out and totally in lust with Dominique (and who can blame him?) but seems to want to remain loyal to the flighty and confused Camille.
Rivette-characteristically for French films as against US films, at least generally speaking-allows us to have mixed feelings about characters.
But I also came to the realization that most people I have encountered DON'T know much of Heidegger's philosophy, haven't read more than "Six Characters" by Pirandello, and few seem to have seen even a single play by Goldoni.And few of the people who express enjoyment of the movie on this site seem to do so based upon the relationship of these authors' texts to what is happening on the screen.
So I rented it again.I now doubt that I missed much - and think the movie simply fails on all levels.Romantic comedies really need appealing characters - this has only one -played by the lovely Helene de Fouguerolles. |
tt0266452 | Death to Smoochy | Randolph Smiley is the host of "The Rainbow Randolph Show", a popular children's tv show. Despite his friendly appearance on-stage, off-stage he is an arrogant and corrupt businessman who accepts bribes from parents who want to put their kids on his show. After an FBI sting exposes him, Randolph is fired and his show is cancelled. He is replaced with the "squeaky clean" Sheldon Mopes and his character, Smoochy the Rhino. Mopes is uniquely sincere and thoroughly interested in providing quality children's entertainment, and despite doubts from his hardened producer Nora Wells, his show quickly becomes tremendously popular. Meanwhile, Randolph turns to his former associate Marion Stokes and pleads to help him get his job back, but Stokes refuses. After several failed attempts to get Mopes fired, Randolph turns to his former partner Angelo Pike and asks if he can stay at his apartment, to which Angelo reluctantly agrees.
Mopes quickly finds himself losing creative control over his show to Nora and with the help of his new agent Burke Bennett, Mopes renegotiates his contract and is named executive producer. Irish mob boss Tommy Cotter approaches Mopes and asks him to create a spot on his show for her cousin Spinner Dunn, a former boxer whose numerous head injuries have left him with brain damage. Mopes reluctantly adds Spinner to the show, first as a cowbell-wielding game warden, and later on as Smoochy's cousin Moochy.
Mopes is horrified to learn that Burke has signed him up to star in a Smoochy ice show, as he fears that the event will exploit children. Burke and Merv Green, the head of the corrupt charity running the ice show, warn Mopes not to back out of the event but he does so anyway. Soon afterward, a disguised Randolph tricks Mopes into performing a Smoochy act at a neo-Nazi rally. Mopes is branded a racist and loses his job and show, and Nora refuses to help him. However, when Randolph barges into Nora's apartment and tries to convince her to help him get his job back, he accidentally reveals that he set Mopes up. Tommy and her crew then barge into Angelo's apartment and force Randolph to confess that he tricked Mopes. As a result, Mopes' show is restored and Randolph is dubbed the most hated man in America by the media. To make matters worse, a fed up Angelo kicks Randolph out of his house. After telling him that his show is back on the air, Nora kisses Mopes and has sex with him.
Mopes then decides to perform in an ice show, but without the corrupt charities. Burke and Green retaliate by plotting to kill Mopes and hire a new host who will cooperate with their profit skimming. Their plan backfires when, during a rehearsal, Green's men mistake Spinner in his Moochy costume for Mopes and murder him. When Tommy gets word of this, she retaliates by killing Green and his men. Meanwhile, Randolph corners Mopes and Nora in their penthouse and reveals to Mopes that Nora has had affairs with numerous children's show hosts, including Randolph himself. Mopes is hurt by this, but Nora insists that she has genuine feelings for him. They manage to calm Randolph down and discover that he genuinely misses entertaining children. Mopes offers to let him stay in the penthouse until he recovers.
Burke and Stokes decide to partner up after hearing of Green's death. They hire Buggy Ding Dong, another former kid show host, to assassinate Mopes during his ice show. Buggy steals a backstage pass to get inside, but before he can shoot Mopes he is confronted by Randolph. They struggle for the rifle until Buggy falls to his death in the ice rink. After Mopes realizes that Burke and Stokes set him up, he pulls a gun and threatens to kill Burke. Tommy and her men arrive and persuade him not to forfeit his high ideals. Tommy decides to take care of Burke and Stokes in her own way, Mopes and Nora share a kiss in Times Square, and Smoochy and Randolph launch a new show together. | comedy, murder, cult, flashback, psychedelic, satire, revenge | train | wikipedia | If you love Robin Williams and think he's one of the funniest men in the planet, if you're a fan of the great Edward Norton, if you think Catherine Keener is really hot, if you think Danny DeVito is a genius or if you simply wanna have a barrel of laughs--"Death to Smoochy" will keep you alive with pleasure.My score: 7 (out of 10).
This film is a dark comedy directed by Danny DeVito about the cut throat world of children's television.
In this film, a popular children's show host (Robin Williams, more madcap than he's been in ages) gets caught taking a bribe and is fired, being replaced by the squeaky clean Smoochy the Rhino (Edward Norton, who is excellent in the role).
But Death to Smoochy is an intelligent and well written film that is completely original.Edward Norton is spot on as the moralistic Sheldon Mopes and Robin Williams is absolutely hilarious as the off the rails Rainbow Randolph.
Otherwise, this black comedy offers a really wonderful character as the lead good guy: "Smoochy the Rhino," played well by Edward Norton.
That's the case with Catherine Keener, who seems to play a lot of these hard-looking, foul- mouthed women.....although "Smoochy" finally softens her up by the end of this story.At any rate, you have to appreciate black comedy and this kind of almost-perverse humor, to like this movie.
I didn't expect it from him after watching Fight club and American history X but he carried out his role really well.Catherine Keener also looked really beautiful, she played her power-hungry turned nice chick character to a tee.Even though the story is about a kids show, there's a lot of dark comedy in it e.g. the involvement of the Irish gangsters (by the way also very funny) showing what a good job Danny devito has done directing this film.
All seemed believable and Robin Williams was the star.If you watch this film, persevere for the first 20 minutes because after which the jokes and plot come in hard and thick.Top stuff, rent if you want a comedy with original storyline and a little bit of good humoured smut thrown in for good measure..
Despite the publicity hyping Williams, Edward Norton is the most firmly situated as the film's 'main character', which works, as Norton is unreasonably hilarious, superbly counteracting his usual intensity as charming yet irritatingly well intentioned children's entertainer Smoochy the Rhino, who goes out of his way to refuse merchandising money in favour of promoting organic, sugar free foods and respecting hostile step-parents on children's television.
Retaining his usual flair for colourful improvisation, Williams lets loose in a twisted, exceedingly dark fashion barely glimpsed before, and while he unquestionably rockets light years past being over the top, his slew of bitter, incensed, profanity-fraught rants are just about worth watching the film by themselves.Catherine Keener's credible charisma and warmth also help acclimatize a shaky character transition from nihilistically jaded producer to earnest, hopeful young woman, making the potentially weakest point of the film instead burst to life with a quirky spark.
The film also offers a collection of memorable character bits worthy of the Coen brothers, from Michael Rispoli's blustering, often incomprehensible lovable nitwit of a former boxer, Danny Woodburn's sardonic children's television actor, and an utterly hilarious Vincent Schiavelli as a narcoleptic, heroin addict assassin.While certainly not for all tastes, Death to Smoochy delivers a unique, daringly morbid and raucously hilarious product which manages to continually dodge expectations while remaining enjoyable.
The cast is also a great ensemble, including Edward Norton, Robin Williams, Catherine Keener, and Danny DeVitto among others.The problem for me was the delivery of the humor just didn't work.
The only scene that I really found memorable was Robin Williams's rant about a certain phallic shaped cookie.Maybe I'm overlooking some deep inner meaning or something, but for me this film just didn't work and while some will no doubt like it for being different, it's a tough sell..
Danny DeVito doesn't go overboard with the black comedy elements in the film and keeps it at a level for family viewing.This film stars DeVito along with notable actors Robin Williams and Edward Norton.
The film is about "Rainbow Randolph" Smiley (Robin Williams), a happily corrupt children's television host, who is disgraced by an FBI sting for making deals with parents who want their kids on the show.
Also, it's fair to say that, despite Robin Williams being billed as the 'star,' I was surprised at how much screen time was given to Edward Norton - really he should be billed as the star.There are mob hits, beatings, murder, blackmail and Nazis in this film - hardly the stuff of your average family comedy.
This hilarious dark comedy, directed by the genius Danny DeVito, shows the evil side behind cute and cuddly kids television programs and their lovable hosts.
The film contains top-notch actors that just add to the greatness of the script.Don't be scared off when the movie starts off with singing and dancing from Robin Williams's character Rainbow Randolph, who in the following scene gets in trouble with FBI after accepting bribes and loses his television show.Network executives are quick to bring in a replacement kids program, headed by Edward Norton's character, Smoochy the Rhino.
Smoochy is an innocent child entertainer who throughout the movie gets corrupted by the evils behind the child entertainment business.Along with the Irish-Mob being thrown in the mix, and a corrupted children's foundation called The Parade of Hope Foundation, everyone wants a piece of this up-and-coming children's entertainer, Smoochy the Rhino.With hilarious one liners thrown in everywhere in this film like: "Can you guess how many original compositions I have in the Smoochy songbook?
While he makes enemies within the studio, Rainbow Randolph is fuming and planning to destroy Smoochy and get his show back.I really wanted to love this simply because I am one of the few people in the UK who will have bothered to see this film since the collapse of FilmFour and poor US box office pretty much meant it barely reached video stores here.
Danny DeVito, Jon Stewart, Danny Woodburn, Edward Norton, Robin Williams, and the beautiful Catherine Keener all bring their A-Game to this feature and it works on nearly every level.Very few movies can make you cheer for the Irish mob.Final Grade: A.
The audience is meant to identify with Sheldon Mopes (Ed Norton) as an outsider who discovers that children's television programming is more of a criminal enterprise akin to a 1930's era Mafia than what "Sesame Street" would have you believe.There are levels of complexity in the characters that most people who consider the likes of "Scary Movie" to be classic comedy will likely miss.
But with this scathing black comedy, which regrettably died a box office death in 2002 in the US, he rediscovered the knack, as a homicidal former kids' presenter who plots to kill his rhino-suited replacement, Ed Norton, reminding us that he doesn't just do dramas.Director Danny DeVito over-cranks the grotesque camera angles, but this combines spot-on satire of kids' TV and some funny set-pieces including Smoochy's inadvertent appearance at a Nazi rally.
Every actor in the movie pulls off their parts great, and Robin Williams is probably the most hilarious I've ever seen him.
But, given the movies premise being the story of a phsycopathic game show host I honestly don't know what anyone was expecting...I give it a 10 of 10 because the film is enjoyable and I've re-watched it plenty of times without it getting old and still being fun and entertaining..
This is one of those movies where the concept is so good that people forget you need to write a decent story to back it up.Edward Norton is badly miscast as the lead character.
On the other hand, its easy to see why and Robin Williams is in this movie, playing a very familiar character (a lifelike Genie), but he never comes close to anything VERY funny.
Well, maybe it isn't, but Danny DeVito sure thinks it is in his darkly comic film Death to Smoochy.
It is about an idealistic purple rhino named Smoochy, created by Sheldon Mopes (Edward Norton) who replaces another star, Rainbow Randolph (Robin Williams) after Randolph gets busted for a bribery scandal.
It gets too ridiculous to enjoy by the end, losing the clever satire and falling to mindless comedy.But Death to Smoochy isn't all bad.
We are delivered the comedic stylings of everyone from Williams, to DeVito himself, and even Jon Stewart who I won't call a great actor but as a huge fan of The Daily Show I couldn't help but enjoy seeing him in this movie.
Danny DeVito scores again with DEATH TO SMOOCHY, a very dark comedy about a fired children's TV show host (Robin Williams) who is out to get his replacement (Ed Norton).
The writing is top notch with some very witty, dark, wry humor.Edward Norton is so believable as Smoochy, Robin Williams is perfect as the embittered deposed kid's show host.
Catherine Keener plays her standard role even better than usual.Jon Stewart has a smaller role and is, as would be expected, darkly funny.It starts a little slow, but I knew where it was headed soon after, with a deadbeat, quite funny dry response from Kenner to Norton when he assumes the worst about her character because of her coming to meet him in the place where he was then performing.I'm going to track it down on DVD, I think I want to own this one.
Robin Williams excel's as Rainbow Randolph, Ed Norton fits the Sheldon Mopes character to perfection and all the supporting cast are excellent.
I don't remember ever seeing it playing at the cinema.Robin Williams, Edward Norton and Danny Devito??
Ed Norton, a rehab motivational guitar playing nice guy, gets his job as the Smoochy character, and Robin Williams wants revenge.
It is about a vindictive former children show star, Rainbow Randolph (played by Robin Williams) who seeks revenge on Smoochy, the new star who replaced his time slot on the network TV.
Smoochy (played by Edward Norton) is a gullible person unfamiliar with the way of running children's TV.There are tons of hilarious situations throughout the entire movie, and they are well-played by the acting talents, and also accompanied by funny dialogue.
I especially love how Rainbow Randolph's appearance becomes more and more ravaged throughout the time."Death to Smoochy" is, in my opinion, one of Robin Williams best movies.There is an impressive ensemble of talents in this fine comedy, and people deliver where it counts.If you are not already familiar with "Death to Smoochy", then it is a movie well-worth sitting down to watch.
As Smoochy catapults to fame - scoring hit ratings and the affections of a jaded network executive Randolph makes the unsuspecting rhino the target of his numerous outrageous attempts to exact revenge and reclaim his status as America's sweetheart.The good things about this movie: The movie is a dark comedy and to me that worked, because when you got a story about Robin Williams trying to kill or ruin a kid friendly pink rhino called Smoochy, you really can't take that seriously and the movie is aware of that and takes it like a joke.
Edward Norton and Robin Williams both did great in this movie.
although to begin with i wasn't interested because of the whole children's television aspect, i was patient with this movie because of Edward Norton who once again delivered a superb performance of a sweet and innocent, save the world type character.
STAR RATING:*****Unmissable****Very Good***Okay**You Could Go Out For A Meal Instead*Avoid At All CostsSet in the (no doubt) cutthroat world of children's television,this is the tale of 'Rainbow' Randolph (Robin Williams),the nation's (America) favourite kids TV entertainer.....until he is busted by the FBI for taking payola.He subsequently loses his job,and discovers he is to be replaced.Hard faced network executive Nora Wells (Catherine Keener) is assigned the task of finding said replacement,and eventually discovers it in the shape of Sheldon Mopes (Edward Norton,in a seemingly permanent mime-like facial expression throughout) a kindly,well to do man who later comes to be known as Smoochy the Rhino.Smoochy is pretty much an overnight success,much to the anger and bitterness of the dejected Randolph,who plots numourous ways to exact his petty revenge fantasies.As his success continues to grow,however,Sheldon finds himself forced to reveal his principles and ideals as the unfeeling Nora tries to force him to endorse crass,tacky Smoochy merchandising and product brands.In his disillusionment,Sheldon finds himself drawn to the lure of Burke Bennitt (Danny De Vito,also directing) a rival exec who can seemingly guide him in a more positive light.But,as his success continues to grow and grow,everyone soon seems to want in on his act and,in the bewildering disarray that follows,his friends and enemies emerge as not all they seem.This is a film that's been held back for so long now I became almost certain it was going to go straight to video.Quite why,I didn't know.Sure,De Vito has been on a downward career trajectory lately (directing wise,anyway) with the likes of What's the Worst That Could Happen?
on his CV,but with an A list cast like that?!?What are the odds?Alas,a disappointing Stateside box office performance is probably not the reason for Death to Smoochy's so far none-existent UK release,as much as it's due to the dissolvement of UK based film company Film Four.However,having seen the film,I really can't say that if I was the man in charge of such decisions,I wouldn't have sent it STV on account of it's quality.This is a dreary,meandering and,worst of all,rarely funny tale with no soild foundational core.The plot is incoherent,and really lacks any sort of substance at all.The characters are totally inconsistent,and,probably on account of the the hazily written script,are never featured at the right intervals or disappear for long stretches of time to prevent any of them (probably with the exception of Smoochy) from having the lasting impact that they might have had.There are also some rather tasteless moments.Shameless indecent exposure to children is something no one is ever probably going to accept,let alone find funny.Neither will Nazi worship by a lot of people.Norton,being the extremely talented actor he is,adapts to his comedy role very well and is able to play off quite impressively with Williams,the master of the manic.Doing his wild,whacky impressions and zany prancing,he is as much a joy to watch as ever.Another good point might be that some of the soundtrack is pretty memorable.Despite this,however,Williams fails to blend his standard wild mugging in with his new found serious actor path,De Vito fails to guide his moving train with any cohision and,despite the irrisistible cast line up,if in the (unlikely!?) event this never washes up on these shores well,to be honest,you've missed much of a lot of nothing.**.
I don't think there was a part to the movie I did not laugh at, and Robin Williams nailed his role as Rainbow Randolph.
Director Danny DeVito uncovers the soft underbelly of children's television in this dark comedy starring Edward Norton and a manic Robin Williams.
Danny DeVito was depressed by the poor reception this film got, but eventually he will have the last laugh; like Used Cars, another forgotten gem, it is a comedy satire that will stand the test of time.
The painfully earnest Sheldon Mopes, played by Ed Norton, and his kiddy Rhino act hits the big time when Rainbow Randolph, in one of Robin Williams' best performances, implodes.
However, this movie is one of DeVito's better works, not necessarily due to his directing but because of actors who play the three main characters (Ed Norton, Robin Williams, Catherine Keener).The movie revolves around a children's show on a network named KidNet.
`Rainbow Randolph' (Robin Williams) plays the main character on the TV show and is the adulated star.until he gets caught accepting bribes from parents who want to ensure better placement of their child/actors on the stage.Randolph is quickly fired and Frank Stokes (Jon Stewart), the producer of the show, is directed by the corporate heads to find a replacement whose ethics is beyond reproach.
Seeing that Robin Williams and Ed Norton are the main stars i hoped Smoochy would be a good film, and i was not at all disappointed.
the apparent "Comedies of the year" and "hilariously funny films" and have barely cracked a smile, not to say i have no sense of humour, it's just too much hype, and terrible scripts, but Smoochy had me in hysterics, from start to finish, brilliant movie, danny de-vito should be extremely proud of this effort, it might not be the critical/financial hit it deserves to be, but Smoochy is probably the best american film i have ever seen!Remember: friends come in all sizes!.
I dislike Robin Williams SO much in family-appropriate movies, so when he plays "Adult" roles, I watch with relief and am not often disappointed.Some of the musical numbers performed on the Smoochy songs were brilliant.The Irish Mob tie-in was completely unnecessary, but at the same time was humorous.Comedies cant come much darker, and not everything in this movie worked.
Ed Norton did a fantastic job acting like you would expect a kids show actor to be and Robin Williams plays the complete opposite.
Rainbow Randolph (Robin Williams), a children's show host, is arrested for taking bribes, and spends the whole movie trying to get revenge on his replacement, a way-too-perky guy in a Rhino suit named Sheldon Mopes (Edward Norton).
Abominable comedy from Danny DeVito about a children's show host (Robin Williams) who seeks revenge on his Barney-like replacement (Ed Norton).DeVito's The War of the Roses was a marvelous dark comedy with outstanding performances from Kathleen Turner and Micheal Douglas; Death to Smoochy is a pathetic excuse for a movie with two good actors who cannot do comedy (Catherine Keener and Norton) simply because they're not funny.
Robin Williams' Rainbow Randolph is so savagely funny even when he falls out of character at the end.
Ed Norton is funny as the ethical Smoochy and Robin Williams is in his element as the not so ethical Rainbow Randolph. |
tt0076299 | The Last Wave | The film opens with a montage of scenes of daily life in Australia in the 1970s: a rural school in the desert, the main street of an outback town, a traffic jam in the city, all being affected by unusually adverse weather conditions that suddenly appear. Only the local Aboriginal people seem to recognize the cosmological significance of these weather phenomena.
During one of these "freak rainstorms" in Sydney, an altercation occurs among a group of Aborigines in a pub, which results in the mysterious death of one of them. At the coroner's inquest, the death is ruled a homicide; and four men are accused of murder. Through the Australian Legal Aid system, David Burton (Richard Chamberlain) is procured for their defence. The circumstances by which he was contacted and retained are unusual, in that his law practice is corporate taxation and not criminal defense. He nonetheless takes on the case, and his professional and personal lives begin to unravel.
Plagued by bizarre dreams, Burton begins to sense an otherworldly connection to one of the accused (David Gulpilil). He also feels connected to the increasingly strange weather phenomena besetting the city. His dreams intensify along with his obsession with the murder case, which he comes to believe is an Aboriginal tribal killing by curse, in which the victim believed. Learning more about Aboriginal practices and the concept of Dreamtime as a parallel world of existence, Burton comes to believe the strange weather bodes of a coming apocalypse.
The film climaxes in a confrontation between the lawyer and the tribe's shaman in a subterranean sacred site. Overcoming the shaman, Burton escapes to the surface, but in the tunnel loses various tribal relics. After emerging from the sewer, he collapses on the beach and stares entranced at the horizon. The screen is filled by the shot of a towering ocean wave, though it remains unclear whether we are witnessing reality or sharing in Burton's final, apocalyptic premonition. | psychedelic, mystery, murder, atmospheric | train | wikipedia | null |
tt1649444 | [Rec]³: Génesis | Koldo and Clara are about to celebrate their wedding day. The wedding is filmed by Koldo's cousin, Adrián, and their wedding photographer, Atun, plus footage cuts from other guests' mobile phones and cameras. The guests travel to the wedding reception, held in a huge mansion, on chartered coaches. Adrián films his uncle, who says he was bitten by a dog, but says he will be all right.
With the party in full swing, Adrián's uncle begins showing unusual symptoms such as vomiting. Adrián also captures people outside in hazmat suits, searching the area and a police car arriving. Adrián's uncle falls in full view of everyone. His wife approaches to help but he bites her neck, then vomits blood on another guest. More guests infected with the demonic virus burst onto the dance floor and begin attacking people. Amidst the chaos, Koldo and Clara are separated from each other. Koldo ends up with Adrián, Clara's sister Tita, Atun, and a guest named Mencu, who is nicknamed Royalties. Koldo asks Atun why is he still filming and destroys the camera. From then on, the film returns to a normal third-person cinematic view. The group tries the back exits but encounter more infected guests. CCTV footage shows the infected now roaming in the ballroom.
They discover they fit through the air-conditioning vents, apart from Atun due to his size, and head outside. Koldo is attacked by Paloma, the woman the Uncle vomited on. Adrián and the others help him kill her. Royalties tries to use the police car's radio to get help but is attacked. The sirens are set off, attracting the infected towards them. Adrián, Koldo, and Tita find refuge inside a chapel where other survivors have gathered. The survivors reveal infected cannot enter the chapel and that holy water hurts them. Clara's voice comes over the P.A. system and, knowing Koldo is listening, tells him she is all right and reveals she is pregnant, something she wanted to tell him earlier. Encouraged, Koldo suits up with a knight's armor to find her with the help of an employee, telling the other survivors to get the children to the charter coaches and escape.
In the mansion, Clara and the priest from the wedding ceremony are hiding in the control room. A horde of infected people begins trying to break into the room. The priest claims "it's too soon"; he refers to "Genesis" and talks about the nature of the demons reciting from the book of Jude. They escape through a window. Clara finds best man Rafa and Natalie, Clara's friend; they soon encounter more infected. In the mirror, the infected are shown as reflections of Tristana Medeiros. The priest holds them off by freezing them with prayer while the others escape. Koldo searches with the employee for the control room, but the man is then killed by the infected. Koldo then finds the control room and witnesses the deaths of Adrián and the survivors from the chapel as they are attacked by the infected during an attempt to escape by coach. In the background on the TV, a news report regarding the quarantine of an apartment block in central Barcelona is shown, revealing that the events of this film are happening concurrently with the events of the first and second film.
Clara, Rafa, and Natalie find "Sponge John", the children's entertainer, and they try to escape, but Natalie is attacked. Outside, Clara faces her infected mother. John shoots her, but later gets bitten as Rafa and Clara go underground into a tunnel. Clara refuses to leave without Koldo. Inside, Koldo turns up the volume on one of the songs on the dance floor, the song from the start of the film. Clara goes to find Koldo, as she sees this as a sign. She fights off a horde of infected, but Rafa is bitten. Clara decapitates him and flees from the infected. She and Koldo find their way back to each other at last. Their reunion is short-lived as a swarm of infected crash into the kitchen. When they began to think they will die, all of a sudden the infected all freeze as the priest recites Bible verses over the P.A. system.
As they go outside, they are attacked by Koldo's infected grandfather who, being deaf, cannot hear the priest. Clara is bitten and tells Koldo to cut her arm off before the infection consumes her. Koldo does so and they leave. However, when they reach the exit, they discover everything has been quarantined. Clara then vomits blood, showing that she is infected. Devastated, Koldo takes her outside where the police and a GEO team tell him to let her go. Clara and Koldo share a final kiss before Clara bites his tongue off and attacks the armed men, who shoot both of them down. In their final moments, Clara and Koldo hold each other's hands as they die of their wounds. | violence, comedy | train | wikipedia | null |
tt0117473 | The Rich Man's Wife | Josie Potenza is the trophy wife of workaholic Hollywood producer Tony Potenza, but their marriage is crumbling due to his increased drinking resulting from stress at work. She convinces him to join her for a romantic getaway at a secluded lakeside cabin, but when it becomes obvious his concerns about the studio are going to take precedence over relaxation, she grudgingly tells him to return home but decides to stay on her own for a few days.
Josie sees Cole Wilson ogling her at a local bar and, uncomfortable with the unwanted attention, she leaves. Her jeep breaks down on a dark, secluded country road, and as she starts to hike to the cabin, Cole pulls up in his truck and offers her a lift. He convinces her he is harmless, and when he extends an invitation to dinner the following night, Josie accepts.
As they linger over drinks after dinner, Josie discusses her unhappy marriage. Although there are problems, and she sometimes fantasizes about her husband's death, she is grateful to Tony for all he has given her and still has hopes for their future. Cole becomes aggressive and she resists his advances. During the drive back to the cabin, he turns off his headlights and begins to drive erratically, and Josie becomes hysterical. When he tries to force himself on her, Josie fires a gun she found in a kitchen drawer and grazes his face with the bullet. Vowing revenge, Cole leaves.
With the passing of time, Tony stops drinking and he and Josie successfully work at repairing their damaged marriage. On the way home one rainy night, he stops at an ATM, and Cole conceals himself in the back seat of his car. He forces him to drive to a secluded park and shoots him numerous times, then goes to Josie's home and reveals he has killed her husband. He warns her if she reports him to the police he will tell them she hired him to murder Tony, and demands $30,000 for his silence. When the police question Josie she says nothing about Cole's involvement, but her story - or lack of one - makes detective Dan Fredricks suspicious, and his African American partner Ron Lewis accuses him of suspecting Josie simply because she is black and her husband was white.
Josie tells her lover, struggling restaurateur Jake Golden, she knows the identity of Tony's killer, but he warns her not to reveal anything. He has an ulterior motive - Jake, desperate for money to finance his failing business when his partner - Tony - bailed out, had hired Cole to kill Tony so Josie would be free to marry him and he could benefit from her wealth. Complications arise when attorney Bill Adolphe tells Josie all her husband's assets were in his name and he died intestate. All his accounts have been frozen and Josie will have to wait an undetermined amount of time for the court to supervise probate.
While Jake's ex-wife Nora tries to convince the police he may have killed Tony, Josie becomes the target of the increasingly deranged Cole. After killing Jake, he traps her in her garage and Josie kills him in the ensuing skirmish. Josie pleads self defense, and when Nora tells them she doesn't believe Josie is clever enough to have masterminded any of the events that have transpired, the police let her go, unaware the two women are partners in crime. | murder | train | wikipedia | Peter Greene as one of the vilest villains I've seen in a while, and Clea Lewis as the greedy, vindictive wife of the best friend.Let's not forget Halle Berry.
All in all, I don't think you can lose by spending a little time with this movie, but I have to warn you: There are more plot holes in it than there are pot holes in Jersey City..
This wasn't a bad film, it was entertaining, made you guess most of the time, and was pretty tense, its only flaw is some stupidity, and the jump scenes in it are predictable.
Halle Berry is sensational as The Rich Man's Wife.
I watched this movie around 3 o'clock in the morning and I wasnt really impressed.First of all, How can you trust a guy like Peter Greene(Cole Wilson)?
This film was predictable in many parts and the lighting was really bad.However,Halle Berry was very pretty in this movie and yes she actually does cry.Just dont make the same mistake I did and stay up til' 3 o'clock in the morning.But what the heck I was bored.To wrap this comment up I give it a 6/10 *.
Early Halle Berry and Clive Owen Neo-Noir.
An early movie by three lead actors who would go on to super-stardom, well Peter Green is not a superstar but makes a super villain.
There is one scene that stands out (in the park) for all those movie fans that recognize that hitting a moving target with a handgun is not as easy as it looks in most Hollywood products.The camera loves Halle Berry and here she displays some acting chops that would prove that she was not just another (very) pretty girl.
Very good cast selection and Halle Berry looks so different in 1996.
Very good cast, direction, acting, sets and if you live in Australia and you see a copy of this movie, get it straight away because it is extremely rare since it is only on video now and they have stopped all production of videos.
Josie, the wife about half his age, feels neglected by him, but hides her concerns because she still loves her husband (and the money, let's not kid ourselves).
Their flawed, but satisfactory life goes awry one night when Josie admits her marital problems to a Cole (Peter Greene), a total stranger who she becomes acquainted with after her car breaks down and he helps her out.
Despite taking the comment back, Cole appears to take Josie's words seriously, and the problems ensue.The cast, especially the supporting actors, bring a rather pedestrian script to life.
Halle Berry is not only beautiful, but a competent actress in any role (aside from Catwoman), and in the context of the first 93 of the films 94 minute runtime, she does extraordinary as a woman lost in a situation which is totally out of her control.
Peter Greene and Clive Owen (Josie's boyfriend) both work with what they have, and Clea Lewis (who I never heard of before this film) brings some mild humor.The plot itself is nothing particularly new or original, but it grabs your attention slowly and when it has you hooked, it doesn't let go.
I won't spoil the "surprise," but it is a twist ending that will cause you to scratch your head for a few minutes, and then make you wish you hadn't wasted your time.
And with the twist at the end, gaping plot holes are left in the film.
It's not such a bad movie, but skip the last 60 seconds or you'll feel cheated out of your time and intelligence..
Beautiful young Halle Berry (as Josie) is married to ultra-rich older PBC-TV network executive Christopher McDonald (as Tony Potenza).
Because Ms. Berry loves her husband, really, she is concerned with his drinking problem and preoccupation with work.
Arriving solo and looking to arouse, Berry has a drink and catches the eye of pool-playing Peter Greene (as Cole Wilson).
No problem, as Mr. Greene happens by to drive her home...Berry insists she loves her husband and declines Greene's sexual invitations.
Greene believes Berry is asking him to kill her husband, but she disagrees.
"The Rich Man's Wife" begins with Berry's arrest.
Cinematography (by Haskell Wexler) and support (like Clea Lewis) help.***** The Rich Man's Wife (9/13/96) Amy Holden Jones ~ Halle Berry, Peter Greene, Clive Owen, Clea Lewis.
This is one of his rare bad movies, but as someone once said, sometimes you just have to make a living too.Story is older than mold.
Christopher McDonald I liked from such classics as "Requiem for a Dream" and "Quiz Show" but his character here is sketchy, at best.Oh yeah, Halle Berry is in it too, and SURPRISE SURPRISE, she cries.
With big A-list stars like Halle Berry and British actor Clive Owen starring in a murder mystery, which on the package seemed intriguing and suspenseful and with promises of twists and turns I was really looking forward to this, but oh dear!
The acting was horrible, Halle Berry as wife Josie Potenza gives a truly dreadful performance, her worst ever.
She wasn't convincing in the slightest, the principal villain Cole Wilson played by Peter Greene has to be one of the worst portrayed villains in cinematic history,he was about as frightening as a piece of fruit that just sits on the shelf waiting to be eaten.Any suspense and tension in the film, which is told in a flashback by Berry to the police who have arrested her, is none.
Yes there are a couple of good twists, but I did see them coming just before they were revealed and I liked Clive Owen's acting as the character Jake, which is why I gave this a two star, but really the acting was so theatrical, it just had the air of a TV movie like you watch on channel four late one night!
I am not sure which movie ripped off who (I believe this one came out first), but the scenes are similar.Overall, Jones wrote/directed an excellent thriller.
The ending has such a neat twist, and even if this is not your type of movie...do watch it to see Peter Greene topless.;).
Oh, I loved this movie from the beginning to the end.
Halle Berry is beautiful, but that doesn't up for mediocre acting and an overall weak movie.
The Rich Man's wife is an unabashedly trashy little Hitchcockian thriller with a young Halle Berry caught in a very dangerous situation that has spun wildly out of control.
Over drinks with intense stranger Cole Wilson (Peter Greene), she offhandedly jokes that she should arrange his murder to speed up the process.
Berry is also getting side action from suave restauranteer Clive Owen, who ends up in way over his head trying to deal with murderous, unhinged Wilson who is attempting to frame Berry for her husband's death and generally causing problems for everyone.
A story the average viewer has seen at least twenty times or more.The screenplay is almost entirely based on unexpected twists the last of which is so implausible only someone who has never seen HG Clouzot's "Les Diaboliques" will be surprised.That said ,Halle Berry is a solid thespian and a very attractive woman,but here she screams to no avail.Peter Green tries and tries to be threatening and scary.Clive Owen does not seem to believe in his part.The cops don't either.Only Clea Lewis displays a sense of humor and is the only one on the screen to have plenty of go.For a rainy day...Barely....
Amy Holden Jones writes and directs this tense drama about a beautiful woman(Halle Berry)who feels her wealthy husband(Christopher McDonald) is not spending enough time with her.
She makes a mistake telling her marital woes to a stranger who decides to help her out by killing her husband.
Rounding out the cast are:Clive Owen, Peter Greene, Frankie Faison and Clea Lewis.
I started watching The Rich Man's Wife, even though the title alone would suggest a crappy, soap-ish kind of movie.
It's a good movie, right up to the ending, then along comes that final twist-- the one plot twist too many-- that shot the whole movie to hell for me.
My problem with this movie is that it tries too hard.It is neither thriller no suspenseful as it intended to be.Can you say predictable??
It tries to take twists and turns but any intelligent viewer has figured them out before the movie actually gets to them.1.
Halle Berry's character says she doesn't need to speak with an attorney.Only an idiot would make a remark like that sitting in jail facing a murder one rap.2.
Plot hole.We see Halle Berry in one scene playing with the gun that would eventually kill her husband.
Mainly the conversation between Cole Wilson (Greene) and Jake Golden (Clive Owen) How can Berry's character tell the story for scenes she wasn't even in?
We learn that supposedly Golden hired Cole to do a simple hit and not even talk to Josie (Berry), but he became attracted to her.How can she tell how the murder occurred if she was not there or had nothing to do with it?
Jake's ex-wife had something to do with it obviously because she was always taking up for Josie.This movie just has bad pot holes and flaws.If you're going to do a murder-for-hire "Don't be seen with the killer in public" Dumb writing, even dumber acting.And this cast is generally a very talented set of actors, too bad they had to follow this piece of crap of a script..
The Ending Really Did It For Me. I would have considered "The Rich Man's Wife" a wonderfully acted and competently made, if cliché ridden, "Women in peril" chick flick, except for the last five minutes.
The ending redeems the movie and makes it a "must see" mystery for those who enjoy movies such as "The Six Sense" and "Wild Things".
Peter Greene takes the obnoxious, menacing villain to new levels of creepiness; and Clea Lewis dominates every one of her small scenes.
I just wish the movie had used the "Wild Things" end credits technique to tie everything together a little better.WARNING: SPOILERFor those who complain of pot holes and "Berry tells the story in the first person, but scenes occur that she couldn't possibly know" is misguided.
Since Berry and Lewis have concocted the entire story to kill their husbands and inherit the estates, of course the story is going to have some disjointed elements.
Most likely, Berry lured Clive Owen's character to the house and shot him.
SPOILERS THROUGHOUT POST: Rich Man's Wife, starring Halle Berry, has one major flaw that I saw and that is to take out all the things that make psychological thrillers great and put in all the things that make them problematic.
As such, this movie let me down many times throughout.As thrillers go, this one actually starts OK.
Everything that's bad in psychological thrillers appears(car chases, chases on foot, ominous music, violence, characters who just seem like caricatures, plot holes that are absolutely unexplainable, and much much more).
Throw in characters who seem to make bad decision upon bad decision solely for the purpose of making a movie and one has The Rich Man's wife.Now I'm not sure if it's the writer to fault-because most of the bad things seem like standard stuff thrown into lots of bad movies.
We get the raging psychopath (played quite well actually by Peter Greene.) The cops who seem to be in another world altogether, the hysterical put upon heiress(Berry who is never quite convincing here) and a few more .
This movie had me rolling my eyes in quite a short period of time, such as when Cole chases Josie into her cabin and she, screaming and shrieking as she runs for her life, then proceeds to leaves the door open for Cole to follow her into the cabin.The Rich Man's wife had a great cast but doesn't seem to care if the audience buys any of what is happening on screen.
It's almost worth it to see the movie just for her.Rich Man's wife also almost crosses into that "so bad it's good" category.
All the scenes of Josie running for her life-oh man, I think I started to lose count.
And I will agree with so many others-the "twist" is completely over the top, a complete rip off from Usual suspects and, rather then thinking "Clever movie" at the end, as with suspects, one just feels a bit ripped off.
(I also think this movie had a bit of "Mortal Thoughts" in it as well as Suspects.) So while I wasn't bored, loved the cast, and thought the premise had potential I am giving this a 3.
Suffering from a bad childhood, "Josie Potenza" (Halle Berry) marries at an early age to wealthy real estate developer named "Tony Potenza" (Christopher McDonald) in order to essentially escape from a life of poverty.
Not long afterward she meets a man named "Cole Wilson" (Peter Greene) and subsequently tells him about her rich husband and the marital problems she is currently having.
Be that as it may, Halle Berry put in a fine performance and because of that this movie wasn't nearly as bad as it could have been.
am not a big fan of Halle Berry but seeing this film was very enjoyable .
the film starts like any thriller trying to set the mood and place for the unusual plot of a nasty husband and a submissive wife who is being abused by him .the night scenes in the woods are very powerful and it brings back the 80s style of suspense .
a twisted series of events take place and one becomes really keen on knowing how it is going to end .the soundtrack is great and the acting is very convincing .if you are a fan on the classic thrillers that keep you at the edge of your seat .
Halle Berry's beauty is ALMOST reason enough to sit through any film, and here she's surrounded by a good supporting cast.
But this glossy thriller (great cinematography by Haskell Wexler) spins a familiar tale, and in the end turns out to be a blatant rip-off of "The Usual Suspects" (even using pretty much the same closing shot).
When I start talking to the characters on the screen, I know it's a bad movie.
I should've turned this one off after 30 minutes but I kept watching it to see if it would get any better, which it didn't, and, not only did the ending leave me scratching my head as one poster said, but it left me dope-slapping myself for wasting so much of my time.Plot holes?
Nowhere to be seen.A woman tells some jerk she just met in a bar that sometimes she wishes her husband was dead -- and show me one woman who hasn't said that at least once in her married life -- and just like that he says, "I'll kill him for you," and she doesn't say to herself, "Uh, could this guy be a psychopath by any chance?" and make some excuse to get the hell out of there and put as much distance as possible between them?
Halle Berry's character is smart enough to double-cross the guy who plotted to kill her husband, but she doesn't take the time to make sure at least some of her husband's assets are in her name.
I'll grant you that we don't know how large a family the man had, or if he even had a family at all, but logic dictates he would have at least a cousin or two somewhere who would definitely make a claim against a multi-million dollar estate.What I love most about murder movies is the funerals themselves.
And the killer comes up to the widow and nobody stops to ask who this man is, since he's obviously not dressed appropriately for the occasion and seems to be causing the widow to be upset and angry.The ending was stupidest of all because Halle Berry and her lover's ex-wife drive off, acting smug, when all they have is 30 grand between them to last them for who knows how long, and with their lifestyles you know it won't get them very far ...
and they're saying men are idiots?I'm the real idiot, for having wasted my time on this silly movie, so learn from my mistake and watch something else..
Halle Berry, around 30 in this movie, not yet the big name she was to become, plays Josie Potenza, married to an older wealthy man after they had barely known each other.
She makes a mistake when she goes to a local bar alone, attracts the attention of a strange looking man Cole (Peter Greene) but, in the cool and wet he gives her a ride back to the cabin, apparently an OK guy.Now, I can't say anymore about the actual story without giving away some key themes.
Berry is nice looking, the acting is pretty much what it should be, but the story relies on some twists near the end, and when it was over I felt a bit cheated.
It isn't a totally bad movie, but it isn't a very good one either.SPOILERS.
Even though Josie claims she loves her husband, she is at the same time having an affair with Jake Golden (Clive Owen).
He ends up back at her home, and follows her husband, getting into his car at night during an ATM stop, making him drive to a park, where he chased him down and shot him multiple times.
Jake was broke and this was part of his plan to get Josie and her dead husband's riches.
But Josie had a plan of her own, with Jake's wife Nora, and in the final scene we see Nora and Josie going away together, having disposed of the bad guy Cole and each of their cheating husbands. |
tt0073896 | White Line Fever | === Backstory ===
Sam Hummer was a local truck driver from Tucson, Arizona who worked for a Tucson-based produce-shipper called "Red River". His driving partners were Duane Haller and "Pops" Dinwiddie. Eventually Sam's son, Carrol Jo, is old enough to ride with his father and the two of them then become partners as well. Sam changes the lettering on the trailer of his rig to read "Sam Hummer and Son".
Carrol Jo begins dating Jerri and the two want to be married, but Sam dies and the trucking partnership suddenly ends. As a result, Carrol Jo joins the Air Force and is soon sent to Vietnam. While in Vietnam, Carrol Jo has a successful career and is deemed a hero, but all he wants to do is return home to Jerri. Jerri spends these years waiting for his return and this is the subject of the film's theme song "Drifting and Dreaming" by Valerie Carter. The opening sequence shows Carrol Jo's plane arriving from overseas as Jerri and her brother give him a hero's welcome. We see the two get married and start their life together in humble settings.
=== Story ===
Carrol Jo obtains a loan from the bank to purchase a new truck. He and Jerri then visit a local used truck sales lot where he purchases a repossessed 1974 Ford WT9000 cabover rig with a Cummins turbo diesel engine. The salesman throws in a custom paint job to seal the deal and Carrol Jo picks a blue and white paint scheme, highlighted with the words "BLUE MULE". Later, the two are jubilant as they drive their new truck through the deserts around Tucson, imagining the new life that awaits them.
CJ announces to the local listeners on the CB radio that he is in business for himself and is intent on getting as much as he can, so that he can get out of hock to the bank as quickly as possible.
When CJ goes back to work at Red River he finds out that things are very different. Duane Haller informs him that the company is now hauling un-taxed cigarettes and slot machines and that if he wants to stay out of trouble and keep working, he’ll have to keep his mouth shut. CJ gets angry and forces his rig to be unloaded, vowing never to haul illegal cargo. Later, Carroll Jo is pulled over on a lonely highway and discovers that the local sheriff is in on the crooked dealing as well, when he is handcuffed to his truck. Three men from Red River then show up and break his ribs.
When CJ tries to find work at other trucking companies around Tucson, he discovers that Red River has blackballed him as a troublemaker, and he is unwelcome everywhere he goes. Livid, he returns to Red River with a shotgun and threatens Duane Haller. Duane informs him that he is just a pawn in the game and that the person he actually needs to talk to is Duane’s boss, Buck Wessler (L.Q. Jones). Buck is a sleazy, lower-level crook who now manages Red River. Buck agrees to let CJ take a load to Dallas, free of any contraband. Sam Hummer’s old friend “Pops” Dinwiddie decides to come along, to help keep Carroll Jo safe on his trip. En route, they are attacked by men from Red River, but manage to fight them off and continue on their way.
Throughout the rest of the story, Carroll Jo tries to make a living by driving daily loads in and out of Tucson, mainly for Red River. He slowly discovers that Red River is actually owned by a large corporation based in Phoenix called the “Glass House”, a diversified energy and transportation company. Unbeknownst to him, though, Glass House is actually a front for organized crime. They use the trucking companies that they own as a transportation system for their syndicate and its illegal shipments.
Over the course of several months, CJ tries to organize the other drivers at Red River and around Tucson to stand up to the Glass House and refuse to haul illegal cargo. In the process he is beaten, vandalized, cheated and then eventually framed for Duane Haller’s murder. After his acquittal, CJ discovers the body of Pops Dinwiddie, who has been driving the Blue Mule while CJ was in jail, in his house. This leads to a climactic confrontation between all of the Red River drivers and Buck at the loading dock. Carroll Jo beats Buck, until CJ’s brother-in-law pulls him off of him.
That night, CJ and Jerri are viciously attacked while they sleep and their house is set on fire. Carroll Jo wakes up and gets both of them out of the house before it burns down. At the hospital, the doctor informs him that Jerri has lost the baby she was carrying and will never be able to have children. CJ returns home in despair.
Moments later, he emerges from the house with a shotgun and gets into the Blue Mule. He radios Deputy “Bob” that he is headed for the Glass House and to tell them that he is coming. Bob tries to intercept him on a two-lane road, but Carroll Jo runs the deputy off the road, destroying his patrol car. CJ shows up at the Glass House headquarters, faced by several heavily armed security guards who are waiting for him. He accelerates as fast as he can toward them, but his truck is riddled with bullets, blowing out several tires, the radiator and the windshield. CJ takes one bullet to the face. He manages to run through the security gauntlet, but he knows he won’t be able to get the crippled truck all the way to the corporate headquarters, so he aims for the giant sign that stands in front of the building, an enormous two-story glass structure with the letters “GH”. Carroll Joe runs up an embankment leading to the sign and crashes through it, completely destroying it and his truck at the same time.
In the last scene, a TV news reporter is announcing that all truckers in Tucson are on strike. The strike is being held in protest of the corrupt system set up by the Glass House and in honor of one trucker who dared to stand up against them, Carroll Jo Hummer. CJ’s brother-in-law wheels him out of his hospital room to the parking lot, which is filled with semi-trucks and truckers. They all begin to clap. Carroll Jo then begins to smile. Jerri is in a window directly behind him (apparently still hospitalized herself), overlooking all of this. Her lack of a smile may indicate that she is still unsure about living her life as the wife of a whistle-blowing hero who is willing to die for his family and the truth. | violence | train | wikipedia | The CB radio craze was at its height when this movie first came out (I saw it on a double bill with "Jaws" at an outdoor)and the country was fascinated by the lives of long distance truckers.
These concepts coalesce in this fast-paced and tough action movie.Carroll Jo Hummer is an independent long haul trucker whose whole life is tied up in two things: his wife and his truck The Blue Mule.
When his greasy boss Duane (good ol' boy Slim Pickens) puts the arm on Hummer to deliver illegal cigarettes and slot machines, Carroll Jo refuses to go along.
In doing so, he becomes an inspiration to other wildcat truckers looking to buck the system but he also becomes the target of a vicious campaign of intimidation endorsed by the corporate slimeballs in their ivory towers.There's fist-fighting, road racing and down and dirty dialog galore as Hummer's war with his enemies escalates to "Walking Tall" levels.
The concluding image of the Blue Mule smashing the glass emblem of the corrupt corporation is iconic.This is a B-movie for sure and no Oscar contender, but the lives of the truckers are portrayed with some grit and realism.
Jan-Michael Vincent does fine as Hummer and it may be one of the best roles of his career (he did all his own stunts).And how can you go wrong with a 70's cast that includes L.Q. Jones, Dick Miller, R.
This film catapulted Jan-Michael Vincent to stardom level for awhile, and contained a lot of good, exciting action scenes as well as politically correct assessment of some of the problems of independent truckers at the time.
Of course, it contained some action and fighting scenes that are somewhat unbelievable, but in the context of the story, they work.
There are lots of eye-pleasing shots of trucks and highway mayhem, and, of course, from a trucker and real-life perspective, lots of technically inaccurate scenes, but, all in all one of the very best trucking movies ever made -- and I've seen 'em all!
Without crossing over into making a film only truckers and their kin would enjoy, they kept the story and the action fast-paced yet clear as to what is happening unseen.
Even though it is a semi-cheesy "B" movie by any standard, the characters are easily related to and the storyline is easy to get involved with, and the action is fun without getting too excessive (gee- a trucker who isn't a gravity defying martial artist!).Jan-Michael Vincent is at perhaps his best, with Kay Lenz as the perfect naggy whiny trucker's old lady- just cute enough to want to come home to.
Some of the old country tunes actually sound pretty good even today (though the twang twang stuff, and the musically reproduced truck horns grew old after while)..
Not being close to the trucking industry, I don't know how accurate a picture it paints for today, but I believe it hits pretty close for 1975..
Don't get me wrong - the truck chase scenes are great too, but the bad guys in this movie kind of suck.
And the end - after the great truck crashing into the sign moment - really makes no sense at all.Just take this for what it is - a strange 70's action movie with good eye candy in it!.
Best trucking movie ever ?.
He's an honest man looking to make an honest living but ends up fighting the corrupt system, a true classic of the seventies.
The film rolls along at a fairly good pace and is for the most part quite believable, the finale has the hero driving his truck through a large sign in a highly symbolic gesture.
However White Line Fever is a classic of its time and in my opinion a remake would never match the originals simple plot and drama without adding too many unnecessary distractions.
There have been very few good trucking movies ever made, so hopefully this one will be re-released..
To be fair even I half way through the movie I thought how on Earth are they going to end this.A unique trucker movie inasmuch as Trucker movies are usually a lot lighter this has some very dark and heavy moments which in turn keeps the viewer unsettled which is only a good thing in an action drama.But the Director needs to look up the word 'Revenge' in a dictionary or at least ask Charles Bronson (Once upon a time in the west) how it's done.The entire cast put in a good performance and the script and pacey direction keep things moving.
Totally fabricated movie with great truck driving scenes..
The other stuff like the plot and ending are apparently fabricated just so we could have a place for the great action.
White Line Fever gets the point across that truck driving is a great way of life.
Jan-Michael Vincent stars in this B-movie from the Redneck Renaissance which has an ex-military man buying a rig to achieve the American dream along w/his doting wife.
Co-starring 2 Sam Peckinpah regulars L.Q. Jones & Slim Pickens, this breezy actioner is a throwback to a simpler time when CG were just 2 letters that meant nothing..
I love 70's cult cinema, I adore trucker movies and I absolutely worship Jan-Michael Vincent whom I consider to be one of the few genuine dukes of coolness amongst B-movie actors.
Hummer's father was a respected trucker in rural Arizona, but he died and Carroll Jo wants to continue the family's trucking tradition.
Finding work isn't really a problem, but the Arizona trucking business is being controlled by corrupt and fraudulent big shots who insist on smuggling stolen and illegal goods.
Okay, admittedly "White Line Fever" contains rather too many tedious parts simply showing trucks on the road and the screenplay is chock-full of clichés, but the whole ambiance and settings are irresistibly 70's.
Handsome Jan-Michael also receives excellent support from a nice assembly of reliable B-movie actors like Slim Pickens, LQ Jones and Dick Miller.
Many fans of cult and exploitation cinema refer to "White Line Fever" as the best trucker movie ever made.
Carrol Jo Hummer (Jan-Michael Vincent) returns home from the Air Force to marry Jerri (Kay Lenz).
When he's the lone Rambo at the end, Pops is riding shotgun in one of the action scenes.
Jan-Michael Vincent, at the peak of his charisma and movie stardom, registers strongly as good, honest young man Carrol Jo Hummer, fresh from a stint in the Air Force.
He gets a loan, which he uses to pay for his own diesel truck, which he dubs The Blue Mule.
Initially thinking of working for family friend Duane Haller (Slim Pickens), he ultimately decides to fight corruption in the transport business, making enemies out of slimy people like Buck Wessle (L.Q. Jones) and Cutler (Don Porter).
It gets a lot of mileage out of its time honoured premise of one good man at war with a corrupt system.Carrol Jo must do battle both on the road and off, and proves himself capable of handling himself in a number of scraps, which are often instigated by swaggering bully Clem (Martin Kove).
This NEEDS to be on DVD (its Sony/Columbia which gives me hope that it might one day see release on their Midnite Madness line of DVDs.) The story is a little confusing--but the movie is so fast moving and so colorful and so involving---the fact that the story keeps flipping the position of whether Jan Michael Vincent is in or out of the corrupt organization who keep alternatively trying to kill him and employ him (sometimes at the same time) just adds to the movie's charm!
(really quickly the story is Jan Michael Vincent is a back from 'Nam truck driver who goes to work for a corrupt organization and rebels against their corruptness--he wants to unionize and only haul what he wants to haul--not the illegal contraband that his bosses want him to traffic in----and his bosses in turn try to kill him, his wife, and just about everybody else who happens to be driving on the road around him---that's it----Jan tries to testify in court about their corruption, but that doesn't really matter--because a couple of scenes later--he's back to driving his truck for the very same guys that he was just testifying against---what?
There are a number of very well shot sequences---the first time Jan Michael has enough of his bosses b.s.--and they fire him---he marches back in his bosses' office with a gun--he forces them to give him work at gunpoint!
Its a very well done sequence (although if you stop and think about it given the plot as its unfolded it doesn't make a whole Lotta sense--but hey A Man's Gotta Work And Put Food On The Table Damnit!) And Then They Drive Him Too Far--which leads to a very depressing ending--but an awesomely depressing one!!!!
I Saw White Line Fever many years ago when I was doing my weekend warrior thing and this was playing on the post theater in I believe Fort Stewart, Georgia.
I wouldn't be surprised, but that back in those days Jan Michael Vincent was a number one star there.It's actually a pretty good film in which Vincent plays a working class hero who stands up to gangsters trying to control the trucking industry.
He's an Air Force veteran who marries the girl of his dreams in this case Kay Lenz and buys a big rig which he names the Blue Mule and pronounces himself ready to enter the truck driving game.Some really nasty people are in control of it though and when Vincent proclaims he won't haul illegal cigarettes and slot machines they come down on him like a ton of bricks.
They hurt him in every way possible, even people like Slim Pickens who was once his father's best friend.But Vincent is a charismatic figure and the independent drivers rally to him.
It all comes at a big price.A nice group of the best character actors around including Don Porter, L.Q. Jones, and R.G. Armstrong are some of the foes he faces as Jan Michael goes up the food chain of villainy.The film owes a lot to some of Frank Capra's work, especially Mr. Smith Goes To Washington.
Jan-Michael Vincent takes on good ol' boy truckers in hixploitation at it's finest!.
Jan-Michael Vincent plays an idealistic long-haul truck driver who wants no part of shipping illegal un-taxed cigarettes and slot machines (which by today's criminal standards seems positively quaint) for corrupt shipping company owner L.Q. Jones.
Co-staring Slim Pickens, R.G. Armstrong, Dick Miller, and Martin "Sweep the Leg" Kove, "White Line Fever" is super fun hixploitaiton with good ol boys cussin', fighting' and driving big rigs.
I've always loved Jan-Michael Vincent's early work and in reflection upon his career have been fascinated and somewhat haunted a quote from Vincent, lamented that he could have been another James Dean if he'd made only three movies and then died, instead of seeing his career and personal life spiral out of control with drugs, alcohol, and multiple arrests (he's now even minus a leg).
But back to "White Line Fever," this film was written and directed by Roger Corman protege Jonathan Kaplan, who'd later go on to write and direct some major films, including "The Accused" and "Unlawful Entry," so it's an early work by a quality filmmaker, which bring quality to this unabashedly low-brown exploitation drive-in material.
Overall, "White Line Fever" is one of Jan-Michael Vincent's better films and is solid entertainment if you're in the mood for "Convoy" meets "Walking Tall.".
I think it has one of the most awesome stunts with a truck at the end.
Yep still a great movie.It made me want to drive a truck then and today I do.It's the classic battle of David and Goliath so to speak.
where could you even assemble a cast like the one in this movie today.
Movies back then were all about stunts, and cool cars and trucks getting trashed big time.
The producers did a top job on getting the right looking truck for the movie, the Blue Mule was a sharp lookin rig, for a while there..
One of the earliest -- and hence best -- of a handful of 70's trucker movies, a once quite hot, but now hopelessly passé sub-genre which beget a mixed bag of films which includes the stellar Claudia Jennings vehicle "Truck Stop Women," the not half bad Peter Fonda pic "High Ballin'," the great'n'gritty overlooked sleeper "Road Movie," Sam Peckinpah's excruciatingly stupid "Convoy," the alarmingly atrocious Chuck Norris chopsocky turkey "Breaker!
Breaker!," and the sturdy made-for-TV item "Steel Cowboy." Jan-Michael Vincent, whose career in the Me Decade was all over the map, peaking with "The Mechanic" and "Big Wednesday" and hitting a wonderfully wretched all-time low with the gloriously godawful post-nuke sci-fi atrocity "Damnation Alley," here gives one of his strongest, most convincing and engaging performances to date as Carrol Jo Hummer, an earnest, moral, youthful independent Diesel driver who finds out that his employers are crooked bastards who sell illegal contraband on the side.
Director Jonathan Kaplan, who was then on a real B-movie roll churning out such kick-ass exploitation flicks as "Night Call Nurses," "The Student Teachers," and "Truck Turner" on a regular basis, hits a brisk, solid groove at the very start of the film and masterfully sustains it to the thrilling end, expertly milking the forever effective and appealing "one lone little man against the big, bad system" populist hero subtext in Ken Friedman's tightly efficient script for maximum socko entertainment.
Kudos also to the exceptional supporting cast ridden with familiar film faces: the late, great, ever-delightful Slim Pickens as corrupt truck stop manager Duane Haller, L.Q. Jones at his most sublimely slimy and serpentine as head heavy Buck Westle, Martin Kove as one of Westle's thuggish goons, R.G. Armstrong as a shifty, manipulative prosecuting attorney, veteran character actor Don Porter as the smug CEO who's running the whole no-count operation, frequent Kaplan pic co-star Johnny Ray McGhee as an angry black trucker, Sam Laws as McGhee's rascally lovable ol' coot pop, and the irreplaceable Dick Miller as fidgety, peppery gear-jammer R.
Further enhanced by Fred Koenekamp's crisp, inventive cinematography, David Nichtern's stirring score, and Valerie Carter tearfully warbling the marvelously mawkish country-and-western weeper "Drifting and Dreaming of You" all of three times on the soundtrack, "White Line Fever" gets a hearty ten-four from your good buddy film critic as quintessential 70's drive-in cinema at its most bluntly exciting and unpretentious best..
Great action flick with well-written characters, often compared to "Billy Jack" and "Walking Tall." Fistfights and tough guys galore, Kay Lenz looking adorable, what more could you ask for?
Climactic scene of Jan-Michael Vincent's "Blue Mule" diesel tractor truck barreling through a guard shack and becoming airborne is one of the most memorable bits of 70's action cinema.
***SPOILERS*** The back then, before he messed himself up big time, sturdy & handsome Jan Michael Vincent in one of his most memorable roles as trucker Carrol Jo Hummer as he hums across the screen in his shinny $34,000.00, that's about $175,000.00 in 2016 dollars, rig the "Blue Mule" that he's deep in hock to the bank.
That in him trying to make a living trucking produce like apples oranges onions & avocados across state lines.
Instead of trucking fruit and vegetables for American families tables Jo finds out he's in fact shipping illegal contraband-Like un taxed cigarettes booze as well as pin ball and slot machines that supplies the mob's cash flow in the state of Arizona.By not going alone with the program Jo puts himself as well as wife Jerri, Kay Lenz, lives in danger of getting whacked by mob enforcer and president of the Red River Trucking Company Buck "Big Bucks" Wessle, played by 65 I.Q Jones, hoods working for him as truck drivers as well as enforcers.
At first blackballing Jo from getting work in paying off the bank loan for his rig he starts to organizes the truckers to demand equal pay for equal work-honest work-that really puts him on "Big Bucks" sh*l or cow manure list.
That with "Big Buck" getting the word from his boss corrupt businessman and mob controlled hack Josh Cutler, Don Porter, to put the squeeze on the rebellious young man and get him into line or in the hospital with a pair of broken legs if not worse.
This besides getting worked over a number of times and having his rig damaged Jo is later framed for his friend Duane Haller's, Slim Pickens, murder who was crushed to death by one of "Big Buck's" drivers in a hit and run homicides.
Shot up but still alive and breathing Jo in the end united the truckers to form a union and not be screwed around by the likes of Cutler as his lackey "Big Bucks" as well as the mob that their in cahoots or in bed with!.
"White Line Fever" was a big hit on the drive-in circuit when it was released.
The whole trucking industry angle, for one thing, though even more appealing is the irresistible there of the "little guy" against a corrupt system.
Jan-Michael Vincent makes for an appealing little guy hero, fighting against some nice bad guys, including the dependable L.
"White Line Fever" is an American trucking/action movie about truck drivers released in 1975.Jan-Michael Vincent plays the hero who returns from Vietnam and takes over his father's trucking business in Tucson,Arizona.He soon discovers that the shippers are corrupt and want him to smuggle illegal loads of cigarettes and slot machines.When he refuses to load such commodities they load his trailer with manure out of spite."White Line Fever" features truly fantastic climax in which Jan-Michael Vincent crashes his truck into the giant sign of the greedy corporation.The film is well-acted,the action is fast-paced and there is an enjoyable country score.8 trucks out of 10. |
tt2309021 | We Are What We Are | During a torrential downpour, a woman, later identified as Emma Parker, confusedly staggers into a store as the butcher receives a delivery. After several attempts to address her, she finally responds and explains that the foul weather has strongly affected her. The butcher says that it will get worse before it gets better, and she purchases groceries. As she leaves the store, she sees a poster that advertises missing teenage girls. Before she can reach her car, she begins bleeding from her mouth and loses consciousness as she falls into a rain-filled ditch, where she drowns.
Later, the sheriff tells Frank Parker that his wife, Emma, has died. Consumed by grief, Frank does not show up to identify the body but instead sends his two daughters, Rose and Iris. Doctor Barrow, who delivered Frank's young son Rory, explains that an autopsy is mandated by the state. During the examination, he finds evidence of Kuru disease. Meanwhile, Frank is comforted by his kindhearted neighbor Marge, and, while driving through the storm later, finds a motorist in need of assistance; the film implies that he attacks her with a tire iron.
Interspersed are scenes from a book the oldest daughter is reading, a journal of the family from pioneer times telling of hunger and hardship in the winter. The men of the party have mostly been lost in the wilderness, and the women may not survive the winter.
Rose and Iris debate whether they are prepared to take over their mother's religious duties, but Iris is adamant that they perform this year's ritual. Rory, too, has trouble keeping the family's past. Eventually, Rory wanders into his father's shed and finds a young woman held hostage. Frank angrily demands that Rory leave, then forces his daughters to kill and butcher the captive. They reluctantly obey, and the entire family eats her remains after a bit of urging from Frank. Marge attempts to deliver a vegetarian meal to the Parkers, noting she thinks she heard a woman crying in the shed, but she receives an icy welcome from Iris.
Back in pioneer times the family has taken shelter in a cave, but the girls fear the father is losing his mind, keeping to himself in the depths of the cave and crying at night. Eventually he leads the girls down to where he has been keeping their only food source, one of the women in the party who died (possibly their mother), tied to a rack with pieces cut off of her. he hands his oldest daughter a knife and points to the carcass. She is grim and resolute.
Barrow, whose daughter previously went missing, becomes suspicious when he finds a bone fragment in a creek. Though Sheriff Meeks brushes off his concerns, Barrow is able to convince Deputy Anders to investigate. Anders finds more evidence in the creek, only to be confronted by Iris, on whom he has a crush. Iris leads him to a secluded spot, and Anders confesses his feelings for her. Confused and overwhelmed with guilt, Iris breaks into tears. As Anders comforts her, they begin to have sex, but Frank finds them and kills Anders. Disgusted, he tells Iris to return home.
Frank orders the girls to stay in their bedroom, and they form a plan to escape. Frank prays alone in his room, muttering that they have kept their tradition and will be joining their mother soon. While Frank recites prayers, Rose takes the car keys. When Frank prepares dinner, he takes a jar full of powder and adds it to the soup. As the children set the table, Rose notices white powder residue and realizes Frank is planning to poison them with arsenic. She unsuccessfully attempts to alert Iris, then knocks Rory's bowl on the floor to prevent him from eating. Before Frank can react, Barrow, whose research has turned up evidence that the Parkers may have engaged in cannibalism, arrives at the home and confronts Frank, demanding to know what happened to Anders and his daughter, whose hair ornament he sees Iris is wearing. Frank stalls for time as he reaches for his pistol, and Iris jumps in front of Barrow to protect him. Frank accidentally wounds his daughter, and Barrow shoots Frank.
Frank survives and knocks out Barrow. Rose and Rory flee the house in a panic, and they take refuge with Marge. Frank breaks into Marge's house and kills her, then convinces Rose and Rory to rejoin him. Back at Frank's house, he again urges his children to eat. When he tells Rose that she looks like her deceased mother, Rose bites into her father’s neck, tearing away a chunk of his flesh, while Iris stabs her father through the hand. Together, the girls bite into him, ripping away his flesh and devouring it until their father dies. Rose notices Barrow, barely conscious, has witnessed the whole thing, and she places his daughter's stolen hair ornament on his chest. The next morning, the children leave town, and Rose brings a diary that details their ancestor's memories of cannibalism, implying their tradition will live on. | dramatic, horror, atmospheric | train | wikipedia | But first, a little information about the premise: the film is a remake of a 2010 Mexican horror film that I was unfamiliar with, and it follows a family known as the Parkers.
As a massive storm batters the town, the family matriarch dies and the father, Frank (Bill Sage), is left to care for three children: Iris (Ambyr Childs), Rose (Julia Garner), and young Rory.
Their mother's death couldn't have happened at a worse time, as the family is approaching time for one of their more unusual traditions: Lamb's Day. As the family's disturbing secrets are revealed, the town's doctor (Michael Parks) finds a clue that might lead to information on his daughter's disappearance and his investigation leads him a little to close to the Parker's family tradition.WE ARE WHAT WE ARE is a tough call.
I don't know exactly what I thought the movie was going to be, but I sure didn't believe it to be a slow-burning, high-tension horror piece.
Then there's a bizarre climactic final sequence to close the movie that goes completely against all the mood and atmosphere building of the previous hour and a half to blast the audience with some shock value that doesn't quite sit right within the film.
Her husband Frank Parker (Bill Sage), who is the owner of a trailer camping area, grieves her death and forces her older daughter Iris (Ambyr Childers) to assume the responsibility for keeping the family tradition, feeding them and nursing her teenage daughter Rose (Julia Garner) and her young brother Rory (Jack Gore).
It's like everyone is trying to rise above the dreaded B level.At the beginning of the film there are thunderstorms and floods that portend the rumblings of something unusual going on, and throughout there are beautifully photographed scenes showing the drenched landscape and lush vegetation of late spring.The acting is excellent, most likely because the actors were provided with something that is rare in many films these days - a great script.
Dark, slow but steady film about the apparently normal Parker family, who share a macabre secret ritual.
While WE ARE WHAT WE ARE is not just a constant schlock-fest, there is some pretty disturbing stuff here: Short but graphic scenes of an autopsy, etc.There's been some debate about whether or not WAWWA is really a horror film, and I would vote a definite "yea" even though the whole mood and atmosphere are different (and better in many ways) than most contemporary horror flicks.
I kept asking myself; why I kept watching it, despite the deliberate slow pace and the predictability of the story, and I figured it was because the movie relied on good acting, an extreme dramatic experience, excellent camera angles, and an atmosphere perfectly in line with the depressing story of the movie.
They could have injected more thrills into the movie, especially towards the end, than just Christ-like calmness (in a deranged way of course); although the movie left me with a tinge of unpleasant feeling, which is a quality that not many horror movies manage to achieve these days; and if this was the intended effect, I must say it was effective.
In my opinion, the movie is worth watching once or twice, only if you don't mind the slow pace, which I'm sure some of the audience would find boring and might fall asleep before they are frightened, a feeling pretty much absent from the movie that is supposed to function as a horror movie rather than a sleeping pill for the majority..
The setting, characters, general plot, and ending all very significantly deviate from the original, and there is even a detailed back story added which creates, if not sympathy, at least comprehension for the acts this family does.The movie itself is beautifully developed to create both a very plausible realism and very well defined characters.
They Are Who They Are. The Parkers, a reclusive family who follow ancient customs, find their secret existence threatened as a torrential downpour moves into their area, forcing daughters Iris and Rose to assume responsibilities beyond those of a typical family.Director Jim Mickle is known for his films "Stake Land" (2010) and "Mulberry St" (2006), and has really made a name for himself as a rising star in the world of horror.
Even after I discovered their secret (which may be common knowledge by now, but I won't spoil it), I was curious to know more - the family's folklore and what would happen to them by the end of the movie.The Parker family is led by Frank (Bill Sage), a heavily bearded man of few words, the kind of guy who brooks no disobedience within his family.
Suddenly, Iris and her 14-year-old sister Rose (Julia Garner) are more involved than they have in the past, thus leading to internal doubts while they protect their little brother Rory (Jack Gore).Part of the suspense is supposed to involve what actually occurs on Lamb's Day. After Emma dies, a beloved book of hers is passed down to Iris, who learns it's been in the family since the 1700s.
But similar shots in this movie took so long to develop that it quickly became obvious what was going to happen next, sort of the opposite of what a director would want his audience to feel.When we do arrive at the concluding scenes of the film, we're met with an ending that's so over the top that it jumps over the line of sanity into full-blown ludicrousness.
The only incongruent acting comes from Gore as the young Rory; in one particular scene, he's obviously supposed to be terrified but instead just looks really mad.We Are What We Are is a movie without a point, with few new wrinkles to a specific subgenre, weighted down by slow-motion pacing and a mostly uneventful plot that culminates in an unlikely, unappealing ending..
Also incredible is their slow burning, brutal cannibal family drama We Are What We Are. Instead of an all out backwoods gore fest, we are treated with a moody, muted slow burn of a horror thriller that gets under your skin with a hot poker, and digs at our primal fears, taking sacred concepts like family and loyalty, and turning them on their head.
No matter how predictable it may seem for the majority of its runtime, Jim Mickle's We Are What We Are still manages to work as a solidly structured & cleverly paced horror that mainly relies on its carefully elevated tension & isolated setting to deliver a thrilling cinematic experience to the blood-thirsty fans of the genre & vehemently succeeds.A remake of the 2010 Mexican film of the same name, We Are What We Are tells the story of a reclusive family that rigorously follows its ancient customs & aims to keep its traditions alive at any cost.
But when an unexpected tragedy strikes during a torrential downpour, the family finds its existence threatened for the secret they've held on for so long is close to being discovered.Co-written & directed by Jim Mickle, I've been meaning to check out his earlier works ever since I watched Cold in July & after sitting through this one, I'm convinced that Mickle is one filmmaker who surely knows how to create the right mood for the desired effect because even if the secret is out of the bag pretty early on, there are still many moments here which feel downright tense, all due to its proper build-up.Cinematography encapsulates the whole picture with a sinister atmosphere that perfectly suits its Gothic plot but its Editing could've managed to get rid of few unnecessary moments.
As I've never seen the Spanish original I cannot compare the two which is probably a good thing as this stands in it's own right as a pretty decent flick involving a secretive family with an overbearing and controlling father.
Cant believe the other scores and reviews and how people liked it let alone thought it was anything other than a b movie story WATCH SOMETHING ELSE ANYTHING sister had no chemistry and you just didn't feel for them or the police guy.The mother seemed to not even be important at all after the first few minutes never mentioned again..
There have been a few poor ones recently and We Are What We Are defiantly makes up for that.Brilliant acting, really well written and has a real eerie atmospheric feel to it.Not just full of blood and gore, it has a great, unusual, quite different story line to it which slowly builds up to it's very shocking conclusion.Not usually a fan or re-makes and I have not seen the original, from what I have heard this film stands out on it's own.A film that I look forward to seeing again Great cast, great film.
Otherwise, the film is sheer tedium to watch, occasionally enlivened by a familiar supporting face (Michael Parks and Kelly McGillis particularly coming to mind).The characters are hateful, the cinematography is dull and depressing with a grey, washed-out look throughout, and the whole thing has a mundane feel to it.
It was well received by critics and I understand why because it is well shot and Mickle knows how to build the right atmosphere, but this horror film was a bit too gory for my personal taste.
It's a beautifully shot movie and the actors were all very good, and I especially liked the performance of the doctor whose daughter went missing and who gradually puts two and two together to realize what became of her.
Which is something that has to do with the cinematography and the actors in this.It will have some scenes that are not easy to watch and it does end on a note that might not sit well with a few people (but that is again something it has in common with the original movie).
I'm not averse to the slow-burn approach per se, but when it holds as few surprises for the viewer as this film from 'Stake Land' director Jim Mickle, you can colour me not impressed.The plot revolves around the Parker family, who harbour a dark secret that has blighted their ancestors for centuries.
Remake of a Mexican Film with the Same Title, this is a Slow-Burn Atmospheric Movie that is Rewarding for Patient Viewers but Fans of Zombie Fests and Torture Porn Gruesomeness will be Looking Elsewhere for Perverted Pixs.An Old Testament Type Flood is Raining Down on this Nutbag Family, Perhaps a Way for Their God to Reek Wrath on these Sinners.
The Restraint Applied to this Horror Film was a Gamble with Current Trendy Filmmakers Trying Desperately to Outdo Each Other with One-Ups-Man-Ship and Leave a Mark Among Critics and Fanboys to Stake Out Claims of the Next Big Thing.This is Well Acted and Staged and the Open Ending has Sequel Written All Over It. The Filmmakers Disappoint, However in Storytelling that is Frustratingly Ambiguous about the Family's Motivations and the Back Story is Felt to be Unclear.Overall, Recommended for the More Cerebral Horror Fans, if there are Any Remaining, and B-Movie Buffs Searching for Something Off-Beat..
it does take a while to get into things but the last 45 minutes gives you a great twist you didn't see coming So the movie is based around the Parker family, a reclusive family in small town America living in Victorian values.
The family secret is about to be exposed after many years which is sending Frank into a frenzy.The ending has a twist I wasn't expecting at all and after you find that out the movie all makes sense If you want something different, a break away from Hollywood fails of horrors or sequels this is one to watch, little gore but more thriller..
This would be hard enough, but this family are also cannibals who believe in eating humans as part of their religion.It's a horror movie.
Kelly McGillis deserves a special mention as the local doctor who figures that there's more going on in this town than he can put his finger on, but, despite his excellent performance, it still doesn't move things on as fast as I was hoping it would.I hope I haven't become completely immune to subtle horror, as, deep down, I know this film was actually quite good.
'We are what we are' is too arrogant a title which has ever been bestowed on a horror film.However,this film is not at all about arrogance or any other negative behavioral trait.It is the tale of Parker family which is facing tough times after the sudden death of Mrs.Parker in a drowning incident.This sudden demise is merely a cover for even greater things to happen as director Jim Mickle has been true to life in order to honestly depict things which might go wrong in a small town in America.Nature can cause a lot of damage in the form of bad weather.However,it is nothing compared to the damage inflicted by a man on other human beings.Much of the sense of horror is depicted through various settings namely interiors of the house where the father lives with this three children-2 young girls and 1 small boy.There is a good mix of drama in this film based on an original screenplay by Mexican writer Jorge Michel Grau.Lastly,a viewer would be wrong if "Evil dead" is considered ultimate expression of horror film.This viewer would have to watch "We are what we are" to understand how a film invents a completely new genre due to its subject matter..
(9/10)Bill Sage: Frank Parker father of the household who is showing the effects of years of cannibalism but still forcing his young family to continue to follow the traditions after his wife dies on the first day of them.
If you're looking for a different, original and scary film this Halloween season, this is one of the best horror movies in a long time..
Some of his shots will haunt you for days.If you're looking for a different, original and scary film this Halloween season, this is one of the best horror movies in a long time.
The film takes us inside the home of the Parkers where we meet family patriarch Frank (Bill Sage), daughters Iris and Rose (Ambyr Childers and Julie Garner) and young son Rory (Jack Gore).
This is a family that is run by the father and their traditions have been passed down for many generations and when they are revealed I was both horrified and enthralled.This movie moves at a good if a bit slow pace but with a film score that helps build the suspense and mood till, you know something has to happen, but will it be what we all expect.
Why, you may ask and the answer is that for some of us, the ones that watched the original version, there's no way that we may get to feel for the Parkers.In "Somos lo que hay" we felt horrified by this family of cannibals and I never forgot the opening scene: the father walking as some sort of zombie, and then watching his own image, and knowing the kind of monster he actually is and having a gruesome death in a shopping mall, while the janitors cleaned up the floor so fast, making life go as if nothing had happened, turning way up into the developing horror – drama, driving into a big question: who was the man and why did he died like this, so seeing the Mrs. Parker "drown" without witnesses is kind of just an unfortunate event, are you following me?
As we realize Julian and Alfredo as the rest of the family are not just demented eaters, but people trying to survive not just in their cannibalistic way, but struggling to get by, in a swap meet surrounded by poverty and mean others, giving more knowledge there than the remake that wastes more time and effort with the somber music and some sort of "relevant" late information from the gruesome autopsy.While the original provide us with a comic relief and the shocking discover of the severed finger, here the filmmakers, try harder in the opposite direction, trying to impose our empathy on two girls and a very young kid, relying more in the "horror" visuals of the autopsy or the very implausible ending than the social drama of Jorge Michel Grau' screenplay, that delivered interesting moments such as when Alfredo and Julian attempt to kidnap a couple of homeless children for their next meal, in an irrational attempt of survival while WAWWA feels like a blackmail to our senses with the beautiful young girls, and cheap scares, like the hand under the door and the young parker.The first part of the movie feels so shallow and irrelevant and following into steps of the "Lone Ranger", attempts to get us involved with the Windigo plotting ("Ravenous" 1999 -good one!-) I mean one way or the other it really gets old!
I went into this movie not realizing it was a remake and while I do wish I had seen the original version first, I'll definitely watch that at some point as well because I'd love to compare the two!After the sudden and mysterious death of their mother (which we witnessed in the opening act — it really set the tone for the remainder of the movie), daughters Rose (Julia Garner) and Iris (Ambyr Childers) are left to carry on with their domineering father, Frank (Bill Sage), and their naïvely innocent younger brother, Rory (Jack Gore).
I'd say it's about as good as the original movie; no better and not much worse.The Parkers seem like a nice conservative family but they're actually cannibals who have secretly been keeping an ancient family tradition (of killing and eating others) alive.
Parks plays an officer investigating his daughter's disappearance.Like I said the original film opened with the death of the family's father but it also revolves around the two eldest sons having to take on their dad's old responsibilities. |
tt1038023 | Ghost Rider | Over one hundred years ago , The Devil, Mephistopheles, sends his bounty hunter of the damned, the Ghost Rider, to retrieve a document known as "The Contract of San Venganza", a list of a thousand corrupt souls. Seeing that the contract would give Mephistopheles the power to unleash Hell on Earth, the Rider refuses to give him the contract.
In 1986, Mephistopheles reaches out to 17-year-old stunt motorcycle rider Johnny Blaze, offering to cure his father's cancer in exchange for Blaze's soul, to which he hastily accepts. The next morning, Blaze awakes to discover that his father's cancer is cured, but he is killed that same day in a motorcycle stunt in which he falls into the ring of fire he is jumping through. Blaze accuses Mephistopheles of causing his father's death, but Mephistopheles considers their contract to be fulfilled and promises to one day see him again.
21 years later, Blaze has become a famous stunt motorcycle rider known for surviving numerous deadly crashes. Blaze meets his lifelong sweetheart Roxanne Simpson, now a news reporter, whom he abandoned after his father's death. He convinces her to attend a dinner date. Meanwhile, Blackheart, the demonic son of Mephistopheles, comes to Earth, along with three fallen angels who bonded with the elements Air, Earth, and Water. They are tasked to find the lost Contract of San Venganza. In response, Mephistopheles makes Blaze the new Ghost Rider and offers to return his soul if he defeats Blackheart, though he is also told he has no choice in the matter. Blaze is driven straight to the station on his "first ride", where he transforms into the Ghost Rider and kills the Earth Angel Gressil. He also saves a young girl from a mugger and incapacitates him with the Penance Stare (a power that allows the Ghost Rider to make any evil person experience all the pains they caused on their victims) The next day, he meets a man called the Caretaker, who seems to know all about the history of the Ghost Rider. He tells him everything that happened was not a dream and that it will happen again, especially at night when he is near an evil soul.
When he arrives home, Blaze finds Simpson and reveals himself as the Devil's bounty hunter. Unconvinced, she walks away in disbelief. After a brief imprisonment for the murders that Blackheart committed, Blaze kills the Air Angel Abigor, and escapes from The Police, before returning to the Caretaker who tells him of his predecessor, Carter Slade, a Texas Ranger who hid the contract of San Venganza. Blaze returns home to find that Blackheart has killed his friend Mack and has taken Roxanne captive, threatening to kill her if Blaze does not deliver the contract. Blaze tries to use the Penance Stare on Blackheart, only for it not to work since Blackheart has no soul to burn.
Blaze returns to the Caretaker and obtains the contract. The Caretaker reveals that he is Carter Slade. Slade tells Blaze that he is more powerful than his predecessors since he sold his soul for love as opposed to greed. Slade leads Blaze to San Venganza, then gives Blaze a lever action shotgun before fading away.
After killing the Water angel Wallow, Blaze gives the contract to Blackheart. He quickly transforms into Ghost Rider in an effort to subdue Blackheart, but dawn arrives and he is rendered powerless. Blackheart uses the contract to absorb the thousand souls into his body. He attempts to kill Blaze, but is distracted when Simpson uses Blaze's discarded shotgun to separate them. After Blaze tries to kill Blackheart with the shotgun, he moves in and uses his Penance Stare to render him catatonic, burning all the corrupt souls within Blackheart, which is what he had hoped for.
Mephistopheles appears and returns Blaze his soul, offering to take back the curse of the Ghost Rider. Determined not to make another deal, Blaze declines, saying that he will use his power against him, and against all harm that comes to the innocent. Infuriated of being robbed of the power, Mephistopheles vows to make Blaze pay, but Blaze tells Mephistopheles that he is not afraid. Mephistopheles then disappears, taking Blackheart's body with him. Later, Simpson tells Blaze that he got his second chance before sharing a final kiss with him. Blaze then rides away on his motorcycle, turning into the Ghost Rider. | violence | train | wikipedia | null |
tt0368343 | Three Way | The film starts in San Diego. Lew (Dominic Purcell) finds out that his wife is having an affair with another man. He grabs his gun and goes to seek revenge but finds both of them dead in the bed. He fears that the police would suspect him because he has had a bad past, so he dumps the bodies and his gun in the sea along with his boat. He leaves for a new life.
Lew starts a new life, working as a sign board maker and gets a new girlfriend Rita (Joy Bryant). One evening while erecting a signboard on the side of a road, he overhears Isobel (Ali Larter) and Ralph (Desmond Harrington) discussing the kidnapping and murder plot of Ralph's wife Florence (Gina Gershon). He soon plots his own plan to pinch the ransom. At the same time, Herbert (Dwight Yoakam), brother of the man Lew's wife had affair with, comes following Lew thinking that Lew murdered his brother.
Ralph kidnaps his wife Florence with the help of his girlfriend Isobel and keeps her in a boat. Lew has been following them and takes Florence away from the boat. Then he phones Ralph anonymously, threatening to call police unless he cuts him in for half the ransom money. Ralph agrees. Ralph and Isobel suspect that it is Florence who has some accomplice of her own and is blackmailing them. Lew sends Rita to get the money from Ralph. But Lew's plans turns awry when Herbert interrupts and kills Florence. When Rita comes back she finds Herbert struggling with Lew and shoots him dead. She later finds that the money she brought from Ralph is fake. Lew goes to Isobel and Ralph to ask them about the real money. In the meanwhile Rita tips the police. Soon police comes and arrests Lew, Ralph and Isobel. Lew is released on the verdict of Rita who had hidden the real money herself. | romantic, neo noir, murder, flashback | train | wikipedia | Some truly stupid behavior (excused, in part, by every criminal in this movie being a rank amateur) hampers an otherwise passable crime movie about sloppy blackmailing, sloppy kidnapping, and not-always-sloppy plots within plots.
Despite the foolish actions, the dialogue and performances are good, especially those of Dominic Purcell and Gina Gershon.
Ali Larter looks fantastic, and the locations are nice even if the time-lapse scenery jumps get a little tiresome by movie's end.Worth a look for fans of the genre, but by no means the soft-core porn flick some posts here (and the title - I wish!) suggest.
Well, one scene, and no, it features neither Gershon nor Larter..
So, what does the title have to do with the movie?.
I had never heard of Three Way, but when I was at Hollywood Video, I noticed the film and saw that Gina Gershon was in it.
I like her, so I decided to go ahead and pick up the film; so I watched it last night and I was really disappointed.
First off, Gina was in the movie for barely 5 minutes, the plot had potential, but most of the actors ruined the movie for me, I mean, absolutely none of the characters were at all likable.
The main character, Lew, wasn't even a cool anti-hero, he just seemed to complain too much.
The film wasn't very well shot and it just seemed like it was more of a chore and a movie that most of the cast and crew just wanted to get through.
I also do not mind sex in a movie, but some of the sex scenes were just plain unnecessary and didn't add anything to the supposed story.Lew is a guy who just complains so much of how badly life is treating him, his wife has been murdered and he got rid of her body with her lover's as well, instead of going to the police.
One night he over hears a couple plotting to kidnap a woman who has a rich family.
The couple has been having an affair, and it turns out that the guy is kidnapping his wife and is expecting a million dollars, but Lew wants that money and has other plans in mind for them.Three Way isn't the worst film I saw, the beginning of the film wasn't so bad, it had enough potential, but there were things that were left unexplained.
Like we see Lew go onto the boat where his wife and her lover were killed, he has a gun, was he intending to kill them or scare them or what?
The scene between Lew and Florence where she was trying to seduce him didn't make much sense, I know what it was, I got the scene, but the whole story of that wasn't needed.
I just think that the film could've been made better, or at least had a better cast, Gina's talent was very much wasted on this stupid film.3/10.
Well, I should have known the underlying rule in soft porn flics.
The girl you want to see with her shirt off never takes it off.
Ali Larter with two sex scenes and nothing more than a naval.
I can't believe she stooped to this movie, same with Gina Gershon.
This movie was garbage.
The "unexpected plot twists were expected, predictable, and worthless.
Ali Larter and Gina Gershon both keep their clothes on the entire movie, and the plot sucks.
Your lead guy plays such a moron that you hope something bad happens to him.
The lead girl is annoying and the ending doesn't fool anyone, it's still crap.
How a Good Film-Noir Is Lost Due to a Commercial Conclusion.
Lew (Dominic Purcell) is a carpenter with a past, who accidentally hears the conversation of two lovers in a car in an isolated spot about a kidnapping of a woman of a wealthy local family.
He architects a plan with his girlfriend Rita (Joy Bryant) to steal the ransom from the couple, but things do not work how planned.
"3-Way" is a erotic and sexy film-noir, with a very reasonable story and very beautiful actresses.
There are many plot points and double-crosses, and I found it interesting.
However, the commercial conclusion spoils the film.
The director and the writer should have seen the masterpiece "Body Heat" and offer an end more suitable for such amoral story.
The participation of Gina Gershon is minimum, basically to give her name to the credits.
My vote is six.Title (Brazil): "Seqüestro, Chantagem e Morte" ("Kidnapping, Blackmail and Death").
So-so straight to video story about blackmailers....
1st watched 5/29/2006 - 4 out of 10(Dir-Scott Ziehl): So-so straight to video story about blackmailers being blackmailed by a man who overhears their plot to kill the man's current wife and receive the inheritance.
The man who overhears the plot is played by Dominic Purcell as Lew, who just happens to have a checkered past himself and is looking for a way to disappear and thinks he's found it.
Other characters enter the story including the brother of someone that the main character supposedly killed and is played by Dwight Youkim and the wife who is supposed to be ofted, played by Gina Gershon.
These two more well known names have smaller parts but the DVD box tries to sell them as stars in the movie.
Joy Bryant has a bigger role as Lew's girlfriend and partner in his scheme and does a good job in her character.
The problem with the movie is that the story doesn't keep your interest and Purcell doesn't do a very good job of carrying the movie.
He plays his part half-heartedly and the movie moves along at the same speed making for a very, as I said before, so-so movie..
No way.
"3-Way" is not as good as the cover makes it look.
For example, in the beginning we can't be sure if the action is taking place in a motel room or on a boat!
But even when the pieces start falling together, the story only gets stupider.
The dialogue is often idiotic and the plot is contrived ("I was in the right place at the right time") and convoluted; for a "plan" movie to work, you have to believe that the plan has at least some chance to succeed - the plan in this film seems doomed from the beginning.
Dominic Purcell is a charisma-free lead, all the girls are pretty (especially Joy Bryant), but the best acting job by far is done by a really creepy Dwight Yoakam.
Full disclosure here...I picked up this movie because I love to look at Dominic Purcell.
So charismatic is this very attractive guy that he can make smoking sexy (and he does A LOT of it during the film).
Believe me, an actor must have a high degree of sexiness to make me still like him when he smokes this much.
And I must give the director credit, the sex (at times gratuitous but always fun) gives equal time to all genders...the women are sexy, the men are sexy, and each really seems to enjoy the act- this must be a difficult task to pull off, at least in a mainstream movie when the sex is not real.
It is hot (although not as hot as it could be...), but, at times, it is actually integral to the plot.
Acting: pretty darned good, except Ms. Gershon.
She starts out with a bang, with one overheard scene (a nice touch by the intriguing writer), but she falters in an awful scene that attempts to capitalize on the untapped possibilities of Stockholm syndrome; but top honors have to go to Joy Bryant, in a thankless role that gives her some puzzling lines to deliver, some of which are confusing (very), at least until the denouement.
Ms Larter need some work (despite some interesting work in fluff like American Outlaws and the Final Destination series), and she certainly cannot deliver some hardboiled lines like those after her sexual encounter with the kinda hot Desmond Harrington which deal with the problem of secrets, namely that no one can keep them.
Mr Yoakam, as always, deserves better- he smolders with an odd sexuality that rivets the watcher as long as he is on the scene; he even makes pain believable.
Directing: like I said, somehow the director makes the sex interesting for people of all sexes and sexual persuasions (I especially like Purcell's tattoos), but at times some of his scenes seem forced.
The stand-out is the overheard scene between Harrington and Gershon (although, oddly, Ms. Larter can't pull it off)...credit the writer for this, which brings me to...
Writing: some very interesting stuff (despite the dialogue between Larter and Harrington in their car toward the beginning- but perhaps we should blame Larter).
The theme of overheard plans (however well-laid they may be) may be derived from the book (I don't know), but its commonness in the film is a reason I think this writer is smarter than the material he has been given- the script sets up events in a necessary manner which is often lacking these days; how many times have you said to yourself, why is this happening?
There is a GREAT scene toward the end between Bryant and Purcell when they don't quite understand one another that is hilarious, but it is so subtle that it may be missed.
Everyone gets what they deserve, and the right people end up with one another.
I just wish Yoakam's character had reached a more interesting end- at least we get one last look at Purcell on the beach.
Overall, if you are a little drunk on a Fri night and want some sexual titillation paired with some degree of intellectual stimulation, you could do worse than this thriller.
THREE WAY is a modern-day attempt to update the classic 1940s film noir genre to a modern setting, featuring a protagonist up to his neck in murky dealings as he attempts to turn a planned kidnapping to his own advantage.
The title and the inclusion of some extraneous sex scenes make this look like an attempt to plough the same furrow as WILD THINGS, but this is nowhere near as good.Dominic Purcell's protagonist is one of the worst things about this: he's ineffective and weak throughout, and you just wish he'd man up and throw a punch here and there.
None of the other cast members are particularly good, with Gina Gerson's role a limited one - she seems to be included for name value alone.Although the convoluted plotting could have been interesting in better hands, often the writing feels lazy here and many sequences which should be suspenseful just aren't - they're boring instead.
After I finished watching, I couldn't help but consider this a waste of time..
Action and soft porn parody?!.
I don't believe this film is a serious one.
We see our hero half naked or with his favorite white shirt, and he never beats someone as we expect from an ordinary Hollywood movie.
Also he keeps one eye always behind the door, watching women, but never succeeds..
If you have time, take a look..
I had so much time to laugh, and had a funny night after the film with discussions about storyline and characters.
The movie shocks you when you try to guess the actions "our hero" will take place.
By the way, the funniest thing about movie is, "our white shirted hero" was in better condition before he takes his time for some action.
I think it will be a cult movie when people realize there is such a film..
Yes, I myself, a huge Gina Gershon fan, was quite disappointed.The one reason I rented this movie was because of her and I guess she obviously had some free time or was offered a nice monetary payday.
The biggest issue I had about 3 Way was the lack of concentration and focus regarding the continuity.
The black pullover ski cap with the bright and very noticeable yellow smily face that was on Gina during her introduction to Dominic Purcel.(Who?) The face was visible as the hat was pulled up to her nose.
The very next scene the face was gone but the ski cap was still on and pulled up to the same spot.
The movie was OK about 6 out of ten.
It had some twists and an interesting story line.
The individuals that wrote about this movie need to rethink their thoughts.
Joy Bryant is the most beautiful woman in the movie by about 5 miles.
The other two females have had more movies, but based on looks I don't see how you could even compare them to Joy Bryant.
The only thing I don't understand about Hollywood, does any female actresses not take their cloths off anymore?
It is common in almost every movie now for some female actress to take their top off.
Isn't there a little bit more to these movies or is that all California wants to produce..
Gina who?.
"The participation of Gina Gershon is minimum, basically to give her name to the credits." No offense Ms. Gershon, but DUDE from Brazil obviously must be a big fan of yours, "Watch out" - I had to actually "IMDB" Gina, b/c I could not place her in anything.
I came to this movie b/c I saw that Ali Larter produced - 'VERY HOT LADY' if you are reading this Ali 'Just one date, please?!!' I did see that Dwight Yoakum is in this movie and I may just rent it since it also sounds good.
The ten line minimum must be done away with, it is really annoying.
I'm seriously not trying to pad my comment, its just that I feel that 1000 words and/or 10 lines is way too much..
Loved the story.
Loved the film..
Three way is not a menage-a-trois film even though the cover makes it look like so.
It actually has a good story, a good plot and really good acting.
The movie was marketed the wrong way and that's why a lot of people are upset because they are expecting a soft porn film when in fact they got the real deal which is a feature length film with a couple of love scenes.The story is like this, A struggling man named Lewis Brookbank(Dominic Purcell) has a bad past but now wants a good future.
He sees the opportunity and is eager to grasp it and live it with his present love or second love named Rita Caswell(Joy Bryant) of his life.
This opportunity though seems to have become more of a nightmare when the plan does not go as planned.This movie has all the right elements for a good movie which is a good storyline with a good plot to carry it out plus a director with actors who know what they are doing.Don't expect for a soft porn flick but a good story on screen..
This really didn't seem to be a "soft porn parody" to me.
In fact I didn't think the movie was bad at all.
It had many twists, and I doubt anyone could have foreseen the ending.
Not only was Dwight Yokam his "creepy self" (he also give a good performance in the "The Three Burials of Melquiades Estrada" starring Tommy Lee Jones) but was a real plus to the movie.
He gets better with every role.
Even though Gina Gershon is only in the movie for a few moments the plot does revolve around her.
And really how much screen time should a hostage get?
The real flaw is that the ending really isn't fully explained, I had to back the DVR up and listen to the dialog closely.
Although it could be due to the fact I watched it at 2:00 a.m..
Dominic Purcell fab, plot lines a bit shaky, continuity effected by a man wearing a blindfold.
OK, I admit that the only thing that led me to this movie was seeing the words "Dominic Purcell".
he looks I thought I'd give it a whirl.
You see a lot of him in the movie (well most of him actually in the early scenes) so in that respect it was a very satisfying experience.However the continuity must have been checked by an underpaid short-sighted person with short term memory loss and a paper bag over his head.
When the gun-toting murderous brother kidnaps the 'hero' what is that random sticking plaster on Lew's arm all about?
The continuity diverted my attention from the unlikeliness of some of the plot twists, or was that the whole idea?
Anyway I kinda liked the end.
Throughout the movie people are constantly physically assaulting Lew, (even the girlfriend) but he never offers violence back, and at one point he apologises for raising his voice to her.
Frankly I'd have given her a slap for some of the things she does, and I'm a woman.
I guess the lack of violence on his part is a deliberate movie plot issue.So hip hooray for him getting a break and us getting another topless moment from Mr Purcell at the end, although up till the credits I was expecting her to screw him over on the money front.
And another cheer for both genders getting their kit off, and not just the females..
Extortion, sex, murder and none of your wildest dreams.
3 WAY is close to congenial coitus...minus one.
A hard luck sign painter(Dominic Purcell)overhears a couple plotting a kidnapping and possible murder all in the name of illicit love.
He schemes up a way to foil the thing and make a sizable fortune in the process.
Now enters a very serious blackmailer(Dwight Yoakam)and this tale becomes more muddled and darkly comedic.
At times there is a something to look at and very little to talk about.
Also in the cast: Gina Gershon, Desmond Harrington and Ali Larter.
In my wildest dreams...Gershon with Larter and well...you know. |
tt0083701 | Bugs Bunny's 3rd Movie: 1001 Rabbit Tales | Bugs Bunny and Daffy Duck have to sell books for Rambling House. They go their separate ways and experience many wacky things. For instance, while flying through a winter storm, Daffy ran into a house owned by Porky Pig and briefly stayed there while taking place of a stuffed duck which he merely destroyed. Meanwhile, Bugs burrowed his way to a jungle where he pretended to be a baby ape to an ape couple. One half of the couple wanted to do Bugs in, but manages to divert him after he accidentally dropped a boulder on his wife's head.
After a little while, Bugs and Daffy reunite and burrowed their way to a cave at a dry desert. Inside, were treasures consisting of gold, jewels and stuff. The greedy duck tries to take the treasure, but he ran into Hassan the guard and made a mad dash back to Bugs who tricked Hassan into climbing into the clouds. Daffy ran back into the cave in excitement.
Later, Bugs comes across Sultan Yosemite Sam's palace in the Arabian desert. Sam needs someone to read a series of stories to his spoiled brat son, Prince Abba-Dabba. When Bugs first meets the tyke and gets mocked, he objects to the idea of reading to him. Then, Sam threatens to make Bugs bathe in boiling oil, at which point Bugs agrees to read to Abba-Dabba. Bugs tries to escape in a variety of ways but to no avail. At one point, Bugs even escaped on a flying carpet from the palace, but Sam catches him.
Meanwhile, Daffy tries to make off with the treasure. As he finished with it, he makes a quick check to see if he missed anything. That's when he encountered a magic lamp with a genie inside. Initially he rubbed the lamp thinking that with a little spit and polish, it would bring a few more bucks but it instead releases a genie whom Daffy pushes him back down thinking he was trying to steal the treasure. But the genie does not like what he was doing and chases him out of the cave by casting dangerous spells on him. Daffy then wanders through the desert in a desperate search for water.
Back at the palace, Bugs is fed up with reading stories to the prince, so he dumps his book in the fire. As he was being threatened to be dunked in boiling oil, Bugs warns Sam not to throw him in a nearby hole which Sam eventually did. Little did Sam and Abba-Dabba realize that this was Bugs' ticket to freedom. So Bugs luckily escapes and ran into Daffy. Daffy was pleased to see Bugs and soon sees the palace, hoping to sell books there. Bugs tries to warn Daffy about the palace, but he would not listen. He found out the hard way and the two walk off into the sunset with Daffy missing all of his feathers.
=== Included shorts ===
Cracked Quack (Daffy's line, "We'll just put it away in the storage for the winter", is replaced with, "Thermopolis will just have to wait")
Apes of Wrath (Bugs' line, "So I'll be a monkey", is replaced with, "I'll sell books later")
Wise Quackers (The opening where Daffy is flying and crash-lands like a plane on a farm and encounters Elmer.)
Ali Baba Bunny (ending to cartoon appears later on with Bugs removed)
Tweety and the Beanstalk (Bugs narrates the closing events of the cartoon)
Bewitched Bunny (ends abruptly after the prince takes his leave)
Goldimouse and the Three Cats (Bugs reads the narrator's lines)
A Sheep in the Deep (Bugs tells the story of Little Bo Peep) *Note: Currently cut out for time constrains.
Red Riding Hoodwinked (Bugs again narrates the opening)
The Pied Piper of Guadalupe & Mexican Boarders (with the story starting in the middle of the former after Sylvester had learned to play the flute before shifting to the plot of the latter and going back to the ending of the former)
One Froggy Evening (the ending is not shown)
Aqua Duck (footage is mirrored and only shown up to the point where Daffy realizes a pool of water is a mirage) | storytelling | train | wikipedia | I'll be honest.
I actually liked this!.
At 18, I am a huge Looney Tunes fan.
As a little girl, I loved watching them and laughing at the manic wit, marvelling at the colourful animation and admiring the playful and energetic music, not to mention loving the witty characters(especially Bugs and Daffy) and the fresh dialogue.
Even if some cartoons were a little predictable in the story, I know some of the Speedy Gonzales cartoons were on the predictable side, I still loved them.
And I still do, I've finished school now, and one of my guilty pleasures is watching Looney Tunes, Tom and Jerry and Scooby Doo on Boomerang, I can't help it and I still love them.So as a huge fan of Looney Tunes, I heard there were a few movies and compilation films and thought I would like to check them out.
I had an inkling I had seen parts of 1001 Rabbit Tales before, as the parts in the palace struck a big bell with me, but I insisted on seeing the whole film.
Overall, I enjoyed 1001 Rabbit Tales.
I agree it is uneven, not a huge surprise for me as I have found in the past that compilation films have parts that work and parts that don't quite, but I liked it.First of all, it was a delight seeing all those cartoons.
I love a vast majority of the cartoons featured, especially One Froggy Evening, Bewitched Bunny, Ali Baba Bunny and Tweety and the Beanstalk, which have great animation, music, dialogue and sight gags.
The ones that didn't strike me as quite as memorable was Mexican Boarders and Apes of Wrath(though Bugs and the drunken stork elevated it), Mexican Boarders because although it was an improvement over most Speedy cartoons it was my least favourite cartoon featured.
I did like Goldimouse and the Three Cats too, it starts off slow but gets better as Sylvester falls victim to his own traps.As for the film itself, it was pretty good, though it is the case where the shorts and characters are better than the story itself in my opinion.
The animation on the whole is pretty good, admittedly better in the shorts than in the edited bits, which had a good "scratchy" style but the animation in the cartoons was much more fluid and colourful.
The music was highly enjoyable throughout, very playful and energetic, and I loved the humour.
The humour in the edited bits stuck to the style of the early cartoons, with the interplay between Bugs, Yosemite and the Prince standing out.
Though when it comes to the cartoons themselves, I loved the dark humour of Bewitched Bunny, how Sylvester Jnr in Goldimouse and the Three Cats was named "spoiled brat", the running joke that Bugs ends up somewhere other than he wants due to a wrong turn and the hilarious ending of Red Riding Hoodwinked(not to mention the Big Bad Wolf's short-term memory).It was a huge delight to see all the Looney Tunes characters, Bugs and Daffy of course are the stars of the show, Bugs having more to do, while Yosemite is a delight as the Sultan, they pretty nail what he was like in the earlier cartoons with the hot temper and the fact he is always up to no good.
Porky and Elmer aren't given as much to do, but they are good enough, while Speedy is a lot less annoying in two of his better cartoons(The Pied Piper of Guadalupe being the other).
The drunken stork and Witch Hazel also give delightful contributions.
And all of these characters are brilliantly voiced, Mel Blanc deserving the most credit.However what I didn't like so much was that the film is too short, for me anyway, and I think it should have been better finished than it was.
The story is a good idea, contrary to what has been said already, however it takes a bit of a while to get going but when it does get going it is fine.
The pacing is uneven here I think, not in the cartoons but parts at the beginning could have been better paced.
Finally while I loved the characters, there was one character I didn't like and that was the Prince.
I just found him irritating, not his dialogue(which was great actually) but how he was voiced and animated, too loud and abrasive and blocky when it comes to the animation.
I understand he was meant to be irritating, but not that irritating.Overall, despite its faults, I liked it.
When it comes to the compilation films, I felt Daffy Duck's Quackbusters had the better story and it felt better paced, but the humour and a vast majority of the cartoons here work splendidly.
7/10 Bethany Cox. WONDERFUL ENTERTAINMENT.
While I do agree with the fact that this is not the best way to see these wonderful cartoons, there's no denying that for some this is the only way.
Regular TV programming has fazed out Bugs Bunny cartoons.
Great video compliations are out-of-print.
And if you don't have cable TV, you're screwed.It edits the original shorts with new linking material, which is not a new practice.
Robert Youngson made a career out of this genre; his titles include "4 Clowns" and "Laurel and Hardy's Laughing 20s".
Also, the MGM That's Entertainment!
series, which is up to three.
Most critics tend to praise those titles, but condemn the Warner Bros.
Looney Tunes films.That is not fair.
"1001 Rabbit Tales" is a very good movie on its' own terms.
Supervised by the late, great Friz Freleng, the linking material is the best so far in this series.
The "plot" involves Bugs Bunny and Daffy Duck as salesmen for Rambling House Publishing (a great in-joke that's just one of many).
They go their separate ways and Bugs ends up being a storyteller for Yosemite Sam's son (this is where the old cartoons enter in)Freleng selects some of the very best Looney Tunes shorts for this film.
His selections include "One Froggy Evening", one of the greatest of all time and "Goldilocks and the Three Cats" (featuring Sylvester Jr.) and his editing is seamless this time round, unlike previous entries where it looked more obvious.
Those critics who feel obliged to hate a film like this can go back on the horse they rode in on.
Even Maltin thought it was decent at 2 1/2 stars.
This is wonderful entertainment and considering today's entertainment, timeless.**** out of 4 stars.
boiling oil.
After the creative team that made the classic Looney Tunes cartoons stopped making original cartoons, they made compilations of varying quality (after they all died, the cartoons turned into total garbage).
"Bugs Bunny's 3rd Movie: 1001 Rabbit Tales" has Bugs and Daffy as book salesmen who go their separate ways to try and sell books.
Eventually, Bugs arrives in the Arabian desert, where Yosemite Sam is the sultan and has a spoiled brat son.
So, Bugs agrees to read to the boy, under the threat of bathing in boiling oil if he fails.I guess that overall, this compilation is pretty harmless.
If nothing else, they still had Mel Blanc doing the voices.
But are compilations really that necessary?.
Good Looeny Tunes movie!.
I thought that the characters were really funny and all had great personalities.
The animation in My opinion was crisp, clean, and really clear.
Not to mention beautiful!
Most of the characters in this show are hilarious Looney Tunes characters that we all love.
in My opinion these characters are the funnies and talented ever seen.
In fact, The things that goes on in this series' cartoons are in My opinion nuts which that is what makes them hilarious!
There are so many to like and laugh at and the silly things they do!
If you like the original Looney Tunes and animated films then I strongly recommend that you watch this movie today!.
Very Good.
Although the idea of making films with Looney Tunes short films has already been used, this film is not behind the others, I think it's better, it has a great set of intelligent jokes, fun stories, interesting characters, among many other points positive experiences that will entertain children and adults.
Highly recommend..
I'd have preferred a plain "best of" instead..
I've been watching Bugs Bunny and the rest of the Looney Tunes and Merrie Melodies bunch for as long as I can remember.
I grew up in the 60's before so many of the cartoons were gutted due to concerns about violence, and before they were edited for time.This vid, and the others in the series, makes use of all the old cartoons and splices them together in an effort to create some kind of common time line, and I supposed if you hadn't seen the originals it would be pretty slick, but for me it doesn't work very well.
Hiccupy, if that's even remotely a word, is how I would describe it.
Little modifications, some substantial cuts, and the overlying *effort* needed to fall into the new storyline takes away a lot of the magic for me.But the cartoons are good, solid classics.
Watch it for those..
The Bugs Bunny tales.
Bugs Bunny and Daffy Duck are book salesmen.They go different ways to sell books and a lot of fun stuff happens to them.Bugs ends up in Sultan Yosemite Sam's palace, where he is forced to tell tales to Prince Abadaba.Bugs Bunny's 3rd Movie: 1001 Rabbit Tales (1982) is directed by Friz Freleng, Chuck Jones and Robert McKimson.It has a compilation of classic Warner Bros.
shorts.As voice artists you can hear Mel Blanc, who does the voice of Bugs, Daffy, Porky Pig and so on.Arthur Q.
Bryan is Elmer Fudd.June Foray (who is 94 years old today!) is Granny and some others.Shepard Menken is Old Storyteller.Lennie Weinrib is Abadaba.Bill Roberts is Michigan J.
Frog.I had most fun watching this.As did my 7-year old cousins.It's hilarious when Daffy pretends to be the stuffed duck.Or Sylvester trying to catch the gigantic Tweety in the beanstalk tale.Not to forget Sylvester as the Pied Piper and Speedy Gonzales doing his thing.These Looney Tunes tales are great fun- for both kids and adults..
Ridiculous Recycling..
Another one of the quick-fix movies by the Warner Bros.
studio to make some fast money off the famed Looney Tunes characters.
Old cartoons starring most all the major characters are held together by an unfunny new cartoon that has book salesman Bugs Bunny telling stories to Yosemite Sam's young brat of a son in a palace in the middle of the desert.
Naturally there is also Daffy Duck trying to survive the harsh desert environment.
It is tough to survive this harsh cut-and-paste mess.
Watch the Cartoon Network instead.
2.5 out of 5 stars..
Bygone .
What makes the Warner Bros.
animated shorts created between the early 30s and the late 50s so interesting is that are brought to life through a combination of perfect timing, wonderful writing and a wicked sense of humor.
That wicked sense of humor got passed the Hays office in the early 30s probably because the censorship watchdogs assumed that they were simple-minded cartoons and paid them no mind (or they were too busy crabbing about the length of Betty Boop's skirt).
These dayts that attitude comes mostly from distributors who routinely pigeonhole these works of comic art as 'kiddie fare' (which explains why the great black and white Popeye cartoons of the early 30s are always shown in color) so they routinely chop, cut and trim them to fit a time schedule.Those same distributors who like to package these great works as 'kiddie fare' are primarily responsible for what doesn't work in 'Bugs Bunny's Third Movie: 1001 Rabbit Tales', the third of Warner Bros.
compilation films linking new (rather ersatz) material to introduce old classic cartoons.The linking premise this time has Bugs and Daffy as book salesmen for Rambling House going their separate ways to try and see who can make more money.
Bugs ends up at a castle in Arabia run by Yosemite Sam who demands that Bugs read 1001 stories to his loudmouth son Prince Abba Dabba.
The first problem is that the premise is lame and the character of the son is irritating with his loud mouth and hyena whine every time Bugs refuses to read him a story.
Daffy meanwhile has unmemorable incounters with Porky Pig and Elmer Fudd.The other problem is that the classic cartoons that they include have been cut mostly to fit the storyline of the new linking material.
One of the greatest animated shorts ever made was Chuck Jones' brilliant 'One Froggy Evening' in which a greedy construction worker finds a box containing a frog that can sing and dance.
The downside being that the frog won't sing for anyone but him.
This falters all of the man's attempts to make money selling him as an act.
The greatest irony of this cartoon is that there are no speaking parts except when the frog sings.
The problem in this movie is that new narration by Bugs as he reads the story interrupts the quiet comic flow and worst of all, the hilarious, wicked final punchline is cut off.I was afraid that this kind of prepackaged butchery was becoming a trend until Cartoon Network put together three shows which really celebrate how important these shorts are.
The best is 'Toonheads' which has a theme every week showing how different artists interpreted different characters.
The others are 'The Tex Avery Show' and 'The Bob Clampett Show' which spotlight the best works of each artist and allow the viewer to learn a little about what went into their inspiration.'1001 Rabbit Tales' is an example of a practice in the 1980s of hurling any moving cartoon image at children and assuming that it would stick.
Thankfully, that era has passed..
bugs Bunny's 3rd compilation.
Friz, Chuck and others all had shorts featured on this one.I love Looney Tunes and have the golden collection sets and watch them and love them and they are put together really well.
I think that we all know how people in the movie business are good at putting out any product to make money off of.
This here is a perfect example of how..This is a compilation of shorts pieced together with popular shorts and new material written to piece it all together.The good thing is that these shorts are not as common as shorts on the first two movies, however they are still popular.
Things like Michigan Dave and the stork who takes bugs to a family of gorillas are nice additions.I love how slow poke Rodriquez was added here as thats not a popular one, as well as Daffy and the trophy duck.I was disappointed to see a short in this film that was also in The Great American Chase.
How can this be a sequel and have the same thing as part 1.I liked this one better than any of the "movies" but it still was nothing spectacular and we've seen it all so much.
I wanted for once there to be an actual movie.
I haven't seen the two daffy duck movies that are considered sequels to this, maybe some more original stuff was included in those.This one gets 5 out of 10 stars cause I have seen them less, and liked the connecting theme more..
Bugs Bunny's 3rd Movie: 1001 Rabbit Tales.
This was the last Looney Tunes and Merrie Melodies compilation film made up of loads of already made cartoons, concocted into a story.
Basically Bugs Bunny and Daffy Duck are working for a book selling company.
They split up to sell books in different areas, however Daffy wants to head south to migrate.
Bugs meets Daffy after mistakingly being given to gorillas by the Stork and chased by Elmer Fudd, and they both end up in Arabia.
Bugs finds a kingdom run by Yosemite Sam. He is told to read his 1001 stories for his prince, or face being boiled in oil.
This is obviously an excuse to use many good episodes involving fairy tales, e.g. Jack and the Beanstalk, Hansel and Gretel, a Pied Piper story, and a Singing Frog.
Daffy Duck was number 30, Looney Tunes/Merrie Melodies number 20 and Bugs Bunny number 10 on The 100 Greatest Cartoons.
Worth watching! |
tt1988591 | Death Race: Inferno | Death Race owner R.H. Weyland (Ving Rhames) has been forced to sell the rights to Niles York (Dougray Scott), a British billionaire who acquired the rights by hostile takeover. York reveals he intends to relocate Death Race to the deserts of South Africa as a Transcontinental Race. Before leaving, Weyland arranges Carl Lucas, also known as Frankenstein (Luke Goss), to have surgery to heal the infected and deadly scars on his face sustained from his gruesome crash. With Lucas one win away from gaining his freedom, York threatens to kill him if he wins.
Before his first race, Lucas engages in a fist fight with other racers and his mask is knocked off in the middle of the fight, revealing to his crew who believed him dead. Before the first race, all of the female navigators had to participate in a Death Race "Navigator Wars" and Death Race itself is now hosted and produced by Satana (Hlubi Mboya). Contestants to be chosen are the top 10 survivors, with Katrina (Tanit Phoenix) among the survivors. Before the first race, all racers receive GPS locators surgically so the showrunners can locate the racers are at all times and if necessary kill them if they attempt an escape.
During the first race, racing in the deserts of Africa present a different set of difficulties compared to racing on the Terminal Island prison race course. Eleven racers take the start, but one, Jackal, jumps the start and is killed by the missile tracker. Joker, Pretty Boy and the Tazmanian Devil also die in the first sector. Razor beats out Frankenstein by a hair to win the first race.
After the race, Katrina tells Lucas they cannot resume their previous relationship as she is hearbroken over finding out he kept his survival secret from her. A fight ensues after the first race and Goldberg (Danny Trejo) is cut in the scuffle. The show's surgeon makes advances on Goldberg and the two establish a relationship. In order to make Katrina jealous, the producer Satana orders Psycho's (Jeremy Crutchley) navigator Amber to have sex with Lucas, who seems to refuse the offer. Satana and York grow suspicious that Lucas is up to something due to his non-rebellious attitude to being forced to lose. Lucas then explains to his team mates his deal with York to lose and says instead he made a "new deal."
The second race then commences with the death of three more drivers. Fury is killed after being tricked by Olga Braun (Death Race's first ever female driver) and she is in turn killed by Razor seconds later. Afterwards, Razor is struggling to handle both Lucas and Psycho before the three are joined by 14K (Robin Shou), having disabled Nero's car before leaving him to get beaten to death by an angry mob of locals. The race ends with Lucas emerging victorious in the second race. But at that moment, Goldberg is caught in an explosion caused by stray bullets from local hostile war lords, and is pronounced dead. Later on, York reminds Lucas he is to lose his next race to 14K or York will torture him and Katrina. Satana then discovers York wishes to replace her as producer and remove her from Death Race so he can assume complete control. Before the next race, Katrina confesses her love to Lucas, and Lucas admits he did not have sex with the other navigator when he had the chance. The final race begins with Razor disabling Psycho's car, and Psycho dies in the flames while his navigator Amber survives without taking any damage. Lucas taking the lead and York attempting to kill Lucas with a homing missile but 14K shoots flares to send the missile off course which saves Lucas's life returning the "life for a life" favor.
Near the end of the race, Lucas holds a commanding lead and kills many of the Death Race guards along the way, vowing to kill York. However, Lucas allows 14K to pass him and then speeds to York. As York attempts to escape, Satana handcuffs him to the table for attempting to replace her also for his actions and making an earlier phone call with a need of help to deal with York. Lucas crashes his car into the control room and explodes, engulfing the room in flames. Initially, it is insinuated that everyone except Lucas perished in the crash. However, it is revealed that Lucas and Katrina escaped unharmed, and now the unrecognizable York as Lucas, aka Frankenstein. In order to assert York is Frankenstein, Lists (Fred Koehler) confirms it is him, along with the show's surgeon who claims the implanted chip is that of Lucas's.
It is then revealed that Lucas's "new deal" he made during the meeting with Weyland was to fake Goldberg's death; the surgeon Olivia (Kim Syster) (Goldberg's love interest) falsely pronounced him dead, and after the crash pronounces York and Katrina as dead and Lucas as the sole survivor. Since York is officially dead, Weyland regains control of Death Race and grants Lucas, Katrina, Lists, and Goldberg their freedom, but Lists elects to stay behind and returns to Terminal Island. Weyland pays Lucas a substantial amount of money for his help regaining control of Death Race, he and Katrina relocate with Goldberg elsewhere, while Niles York is punished for his crimes and he is imprisoned in Terminal Island, forcing him to become the Second Frankenstein. | violence, murder | train | wikipedia | null |
tt0232960 | Woh Kaun Thi? | On a rainy night, the highly reputed Dr. Anand is driving. He sees a woman standing in the road and gives her a lift. She introduces herself as Sandhya. As soon as she steps in the car, the wipers eerily stop working. He's even more spooked when the lady shows him the way when it isn't visible and guides him outside a cemetery. On reaching the cemetery, the gates open automatically and he hears someone sing the words “Naina Barse Rimjhim Rimjhim”.
Dr. Anand is about to inherit a large fortune from a distant relative under the condition that he is perfectly mentally stable—otherwise he would not inherit the property as there had already been cases of mental instability in his family in the past. His colleague, Dr. Lata loves Dr. Anand but he already has a girlfriend, Seema. Mystery unfolds when Seema is killed by a cyanide injection and the suspects are Dr. Lata and her father, Dr. Singh, the head doctor of the hospital in which Anand and Lata work.
On a stormy night, Anand is called to a dilapidated mansion on an emergency case. There, he comes to know that the patient has already died. He is surprised to see that the patient is Sandhya. Some policemen tell him that the place has been deserted for a while and that it is rumored to be haunted. The policemen inform him that what he saw in the mansion happened years ago and many a doctor have registered similar cases with the police on rainy nights. On another occasion, he sees a newspaper which says that Sandhya died in a rail accident.
Anand is very unhappy after his girlfriend’s demise but his marriage is fixed to a girl Anand’s mother has never even seen, but was recommended by her sister. On the wedding night, Anand is shocked to see that it's Sandhya. He starts avoiding her. One day, he sees that she has painted the same bungalow in which he was called on that rainy night. Just after that, he hears her singing a part of “Naina Barse Rimjhim Rimjhim." Another evening, he sees an unmanned boat sailing in the lake and hears another part of “Naina Barse Rimjhim Rimjhim." Yet another night, Sandhya reaches Anand’s hospital and tries to impress him with her beauty and singing. He gets impressed and they sit in the car, where he gets déjà vu as again the wipers stop working and she can clearly see the way in the stormy and foggy night. He takes her to the bungalow and to the room where he had seen her dead and she disappears. When he reaches home, she is waiting for him and his mother says that she never left the house.
Anand is finally successful in persuading his mother to let Sandhya go back to her home by train. The next day, he comes to know that the train got into an accident, but he saw her on the terrace that same night. All these things take a toll on his mental health and he is advised to take some rest in Shimla. There, he meets a monk on a hilltop who tells him that 100 years ago at this very spot, a boy and a girl were romancing when the girl fell and died. Since then, her spirit has been roaming, waiting for her lover to return, who has been reincarnated in Anand’s form. Anand then sees Sandhya far down the hillside and she sings the last part of “Naina Barse Rimjhim Rimjhim”. Persuaded, Anand jumps, but is saved by Lata. Later, when Anand sees Sandhya trying to lure him out, he follows her to the same old bungalow, where he sees Sandhya on the stairway in one moment and then impossibly beside him in another.
She lures him to the roof, where suddenly he sees a duplicate of Sandhya. The duplicate shouts that she is the real Sandhya but she is gagged and taken away. Strengthened by this sudden revelation, Anand realizes this woman is not a ghost and confronts her, but she accidentally falls down and dies. Then comes Ramesh, Anand’s cousin. He reveals that this was his plan so that Anand is termed as mentally unstable and that his entire inheritance would pass to the next cousin: Ramesh. A duel follows and the police arrive. The other woman was Sandhya’s twin, of whom Sandhya didn’t know, but Ramesh came to know by chance. Sandhya’s parents had separated them years ago when her father took away the other girl. He died, and she was forced to adopt unfair means for her living. The “Sandhya” who had lured him in the hospital was this other girl. This explains Sandhya’s presence at 2 places at the same time. Hence, the mystery is solved and at the end of the film Sandhya and Anand hug. | suspenseful, murder, romantic | train | wikipedia | Watch the film to find out.
is the first out of three Raj Khosla-directed thrillers starring Sadhana in the lead, the other two being Mera Saaya (1965) and Anita (1967).
Actually, all three films have similar concepts and are all successful, although Mera Saaya is my favourite.
The movie starts on one rainy night when Manoj Kumar's Dr. Anand while driving home meets a young, serious and awkward woman, whose image will chase him for a long time to come.
The movie is high on suspense, and Raj Khosla handles everything very well.
The script is tense, interesting and twisted, at times so much that there isn't a possible solution one would offer.
The writers try to lead the audience to one particular prediction, but the movie is still highly unpredictable.
I liked many of the film's scenes.
The movie is aided by some melodious songs composed by Madan Mohan and sung by Lata Mangeshkar, it is technically well done and is generally well cast.
While Manoj Kumar does well and is pretty decent as the confused guy, it is expectedly Sadhana who dominates this show with her beauty and ambiguity, successfully creating a mysterious, eerie character.
The climax actually turns into an anticlimax which reveals all the secrets in one hit and is a bit too direct for my liking.
I just felt everything was uncovered because there was no other way around.
Clearly, the writers wanted to keep the mystery for as long as they could and then throw everything into one scene which clarifies it all within two minutes.
But even then they failed to answer some substantial questions like how the car's wipers stopped and how Sadhana found the way visible through the car's front windowpane while the guy could not.
This is a major plot hole and I wonder how the makers did not notice that.
Anyway, Woh Kaun Thi?
Anyway, Woh Kaun Thi?
is still a memorable Raj Khosla thriller which was quite good for its time and is still worth watching today..
Sadhana at her mysterious best.
On a rainy night, a doctor on his way back home meets a white sari clad girl.
He offers her a lift and as soon as she steps in the car wipers cease working.He's even more spooked when the lady tells him she knows the way and guides him outside a cemetery.
Enroute when he notices her hand is bleeding, she tells him "Mujhe khoon achcha lagta hai" (I like blood) A while later a distraught father stops his car begging him to save his daughter's life.
He follows the man and comes to a manor-like house, but unfortunately the girl in question is already dead.
He is surprised to see her, she being the same who he just dropped off at a cemetery a while ago.
When he goes back,he encounters some policemen who tell him that the place is deserted and no-one has been living there for a while now.
Thus starts off the promising premise of Woh Kaun Thi,a wonderful whodunit by Raj Khosla aided by some great music by Madan Mohan.
Sadhana never looked more enticing (check her out in "Lag Ja Gale") and Manoj Kumar thankfully is restrained.
The supporting cast is also good..
Spledind performance.
Splendid performances by Manoj & Sadhana.A haunting tale from Raj Khosla.
A thoroughly gripping story.
Songs are melodious and catchy.Manoj plays his role convincingly and Sadhana is charming as well as haunting in it.All the supporting cast has done their part convincingly.There is not a dull moment in this film.The ambiance of the film is spooky and the songs add to it.
The plot is taut and keeps the audience engaged.The viewer gets intrigued by the twist and turns of the story.
Sadhana is at her best as the haunting lady who makes the viewer trying to guess her true identity.The suspense is absorbing and keeps one wondering what will happen next?
The songs lend an aura of mystery to the film.
Great music by MadanMohan..
Watch if for Sadhana.
I was not much fan of yesteryears Indian movies before seeing this movie.
Man this movie is so captivating, it just suck you in..
The very first scene when the protagonist(Manoj Kumar) gives lift to Sadhana, and the dialogues that goes in that journey is pretty cool..
Little flaws of editing or tilt screen is easily forgotten when you consider this is made in 50s.
for me movie is all bout the the leading actress Sadhana..
She luks so natural and ravishing...
now I understand what was all the fuzz about Sadhana's Cut..
Watching her on screen is simply mesmerizing.
If you like this you will surely watch the trilogy of Wo kaun thi, Mera saaya and anita..
I am a big fan of Sadhana so i wud recommend this movie to everyone..
8/10 easily..
It's the time of wee hours in India and it's raining outside in Hyderabad.
What can be the better situation to write a review of this movie which begins with the scene of heavy rainfall and that scene itself lends momentum to the mystery of the movie ?
The opening scene picturized upon Saadhana and Manoj Kumar in heavy rainfall is itself so impressive that the viewer gets compelled to watch the full movie.
Perhaps in no other Indian suspense-thriller, the opening scene is that much impressive.
Manoj Kumar driving home in heavy rainfall finds Saadhana standing in the middle of the road, wearing a white saari and getting drenched without apparently unaffected by this fact.
Mysterous dialogues take place between them and finally Manoj Kumar drops her near a graveyard with spellbound to see her disappearing in it with a highly melodious song echoing inside - Naina Barse Rimjhim Rimjhim.
The spellbinding suspense starts now for the next two and a half hours.Woh Kaun Thi (who was she ?) is a black and white movie released in 1964 starring Manoj Kumar and Saadhana.
It is still considered a classic mystery.
In fact the fact of its being black and white is a plus point of this movie as the mystery appears to be deeper with the characters appearing on the screen looking more mysterious than they actually are.
The great music composed by Madan Mohan rendered further strength to the suspense and thrill of the movie and Saadhana in the title role delivered a splendid performance to make the movie as spellbinding for the viewers.I have already discussed the highly impactful opening scene.
The story moves quickly with the fact coming out that our hero, Manoj Kumar is a doctor, working in the hospital of K.N. Singh and having a love affair with Helen.
Shortly Helen gets murdered and the mysterious woman, Saadhana who had disappeared in the graveyard in the beginning reappears before him in a further mysterious fashion only to disappear even more suspensefully.
His mother gets him married to a girl of her choice but you can guess that when he sees her face on the first night of their conjugal life (yes, there were times in India in which the bride and the groom of an arranged marriage were able to see each other's faces for the first time on that night only), he is taken aback to see the same girl, now as his wife.
Then several twists and turn keep on coming in the narrative taking the story to Shimla and the suspense is finally revealed in the climax.The story is just very very good and Raj Khosla was an able director of his time who directed classic suspense movies like Mera Saaya and Anita too.
He has handled the plot very well.
The problem is with the revelation of the suspense in the climax in which the police officer, Raj Mehra delivers a long speech regarding the mystery and despite that leaves many significant questions unanswered.
If you ignore that fact, you won't find any fault with the movie which contains comedy, romance and melodious music alongwith the gripping mystery.
The very first scene grips you like a powerful clamp and then you are so engrossed in the narrative that you can leave the movie after seeing its climax only, not before that.Saadhanalooks so gorgeous in the movie that it's better for you to watch her instead of reading my narration about her.
And acting ?
She has delivered a highly admirable performance in the pivotal role.
Manoj Kumar is OK.
The supporting cast includes Helen, K.N. Singh, Parveen Chaudhary, Prem Chopra, Dhumal, Raj Mehra, Ratnamala etc and all of them have performed their roles pretty well.Technically also the movie is perfect.
The aura of suspense is maintained throughout.
The cinematographer has ably captured the snowy beauty of Shimla.The discussion of Woh Kaun Thi cannot be complete without its music.
Madan Mohan has composed immortal music for the movie with the classic songs of Lata like Naina Barse Rimjhim Rimjhim, Lag Ja Gale and Jo Hamne Daastan Apni Sunaai.
The other songs of the movie viz.
Chhod Kar Tere Pyar Ka Daaman (Rafi), Shokh Nazar Ki Bijliyaan (Asha), Tiki Riki Tiki Riki Takuri (Rafi-Asha) are also very melodious and a treat to listen.No suspense-thriller fan should miss this movie..
Great suspense.
The movie has a great suspense which is only revealed at the end It cannot be guessed easily if you haven't seen similar movies.
It also has an element of horror setting.
Sadhna's acting is brilliant.
Manoj Kumar looks handsome.
Watch it for the mystery that the movie carries all throughout.
There are a few moments of slow pace but overall a great thriller. |
tt0117991 | Twelfth Night or What You Will | Viola is shipwrecked on the coast of Illyria and she comes ashore with the help of a captain. She lost contact with her twin brother, Sebastian, whom she believed to be drowned. Disguising herself as a young man under the name Cesario, she enters the service of Duke Orsino through the help of the sea captain who rescues her. Duke Orsino has convinced himself that he is in love with Olivia, whose father and brother have recently died, and who refuses to see charming things, be in the company of men, and entertain love or marriage proposals from anyone, the Duke included, until seven years have passed. Duke Orsino then uses 'Cesario' as an intermediary to profess his passionate love before Olivia. Olivia, however, forgetting about the seven years in his case, falls in love with 'Cesario', as she does not realize the Duke's messenger is a woman in disguise. In the meantime, Viola has fallen in love with the Duke Orsino, creating a love triangle between Duke Orsino, Olivia and Viola: Viola loves Duke Orsino, Duke Orsino loves Olivia, and Olivia loves Viola disguised as Cesario.
In the comic subplot, several characters conspire to make Olivia's pompous steward, Malvolio, believe that Olivia has fallen for him. This involves Olivia's uncle, Sir Toby Belch; another would-be suitor, a silly squire named Sir Andrew Aguecheek; her servants Maria and Fabian; and her fool, Feste. Sir Toby and Sir Andrew engage themselves in drinking and revelry, thus disturbing the peace of Olivia's house until late into the night, prompting Malvolio to chastise them. Sir Toby famously retorts, "Dost thou think, because thou art virtuous, there shall be no more cakes and ale?" (Act II, Scene III) Sir Toby, Sir Andrew, and Maria are urged to plan revenge on Malvolio. They convince Malvolio that Olivia is secretly in love with him by planting a love letter, written by Maria in Olivia's handwriting. It asks Malvolio to wear yellow stockings cross-gartered, to be rude to the rest of the servants, and to smile constantly in the presence of Olivia. Malvolio finds the letter and reacts in surprised delight. He starts acting out the contents of the letter to show Olivia his positive response. Olivia is shocked by the changes in Malvolio and leaves him to the contrivances of his tormentors. Pretending that Malvolio is insane, they lock him up in a dark chamber. Feste visits him to mock his insanity, both disguised as a priest and as himself.
Meanwhile, Sebastian (who had been rescued by his friend Antonio, a brigand who Orsino wants arrested) arrives on the scene, which adds confusion of mistaken identity. Mistaking Sebastian for 'Cesario', Olivia asks him to marry her, and they are secretly married in a church. Finally, when 'Cesario' and Sebastian appear in the presence of both Olivia and Orsino, there is more wonder and confusion at their similarity. At this point, Viola reveals her disguise and that Sebastian is her twin brother. The play ends in a declaration of marriage between Duke Orsino and Viola, and it is learned that Sir Toby has married Maria. Malvolio swears revenge on his tormentors and stalks off, but Orsino sends Fabian to placate him. | romantic, flashback | train | wikipedia | Trevor Nunn's beautifully photographed and acted, deftly written film is one of the most enjoyable adaptations of a Shakespeare play ever made.
Helena Bonham Carter is pitch perfect as the beautiful Olivia, who in "deep mourning" for her dead brother, falls in love with Cesario (who happens to be a woman named Viola dressed up as a man, wonderfully played by Imogen Stubbs, the only actress I've ever seen able to create both a charming Viola and a totally believable Cesario), meanwhile Viola falls for the Duke of fictional Illyria (the exquisite Toby Stephens) who is desperately in love with the Lady Olivia.
The beautiful natural light, with later dark contrasts, perfectly complements the jovial, winning mood of this Shakespeare comedy brought to screen: and, what is more, this is truly beyond any sense of 'heritage cinema', as Shakespeare's genius is retained.Yes, it is all a very 'accessible' package, but much is unusual and distinctive to this film adaptation.
In Illyria, Orsino (Toby Stephens), a nobleman, is saddened because he cannot have the love of Lady Olivia (Helena Bonham-Carter) who is mourning the loss of her brother.
This is the premise of one of William Shakespeare's most appealing comedies, Twelfth Night: Or What You Will, updated from Elizabethan England to late 19th century and brought to life by director Trevor Nunn.
It is one of the best interpretations of Shakespeare that I have seen on film.Reminiscent of other Shakespearean cross-dressing comedies such as As You Like It, Twelfth Night is mostly about the ins and outs of romantic love but it is also about pride, "overweening ambition", disguises, and mistaken identities.
The play contains some of Shakespeare's most memorable characters: Sir Toby Belch (Mel Smith), Olivia's drunken uncle, his friend Sir Andrew Aguecheek (Richard E.
Grant) who is also trying to court Olivia, Olivia's gentlewoman Maria (Imelda Staunton), Feste (Ben Kingsley), the house clown, and Malvolio (Nigel Hawthorne) the prudish steward.
Some have noticed a similarity between the character of Olivia and Queen Elizabeth and interestingly, Olivia is addressed by Feste as "madonna", the only time the word is used in all of Shakespeare, perhaps a wry comment about the myth of the Virgin Queen.The main story involves a love triangle between Orsinio, Viola, and Olivia but the minor characters have more than ample time on stage.
She forges a love letter supposedly from Olivia telling him that if he wants her to notice him, he should dress in yellow stockings and crossed garters and, as he woos Olivia dressed in his strange attire, Malvolio cuts a ridiculous figure (incidentally this is the same costume worn by Henry VIII when he danced with Anne Boleyn, Queen Elizabeth's mother, at a masked ball, before he had her beheaded for adultery).While there are many great performances, the star for me is Ben Kingsley who is totally convincing as Feste, a fool but a knowing one who functions as an objective commentator of the scene around him, exuding an air of righteous superiority.
The scene that cuts between Feste's song and Viola/Cesario and Orsino playing cards is wonderful, taking in eight of the characters and telling you more about them.
However, the excellent Cornish locations at St Michael's Mount & Lanhyrock give a good sense of place and the winter setting (apart from the scene of apple picking!) comes across well - it really does look like an English winter, rather than a picture postcard snow-scene.The play is cut down to a manageable length without losing the sense of it, The broad comedy aspects (Toby Belch et al) are thankfully limited.The acting is well done by a cast of British stalwarts.
Amazingly, Viola and Sebastian actually do look broadly alike.This film is best viewed as an amusing light romantic comedy rather than a side-splitter..
The film nails both the joy and the darkness of Shakespeare's play - and the play, make no mistake, contains plenty of dark and strange moments when things go, as the drunken uncle Sir Toby Belch says, "Out of tune, sir." The filmmakers deserve credit for not glossing over the shades of sadism in Toby's treatment of Malvolio or the shallow fickleness of Orsino's character.
Nigel Hawthorne's Malvolio is destroyed by the glacial tempo, and Helena Bonham Carter's charm wilts at half speed.Mel Smith is beautifully cast as Sir Toby Belch, but is also just too darn slow.
Apparently he succumbed to the notion that everything Shakespearean has somehow to seem profound, which in this case results in an attempt to transfer this light, sparkling comedy, full of deliberately overdrawn characters and silly lines and pratfalls, into a brooding tragedy in which pompous ass Malvolio acts as if he were, or imagined himself to be, Hamlet caught in the wrong play, while clown Feste is misanthropic to the point of sadism.
Twelfth Night is one of Shakespeare's finest plays, with many complex characters who can constantly surprise the audience without in any way derailing the ongoing comedy, and this makes the play a joy to watch.
Overall I have rated this film at 5 stars; but readers of these comments should recognise that I would have liked to give it a higher rating if only I had been able to forget occasionally that I was watching actors playing rather strange and hybrid parts..
The 1990s, however, saw two very fine adaptations of Shakespearean comedies, Kenneth Branagh's "Much Ado about Nothing" and Trevor Nunn's "Twelfth Night"."Twelfth Night" is another name for the Feast of the Epiphany, January 6th, and the action of the play is supposed to take place around that date.
The lesbian overtones to the Olivia/Viola relationship would probably have been rather muted in Shakespeare's day when all female roles would have been played by boys, but here Helena Bonham-Carter and Imogen Stubbs (the director's wife) make the most of them.
I must, however, mention Stubbs, who is able to suggest both a male persona and the underlying woman, and Ben Kingsley as Olivia's jester Feste, whom he plays less as a clown than as a sardonic old philosopher, an eccentric but also a man gifted with penetrating insights into human life.
"Twelfth Night" is one of Shakespeare's best-known comedies, and like all well-known Shakespeare plays it has become very familiar in the theatre.
Bright spots came from the interaction of "Cesario" and Orsino, and a bright performance by Helena Bonham Carter as Olivia, who played mournful sister, besotted lover and imperious noblewoman with equal brilliance.
Throughout the play he has a disconcerting habit of staring at other characters or the camera with what almost be described as a leer.Maybe Shakespeare would have sighed and commiserated with the producer of this film, because the clowns in his day were also big stars who demanded a lot of meat in their roles.
Imogen Stubbs is attractive and feisty as Viola/Cesario, Ben Kingsley delivers a complex and intriguing performance as the fool Feste, and Helena Bonham -Carter is a warm, humorous and devastatingly beautiful Olivia.
Ben Kingsley can't sing but is nonetheless a charismatic, intriguing Feste; Nigel Hawthorne is particularly effective in Malvolio's final scenes, somewhere close to Madness of King George territory, while Imogen Stubbs is an engaging Viola (and reasonably credible Cesario) throughout.
I admit I'm no expert on Shakespeare and I'd never read 'Twelfth Night' before seeing this film, so I found it a little difficult to follow.
Her scenes with Helena Bonham Carter as Olivia, who is smitten with "him," are a great joy and lots of fun to watch.
For various reasons, I think that stage representations, and films all the more, are usually incapable to render the full power of Shakespeare's genius."Twelfth Night" sits among the too many movies from Shakespeare's works.
Following are my comments on the film.Usually, and sensibly, the twins Sebastian and Viola are played on the stage by the same actress.
Unfortunately, Mackintosh and Stubbs are so utterly different that the view of people on the screen pretending to mistake one for the other has a ridiculous effect on the audience.The 19th century costumes ruins the legendary atmosphere of the story: where to place Orsino's duchy in Illyria, at that epoch divided between the Austrian and Turkish empires?I have seen Nigel Hawthorne in several British movies.
There's no art in many of these comic scenes, which should be cut with advantage.Bonham Carter and Stubbs act well and are pretty and attractive women; but Shakespeare's love-verses praise and exalt a beauty these two actresses don't attain.
And, speaking of women's attractiveness, how much drunk is supposed to be Sir Toby, to fall in love with THAT maid Maria?The above considerations are not intended to blame "Twelfth Night", a pleasant movie with some merits.
Although not the 'modern' version it once was this is still a good enough film version of Shakespeare's immortal comedy of misunderstandings and love triangles galore.As with any literary adaptation there are certain interpretations of characters/actors playing them that you prefer, and this version is no different.
I liked Helena Bonham Carter's portrayal, I didn't like Ben Kingsley's, it's swings and roundabouts.This is however a decent enough adaptation that remains faithful to the original text to satisfy fans, while also filmic enough to entertain those who haven't read the play..
With this version of Twelfth Night, I did find some parts of the first half of the film a little hard to get into but as the characters and various threads get developed a bit more.At the start the aspects of farce and slight melancholy don't totally work but as it went on and I got into it, I found that it worked better and better.
Perhaps Viola has previously been played as a page rather than a young man being trained in warfare as in this movie but I think the best reading is that Viola is a strongwilled, adventurous young woman who wouldn't want the kind of conventional life Olivia has and with her brother lost seizes the opportunity to try out living a man's life with all the privileges that would bring in Shakespeare's time.
I'm no big fan of Shakespeare's comedies, much preferring his darker fare like the tragedies, but TWELFTH NIGHT is a riotous film brought ably to life by theatre director Trevor Nunn.
Shakespeare's story of mistaken identity and the attempts of numerous suitors attempting to woo a countess is certainly a fast-paced and chaotic affair.Helena Bonham Carter headlines the cast in a decent early role, and she's supported by the likes of Nigel Hawthorne, Toby Stephens, and Nicholas Farrell.
The cast are good, the choice of which parts would and would not work in film was (usually) good and the soundtrack is quite nice, although certain liberties have been taken with the lyrics that Shakespeare included in the play.
Put Imogen Stubbs and Helena Bonham-Carter together as Viola/Cesario and Olivia, add Toby Stephens (Orsino), Mel Smith (Toby Belch), Richard E Grant (Andrew Aguecheek), Imelda Staunton (Maria), Nigel Hawthorne (Malvolio), and Ben Kingsley (Feste) to the mix - and Trevor Nunn's bright and witty film couldn't fail.
A certain scene (which I will not spoil, but occurs as Act 2.4) was an unconventional yet successful way to add dimension and depth to said persons' relationship.I give abounding credit to Trevor Nunn, for it is difficult to adapt plays to the big screen and have it be as captivating as if you were reading the story or watching the play.
When the Duke sends his new "male" servant to woo his love, Lady Olivia (the glamorous Helena Bonham Carter), all sorts of chaos reigns, especially when Viola's now identically looking twin brother arrives!!The actors give it their all and make the complicated Shakespearian language much easier to follow.
After watching this film, however, I have been reading the play itself and have really enjoyed studying the original Shakespeare!
The acted dialog does not flow as well as some Shakespeare films (such as "Much Ado About Nothing" with Kenneth Branagh, which is a personal favorite) and it took me a few viewings to be able to appreciate this "Twelfth Night" movie as well as I do now.
Feste the clown, played by Ben Kingsley, is quite entertaining and expressive, and perhaps one of the best characters in the film.
In William Shakespeare's "Twelfth Night" (or, "What You Will"), brother and sister twins "Viola" and "Sebastian" are shipwrecked off the shores of "Illyria".
Then, all's well that ends well.The supporting characters in director Trevor Nunn's cinematic version are all right (actually, they come off better, due to the overall execution of the film).
But, mainly, it's about Imogen Stubbs (as Viola aka Cesario), and her interaction with Toby Stephens (as Orsino) and Helena Bonham Carter (as Olivia).
This film points in the right direction; but, next time, either go all the way, or leave "Twelfth Night" on the stage.****** Twelfth Night (1996) Trevor Nunn ~ Imogen Stubbs, Toby Stephens, Helena Bonham Carter.
Trevor Nunn's adaptation of one of Shakespeare's best comedies rates as one of the finest.
I'm in a Shakespeare class in school this year, and we watched two or three different movies/films of each play we read.
Twelfth Night is an adaptation of Shakespeare's play of the same name.
This version, directed by Trevor Nunn in 1996 starred Imogen Stubbs, Steven Mackintosh, Ben Kingsley, and Helena Bonham Carter.
It is not thr best Shakespeare film, not like Othello, Henry V, Much Ado About Nothing and Hamlet, but it does boast a strong cast and impeccable production values.If I had any criticisms against this Twelfth Night, they would be that as well shot and as interesting as the beginning scene was, part of me found it unnecessary compared to the rest of the film and it didn't add much to the storytelling, and also it did feel a little sugar-coated towards the end.Criticisms aside, this is a very beautiful-looking Twelfth Night, with the luscious photography, autumnal imagery and scenery and colourful, sumptuous costumes.
A first-rate cast directed by Trevor Nunn, the premier Shakespeare interpreter of our era, makes this version of Twelfth Night a must-see for anyone who loves Shakespeare.
Nunn takes full advantage of the rugged setting to eliminate the proscenium and draws excellent performances from his cast of British-trained stars led by Helena Bonham Carter as Olivia, Imogen Stubbs as Viola (posing as Rosario), Ben Kingsley as Feste, the clown, Nigel Hawthorne as Malvolio, the proud steward, Mel Smith as Sir Toby Belch who combines with Maria, played by Imelda Stuanton, to reduce Malvolio to ridicule and tears.
The lone weak spot in the cast is Toby Stevens as Orsino, too weak a personality to inspire Viola's love (though his spurning as a suitor by Bonham Carter's Olivia is easy to understand).
Most of the others are great as well, but I will single out Olivia again, as I hold Helena Bonham-Carter to be the One True Fit for Shakespeare's quintessential "dark lady" stock character, and it is such a shame that she hasn't had the chance to prove it more often.Anyway - there is one major imperfection in this Twelfth, and that is Malvolio.
The comedic sub-plot involving Sir Toby, Sir Andrew, Maria and Fabian is an essential, earthy counter balance to the rather airy-fairy love triangle.The parts of Feste and Malvolio straddle both the main plot and the comedic sub-plot and it is no surprise therefore that these characters, wonderfully played by Ben Kingsley and Nigel Hawthorne, are the most effectively realised.Imelda Staunton was excellent in the role of Maria but Mr. Nunn failed Mel Smith and Richard E.
Imogen Stubbs and Helena Bonham Carter were both very good (and delightfully easy on the eye), while I also liked Toby Stephens very much as the sexually ambiguous Duke.Any Shakespeare is worth watching, and this is no exception.
The guys who played the Duke of Orsino and Viola's twin brother are absolutely handsome and great in their roles.
Second best movie adaptation of a Shakespeare comedy.
Oh, and the best movie adaptation of a Shakespearean comedy is Branagh's MUCH ADO ABOUT NOTHING - if you liked TWELFTH NIGHT, check this one out as well!.
Even if I did not understand every word, I would get the meaning with help from the incredible acting.Imogene Stubbs is beautiful as Viola- she really makes a very cute, albeit effeminate "boy." I felt the most for her, especially when she tells the Duke the story of her love for him under the guise of a "sister." Toby Stephens as the Duke was quite handsome, and made the character more likable.
I really really wanted to like this film but I suppose since I'm not a huge fan with Shakespeare, it made it difficult for me to enjoy it and the fact the storyline should change with Imogen Stubbs' character falling in love with Helena Bonham Carter's character instead.
When it emerges that Sebastian is in fact still alive things get even more confused as he looks and is dressed just like 'Cesario'!This is the first version of this Shakespeare comedy that I've seen so can't say how it compares to other adaptions.
The rest of the cast were impressive too; notably Helena Bonham Carter as Olivia; Nigel Hawthorne as Malvolio; Ben Kingsley as Feste, the fool; Mel Smith as drunken Sir Toby Belch and Richard E.
Twelfth Night or What You Will (1996): Dir: Trevor Nunn / Cast: Imogen Stubbs, Helena Bonham Carter, Ben Kingsley, Nigel Hawthorne, Tobey Stephens: Art house film with stunning photography and tremendous art direction.
This gets even more twisted when Sebastian, Viola's twin brother, arrives and Olivia, believing him to be Viola, marries him.This particular version of the play is well done, though there are a lot of additions, and the scenes are changed about to make it flow better on the screen.
You can't go wrong with Shakespeare's best romantic comedy, Twelfth Night. |
tt0076591 | Race for Your Life, Charlie Brown | The Peanuts gang heads off to Camp Remote somewhere in the mountains. Charlie Brown is accidentally left behind by the bus while at a desolate rest stop. He is then forced to hitch a harrowing ride on Snoopy's motorcycle in order to make the rest of the journey to the camp, accompanied by rock guitar type riffs while he is shouting in fear at Snoopy's wild driving.
Upon their arrival, the kids are immediately exposed to the regimentation and squalor of camp life which is a stark contrast to their comfortable residences back home. They are unfamiliar with the concept that the camp schedule is in the 24-hour clock (Franklin asks if "oh-five-hundred" is noon, and Sally thinks "eighteen-hundred" is a year). Although they do their best to adjust to the rigors of camp life, Snoopy, in a tent of his own, enjoys an ice cream sundae while watching TV on his portable set.
The gang must contend with a trio of ruthless bullies (and their cat, Brutus, vicious enough to intimidate even Snoopy and Woodstock) who openly boast of them having won a raft race every year they have competed. The only thing that keeps them at bay is Linus using his security blanket like a whip (which also gets him unwanted attention from Sally due to her praising the courage of her self-proclaimed "Sweet Babboo"). It is revealed that they have only won through outright cheating — using a raft equipped with an outboard motor, direction finder, radar and sonar. They also resort to every trick they could think of to hamper or destroy everyone else's chance to even make it to the finish line, much less win the race.
The kids are broken into three groups: the boys' group (consisting of Charlie Brown, Linus, Schroeder, and Franklin), the girls' group (consisting of Peppermint Patty, Marcie, Sally, and Lucy), and Snoopy and Woodstock. Charlie Brown is the very reluctant leader of the boys' group, struggling with his insecurity but making a good effort to lead and implement well-thought out decisions. His anthesis is Peppermint Patty, the leader of the girls' group, who is very confident despite her incompetence as a leader. She insists on every decision, no matter how inconsequential, being confirmed by a vote of secret ballots. Predictably, when the voting is tied or she disagrees with the outcome, she often overrules the decision, to the disdain of the other girls. The bullies are overconfident; they use their cheating to burst ahead, but in their boasting they fail to watch where they are going and crash into a dock, which costs them a lot of time and effort to dislodge their boat while the others sail past.
The groups see many unique sights along the river race, such as mountains, forests, and a riparian logging community of houses built on docks. However, they also run into different obstacles: getting lost, stranded, storms, blizzards, and sabotage from the bullies. Snoopy abandons the race to search tirelessly for Woodstock when a storm separates them; after a long search, they manage to find each other and are joyfully reunited. Charlie Brown grows increasingly into his leadership role; ultimately, after the bullies sabotage both the boys' and girls' rafts, Charlie is asked to be leader of both groups — only to find himself treated more as a scapegoat than a leader.
Thanks to Charlie Brown's growing self-confidence and leadership, the gang is about to win the race at the climax after overcoming considerable odds. Unfortunately, Patty incites the girls to celebrate too soon and they accidentally knock the boys overboard in their excitement; when they attempt to rescue them, the bullies seize the opportunity to pull ahead.
The bullies gloat about their apparently imminent victory. However, their brash over-confidence, infighting, and constant carelessness during the race has seen them become involved in numerous mishaps, causing them to suffer substantial damage to their raft. Just shy of the finish line, their raft finally gives out and sinks. This leaves Snoopy and Woodstock as the only contenders left. Brutus slashes Snoopy's inner tube with a claw, but Woodstock promptly builds a raft of twigs with a leaf for a sail and continues toward victory. When Brutus tries to attack Woodstock, Snoopy decks him, and Woodstock wins the race. Conceding defeat, the bullies begin to vow vengeance next year, but their threats are humiliatingly cut short when Snoopy hands Brutus a rough beating after he threatens Woodstock again.
As the gang boards the bus to depart for home, Charlie Brown decides aloud to use the experience as a lesson to be more confident and assertive, and to believe in himself. Unfortunately, right after he finishes speaking, the bus leaves without him for the second time, and as before, he is forced to hitch a ride with Snoopy again. | psychedelic | train | wikipedia | Definitely the best Charlie Brown film ever.
As usual Peppermint Patty wants to be in control of everything, but this is a movie were everyone gets to do their bit.
In fact, one couldn't help but feel lonely as Charlie Brown spent the night studying in a big city in "A Boy Named Charlie Brown"; as Snoopy got kicked out of place after place in "Snoopy Come Home"; or as Charlie Brown and Linus encountered a dark, daunting chateau in "Bon Voyage, Charlie Brown."And so it was great to see that for this movie, they decided to lighten it up.
Although there is a little of that in this movie, one remembers it more for the scenes of the Peanuts gang interacting and encountering fun/peril on the rapids or making the best of a bad situation while lost in the woods.
This one has more comedy and action than any of the other Peanuts movies, and it all makes for an enjoyable ride.Perhaps the best part of the movie is that fact that you finally get to see all the major members of the Peanuts gang play off of each other (the other movies each concentrated on a few of the characters).
It's hilarious!This is easily my favorite of the Peanuts movies, and, for me, one of the great examples of what kinds of great comedic/dramatic situations one can draw from a diverse cast of characters.
This film should be released on DVD, with commentary by Lee Mendleson and Bill Millendez, theatrical trailer, TV ads, and when you click on "play movie", you see the 70's "Our Feature Presintation" clip before the picture starts.
It's significantly less static than most other Charlie Brown films and programs such as The Great Pumpkin, even though it has been edited and is less static now.
This is a great movie for kids to watch because of it's character and originality.
In short I think this is one of the best family/kids movie I have ever seen and I'd recommend it to any fan of Charlie Brown movies.
Wonderful animation and a great story make for the best Peanuts feature ever produced.
This is the only Charlie Brown full length motion picture I have ever watched, but I believe I have seen it at least 20 times by now.
I caught it on Thanksgiving Day afternoon on channel 7 in Washington DC around 1983 or so, and have been compelled to stop and watch it every time I see it, ever since.The plot centers around the Peanuts gang going to a summer camp, where a group of punk kids and a nasty, mangy cat are intent on humiliating the other kids, and winning the raft race.
The Peanuts gang competes in the race, with the guys (Charlie Brown, Schroeder, Linus, and Franklin) sharing one raft, the girls (Lucy, Sally, Peppermint Patty, and Marcie) sharing another raft, and Snoopy and Woodstock having their own raft.
Of course, mishaps ensue and the gang ends up working together to defeat the bullies.This movie really has what a lot of real life movies don't have.
Snoopy rides in the abandoned tire, the debate over cold cereal for breakfast, Charlie Brown is promoted to leader of the gang but can't get a word in edgewise due to Peppermint Patty ("That's IT CHUCK!!!
Charlie Brown and the gang head to summer camp, where they run into a group of nasty bullies and their cat (which is the size of a bulldog).
They all compete in a big river raft race where our favorites run into lots of obstacles, including sabotage from the bullies.
Snoopy and Woodstock also get some amusing stuff to do but the boy characters, like Charlie Brown and Linus, have few memorable funny moments.
Charlie Brown does get to step up and be the hero in the end, and the scene where he stands up to pushy Patty was very awesome, but he doesn't get much in the humor department.
Charlie Brown specials and movies have always been a big part of my childhood, this film is another one of my favorite Charlie Brown films.The animation is great as usual because it stays true to the hand drawn style from the strip which is fine by me I wouldn't want it any other way.
From the amount of crap they dish out to Charlie Brown and the Pennuts gang it just makes you all the more want the Pennuts gang to win just to rightfully knock them off their butts.I really like how the film is somewhat different from the usual Pennuts specials we see because here this is an adventures.
It's interesting and a bit thrilling just seeing the Pennuts gang river rafting and getting though some pretty sticky situations along the way.As usual the stuff with both Snoopy and Woodstock is cute and great from seeing both of them ride wicked fast on a motorbike that looks like something from the film "Easy Rider".
Charlie Brown realizes how hard things have gotten which at times almost makes him cave into doubt as he sees only failure ahead, but as Rocky Baboa once said, "Life isn't about how hard you hit, it's about getting hit but keeping on coming up." and those words are true despite how hard things get they have to push on forward no matter what because it's really the only thing they can do as their survival depends on it and that's true about life itself.But also about friendship and stepping up when one should.
We like the Pennuts gang because they are individuals and winning isn't everything to them, in fact it's not their whole life; as we see in one scene their dancing in a cabin having fun together.Charlie Brown actually has a very good character arc and it's great when we finally see him step up, from the amount to crap he has to endure it then finally comes to the final straw.
It's sort of the old saying "Some days you just gotta say Frak This!" and that's what Charlie Brown does when he realizes certain things aren't working like the girls so called democratic system which doesn't amount to jack squat in wilderness survival.The only bad things for me about the film is Peperment Patty, in a way this film is kinda justifying why she's one of my least favorite characters in the Pennuts bunch.
sometimes and it really became a bit much in the film; sorry that sounds bold but oh man if you had to endure the bossiness, denseness in wilderness survival, let alone small sexism she spills out that could push anyone over the edge; though this was all the more reason I wanted Charlie Brown to step up and tell her who's the boss.
Another is that voting joke was really redundant after a while.Overall this was a very good Charlie Brown film, it's a ride worth taking.Rating: 3 and a half stars.
As a long time fan of Peanuts there is hardly a movie,TV show or special I don't like from them.
And Race for Your Life,Charlie Brown is no different the gang are heading to camp and it all leads to a Adventure for Charlie Brown,Lucy,Linus,Sally Snoopy and the gang This is easy one of my most favorite Peanuts movies I have good memories of this film from my childhood.
The animation is very strong and when you watch the Peanuts films you can always expect strong animation and this film has very well done animation I like how the animators took the time to focus on the art work to make sure it is up to the standardThe voice acting is very good and the writing has a lot of humor.
However there were some moments that I didn't think work for the movie but still The films does great there are a lot of twist in the film That you wouldn't expect to have in a peanuts movie but this one does it wellThe music is very good and it makes the story more interestingOverall I'm sure all Peanuts fans will enjoy this classic film and this is a very good movie I give Race for Your Life,Charlie Brown an 9 out of 10.
Typically cute, charming - if not inspired - Peanuts feature film sees the gang go to summer camp and participate in a sometimes hazardous raft race.
Charlie Brown (voice of Duncan Watson) is immediately targeted by a swaggering trio of bullies who won the race the past two years, but seemingly can't succeed without cheating.You can never really go wrong with Charles M.
There are enough pleasant and funny moments here to make "Race for Your Life, Charlie Brown" quite agreeable.
Now, not all of the humor quite worked for this viewer - the running gag about the girls always voting on things wears thin - but the traditional hand drawn animation is engaging, the subplot about Snoopy and Woodstock getting separated is rather touching, and it's nice to see Charlie Brown actually stand up for himself and, in general, be a stronger character than usual.One thing you definitely miss is the jazz style music that Vince Guaraldi would have provided, but his untimely death put the kibosh on that approach.
There are some very annoying songs that pop up, but they're over appreciably quickly.A straightforward story (with an endearing ending), a theme of people working together for the common good, decent laughs and thrills, and a funny gag involving Charlie Brown having to hitch a ride with Snoopy on the latters' motorcycle all help to make this nice entertainment for Peanuts fans.Seven out of 10..
"Race for Your Life, Charlie Brown" is the third of four feature-length movies based on the beloved comic strip "Peanuts" by the great Charles M.
It precedes "Bon Voyage, Charlie Brown (and don't come back!!!) and follows "Snoopy, Come Home" and the marvelous, underrated classic "A Boy Named Charlie Brown." For the third film, the animation quality was taken down a notch, but the real charm of "Peanuts", the comic strip and the specials, was never in the visual look.
And this short and delightful little movie captures that effectively.A common recurring theme in the "Peanuts" universe is summer camp, where Charlie Brown, Peppermint Patty, and sometimes others go to the remote woods and uncover fall into challenges, predicaments, and situations, all to the amusement of the audience.
Charlie Brown and all of his pals are sent to summer camp and are pitted against a group of bullies and their rascally pet (I wasn't sure if it was a dog or a cat) in a river raft race.
The race consumes most of the movie's running time as Charlie Brown, Snoopy, Linus, Lucy, and the others make their way through the wilderness and as usual, our round-headed protagonist, is trying to find a way to stand up for himself and prove that he's not a born loser.The story for "Race for Your Life, Charlie Brown" could have been done effectively in a half-hour short, as it very well may have been originally intended.
At times, for example, Linus's head would be of the appropriate proportion to his body, but at other times, it would seem to oversize itself.From an effective opening to a most effective ending, "Race for Your Life, Charlie Brown" is another example of the countless charm that rectifies Charles M.
I know many people are hesitant to watch children's features, especially if they are animated, but I had a really good time with the "Peanuts" gang.
The Peanuts gang go away for summer camp and are split into tents to compete against one another.
When the raft race comes each tent is out to win no matter what.I like Peanuts the strip even if it is more melancholy than funny at times.
The voices are pretty much as you'd expect them to be but the animation seems very basic at times and doesn't seem too large a step away from the strip.Laughs are few but the overall feel of the film is similar to the feel of the strip.
Snoopy rules and his sidekick Woodstock isn't that bad either, why these were often named with Charlie Brown in the title I don't know - they should have all been just Snoopy cartoons and kept the rest of the gang out of it.
Race for Your Life, Charlie Brown was the third feature film that starred the Peanuts gang.
As you may have guessed, the gang gets their rears handed to them early, and it all comes down to a river race that is the basis for the entire plot.The first problem in the movie is that the bullies are written as the biggest one- dimensional tools on Earth.
I understand that the Peanuts franchise has emphasized feminism several times with its characters and story lines, and this movie is trying to show that girls can be independent.
It still has a lot of plot structure, clever comedy, entertaining moments, neat animation, and valuable lessons that the Peanuts franchise is always best at..
a river runs through the "Peanuts" gang.
Charlie Brown and company go to summer camp and then have to compete with some bullies on a river-rafting trip.
Most "Peanuts"-based movies are pure comedy, but "Race for Your Life, Charlie Brown" does turn a little more serious when Snoopy and Woodstock get separated during a storm.
To be certain, this movie allows Charlie Brown to find his inner strength when he becomes the leader.No, it's not a masterpiece, but it's definitely fun.
That year brought us timeless classics like "Pete's Dragon", "Close Encounters of the Third Kind", "The Rescuers", "The Many Adventures of Winnie the Pooh" and this "Race for your life, Charlie Brown"."Race for your life, Charlie Brown" is the 3rd of the Peanuts's specials and one of their best.
The movie is great fun, very entertaining, thrilling, exciting and funny.
Besides, the artwork is pretty good (great colorful sceneries).As for the soundtrack, the song "Race for your life, Charlie Brown", which plays in the opening and final credits, is nice.
One of the most different things about this movie is that it features the whole Peanuts gang...
or at least pretty close to that.In this story, the gang goes to a Summer camp at the Rogue River (in Oregon).
The gang is in separate groups: the boys (Charlie Brown, Linus, Schroeder and Franklin), the girls (Lucy, Sally, Marcie and Peppermint Patty as the leader), Snoopy and Woodstock and last, 3 bullies and their vicious cat.Our friends live many adventures and face many challenges in this race, including to get lost in numerous places and to confront the schemes of the 3 bullies and their weird cat (a malicious cat, very much like Lucifer from Walt Disney's "Cinderella").
The Peanuts gang doesn't win, but the bullies don't win either.Peppermint Patty is funnier than usual here.
Don't forget me!», leaving Charlie Brown with no choice but to hitch a ride on Snoopy's Harley Davidson-like motorcycle.
He's got so much lack of luck, but at the same time this makes Peanuts so funny.This movie has yet delightful and hilarious scenes with Snoopy and Woodstock, of course.
I adore whenever they say «Hey!» to each other."Race for your life, Charlie Brown" is one of Peanuts's classics, almost as good as "Bon Voyage, Charlie Brown (and don't come back!)".
"Race for your life, Charlie Brown" is a movie from the Peanuts series, that deals with a summer camp the kids are joining and how they all try to win the big race on the river.
It is based around the well-known Peanuts characters and suitable for both child and grown-up audiences in my opinion.What I liked most about the movie was its humor.
When the girls try to iron their clothes, first thing after landing, that's a bit too much stereotype for me.Otherwise every Peanut fan will surely have a fun time with this one.
For starters, it seems like Charlie Brown's gang, the girls, snoopy/Woodstock and the bullies are the only ones racing.
Sorry...I know it really is a great movie, and obviously you don't think about those things as a kid..
"Race For Your Life Charlie Brown" has even yet to be mentioned.
"Race For Your Life Charlie Brown" has even yet to be mentioned.
The entire gang, camping, rafting, through desert and wood, Snoopy and Woodstock on a chopper, multicolor ending.
Why have they put this ultimate Charlie Brown Movie out to pasture.
I have stopped purchasing anything "Peanuts" "Snoopy" or "Charlie Brown" since the Remastering of "A Charlie Brown Christmas" due to the Non-Release of this, my third favorite Peanuts Movie.
Fantastic remastering!Thanks People, VOTE for "Race For Your Life Charlie Brown" on tvshowsondvd.comGary.
Charlie Brown: Ladies Man. The beauty of virtually all "Peanuts" gang movies is that they're fun for kids, but they're still just as entertaining for adults.
"Race For Your Life, Charlie Brown" is no different.
You sit there as a kid and laugh at Charlie Brown's wishy-washiness, Snoopy and Woodstock's hijinks and Lucy's crabbiness.
Charlie Brown and the gang go to summer camp.
They try to steal a win in the annual raft race from the Camp Bullies, who make Charlie Brown's life miserable by pushing him around all throughout the movie.
Also causing Chuck to want to slash his wrists are Lucy and Peppermint Patty, who are their usual bossy selves; and Snoopy and Woodstock, who just kind of do their own thing and get themselves in jams that Cuarlie Brown has to bail them out of.
The nice thing is, Charlie Brown actually comes out the winner here; but he gabs so much afterwards that he misses the bus ride home so you still feel like the cartoon is not compromised from the usual "Charlie Brown-the-loser" theme.
Overall, a great movie that you'll want to keep watching over and over. |
tt0038356 | The Big Snooze | In this cartoon-within-a-cartoon, Bugs and Elmer are in the midst of their usual hunting-chasing scenario. After Bugs tricks Elmer into running through a hollow log and off a cliff three times (a comic triple of sorts originally used in Avery's All this and Rabbit Stew. In fact, the same animation sequence was recycled for "The Big Snooze", with the stereotypical black hunter being redrawn into Elmer Fudd), Elmer becomes enraged and frustrated that the writers never let him catch the rabbit in the pictures they both appear in. He tears up his Warner Bros. cartoon contract and walks off the set to devote his life to fishing, stunning Bugs, who piteously protests and effortlessly tries to ask him to reconsider. During a relaxing fishing trip, Elmer falls asleep.
Bugs observes Elmer's nap and takes sleeping pills in order to rock Elmer's "dreamboat" (Bugs sang Beautiful Dreamer, by "invading" his dream and continuing to drive Elmer crazy when Bugs uses the "Nightmare Paint". Symbolic of his dreamland plight, Elmer appears nearly nude, wearing only his derby hat and a strategically placed "loincloth" consisting of a laurel wreath. Elmer's dream is invaded by "ziwwions and twiwwions of wabbits" dancing on his head and singing "The rabbits are coming. Hooray! Hooray!" in a parody of the Pink Elephants on Parade sequence from the 1941 Disney film Dumbo with Bugs Bunny literally multiplying them from an adding machine. Looking for another way to torment Elmer, Bugs consults the book A Thousand and One Arabian Nightmares, exclaiming, "Oh, no! It's too gruesome!" before peeking over the book to cheerfully tell the audience, "But I'll do it!" Elmer realizes what Bugs has in mind, pleading "No, no! No, not that! Not that, pwease!" as Bugs ties him to railroad tracks, just as "the Superchief" (Bugs in an Indian chief's headdress, leading a conga line of baby rabbits) crosses over Elmer's head.
Elmer's anger at a failed pursuit through the surreal landscape, down connected rabbit holes, is promptly used against him by Bugs who inquires "What's the matter doc, ya cold? Here, I'll fix dat". Before Elmer can protest, Bugs dresses him like a woman by wrapping his body with green material from the right, slapping a wig on him, and applying lipstick. Bugs inspects his handiwork, then lifts the backdrop to reveal a trio of literal wolves, lounging by the sign at Hollywood and Vine. When the trio notice Elmer, one wolf hollers "Hooooow old is she?!", right before another wolf begins flirting with Elmer. Bugs enjoys watching the male wolves hit on Elmer, who yells "Gwacious!" before he grabs the hem of his gown and flees from the wolves, who give chase, briefly stopping to ask the audience "Have any of you giwls evew had an expewience wike this?".
In an attempt to "help", Bugs persuades Elmer to follow a mad dash towards stage right, as Bugs plays the old gag "run 'this way'!", putting Elmer through a bizarre series of steps which include running on his feet, flipping upside down to run on his hair, hopping like a frog, as well as Russian folk dancing.
As Bugs and Elmer dive off a cliff, Bugs drinks some "Hare Tonic (Stops Falling Hare)" and screeches to a halt in mid-air, while the dream Elmer continues to careen toward earth, finally crash-landing into the real Elmer's snoozing body as he wakes up with a start, exclaiming "Ooh, what a howwible nightmare!".
Elmer dashes back to the cartoon's original set, pieces his Warner contract back together, and agrees to finish what he started. The chase through the log begins anew. Bugs faces the audience in a closeup, closing with the catchphrase from the "Beulah" character on the radio show Fibber McGee and Molly, "Ah love dat man!" | psychedelic | train | wikipedia | I don't know any of the details surrounding Bob Clampett's departure from Warner Bros., but in this, his last cartoon for them, was one of the weirdest from a long list of strange entries from him.
I don't think he got along well with the new studio imposed producer, Edward Selzer.
Leon Schlesinger, the previous one, and the creator of Looney Tunes and Merrie Melodies, let him have all the freedom he needed with zany, wild cartoons as the result.
Some, like "Porky in Wackyland" and "The Daffy Doc" are considered by many cartoon historians to be important for the bold liberties he took with art and the use of space.
He did things that had never been done before, but Warner Bros.
bought out Schlesinger for $1,000,000 and Clampett's star never quite shone as brightly as it did in those heady days.At the beginning of this cartoon, then, it is significant that we see that Elmer Fudd is becoming disenchanted with his cartoon contract with "Mr. Warner" and tears it up in frustration after once again being the fall guy for Bugs Bunny.
What follows is a surreal sequence after Elmer falls asleep.
Bugs uses "nightmare paint" to make him dream so Bugs can manipulate him in his slumber to save both of their careers.
We have the usual assortment of corny Clampett gags mixed in with some stunning scenes that must have had everyone back in 1946 scratching their heads a little, wondering if Clampett had finally lost his mind.
The price that innovative people sometimes have to pay is that not everyone will get it, and I don't think Selzer was anywhere near "getting it", so Clampett got the door..
Elmer Fudd is the doing the normal thing for him: hunting for Bugs Bunny in the woods.
Bugs cleverly uses a log and a cliff to repeat the same joke three times, but it's always funny.
Finally, Elmer has had it.
He tired of always losing "in these cartoons." He takes his Warner Brothers contract and rips it up!"From now on, its nothing but fishing for me, and no more wabbits," announces Elmer to a stunned Bugs, who pleads with him to change his mind.
We're like Rabbit & Costello," he says.
(That's one of the things I love about these cartoons - great, inventive dialog.)While Elmer's peacefully dreaming, Bugs invades his dream!
This is one of the wildest, funniest Bug Bunny cartoons I have ever seen - just brilliant material..
Bugs Bunny as Freddy Krueger.
If you thought that Bob Clampett had gone as far out of normalcy as possible with "Porky in Wackyland" and "The Great Piggy Bank Robbery", then check out "The Big Snooze".
When Elmer Fudd - tired of always Bugs Bunny always embarrassing him - tears up his Warner Bros.
contract, Bugs does something that I wouldn't even imagine him (of all people) doing: he invades Elmer's dreams, creating one of the most surreal sequences that I've ever witnessed.
Who would have ever guessed that Bugs Bunny was Freddy Krueger's forebear?!
Above all, it's a good thing that I first saw this cartoon now, when I'm old enough to fully understand what it portrays (not to mention that I know who Bette Davis was).
As Looney Tunes screenwriter Michael Maltese said in an interview: "We wrote cartoons for grownups, that was the secret." But overall, this is a really cool cartoon.
Bob Clampett, during the approximately one decade that he worked with the Termite Terrace crowd, created a body of work beyond what I could have ever conceived of.
I own the compilation that 'The Big Snooze' is featured on.
From the get go....the stand alone cartoon seems pretty much like any of the other Bugs Bunny 'toons.
Fudd chases 'wabbit'....wabbit makes him look like a sucker....and so on so forth.
Until....Elmer has finally decided he's had enough.
At first....seems Elmer is going to finally be free.
Or so he thinks.
After all....as Bugs put it....'think of your career.
And for dat matter think of my career.' From there it just goes into the category of just plain silly.
The 'nightmare paint' and the other touches bringing a surreal sense to the whole thing.
And then there was 'da Super Chief!' Not to mention the book....aptly titled '1001 Arabian Nightmares.' And of course....what would a cartoon like this with that 'wascally wabbit' be without some clever misdirection from the craziest hare in the world....thereby allowing him to run amok.
Elmer after stopping [Why did 'she' stop?] : 'Have any of you girls ever had an experience like this?' Oh sure Elmer....you should've known better when that rabbit set you up by skewing your expression of [surprise] anger over being the 'fall guy' once again.
Of course if you had....the cartoon would've been ruined.
And to think what we would've missed along the way if you had stayed retired.
'Bugs vs Elmer.'.
Big Snooze, The (1946) *** (out of 4) Elmer Fudd, tired of being abused by Bugs Bunny, decides to tear up his contract to Warner and go on vacation.
Bugs needs him back so the rabbit invades his dreams to cause a nightmare.
This is certainly a wild short but I've never found it to be a funny one.
What does work here are the amazing colors inside the "nightmare", which look absolutely stunning in their remastered form.
The visuals are certainly the main reason to watch this film as there aren't too many laughs.
The film starts off with a chase, which would normally end a cartoon but here the gag is somewhat funny.
The best sequence is the famous one where Elmer is tied to the train tracks and a train of rabbits run over him..
Clampett goes out with a bang.
In this last Bob Clampett Looney Tunes short, Elmer Fudd is thoroughly appalled by the treatment he always winds up getting from Bugs Bunny, so he decides enough is enough, tears up his Warner Brothers contract and commits himself to fishing for the rest of his days.
Bugs is mortified of course (for his own job security mind you) and when he finds Elmer dreaming, he takes a sleeping pill and enters his pleasant dream to turn it into a nightmare.
This is a hilarious if a wee bit surreal cartoon that can be seen on Disc 1 of the Looney Tunes Golden Collection Volume 2.
It also features an optional commentary by animator Bill Melendez that is pretty good.My Grade: A.
A lotta fun--and it steps out of the fourth wall..
This is a very funny and very unusual Bugs Bunny and Elmer Fudd cartoon.
It starts off typically--with Bugs repeatedly tormenting Elmer.
Finally, however, Elmer announces he's had enough and he takes out his Warner Brothers contract, tears it up and announces he's done with cartoons!
Bugs makes a comment to the audience and then decides that he MUST bring Elmer back into the Warner fold--otherwise he, too, might be out of work.
When Bugs finds Elmer, he's sound asleep, so Bugs takes a sleeping pill and enters Elmer's dream in order to torment him (much like a recent Spongebob cartoon).
It's all very funny--and filled with a lot of nudity, as Elmer, inexplicably, runs about in fig leaf underwear.
Most importantly, however, it is very funny, fast-paced and I love how the cartoon lets you know that the characters know they are cartoons.
I don't think this is the best Bugs and Elmer partnering, A Wild Hare or any entry in the superb Hunting Trilogy I would put over this, but The Big Snooze is still a terrific Looney Tunes cartoon.Animation: Beautiful!
A vast majority of the Looney Tunes cartoons have great animation and this is no exception.
The backgrounds are pretty, the colours are audacious and the characters are well drawn.Music: I look out for this all the time, and this was not a disappointment either.
It was rousing, energetic and whimsical, like the very best scores from the Looney Tunes cartoons are.Story: The weakest asset of the cartoon but still works.
It is carefully constructed, with some very effective moments, especially the dream sequence which is by far and away the highlight of the cartoon, but the only criticism of the cartoon is that there are one or two parts at the beginning that seem a little aimless.Dialogue/sight gags: Typical Looney Tunes fashion.
The dialogue is inventive and witty and the sight gags are very clever.Characters/ Voices: Nothing to complain about here.
Bugs steals the show no doubt about it, but Elmer proves himself a great if rather dumb foil.
Mel Blanc and Arthur Q.
Bryan's vocal characterisations are consistently superb too.Overall, not the best but still terrific.
'The Big Snooze (1946),' a Looney Tunes short directed by Robert Clampett, is basically seven minutes of cultural references: the title is derived from Howard Hawks' classic Bogart-Bacall film-noir, 'The Big Sleep (1946),' and there are throwaway mentions of Bette Davis, Laurel and Hardy, Abbott and Costello, Damon Runyon and Mr. Jack L.
Warner himself.
The film's premise, in some eerie twist of Einstein's space-time continuum, even appears to reference Freddy Krueger and 'A Nightmare on Elm Street (1984),' though greater minds than mine could undoubtedly arrive at a more sensible conclusion.
The opening sequence was recycled from the 1941 Bugs Bunny cartoon, 'All This and Rabbit Stew (1941),' with Elmer Fudd substituted for the black hunter from that film.
'The Big Snooze' wanders quite aimlessly through its scenario, but the idea itself is clever enough to last the total running time.
As usual, Mel Blanc voiced the wabbit, but Arthur Q.
Bryan (uncredited) is responsible the characterisation of Fudd.In a shrewdly self-referential twist on the usual formula, Elmer, after being outsmarted by the mischievous Bugs for the last time, angrily tears up his Warner Bros.
contract and decides to spend the rest of his days fishing.
Fearing for his own career, Bugs attempts to frighten Elmer back into acting, and does so by entering into his dreams and systematically turning them into a string of terrifying nightmares, plagued by horrific armies of annoying "wabbits." With the realisation that retirement isn't quite as peaceful as he'd anticipated, Elmer promptly returns to the film set and accepts that it is simply his duty to be consistently suckered by a rascally rabbit.
Just as the classic 'Duck Amuck (1954)' derived humour from its self-referential nature, Clampett's film {ironically enough, the last that he made for Warner Bros.} has some fun with the conjecture that Elmer Fudd is a contracted actor on the studio's payroll.
The dream sequence is colourful, chaotic and suitably threatening, and Bugs appears to get a lot of enjoyment from tormenting the hapless little hunter..
Bob Clampett's final short for Warner Bros.
is a classic Bugs & Elmer cartoon.
Elmer's tired of the routine they're in where he chases Bugs but never wins.
So he tears up his contract and quits the cartoon!
Bugs, determined to get Elmer back, invades his dreams (like Freddy Krueger) leading to some surreal and wacky imagery.
The voice work from Mel Blanc and Arthur Q.
The animation is beautiful with well-drawn characters and backgrounds and lovely Technicolor.
The dream stuff is amazing.
Funny gags, lines, and fourth-wall breaking makes this one any Looney Tunes fan will want to see..
After one time too often falling foul of Bugs Bunny's tricks, Elmer Fudd rips up his contract with Warner Brothers Studios and leaves to get some R&R fishing by the lake.
Realising that his strongest career sidekick is important in his own career, Bugs goes after him and enters his dreams to encourage him to return to the job at hand.The cartoon starts very abruptly and continues in that vein as scenes appear to just jump around very quickly and without a huge amount of internal structure.
The plot cleverly acknowledges a reality of contracts (which of course, isn't reality for cartoon characters) and also has some funny asides from Bugs, but it doesn't appear to have a central plot.
The dream sequence is colourful and well drawn but not necessarily funny as a result.
I never fully got why Bugs took this approach to the problem!The characters are good.
Bugs does his usual stuff but doesn't seem relaxed in the cartoon - the dialogue is edited too fine and close for his style I felt.
Fudd has little to do and his character doesn't serve as well as he usually does as a foil to Bugs - he simply isn't given the time to respond in a way he normally is.Overall, almost any cartoon with Bugs and Fudd is going to be work watching for me, but this one just seemed a bit aimless - like the dream sequence was the original idea and the rest of it was just a thin excuse to get to it.
It is all over a bit fast and without any really hilarious action, it is OK but really is a poor entry from this famous double act..
'The Big Snooze' is a surreal sequence inside a dream of Elmer Fudd.
After Bugs Bunny is too smart for him once again Elmer wants to quit from Mr. Warner and shreds his contract.
He says he will be fishing from now on and he will never try to catch a rabbit again.
Bugs begs him to go on since it is also his career that can come to and end.Elmer falls asleep against a tree and Bugs sees that he is dreaming.
Bugs makes himself dreaming and in his own dream he enters Elmer's dream.
He changes that dream into a nightmare with all the surreal images as a result.The cartoon is interesting for its story and sometimes the animation but for simple entertainment it is not very good.
The beginning is nice but too predictable and the idea of going into another one's dream is good as well but it feels like there are a lot of missed opportunities.
There a couple of laughs so watching this is not completely wasting time..
Not amongst Clampett's best but partially brilliant nonetheless.
Bob Clampett's final cartoon for Warner Bros.
is an appropriately strange and crazy film, a fitting finale for the wackiest director the studio ever saw.
'The Big Snooze' begins unpromisingly with reused animation from an old Tex Avery short and a sequence in which Elmer Fudd quits his role as a cartoon dupe.
Although the premise is strong, these early scenes are curiously ugly in both drawings and animation.
However, the moment Bugs invades Elmer's dreams and splashes them with Nightmare Paint, 'The Big Snooze' becomes an absolute riot.
Since the action is set in the world of dreams, Bugs is able to tear up the rulebook even more than usual.
The pace and quality of the wisecracks increase immeasurably and the cartoon goes from ugly to positively sumptuous to look at.
The jokes in 'The Big Snooze' are all extremely unconventional, with the closest to a traditional gag being an extreme reading of the old "walk this way" joke.
Oddly enough, the cartoon reverts to being bizarrely unattractive the moment the dream sequence ends.
Just look at Bugs as the iris closes on him at the end.
Nevertheless, 'The Big Snooze' will always be remembered for the dream sequence rather than the clunky sequences that bookend it.
While it doesn't quite rival Clampett's very best work, 'The Big Snooze' ends the man's career with Warners on a strikingly inventive note..
Warner Bros.
tries to spoof THE BIG SLEEP .
. with this 1940s animated short, THE BIG SNOOZE.
Bugs Bunny takes on the Humphrey Bogart part, which of course leaves the Lauren Bacall role to Elmer Fudd.
Though Mr. Fudd looks better in a green cocktail dress than Ms. Bacall, that may be a moot point, given SLEEP's monochromatic nature.
Whereas the live-action Bogart flick involved him and Bacall telling each other an increasingly complicated bedtime murder mystery in which even the Real Life movie director admitted he could not figure out exactly who killed whom, SNOOZE finds Bugs invading Elmer's retirement dreams with packs of bunnies and wolves until Elmer's not sure which bathroom to use in North Carolina.
Since Elmer logs on and off to Reality here like a schizophrenic on an LSD trip, there's no need for SNOOZE to introduce such tomfoolery as SLEEP's hidden cameras.
Elmer appears totally nude from 5:08 through 5:11 of SNOOZE, which is a lot more daring than you can credit Bacall for anything she doffs in SLEEP.
If you want to see a wacky Bugs Bunny cartoon featuring wild animation and fast-paced energy that never lets up, watch "The Big Snooze".
Directed by Robert Clampett, this cartoon pits the scwewy wabbit against his most famous nemesis - Elmer Fudd.
Fudd finally tires of hunting & chasing Bugs, so he tears up his contract with Warner Bros.
and decides to go fishing.
But if Bugs has no Fudd to play off of, then there's no team!
Oh no, Bugs ain't gonna let THAT happen!
Highlights: Bugs is hilarious at the beginning of this cartoon as he pleads with Elmer not to break up the act.
Carl Stalling's music score cleverly aids Bugs' act of throwing nightmare paint onto Elmer's peaceful dream, followed by "The rabbits are coming, / Hooray, hooray!
/ The rabbits are coming, / Hooray, hooray!", etc.
In order to escape the wolves, Bugs convinces Elmer to run away and dance in some fairly unorthodox ways, again aided by Stalling's score.
(In fact, listen to the entire music score for this film and you'll surely be able to pick out various melodies that are familiar.) "The Big Snooze" is a terrific cartoon that just happened to be director Bob Clampett's swan song before he left Warner Bros.
That's too bad, because one can only wonder what other wacky creations Clampett could have made had he decided to remain at WB. |
tt0062229 | Le samouraï | Hitman Jef Costello (Delon) lives in a single-room Parisian apartment whose spartan furnishings include a little bird in a cage. A long opening shot shows him lying on his bed, smoking, when the following text appears on-screen:
There is no greater solitude than that of the samurai unless it is that of the tiger in the jungle... Perhaps...
Costello's methodical modus operandi includes airtight alibis involving his lover, Jane (Nathalie Delon). Having carried out a murder contract on a nightclub owner, he is seen leaving the scene by several witnesses, including piano player Valérie (Cathy Rosier). Their statements are inconsistent but the investigating officer (François Périer) believes Costello is his man based on the witnesses who viewed Costello and his alibi that he was with Jane the whole time.
Costello loses a police tail and gets to a meeting point on a subway overpass to get paid by his employers. However, instead of getting money, he is shot and wounded by a man sent by his employers. Having bandaged his wound and rested, he returns to the nightclub and goes for a car drive with the piano player. He is grateful to her, but does not understand why she protected him from the police even though she was the key witness to the murder. In the meantime, police officers bug his room, which agitates the bird in its cage. Upon returning, Costello notices some loose feathers scattered around the cage and the bird acting strangely. Suspecting an intrusion, he searches his room, finds the bug and deactivates it.
In the meantime, the police ransack Jane's apartment and offer her a deal: withdraw your alibi for Jef and we will leave you alone. Jane rejects the offer and shows them the door. Back in his apartment Costello finds himself held at gunpoint by the overpass shooter who gives him money and offers him a new contract (the intended target is not revealed to the audience at this point). Costello overpowers him and forces him to disclose the identity of his boss, a man by the name of Olivier Rey (Jean-Pierre Posier).
Following a chase scene in the Métro by several disguised cops and a goodbye visit to Jane, he drives to Rey's home, which turns out to be the same house in which the piano player lives. Costello kills Rey and drives to the nightclub. This time he makes no attempt to conceal his presence. He even checks his hat but does not accept the hat-check ticket. Having put on his white gloves in full view of everyone, he walks over to the stage where Valérie advises him to leave. When he pulls out his gun and points it at her, she quietly asks "Why, Jef?" and he replies, "I was paid to." After a moment of tension, the audience hears gunshots, but not from his gun. Costello falls to the ground and dies. A junior police officer tells Valérie she is lucky the police were there because otherwise Costello would have killed her. But when his boss picks up Jef's gun, it is revealed that he had removed all the bullets before entering the club. | murder, violence, atmospheric, claustrophobic, romantic, suspenseful | train | wikipedia | null |
tt0082562 | Innamorato pazzo | Cristina, the princess of a fictional monarchical state named San Tulipe, is visiting Rome with her father, Gustavo VI, who is trying to appeal to Italy's national bank for a loan to buoy his country's financial crisis. Bored and rebellious, Cristina sneaks away from the embassy and decides to engage in a sightseeing tour of the city. On the bus she takes, Cristina meets the driver Barnaba Cecchini, who instantly falls in love with her.
Barnaba, a charming and happy-to-go ATAC employee, takes Cristina around the city, including the Forum Romanum, and slowly begins to win her personal interest. But after having had her fun and spending a (chaste) night in his apartment, she locks him into his clothes dresser's massive drawer and leaves with her family's bodyguards without telling him about her true identity. After a fruitless search on his own, Barnaba recognizes her when he witnesses a TV report about her sojourn in Rome, and despite his modest background he boldly asks her father for her hand. When Gustavo refuses, Barnaba engages in a series of daredevil schemes to prove his worth, even to the point of appearing (by Cristina's invitation) at a royal banquet in his ATAC uniform and holding successful discussions about high politics with a number of international dignitaries.
However, although Barnaba succeeds in impressing Gustavo and winning Cristina's genuine affection, San Tulipe's financial crisis finally drives the king into engaging his daughter to a billionaire. Determined not to lose his love, Barnaba appeals to the citizens of Rome to make a donation for the cause. As Gustavo's family leaves the city, Barnaba's sympathizers shower them with money, thus annulling both the royal debts and Cristina's planned engagement to a stranger, and Barnaba gaining Gustavo's approval to marry his daughter. | romantic | train | wikipedia | null |
tt0143016 | The Zodiac Killer | The film is a highly fictionalized telling of a month in the life of the Zodiac Killer (played by Hal Reed). The film follows the killer (whose identity as the Zodiac Killer is not revealed until the end of the first act of the film) and a friend, Grover (a drunk, toupee wearing truck driver who is divorced from his wife and in financial trouble from his divorce) as they meet and go about their normal day. Grover eventually has a nervous breakdown due to the upheaval in his life caused by his divorce, as he is denied the right to visit his daughter when he makes a surprise visit to his ex-wife. Taking his daughter hostage, the police are called and as he tries to escape, Grover sees the day's paper laying on the front steps announcing another murder by the Zodiac Killer. In a fit of madness, he declares himself the Zodiac Killer and lets his daughter go in order to flee. The police shoot him dead as he falls into a nearby pool.
The second act of the film follows the real Zodiac Killer, who the film positions as having a day job as a much put upon postal carrier. The death of his friend causes him to phone the police to announce that the man they killed was not the Zodiac Killer, then goes about a major killing spree culminating in him murdering a pair of lovers in a park. The film also portrays him as a Satanist and one who actively kills those in his personal life who mock him or are mean to him in his normal life or who he hears mock his alter-ego.
The final act of the film attempts to provide a motive for the crime. The Zodiac Killer visits his father in a hospital, where he is kept in a caged room on the top floor. It is implied that the Zodiac's father is mentally ill and has to be restrained 24/7 and refuses any verbal communication with his son. The Zodiac Killer begs for his father to talk to him only to be rebuked. The staff of the facility ask the Zodiac Killer to leave, claiming his presence "upsets" his father. On his way out, the Zodiac Killer takes out his anger on two patients, wounding one and killing another.
The film ends with a voice over monologue as the Zodiac Killer goes about his normal routine. The Zodiac Killer brags about how he will never be caught and taunts the viewers of the film telling them that other monsters like himself lurk out there, able to blend in with normal people to avoid being caught while doing evil. | violence, cult, cruelty, murder, sadist | train | wikipedia | null |
tt0094017 | The Spirit | In a cat-filled mausoleum in Central City, Denny Colt, also known as "The Spirit", receives a call from Detective Sussman, about a major case that could involve "The Spirit's" arch-nemesis, "The Octopus". The Spirit dons his costume and travels across rooftops, while delivering a voice-over soliloquy, about the city being his one true love. A woman (Kimberly Cox) is being mugged in an alley below. He manages to save her, receiving a knife wound that he barely seems to notice. The woman asks, "What are you?", with an officer arriving at the scene answering, "That's The Spirit". The Spirit runs away, catching a ride from Officer Liebowitz and heading toward the flats.
At the swampland, femme fatale Sand Saref rises from the water and appears to shoot Sussman multiple times. The Spirit and Liebowitz find the wounded Sussman, but a flashback reveals that it was really The Octopus, who shot him in an effort to recover two identical chests underwater. Sand and her husband Mahmoud tries to flee with both chests, but The Octopus wounds Mahmoud, and breaks a line connecting the two chests. Sand escapes, leaving one chest behind, which the Octopus retrieves from the murky depths.
After The Octopus kills Liebowitz, he sends away his cloned henchmen, "Ethos", "Pathos", and "Logos", to take on The Spirit alone. His accomplice Silken Floss drives up, running over Pathos in the process. She departs with the cargo as the two arch-nemeses fight.
The scene transitions to the next morning when The Spirit is awakened by his lover Dr. Ellen Dolan, daughter of the Police Commissioner. Appearing to be in perfect health despite his gunshot wounds, The Spirit is shocked to notice a gold locket in Sussman's hand; a piece torn from Sand Saref's neck earlier.
Saraf's locket contains pictures of a much-younger Denny Colt and Sand; the two grew up together in Central City, where Denny bought Sand the locket as a gift, to satisfy her love of "shiny things". They lived happily until Sand's father, a police officer, was shot dead by a criminal with whom Colt's uncle was involved. Sand, now disenchanted with the city and its corruption, fled to Europe and has not been heard from for fifteen years. In a secret lair, The Octopus and Silken Floss open their stolen chest, but discover that it does not contain the mysterious Blood of Heracles as expected but the Golden Fleece, and decide a trade is in order.
Sand and Mahmoud visit the office of a high-class fence named Donenfeld, whom Sand paid to locate the underwater treasure. It is implied that Donenfeld gave up the treasure's location to the Octopus to ensure his family's safety. At Alice's Hospital, the Spirit has fully regenerated and is as good as new; Commissioner Dolan angrily enters with young rookie cop Morgenstern and calls the Spirit away to a case.
Sand's history as one of the world's great jewel thieves is related to the Spirit. As the Spirit is about to arrest her, he is caught off-guard by her standing before him fully nude. Sand doesn't recognize the Spirit as the presumed-dead Denny. She is stunned when he reveals his knowledge of her looking for the Golden Fleece and she shoves the Spirit through a window, only to see him survive the fall.
After his run-in with Sand, the Spirit receives a tip on the location of the Octopus's lair. In the process of breaking in he is captured and tied to a dentist's chair. The Octopus reveals his own origin as well as how he and the Spirit became arch-enemies: Octopus and Floss's experimentation have led to the creation of a serum (something of a scientific equivalent to the Elixir of Life) that could grant immortality. The Octopus first tested it on the dead body of the murdered officer Colt, who came back from the dead; his resurrection has earned the ire of Death, being the only man to ever wrongfully escape her clutches. Contacting Dolan, the only one aware of his true identity, he vowed to become the city's protector, "her spirit". Eventually, the Octopus injected himself and arch-enemies were born. However, the Octopus needs the blood of Heracles, a demi-god, to perfect the serum's formula. The Spirit manages to escape by spontaneously seducing a belly-dancing female assassin named Plaster of Paris, who as a parting gift turns on The Octopus in favor of The Spirit's charms.
Outside in an alley, The Spirit irks Paris by mentioning Sand's name; she stabs him out of spite. After being unconscious for a period of time, the Spirit stumbles to the city docks and collapses into the cold water, where he confronts the ethereal Angel of Death, Lorelei Rox, who has haunted his sleep. While at first, he is willing to finally give into her embrace, he escapes her yet again when he manages to gather his senses by remembering Ellen, Sand, Floss, Paris, and the other women he claims to see in place of his life flashing before his eyes. As the Spirit swims to the surface, Lorelei vows that he will be hers eventually.
At the projects, Sand and her latest henchman fly in with the Blood of Heracles to meet Floss and a clone carrying the Golden Fleece. After a four-way Mexican standoff, Sand attempts to convince Floss to get out of serving the Octopus before she is killed by the Octopus himself. The clone kills Sand's henchman and the Octopus asks Floss for the vase. As the Spirit suddenly materializes, Floss drives off, unable to take a side. The Octopus unloads with progressively bigger guns on the Spirit, apparently killing him off, but Dolan's SWAT team storms the area and opens fire right after. Morgenstern blows the Octopus' arm up with a hand-cannon and Dolan shoots him several times on the head. To recover from the damage, the Octopus gets to the Blood of Heracles and prepares to drink it, but Sand shoots the vase just in time as the Spirit rises, having worn a bullet-proof vest. He then attaches a grenade to the Octopus' chest, blowing him up into pieces with Sand protecting the two of them with the Golden Fleece.
The showdown over, the Spirit gives Sand her locket back. They kiss as Ellen looks on, feeling betrayed. The old flames bid each other goodbye and the Spirit convinces Dolan to let Sand go in gratitude for saving him and the world. Nearby, Floss discovers one of the Octopus's severed fingers crawling towards her; she picks it up and departs with two of the clones saying, "We'll start from scratch". Meanwhile, the Spirit and Ellen make amends and embrace.
The final shot shows the Spirit standing triumphantly on a rooftop with his cat, looking over the city as the sun rises. | cult | train | wikipedia | A decent, well-intentioned attempt at a classic character.
I just saw this unsold pilot for the first time since it aired in 1987, and I was pleasantly surprised to find out that it was much better than I remembered.
Sam Jones looked great as the Spirit and he played the part in a tongue-in-cheek manner that was just right.
Nana Visitor (STAR TREK: DEEP SPACE 9) was also very good as Ellen Dolan and showed some real chemistry with Jones, as well as a gift for physical comedy (she did start out as a dancer, after all).
The fellow who played Commissioner Dolan suited his part very well.
The woman who played P'Gell was okay, but she didn't have quite the spark the role needed.
A sultry young Joan Collins type would've been better.
Eubie (formerly Ebony) White didn't have much to contribute to the plot and consequently didn't make much of an impression.
The movie's plot (about some art forgeries at a Central City museum) is more of a straightforward adventure story than anything Will Eisner ever did, which does take away from some of the Spirit's uniqueness.
There are a couple of plot holes here and there (why do they have a gravestone for Denny Colt in a Central City cemetery when he was just visiting?), but nothing too heinous.
And, if you have more than a passing familiarity with the Spirit, it's all too easy to figure out who the mystery villain is.
The movie takes place in 1987 instead the 1940s (with plenty of contemporary references to remind you of that fact).
It was too expensive to do it as period piece, I'd imagine.
Sometimes the budget limitations are all too evident (Wildwood Cemetery looks like nothing so much as a studio set).
And a few too many scenes are daytime ones.
But there are a few shots here and there which positively REEK of the right sort of film noir atmosphere.
You can definitely tell the creators of the movie had a genuine affection for the Spirit.
It would've been very interesting to see where this show would've gone if it had become a series.
If you come across a copy somewhere (I was told it originally ran 90 minutes long but it was edited down to 70 before air), check it out, it's worth a look.
For another cool movie with a Spirit reference, see THE IRON GIANT..
One and Only adaptation of Will Eisner's SPIRIT was pretty good.
The adaptation of Will Eisner's SPIRIT to the TV screen followed many other offerings developed from comic strip pages or comic books.
(Remember, the two aren't exactly the same medium) It is indeed ironic that this is the one and only adaptation (as of the time of this writing)of Eisner's smart alec, wise cracking, tongue-in-cheek super hero.Story has it that Republic Pictures was interested in doing a film version and was in negotiation with the copyright owner in the mid '40's, but they were never able to close the deal.
The left over screen play became the serial, THE MASKED MARVEL, one of Republic's best.
Perhaps that it was just as well, for that studio had a penchant for tinkering with material adapted from the comic strips, pulp mags, radio and the comic books.As for this 1987 made for TV movie, it's pretty obvious that it was a failed pilot for a proposed television series.
Whereas an old, long time comic reader,like myself, can be a little harsh in criticism of an adaptation, a viewer unfamiliar with the character may be able to give some fresh observations, clear of any preconceived notions of what this screen version should look like.Well, while sitting and watching the story unfold, with the characters interacting amid some crime wave, the Little Lady (my wife, Mrs. Ryan) nailed it with one statement.
"This can't make up its mind if it's serious or not!" That pretty well describes both THE SPIRIT and his creator, Mr. Will Eisner, the true creative genius in the comics.The film is a sincere attempt to put Eisner's world on the screen.
The casting of Denny Colt/The Spirit, Commissioner Dolan and Ellen was really quite well done.
Though in a contemporary setting, it was still in the tradition of "the good old days" as far as the costuming goes, you know, when men and women still wore hats!
That brings up this one final (and meandering) point, and that is that the director and the production made a conscious effort and succeeded in giving the characters a Will Eisner look as far as facial expressions and body language.
We say,Kudos to them for their efforts.It's just too bad that no series followed!
Oh, well in today's motion picture world, comic adaptations seem to be a hot item.
Maybe some big timer producer and director could do a really 1st class SPIRIT production for the Big Screen.
We can only hope.UPDATE: Dateline, Chicago, Illinois.
By now, everyone who goes to the Movies at the Shopping Centre Multiplexes has seen the poster advertising the new film of THE SPIRIT, (subtitled, MY CITY SCREAMS); which is to be released Christmas Day, 2008.
Well, we'll see then just what we've been talking about.
Just keep your fingers crossed!
TO BE CONTINUED.............UPDATE II: We saw the new film, Writer-Director Frank Miller's rendition of THE SPIRIT a couple of days ago.
Well, we got our wish; but is this a good thing or another case of "Be careful what you ask for; because you may get it?" Please read our write-up elsewhere in IMDb.com.
THANX!.
In spite of its flaws I liked it..
Based upon Will Eisner's comic book character, the movie manages to capture the essence of the hero while sacrificing the film noir elements of the original comic book.
Here are all the trademarks of the original character: the torn shirt, the beautiful femme fatale, the cemetery, the rain storms.
However, the film never looks "right" - the film appears low budget despite some very good actors and actresses.
Part of the problem is the translation of the Spirit to the 1980's.
Two scenes in the film stand out as classic Esiner: the scene in the foundry and the final fight in the museum.
Not a great film but a fun way to spend an afternoon..
Good, but not great..
I enjoyed this adaptation of The Spirit comics, and in many ways it caught the flavor and humor of the original stories.
It had a nice cast of virtual unknowns, and hit all the marks for fun and adventure.
Sam J.
Jones did a creditable job, and Laura (McKinley) Robinson had P'Gell down cold, and was a gorgeous femme fatal.
It had a low budget look, tho, for much of its length, and not enough of the wonderful camera angles The Spirit comic practically cried out for.
That said, Will Eisner told me himself, at a ComicCon, that he would rather I never mentioned it again.
He wanted a darker, more noir look to it, with a better cast.
As for the re-make from 2008, which reeked, the less said the better - I'm sure Mr. Eisner would have plenty of negatives to talk about for that film; many, many more than for this one..
Feels like an 80s music video.
This is an origin story, but does not dwell much on the character's origins.
You get to see the moment he decides to become The Spirit, but not much of his story before that.
The case he's trying to solve involves the curator of a museum being involved in criminal activity.
The character himself is dumb, clumsy, and at times quite rude.
It's hard to see why one should sympathize much with him.The best thing with this movie (TV pilot) is also one of the things that makes it hard to take it seriously: it looks more like a music video then an action story.
A bit similar to the Schumacher Batman-movies at times, while at other times it looks like any 80s TV-series.
Especially the graveyard set reminds me of something like Michael Jackson's Thriller.So is it worth a watch?
Maybe if you have some sort of relationship with The Spirit, or if you like movies based on comic books.
It's typical for its era, but that's about the only interesting thing about it..
TV Spirit Entertaining.
The 1986 TV movie of The Spirit was a pilot for a possible series.
However, Spirit creator Will Eisner did not like the film and thus no series was produced.
I thought it was a very entertaining film and captured the spirit (sorry) of the comic with a modern twist.
I'm sorry it didn't materialize into a series.
Sam (Flash Gordon) Jones was a perfect Spirit.
Nana Visitor was a nice Ellen Dolan and of course would later go on to Star Trek:Deep Space Nine years later.
Maybe with the release of Frank Miller's big-screen version of The Spirit, more people will be able to see this rare gem of Spirit history.
It seems that when Hollywood makes a film from an already established character or idea, someone will inevitably seek out previous versions of the property and release it to video in order to make a few dollars.
When Antonio Banderas donned the mask of Zorro, we were able to get earlier versions of the masked hero on DVD, such as the great Alain Delon version of the 1970s (although all copies I ever saw were badly edited).
Heres hoping someone will release the TV adventure of The Spirit to DVD soon..
Semi-comical version of a serious character, but it mainly works.
I saw this pilot when it was first shown, and I'm sure countless "Spirit" fans hate it, because, like Batman, the Green Hornet etc., it took the character in the direction of "camp".
But I evidently never got enough of Batman, because I thought it was entertaining, in some of the same ways as that show.
There are two parts that stay with me.
First, when Denny's partner has been fatally wounded, and he makes a dramatic speech about how he always stood for the law, and obeying the exact letter of it.
Then, he says something like, "Boy, was I stupid!" Which is his way of telling Denny to become a vigilante instead, which he does (though the TV Batman kind).
Then, there's the scene where he tries to seduce the villainess into letting him go by kissing her, but she isn't fooled, because he's too honest to kiss her convincingly !
This was a great example of "camp", that was also "underplayed", by both the actor and actress..
Although the movie has its ups and downs, most fans will find this easier to digest than Frank Miller's big-screen adaptation.
Originally made as a pilot for a series based on Will Eisner's legendary comic book character, it ended up forever lost as a TV-movie.
It wasn't until the arrival of Frank Miller's ill-received big-screen adaptation that this garnered attention once again.Denny Colt (Sam Jones) comes to Central City to investigate the death of his good friend (Philip Baker Hall).
After getting a little too close to the truth, Colt is shot and left for dead to drown in the harbor.
Thought to be dead, he "raises" from the grave as the masked avenger the Spirit.
He joins forces with the city's police commissioner Dolan (Garry Walberg) to find the connections between his friend's murder and a local art heist.The cast of "The Spirit" features some interesting actors in key roles.
Sam Jones steps out of his Flash Gordon outfit and into the blue suit and fedora of the masked vigilante.
Nana Visitor ("Star Trek: Deep Space Nine," "Torchwood") plays police commissioner Dolan's daughter, Ellen, who has a crush on the Spirit.
Television actor Garry Walberg of "Quincy, M.E." fame portrays Commissioner Dolan.Most fans of "The Spirit" will find this failed 1987 TV-pilot much easier to digest than Frank Miller's big-screen adaptation of the hero.
Although the movie has its ups and downs, it's more accurate to the tone and visual appearance of Will Eisner's beloved comic book. |
tt0113633 | Bullet to Beijing | Harry Palmer (Michael Caine) is forced into early retirement from MI5. He receives a telephone call offering a mysterious job opportunity.
Harry flies to St. Petersburg, Russia, where he is met by Nikolai (Jason Connery). They are followed and shot at by Chechens, before Nick (as Harry insists on calling him) and Natasha (Mia Sara) can deliver Harry to his potential employer, Alex (Michael Gambon). Alex tells Harry that a deadly binary biological weapon called Alorex has been stolen; he wants Harry to find it. Harry cannot turn down the pay: $250,000.
Louis (John Dunn-Hill), one of his old contacts, tells him that the Alorex will be on a train, the Bullet to Beijing. Ex-KGB Colonel Gradsky (Lev Prygunov) and his men are also passengers, as are Nick, Natasha and Craig Warner (Michael Sarrazin), yet another unemployed spy, this time formerly with the CIA. When Harry and Nick try to find out what is in the crate Gradsky is transporting to the North Korean embassy, Gradsky (as a professional courtesy) merely has them thrown off the train. Conveniently, though they are in Siberia, there is an airport nearby, and they are able to board a crowded, ramshackle Aeroflot Antonov An-30 aircraft. Though the plane runs out of fuel and has to set down 300 miles from the train's next stop, Harry and Nick just barely manage to get back aboard the Bullet.
When they go to confront Gradsky, they receive several surprises. Natasha, whom they find in the colonel's compartment, turns out to be Gradsky's daughter. Then, they learn that Gradsky also works for Alex. Finally, Harry guesses that Alex is selling the Alorex to the North Koreans for heroin, a specialty of Craig's. Nick, who sincerely thinks that Alex is the man to lead Russia in the troubled times ahead, refuses to believe it. Harry talks Gradsky into dumping his half of the Alorex and replacing it with vodka and urine. But where is the other component? Then, Harry remembers that Louis' grandson had given him a seemingly innocent gift, a Matryoshka doll. Inside, he finds a vial.
Nevertheless, they have to pretend to deliver the Alorex. At the North Korean embassy, Palmer meets another old spy acquaintance, Kim Soo (Burt Kwouk). Kim Soo has orders to get rid of Harry because he knows too much. Fortunately, Nick rescues him by lying and saying Alex will deal with him later. Later, when Harry asks him why he did it, Nick tells him that he thinks Harry is his father. During the Cold War, the Soviets had attempted to suborn a British spy by having a woman agent seduce him. Harry denies being that man, but Nick doesn't believe him.
On the way back to St. Petersburg, Harry explains to Nick that Alex planted the specifications for Alorex in his passport (which was confiscated by Kim Soo), but Harry was not fooled. He burns the valuable but deadly information and tips off both a rival gangster and the police about the incoming heroin shipment. Complications arise when there is an attempt on Harry's life by men working for Kim Soo, which Craig surprisingly foils. The American, it turns out, is working for the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration. Harry and his friends emerge relatively unscathed from the chaotic final shootout. | intrigue, murder | train | wikipedia | BULLET TO BEIJING amusing return of Harry Palmer.
After 30 years Harry Palmer ( Michael Caine) returns a bit older but still amused and amusing.
In the one I own, Sue Lloyd makes a brief appearance as Harry's old girl friend Jean, now a blonde, sexy widow.
However, I though Caine, Connery and Michael Gambon were all first rate and the running gags about redundant, over-the-hill secret agents worked for me.The locale of St Petersburg is fresh and the complications of plot ( who is one whose side), falling off the train, the problems of the decaying yet free market Soviet Union, etc.
I like BULLET and have actually watched it twice in 2 weeks.
The Return of Harry Palmer.
I first broke into the Harry Palmer series when I thought Midnight in St. Petersburg sounded like a good film in the TV guide, and it had Michael Caine in it.
Since then (realising there was more of it)I've become quite a fan of the series, not really minding if it was the vintage 60s or the modern 90s.Bullet to Beijing was the fourth film out of the five that I've seen (I've yet to see the somewhat rare Billion Dollar Brain) and I thought it was a good film, certainly worthy of at least a 6.5 rating on IMDB.
I know fans of the vintage 60s were somewhat opposed to this even being made, because it was obviously not going to be as good as The Ipcress File.And it's not.
The Ipcress File is still the best of Harry Palmer, but I thought this was the second best of the series.
I found Funeral in Berlin to be mind-numbingly tedious, and Midnight in St. Petersburg didn't quite live up to this one.First thing, I'm going to address a few issues regarding plot holes or continuity.
Make no mistake, this is one of those films you'll probably have to watch twice or even three times to fully comprehend all that's going on.
So most plot holes are probably down to something the viewer missed (I certainly thought that the first time I watched it).This certainly isn't vintage Palmer, and I give it credit for not trying to be.
Palmer is on the verge of retirement anyway, and so he's not going to be as quick or sharp as he once was (at least they didn't try and pretend he was still young!).
He doesn't run from danger, something present in all the movies, even when he's being followed by the mafia, he's fairly daring once he's got away from them.As for the film itself, it's very fast-moving and fluid.
There are a LOT of twists and turns in the plot, but I like the fact that's it's all within the time limit of the train arriving in Beijing, who's going to make it there etc.
The trouble with something like the Ipcress File was the amount of free time Palmer had, and so it would sometimes seemingly stand still, whereas the train journey here gave it an edge.That's my humble opinion anyway, maybe I'm just uncultured.
This certainly doesn't have the class of the 60s, but it makes up for it with the action, humour and plot-twists.8.5/10Incidentally, if you can get hold of it, there's a special edition DVD where Sue Lloyd has a slightly bigger role than a voice on the telephone..
This was my kind of spy movie...really bad bad guys...really sexy sexpots...car chases...boat chases...mysterious trains crossing hostile borders and the worst gang of lousy shots you ever saw.
Believe me, the hilarious sequence in the movie of the flight to Irkutsk is not that much of an exaggeration.) It's probably more of a spoof than a spy thriller.
Sure it doesn't all add up and the continuity is a bit suspect but I have to say that I really thought it was good fun.
The collapse of the cold war has somewhat put an end to our spy stories, but I was thrilled to get another Harry story.
I have seen and loved the original Harry Palmer movies and can tell you that this belated made-for-TV sequel does not measure up at all.
BULLET TO BEIJING doesn't even deserve to be called a Harry Palmer film.
Skip this failure and see THE IPCRESS FILE, FUNERAL IN BERLIN, or THE BILLION DOLLAR BRAIN.
As Michael Caine said in his Golden Globes speech "I made a lot of crap" this is some of it.
Please disregard the review of this movie by "Dr_Yvon_COULARDEAU"......he clearly entered a review of some other film here by mistake....i think he was trying to review some version of "the Thomas Crown Affair".....first, there is no character in this movie named "Crown".........there is also no robbery with an insurance investigator involved.......i think it is odd that Dr_Yvon_COULARDEAU did not correct his mistake after he realized he reviewed the wrong movie........i think it is odd as well that no one from IMDb noticed either..........IMDb.......may i review a three stooges film and put it here or vice versa?.........Dr, a question.......do you often lose track of where you are?.
After almost thirty years, Michael Caine is back playing Harry Palmer.
However, it has been THIRTY YEARS--and, like the expression goes, you can never go back--and that certainly is true of "Bullet to Beijing".
Unlike the earlier Palmer stories, Len Deighton was not involved with this one...and I think it shows.
The first three films of the series ("The Ipcress File", "Funeral in Berlin" and "Billion Dollar Brain") were great--a nice alternative to a Bond film.
Here, however, it looks like there is a lot more Bond and a lot less Harry Palmer.After three decades with the British secret service, Palmer is summarily retired without so much as a thank you.
Harry takes the offer (why?) and soon is transported into a world completely unlike his earlier film efforts.
Sure, things happened--but most of the time Palmer stood by on the sidelines.
Here in "Bullet to Beijing", it's one action sequence after another after another--including way too many shootouts that resulted in folks with pistols taking out many folks with machine guns!!!
The overall effort is a passable ACTION film but one severely disappointing to those expecting the Harry Palmer of old.
Return of Harry Palmer is not as bad as expected and is occasionally amusing.
The fact that I can only recall a funny car chase scene with falling apart Russian cars is ominous, though.
palmer only shot one person the entire trilogy, If I recall correctly.The Palmer of those films was something of a blank page.
The Palmer of 'Bullet' has lost that sixties cool and it's hard to recognise him.
He's more like an ex-football or pool hall manager with a drink problem or simply Caine being more his working class self.
Some of the old stalwarts remain, such as Harry meeting 'old friends' who turn out to have no qualms in dispensing with him altogether in the terminal sense.
'Bullet To Beijing' is only to be viewed as a last resort, that is you have been made redundant, your wife has left you and your TV license is about to expire with no money left in the kitty to renew it..
If they wanted to make an ironic post glastnost Harry Palmer film why did they not ask me to write it!
There is nothing of who Harry Palmer was in this film; it's trite, corny, contrived, and set in the worst stereotypical world.
If you like Caine being Caine in an average spy spoof played for laughs, enjoy..
Disappointing attempt to reinvent Harry Palmer.
A damn good cast and a good storyline....wasted and spoiled by poor acting by Jason Connery in a central role....definitely not a chip off the old block..
Fun, light action film.
If you loved the Harry Palmer movies in the 1960s—The Ipcress File, Funeral in Berlin, and Billion Dollar Brain—you'll be happy to hear that thirty years later, Michael Caine agreed with you!
He made two more Harry Palmer films, Bullet to Beijing and its sequel Midnight in Saint Petersburg, both costarring Jason Connery and Michael Gambon.In this one, Michael Caine is forced to retire, but isn't slowed down a bit in his secret spy career.
He's approached to work for Michael Gambon, with Jason Connery and Mia Sara as his colleagues, but who can he really trust?
I really liked this spy thriller because it wasn't too complicated, so I could easily keep up with the plot twists.
Some of the other Harry Palmer movies were a bit too complex for me.
Also, even though Michael Caine makes several references to his age, since it's been thirty years since he played Harry Palmer, it's fun to see him still fighting the bad guys with as much pizazz as he had before.
Rent it if you're a Michael Caine fan or are in the mood for a light action film, and for a double feature, rent the sequel!.
Good action, multiple plot twists, exotic locales.
Good action, multiple plot twists, exotic locales.
There are excellent well-shot action scenes, familiar faces, respect paid to the Russian location and people, and it all moves along at a decent fast pace.People who hated this 1995 offering are always comparing it to the 60s films.
Now lumped together as one tidy trilogy (due to the temporal proximity of their productions) Harry Palmer was then touted as a less glamorous, thinking man's Bond.
But the movies were still pretty sensationalist and fantastical.A lot had changed since, and what was right for the big screen in the 60s would have to reinterpreted to a modern context.
(That said, the stultifyingly vapid Blue Ice, another Michael Caine-led spy film released three years prior, failed to thrill - but that's my opinion.)The film would have been improved with a more dramatic score, and I'm sure it would have made greater impact, been more memorable, and be held in higher esteem if it had it.
But for what Bullet to Beijing was - a direct-to-video movie - it was an impressive and enjoyable work.
The storytelling and pacing made it feel like it could be a big-screen movie, and otherwise it hit the spot in the right places.
Location shooting is not as common these days, so in a historical context, Bullet to Beijing is something that is getting rarer and more special by the day.
Although it's always a pleasure to watch Michael Caine -- even in stinkers such as "Blame It On Rio" -- there was little fun in this lame attempt at resurrecting the under-paid and melancholy British agent of the 1960s Harry Palmer.
"Bullet to Beijing" has holes in the plot you could drive the Trans-Siberian Express through, with little of the humor and none of the style of "The Ipcress File" or "Funeral in Berlin".
I was surprised to see this film on the shelf for sale as I'd never heard of it and never knew anyone had tried to resuscitate Michael Caine as Harry Palmer.
I came to the conclusion it wasn't going to be very good compared with the original Palmer films and would be like other attempts at revivals i.e. not very good.
If you watch this film with this frame of mind you won't be too disappointed.
Mr Caine still gets to do his cheeky one liners to those in authority but Harry appears to have grown less subtle in his later years(unlike his new black framed glasses) Certainly not a Harry Palmer film of the old ilk, but could a post Cold War version ever be?
Not a bad Michael Caine film which he just does for the money, just one he's done when there are no good scripts on offer!.
Playing Harry Palmer, the most boring secret agent ever presented on screen (can't say if he's that boring on the books), Michael Caine has the mission of tracking down the formula of a nuclear weapon that is about to be delivered to North Korea by the Chinese.
And Palmer is not working for his British comrades that decided to retire the man, but yes for the Russian, in the post Cold War scenario.Has to be one of the most uninteresting and weak developed spy films I've ever seen.
In one of his weakest performances but not to the point of going to the Wall of Shame (like "Jaws 87"), Michael Caine is helpless in playing a character that isn't appealing like James Bond or clever and real as George Smiley.
Jason Connery, Mia Sara, Michael Sarrazin, Burt Kwouk and Michael Gambon, they all didn't have much to do with a script that leaves somewhere to go nowhere.The more it reaches the end the worse it gets, and the only good moment out of "Bulllet to Beijing" is a sequence involving a car chase where Caine and Connery's son need to get in time to catch the Express train to Beijing.
Like the majority of people brought up on The Ipcress File I was disappointed by sequels such as Billion Dollar Brain (yet to see Funeral in Berlin).
Although he has done some great stuff in his career, Mr Caine, a "working actor" who does not suffer luvvies and primadonnas gladly, has produced some real stinkers.
This is one of them, although I have to say it was initially good to see Caine returning to the role after all these years (and he looks bloody good for 62 as well).
At the beginning of the film when HP is spying on an embassy through some net curtains, you can see where the comedian, Paul Whitehouse, got the inspiration for "Michael Paine, the nosey neighbour." Apart from that, a disappointment and an unbelievable plot.
And tell Jason Connery not to give up the day job..
I Love Beijing.
I was very excited when I first read that Michael Caine would return to the role of Harry Potter in not just one, but two made-for-cable-TV films for Showtime networks.
But after the announcement was made it was a few years before they actually aired.I was wary when I learned that one of the producers was Harry Alan Towers.
Caine looks good, but he doesn't have the same verve.
Potter was always a bit of a dupe in the earlier films (MOUSETRAP, THE SPY FROM RIO, and HARRY'S MISFITS), but here he seems particularly dull-witted.
It looks like the majority of the budget went to Caine and location shooting, because it didn't go for editing or photography.
And the score by Rick Wakeman sinks the project.Casting is nice, but even though the two films were directed by different men, it is obvious they were filmed at the same time, with many of the same supporting players, including the less than impressive Jason Connery.
Fans of the Len Deighton novels know that Harry Potter is not the name of the character in the books (his name is never revealed), and that the name Harry Potter is an invention of J.K. Rowling (and not Harry Saltzman who co-produced the early Bond films).
The worst film I have seen for a long time..
Sad that this is the first film I have commented on, for most of the films I bother to vote on are good - but having just watched this, and been so disappointed, I must make the effort.
Just how did Michael Caine, and other names I recoginised, get involved in such a film.
Awful scriptwriting, wooden acting, poor editing, continuity and most other aspects of film-making.
Michael Caine keeps the train moving.
British agent Harry Palmer (Michael Caine) is doing a nothing job observing the North Korean Embassy when a demonstration turns violent.
Harry gets retired due to budget cuts.
He is lured to St. Petersburg where he meets Nikolai (Jason Connery), Natasha (Mia Sara) and potential employer Alex (Michael Gambon).
All the while, Harry is hounded by would-be assassins.This is a continuation of Len Deighton's character Harry Palmer but not actually from a book of his.
It's a TV movie elevated by Michael Caine returning as Harry.
The action isn't slick like 007 but it's exotic enough.
Other than Michael Caine, there isn't anything superior in this movie..
Harry Palmer still shows 'em how it's done!.
Michael Caine slips comfortably and amusingly into one of the most famous roles of his career, Harry Palmer (AKA the anti-Bond), after a 30-year break.
The film itself is both pleasingly old-fashioned (much of it takes place on a train, by far the most traditional means of transportation in this genre), and successfully updated to be relevant in the mid-1990s, post-Cold War era, where spies from all over the world are suddenly labeled "redundant" by their governments.
The story is slightly meandering in the middle but it has its surprises too, and the film is well-produced (especially for a TV project); the relatively (in comparison to James Bond) small scale of its action sequences generally works in their favor.
It's been a long time since I last saw the final theatrical Palmer film, "Billion Dollar Brain", but I think "Bullet To Beijing" is superior to that one at least.
Like the man said you can't go home again and in most cases you shouldn't even try but as we all know Michael Caine is so afraid of winding up broke he'd even black up to play a spear carrier in a remake of Zulu.
Although Caine is still the Harry Palmer of The Ipress File, Funeral In Berlin etc, Len Deighton didn't write so much as FADE IN on this one and all I can say is he must have got some serious wedge for the use of his creation.
The plot, if you can call it that, needn't detain us, suffice it to say there is lots of shooting, blowing up and stuff of that ilk and about once every other Fall you can actually tell who is who and what side they're on. |
tt1308138 | Hua Mulan | The poem starts with Mulan sitting worriedly at her loom, as one male from each family is called to serve in the army to defend China from invaders. Her father is old and weak and her younger brother is just a child, so she decides to take his place and bids farewell to her parents, who support her. She is already skilled in fighting, having been taught martial arts, sword fighting, and archery by the time she enlists in the army. After twelve years of fighting, the army returns and the warriors are rewarded. Mulan turns down an official post, and asks only for a swift horse to carry her home. She is greeted with joy by her family. Mulan dons her old clothes and meets her comrades, who are shocked that in their years traveling together, they did not realize that she was a woman. However, this does not change their good friendship.
=== Sui Tang Romance ===
Chu Renhuo's Romance of the Sui and Tang (c. 1675) provides additional backdrops and plot-twists. Here, Mulan lives under the rule of Heshana Khan of the Western Turkic Khaganate. When the Khan agrees to wage war in alliance with the emergent Tang dynasty, which was poised to conquer all of China, Mulan's father Hua Hu (Chinese: 花弧) fears he will be conscripted into military service since he only has two daughters and an infant son. Mulan crossdresses as a man and enlists in her father's stead. She is intercepted by the forces of the Xia king Dou Jiande and is brought under questioning by the king's warrior daughter Xianniang (Chinese: 線娘), who tries to recruit Mulan as a man. Discovering Mulan to be a fellow female warrior, she is so delighted that they become sworn sisters.
In the Sui Tang Romance, Mulan comes to a tragic end, a "detail that cannot be found in any previous legends or stories associated Hua Mulan," and believed to have been interpolated by the author Chu Renho. Xianniang's father is vanquished after siding with the enemy of the Tang dynasty, and the two sworn sisters, with knives in their mouths, surrender themselves to be executed in the place of the condemned man. The act of filial piety wins reprieve from Emperor Taizong of Tang and the imperial consort who was birth-mother to the Emperor bestows money to Mulan to provide for her parents and wedding funds for the princess who confessed to having promised herself to general Luō Chéng (Chinese: 羅成). (In reality, Dou Jiande was executed, but in the novel he lives on as a monk.)
Mulan is given leave to journey back to her homeland, and once arrangements were made for Mulan's parents to relocate, it is expected that they will all be living in the princess's old capital of Leshou (Chinese: 樂壽, modern Xian County, Hebei). Mulan is devastated to discover her father has long died and her mother has remarried. According to the novel, Mulan's mother was surnamed Yuan (袁) and remarried a man named Wei (魏). Even worse, the Khan has summoned her to the palace to become his concubine.
Rather than to suffer this fate, she commits suicide. But before she dies, she entrusts an errand to her younger sister, Youlan (Chinese: 又蘭), which was to deliver Xianniang's letter to her fiancé, Luō Chéng. This younger sister dresses as a man to make her delivery, but her disguise is discovered, and it arouses her recipient's amorous attention.
In the novel, Mulan's father was non-Han, a Xianbei (described as "a Hebei person of the people of the Northern Wei dynasty, ruled by the Tuoba clan"), while her mother was Han Chinese from the Central Plain. But "even a Chinese woman would prefer death by her own hand to serving a foreign ruler," as some commentators have explained this Mulan character's motive for committing suicide. Mulan's words before she committed suicide were, "I'm a girl, I have been through war and have done enough. I now want to be with my father." | violence, murder, romantic | train | wikipedia | Words escape me at the moment, but this review can say it all for me: http://yingweitan.wordpress.com/2009/11/25/movie-review-mulan-2009/ Also, the comment at the bottom of the article is very insightful.Differing from the usual route of Chinese epic movies, which usually portrays huge battle scenes, extravagant costumes, and such, this movie concentrated more on the character's development and emotions.
I remembered as the lights to the cinemas brightened as the credits start to roll, it felt breathtaking to had partake in this film as an audience of it.Do NOT, and i repeat, do NOT, go into this film wanting it to be one of those battle-like army type of films one generally associates with the genre of epic at its core.
Warlords that was released in 2007 starring Jet Li, Andy Lau and Takeshi Kaneshiro).There are battlefield scenes, Yes...but they are of minimal depiction based on the context of this film, that are used to carry the characterization of Hua Mulan that was perfectly casted with Vicki Zhao at the helm.There is a plot, and that plot is to drive the main theme of this film that is to showcase to us about how she grew into the character in legends.
While concepts based on being a filial daughter to her father, and loyalty to the fellow troops that she commands and finally patriotism that drives her to do what she does for twelve years are all being explored, minimally but it is enough to drive her overall characterization in just under 2 hours (even though it may seemed longer than that).Having said this, there is no need for me to summarize the film for you readers as that is one of the beauties of storytelling, where it is for the viewers to partake for themselves to let the story be told to you by the story's presentation.
And definitely not by me.Overall, if one is into a movie that is emotional (depending on individual's views upon what is regarded as emotional), and does not showcase violence for violence's sake, then i guess one can do themselves the favor of partaking on this trip of 2 hours into another era.Again i must stress, do NOT go into this film hoping to see the likes of battlefield scenes.For me, i would classify this film like the other greats of Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon; The House of Flying Daggers; Warlords; Musa, and the very recent Red Cliff saga.
I got quite excited when I heard of this re-adaption of the Chinese folk tale Mulan, having always loved Disney's version for unexplainable reasons.
Well worth giving it a go to draw your own opinions because the film is brilliant yet at the same time flawed throughout.Having the feel of many recent Romance of the Three Kingdoms historical epics that have been popping up regularly from the fantastic new generation of Chinese cinema, Hua Mulan is fast paced, uplifting and in a narrative sense very well strung together.
Unlike many of its' counterparts we don't have the long and often drawn out political segments we found throughout the Red Cliff films (Absolute wonders in their own right).The evident flaws popping up in the casting of Hua Mulan herself and the balance between the story of a solider and that of romance wasn't really able to find a true sense of equilibrium, I felt slightly discontented by the conclusion but Hua Mulan is not a film to disregard from the above remarks.
A film well worth watching, putting a blunt and more practical spin on the story of Mulan; placing the tale within an Era of Chinese antiquity that easily rivals that of King Arthur or Julius Ceaser..
We all know how the story of Hua Mulan follows that of other legendary folk heroes in China's rich history, and to date there's only a reference poem which accounted her exploits which stem out of filial piety, at a time in the Northern Wei state centuries ago when the Emperor decreed that all families must contribute to the war effort.
That's basically the gist of the story, where she spends 12 long years at the war-front to the amazement that she was never found out, before returning to the gratitude of family and country.This also means that storytellers have almost a full reign at what could have transpired during her tour of duty, and suffice to say this will always mean that there will be elements of hardship during training, attempts or situations at putting her true identity at risk, and given the soft hearted nature of an adolescent female, affairs of the heart will come knocking.
The same goes for this film, written by Zhang Ting, which adopted the romantic angle rather heavily, exploring the relationship between Mulan, and General Wentai (Chen Kun), in a love that's quite forbidden since firstly a female cannot be serving in the army, and secondly, face it, two male soldiers, and later on, of general rank, can't be seen behaving lovey-dovey in front of their men.
Besides, being romantically involved also served to be a roadblock to Mulan's innate war ability, or so Wentai believes that needs some way to be severed so that she can unleash that beast within.As Wei soldiers, they're tasked to defend their country from the nomadic invading forces which seek to conquer Wei for their iron, in which to make weapons, and then to plunder some more.
I suppose with any effective leader who walks the reasonable talk, should be able to attest to the respect that they command over their followers.Then there are the battle scenes, because what's a Mulan film without one.
The war front scenes were like a quick summary of 12 years of iconic battles that Mulan had led, so those looking for fantastically choreographed battles in the mould of Red Cliff, will be sorely disappointed.Then there are some rather questionable scenes which comes out of the blue, and somehow marred the enjoyment of the film a little because of their convenience, with that little bit of vampirism which I felt was not quite necessary, and a natural phenomenon which just appears and seem to take sides, again for reasons I am not able to fathom, and speculate only for the showcasing of special effects.
Chen Kun also held his own against the veteran actress, although one can feel that since this is a Mulan film then he's playing second fiddle.
Supporting roles range from Jaycee Chan to Hu Jun, who seem rather functional than to add any emotional depth to the film.Mulan is just one version from a folklore open to vast interpretations, and you can bet your last dollar that this isn't going to be the last of Mulan related stories that we'll hear of.
excerpt, full review at my location - Not to be confused with Disney's 1998 animated blockbuster Mulan, director Jingle Ma's 2009 epic offers a more sophisticated and nuanced retelling of the story based on a sixth century Chinese poem.
Mulan: Legendary Warrior charts the early life and rise to power of Hua Mulan, a fearless heroine who disguises herself as a man and goes to war in place of her ailing father.Mulan: Legendary Warrior isn't exactly innovative, and it doesn't really add anything new to a story that has been told many times, but it's an expertly crafted film that fuses war and romance genres in a highly absorbing way..
There was also no gi jane trying to show the world something, mulan was just a person who grew with the duty and just did what she had to do.The film left out all the gender conflicts beside and truly presented us a pure touching story.Hua Mulan being a great general and warrior is after 12 years again a woman of her time at the end.
The end of the love story is also sad but otherwise it wouldn't be such a good film.Hollywood would surely add a kiss at the end, it was much better that there were just the right words....
Having Just watched this film, and whilst it is still fresh in my mind I found the movie to be a refreshing change to traditional epics offered by Asian Cinema.
While the length of the film made me hesitate, I found it quite enjoyable.The film did not have the Disney/Hollywood touch to it, and as much as I still spend time watching Hollywod movies, it gives a fresh new take on Mulan (or new to me anyway).
Note: The legend of Hua Mulan is actually based on a poem.The film starts off with Mulan caring for her father, and progresses to the familiar calling for soldiers from every family and Mulan running off in her father's place.
In this film Mulan already knows how to fight before going to war, so I guess that makes it more believable that she will be able to keep up with the others.
The war lasted a long time and I guess this is reminiscent of wars in those times.I wasn't really fond of the character of Modu (Jun Hu), who like the enemy in the Disney film, is very exaggerated in his evilness.
Wei Zhao and Kun Chen as Mulan and Wentai (character of Shang in Disney's Mulan) had pretty good acting, but at times I felt the chemistry between them was too forced, and some parts were also a little cheesy.
'Mulan' is folklore--like Robin Hood, King Arthur--initially popularized as literary fiction, perhaps with some 'historical grounding', but so heavily mythologized that what is 'fact' and what is 'fiction' is virtually indistinguishable (this in turn produces multiple versions of the story, including of course, Disney's campy animated 'revision').
I specifically mention this because as silly as the 'plot twist' near the end of the film may seem to those familiar with the premise of the story, it is not nearly as silly as the rest of the film—-and just as a footnote, this version is campier than Disney's.Zhao Wei plays Hua Mulan, a young woman who pretends to be a man in order to substitute her ailing father as a conscript in an army raised by the Northern Wei dynasty to fend off incursions by the Rouran Confederacy.
If you have read all the reviews, as I did, I think you will all know which one it is when I say was this person even reviewing the right film.The one thing that needs to be said about a film of this calibre, is that you have to be into this kind of movie and the Far Eastern ways of making films.
Unusual for a high end film and the fact that the soldiers of the armies were most likely real PLA soldiers; something that is done in most large battle scene movies in China...they use the real army.
The Chinese movie industry only uses CGI for its way out high fantasy productions such as 'The Monkey King' films.Best thing is to watch it and expect nothing so that you can view it with an unfettered view.
Wei Zhao, as Hua Mulan, plays her part fantastcally and her co-star love interest Kun Chen, as Wentai, is excellent also.
It of course builds on the fact that the main character is a woman, who tries to pass herself off as a man, in order to serve in the Chinese army, instead of her fragile, old father.
Problem is that at no time Wei Zhao ever looks or even acts like a guy.
highly annoying, unlikely and distracting that no one in this movie seems to notice that 'he' is actually a she.The story has some soap opera type of developments to it but also has the look of it.
It just isn't solid enough and has some really poor dialog, which lets the patriotic moments come across as weak, as well as misplaced.No, this never looked like a solid movie to me but I was at least expecting some entertainment and a good story to follow, since the tale of Hua Mulan in itself is of course a really great and fascinating one.
This movie however just never surpasses the level of a straight to DVD or made for TV drama-production, with cardboard characters and bad dialog, disappointing acting and soap like developments with its story.4/10http://bobafett1138.blogspot.com/.
By all rights, MULAN should be THE definitive retelling of the story about the famous woman warrior: it's a big-budget Chinese historical war film, made with a huge crew and cast, actors who have previously excelled in other movies, and a thoroughly serious look at a woman out of place in a man's world.
Those hoping for spectacle and battle will be sorely disappointed, as Jingle Ma's appalling direction sees the war scenes glossed over and dealt with in a purely defunct way.Instead, at least half of the (oh so lengthy) running times chronicles Mulan's descent into an endless depression as she laments a lost love and wishes she were elsewhere.
Zhao Wei's acting can't be faulted, but the attempts at character and personality are so poorly conceived that the audience couldn't care less about any of the characters, from Jaycee Chan's irritating attempts at a buffoon to Kun Chen's bawling crybaby.Although the cinematography makes this film look good, it's far from entertaining.
This 2009 movie is based on the legend of Mulan, the woman taking the place of her father in order to go to war, and whose accomplishments led her to rise as a general in the Wei army.While this movie is entertaining in terms of action, drama and warfare, then if you are already familiar with the story of Hua Mulan, then there is very little surprises throughout the course of the movie.
Well, aside from the devious Mushu dragon is not here."Hua Mulan" does differ from many other movies in the genre, that being big, epic war movies.
So thumbs up on their achievement here.The acting in the movie was good, although I think they could have had some more talented people in the roles of Hua Mulan (played by Wei Zhao) and Fei Xiaohu (played by Jaycee Chan).
Kun Chen (playing Wentai) was really doing a phenomenal job though, and he alone lifted the movie a great deal."Hua Mulan" is a good and entertaining movie.
The characters were not believable and I felt throughout the movie that the soldiers or military personnel around Mulan are either too stupid to figure out she's female or in major denial.
However for a story like Mulan, one expects far better.
The only thing about the story of Mulan that i knew, was what i learned from the Disney version.
And yes, this is also a love story, but just like the fighting and everything else, to me it seems that the people who made this movie gave a lot of thought to how much romance would be possible under the circumstances.
For example i don't know how the character of Wude (played by Vitas) actually fits into the story, he feels slightly out of place.
All in all i think this movie is absolutely worth watching if you're not too focused on any aspect of Chinese cinema, but even then it might well be worth your time!.
Well, yes, that is the purpose of this film, the absurdity of war and heroism, of true sacrifice and no happy ending in the Hollywood way.Mulan becomes a tactically sound commander of some Chinese army, learns the realities of politics the hard way, learns the Chinese way of sacrificing your own happiness for the greater good of the nation.It is not merely a sacrifice of your life, but a sacrifice of everything you might think will or would define yourself.
The nation, the people, not the individual.So the story doesn't really go anyway - and still it goes everywhere, touches upon the absurdities of our quaint notions of self and of glory and of victory.When Mulan finally puts the welfare of the nation above herself and even above her family and her brothers-in-arms for the sake of the greater good, she ends up where she finally understands what her father meant, despite her fears or even because of her fears.It is a brilliant movie.
I will Watch it Again, and not because of the battle scenes - they are mostly not there - but for the story that doesn't lead you anywhere, drags you along against your will and you end up the same way of Mulan, with only a fling of hope: there is a greater good, and it is not you!.
The numerous battle scenes are impressive and look realistic so if you are expecting highly choreographed almost balletic action of wuxia films you may be a little disappointed.
The film also feels like a TV movie with little sense of reality and sense of place.
Just watched this yesterday with full of anticipation coz I love epic films like these.
Remaining true to the legend, Mulan takes place of her father to fight in the war.
Okay, Joan was considered touched by God as it was a vision that made her take the fight to the English, where as Mulan did it out of a sense of honour.The period in China in which this story is set is quite vague.
However, at the time of this movie, the Wei people were under attack from roaming bandits, but these bandits had decided that raiding wasn't as good because when winter comes they always had to return home, so they decided to invade and stay.The people of Wai thus had to go to war, and as was expected every family was to put up a male to join the army.
However she is caught out, but the person who catches her is on his way up anyway and decides to protect her, but as he goes up the ranks he brings Mulan with him.One of the things that made me think while watching this film is whether there is any incidence of grace or self-sacrifice outside of the Christian sphere. |
tt0454776 | Amazing Grace | In 1796, William Wilberforce is severely ill and taking a recuperative holiday in Bath, Somerset, with his cousin, Henry Thornton. It is here that William is introduced to his future wife, Barbara Spooner. Although he initially resists any romantic overtures, she convinces him to relate the story of his career.
The story flashes back 15 years to 1782, and William recounts the events that led him to where he is now. Beginning as a young, ambitious, and popular Member of Parliament (MP), he experiences a religious enlightenment and aligns himself with the evangelical wing of the Church of England. William contemplates leaving politics to study theology, but is persuaded by his friends William Pitt, Thomas Clarkson, Hannah More, and Olaudah Equiano that he will be more effective doing the work of God by taking on the unpopular and dangerous issue of the abolition of the British slave trade. His conviction in the cause deepens following a meeting with his former mentor John Newton (introduced sweeping a church floor dressed in sackcloth) who is said to live "in the company of 20,000 ghosts... slaves". As a former slave ship captain turned Christian, he deeply regrets his past life and the effects on his fellow man. Newton urges William to take up the cause.
Pitt becomes Prime Minister and William becomes a key supporter and confidant. Pitt gives William the opportunity to present a bill before the house outlawing the slave trade. William's passionate campaigning leads him to become highly unpopular in the House of Commons. He is opposed by a coalition of MPs representing vested interests of the slave trade in London, Bristol, Glasgow, and Liverpool led by Banastre Tarleton and the Duke of Clarence. Despite popular support and the assistance of an unlikely ally in the form of Charles James Fox, William's bill to abolish the slave trade goes down to defeat. Afterward, the film portrays Pitt as one of his few friends and allies remaining in Parliament, however even their relationship becomes strained. Pitt, now facing the stresses of leading a shaky coalition during the French Revolutionary Wars, tells William that his cause must now wait for a more stable political climate.
William keeps up the fight but after years of failure he is left exhausted and frustrated that he was unable to change anything in the government. Believing his life's work has been in vain, he becomes physically ill (in the film he is depicted as suffering from chronic colitis which causes him to become addicted to laudanum prescribed for the crippling pain), which brings the story back up to 1797. Having virtually given up hope, William considers leaving politics forever. Barbara convinces him to keep fighting because there is no other person who is willing or able to do so. A few days afterward, William and Barbara marry. Several years pass with no further success. William's wife and new children provide him with the support and strength needed to carry on the fight.
Finally, with a renewed hope for success William devises a backdoor method of slowly weakening the slave trade through seemingly innocuous legislation. Aided by Thornton, Clarkson, and new ally James Stephen and cheered on by the now terminally ill Pitt, he reintroduces his bill to abolish the slave trade. In time, after the 20-year campaign and many attempts to bring legislation forward, he is eventually responsible for a bill being passed through Parliament in 1807, which abolishes the slave trade in the British Empire forever. | historical, flashback | train | wikipedia | null |
tt1133993 | Serious Moonlight | When Louise, a high-powered attorney (Meg Ryan), discovers that her husband Ian (Timothy Hutton) is about to leave her for another woman Sara (Kristen Bell), she prevents him from doing so by binding him to a chair with duct tape. She tries to persuade and convince him that he still loves her, but everything she says fails to change his mind. He lies and promises that he still loves her and won't run away when she frees him. When he tries to escape, she knocks him out with a flower pot and tapes him to a toilet. She then leaves the house to purchase groceries to make a "romantic meal." While she is out, a lawn service boy comes by to mow the lawn, and Ian successfully yells for help and gets his attention. The boy, realizing that there is no one else in the house, begins robbing their house. When Louise returns, the burglar attacks her and brings her into the bathroom with Ian. During their captivity, Ian realizes that he does still love his wife, and the couple makes up. The next morning, Sara (Ian's mistress) comes to the house, furious that Ian did not show up at the airport to go to Paris with her. The burglars put Sara into the bathroom with the reconciled couple, and the three discuss their love triangle situation. They manage to escape by calling the police from Sara's cell phone, which is in her back pocket. After the whole ordeal, Ian chooses to stay with Louise.
Some time later, Ian and Louise have sold their house and are moving away. They have had a baby as they had tried to in the past. They decide to have lunch one last time in town before they move. While walking to the restaurant, they walk past the same burglar who robbed their house, and the burglar nods at them in recognition. Louise looks away and walks away quickly, and Ian looks stunned (implying she organized the burglary). | romantic, comedy | train | wikipedia | If you enjoy films like "War of the Roses", you should like this one.Basically this is a love-triangle story about a man (Tim Hutton) whose planning on leaving his wife (Meg Ryan) of 14 years for a much younger woman (Kristin Bell).
Unfortunately, Kristin Bell bores us with her very two-dimensional performance.The plot tidies itself up rather too quickly from this twisted story, but at least we're not left with an overly long film.
This is a dark comedy worthy of Hitchcock, and it's far, far removed from Meg Ryan's past 'sweetheart' roles.'Serious Moonlight' is a simple, character-driven story of what happens when high-powered lawyer Louise (Meg Ryan) finds out her husband Ian (Timothy Hutton) plans to leave her for his younger mistress Sara (Kristen Bell).
Eventually, an unexpected visit by Todd (Justin Long) forces husband, wife, and mistress to confront their situation in an unexpected manner.As director Cheryl Hines suggested at the Austin Film Festival Q&A before and after the movie, the film's plot really centers on Ian's character development.
I have to agree, and I also think Hines was right when she said that Timothy Hutton was perfect for this role.And while some might take Louise's decision to tie her husband up as pathetically desperate, I found it entirely believable that such drastic action would be necessary to make a man talk about his real feelings – especially when he's doing something as unoriginally asinine as finding 'real love' with a younger woman.
It's no accident that Sara looks conspicuously like young Louise, I think, and much of the movie's subtext is about the difference between early passion and long-term commitment.This movie often feels like a play in the best sense, focusing on small moments and realistic conversation.
Perhaps because of her strong background in comedy, Hines wisely avoids this pitfall, making the movie's laughs razor-sharp, but balancing them with genuinely tense moments.I won't tell you how the movie ends, because there's a bit of a twist.
But that's almost the point, and I'm glad to see a woman-authored, woman-directed view of male infidelity for once.This darkly comic movie is definitely worth seeing, in my opinion, and given how seriously funnylady Hines takes her job as director, I sincerely hope to see more of her work soon..
After her death, her husband set up the Adrienne Shelly Foundation to help women pursue their film-making dreams.
Money earned from her films goes towards this foundation.Second, there are a lot of elements in this film that are pretty original which seems to be a hard feat to accomplish for most films today.Third, the interesting casting choices, which give us the pleasure of seeing Meg Ryan and Timothy Hutton in mature, grown up roles but acting childishly-stupid with glimmers of maturity and wisdom.
Add to this, Justin Long in a funny and very surprising role, and then the adorable Kristin Bell who for once is actually playing a character less-accomplished than the average woman her age."Serious Moonlight" is a romantic comedy of sorts where we have a husband divorcing his wife so he can be with his younger mistress.
Every turn in this movie is funny, original, thoughtful, and romantic - in its own weird way.I recommend spending your money on "Serious Moonlight".
To be brutally honest, I think winning had more to do with leads Meg Ryan and Timothy Hutton, along with director Cheryl Hines, being by far the most well-known participants, than it did with the quality(or relative lack thereof) of the film itself.Obviously, SERIOUS was inspired/adapted by a play.
The basic premise seems like a sure-fire winner: Not-so-successful, burned out husband decides to leave more successful lawyer wife, before she gets home from vacation, for his ditsy, twenty-something secretary.
Getting home a day early, wife(Meg Ryan) catches hubby(Timothy Hutton) sneaking out in Stealth Mode.
She seems like a sweet, wonderful person; a rather competent actor; and a totally unimaginative, inexperienced and lackluster director.One sequence, midway into the film, is particularly annoying: Husband and wife, tied up in the bathroom, begin a prolonged argument.
Timothy Hutton and a rejuvenated Meg Ryan both turn in commendable, but somewhat strained performances (Over-direction Perhaps?) Two things saved SERIOUS: A fair share of laugh-provoking moments; and acts 3 and 4.(Far superior to rest of film) So, instead of 5*-IT GETS 6*.....ENJOY/DISFRUTELA!.
This is one of the better movies I have seen this past month or so.Meg Ryan puts on a marvelous performance as the slightly crazy wife doing whatever she can to make her husband love her.This is a comedy unlike most other comedies out there.
You really get to feel for the characters of the movie.I like Meg Ryan as an actress, and this is one of the better roles I have seen her portray in awhile.
Looking at the cast of the movie, you'd think you have a nice comedy at hand.
That it is borderline insane (the set-up, which gets even more ridiculous by an ending that is pretty clear, but gets "explained" here on IMDb, if you happened to miss that) and tries to "hammer" in things (quite literally at times), does not make this any better than other movies.
Marital discord making for an unfunny dark comedy, with Meg Ryan and Timothy Hutton failing to create a convincing union (tattered or otherwise).
This is just to let anyone seriously considering to watch this movie know that it is a complete waste of time.
Ryan is way over the top (as her role requires her to be) and that means I could barely stand any scenes with her (which amount to 85% of the movie).
She ties him up, with duct tape, in their farm house.Unlike the kind of humour that's often used in a romantic comedies 'Serious Moonlight' is a lot more tongue in cheek and even dark at times.
Cheryl Hines, who's already known for her comedic talents, proves to be a competent director and with the late Adrienne Shelly's funny and yet thought-provoking screenplay, she has made something entertaining.
I found most of the dialogues laugh-out-loud funny.Timothy Hutton finally gets a part that's just right for him as he does full justice to Ian. Meg Ryan looks great and she's superb as the almost insane Louise.
Justin Long and Kristen Bell provide hilarious support.The twist in the end was cleverly done and works as a good conclusion with a funny touch..
Luoise (Meg Ryan) cannot and will not accept the fact that Ian (Timothy Hutton), her husband, wishes to leave her.
It took both of them quite some time to accept where they had failed, Louise much longer than Ian. In the middle, you have Sara (Kristen Bell), who obviously loved Ian and went to lengths to fight for him.
In the end, as they say, may the best man (or woman) win, but if you notice carefully, there was something lacking in Ian when these scenes were being played out, something which makes you think , "Ok, now, seriously, are you gonna be a man about this or what?" I couldn't help feeling sorry for the girl - she was obviously sincere and showed it without compunction.However, just when you think you've got it all figured out and you see the pieces falling into place, well here comes the final scene, where you say, "What?
I'm sitting here writing this and still turning this scene over and over in my mind, contemplating the different possible meanings.I don't agree the movie is a waste of time or disappointing.
When she is informed by her husband of thirteen years that he is leaving her for another woman, Louise does what every self-respecting woman in her position would do: she conks him over the head, duct-tapes him to a chair, and threatens to hold him prisoner till he comes to his senses.
Thus, for an hour-and-a-half, we're forced to watch as two self-indulgent crybabies - one a cheat, the other a raving psychotic - thrash out the details of their relationship in a tone so grating and mean-spirited that before long we're ready to send in our own hostage-negotiating team just to bring an end to all of our suffering.Despite the presence of Meg Ryan, Tim Hutton, Kristen Bell and Justin Long in key roles, "Serious Moonlight," directed by Cheryl Hines and written by the late Adrienne Shelly (both of "Waitress" fame), is a hopelessly contrived, endlessly off-putting dark romantic comedy (a la "The War of the Roses," albeit without the courage of that film's ending) that, I guess, is supposed to be every cheated-on spouse's idea of the perfect wish-fulfillment revenge fantasy (even if the fantasy winds up going awry in the end).
At one point, Hutton seems to be speaking for the audience when he states, "It's like torture." That's about as astute an example of built-in self-criticism as I've ever come across in a movie..
First off, don't buy this movie unless your a colector of Meg Ryan films etc...Secondly, rent it only when you have rented 90 percent of all the other movies you want to see....Meg Ryan, and I am a fan, was quite good in this film and for that reason only I have rated it a 6 out of 10.I don't want to give away any part of the movie at all however, there is a scene with Timothy Hutton (Ian).
I guess its a dream or a flashback, i'm not at all sure how it fits into the film but its half way in and its at least a minute long where most woman will be absolutely shocked that Meg Ryan was part of this filth.My suggestion, watch it with your female friends, most men will only appreciate 1 minute of this shocking film..
She holds her husband captive to try to win him back."Serious Moonlight" has only two actors most of the time, and the whole film is set in a house.
The screenplay is the last work of the late actress Adrienne Shelly, who wrote, directed, and co-starred in 2007's agreeably idiosyncratic "Waitress", and what they have in common is her supple dexterity in balancing the off-kilter elements of her stories into something deeper.
Her "Waitress" co-star Cheryl Hines ("Curb Your Enthusiasm") takes the helm in her directorial debut, and her lack of experience may attribute to the fact that it feels more like a filmed stage play despite Nancy Schreiber's expert cinematography.The brief story focuses on married couple, Louise and Ian, on a day when they unexpectedly cross paths at their bucolic vacation home.
In a welcome big-screen return as Ian, Timothy Hutton does what he can under a lot of duct tape in a mostly passive role with moments of vented exasperation, while Kristin Bell ("Forgetting Sarah Marshall") shows surprising grit as Sarah, especially toward the end when the women grapple on the bathroom floor.
More than Hines' workmanlike direction, Shelly's somewhat uneven screenplay offers enough dark elements to make the contrived set-up worth accepting for the sake of the unfolding story she wanted to tell..
Besides, this movie was written by Adrienne Shelly (1966-2006), a young filmmaker who was tragically murdered 5 years ago, and it seems unfair to posthumously speak against a screenplay which may needed various (better said, a lot of) revisions.
Having said all that, I need to go back to the point: Serious Moonlight is an unbearable and repulsive disaster.I still remember the days in which Meg Ryan was considered the "queen of the chick-flicks".
So...how did she end up in such an atrocious and cheap movie like Serious Moonlight?
Ian (Timothy Hutton) wants to have a day with his mistress Sara (Kristen Bell) but his high-powered lawyer wife Louise (Meg Ryan) surprises him by showing up a day early.
The quirky tone is not funny until the last act when Hutton, Ryan and Bell are locked in the bathroom.
I loved this movie I found myself wanting to cry and laugh at the same time-I could feel such strong raw emotion from the actors and could definitely identify with their feelings of hate and love and lust all in one situation.
Full of great actors such as Meg Ryan, Justin Long, and Kristen Bell- It was a highly entertaining and heart warming story of a romance lost and found again.
Meg Ryan is one of the most beautiful women in entertainment but in this film it looks like her face is numb and mostly expressionless.
Only Timothy Hutton's talent made me give it two starts instead of one.By the way, I hope we see more of Meg Ryan but please, stay away from the cosmetic chemistry!
Cheryl Hines) Ian has grown tired of his wife Louise, decides to quit the marriage, and takes up with a much younger woman.
The acting is amazing, I love all four of the actors in this especially Meg Ryan and Kristen Bell.
I will be putting this on my list of favourite Meg Ryan movies and would watch it again and also recommend other people to watch it.
Meg Ryan and Timothy Hutton star yet again in a romantic comedy, not called French kiss but Serious moonlight.
But Serious moonlight, though predictable, works cause of the charm between the two stars and it's hilarious.Meg Ryan stars as Louise, a lawyer who realizes that her husband(played by Timothy Hutton) is having an affair.
It's all an act by Louise and lawn boy.When lawn boy drags Louise into the bathroom, apparently unconscious, and tapes her up, the husband begins his long, tearful confession that he really loves her.
I watched the movie without seeing any trailers or anything, I had the idea that it was another romantic comedy, but it was a nice surprise to see that it was an interesting story, with a surprise ending.
The main characters played by Meg Ryan and Timothy Hutton are credible.
It was surprising to see Justing Long doing this character, he was good in this movie.
Danny DeVito is not in this movie - but between Ruthless People and War of the Roses, I certainly felt his presence in the echoes.*** SPOILERS *** Meg Ryan is perfection in the lead as the high-powered lawyer who refuses to let the end of their marriage and her life after it - which she sees all too clearly - become just another cliché.
Justin Long, seemingly cast against type as a thuggish yet provocatively curious home invader with - and he is great - and the balance he shows between these aspects of his character doesn't really hit home until after you have viewed, re-viewed, then thought about the film's final scene.As others have pointed out, Cheryl Hines from Waitress, RV, and Curb Your Enthuiasm directs the script from the late Adrienne Shelley who had died before the film was produced.
Since, i tend to be story-acting-and dialog oriented, that did not bother me as much as some, but if you are looking for visual satisfaction from a film and seeing Timothy Hutton duct-taped to a toilet does not turn you on, you should probably look elsewhere.On the other-hand, it you are looking for well-acted and off-beat character-driven entertainment as a way to spend 90 minutes of your day, watch the DVD of Serious Moonlight..
Not so simple when your wife decides that she's NOT going to let you leave her and holds you captive until she convinces you that you are wrong and that despite what you think you DO actually still love her.Ryan plays this role to perfection and she vacillates between heartbroken wife to complete sociopath and is remarkably convincing at portraying both.
Knowing Ryans movies for many years where she's the good, sweet girl, love interest, adorable girlfriend.....it's fun to see her in such a dark role and in my opinion perfectly cast because she's still cute as a button, but juxtaposed against the diabolical nature of her character was brilliant.
I'm shocked that something this bad was filmed in the first place.Meg Ryan is a mess.
There is little (or no) continuity in any of the initial set-ups of the movie (Ryan is initially presented as a hardworking, romantic woman.
Oh, then she returns to being the romantic, stable woman who tries to salvage her relationship with the husband.) Out of the two people I saw this movie with, one of them actually enjoyed it, and one of them slept through the whole thing.
Meg Ryan & Timothy Hutton,usually can be relied upon to deliver good performances.
The only other actors in the film are done by Justin Long and Kristen Bell, they too needed a tougher director.
I really like Meg Ryan, and Timothy Hutton is okay.
But I'm not sure a film where one of the stars is duct-taped into a chair or onto a toilet for nearly the entire 84 minutes is going to be very compelling.
Horrible Mess...Like a Play Written by a High School Kid. We find Meg Ryan, who has never looked hotter, lowering herself and losing all dignity to keep a not-so-hot husband who has been cheating on her and who happens to speak and act like a teenager.
We are really so much the worse for her untimely horrible loss.This is a unique story of a marriage gone wrong and the wife's attempt to rescue it at any cost, even if that means taping her husband to a toilet seat.The main leads by Meg Ryan and Timothy Hutton are absolutely terrific.
This movie had some good acting (Tim Hutton had to do a whole long speech alone while the Louise character was supposedly passed out - listening I guess too).
The script needed a lot more to make this movie good.I can't recommend this film unless you really have the need for more forced Meg Ryan "cuteness" and you happen to get off on seeing her get her breasts fondled (twice no less).This movie is a DUD.. |
tt0334754 | Yossi & Jagger | Yossi (Ohad Knoller) commands a company of soldiers in the snow-covered mountains near Lebanon. In secrecy, he leads a passionate romantic relationship with his second-in-command officer, Lior (Yehuda Levi), who is called Jagger by everyone for his rock star-like handsomeness and his lip-syncing Mick Jagger. The pair, Yossi and Jagger, lead a loving, yet secret life together, venturing off to be alone and open with one another.
One day, a colonel (Sharon Raginiano) arrives at the base with two female soldiers, one of whom he immediately sleeps with in the bunker. The other one, Yaeli (Aya Koren, credited as Aya Steinovitz), is very interested in Jagger, while she refuses the sexual advances of Ofir (Asi Cohen), who tries to make clear to her that Jagger is not particularly interested in her.
The colonel is there to supervise a night-time ambush, of which Yossi is resentful because of the full moon, and also because he fears for his soldiers' safety. And indeed Jagger is fatally injured that night, dying in the arms of his lover, who only now is able to articulate his love for him.
At the funeral reception at Jagger's parents' house, Jagger's mother mistakes Yaeli for his girlfriend. She laments that she knew very little about her son, including his favorite song, which only Yossi is able to tell her was "Bo" sung by Rita. The song was also sung by Ivri Lider. | tragedy, romantic, sentimental | train | wikipedia | It also cemented the fact that all you need for a truly moving film is (no kidding!) a good story, good characters, good acting (not stars hamming it and ISO of an Oscar - gag), good cinematography, a good script with good dialogue and good direction.
I'm not a big fan of handheld camera cinema verite BS, but there is a scene in which it really does work to great effect: Yossi & Jagger having a playful snowball fight, putting down their weapons, laughing like kids, having a blast.There are just a few select locations, and a small ensemble of actors and that's all that's needed.
Music is used to great effect, not giving us cues as to when we're supposed to cry and when we're supposed to laugh, but is instead perfectly weaved into the story fabric as when Jagger (so named because he has rock star charisma and looks) changes the words to a pop song and singing not in the rain, but the snow.The two actresses and their male colleagues are all young (except the Colonel character, a big beefy macho guy) and very impressive.
How I wish that we would see actors like this instead of the bore-me-to-death Hollywood stars.This is also an incredibly sexy film with looks and unspoken words that are more erotic than anything that's coming out of Hollywood where the stunt-butts and stunt-boops in flattering light and every bump and grind choreographed to death have the unintended and complete opposite effect on me, namely laughter and/or yawning.
The scene with Yossi & Jagger kissing in the snow is the most tender AND sexy I have seen in ages, and the gender of the participants is completely irrelevant.
Watch this film and you'll never be able to watch products off the Hollywoodassembly line again in the same way.Oh, and did I mention that Yehudi Levi (born 1979) who plays Jagger is unbelievably to-die-for-gorgeous with a 1000 watt charisma and a sweetness that makes you want to hug him, after you kiss him all over?
Straight women and gay men, beware - he will break your heart.Hope we get to see him and some of the other cast members in other films, but if Hollywood comes calling Yehudi - give 'em the finger, will ya?
But then I read that it's supposed to be a good movie with a tender love story; I swallowed and gave it a try.
I wouldn't go so far and call the whole movie good but it does have the most touching and beautiful love story I've seen in a long time.I think it's no secret what the movie is about: We are in a military base in Israel and ordinary young people cope with the daily horror each in their own way.
Jagger (named after Mick Jagger cause he's a bit of a rock star himself) is the more flamboyant, vivid, playful and childish one he's romantic, he is a dreamer, he makes plans for his future with Yossi and wants a love like in a Hollywood movie.
Also because of the two great protagonists: Israeli TV star Yehuda Levi is terrific as Jagger and the charismatic Ohad Knoller is simply wonderful as Yossi (he was awarded for his performance).
His lyrical "Yossi and Jagger" proves he is man who can deal with a lot of controversial subjects in a realistic and convincing way.This brief film packs a lot for a 65 minutes feature, but in spite of its short length, what comes out of the story feels real and we don't begrudge the brevity in which it was presented.
The story of Yossi and Jagger is presented without phony touches, that in the hands of another director, of worse yet, a Hollywood studio, would have been meaningless.This is the story about two men who happened to be in love and the consequences of something that goes terribly wrong that ends their involvement.
The two central characters stay with the viewer for a long time, which says a lot about Mr. Fox and the way he has presented his tale about how fate intervenes in the lives of these young men.Ohad Knoller and Yehuda Levi give good performances as Yossi and Jagger.
These actors make their characters work on the movie because of the intensity of their contribution to the film.Mr. Fox is to be congratulated for his inspired direction..
But within a running time less than an animated film, this movie delivers a complete story with genuine feelings, touches many grounds, and manages to be moving and leaves your heart ache by the time when end credit rolls.
with the backdrop of the sad history of conflict in that troubled region, makes the film even more stunning.I was surprised to learn that Israel has allowed gay men and women to serve in their armed forces since the mid eighties.
YOSSI & JAGGER (Yossi VeJager) Aspect ratio: 1.37:1Sound format: StereoOriginally produced for Israeli television but screened theatrically in Tel Aviv to great success before opening nationally to even greater commercial and critical acclaim, this engaging drama from director Eytan Fox has been hailed in some quarters as one of the best gay movies ever made.
Running a mere 65 minutes, the film divides its time equally between a platoon of soldiers operating on the Israeli-Lebanese border, and the two men at the center of a clandestine relationship.Yossi (Ohad Knoller) is a brooding commander who feels constrained by his role as a macho authority figure to conceal his sexuality from the conscripts under his command, while Jagger (Yehuda Levi, a popular Israeli heartthrob whose career was kickstarted by an appearance in the TV soap opera "Cheers for Love" in 2001) is one of his subordinates, a carefree guy who wants them to declare their love publicly by retiring from the Army and setting up house together.
There's a now-famous scene, early in the movie, when Yossi and Jagger make love in the snow (don't get excited - all you see are some lingering kisses and the aftermath, in which the two characters are entirely at ease with one another, free from the restraints imposed by Army discipline), but their romance takes up a surprisingly small amount of the movie's running time, which appears to have been curtailed for reasons of length (there's a number of images doing the rounds from scenes which were apparently shot but didn't make it to the final print).
Based on a true story, the film is warm-hearted but inconsequential, with some annoyingly jerky hand-held camera movements, and the climactic scenes are a little too restrained to be entirely successful (though Knoller, in particular, gives a truly remarkable performance in the aftermath of a devastating plot development).
The right things: a great idea for a film, some very good acting, totally un-Hollywood production values, engaging characters and an emotionally charged plot.
The wrong things:it is far too short to fulfill all of its promise, handed-held camera techniques(Dogma style) are too intrusive and too jarring, and complex characters are introduced and left dangling.As it is, this rough sketch of love in the military is worth the watch (I was strongly affected by the relationship between these two men) but it seems as if this is the director's experimental cut: I wish I could see the finished product..
Yossi and Jagger is a bittersweet love affair between two Isreali soldiers, very well played by Yehuda Levi , and Ohad Knoller, you could feel the love they had for each other and the hurt Jagger was going thru because they had to be so careful as they were officers.
The other is his companion and secret lover Yossi who despite command responsibilities, yearns for a time when he and Jagger can openly express their love.
The script is over ambitious, covering at least three love stories at one time, introducing too many interesting characters, but way too thin in development.
Since the film is called Yossi & Jagger, it might have been appropriate for the story about them to be the main focal point.
The excellent theme here--when you have feelings for someone, don't run from them or hide from them as you may never have a chance to express them.The final scene in Jagger's home is extremely tender and ironic and left this viewer with tears in his eyes.I just wish the film could have devoted much more time to its main characters..
Provided my officers looked as cute and handsome and so-damn-sexy-and-hugable-Yehudi-Levi (Jagger), of course I would enlist.Mild as it may seem at times, it's perhaps the most consequent movie on a gay theme that I have ever seen.
Yossi & Jagger's love is real and palpable, even if semi-secret (I think everyone new, anyway).
The scene where Yossi and Jagger kiss in the snow is surprising, and by far the most sensuous thing I've seen in cinema in years!
Yossi & Jagger is a tender, sweet, sensuous, pure, honest, scrumptious, beautiful, sexy and consequent movie.
Yossi and Jagger is really a short story of a movie: one climactic incident, no development of character, a lack of narrative dimension.
But it's a very interesting picture, for two reasons beyond the usual interest in a movie about gay life in the Israeli army.
I still can't describe this story in few words, is one of those one in a life time experience, its very short but great, you have not a full, crude view of any relationship or the bonds among characters but everything is there.
The characters were great Ohad Knoller (Yossi) is amazing, you see feeling like it was real in every move, and Yehuda Levi (Jagger)is even better.
at the end you'll understand why a picture can make you cry.this is one of those movies that you'll enjoy in a night after a long day of boring life..
but the dialogues, the tension, the love scene in snow,the feelings of Ophir for Yaeli, the smell of danger, the end are arguments for admire a great work, about a delicate subject, who explores the humanity in time of war more than one of the love stories between two men.
"Yossi and Jagger", 2002, is a military based drama and same sex love story.
Director, Eytan Fox, with Ohad Knoller (Yossi)and Yehuda Levi (Jagger).
If the yesterday's opening film dealt with the uniquely Israel topic of Talmudic research, the second film of the week takes up the more universal topic of erotic love between men -- but set at a front line military outpost where machoism in the face of death is the norm.The basic setting: Yossi (Ohad Knoller) commands a company of soldiers in the snow- covered mountains above the Lebanese border (or maybe it's the Golan heights).
This compact smackeroo calls into question all the clichés regarding homoerotic love between men, especially in the military, while at the same time offering documentary like insight into daily military life in the Israeli army, including the roles routinely played by young female draftees.
There are frequent references to the influence of American films on young Israelis, a kind of ongoing in-joke...for instance at one point one soldier asks another: "Who do prefer -- Sharon Stone or Michele Pfeiffer?" --that the answer is Pfeiffer doesn't really matter -- what matters is that Hollywood is the bench mark for beauty in Israel.
YOSSI AND JAGGER is an important film on many levels: it deals with gay relationships in the military in a country known for its lack of support for gender issues, it manages to make a small independent film seem like a major studio production, and it introduces to the rest of the world the gifts of Director Eytan Fox and actors of the caliber of Ohad Knoller (Yossi - a lifetime military type who is in love with his subordinate officer), Yehuda Levi (Jagger - called that because of his resemblance to the rock star and who returns the love of his commanding officer Yossi), and Assi Cohen (Ofir - the soldier who is caught in a triangle with a female soldier (Yaeli - the luminous Aya Steinovitz) who happens to be in love with Jagger).
The story is brief, the love between the two main characters is palpably real, and the tragic ending is made more tragic because of the response to Jagger's death in maintaining the agony of closeted gays.
This film is about the secret love affair between two male soldiers in the Israeli army, who are stationed in the front line."Yossi & Jagger" has been talked about by many for years as a really good gay film.
Opposites attract: Yossi is a career man who has stepped out of character to love Jagger, is terrified of discovery, and reluctant to declare his love; Jagger, so nick-named because of his seductive rock star looks (Mick was sexy, but never this sweet and seraphically beautiful), is a free spirit who is beginning to demand that they live in the open.
A desolate army outpost near Lebanon is the setting for this tale of intimate relations in "Yossi & Jagger." The viewer has a rare opportunity to spend time with a small battery of Israeli soldiers preparing for an ambush.Eytan Fox's direction is comparable to another Hebraic effort, Amos Guttman's "Hessed Mufla" (1992) in its subtle yet realistic depictions.
The film is a very simple story of two men in love.
It's a movie based on homosexuality in a very macho environment, and yet, there is nothing expressly queer about Yossi and Jagger's relationship--this is a love story and a human story more than a gay story.
I had seen another two movies of Eytan Fox and Gal Uchovsky's before this one, both are "gay theme", both are amazingly good.
i think people should really watch this film and come to an understanding that NO one can tell some one else who what why and when to love - cause it's a free right - no one is entitled to take from another person.
The two leads, Ohad Knoller as Yossi and the handsome Yehuda Levi as Jagger brought warmth and sensitivity to their roles without being overly sappy in their love story.
How I envied the little rabbit that was the only witness.It is a short film, and I felt I wanted more moments between Yossi and Jagger, but alas, this wasn't going to happen.
I have rarely been as profoundly moved by anything whether it has been on TV or film as I am by "Yossi and Jagger." From the opening scene until the extremely powerful ending, I was riveted.
there, I said it).the results of this ambush i have no intention of revealing here but let me just point out that it's a very dramatic scene and it makes the generally easy going movie to an emotional turmoil which leaves the viewer with an added value measured in-how long does one ponder of the movie after it ends.summing up: this movie is a terrific movie with superb acting, a flowing (although not flawless) script and a very skilled direction (by the veteran Israely director Eitan Fuchs).9 out of 10 in my FilmOmeterP.S. Israel Film industry is back on track after a couple years of creative drought, kudos!.
I suspect they hit many people hard, as well.I've read several times on this discussion that a major weakness of "Yossi & Jagger" was its length...only a little over an hour.
The protagonists of the movie Yossi and Jagger are seen very little, and the love that they share is very special.
Strong pain in heart when that sad mother (Mrs Amichai) says " people don't have time to know each other...I don't even know my son favorite song..."Commandant Yossi, not the beautiful soldier Yaeli ,answer: "BO, from Rita".
To me, the most blatant thing about Yossi and Jagger is the sexual tension running throughout the film.
it lingered briefly (and quite appropriately) over the tender moments, but did not dwell on the sad, over-dramatic parts (that would have been overkill)...the point was made and it came across quite well under 75 minutes."Yossi & Jagger", though primarily categorized as a "gay film", tugs at the most visceral feelings any person (gay or straight) can have -- the comfort that only comes with genuine and true love, the intense need to be true to one's self, and the sorrow that can only be brought about by a great loss.
Jagger (played by Yehuda Levi) is beautiful and a free spirit, loved not just by Yossi, but also by Aya and his family, even though they don't know him at all.
Only Yossi knows the secrets of Jagger's heart.This is a short and sweet movie that has a simple, predictable, contrived and disturbing ending.
The film is about a gay relationship between two men; Yossi and Jagger.
The relationships which they form is beautiful and it's only when something tragic happens, Jagger is about to die, that Yossi expresses all his feelings for him.
This is a true love story - makes me proud to be gay and able to tell me lover each day.
While the movie is pretty well acted, and the plot a great one, the film is simply too short.
I will never look at a snowball the same way again.) There is simply not enough time to really go into the characters or the plot, and when the movie was finished, I was wanting more.
The characters are captivating and at the end of the ambush, when Yossi finally admits his love, I was crying.
Jagger dies saying that "This is not an American movie." (a reference to something they had talk about as they rolled in the snow)So in the end, Yossi has to visit Jagger's mother.Now, I neglected to mention that there was one female soldier who had rather a crush on Jagger and who was trying to make her feelings known to him on that fateful day. |
tt0035575 | Yankee Doodle Dandy | In the early days of World War II, Cohan comes out of retirement to star as President Roosevelt in the Rodgers and Hart musical I'd Rather Be Right. On the first night, he is summoned to meet the President at the White House, who presents him with a Congressional Gold Medal (in fact, this happened several years previously). Cohan is overcome and chats with Roosevelt, recalling his early days on the stage. The film flashes back to his supposed birth on July 4, whilst his father is performing on the vaudeville stage.
Cohan and his sister join the family act as soon as they can learn to dance, and soon The Four Cohans are performing successfully. But George gets too cocky as he grows up and is blacklisted by theatrical producers for being troublesome. He leaves the act and hawks his songs unsuccessfully around to producers. In partnership with another struggling writer, Sam Harris, he finally interests a producer and they are on the road to success. He also marries Mary, a young singer/dancer.
As his star ascends, he persuades his now struggling parents to join his act, eventually vesting some of his valuable theatrical properties in their name.
Cohan retires, but returns to the stage several times, culminating in the role of the U.S. President. As he leaves the White House, after receiving the Congressional Gold Medal from the President, he performs a tap dance down a set of interior stairs (which Cagney thought up before the scene was filmed and performed with no rehearsal). Outside, he joins a military parade, where the soldiers are singing "Over There", and, at first, he isn't singing. Not knowing that Cohan is the song's composer, one of them asks if he knows the words. Cohan's response is a smile and then joins in the singing. | melodrama, flashback | train | wikipedia | Unlike today's biographies, this is a very positive story about a man who brought patriotism alive during World War I with such inspirational songs as "It's A Grand Old Flag" and "Over There." For some of us, listening to these songs can bring a tear or two.Cagney is his normal riveting self and Joan Leslie certainly makes an appealing female lead as Cohan's wife.
`Yankee Doodle Dandy' makes the viewer say, `They don't make them like that anymore.' The film is uplifting for its espousal of unabashed patriotism and its representation of America as a place in which a gifted performer like George M.
I was moved to tears by the ending showing the elderly Cohan joining in a World War II parade, a group of soldiers marching to `Over There' and being asked why he isn't singing, `Hey old-timer, don't you know this song?' `Yankee Doodle Dandy' is a celebration of Cohan's life and career -- a little sanitised perhaps, but still portraying his love for his family, his profession and his country.
YANKEE DOODLE DANDY (Warner Brothers, 1942), directed by Michael Curtiz, is an autobiographical musical of a legendary Broadway showman, composer, actor and dancer, George M.
Interesting to see a noted movie tough guy singing and dancing, but it's even more-so in watching Walter Huston as Cohan's father doing a song and dance himself.The story opens with the middle-aged Cohan (James Cagney), following a comical musical performance in "I'd Rather Be Right" in which he plays and spoofs the president (Franklin D.
Believing the worst, he arrives to meet "with the head man." Alone with him in the Oval Office, the two men converse which leads to Cohan to soon be relating his life story via flashback starting with his birth (born on the 4th of July), as the son of stage entertainers, Jerry and Nellie Cohan (Walter Huston and Rosemary DeCamp), followed by his boyhood days as the star of "Peck's Bad Boy" (Douglas Croft playing George at age 12), the teaming up with his younger sister, Josie (first played by JoAnn Marlowe, then by Patsy Lee Parsons, and by Jeanne Cagney as an adult) and his parents, forming the act called "The Four Cohans," George leaving the family to form an act on his own, his association with a young hopeful named Mary (Joan Leslie), whom he eventually marries, the publication of his songs that make him world famous, the death of his parents, his retirement from the stage and his return to Broadway to appear in a play that has summoned him with an invitation from the president, and after nearly two hours of recollection, the story moves forward to present day with Cohan to find out why he was really asked to come to visit with the president.With a handful of song and dance tunes, many composed by Cohan himself, the soundtrack is as follows: "The Dancing Master," "The Dancing Master" (reprise); "Strolling Through the Park One Day" (by Joe Goodwin and Gus Edwards); "Minstrel Number," "I Was Born in Virginia," "The Warmest Baby in the Bunch," "Harrigan," "Yankee Doodle Dandy," "Yankee Doodle Dandy," "All Aboard for Old Broadway" (by Jack Scholl and M.K. Jerome), "Give My Regards to Broadway," "Oh, You Wonderful Girl," "Blue Skies, Grey Skies," "The Barber's Ball," "Mary," "Forty-Five Minutes From Broadway," "Mary" (reprise); "Forty-Five Minutes From Broadway," "So Long, Mary," "You're a Grand Old Flag," "Battle Hymn of the Republic" (by William Steffe and Julia Ward Howe); "When Johnny Comes Marching Home," "Of Thee I Sing," "You're a Grand Old Flag," "Come Along With Me," "Over There," "I'm Happy As Can Be," "Love Nest" (by Louis A.
Hirsch and Otto Harbach); "Little Nellie Kelly," "The Man Who Owns Broadway," "Molly Malone," "Billie," "Jeepers Creepers" (by Johnny Mercer and Harry Warren); "Off the Record" and "Over There." Of the songs listed above, several could have been chosen as alternate titles in regards to Cohan, including: "Give My Regards to Broadway," "Grand Old Flag," "The Man Who Owns Broadway," or "Off the Record," but the final selection became "Yankee Doodle Dandy." While many of these songs are Broadway show tunes, the most memorable ones happen to be the patriotic songs, especially "Grand Old Flag," "Over There," and of course, the title tune.In the supporting cast are Irene Manning (Fay Templeton); Richard Wholf (Samuel H.
As a movie, YANKEE DOODLE DANDY is a grand old musical that blends nostalgia of the past (early twentieth century, World War I) with patriotism of the 1940s.
Although the patriotism plays towards the World War II audience, much of Cohan's spirit of being an American continues to reflect upon the present generation.Full of memorable lines, YANKEE DOODLE DANDY's most noted happens to be Cohan's closing speech following a performance, "My father thanks you, my mother thanks you, my sister thanks you, and I THANK YOU." Filmed with crisp black and white photography, YANKEE DOODLE DANDY did go through the process of colorization in the mid 1980s.
Already terminally ill, Cohan lived long enough to see the film and no doubt he would have approved of it because it sure is how he would like to have been remembered.In 1942 when Yankee Doodle Dandy premiered there was a whole generations of people left alive who saw George M.
And his first real success was Little Johnny Jones which score included American classics, Yankee Doodle Dandy and Give My Regards to Broadway.What's left out is the fact Cohan had two wives.
Far from it, he was a very bitter man and when he did that final comeback in I'd Rather Be Right he fought with Kaufman and Hart over the book and Rodgers and Hart over the songs.But Yankee Doodle Dandy presents the public musical face of George M.
YANKEE DOODLE DANDY, the classic WB wartime musical, has delighted three generations of audiences with its unabashed patriotism, rousing songs, and, most of all, with the unmatched energy and talent of its Academy Award-winning star, James Cagney.
From his first Broadway success (1904's 'Little Johnny Jones'), he had been determined to leave a legacy that would not be forgotten, and by 60, with his health beginning to decline, he concluded a film biography was the surest way to achieve immortality.He first approached Sam Goldwyn, a personal friend, to do the picture, but demanded creative control, and when his choice to play himself, Fred Astaire, turned down the role, Cohan backed out of the project.
Warner was more than happy to take on the biography, and after viewing earlier Cagney musicals, Cohan agreed with the selection of leading man (Cagney had actually auditioned, once, for a Cohan play...and was rejected!)Cohan's colorful life had to be toned down, somewhat, for the screen (he had been married twice, and 'wholesome family films' did NOT portray divorce), so an amalgamation of both wives was created by screenwriter Robert Buckner, and named Mary (to capitalize on one of Cohan's most popular tunes).
While the showman fretted that current wife Agnes might be offended, the second Mrs. Cohan was actually pleased (her middle name was Mary, she had started in the chorus line, and so she assumed the character Joan Leslie played WAS her!)Finally (after the Epstein brothers were called in to add their legendary comic touches to the screenplay), filming began...on December 8, 1941.
Cast and crew listened to President Roosevelt's radio address about Pearl Harbor, Cagney led everyone in a prayer, and an unspoken goal was set, to make YANKEE DOODLE DANDY the most patriotic, inspiring film possible.
The film was a huge hit, and was gratifying to Cohan (it is said that the day he died, November 5, 1942, he took a last stroll on Broadway, then joined the long line waiting to see his film biography, and watched James Cagney's unforgettable performance).While it is true that the film is a bit dated, it is still a grand entertainment, and is on the AFI's list of the '100 Greatest Films of the Twentieth Century'.George M.
Hollywood- and the nation at the time- was more concerned with the way things should have been than with the way they actually were.Cagney was surely a perfect choice to play Cohan, being an Irishman who enter show business as a song and dance man, (and always considered himself primarily that).
James Cagney (who was a first rate song and dance man on Broadway) studied THE PHANTOM PRESIDENT to know what were Cohan's singing and dancing style.
Oddly enough, it was Cohan who said he wanted as little romance in the film as possible.The more I learn about Cohan the more I realize that Cagney was perfect to play him - both Irish Americans, both about the same size and build, and George Cohan's style of dancing and singing were about the same as Cagney's.
recount his life story to FDR, receiving his Congressional medal in the Oval Office, and then dance joyously down the White House stairs and into the streets joining a group of marching soldiers in a chorus of "Over There" was probably a great way to bridge Cohan's patriotic past with what was then an uncertain time that certainly needed a dose of his optimism.The one thing that I did find a little odd - and one thing isn't much in a two plus hour long movie - is that it is hard to spot the actual point in the film where Mary becomes George's wife.
Being a newbie to both the world of Cagney as well as American propaganda, "Yankee Doodle Dandy" seemed the best place to start, and from the opening scene of the birth of George M.
James Cagney put down his tommy gun and grapefruit long enough to register his lone Oscar-winning performance in one of Hollywood's most enduring biopics, playing song-and-dance man George M.
Cohan songs for extra insurance.There are plenty of delightful moments, along with some pretty corny and sentimental nonsense dreamed up by the scriptwriters, but there's an infectious air about all the song and dance numbers that make the musical moments count the most.WALTER HUSTON as dad, ROSEMARY DeCAMP as mom and Cagney's real-life sister JEANNE CAGNEY, all of them turn in inspired performances.
In case you've seen Yankee Doodle Dandy and couldn't figure out why James Cagney won his Oscar for it, when he lost the gold in Angels with Dirty Faces and Love Me or Leave Me, you need to remind yourself when it was made.
He was also nominated for his role, probably because it was fun to see him sing and dance, and he's in the big tearjerker scene of the film.If you're a sucker for patriotic songs and want to see big production numbers of "Over There," "Give My Regards to Broadway," "You're a Grand Old Flag," and of course, the title song, you're going to want to rent a copy of this famous forties flick.
I don't think any other actor could portray George M Cohans dancing style better than James Cagney.
was known for it's gangster films rather than musicals (that was M-G-M's domain), but with 'Yankee Doodle Dandy' they scored a hit with wartime audiences and the Academy Awards.'Dandy' is a sentimental, albeit fictitious biography of prolific Broadway producer, composer, actor, George M.
booth), his songs, 'Give My Regards to Broadway' and 'You're A Grand Old Flag' are still being sung today.The film's patriotic message may seem a bit over the top to some in the 21st century, but for the era in which it was created it clearly expressed the feelings of the majority of Americans involved in the war effort.The real reason to enjoy this classic showbiz musical is the stellar performance by James Cagney.
Like Fred Astaire, Marilyn Monroe, Cary Grant, Katharine Hepburn, Jack Nicholson, Jodie Foster and Robert De Niro, Cagney truly possesses that screen presence and 'aura' that defines a true Hollywood star.One of the most interesting numbers is Cagney as Cohan performing 'Off the Record,' in a recreation of the 1937 Broadway musical 'I'd Rather Be Right.' Cagney/Cohan portrays a singing, dancing Franklin Delano Roosevelt delivering a press conference to a group of reporters in Central Park (trust me, it's more convincing when you see it on screen).
Cagney, best known for his gangster roles, had always wanted to be a 'song and dance man', and this movie showcases his talents.
Cagney took the role because it was a great part, maybe the greatest part he'd get that played to his talents; Cagney was a song and dance man on vaudeville before he went to Hollywood and did gangster movies; he and his wife even opened a dance studio briefly to make ends meet and took every opportunity to break free of his gangster typecasting to do musicals.
The movie is a delight not only for Cagney's performance, but for all the character actors who shined in their individual roles; George Barbier, who played the guy representing Fay Templeton, was also featured in "The Phantom President" 1932 which starred the real Cohan!
I think I might have heard the warning signals about Jimmy Cagney's Yankee Doodle Dandy as a movie that was great when it came out (1942) as it was exactly the type of movie the USA needed, but after watching it, I must say that I agree with a lot of people that say that this movie hasn't dated very well, and it's over the top patriotism would probably make people wince.Jimmy Cagney is here playing George M.
Cohan incarnates the USA.The genius of the film, is that you don't even need to open a book about America, to get the meaning of the patriotism that inhabited the hearts of people, in these doomed years, Cohan embodies this proud and passionate feeling: the "Yankee Doodle Boy", James Cagney's greatest role.
We love Cohan, because we admire him, and would love to be like him.Like a good biopic, the film starts with the family life, but this part is even more relevant because it shows George as the center of a Family, he's one of the four Cohans, including Josie, the sister, Nellie, the mother, and Jerry, the father, played by Walter Huston in an admirable supporting performance that made me forget he was Howard, the Old prospector from "The Treasure of the Sierra Madre".
Where "Yankee Doodle Dandy" succeeds, "Saving Private Ryan" fails, Curtiz' film says "We're great" while Spielberg says "We're greater
" It's all about emotions, and by not trying to manipulate MY emotions, "Yankee Doodle Dandy" made me feel for this country, and this spirit
This probably wasn't intended but the film, released when the Americans were going "over there" for the second time, is so refreshing and entertaining it still appeals now, even beyond the frontiers, and make some more recent movies look like propaganda.But "Yankee" is definitely not a propaganda, it has the same patriotism I found in the cartoons that enriched my childhood, I knew the 'Battle Hymn of Reblic' song from the Looney Tunes, the "Yankee Doodle" music from Tom and Jerry, and the "Over There" theme from a Tex Avery's cartoon, I grew up with this music, with "When Johnny Comes Marching Home Again", with all this catchy and inspiring themes that celebrate for me an eternal fascination for USA, as people, as a spirit
and I watched this film with the same joy as when I was a child watching these cartoons, and this is not belittling the merit of the film, not at all.
Released in 1942, "Yankee Doodle Dandy" is a superior film with a great cast, music, story line, and dancing.
Cohan (James Cagney) in director Michael Curtiz's 1942 musical biopic "Yankee Doodle Dandy".
Amongst the big life events we follow Mr. Cohan through include joining his parents (Walter Huston, Rosemary DeCamp) and sister (Jeanne Cagney) in the family's vaudeville act as a young and cocky kid, meeting his future wife Mary (Joan Leslie) who is also in showbiz, and his successful partnership with struggling writer Sam Harris (Richard Whorf) in producing one popular musical production after another.
But for the great scenes, and they are many, you will forget all about your popcorn and just marvel at the energy and life in this movie, a great deal of which emanates from the deservedly Oscar-winning performance of its star, James Cagney.-------------------------I just finished watching the new Ken Burns series on The Roosevelts.
Likely no one under the age of 40, surely 30, has ever heard of him....and there's a good reason for that.Cohan was still alive in 1942 when this film was produced AND the United States had just been drawn into World War II...making "Yankee" relevant for the time.
Cohan, was Irish-American and a song and dance man.Yankee Doodle Dandy was the most patriotic of WWII films and its flag waving and American "Over There" mentality was just the shot in the arm the country needed.
Well, I don't think anyone in 2006 (or 1942 for that matter) should care that Yankee Doodle Dandy is not exactly faithful to the facts about the real George M Cohan.Can any actor today have the played the part as well as Cagney did?
Get past that and you have an incredibly entertaining film, with great music, a strong supporting cast, and a one-of-a-kind performance from James Cagney.
He meets his wife backstage, gets his first big break backstage and soon becomes the writer of some of the most well-known patriotic songs ever written, including "A Grand Old Flag, "Over There, and of course "Yankee Doodle Dandy." Unfortunately, there is very little truth to most of this as the actual Cohan saw the film, loved it but was unsure who it was about.
The film was released just-in-time for World War II, and accurately predicted its outcome.********** Yankee Doodle Dandy (5/29/42) Michael Curtiz ~ James Cagney, Joan Leslie, Walter Huston, Richard Whorf.
it is good enough to watch on any day, not just the Fourth of July.James Cagney really brings George Cohan to life. |
tt0053980 | Kala Bazar | Raghuvir (Dev Anand) is a poor bus conductor who is fired from the job after getting into an argument with a passenger. With an ailing mother (Leela Chitnis) and two younger siblings to take care of, Raghu doesn't know how to provide for his family. When he passes by a cinema hall and sees Kalu (Rashid Khan) selling movie tickets, he gets an idea. Raghu steals ₹ 5000 from Advocate Desai (Chetan Anand) and sets up his own black marketing business.
First, he works with Kalu, and at the premiere of Mother India, their tickets sell faster and faster as more film stars arrive - they include Dilip Kumar, Geeta Dutt, Guru Dutt, Kishore Kumar, Raaj Kumar, Rajendra Kumar, Lata Mangeshkar, Sohrab Modi, Mohammed Rafi, Nargis, Nadira and Nimmi. Finally, he sells his last ticket for ₹ 100 when one ticket cost only ₹ 2.
Elated with his newfound business, Raghu and Kalu go from strength to strength, recruiting many poor and homeless thieves. When Ganesh (Madan Puri) dares to challenge him, Raghu beats him up. The next day, Ganesh agrees to work for Raghu. Now a wealthy man, Raghu buys a new, spacious flat for his family in Marine Drive. Things change when a group of students buy movie tickets from him. Alka (Waheeda Rehman) finds out that her friends bought them in black, and tears the tickets. This has a great impact on Raghu, who is standing nearby and watching. Her boyfriend, Nandkumar Chattopadhyay (Vijay Anand) promises her not to do it again.
Smitten with Alka, Raghu starts to follow her. When Nand gets a scholarship and travels overseas, Alka's parents decide to take her to Ooty to take her mind off Nand. Raghu sees this as a perfect opportunity and gets on the same cabin as her family. He sings "Apni To Har Aah Ek Toofan Hai", trying to flirt with Alka, while the song itself was veiled as a prayer. He also helps to cure Alka's father's back pain with a massage, and soon, he becomes friends with the family.
All that taken care of, he sets out to romance Alka, but she resists and turns away his love when she lies that she is engaged to Nand. Heartbroken, Raghu returns to Bombay to continue his business, but his love for Alka has changed him. When he left Alka in Ooty, he promised that he would never do anything bad. Raghu tries to convince his partners to stop black marketing and get an honest job, but they all eventually go back to their bad deeds. Raghu continues to try and earn an honest living, and to his surprise, he meets Alka one day in Bombay.
Alka, meanwhile, also falls for Raghu, but hesitates to tell him. Finally, she writes a letter to Nand, telling him to forget her because she loves Raghu. The latter is delighted, and Alka tells him to come in the evening to talk to her parents. However, everything goes awry when she learns that Nand has returned. When Nand comes to her house, the two of them argue, but finally both concede that their "love" was just childishness. Now free to profess her love for Raghu, Alka goes to his house, only to learn that he has been arrested for black marketing... | romantic | train | wikipedia | Another memorable movie from the house of Dev Anand's Navketan.. Dev Anand again plays the role of an anti-hero with a lot of restraint and deftness. A rare film, by Indian standards, where the heroine is shown falling in love twice. Wahida Rehman is initially in love with Vijay Anand, who, having gone abroad for higher studies, falls in love with another woman, and so does Wahida, who, after initial reluctance, falls for Dev Anand. The film is also notable for the fact, that in this film, all the three Anand brothers, Chetan, Dev and Vijay acted together. Chetan Anand gave an excellent performance in a cameo role of an Advocate, who fights for the reformed Dev Anand. With excellent screenplay and dialogues, the film showed the calibre of the young director, Vijay Anand, who was directing his second movie only. Another highlight of the film was its music by Sachin Deb Burman. Mohammad Rafi's "Apni to har saans ik toofan hai" and "Khoya khoya chand, khula aasmaan" are excellent numbers. Another good song by him is "Sooraj ke jaisi golai, chanda si thandak hai paai". His duet with Geeta Dutt "Rimjhim ke tarane leke aai barsaat" to date remains one of the best rain songs. Asha Bhosle's solo "Sach hue sapne mere, jhoom le O' man mere" is one of her best songs. Her duet with Manna Dey "Sanjh dhali, dil ki lagi" is a typical experimental number by Burman da. The film also has a beautiful bhajan in "Na main dhan chahun, na ratan chahun", sung by Geeta Dutt and Sudha Malhotra.. Great film and a wonderful comment on the path of righteousness. A very heart warming movie with great acting and absolutely lovely songs. A must see for cinema that portrays the grittiness of life. Dev Anand's acting is restrained and effortless. He displays all the charm that he is rightly famous for and looks quite the dandy in his ascot, coat draped over this shoulder's and bouffant hair style. None of the phony and overdone glitz of today's movies - simple, charming and a strong commentary on the insidiousness and vagaries of corruption in India. It must have been quite daring in 1960. The music and songs are really wonderful and worth the effort to see this film. The song shot in Ooty is very well formatted as is the foot path scene in Mumbai illuminated by the street light. This is a classic of Indian cinema as is Dev Anand's other movie of 5 years later - GUIDE. Both are must see movies for those who enjoy Hindi films.. Vijay Anand inspired Manmohan Desai and Farah Khan. Kala Bazar meaning 'black market' essentially dealt with black marketing of movie tickets which Dev Anand does in the film. The story follows the template of a protagonist who takes the wrong path to make money and then realizes his mistake for which he has to pay back.Raghuvir (Dev Anand) loses his job and is in dire straits when he sees a man (Rashid Khan) selling tickets in black outside a cinema-hall. Seeing that as a good source of quick money, he too decides to black movie tickets. But for that he needs capital to start with. So he robs Advocate Desai (Chetan Anand) of Rs 5000 and soon sets his own network of black marketers outside all prominent cinema-halls of Bombay.One day, outside a theatre, he stumbles upon Alka (Waheeda Rehman) who hates black marketing. Raghuvir is attracted towards Alka but Alka is in love with Nand Kumar (Vijay Anand) who goes abroad to study. Meanwhile Raghuvir attempts to woo Alka on their trip to Ooty but in vain. Though he is unable to win Alka, his feelings towards her makes him a changed man and he gives up the path of black marketing.Kala Bazar was Vijay Anand's second directorial venture post the success of his debut venture Nau Do Gyarah. His writing was multi-layered where he enmeshed a charming love story inside the central plot of going the wrong (illegal) way in life. There were some very unconvincing conflicts like how the 8th pass Raghuvir showed a sudden keen interest towards gaining knowledge because of Alka. Coincidentally he also accidentally stumbles upon a BA scholar (Krishan Dhawan) who takes his tuitions. But the pacing was very fast and kept the viewer engaged.Like in Nau Do Gyarah, where he stationed a major portion of the film in the hill station of Mahabaleshwar, here Vijay Anand explores the beauty of the South Indian hill station Ooty. Dev Anand kept strolling through gardens of Ooty in the song 'Khoya Khoya Chand' in his trademark swaying motion where he kept swinging his arms all through. It might appear kind off funny today but back then it was Dev Anand's patented dancing style which he continued for years to come. The scene immediately after the song was considerably bold by the 60s standards where Waheeda Rehman removes her sari to use it as a cord to pull Dev Anand up, when he slips down from the cliff.The love story in the film was refreshingly restrained and despite a love triangle, Vijay Anand never loaded the proceedings with melodrama. The screenplay never makes a huge hue and cry of the scene when Waheeda Rehman rejects Dev Anand and yet remains his friend or subsequently when she gets back to Dev Anand and disowns Vijay Anand. The director had a very matured and progressive outlook towards relationships.The film also deals with its title conflict of black marketing very smartly. Dev Anand's repentance for his misdeeds and the way he convinces his gang to give up the wrong path is very interestingly portrayed. The courtroom drama in the climax (where Chetan Anand fights for Dev Anand) is thoughtfully conceptualized and very well-worded with a balanced and impartial point of view. It neither glorifies or glamourizes Raghuvir's black-marketing nor does it ignores his remorse.Through black marketing outside cinema-halls of Mumbai, the film captures the glory of good old movie theatres of the city, some of which (like Liberty and Metro) exist even today. Vijay Anand also very intelligently incorporated the real-life premiere footage of the film 'Mother India' in the initial reels of Kala Bazar thereby adding immense (cameo) star value to the film showing the likes of Dilip Kumar, Nargis, Guru Dutt, Rajendra Kumar, Sohrab Modi, Kishore Kumar, Mohammad Rafi, Lata Mangeshkar and many more names. Years later Manmohan Desai and Farah Khan replicated the same formula in their films Naseeb (1981) and Om Shanti Om (2007) respectively and to good effect.Like any Navketan production, even this film was blessed with melodious tunes by S D Burman. The soundtrack had everything from love songs to a bhajan to a Helen cabaret number. 'Khoya Khoya Chand' and 'Rimjhim Ke Tarane Leke Aayi Barsaat' are timeless tunes. The picturization of the song 'Teri Dhoom Har Kahi' starring Dev Anand and his sidekick Rashid Khan was borrowed by Rakesh Roshan in a similar theme song 'Yeh Paisa Bolta Hain' starring Kader Khan and his sidekick Johnny Lever in his 1989 film by the same title Kala Bazar.Dev Anand was charming as always and gave a splendid performance in a character that had an interesting graph. Waheeda Rehman looked beautiful and was natural as ever in her performance. Vijay Anand and Chetan Anand were good in their special appearances. Nanda played a supporting part as Dev Anand's sister and was decent.Gaurav Malani |
tt3121332 | Nasty Baby | The film centers on European-looking, South American immigrants, Freddy and Mo, a gay couple trying to have a baby with the help of their friend Polly. Freddy is also a performance artist who is attempting to make a short film entitled Nasty Baby which features himself portraying a screaming infant. Freddy's sperm count is too low causing every attempt with Polly to fail. Mo is reluctant to be the donor but eventually concedes, and Polly successfully gets pregnant. Throughout the film the trio are plagued by a mentally ill vagrant called The Bishop. Polly and Freddy make the mistake of initially being friendly to him, but he is aggressively homophobic and gives Polly unwanted attention. One evening he assaults Polly, and the next morning a policewoman intervenes. This only worsens the situation, and ultimately The Bishop follows Freddy home the same evening his performance art piece is rejected. The Bishop assaults Freddy with a rock while verbally attacking him with homophobic slurs, and in self-defense Freddy swings a six pack of beer at The Bishop's head, badly wounding him. Freddy carries The Bishop up the stairs of his apartment, remorseful and wanting to help, but The Bishop attacks Freddy with a kitchen knife and Freddy kills him in self-defense. Realizing Freddy could be deported because of this, and with Polly pregnant, the trio (with the help of several other friends) take the body to the woods and burn it. | murder | train | wikipedia | "Nasty Baby" by filmmaker Sebastián Silva takes you on a back ally tour of the character of ordinary people.
This movie starts off pleasant enough with likable, real character; but from the start there is a slow burn that is building towards some unwanted destination.
This movie takes you around the big attractions of a city and delivers you via the characters in places you would never expect to visit or would want to go.
Nobody can say writer/director/actor Sebastián Silva lacks creativity and ingenuity as a young filmmaker.
His film Crystal Fairy & The Magical Cactus, while being frustratingly quirky and an overall unpleasant experience for me years back, did show that Silva had a talent for concocting pretty bizarre scenarios with an ethereal vibe in their cinematography.
Silva's latest directorial effort, Nasty Baby, comes very close in giving off the same kind of young, upstart filmmaking tendencies of Jay and Mark Duplass, but it's a film that gets bogged down by a serious sense of misguided direction in its third act that almost makes the film's pillars collapse under the weight of its incredulity.Spoiling the film would be criminal, so expect me to dance around the events with great detail.
The story revolves around a European immigrant named Freddy (played by Silva, who also wrote the film, as well) and Mo (Tunde Adebimpe), a gay couple who are trying to have a child of their own and enlist in the help of Polly (Kristen Wiig) to be their surrogate mother.
This wouldn't be such a chore, but due to Freddy's low sperm count, his numerous attempts to impregnate Polly have resulted in nothing but frustration.
Freddy is also a prolific actor and starving artist, and his latest project is a short film titled "Nasty Baby," which will show him portraying a screaming infant (just when I thought Mark Duplass's role in Creep that had him making a video for his unborn son to enjoy was the peak of strange).The bane of the trio's existence comes in the form of a mentally ill neighbor they know as "The Bishop" (Reg E.
"The Bishop," while initially seeming like a petty character in the lives of these three, consistently finds himself being a common problem as they try to go about their daily lives unbothered, especially given the stressful circumstances they're currently facing.Nasty Baby is a film that works largely because it's free-form and unwilling to conform to a discernible plot for much of its runtime.
It admirably rejects form, and that makes it easy to believe that this is a film about three realistic characters that are simply going about their days.
The vibes the film gives are so natural and nuanced that even the quirkiness of Freddy making a video of him acting infantile is a believable inclusion, despite its most illogical entrance into whatever remnants of a plot this film bears.Nasty Baby's issue comes when it decides to introduce a plot - a considerably dark and sad one, at that - late in its third act.
It's as if, in that very moment in his screen writing, Silva forgot to really introduce a bigger, more identifiable conflict for his characters, and as a result, the final twenty minutes of the film feel very forced and rushed in attempting to introduce, remedy, and eventually solve the newly introduced problem for their characters.
Had Silva stopped dawdling with the screenplay and introduced this conflict earlier, maybe at the fifty-minute mark, this film could've been the best of both worlds - a largely free-form exercise in indie, LGBT filmmaking, in addition to a compelling black comedy/drama.Instead, this feels like a film that doesn't really find its very real problem or identity until it's too late to really leave a meaningful impact.
The overall effect of introducing such a huge and potentially life-altering situation to the characters with only about twenty minutes left in the film not only is unfair to the film's characters, but the audience members, who will undoubtedly emerge feeling a sense of disconnectedness and discomfort thanks to a film showcasing such a monumental event before solving it and cleaning it up like it was nothing at all.With all that in mind, Nasty Baby is just sporadically funny enough to be deemed a comedy, and wisely punctuated by enough sadder or more dramatic moments to also fittingly earn the title of a drama.
Silva's quirky narrative, for the most part, doesn't get the best of him, and the trio of performances from the main cast is particularly strong, with the standout being Wiig in another performance that needs just the right amount of eccentricity and humanity to make it work (see Adventureland and The Skeleton Twins for her other strong performances at playing smart, if disconnected).
This is a film that works marginally well for the most part of its runtime, teetering on the edge of silliness and sophistication until the point where it reaches its climactic arc, which should've been its second major conflict throughout.
At that point, we see that Silva has been piloting a ship that he knows how to operate but doesn't really know how to steer and doesn't find out until the ship has sailed well past it's destination.Starring: Sebastián Silva, Tunde Adbimpe, Kristen Wiig, and Reg E.
Many indie films receive positive responses during a film festival run because most festival goers are frequent movie watchers, and really appreciate the unique and brave approach taken by the rebellious and up-and-coming filmmakers.
Writer/director Sebastian Silva lulls us into the comfort zone of a "friends" story and then stuns us with a third act that could seem out-of-the-blue, if one weren't paying close attention along the way.Mr. Silva also stars as Freddy, a media artist who is working on a video project (entitled Nasty Baby) that features himself (and others) imitating infants.
He lives in Brooklyn with his boyfriend Mo, played by TV on the Radio's Tunde Adebimpe (so good in Rachel Getting Married, 2008).
They are part of a trio of friends completed by Polly (Kristen Wiig), who is addressing her biological clock by relentlessly pursuing artificial insemination from her two friends.While it's easy as a viewer to get complacent watching the interactions of these three mostly likable people in various elements: together, separately, at work, with other acquaintances, and especially with neighbors; the script offers many subtle hints along the way about the make-up of each.
The supporting cast is excellent and includes Reg E Cathey ("House of Cards") as a mentally-shaky neighbor, Mark Margolis ("Breaking Bad") as a more level-headed neighbor, Alia Shawkat (underutilized here, but very talented) as Freddy's assistant, and Neal Huff as the eccentric gallery owner.Normal seems like a pretty straightforward term, but the film shows that normal really doesn't exist, since it's always changing.
The relationship of this trio of friends, their plan for child-rearing, and the family dinner at Mo's parent's home
all examples of how normal has shifted.
And to top it off, the film's third act can't be considered normal by any standard of story-telling, and you will question how you missed the true character of the main players
and maybe even how you would react, if you found yourself in this spot.
I love Sebastián Silva film's but this one left me a bit empty and confused.
I have no doubt there is a serious message flowing throughout this story but this time it went right over my head.The central character is Freddy.
He's an artist and this story is about him preparing to film or rather video his entry to an art exhibition.
His art project is to record himself dressed and acting like an infant, a baby in diapers!
The hate filled man continues his harassment of Freddy and Freddy has had his fill of this grotesque man and strikes back.At this point the story suddenly changes.
I wondered what is Sebastián Silva doing to this mostly benign story.
Freddy as an artist is innocent in his creative quest, the baby is innocents.
Freddy is forced to abandon his innocents by the hate filled man who represents society in which innocents tries to survive.At movies end we see Freddy and friends are admiring an infant in a stroller.
Here we see the same movements and sounds that Freddy created for his art project as a baby in diapers.
I don't think I've seen more than five films in my life that take such an unpredictable, wild turn and tonal shift like this did.
This is the troubling question that this film wants us to answer, and honestly, I think it did an amazing job of it.
There are many different ways that the film could've posed these questions, and sure enough many other films that I've seen have posed them in different ways, but I think the unorthodox unpredictability of this really hits those points home.
I think that first normal hour is needed for this reason, and why no one should read anything about this film going into it.
For better or worse, the filmmakers took a huge, giant risk here (like, I cannot stress enough how HUGE that risk was), and they didn't want this film to be forgotten lightly.
For my money, I left it feeling like it had made me think about a lot of different things, along with being a highly intriguing, engaging film..
Director Sebastian Silva stars along with Tunde Adebimpe as a gay couple in New York City who are thinking about having a baby with their best friend, Kristen Wiig.
Not much really happens plotwise for the first hour or so, though a conflict arises between the trio and a mentally unhinged, homophobic man who lives in their neighborhood (Reg E.
He often follows Wiig around in a threatening manner, and likes to throw homophobic slurs at Silva and Adebimpe as they walk down the street.
Freddy (Sebastián Silva) and Mo (Tunde Adebimpe) are a gay couple in NYC.
They're trying to have a baby with friend Polly (Kristen Wiig).
Freddy is a performing artist making a short of adults acting like babies.
Grotesque (Noun) - A distortion of reality, often comic or satiric in nature.Sebastian Silva has a knack for making films that mask simmering malice, danger, and outright evil in a playfully subversive manner.
"Magic Magic" detailed the slow crack-up of an innocent and naive California blonde as she's dragged deep into the bowels of South American ethnicity (read: Reality).Silva himself stars in this latest excursion into unwanted reality, one his character, Freddy, seems just as terrified to face: that of fatherhood.
Freddy lives in an airy Brooklyn apartment with his partner Mo (Tunde Adebimpe).
He's a visual and performance artist who's got a child's attention span (and general life attitude): flighty, not overtly responsible or aware of other's feelings, and prone to fits of rage that mask an underlying self-hatred and nonacceptance.
Throw into this emotionally thick stew Freddy's fixation on getting his best friend Polly (Kristin Wiig) pregnant with Mo's sperm (as Freddy's isn't up to the task - ouch), an obsession with an oddly self-conscious performance art piece that articulates his own fear and loathing, and a crazy neighbor who's becoming more and more aggressive in his assaults.
There's enough TNT here to detonate the most stalwart brownstone.Most of Freddy's fears and neuroses are down-played in Nasty Baby, just as Juno Temple's were in "Magic Magic" and Silva is good at this.
Mo, Polly, and even Wendy, Freddy's assistant (the sparkly Alia Shawkat, who also produces here) can see the cracks and the film does a good job at slowly turning up the seismic rumble under the surface.Reg E.
Does Freddy really want a child?
Nobody around him seems sure, even his elderly gay neighbor (the superb Mark Margolis) who's seen his share of battle wounds from just being himself.Nasty Baby eventually erupts in an unexpected and nasty way that I won't spoil.
It's anything but light entertainment, but like all of Silva's films it will make you think and will hold up over repeat viewings.
There is no doubt that everyone who performed in this movie believed in it and did it for the art and beauty of a great film.
Everyone who took part in this film should be very proud as it's a great work of art..
Chilean director Sebastián Silva's Sundance premiered sixth feature NASTY BABY is an oddity in queer cinema, it ostensibly starts to tackle with a topical issue of gay couples, after homosexuality has been reckoned more or less as a normalcy in America, - parenthood, but rounds off with a shark-jumping bang.
Freddy (director Silva himself) is an European immigrant, from Spain, one divines, he is a performance artist lives in New York with his black boyfriend Mo (Adebimpe, leading singer from TV on the Radio).
Freddy and his bestie Polly (Wiig) are both broody: Freddy is caught up in his new project named "Nasty Baby" which involves adults imitating baby behaviours, it is absolutely nonsensical both on paper and in its eventual form, while Polly, at one point is joked by Freddy as a"semen vampire", she is not young anymore, so timing is also crucial for her whether she could ever become a mother.
Naturally, they decide to having a baby together, only to their dismay that Freddy's sperm count is too low.
So Freddy is egged to persuade Mo as the sperm donor, and the latter eventually caves in.Meanwhile, a mentally impaired vagrant Bishop (Cathey) lives nearby begins to wrack the trio firstly by leaf-blowing in every early morning across the street of Freddy and Mo's apartment, then physically pestering Polly several times and constantly hurling homophobic abuse at them, anyway he is cuckoo, and Silva ascertains that the aversion to Bishop is plain vicarious.
Time goes by until a mood-shifting third act happens on the day when Polly phones Freddy that she is not pregnant with Mo's semen whereas the truth is otherwise, she only wants to give him a surprise later to cheer him up after knowing Freddy's Nasty Baby is cold-shouldered by the gallery owner initially shows interest but backtracks.
On his way to his apartment, a tetchy and smouldering Freddy encounters Bishop again, and this time, there will be blood!
The trio is going to become parents of a mixed race baby, but a callous truth is that not only they have no instinct to save one when they can, they also unanimously chooses the other way around, on a deceitful ground that man is a scourge, despicable and expendable, yet, he is still an egalitarian human being, when bringing a new life into this world and extinguishing an old one (assumably with the same skin color) has been juxtaposed in that fashion, it electrifies viewers to jump on that cynical old question: how can we keep our inner demon at bay and raise a child free of such contamination?
Sebastian Silva's Nasty Baby is a movie that features a tonal shift so abrupt you find yourself questioning the likelihood of the behaviour you are witnessing.
It seems forced and unrealistic, as though the writer, director and star (all Silva) knew he had this destination in mind, but didn't really know how to get us there.He's done tonal shifts before, and much better, in Crystal Fairy, for example, which was a kind of quirky comedy until an absolutely poignant moment toward the end almost had me in tears.In Nasty Baby, the shift is handled with a plot device we've all seen before, so it feels like the movie wants to move into thriller territory without warning.
It finishes with the trio - two bearded gay men and a woman, trying to get pregnant - needing to dispose of a body.
Why doesn't the Silva character call the police as soon as it happens?
If he is worried about deportation, why is he in such a high profile career?Nasty Baby starts like a Nicole Holofcener drama, with quirky, believable characters trying to work out with what they want for themselves and each other.
Silva should have watched one of Holofcener's movies to see that that would have been enough: perhaps he thinks an abrupt tonal shift is required of him now.
It doesn't look like the movie believes it either.Another thing: why on Earth is the elderly gay neighbour so efficient at disposing of corpses?
Directing and acting are definitely the strong suit of the film, the dark comedy is sharp and on point in terms of timing and rhythm.
Nasty Baby looks into the lives of young artist Freddy (played by Sebastián Silva), his boyfriend (Tunde Adebimpe), his best friend (Kristen Wiig), and some of his other cool hipster buds.
The trio are trying to have a baby, but end up having to deal with some darker things than baby names and homophobic families.
Nasty Baby, Sebastian Silva's an independent movie presents contemporary urban drama.
This film undertakes a story of homosexual partners Freddy and Mo and their female friend Polly.
Freddy, an artist, to become a father creates a piece of art.
Not just between trio but in Silva's creative work as well.
Bishop, a mentally troubled neighbor, invades the space of the trio and pushes their boundaries to the edge.Silva starts his story using close-ups to revoke the parochialism of emotions between the trio.
Puts them in a serious life threatening situation to show that one need the life create a life comes with a contempt of the others.In Silva's film core of attention is paid to the characters rather than production design or insane stunts.
Nasty Baby is an intimate drama, a story of a group that is complicated and diversified.
Silva encircles the story by grotesque thought provoking scenes, characters poor behavior to the situations.
All performances in the film at a good level.
Nasty Baby is a substantial artistic and contemporary drama that through a challenge to the viewer.Read more on www.visualandwrting.com |
tt0058257 | Kashmir Ki Kali | Wealthy and pampered Rajiv Lal (Shammi Kapoor) is the only son of widowed Rani Maa. At the silver jubilee anniversary of the mill that his father, the late Sanjiv Lal opened, he announces a bonus of 5 lakh rupees for all the workers, annoying his mother. A servant at the house, Karuna (Mridula Rani), suggests marrying him off to stop his immature antics, to which Rani Maa agrees. Her manager, Shyamlal, arranges for her to meet some girls, as she insists that Rajiv will marry a girl of her choice. Rajiv returns home and sees all the girls - he correctly surmises that his mother is getting him married, and he pretends to be a mute who walks with a limp in order to chase all the prospective suitors off. His plan succeeds, although he is in a dilemma as his mother is furious at him. One of his friends suggests that he should go away to their bungalow in Kashmir - after all, Rani Maa never goes there.
Upon arrival in Kashmir, he finds that his estate manager, Bholaram (Dhumal), has made a hotel out of their bungalow and has rented out some rooms for the season. He tells the tenants that he is Rajiv Lal, although when he meets Bholaram, the latter informs him that Rani Maa had called him, and told him not to let Rajiv stay at the bungalow, should he come. Rajiv manages to convince Bholaram to tell Rani Maa that he is not there. Bholaram tells the tenants in the house that Rajiv is mad, and in his madness, thinks that he is the real owner of the estate.
The next day, Rajiv meets Champa (Sharmila Tagore), a girl who sells flowers for a living. He buys her flowers for 20 rupees when they are priced at 5, and tells her that he is not the owner, but the driver. Soon enough, after a few misadventures, they fall in love and decide to marry, but there are a few obstacles. First of all, Mohan (Pran), the forest manager, has loaned out some money to Champa's father, Dinu (Nazir Hussain), and he insists on marrying Champa if Dinu cannot repay the debt.
Things become complicated when Mohan finds out that Dinu is not Champa's real father, and he blackmails Dinu into getting Champa married to him, or else he will let out the secret to Champa. Champa still continues to meet Rajiv on the sly, but all of that comes to an end when three girls, who are tenants in his house, reveal in her presence that he is not the driver, but the owner of the estate. Feeling betrayed, Champa runs off. Before Rajiv can go after her, he receives a trunk call from his mother, and he is informed that Karuna is seriously ill.
After telling Bholaram to explain everything to Champa, he leaves for Bombay, and finds Karuna on her deathbed, with Rani Maa at her side. Karuna tells Rajiv that he is not the real son of Rani Maa, and that his biological father is none other than her brother, Dinu. Many years ago, Dinu had sold him off to Karuna for alcohol, and Rani Maa had taken him in. Soon after, Rani Maa gave birth to a baby girl, but Dinu abducted her, intending to kill her so that Rajiv will be the sole heir to Rani Maa's wealth.
However, on the way, Dinu tripped and fell, and loses his eyesight, so he does not kill the girl. Rajiv is shocked at the revelation, but more so is Rani Maa, who had assumed that her baby girl was still-born. Before Karuna can say who the girl is, she dies. Shyamlal informs the two that the day Karuna fell ill, a man from Kashmir had come to see her and asked about Rani Maa's girl, but Karuna hadn't told him anything. The man turns out to be Mohan. Rajiv and Rani Maa head back to Kashmir to find out who the girl is, and Rajiv, acting on a tip from Bholaram, goes to confront Mohan.
He beats Mohan unconscious, and Mohan's friend tells Rajiv who the girl is - Champa. He goes to find her, and finds out that she is getting married to Mohan in a few days. Dinu returns home and Champa questions him. He lies to her at first, but when Rajiv drops a hint that he is the son that Dinu had sold all those years ago, the latter hugs him and admits that Champa is not his daughter. Rani Maa comes in and finds Champa, and the two embrace. Mohan arrives with his goons and decides to forcibly marry Champa.
Dinu tries to stop him, but Mohan beats him badly. The goons tie Rajiv up, and then take Rani Maa and Champa to the wedding venue forcibly. Back at Rajiv's bungalow, Chander (Anoop Kumar), Rajiv's friend, and Shyamlal decide to go after them and see why they are taking so long. Rajiv manages to escape from his captors, but Dinu is still unconscious. He meets with Chander and Shyamlal on the way, and tells them to get the police while he goes after Mohan.
He breaks into Mohan's hideout and stops the wedding ceremony. A fight ensues, and Mohan runs off, Rajiv hot on his tail. The police arrives soon after, and arrests all of Mohan's goons. Meanwhile, Rajiv and Mohan get into a fight, and the police come to take the latter away. The film ends with a shot of Rajiv and Champa, happily married, driving away in his car. | romantic | train | wikipedia | null |
tt0043726 | The Late Edwina Black | The domineering Edwina Black has just died, and the general feeling appears to be of relief rather than grief. The local community whispers that her death is a disguised blessing for all concerned, particularly her henpecked widower Gregory (Farrar) and downtrodden personal companion Elizabeth (Fitzgerald). Unknown to anybody, Gregory and Elizabeth have been clandestine lovers for some time, and matters take a serious turn when the local doctor, feeling uneasy about Edwina's sudden and unexpected death, orders an autopsy. The result come back, revealing that Edwina's body is full of arsenic.
Inspector Martin (Culver) determines to get to the bottom of the case and his suspicions obviously fall on Gregory and Elizabeth. In the absence of concrete proof of their guilt, he sets out to trap them, hoping that they will inadvertently implicate themselves. A complicating factor arises when it is discovered that the housekeeper Ellen (Jean Cadell) has been keeping secrets of her own, and also had good reason for wishing Edwina ill. Two travel tickets and a guidebook to Italy are found in Elizabeth's possession. How does she explain that away?
Martin proceeds to drop seemingly innocuous but loaded observations into the ears of the three suspects, hoping to provoke doubts and foster mutual suspicion. This works so well that they are soon apparently falling over themselves to incriminate each other. Martin has to try to untangle the stories to come up with a coherent picture of what actually happened, all the while being aware that he is perhaps being manipulated into barking up entirely the wrong tree. | murder | train | wikipedia | The Old Dark House.
Edwina Black has died and an autopsy shows she was poisoned with arsenic.
Meanwhile, her widower and his secretary (played by the wonderful Geraldine Fitzgerald), who have been waiting for her to die, are preparing to go off to the Continent.
While the police inspector (played slowly and perfectly by Roland Culver) investigates, they turn on each other in private.
Who poisoned Edwina Black?
Who is lying?Maurice Elvey, one of the great forgotten talents of the British film industry, directs this as an Old Dark House mystery, where the spirit of the late Edwina Black is evinced by the low light levels and the occasional tinkling of a crystal chandelier.
His use of camera movement is almost undetectable unless you look for it -- it serves merely to maintain composition.
Elvey was among the most subtle of directors in the British industry -- he did what he did in support of the movie, lacked any of the immodesty that the auteur-loving writers of the CAHIERS DE CINEMA adored and made an excellent movie in the process.
Take a look at this one and see..
It isn't us.
It's this house, it's full of her!.
The Late Edwina Black is directed by Maurice Elvey and adapted to screenplay by Charles Frank and David Evans from the play of the same name by William Dinner and William Morum.
It stars David Farrar, Geraldine Fitzgerald, Roland Culver and Jean Cadell.
Music is by Allan Gray and cinematography by Stephen Dade.It's Victorian England and Edwina Black has just died.
When a fatal dosage of arsenic is revealed to be the cause of death, suspicion falls on Edwina's husband Gregory (Farrar) and her house companion Elizabeth (Fitzgerald).
More so when it becomes apparent that Gregory and Elizabeth are having a passionate love affair.
Intrepid Inspector Martin (Culver) investigates as housekeeper Ellen (Cadell) looks on with interest from the shadows.Under seen Brit period mystery resplendent with moody melodramatics and some spooky shenanigans.
This is all about a mystery to be solved in a big Victorian house bathed in shadows and low lights.
There is only three suspects, so for those paying attention from the off the mystery is a little weak, while there's some over acting indicative of the time.
However, Elvey and Dade prove very adept at creating a house of ominous atmosphere, where although the hinted at supernatural elements are not in the realm of horror, they work well in context of the back drop.
Characterisations are nicely drawn, especially when the harmony of Gregory and Elizabeth's affair begins to crack.It all builds to a quintessentially olde British finale, as the great Roland Culver gets to do his Hercule Poirot act, all neatly revealed over a cup of tea!
Hooray!
Another fine, understated performance from Geraldine Fitzgerald.
Geraldine Fitzgerald gives another of her usual fine, understated performances as Elizabeth Grahame, a maid, who may or may not be a murderess.
This is, however, a very unusual thriller which starts with the death of Edwina Black.
Everyone is suitably shocked but when an autopsy is requested it proves that she was poisoned.
It seems that Mrs. Black was a hard and bullying mistress and the villagers think life will be much easier at the house now she is dead.
Mr. Black (David Farrar) and Elizabeth have fallen in love but there are some red herrings that pop up - a travel book to Italy that Elizabeth had ordered a month before Edwina's death is innocently explained.
She is convinced a black cloud hangs over the house and as time goes on begins to be eaten up with suspicion and jealousy and is slowly consumed by Edwina's personality.
Jean Cadell is excellent as the aloof housekeeper.
You never realise, until the end of the film, "who done it" - as everyone seems to be acting so innocent!!
Geraldine Fitzgerald was quite a rebel - she was often suspended because of films she refused to do.
She returned to England for a time in the late 40s.
She starred as an alcoholic murderess in "So Evil, So Young" and "The Late Edwina Black" before she returned to the States..
Don't tangle with Jean Cadell.
This is a fine thriller well acted and directed.Jean Cadell does a fine job of scaring the life out of everyone.Veteran director Maurice Elvey does a fine job of sustaining suspense despite the fact that there are only three suspects.Roland Culver is the diligent detective who bit by bit manages to deduce what happened and whodunnit.The ending is a bit of a surprise..
Jumble of emotions.
The Obsessed is a nice example of English noir and of the murder mysteries they do so well and with such style.
It's a wonderful case study on how suspicious minds can mess with your head.Schoolmaster David Farrar's wife who's a rich sickly soul is given arsenic poisoning and that brings Scotland Yard in with Inspector Roland Culver.
Farrar has been carrying on for some time with Geraldine Fitzgerald who is the wife's companion.
The bulk of the film is spent with Farrar and Fitzgerald each thinking the other did it and trying to keep their relationship intact.
Housekeeper Jean Cadell, a nasty old soul is sure it was one of both.A whole lot of emotions come into play with the scenes of the two leads often at the same time, hope, fear, anger, suspicion all fueled by the wife's poisoning.As is usual the wise Scotland Yard inspector with some forensic help sorts it all out.Great acting especially from the two leads..
Mix of murder mystery and old dark house spooker.
THE LATE EDWINA BLACK is one of many filmed versions of a popular stage play of the mid 20th century.
This low budget, black and white tale is very much in the 'old dark house' mould, beginning with the murder of the house's mistress by arsenic poisoning.
Suspicion immediately falls on the woman's husband and her maid, who are planning to elope together, and a visiting detective must examine the clues to solve the mystery.This is a spare, tidy kind of production, focusing on just a handful of characters and presenting the plot twists in a matter-of-fact way as they occur.
Roland Culver has the most fun as the quirky inspector while David Farrar does dark and brooding very well.
The film manages to build up a fair head of atmosphere of times, reminiscent of REBECCA in the way the mistress's spirit seems to linger in the surroundings, eerily mournful for justice. |
tt0119931 | Standoff | A young girl, Bird with her aunt's boyfriend waiting at the car, visits the grave of her parents on the anniversary of their deaths, witnesses and photographs a hitman, Sade, killing people attending a funeral. When her aunt's boyfriend, Roger, comes looking for her, Sade kills him and tries to kill her too, but she flees into the woods. Bird comes across the house of a war veteran, Carter, who vows to protect her. Arriving at the house, Sade shoots at Carter, who grabs a shotgun and shoots back. They exchange words and gunfire, and both are wounded. During a break in the gunfire, Sade tries to talk Carter into sending Bird down so he can kill her. Carter refuses, and they both pause to patch up their wounds and prepare for the next round. Carter sends the girl for some light bulbs, which he breaks and throws down the stairs, alerting Sade to the fact that he "ain't no farmer." Carter finds out from the girl what happened in the cemetery and that she has a picture of Sade's face. Sade, in the downstairs of the house, starts going through Carter's possessions and finds a picture of Carter in military uniform with his wife and son. He tries to convince Carter he is also ex-military and he understands why Carter is protecting Bird. Carter lets him know he is aware that Bird has a picture of him and that is why he is after her.
Meanwhile, a sheriff's deputy happens upon the abandoned cars at the cemetery. In the house, a resting Carter is dreaming about a tragedy that happened to his son. He wakes up and sends Bird to get a bottle of alcohol. She returns with the drink and his son's teddy bear, which he angrily tells her to put back. Sade finds and starts to read a letter Carter had written his wife, taking blame for the death of their son. In the letter, he states he knew she blamed him for the death and didn't blame her for leaving him. Sade realizes that Carter had packed up and written the letter as he was contemplating suicide. He snidely encourages him to go ahead.
Bird tells Carter that her dad told her she had "no quit in her" and wonders if she will see her dad when she dies. She asks Carter why his wife left him and he said the house reminded her of their son. They hug and Sade shoots a round, gaining the attention of the deputy (Jim Watson) who was looking around for the cars' owners. The light in the house starts to fade and Carter now needs to get Bird out as he only has one shot remaining and in the dark he can't protect her.
The deputy goes back to his car to report the shot fired and ask if a shooting range had opened. He drives up to the house, where Sade sees him arrive while Carter is trying to get Bird out through a window on the second level. Knocking at the door, the deputy is shot by Sade and Bird goes back into the house. Sade hides the deputy's car and starts to head back to the house where Carter confronts him and tells him to leave. Sade tries to goad him to shoot, guessing he only has the one shot and would likely miss given the shotgun's range. Carter backs off and Sade grabs the deputy as bait. He tries to bargain with Carter for the deputy's life as well as his own for Bird. When Carter refuses, Sade starts to torture the deputy. He eventually shoots him and rolls him out where Carter can see him.
After a period of silence, Carter tells Bird to hide and starts down the stairs. Sade in the meanwhile makes his way barefoot across the roof. He ends up at the top of the stairs, where he is surprised by Carter, and falls down the glass-strewn stairs. Fed-up, Sade plans to set the house on fire, but changes his mind and calls Carter's wife on Carter's cell phone which he had found earlier. Resting again, the men engage in another argument.
Night descends and Carter's wife Mara arrives. Sade bargains again for Bird implying he'll rape Mara if Carter doesn't comply. Fearing he will trade for his wife, Bird pleads with Carter not to. Instead he gives her the gun instructing her to shoot down the stairs if Sade heads up. He heads down the stairs, telling Sade "if he wants her, go get her." Sade goes on a rant before shooting Carter in the leg. When Sade yells to Bird that he will kill Carter, she quickly heads down the stairs in order go save him. Before Sade has the chance to kill any of them, the lights in the house flicker, giving Carter the chance to rush the assassin, stabbing Sade multiple times, though is shot in the ensuring struggle. While Carter incapacitates Sade, Mara runs outside to call 911. Bird, however, stays behind, determined to kill her tormentor herself. Finding Sade against the wall, severally bleeding, he tells her to shoot him after she aims the gun at Sade and pulls the trigger, but the gun only clicks; with Sade realizing the round was a dud the whole time. Sade aims his gun at Bird, who looks on at the man, unafraid, telling him herself to pull the trigger, though he only responds with the fact that he is not a monster before dying without shooting. With it finally over, Bird heads over to Carter who is still alive. He simply tells her "there is no quit in me." as the three of them wait for the police to arrive. | cult, flashback | train | wikipedia | Not what I was expecting, but alright nonetheless. I basically saw this movie through happenstance, and had no expectations whatsoever. I will admit to being shallow and expressing disappointment at not seeing Natasha Henstidge topless, but besides that, this movie was enjoyable. It has the feel of a converted stageplay, in the sense that it is essentially six people locked in a room for two hours. Maybe I'm completely out to lunch here, but it reminds me of other converted plays like 'twelve angry men' and 'lifeboat'. It definitely has that HBO/Sci Fi Channel feel to it. The acting was solid overall, though not exceptional. The best of the bunch I think was 'Bama'. Also, maybe I'm a tad naieve, but I found the surprise ending to be a big surprise. Maybe I got suckered by it all just like Jamie, the main character did. Hmph. On an overall scale of enjoyment, I'd have to give this a six or so.. A Good Cast in a Low-Budget and Confined Thriller. A way to go for some Low-Budget Movies is to have a Confined or Closed Environment. The thing Is, if You go that way, the Characters and the Actors have to be on Their game or the whole thing collapses under its own restraint.In this one the Setting is an Abandoned, Run Down Farmhouse in Rural Texas. The Backdrop of the Story is a WACO like Raid on a Nut-Case Religious Cult and some FBI Agents are Caught in the Crossfire and Holed-Up, Waiting for the Calvary.The Cast is a Good One with Dennis Haysbert, Keith Carradine, and Natasha Henstridge (fully clothed). The Headliner is Robert Sean Leonard, whose Film Career Stalled early on and He went to TV. The Interaction, Anxiety, and Paranoia of the Agents and Their two Cult Captives (both Women) are what's at hand here and it is a fine Dramatization of a Stressful Situation where Everyone Comes Unglued.There is some Strong Violence and the Players have the Chops to make this work. The Plot may be Predictable or Not, but the Ending is Not the Big Noise in This One. It is a Character Study and the Script is a Good One for a Low-Budget Standoff.This Virtually Unseen Movie that Captivates with the Crackerjack Cast and the Dialog. There are frequent Shootings In between the Character Confrontations and Overall it's Worth a Watch for some Good Acting and a very Tense "Pulled From the Headlines" Scenario.. It was ok, but could have been better with cast changes and more originality. I kinda enjoyed "Standoff (1998)" even though it wasn't the least original. A bunch of FBI agents storm the headquarters of a deeply religious cult Waco-stylee.But the operation - which we never see, only in flashbacks - goes wrong and two of the agents, played by Robert Sean Leonard and Dennis Haysbert, get away. Sounds an awful lot like "Reservoir Dogs (1992)" doesn't it?They hide in an old house with the vicious trigger happy cult members lurking outside. Soon more people, a couple of other guys who are also fighting the cult, show up. They don't like each other at first, but they all have to work together to survive and fight enemy outside. Sounds an awful lot like "Night Of The Living Dead (1968)" doesn't it?And in the basement of this house they find more people, who also hide from the danger outside. Gee, for some reason that's sound very familiar... I've heard that somewhere before, wonder what it could be... Oh yeah, it's "Night Of The Living Dead (1968)" again.From there, more things happen, problems appear and everything seems hopeless. I can't go on about the plot without spewing spoilers all over the place, so I'll stop right there. Let's just say that if you've even seen only one film in this genre, doesn't really matter which one, you know exactly what's gonna happen and you won't find the ending the least surprising. I spotted that one coming casually from a mile away.What I liked about "Standoff (1998)" was that I, in all its predictability, actually found it sort of exciting. It's like when you're watching a "Die Hard"-movie, you know exactly what's coming (that's about the only resemblance, but give me a break, it's just an example). You know Bruce Willis is gonna blow stuff up, start bleeding, get dirty and sweaty, spit out a decent amount of one-liners and, of course, save the world. But somehow it keeps you on the edge of your seat, anxiously awaiting whatever comes next.What I didn't like was some of the acting, Zeke Clayton was nothing short of being one complete disaster. Cliché and stereotyped anyone? But he was probably told to act the way he did by writer/director Andrew Chapman (son of Michael Chapman, wow!) so won't blame him for this flat performance. And I've never liked Robert Sean Leonard all that much. He reminds me too much of Hugh Grant, and that's about as far away from a compliment you can ever get. They both have that nervous appearance with the stuttering and the blinking and all that. No hard feelings though, I'm sure they're both really nice guys, I just wouldn't mind if they would cast someone else instead. |
tt0104549 | Jennifer Eight | Former Los Angeles policeman John Berlin is teetering toward burnout after the collapse of his marriage. At the invitation of an old friend and colleague, Freddy Ross, Berlin heads to rural northern California, for a job with the Eureka police force. Instead, Berlin prickles his new colleagues, especially John Taylor, who was passed over for promotion in order to make room for Berlin.
After finding a woman's severed hand in a garbage bag at the local dump, Berlin reopens the case of an unidentified murdered girl, nicknamed "Jennifer", which went unsolved despite a full-time six-month effort by the department. Berlin notes an unusually large number of scars on the hand as well as wear on the finger-tips which he realizes came from reading Braille, determining that the girl is blind. He begins to believe the cases are related. Berlin does his best to convince Freddy and his fellow officers of his suspicions, but Taylor, and police chief Citrine, refuse to believe that the hand found at the dump is in any way connected to the other cases.
After consulting his former colleagues in L.A., Berlin discovers that in the previous four years, six women, most of them blind, have either been found dead or are still missing, all within a 300-mile radius of San Diego. He becomes convinced that "Jennifer" was the 7th victim and the girl whose hand was found at the dump is "Jennifer 8", or victim #8. While investigating the links between the dead and missing blind girls, he meets blind music student Helena Robertson, determining that her roommate Amber was the eighth victim. Berlin becomes obsessed with the case, despite an almost complete lack of hard evidence, and becomes romantically involved with Helena, who resembles his ex-wife.
After an attack on Helena, Ross accompanies Berlin on a stakeout at the institute where Helena lives in a dorm, after leaving Helena with Ross' wife Margie. When they see a flashlight shining on the same floor as Helena's apartment, Berlin investigates and is knocked unconscious by the killer, who then shoots and kills Ross with Berlin's .32 pistol. A grueling interrogation of Berlin by FBI special agent St. Anne ensues. St. Anne makes clear to Berlin that he figures him for Ross's murderer, but also inadvertently reveals information which clues Berlin to the identity of the true killer. Berlin tells St. Anne and Citrine who he believes the killer to be, but his deductions are met with disbelief. Berlin is arrested for Ross's murder, but is bailed out by Margie, who believes that Berlin is not the killer.
Upon making bail Berlin returns to Margie's house only to learn that Margie has taken Helena back to the institute. Fearing that Helena and Margie are in danger, Berlin rushes to the institute, but fails to arrive ahead of the killer, who breaks in and chases a woman he believes to be Helena through the dorm. Finally catching up to her, the killer is shocked to discover that the woman he'd been pursuing is actually Margie, who shoots him dead, avenging her husband and closing the case. | murder | train | wikipedia | It's absolutely entertaining, with great performances from pretty much everybody, but especially Andy Garcia and Lance Henrikson.It plays out like a good mystery/thriller should: Frustrating twists and turns, brooding atmosphere and music, and layer after layer of clues that you know are building to a big time climax.
Like any great film actor there is little time to develop a character so casting must be spot on.
Such amazing acting from such incredibly diverse actors: Andy Garcia is just perfect as the police sergeant (and incredibly sexy in this role); Uma Thurman plays a blind musician very convincingly and some scenes are truly terrifying; John Malkovich has a stern, unrelenting style that is seemingly perfect for him in this role (St. Anne).
This is easily one of the most underrated Hollywood films of the nineties - it's got a compelling script, beautiful performances (particularly from Andy Garcia, Uma Thurman, and John Malkovitch in a short but unforgettable cameo.), some of the best cinematography ever set on film (director of photography Conrad Hall later went on to shoot 'American Beauty'.), and one of the greatest scores ever written by underrated composer Christopher Young.
I cannot and will not for the life of me comprehend why people do not like provoking and complex movies, (ya know, WHERE YOU HAVE TO BE ABLE TO THINK).Jennifer 8, is a great movie, it is daring, smart, witty, scary and....a bit on the real side.
Uma Thurman is remarkable as the blind Helena, and one would be hard pressed to find fault with her very realistic performance as the would-be next victim for the serial killer.
It stars Andy Garcia, Uma Thurman, John Malkovich, Lance Henriksen, Kathy Baker and Graham Beckel.
The rushed ending is particularly galling, after asking the audience to stay with the pic for two hours, it's not unreasonable to expect a good long and dramatic finale, sadly that's not the case.Fans of neo-noir type visuals have some interest here, as does anyone who likes the type of serial killer movies that dominated the late 80s and early 90s before Fincher's Seven raised the bar.
Freddy Ross, sergeant on scene (Lance Henriksen in a rambunctious, really underrated performance) calls in his old friend, big city Detective John Berlin (a haggard Andy Garcia), to help investigate.
this movie has great stars( Thurman, Garcia, henriksen & a great cameo by malkovich( he is so good that i wanted to put my hand thru my flatscreen & just choke him).
With Andy Garcia, Uma Thurman and John Malkovich all playing intriguing characters, this should have been better than it was.
"Jennifer 8" is a passable thriller with an exceptional cast and a relatively cohesive story, but much like the "gialli" of Dario Argento, it's a film that doesn't have the good sense to quit while it's ahead, and expects to tie things up with a reveal that is just so much hastily-assembled pop-psychology cliché.
Set in a pervasively dreary New England state, Andy Garcia plays a LA cop who's transferred in order to be under the command of mentor Lance Henriksen, and discovers a bloodied brassiere and a severed hand at the scene of an apparent suicide; thus is unearthed a casefile on a string of murders targeting blind women as a masked assailant goes back into action, stalking attractive music teacher Uma Thurman (who gives a performance better than the material deserves).
While Andy Garcia's sometimes-frantic line readings and bug-eyed expressions make him a dubious choice for the lead, he plays well off his more seasoned costars, particularly Henriksen (whose profane, hard-boiled zingers remind us why he is one of cinema's best-kept character-actor secrets); additionally, John Malkovich shows up late in the game for a brilliantly-performed interrogation scene that, while seemingly extraneous to the ongoing plot, is nevertheless worth watching for the man's undeniable chops (like Charles Bronson, he basically plays the same character in each film--but does it quite well).
Enjoyed the great acting of Uma Thurman,(Helena Robertson),"Prime",'05, who plays a blind gal who has some connection to another young girl who disappeared and is being investigated by a detective.
This detective is played by Andy Garcia,(Sgt. John Berlin),"The Lost City",'05, who has just transferred from Los Angeles to a small town in Northern California and his first assignment leads him to a garbage dump and all its smells in the pouring rain.
Beautifully directed, dark thriller with twists and turns as an obsessed detective tracks a dead-end serial killer case with clues that point to him as he gets closer to the killer.Andy Garcia smolders with gravitas and intensity in a way he has had trouble matching ever since.
classic scene in a rainy dump in the beginning, where he uncovers a severed hand.John Malcovich nearly steals the film in a series of interrogations as a smarmy investigator trying to pin the murders on Garcia, and Lance Henrikson puts in some very solid character work.Uma Thurman looks great and the film has a surprise ending that satisfies..
This is a thriller with a good concept, good acting, good photography and good intentions all around, but which is confused and disjointed in execution.Garcia stars as John Berlin, an L.A. forensic detective who has moved to a small California town at the behest of a friend of his on the force there.
The known victim is theorized to be blind, which leads to a romance with a blind girl - believed to be a witness - at a nearby school for the blind.Despite a basically intriguing story there were too many quantum leaps and plot holes in this movie where I found myself wondering, 'how the hell did we wind up here?' or 'how did we find this out?' I found it confusing and disjointed, despite the good acting, etc.
I also liked that the film kinda gives you 'the clues' into possible murderers but in the end you are surprised by who actually is.And that is maybe my only complaint.
At times, this movie is mesmerizing and mysterious, a really good story about a serial killer who targets blind women.
While it does follow the detective-suspects-pattern-in-murders-and-has-to-protect-someone formula, Andy Garcia's and Uma Thurman's performances give the movie its strength.
Andy Garcia, Lance Henrikson, Uma Thurman, and John Malkovich all give extraordinary performances in a novel script that involves intriguing and very deep characters.
Behind the murders involved and the tense atmosphere, the movie also tells a romantic love story of a blind woman and a cop returning from the badlands.
After moving from the big city to a smaller town, forensic detective, Sgt. John Berlin(Andy Garcia) finds himself immediately thrown into an important case when a human hand is found at a local rubbish tip.
"Jennifer 8" is a decade old noirish whodunit which tells of a burned out L.A. detective (Garcia) who moves to a small town force where he finds himself obsessed with a serial killer case and in love with a potential victim.
A good old fashioned suspense-mystery, "J8" is a solid C+ watch which features good cast performances, above average cinematography, and enough plot twists, clue discovery, action, and somber romance to keep most viewers interested all the way through a 2+ hour run to a surprise conclusion.
Bruce Robinson's film is very well made; it has a good cast and they all perform well, but that really counts for nothing when the story is not interesting enough to keep the audience interested for the overlong two hour running time.
Uma Thurman doesn't really get to do much other than play the token 'victim' blind girl, and John Malkovich steals the show once he gets on screen.
Midway through the murky thriller "Jennifer 8," a bit of much needed life is injected into the proceedings when John Malkovich, bald, somewhat effeminate, and eerily charismatic, turns up to interrogate detective Andy Garcia, stringy haired, hyper, and about as charismatic as your local grocer.
Nothing of interest occurs until he appears, and little of interest occurs after he's gone.In addition to Malkovich, there's Uma Thurman as a blind woman who has "witnessed" a murder, Kevin Conway as a gruff detective, and a lot of indecipherable dialogue, as well as cinematography that attempts to be moodily noirish.
The thing that stands out in my mind in this film (sadly) is the introduction, where John Berlin (Andy Garcia) is driving into town.
In retrospect, this film is probably more true to life in showing an unsuspecting individual as capable of murder simply because they became a little wacko over time or maybe were born looney toons.John Malkovich does a stupendous job in his interrogation of Garcia!
Jennifer Eight is 2 hours and 7 minutes too long.The plot is boring,way too talky and confusing.I saw this in the movies and at one point i actually closed my eyes thinking that i could kill some of the time by sleeping some of it away.In fact towards the last 20 minutes or so i got a little paranoid and thought this film was never going to end.To make matters worse they added a little love story to it and you know whenever they do that it ruins the interest of the film because you have to sit through all that mushy crap.John malkovich also got on my nerves with his long talky scene.When the movie finally ended and a disappointing ending might i add,I walked out of the theater feeling as if i just been parolled from prison.And ladies,don,t ever let your boyfriend rent this movie for the 2 of you to watch.I gaurantee you will end off the evening slapping his ears off..
Police detective John Berlin (Andy Garcia) moves from L.A. to the small town of Eureka.
Only Berlin believes that there is a serial killer.This is a rather slow murder mystery thriller.
Andy Garcia plays cop John Berlin, on the track of said murderer, despite the belief of other cops that there is no serial killer involved.In the first ten minutes the visuals are truly ugly, as Berlin plows through a big garbage dump in adverse weather looking for clues.
Andy Garcia and Uma Thurman make a convincing couple, their romantic subplot might just be more interesting than what the movie is actually about.
Law Enforcement seems to be made important as a way of life however the way of life that is preserved is what provides the inability of the film to take a serious look at one of its own in Detective Taylor.The need to put one and one together for some reason never is developed beyond Detective Berlins dogged pursuit of an at large Killer.The film has a real reservation about this dangerous if you will predator with revelations at a later point suggesting that Detective Taylor may very well have obstructed justice or at the very least damaged the ability of the department to protect a witness.That scene was useful because as the audience participates in a second guess as to Taylors motive, Det.Berlin was perhaps close enough but did not know quite what was necessary to question Taylor with what I would of frightened Taylor with.Taylors mal-intent was correctly suggested by Det.Berlin in the interrogation but Detective Berlin needed help and help was only coming from sources other than rather than from the respective police department.It certainly did seem that there was more important things to do with one of those things being at the very least not providing the kind of care that the truth requires.Detective Berlin was being dealt with improperly because some suggested,perhaps even Taylor that we have already been over all this and wished ultimately to remove the search entirely.When the FBI agent reveals to Berlin that they found this capsule in his car,I felt what a smart point!I think Berlin thought so too!That was excellent.Berlin should of thought that even further when he had the scene with Taylor over the witness tampering because the interrogation room yielded that Taylor again was involved in obstruction.This attempt was of a willed calculation and it is part and parcel what this film looks like from time to time.That in fact there is a willed attempt to circumvent the truth for another way(commonly referred to as a mis-direction).The inability to properly prosecute the grounds keeper for such conduct was evidence that someone else was being either willfully ignored or deliberately denied and further denied what, Denied a honest position.The Robertson girl was indeed ignored beyond belief as I no more believed the Principal when he suggested that he did not know any of the people who attended the school than,I believed the grounds keeper did not know more than merely committing that kind of salacious crime.This indeed is evidenced of having power over another and there being a willful attempt to deny ones right as a result.There is a most certain shared perhaps even complicity is a better word in almost anything that Detective Berlin attempts to establish.The initial interview at the boarding school suggests that Det.Berlins buddy was unfair and there did not seem to be a point where to start.The relationship between Det.Berlin and Helena Robertson was perhaps inevitable though as truth would have it things were just getting started.This film does not believe and as such we are asked to consider what does this film not believe,?
In the first, Uma Thurman, who has been blind since childhood and sequestered in a bleak institution is taken to a Christmas party by Garcia, the detective investigating serial murders, in one of which cases she is a witness.
"Jennifer Eight" is an absorbing crime thriller about a burned out homicide detective who, whilst trying to get his life back on track, uncovers information which suggests that there's a serial killer on the loose who specialises in killing and dismembering blind women.Police Sergeant John Berlin (Andy Garcia) transfers from the LAPD to the small rural town of Eureka in the hope of finding a quieter and less stressful way of life.
Matters become more complicated however, as he falls in love with Helena Robertson (Uma Thurman) and soon recognises that she could be the serial killer's next victim.Berlin's senior officers aren't convinced by his findings and are also dubious about the value of a blind witness.
Berlin eventually discovers the identity of the serial killer before the culprit's activities are brought to an end in an unconventional way."Jennifer Eight" is a dark and moody film with a great deal of suspense, interesting characters and a number of unexpected plot developments.
Andy Garcia is convincing overall and Uma Thurman was very believable in a part that's hard to play.
In a scene where one of the main characters is killed off, by the killer who he mistakes for his partner (it's never explained why he thinks it's him, they look nothing alike and the killer doesn't even speak before he shoots the partner) you expect the serial killer to be killed off soon after and the movie to end.
In "Jennifer 8" Andy Garcia plays an L.A. detective who goes to a small town to find a women's killer who seemed to return after two years without making new victims.
This new investigation will lead to more conclusive clues on discovering that this murderer always female targets who happen to be blind and the only one who can help the police is an blind teacher (Uma Thurman) that might be the next victim.Moving with great thrills and some twists and turns, the film is incredibly good in its drama, in its effective suspense, only losing some credibility towards its conclusion of unbelievable situations and some deranged slowness when it comes to show the questioning of Garcia's character as the main suspect of his partner's murder while solving the case.
"Jennifer 8", panned by critics upon release, now finds itself being compared to some of the better films in the genre ("The Pledge", "Silence of the Lambs", "Seven", "Manhunter" etc).The film stars Andy Garcia as Sergeant John Berlin, a detective hot on the heels of a psycho sexual serial killer.
I got about half way through the film before I realised I did not really know what the film was even about, expect that fact that it involved a blind Uma Thurman and a stiff Andy Garcier in which they are supposedly meant to like each other, although I do not see a very effective connection between the two actors.
I feel the actors within the film are B-list featuring Andy Garcier, Uma Thurman, Kathy Baker and John Malkovich.I just felt as though the film was very slow and not very intense at all, with a mellow romance meant to be budding between the two main characters of the detective and the witness.
Even so I liked the performances of both Andy Garcia and Lance Henriksen and for that reason I have rated it accordingly.
Everyone seems to look the other way to avoid the person who turns out to be the killer maybe because the movie still has an hour or so to pad out, the time that it becomes crystal clear to the audience who that person is.The movie stars Andy Garcia as a cop with a movie cop name – John Berlin.
Garcia ends up falling in love(quite unsurprisingly!!) with the blind, Helena (Uma Thurman, as great as usual).
Andy Garcia, the under-rated Lance Henrikson, John Malkovich, and a young Uma Thurman are all fine.
Atmosphere can really make a movie and lord knows I'm all up for moody little cop thrillers when they work and I wanted Jennifer 8 to work.
Because for all the setup and ample atmosphere this film could have built from Jennifer 8 just falls apart in the end.Andy Garcia stars as John - a tired weary cop who moves from the big city to the small in hopes of rebuilding himself back up. |
tt1034306 | Dorothy Mills | Jane Morton (Carice van Houten), a psychiatrist in mourning after the accidental death of her son, is assigned the case of Dorothy Mills (Jenn Murray), a 15-year-old girl from a small Irish island, accused of attempting to murder a baby while babysitting.
The film starts with Jane at a psychiatric hospital speaking to a gentleman about the case she was given and begins to tell the story of what happened.
When Jane arrives at the island her car gets run off the road and crashes into the lake. It is caused by two cars that appear to be having a race. While the villagers attempt to drag the lake Sheriff Colin Garrivan (David Wilmot) arrives and speaks to Pastor Ross (Gary Lewis). Jane emerges from the lake and is driven by Colin to an inn where she receives sarcastic remarks by the men of the village. While in her room she hears an electric guitar being played in the room above hers.
The next morning Jane waits in the dining room and notices an old woman staring at her. She then visits the parents of the baby that was attacked and due to her unbiased view and her concern for the welfare of Dorothy she is driven from the house by the father with the advice to speak to Jake. She then goes to visit Dorothy and her aunt Eileen McMahon (Ger Ryan) who is very protective of her niece. Jane attempts to speak to Dorothy and Dorothy says she wasn't there the night the baby was attacked. All she remembers is falling asleep in her bed and waking up there the next morning. Jane then goes to visit the Pastor who shows her Dorothy's medical file and stresses that Dorothy is a very special child.
The next day Jane visits Eileen and is recounted the story of Dorothy's mother who was a strange woman who found happiness laying out the dead at a funeral home. Jane then goes for a walk with Dorothy and they bond slightly with Dorothy recounting that her mother used to walk with her and they would pretend to fly once they got to the cliffs. At their next meeting Dorothy seems very childlike and refers to herself as Mimi who is 3 years old. She mentions that she comes out to protect Dorothy because Dorothy is always trying to kill herself. Jane takes "Mimi" to a dress shop and buys her a dress as a present and then takes her back to her hotel room and "Mimi" falls asleep. A few minuted later it seems as though Dorothy is having a nightmare and she suddenly wakes up and starts tearing at her clothes while shouting abuse and swearing. She suddenly stops and becomes childlike again and starts asking for her mummy. As Jane tries to comfort her Eileen arrives and takes Dorothy away.
Later in the night Jane arrives back to her hotel room to find Dorothy sitting on her bed in a red wig and punk style clothes smoking a cigarette. Dorothy introduces herself as "Mary"; she is very loud, obnoxious and loves to drink. There is then a snapshot of the three teenagers who were in the car that ran Jane off the road discussing going to a party where everyone bar the three teenagers are wearing masks.
The Fallons wakes up the next morning to find all of their sheep have had their throats slit and Paul angrily goes to find Colin. Jane arrives to speak to their son Jake about Dorothy and is given a frosty welcome by the mother who calls Dorothy a slut. While trying to get to the reason behind the comment Colin and Paul return and Jane is threatened by pushed over by Paul who says she is meddling in their lives.
Jane is approached by the old woman who was staring at her and is told to go to Dorothy. There she witnesses Dorothy being subjected to a ritual and interrupts saying Dorothy is unsafe with the members of the community and she is taking her back to the main land for treatment. Jane takes Dorothy to the police station and talks to her in one of the cells. Dorothy reverts to another character called "Kurt" who warns Jane about "Duncan" who is the boss. Dorothy then starts to get violent and Jane gives her a tranquilizer and takes her home. "Mary" escapes from the house and goes walking on the moors. Jane wakes up to a phone call from "Kurt" saying Dorothy tried to kill herself.
Jane visits Dorothy the next morning and tries to explain that she has multiple personality disorder and that her mind creates characters to protect herself from pain. Suddenly "Duncan" appears and angrily shows her a picture that Dorothy drew of Jane's son David drowning. When Dorothy becomes "David," Jane becomes upset and locks herself in the bathroom. After returning home she sees David outside her window and goes outside to get him, when he isn't there she returns to her room to find him sitting on her bed. She tearfully apologizes to David for being unable to save him and asks for his forgiveness. Waking up the next morning she hears the electric guitar and goes upstairs to see where the noise is coming from. She enters a boys room that is covered in cobwebs and sees the old woman sitting on the bed strumming the guitar. Seeing a picture of a teenage boy and recognizing it as one of the boys who ran her off the road she confronts the old woman about who he is. The old woman says it is her grandson Duncan McClellan who died 10 years ago along with his friends Mary McMahon and Kurt in a car accident.
Feeling like she is going insane Jane visits Colin who she has become quite close to and tells him her suspicions. Colin seems jittery and alludes to a community secret and tells Jane he wants to take her back to the mainland. Jane is adamant about staying and protecting Dorothy and falls asleep on Colin's sofa after she is given sleeping pills by Colin who promises to wake her in the morning. In the middle of the night Colin is woken by the sounds of the teenagers and runs outside to confront them. He then finds that his dog has had his throat slit.
Jane wakes up and leaves Colin a note saying she isn't leaving without Dorothy and she quietly leaves. Arriving at Eileen's house to take Dorothy away Eileen becomes upset and reveals that she wants to keep Dorothy so she can see her daughter Mary again. Eileen then accuses Jane of wanting to keep Dorothy's gift all to herself and calls Jane out about her son. Jane reiterates that she is there to do what is best for Dorothy. While Dorothy is walking up the stairs to Jane's room her nose starts to bleed and she warns Jane that she sees death in her future and warns her she has to leave. Jane calms her down and tries to get Dorothy to remember why she is so scared. Dorothy remembers back to when she was in the morgue with her mother and her mother was cleaning up the three teenagers bodies after their car accident. Her mother then tells Dorothy to kiss all the bodies goodbye and Dorothy is so scared to do it that "Mimi" appears and does it for her. This then allows Dorothy to overcome her fear and let "Mimi" go.
Colin is at home alone and has drunk a lot of beer and seems conflicted over something. there is a buzz at the door and Colin picks up his gun and goes to answer it. Dorothy is there as "Mary", "Duncan" and "Kurt" and they push him around calling him dirty. Colin is so traumatized and guilty that he shoots himself in the head and Dorothy is sprayed with blood.
Jane wakes up to find that Dorothy is gone and she follows all the villagers that are pouring into Colin's house. Jane finds Colin dead and Paul and a few other villagers are ganging up on Dorothy demanding that something be done. Jane defends Dorothy and "Duncan" appears saying that there is a secret that needs to be told. "Duncan" leads then to the side of the lake and recounts what happened on the night of the party.
Mary, Duncan and Kurt were at the party and Mary was being flirtatious and taunting the men for fun yet she pushes them away when they get too personal. After the party when Mary is trying to find Kurt and Duncan she ends up being cornered by four men in masks and dragged into a house and raped. Duncan and Kurt interrupt and Duncan holds one of the men hostage in order to free Mary. Duncan slices the man's throat without killing him and they run out to their car. The three teenagers are followed by the four men and a car race starts. Eventually their car is run off the road into the lake and the three of them are killed. The four men are then unmasked as Paul, Colin, the abused babies father and another villager.
After the truth is revealed the other villagers are disgusted and Eileen screams in grief at Paul. Yet Paul turns to the Pastor and tries to wheedle his way out of it saying that the Pastor's quiet community will be interrupted by police officers and publicity. Jane who is aghast that the Pastor is starting to sway towards Paul's idea and attempts to intervene only to be pushed out of the way in anger by Paul and hits her head on a rock and dies.
The Pastor decides to banish the rapists from the island with their families, level their houses, and all erase any record of their existence from the island. Jane's body is dumped into the lake and the villagers agree to tell the outside world that she left without a word of her destination or plans.
The film ends back in the psychiatric hospital where Jane realises she is dead and in Dorothy's body. The gentleman she is speaking to ends up being the father of David and her husband/lover. After saying her farewells and leaving Dorothy's body Dorothy is seen leaning out the window and looking at the sky with a smile on her face as she takes a deep breath. | psychedelic, flashback | train | wikipedia | null |
tt1206585 | Winx Club: Il segreto del Regno Perduto | In season 1, Bloom, a 16-year-old girl from Earth, discovers she has magical abilities when she saves Stella, a fairy princess from Solaria. Stella persuades Bloom to enroll in Alfea, a school for fairies in the Magical Dimension. There, she meets roommate Flora and apartment mates Tecna and Musa; together they form the Winx. They encounter and befriend the boys from the Red Fountain school of Specialists. They also make enemies, mainly a trio of witches called the Trix. Together, the Winx go through many adventures and discover many secrets about Bloom's past while fighting their enemies and studying at Alfea. Their power in Season 1 is Winx.
In season 2, the Trix are back and have allied with Lord Darkar, an ancient creature of evil who wants to rule the universe. Together with their new member, Aisha (also known as Layla in some dubs), and their new friends the Pixies, the Winx will have to fight this new threat. They also meet Helia who, at first, is not a Specialist but becomes a Specialist and the love interest of Flora. Their power in Season 2 is Charmix.
In season 3, the Winx have to face a new enemy, Valtor, who was freed from his prison by the Trix and who took part in the destruction of Domino and shares a dark past with Bloom and her birth parents. Aisha meets a wizard, Nabu, with whom she falls in love. In Season 3 the Winx Club got a new power called Enchantix. The events of the third season are followed by those of the first movie, The Secret of the Lost Kingdom.
In season 4, taking place after the events of the movie, the Winx face a new threat: the four Wizards of the Black Circle, who caused all magic to disappear from Earth. The Winx go to Earth to save Roxy, the last fairy from Earth, fight the Wizards and restore its magic by freeing the Earth fairies from the Wizards. They also get a new power called Believix. They then get powers called the gifts of destiny. The gifts of destiny include Sophix, Lovix, and the black gift. The black gift can give life to a person who is not living. The events of the fourth season are followed by those of the second movie, Magical Adventure.
In season 5, taking place after Magical Adventure, the Winx Club battle Aisha's evil cousin Tritannus, who's allied with the Trix in a quest to take over the Magic Dimension. To defeat them, the Winx must prove their self-confidence, empathy and courage and achieve the power of Sirenix. They will also earn the two new transformations: Harmonix and Sirenix. The Winx bond with Selkies from the seas of the Magic Dimension, Aisha meets Roy, a specialist towards whom she is attracted while Bloom will have to save her sister Daphne from Tritannus. The events of the fifth season are followed by those of the third and last movie, The Mystery of the Abyss.
In season 6, the Trix take over Cloud Tower and ally with a young witch named Selina, who owns the Legendarium, a magical book which can make the legends become reality, and was once a childhood best friend of Bloom's. However, the Winx lost all their powers except Bloom. They will have to obtain two new transformations known as Bloomix and Mythix. During their quest to seal the Legendarium, the Winx will discover that they face the Trix and Acheron who is an evil wizard imprisoned in the Legendarium. Acheron is the master of Selina.
In season 7, the Winx Club discovers the Fairy Animals, which are magical creatures with special talents that are necessary for the balance of the Magical Universe. The Winx find out that they are under threat from the new villains Kalshara, who is an evil shape-shifter, and her brother Brafilius. As well as an unexpected appearance from the Trix, which counts as the third villains. To save the Fairy Animals, the Winx will have to travel through time, gain new transformations known as Butterflix and Tynix, and bond with Fairy Animals. | fantasy | train | wikipedia | Possible reasons for lower ratings and things that make it unique. The secret the lost kingdom has become on of my favorite movies. The point of it was to tie up lose ends from the show but leave room for it to expand; in my opinion, they did an excellent job. While the fans being unused to the cgi graphics , the people who do not watch the show's lack of character background and plot understanding, and the dubs which cut parts and change lines, or aim it for a younger audience have caused this movie to be rated lower, but I believe that if you keep an opened mind and watch the original Italian version with subs this movie is great. This movie along with the show are unique you have real friendship really being shown, relationship trouble, actual violence but leaving out the blood and gore, and having balance of the fantasy with the modern twist. While critics dislike the movie because of an over emphasized version of beauty we have today in these characters they fail to realize they are cgi versions of cartoon characters, so in other words THEY'RE NOT SUPPOSED TO BE DETAILED AND LOOK REALISTIC! In cartoons the artists like exaggerate features creating a cartoon look, and if in the movie they looked completely different, the show's fans, which is the major fan base, would not recognize the characters and most likely bring even more hate to the movie. Also critics mention some of the beauty references which in most cases are Stella's lines. Stella is a play off the stereotype of "a dumb blond" but one of the shows purposes was that she is obsessed with shopping and fashion while still being a funny loyal and smart friend.. A great movie that completes the story with the first three series. I think the people who gave this movie a low rating, probably have never seen any series of it. I loved Winx club so much when I was a kid, I had seen all episodes (of the first three series) a few more times and when I saw their first movie in theaters, I found it a perfect sequel of the third series and it was a great and magical adventure and here are the reasons why: Bloom is searching for her biological parents (king Oritel and queen Marion of Domino). In the first series, she discovered she was adopted and where she really came from, in the second series, she wanted to know more about them, and in the third series, she discovered who them has captured. Now in this movie, Bloom tries to find them!The beginning is exciting. It starts with an action scene in a dark castle. Flora, Stella, Musa, Tecna and Layla are graduated at Alfea. It has a perfect mix of humor and drama.. Pretty much lacks and feels low budget. Well, Winx Club is pretty much a magical girl show with fairies instead of solar planets as their powers. Now, I have a little problem with the opening in that they do not explain much about what is going on. We get the girls going to a spooky castle dressed in strange capes. When they take the capes off, it looks like they are naked under them. They don't explain how Ms. Faragonda ended up finding the girls and teleporting right in front of the person the winx was looking for. A lot of things seem broken but part of it might be there was one before this. I still think that a movie should be able to stand alone or have something that would explain more about this.The whole first part of this is Bloom feeling sorry for herself and her problems without any let up. She show just keeps going downhill to me. The next part is just her going back to normal with her adopted family, and then it feels like nothing really gets resolved at in the first part. The only thing that changes things is the dream that Bloom has. It's the standard dream of someone from her past talking to her. They could have done this a bit sooner in the show and it wouldn't seem so boring.This shows a lot that boys will be boys too. A lot of times the boys started acting rather immature. The enemy is really pathetic. She's whiny and always narrates her actions. I also want to hit Stella too, she is more annoying then the cartoon.A lot of times, they fad in and out in different areas and makes the show rather choppy. If they were going to do that, then The 3D version of everyone doesn't really look good. I think it would have been much better if it was done in the style of the actual cartoon instead. It just feels like it lacks something to it. The characters act rather oddly sometimes and move around rather stiffly. The hair looks rather wet and messed up.The script sounds really off for how the characters talk in the show. The script seems rather rushed and Lip movements don't always work right. It just bothers me. We also really don't need a narrator for both the beginning and ending. It just feels disjointed again. |
tt0304262 | Katakuri-ke no kôfuku | The Katakuris are a four-generation family of failures: patriarch Masao Katakuri (Kenji Sawada), his wife Terue (Keiko Matsuzaka), his father Jinpei (Tetsurō Tamba), his formerly criminal son Masayuki (Shinji Takeda), his divorced daughter Shizue (Naomi Nishida), her child Yurie (Tamaki Miyazaki, who narrates the film), and their dog, Pochi. The family uses the father's redundancy pay to purchase a large old home situated on a former garbage dump near Mount Fuji that they have named the ‘White Lover's Inn'. They have the intention of converting it into a bed & breakfast, since the road running nearby is supposed to be expanded up to the house, which would bring many guests and tourists. However, the road hasn't been expanded yet and the Katakuris subsequently have no guests. When one finally shows up, a TV personality, sans clothes, he subsequently commits suicide during the night, and the Katakuris make the decision to save their business by burying the body and concealing the death. The second guest, a Sumo wrestler, also dies of a heart attack during a tryst with his underage girlfriend, who also dies.
Somehow, each of their guests ends up dead—by suicide, accident or murder—and pretty soon the bodies in the back yard begin to pile up. The Katakuris soon find themselves sucked into a nightmare of lies and fear (not helped by the arrival of the daughter's con-man boyfriend, an escaped murderer with police in hot pursuit, and an erupting volcano).
Meanwhile, the recently divorced daughter falls in love with Richard Sagawa (Kiyoshiro Imawano), a mysterious U.S. naval officer who looks suspiciously Japanese but claims to be the nephew of Queen Elizabeth II herself. Just when Richard bungles onto a clue that might lead him to uncover the string of disappearing guests, a nearby volcano begins rumbling to life. | absurd, psychedelic, comedy, flashback | train | wikipedia | It's an absurdist mix of horror, surrealism, a musical, claymation, a black comedy, and one of those progressively "going to hell in a handbasket" films ala After Hours (1985), Very Bad Things (1998) or My Boss' Daughter (2003).
All of the individual elements are superb, but director Takashi Miike simply abandons too many interesting threads and the film ends up feeling more like a loose collection of skits.
If it were tied together better, this would easily be a 10.Happiness of the Katakuris, which is a "mutated" remake Ji-woon Kim's Choyonghan kajok (The Quiet Family, 1998), begins with a restaurant scene that ends up being unrelated to the rest of the film.
At this point I was completely loving the film.Oddly, Miike drops this material and we go back to a standard live-action mode as we learn about the Katakuris, initially from narration by toddler Yurie (Tamaki Miyazaki).
Miike treats us to a lot of interesting cinematography, the location/setting of the Katakuri home is wonderful, and the performances are good.Later, Miike shoots for more of a madcap Monty Pythonesque style, complete with "zombies" nodding their heads and toe-tapping to a song (ala the Camelot dungeon prisoner in Monty Python and the Holy Grail, 1975, or the group of people being crucified in Life of Brian, 1979).
Soon more guests come, they all die, and the Katakuris have to bond together to figure out a solution to this problem.The movie starts off with a couple minutes of claymation that serves as an odd transition to the actual story.
Version: Japanese audio, English subtitles (by SBS).Oh my, I think I have a new favourite movie, and the only way I can describe this is as a death musical about happiness.
Wow, 'Happiness of the Katakuris' is possibly the most incredibly awesome movie I've ever seen.In an effort to keep the Katakuri family together and happy, Masao (Kenji Sawada) opens a guest house in a secluded mountain area.
Such a rising body count will test the Katakuri family's unity and their ability to break into impromptu song and dance numbers.I was under the impression that 'Happiness of the Katakuris' was a zombie musical (like 'Battlefield Baseball').
I'm sure NONE of this sounds funny or charming, but it is without a doubt both of these things as well as, believe it or not, a family values-affirming film.The bottom line is, if you are brave and want something that is TOTALLY unpredictable and engaging, watch this film ASAP!
This is terrible, certainly one of the worst films I have ever seen.The, animated, opening sequence is startling and weird in a dark and funny way and sets the scene for a great film but unfortunately what follows is rubbish.The acting is terrible, the first scene with the family is cringe worthy and is a good indication of what's to come.The song and dance numbers are deliberately over the top with the intention of being funny but they are just annoying and there are far too many of them, every few minutes has a stupid song and dance routine.The writing is awful with no decent dialogue or jokes or any intelligence.There are one or two funny bits but they are small visual jokes and that isn't enough for a film that is supposed to be a comedy..
The first time you watch it and see the happy dancing and singing mixed with what looks like a frightening acid trip some junkie would have- you think- this is going to be so stupid...but it isn't.
The somewhat unpolished song & dance routines (unlike K2C), along with episodic fits of overacting and self-depreciating man-on-a-wire work combine to create a totally off the wall mix of dark humour and Miike's trademark visual gross-outs.In synopsis, Katakuri Masao is a downsized urbanite who stakes his family's livelihood on restoring a run-down country inn.
Not to be discouraged however, the Katakuris do their best to persevere as a family, and find time for a number of offbeat musical numbers in between.The most irritating character was the second-rate con man Richard Sawada played by actor/singer Iwamano Kiyoshiro, who also played a deadbeat suitor in the TBS dorama, "Boku no Shusshoku".
While the idea of a combination slapstick musical/black comedy filled with incongruent claymation sequences should, on the face of it, be enough to recommend any film, I could not help feeling let down by the genius behind "Audition" and "Ichi the Killer." "Little Shop of Horrors" and "Meet the Feebles": Yes!
"The Happiness of the Katakuries" tries so hard to be a cult movie, that it is disgusting.I advise everybody to concentrate on better Miike films, like "Audition" and "Ichi the Killer", to name but a few..
Let's focus in this film, great staging, well used resources (good option using stop-motion for most complex scenes), delirious characters (Sagawa, sumo and the schoolgirl are awesome), big hit moments (when the first body is found out, I laughed a lot with the family) and the plot
well, the plot doesn't matter.
One of Seven films made in 2001 alone by the absurdly prolific Takashi Miike (best known in the west for his more intense horror works such as the magnificent "Audition" and "Ichi The Killer"), this loose remake of Korean film "The Quiet Family" has all the rough edges and scatter-shot structure you'd expect of a film presumably made over a quiet weekend between projects.
When I bought "The Happiness of the Katakuris" from Amazon it was under the impression that it was a musical with zombies, plus it is a Takashi Miike movie, two good things combined, or so it would appear.First of all, you had to wait 76 minutes into the movie before the zombies make their appearance, and then even so, you see them for less than 5 minutes.
And the make-up of the zombies was actually quite good, I enjoyed that quite a lot, even though it was less than 5 minutes of screen time.If you enjoy Asian musicals, then "The Happiness of the Katakuris" is perhaps a great choice for you, personally, I enjoyed the Korean musical "The Fox Family" a lot more than I did this movie.
The maverick like Takashi Miike, who sends up Japanese culture in many of his films, directed this film about a family who have a guest house in the middle of nowhere, where the (few) lodgers end up dead by morning.
"Happiness of the Katakuris" comes across as a heartfelt ode to the Japanese tradition of "New Years" movies - i.e. feel-good family entertainment.
You really can't describe this movie, which has crazy characters, claymation, and cheesy musical numbers, but it is absolutely amazing and something that should be seen by anyone who appreciates out-there humor..
THE HAPPINESS OF THE KATAKURIS is one of his most lovable and least offensive films, filled with charming characters and tacky music and dance scenes.The movie focuses on a Japanese family, the Katakuris, that tries to run a guest house in the mountains, but with little success.
I hate when a director known for doing such things has his movie called shocking and controversial, like Quentin Tarantino with "Django Unchained", but "The Happiness of the Katakuris" is actually pretty light for a Miike film, even though there are a couple of bizarre events in it.A family decides to come together after being apart for so long for personal reasons (e.g. one of them is a gangster on the run) and open a little hotel for people passing by the lonely place they live in near a volcano.
The two memorable scenes for me were one hilarious musical scene involving a suicide and another musical scene satirizing rom-coms.Overall its a surreal musical comedy, its as family-friendly as Takashi gets, which isn't saying much since its rated R, but if you're looking for something weird I'd probably watch some other film of his.I'd recommend it to anyone who liked movies like "The Trouble with Harry", "Heathers", and/or Harold and Kumar movies..
Similar things happen in this film, with parody, satire, sentiment and mayhem all mixed in a daft melange of sometimes zany offshoots.The essential plot is simple: the head of the Katakuri family wants to move his family into the country,and open a bed and breakfast, and find contentment.
Rather than calling the police or getting upset at the impact on future bookings, they decide to bury the bodies in the local forest while taking part in one song-and-dance number after another.The film is filled from beginning to end with verve and vitality and the music numbers really zing, proving real highlights.
And that luckily is the case with Takashi Miike's horror musical "Katakuri-ke no kôfuku".Basically the one thing that this movie has really got going for it is the fact that it's a real joyful movie to watch.
There will be still people that just can't get into this movie of course, since it's a movie that isn't simply for all tastes but I think that overall most people will truly enjoy this movie, even those that aren't familiar with Takashi Miike other work or style of film-making.You can also really take this movie as a spoof on the entire musical genre and scene.
Not that the movie becomes boring but it does start to drag toward its end and even though the movie is well below 2 hours, it feels like a much longer one.Other than that, a greatly cheerful and unique horror musical from Takashi Miike (who else?).8/10 http://bobafett1138.blogspot.com/.
Fans of previous Takashi Miike films should not be surprised to learn that The Happiness of the Katakuris is another surreal shock-fest of bizarre sexual imagery coupled with ultra violence.
Unfortunately, the business is threatened by the untimely spontaneous deaths of each and every guest whom stays at the Katakuri home in some odd and twisted "accident." In order to save the name of their business from negative publicity, the Katakuris begin a massive scheme to hide the death of all residents through burials and well-constructed lies eventually leading the family into an obvious "dead end" which is performed in a "to-die-for" manner by the eldest Katakuris, Masao (Kenji Sawada), and Terue (Keiko Matsuzaka), (don't expect to find better humor in the movie itself).
Anyone familiar with Takashi Miike (Audition, Ichi the Killer) would find this film to be so unlike his other efforts, but, still, only he could do this and make it work.It started with claymation and I really wasn't sure where it was going because it was so strange.Then it settled down to a normal film about a father who just wanted to bring his family together in the hills running a guest-house.Unfortunately, the guests kept dying and they had to bury them so that their guest-house would not get a bad reputation.Sounds like an interesting story by itself, but they would just break out in song at the strangest times.
From the strangely endearing opening claymation sequence to the epic finale, 'Happiness of the Katakuris' is a film well worth a watch.
The Happiness of the Katakuris is probably Takashi Miike's strangest film (or at least, stranger than any of the others that I've seen so far; which is quite an accomplishment when you consider that some of those films include the equally bizarre delights of Gozu, Dead or Alive, Ichi the Killer and Visitor Q).
Where The Happiness of the Katakuris exceeds the strangeness of those particular films is in the not so subtle blending of genres, styles and influences; making reference to and pastiche of everything from Japanese television and post-war family melodrama, to Hollywood musicals and zombie exploitation.The overall result is like a kind of giddy burst of merry, kaleidoscopic excess; as sounds, sights, colours and textures all blend amidst the barrage of stop-motion horror, live action character development and scenes of Technicolor, all-singing/all-dancing delirium!
Miike transports the action to rural Japan and spins a yarn of staggering imagination; adding broader strokes of slap-stick humour, campy musical numbers and a colourful zombie pastiche.Still, don't come to this expecting a horror film or something that continues the brutality of Ichi the Killer or Agitator (two other films that Miike directed alongside this in 2001); The Happiness of the Katakuris is a comedy at its most satirical and absurd; using the frame-work of the story to look at the backgrounds of three generations of Japanese men and the women that support them, and tying it all into a subtle reference about Japanese culture, from the post war to the present.
And even if you chose to ignore the more satirical angle presented in both the humour and the narrative design there's still so much left to enjoy; with the constant barrage of sight gags and colourful musical numbers erupting from the seemingly calm veneer of a "normal" family life.For me, Miike is a genius filmmaker, and The Happiness of the Katakuris is easily one of his must-see works!
Skipping any attempt to outline the story; (which for Takashi Miike, is remarkably blithe), The Happiness of The Katakuris is an often hilarious journey through cross genre pastiches, dealing with familiar themes of family breakdown, violence, murder, sexual perversion and criminality, only with a delightfully lighthearted twist.The whole film is dripping with a camp amateurishness which makes it all the more marvellous to watch; from the farcical musical numbers, to the occasionally outrageous acting and unlikely dialogue.
The Happiness of The Katakuris isn't afraid to go anywhere, and succeeds in shocking only because no genre is left unexploited; (comedy, horror, slapstick, family drama, musical, animation, crime drama etc etc etc).
Like other Takashi Miike films, The Happiness is definitely an assault on the senses, with semi-naive but non-the-less complex claymation, hammy song and dance numbers accompanied by over the top lighting and visual effects you might be forgiven for thinking that the movie is simply a mish-mash of cross-genre parodies, however, the whole is certainly better than the sum of its parts and The Happiness stands as a unique and totally watchable - nay - immensely enjoyable movie..
The Happiness of the Katakuris, directed with the full vigor and passion for film-making and fantastical-realism by Takashi Miike, has a simple premise that gets the best kind of imaginative treatment that could never really be expected, even as a fan of Miike's.
But then things start to get stranger still, leading up to a certain development with the volcano, among other things...MANY other things.But once that simple tact of the story is laid out, the question comes up for one who's seen films like Ichi the Killer and Visitor Q and Imprint- how in heaven's name will Miike take on this material?
What I loved about the picture as well is that the jokes, both aural and occasionally with the dialog, are not too constant, making it overbearingly campy or dumb.It's very smart actually about what it is, and Miike directs with confidence that his melding of standardly shot scenes, wildly filmed and choreographed musical numbers (one of which, the courting of Richard and Shizue, is maybe one of my top favorite musical numbers ever), animation, and real horrific or dramatic moments, will work.
Now the Katakuris just expect the worse when their next guest/s appear and things do get incredibly weird.Man, I didn't know what I was getting myself into, but in all this Takashi Miike flick is high camp and I mean HIGH, it was hard not to enjoy.
Takashi Miike is one of cinema's true mavericks, a bold auteur who flirts with disaster every time he settles into the director's chair, and yet somehow, more often than not, he still manages to pull something out of the bag to surprise and delight fans of the bizarre.Take The Happiness of the Katakuri's for example: on paper it sounds positively dreadful, a horror/comedy/musical remake of Jee-woon Kim's The Quiet Family, with random claymation sequences thrown in for good measure; once again, though, Miike's unique, off-beat approach to his work, which eschews virtually every convention of mainstream cinema, makes for a visually innovative, one-of-a-kind viewing experience.It takes less than a minute for the madness to begin, when a woman eating soup pulls a small animated imp-like creature out of her bowl, after which the film becomes progressively more bonkers—a wild ride through a world where mid-movie karaoke singalongs and dancing zombies are routine occurrences.
Does not go too far down the road in poor taste, but rather prefers to spoof various genres, including musical horror slasher and even comedy, in order to give the audience a varied mixture of a movie that is completely no-brainer but still hits the spot.Basically, about a dysfunctional but likable family running a hotel in the middle of nowhere who end up with the unwanted conundrum of getting weird guests who all seem to die on them.....
There's an extended song and dance sequence in which the dead guests of the inn rise zombie-style and break it down with the inn owner and his family.Ultimately, the film truly cannot be described with words.
It's a hybrid musical/ dark comedy/ crime story/ love tale/ claymation/ horror/ kitchen sink movie.
Takashi Miike has done it again with his film that mixes "The Sound of Music" with "Night of the Living Dead", and makes a hilarious comedy.
Most uniquely funny horror, foreign, comedy, partially claymation, musical movie seen anytime.
The major difference is that Miike's film is a musical, and the original is a straight black comedy.
One of the best things to play in New York in awhile, this movie combines all the wierdness of modern musicals, horror movies, and family films into a happy story where almost everyone dies.
Another great film form Takashi Miike, if you take the time to explore his movies, he deserves your praise.
A random mix of claymation, musical and live action, the movie concerns a family trying to build up their guest house our in the middle of nowhere. |
tt1316554 | Kuroshitsuji | In Victorian-era London lives a young boy named Ciel Phantomhive. Ciel lives with his wealthy parents in a manor in England. On the night of his tenth birthday, Ciel comes across his mother, father, and dog dead and surrounded by flames. The manor was set on fire, and he is captured by cultists. He is sold by his kidnappers, and then given a mark on his abdomen that's supposed to be the mark of a "noble beast". After enduring a month of excruciating and humiliating torture, Ciel unknowingly summons a demon, but signs a contract with him. He names the demon Sebastian after his childhood dog. Ciel returns to the Phantomhive household with an enigmatic black-clad butler, Sebastian Michaelis. To others, it seems that the butler is simply the best at his craft, from anticipating his young master's needs to carrying them out to the best of his remarkable abilities, which seem limitless.
In truth, Sebastian is actually a demon, and in exchange for the boy's soul, the demon will help him exact revenge on those who have wronged him. As the Queen's guard dog and standing at the top of the British underworld, Ciel solves the crimes plaguing London while waiting for the day of his revenge. | psychedelic, murder | train | wikipedia | It all depends on the person, so if you really want to know if it is good or bad, watch it for yourself and don't take someone's word for it (you might be missing out on something great!) This show will woo you if you give it the chance to!
The characters, mainly Sebastian and Ciel, were really intriguing and had this captivating dynamic which made every situation, from funny to dramatic, entertaining.
This is one of those shows that gets better as you watch and the ending is desirable.
Well written anime series with an interesting plot and many shades of dark humor.
This isn't an anime with non-stop action, but it does have its share of dark supernatural battle scenes, as well as witty humorous battle scenes.
There is quite a bit dark humor in different parts of the series, but it's balanced out by traditional anime slapstick comedy (which I'm actually not a fan of and part of the reason it didn't get 10 stars).If you watch the dubbed version, the translation and acting are all excellent.
Some hardcore anime fans complain about the fake cockney accents, but they're mostly limited to some supporting characters.
The voices for the two main characters (Ciel and Sebastian) are portrayed terrifically and are true in tone to their Japanese voice counterparts (I saw season 2 in the subbed version).
Simply put, this may be the best job of versioning I've ever seen in anime.
In its early U.S. import days, anime had horrible translations in both subbed and dubbed versions, due to what I expect as literal translations of the script from Japanese to English.
Funimation has really done well in this department, as they've taken the meanings of the original Japanese script and rewritten it in English with English idioms and phrases that work perfectly with the characters and themes, rather than just lazily taking the Japanese words and translating them directly into English words, creating phrases that are unusual or that simply don't make any sense..
Every so often viewers will want to cry, laugh and get angry at Ciel and Sebastian.
Oh yes, and if you are interested in finding out more about what happens to our faithful butler, Sebastian, the Queen's watchdog, Ciel and the rest of his gangly crew, the manga version is really, really good as well.
At first it might seem a little weird, but after the second or third episode viewers will be hooked on the show and will want to see more of the adventures of the amazing duo, the butler and his master, Ciel and Sebastian!.
Not as good as Death Note but still an awesome anime show.
After some time, the typical anime plots (Faustian Pact, Lost Parents, Revenge, Friendship) are revealed but then the Victorian Age feeling gets much better and bigger attention.
While Walt Disney is getting really feminist lately, the Japanese have yet to invent better female - believable - anime characters.
From A1 Pictures and Squenix comes a 24 episode anime based on the popular manga.
Together, the earl Ciel Phantomhive and his 'One Hell of A Butler', Sebastian, battle everything from drug runners to serial killers to demon hounds to even other angels, ghosts and demons.A glorious mess if there ever was one, this has to be one of the most fun yet unbalanced shows I've ever sat down for.
On the definite up, the animation is rock solid and dynamic, the voice cast in either language is spot on, and the Victorian setting allows for a lot of weaving in of actual history and culture from the era (not limited to but including Jack The Ripper, Hound of the Baskervilles, The Opium Wars, the construction of Tower Bridge and the Eiffel Tower and even a really touching take on the story of the Princes in the Tower thankfully free of any revisionist history BS).
What's more, despite the dark subject, the characters are by large really likable and a lot of fun to be around, with special note going to the wonderfully charismatic yet dry Sebastian (who practically built this franchise), as well as the simply FABULOUS grim reaper and humorous fangirl insert Grell.However, I did say the show was a mess: it's tonally all over the map, one minute dark psychological horror and revenge thriller, the next, your prototypical slapstick wacky anime comedy complete with goofy servants (whose back story and ultimate rational is kind of neat, but it comes really late) and stuff that feels like its prodding at anime tropes and the fanbase (such as the infamous corset and nun scenes).
The issue is not being sure how of this is intentional versus just plain tropes that are part and parcel of anime, but would feel jarring to Westerners more used to tonally cohesive entertainment.
Furthermore, at 24 episodes, it's too damn long for this kind of story and Ciel by and large isn't terribly proactive in finding his parents' killers despite the pact, with the whole 'Queen's Guard Dog'aspect being more the bread and butter of the show, and the two sides never fully reconcile save for a few choice moments and hints drops sprinkled very, and I mean even Abrams would blush VERY, liberally across the many episodes.
From an entertainment angle it's fine, since I get to spend more time in this world, but to less generous viewers or those new to the weird world of anime, this could be a big deal breaker.Despite that though, it still kept me really engaged, even the really filler-y episodes concerning life in the mansion (because that's what I want in a show about a badass demon butler who can kill with silverware and still be on time for tea!).
A great first season to my favourite anime..
Black Butler is my favourite anime for a reason.
It's the best anime dub I've ever heard, and since the show is set in late 19th century England, British sounding voice actors fit even more.
The plot is straight forward, young Ciel Phantomhive summons a demon to save himself from the torture he was being put through.
Ciel names the demon Sebastian and asks him to take on the form of a butler to help him as he is now the owner of the Phantomhive manor, previously belonging to his murdered parents.
Ciel makes a deal with Sebastian stating that when he finds the killer of his parents, Sebastian can have his soul.
Sebastian comes close to being my favourite, however I just like Ciel a little more.
Even the FILLER episodes are enjoyable because I just love watching what life is like in the Phantomhive household with Sebastian, Ciel, and the servants.
Black Butler has a consistent good quality throughout season one, and I'm glad that they have that consistency.
Check this season out and then watch the second one and the manga adaptions.
Which is understandable as there are tons of great anime out there that came out at around the same time as Black Butler like Fairy Tail, Attack On Titan, Death Note and so much more.
If you want a solid story with some of the cutsie stuff that ends well, has really decent lessons, and great side character stories then I say give it a try.
The second half is not quite as good but then ending makes it well worth the time.Plus there is no way to not like Sebastian since he is "One hell of a butler".
Okay so I've watched all 3 seasons and here's my thought on each of them.
SEASON 1: I really liked this season since I have read the early chapters of the manga, and it looked like a beautifully animated version of every page of that.
I didn't like every single episode of this season but overall it was really enjoyable!SEASON 2: the style of the animation and characters are a lot like , but some of the stories really REALLY don't make sense and I didn't like that.This season has basically nothing to do with the manga except some episodes.
There are new characters there that are not even mentioned in the manga and the whole series is about them!
And they weren't really charismatic like Sebastian and Ciel.
But I didn't hate the season overall because it did give some insight of the existing characters that I found really really interesting!
SEASON 3: well this shouldn't really be called "season 3" since it has a totally different mood and animation style and you'll notice it the moment you start watching the first episode.
It's called "The Book of Circus" following this 10 episode season, there are 2 episode called "the Book of Murder" and after that is the movie, "The Book of Atlantic".
These three "the book of.." are all tied together and totally different from the Black Butler season 1 and 2.
I hated it the first time I watched it but then as I was searching in the internet I found out there are some hidden notes in all the flash backs that are showed there that are really really important to what the manga is getting right now.
I think they WANTED to make sure everything in the manga is in the anime for this sake.
but if you're a fan girl like me, and you know you WILL go through the internet just to understand every bit of the anime, you're gonna love it..
The Atmosphere of this Anime is getting interrupted by the Comedy Scenes, for example Tanaka.The first Season has too much Comedy.The Second Season is Kinda unnecessary.
Black Butler is a manga which is set in the ebd of the 19.century.It has Faustian tale at its core.Animation is nice and the characters are interesting.The one problem I had is that there are too many things here which were not in the manga.7,5 out of 10.
If you wanna suffer through days of brain-dead plot-holes obnoxiously annoying characters and writing that seems to hint arrogance in its-self, go on and watch this...
the only good thing about this i can possibly find is the beautiful, but then again very typical anime art that reminds me a lot of D.Grey-man but lacks that series variety...If you wanna watch a tired master-slave philosophy, clumsily disguised sadomasochism and hints to pedophilia have fun.
There are amazing anime series and its hard to say, how they turn out in the end, since many series tend to change drastically over their course.
This Anime was nice, it wasn't a masterpiece, and I didn't receive any epiphanies, but it was a really enjoyable anime, with several very interesting characters and an interesting plot.
It switches between light and filled with humour, and really dark and almost depressing in an exciting way and is in general a pretty light anime that you don't really need to think much about and just enjoy.
At times though, it suddenly turns really dark and emotional, and the ending made me cry a little.
In summary, a nice little anime thats pretty fun(and a little childish) but at its moments really dark and emotional.
I recommend Black Butler primarily to those who are pretty new to anime and maybe a bit youger(10-16), but overall a good anime..
supernatural anime with a mixture of drama and comedy.
This is a really good supernatural anime with a mix of drama and comedy.
The story revolves around about a boy of about 12 who is of noble heritage, Ciel and his butler Sebastian.
As episodes go on you find out that Sebastian is in fact a demon, and Ciel made a contract with him, thus when the contract comes to a conclusion Sebastian will have his soul.
But after watching a few episodes you get a feeling that Sebastian perhaps in some way cares for Ciel, who is his master fro duration of the contract and Sebastian bound to whatever he is told and to protect Ciel fro any harm.
The anime is set in the Victorian England, and there is a strong emphasis on English loving their tea time, which I found so fun because it is true.
The characters that bring humour to the series are the household servants of Ciel, Finny the gardener, Meirin the maid and Bardroy or Bard the cook, who seem to be clueless to the fact that Sebastian is a demon.
First impression, after a couple of episodes Ciel seemed like an arrogant brat, but after a while you begin to get a real feel of his character.
This gives the anime a dark note, and there are many sad moments, but nonetheless there are tones of comedy there, and I find it has great balance between them..
A demon that makes a deal with a young boy who has lost his family, and unlike so many other good vs evil in the Christian USA, it adheres more to Japanese standards.
The Supernatural Franchise made it clear that in this power struggle between Angels and Demons, Humans can receive nothing good from getting in the way of either.
Really good anime but dislike the part where Ciel turns into demon!.
I really liked this anime, i would have given it 9 rating but 7 is because of tuning of Ciel into demon.
Ending of first phase where Sebastian tries to eat Ciel's soul and story ends was so good!
but i really didn't like the ending of second season (second phase) where Ciel turns into demon.
It was unjust with Sebastian as he served Ciel a lot and what he gets in the end, nothing but a kind of punishment!
The story was about the relationship of human and demon but in the end they changed it!
It would had been a better ending if he(Sebastian) had eaten his(Ciel) soul, rather than turning into demon!
I wish there had been more episodes before the end of Ciel.
At first I could not stand to watch it in dubbed version - the accents just rankled as racist and they aren't very good accents.
Funny how in Japanese, everyone has the same accent...While it could have ended simply at Season 1, and since Season 2 was half filler anyway, I enjoyed the twist of the end of the story for Ciel and Sebastian in Season 2.
Not to knock the "filler" - couple of fun episodes in there, so watch!
But I think Season 2 might show us that the human master may ultimately affect the demon servant too.Sigh.
First, it's about a boy named Ciel Phantomhive and his demon butler, Sebastian.
Sebastian acted as a butler, saying that he would never lie, always do as his young master said, and following through with the contract.
If you don't like darker themes with violence, then this anime is not so much for you.
I got a couple of friends before who did not like darker animes, but they still really enjoyed it.
The first few episodes, we are introduced to some of the other characters, pretty much the Phantomhive manor staff.
We are later introduced to many other characters, each having their own unique traits that make them lovable.The first season was great.
I'm not too sure why the second season's facts are included in this page, as it's actually considered a whole new 'show'.
The other 'seasons' are actually arcs, which are different 'shows' as well.
To sum it up, this season is about a boy named Alois Trancy and his demon butler, Claude.
Alois 'wants' Ciel, yet he attempts to kill him multiple times.
I just didn't like this season very much and don't think it should share the ratings the first season deserves x-x I say that those 15/16+ should watch it.
But again, it's not that good in comparison to the first season.The arcs are well done as well, Book of the Atlantic will forever be my favorite.
They are adaptations of the manga and are like the first season.
At least one character will have a close place to your heart.To sum this up, Kuroshitsuji is one hell of the show (reference to Sebastian's line - One hell of a butler).
The first season is really good as well as the arcs, mainly violent with gore over anything else.
The only thing that made me continue watching Kuroshitsuji II was Ciel and Sebastian, that is it.
I highly suggest watching Black Butler if you love mysterious/action animes with little fan-service.
Actually, the art was really good, as the whole universe of the anime was impressive, full with details.
The small cases, in addition, kept the interest high and provided entertainment, as the main story wasn't strong enough to support the whole season.
Also, the characters were pretty interesting, especially Ciel, who was charming and complex, which added some spice to the story.
I feel this anime is dark with a touch of humor.
The charming dark demon serves Ciel as he is the queens 'Guard dog'.
I feel this season has a more whimsical feeling rather than dark because it focuses more on the mission that the queen gives Ciel.
In this season there was a lot more of screen time with other minor characters such as Lady Elizabeth, Finney, and Mei-Ren. The time period was Victorian London 1899, with 12 year old Ciel.
I do feel like the anime just kind of threw you out there as far as the first couple of episodes because you don't know exactly what is going on and I think that's different and a good thing.
Funny interesting mystery anime.
At least the character isn't killed off but honestly, why did Ciels aunt have to be killed off?
They are both demons at the end of the day!I enjoyed this anime like the tone of it was just spot on for a Victorian anime series, ill give this 8/10! |
tt0369610 | Jurassic World | Following the demise of dinosaur-themed Jurassic Park, a new resort called Jurassic World opens in its place on Isla Nublar years later. The Masrani Global Corporation – owner of the genetics company InGen that creates the dinosaurs – has been operating the successful tourist destination for the past ten years. Brothers Zach and Gray Mitchell visit Jurassic World to spend time with their aunt Claire Dearing, the park's operations manager. Claire, a busy workaholic, assigns her assistant Zara to be their guide, but the boys evade her and explore the resort on their own.
Owen Grady, a Navy veteran, has been researching the intelligence of the park's four Velociraptors. InGen security chief Vic Hoskins believes the raptors should be trained for military use despite Owen's objections. Park owner Simon Masrani has Owen evaluate the paddock of the park's new hybrid dinosaur, Indominus rex, before the attraction opens. Owen warns Claire about the danger of raising Indominus in isolation, pointing out its lack of socialization with other animals. When the staff learns that the Indominus appears to have escaped its paddock, Owen and two others enter the enclosure. Able to camouflage itself and mask its heat signature, the Indominus suddenly appears and devours Owen's companions before escaping into the island's interior. Owen orders the Indominus to be killed, but Masrani instead sends a specialized unit to capture it. When most of the unit is killed, Claire orders the evacuation of the island's northern sector.
While exploring in a gyrosphere ride, Zach and Gray enter a restricted area. The nearby Indominus attacks and destroys their sphere, but both manage to escape to the ruins of the original Jurassic Park visitor center. They repair an old Jeep Wrangler and drive back to the park resort. While Claire and Owen are searching for the boys, they encounter the Indominus and barely escape themselves. Masrani and two troopers hunt the Indominus by helicopter, but when the Indominus smashes into the park's aviary to escape gunfire, it releases a flock of pterosaurs that collide with the helicopter, causing it to crash, killing Masrani in the process. The pterosaurs then attack the resort itself; in the chaos, Zara is carried off by pterosaurs before falling into the park's lagoon and being devoured by a Mosasaurus. Gray and Zach eventually find Owen and Claire at the resort as armed personnel subdue the pterosaurs with tranquilizers.
Assuming command, Hoskins orders that the raptors be used to track the Indominus; Owen is forced to accept Hoskins' plan and lead the raptors. Upon reaching the Indominus, the dinosaurs begin communicating with one another. Owen realizes that the Indominus includes raptor DNA, and it becomes the raptor pack's new alpha, taking command away from Owen. Hoskins arranges for chief geneticist Dr. Henry Wu to flee the island by helicopter with dinosaur embryos, in order to protect his research. Owen, Claire, and the boys find Hoskins at the lab packing up more embryos. Hoskins reveals his plan to create miniature versions of the Indominus for use as weapons, but a raptor breaks in and kills him.
Owen reestablishes his bond with the raptors before the Indominus reappears. The raptors attack, but are all seemingly killed. Claire releases the park's Tyrannosaurus rex and lures it into a battle with the Indominus. The T. rex is overpowered, and is knocked to the ground. Before the Indominus can move in for a killing blow, a surviving raptor joins the attack, distracting the Indominus long enough for the T. rex to recover. The raptor and T. rex force the overwhelmed Indominus toward the lagoon, destroying part of the fencing. As the Indominus prepares to attack again, the Mosasaurus leaps out of the water and clamps its jaws on the Indominus before dragging it underwater. The T. rex retreats, followed by the raptor, who turns to acknowledge Owen before leaving. Isla Nublar is once again abandoned, and the survivors are evacuated to the mainland. Zach and Gray are reunited with their parents, while the T. rex roars over Isla Nublar. | violence, satire | train | wikipedia | null |
tt0154683 | Jigoku | A young Tokyo theology student, Shirō (Shigeru Amachi), is set to marry his girlfriend, Yukiko (Utako Mitsuya), the daughter of his professor, Mr. Yajima. After announcing the engagement, Shirō's dark and unsettling colleague, Tamura (Yôichi Numata), drives Shirō home, suggesting that Shirō had been sleeping with Yukiko for some time. Taking a side street at Shirō's request, Tamura hits and kills drunken yakuza gang leader, Kyōichi. Though Shirō wants to stop, Tamura keeps driving, stating that it does not concern him and that ultimately, the murder is Shirō's fault for asking him to drive down the street. Unbeknown to either of them, Kyōichi's mother (Kiyoko Tsuji) witnessed everything and resolves to find and kill them.
Though Tamura feels no guilt for the murder, Shirō does and attempts to go to the police. After telling Yukiko of what happened, Shirō insists that they take a taxi cab to the police station, despite Yukiko's pleas to walk instead. While in the cab, Shirō hallucinates that Tamura is driving the cab, and it crashes, killing Yukiko. After her funeral, Shirō seeks solace in the arms of strip bar worker and Kyōichi's grieving girlfriend Yoko (Akiko Ono), who discovers Shirō's culpability for the hit-and-run after sleeping with him and, with Kyōichi's mother, plots revenge.
Shirō receives a telegram that his mother, Ito, who lives in a country-side retirement community run by his father, Gōzō, is dying and rushes to see her. There, he meets the other residents including a disgraced painter, Ensai, who is painting a portrait of Hell, a former reporter, Akagawa, a corrupt detective, Hariya, and the community doctor, Dr. Kasuma. He meets Sachiko (also played by Mitsuya), a nurse and Ensai's daughter, who bears an uncanny resemblance to Yukiko, and is taking care of his mother. During his stay, Shirō and Sachiko become close while each of the residents' sordid activities are revealed: His father carries on an open affair while his mother lays dying and also cheats the community of its money by cutting corners; the painter is wanted for a crime in another city; the detective threatens to turn the painter in unless he gives her Sachiko to marry; and the doctor knows his diagnoses are wrong, but feels seeking a second opinion too cumbersome. Both Mr. and Mrs. Yajima, both despondent after Yukiko's death, arrive by train to pay their respects to Shirō's mother. Ito dies, and Ensai blames Gōzō; decades ago, he and Ito were lovers before Gōzō came between them and married her leaving her unhappy. Inexplicably, Tamura appears and reveals that each of the residents has some complicity in a murder: Mr. Yajima killed his comrade during the war, stealing his water for himself; both the detective and reporter framed or slandered innocent men who then both committed suicide; and the doctor knew his diagnosis of Ito's condition was wrong, but chose not to tell anyone.
Yoko tracks Shirō down and meets with him on a rope bridge in the area. There she reveals her identity and attempts to shoot him while Kyōichi's mother watches from the trees, but she trips and falls to her death. Tamura appears, and the two struggle over the gun, and Tamura also falls into the gorge. Shirō stumbles back in time for the community's tenth anniversary party, where Gōzō has knowingly allowed cheap, rancid fish to be served to the residents. As the party descends into debauchery, Mr. and Mrs. Yajima both decide to leap in front of the train, killing themselves, and Gōzō's mistress falls to her death following an altercation. The residents die from consuming the tainted fish, and Kyōichi's mother sneaks into the party, poisoning the remaining residents' wine, killing them. Tamura, near death, stumbles into the party and shoots Sachiko, while Kyōichi's mother strangles Shirō to death and then commits suicide.
In Limbo, Shirō encounters Yukiko, who reveals that she was pregnant with his child, a baby girl named "Harumi", but has sent her floating away on the river of the underworld and begs Shirō to save her. Shirō enters Hell and is sentenced to punishment in the Eight Realms of Hell by Lord Enma for his sins. While running through Hell to find his daughter, he encounters each of his acquaintances, who suffer, in gruesome fashion, a variety of punishments for their sins, such as being boiled and burned alive, dismembered and flayed, or cut apart and beaten by ogres, only to be revived to suffer anew. Meanwhile, Tamura taunts Shirō, saying there is no escape from Hell, before being butchered for giving his soul over to evil. In a realm filled with glass shards jutting from the ground, Shirō finds Sachiko, but their reunion is interrupted by Shirō's mother, who shamefully reveals that Sachiko is his sister: Shirō is actually Ensai's son, and Sachiko is actually her daughter, also a product of her later affair with Ensai. Shirō is disgusted with his family, and continues searching for his daughter, determined to live and save her. While caught in a vortex of damned souls, he finds his baby daughter helplessly rotating on the Buddhist wheel of life. Lord Enma gives Shirō one chance to save his daughter, otherwise she too will suffer for all eternity in Hell. As Yukiko, Sachiko, and his mother call to him, Shirō leaps onto the wheel, but cannot reach his daughter.
The moment is frozen in time, revealed to be nine o'clock: the exact time that everyone at the party has finally died, including Ensai, who has hanged himself after completing his portrait of Hell and set it on fire. In a final scene, both Sachiko and Yukiko stand smiling in peaceful light, calling to Shirō as lover and sister, respectively, with lotus petals falling around them, symbolizing mental and moral purity. | revenge, psychedelic, violence | train | wikipedia | If good movie is sin Jigoku will surely take you to hell.
It's somewhat bizarre combination of drama, horror, film noir and art house where happy moments are more rare than good movies in Hollywood.While the hell sequences of Jigoku seem to gather most of the attention I think that the story as a whole is what makes this movie good.
It proceeds fluently from disaster to another and while some events lead to unexpected results the script never leaves a viewer with a feeling that the twist was added just for the twist's sake (as is the case with many new movies).Technically the movie is awesome; good acting, great score (especially the haunting vocals) and beautiful cinematography.
From modern perspective some of the hell sequences are way outdated (mainly the demons) while some look brilliant even today (settings like the river bank and some of the gore effects like the guy who gets flayed).I doubt that Jigoku pleases everyone but if you're into bleak and uncompromising movies this is almost a must see.
Finally I was able to secure a copy and I sat down to watch the horror.For the first hour of this film we watch as our hero lives a life that is more or less a living hell.
Words can't aptly describe the assault on the senses that is JIGOKU but I'll try anyway: over-used phrases like fascinating, surreal, disturbing and unique instantly come to mind - but the film is all of these and more.
By now, I have a fair number of strange Japanese films under my belt - but this one's something else entirely!From the stylized approach (shooting from odd angles and the occasional adoption of a greenish hue) to its plethora of arresting imagery (especially the gruesome body piercing - sword through neck, eye-gouging, feet stamping on huge needles, torso sawed in half, etc.), director/co-writer Nakagawa's vision of Hell is surely among the most visceral ever depicted on the screen.
Still, with respect to both the microcosmic viewpoint of the plot and the film's vivid color scheme, it also reminded me of GOKE - BODY SNATCHER FROM HELL (1968), while its essential nihilism (I literally lost count of the number of people killed off during the first hour!) looks forward to BLIND BEAST (1969).The doppelganger element - in the DVD's main supplement, a 39-minute featurette, it's mentioned that the script was partly inspired by the Faust legend - heightens the film's already disquieting aura: Yoichi Numata as an emissary of Hell in human form (though he's not spared the painful retribution for his sins once the scene shifts to the netherworld) is especially effective; interestingly, the actor was disappointed by his own performance and admits now that he couldn't understand the role!
However, I need to point out that - much like I had written of Ingmar Bergman's THE RITE (1969) - the plot reaches a level of implausible melodrama as to feel almost like a parody (even more so when considering the various characters' penchant for bursting into sentimental songs a' la the work of John Ford!).Anyway, while I found the DVD transfer somewhat dark, I'm glad to say that the copy I own is the 'Second Pressing' - this means that the problem concerning a 2-minute sequence, which previously got skipped when watching the disc on a DVD player, has now been fixed.
Originally intended for Eclipse, Criterion's sub-label - back when it was supposed to release little-known genre/exploitation titles - I feel that the film is important enough to warrant its place in the official Collection.The bits from GHOST STORY OF YOTSUYA (1959) shown in the featurette were very intriguing and, hopefully, won't be too long in coming; still, I was equally itching to learn more about the various 'B' horror films by Nakagawa and production company Shintoho (which had actually started out by making such masterworks of World Cinema as Akira Kurosawa's STRAY DOG [1949] and Kenji Mizoguchi's THE LIFE OF OHARU [1952]!) whose posters form the extensive still gallery...
Although I have to admit that I'd never heard of the film prior to Criterion's DVD announcement, Chuck Stephens - in his rather pretentious essay in the accompanying booklet (though he perceptively suggests that the pairing of the dead yakuza's mother and girlfriend may well have anticipated the deadly female relatives of ONIBABA [1964]) - believes that JIGOKU ought to be thought of in the same terms as such horror landmarks as EYES WITHOUT A FACE (1959), BLACK Sunday (1960), PEEPING TOM (1960) and PSYCHO (1960), films which collectively brought an unprecedented maturity to the genre.
Meanwhile Shirô decides to turn himself in to the police and he takes a taxi with Yukiko but there is a car crash and Yukiko dies, in the beginning of the bizarre journey to hell of Shirô."Jigoku" is a weird and insane Japanese horror cult movie from the 60's.
Almost everyone's evil and even the people who've committed fairly understandable and, I'd think, forgivable sins end up in hell.
"Naraka" the Buddhist word for Hell, we are told when the film opens means roughly "abdonimal" or "excrusiating", and though it's concept is more abstract than the Wests, it's torture's are much more specific, and would make Eli Roth blush.The story, begins with young man, who get's in the wrong car with the wrong guy(Tamura, who just appears out of nowhere, and then usually just to cause trouble or point out others sins), who has a hit and run, with a drunken Yakuza.
Girlfriend dies, mother becomes terminally ill, father revealed as an unrepentant adulterer and reprobate, a doppleganger of his girlfriend re-appears, and the girlfriend and mother of the man he killed are on his tail too, which all come together in one hellish night of murder, revenge, and accidental death that takes them all.The next half hour to forty minutes takes place in Hell.
We watch a series of spectacles from the outer depths of purgatory to the inner rings of the vortex of torment, where our Hero after meeting his wife again (who may have been his sister, it's revealed, at least one of the dopplegangers was), goes on a quest to find the soul of his brother/son, who is shown on screen as a baby riding a leaf down a river of blood.Severed heads, flailing, a field of faces half buried (images I recognize from "What Dreams May Come" Hell sequence), and much, much, more.Jigoku, is one of the few horror movies I've seen, that has no pre-cursors, nothing has ever looked this, though plenty have tried since.
There's elements of theater, b-movie conventions, theology, sharp editing and directing, and some of the best set design I've ever seen.Though over 60 years old, it feels surprisingly not too dated, and though bleak as any film about "Hell" could be, it's important to note that Buddhist Hell is more like a place for shedding psychic skin, than an eternal prison, as the last frame of our hero and his child on opposite ends of the wheel of torment, followed by a distant light shimmering in the darkness, would suggest.So...not to scary, but Brilliant.
Certainly not a film for everyone, 'Jigoku' combines visions of Dante, surreal art, nightmarish tortures, and of course, Japanese camp.
Director Nobuo Nakagawa presents it all in a dark, dreamlike way, shocking us (mildly) with the death of characters in the first part of the movie, and ramping this up to really shocking us with his vision of the torments of hell.
Where the film is weaker is in providing reasons for why all of the characters end up in hell in the first place.
When they get off scot-free after a hit-and-run accident, two friends go about their lives until their two family's start to come under mysterious supernatural forces, eventually dragging them into a struggle with the powers of Hell for their actions and must try to escape alive.This is definitely an exciting film with a lot to like.
This is a highly visual film, with a large amount of time spent on simply creating wonderful images for inconsequential moments, such as the encounter on the bridge to the weirdness of the caricatures in the opening montage to their idea of Hell, where shots feature select objects sitting in the middle of the picture with a black frame around everything else, these create all sorts of impressive and enjoyable series of scenes.
When it gets to the final act, it becomes far more prevalent as it's literally in the afterworld and is just a continuous stream of incredible images, from the interactions with the God of the Underworld to the scenes with them by the river meeting each other and the conclusion where the hero climbs along the cogs of a giant machine to rescue the spirit of his unborn child that is one of the most exciting and action-packed scenes in the film.
One of the only problems here is the fact that, during the middle segment, it noticeably stops being a horror film and instead turns into a character study about the effect their actions have on them.
we get some great effects and moods, which are ahead of their time and look like a precursor to such films as Fulci's "The Beyond".What struck me as odd, though, was the idea of "heaven" and "hell" in a Japanese film.
A typical bad film will have various moments of deficient acting, but Jigoku is systematically deficient, meaning that there are extremely long periods of time where just about everyone on screen is stinking the place out.
For example, the latter half of the film – which takes place in Japanese Hell – is basically a 45-minute trainwreck that is the epitome of quintessential artificiality.
Just look for the dude who gets "flayed", which will undoubtedly have the viewer rolling hysterically.At one point the movie shows extreme closeups of random people screaming at the camera, which gets very annoying.The finale has the lead character run in ultra cheesy fashion (in slow-motion) after his baby, which is strapped onto a big, turning wheel.
It's almost as if the filmmakers weren't so much intending on depicting hell as they were attempting to INFLICT hell on the viewer with this pathetic attempt at film-making.To supplement the horrible finale with the spinning baby, the lead character jumps in an attempt to save the child, but mis-times it so badly that he ends up on the OPPOSITE SIDE of the giant wheel.
I knew this guy was stupid, but it doesn't get any more moronic than that.Some gore (that was a ahead of its time) and a few scenes with fantastic imagery could have saved this one from the cinema sewer, but everything else is of such an unbelievably low quality that this film easily steamrolls to the bottom of the barrel..
The film is a true work of art.Jigoku weaves the story of a young man who has a devil of a friend.
As for me it is principle question: who was the first in modern horror genre?Italy or Japan?Father of Italian horror Mario Bava was first who explore sex and violence theme ("The Vampires"," The Mask of Satan ").Most cinema products of Italy interest (at 50s) rather "historycal" adventures than tits and blood.Front edge of Japanise genre cinema was Godzilla (at 50s).Without sexual tits too.It seems that Nobuo Nakagava one of the first directors who knowingly using shocking images (blood,tortures) and naked bodies for creation of modern sad Gothic movie - "Jigoku" (1960).May be some times "Jigoku" is too much slow movie.But always impressive style (espetualy in second part of the film)..
Seriously, as far as old fashioned Japanese movie go, this one is pretty much straight-forward and understandable enough for western people, when you have subtitles available of course.But above all things this movie still manages to impress the most with its visuals.
The mother and widow of the slain yakuza boss have also chosen such a fate- as they plot their revenge against the two killers...by any means necessary.The fact that Tamura seems to know everything about everyone- including all their dirty secrets; and how he manages to pop up whenever bad things are happening...and people die...leads you to believe that he is some sort of demon.
The final shot offers an interesting little psychological twist, that makes you question whether this was all truly a journey to hell; or whether it was all a hallucinatory experience, brought on by the onset of death, resulting from the consumption of poison fish heads.A truly beautiful film, all around.
And of course it's all downhill for Shiro as bad karma just brews, left and right everything goes wrong to the point of his inevitable doom which is when things really get exciting or terrifying however you see it, but that's what were all really in this film for the visuals/journey to Hell.The hell sequence is fantastic, the only other film that has this type of sequence is one of the Coffin Joe films but that's a different story.
Jigoku is a very strange and disturbing 1960 Japanese horror film whose title literally means "Hell".
The film opens with student Shiro (Shigeru Amachi) who reluctantly falls in with another student named Tamura (Yoichi Numata), despite Shiro feeling very uncomfortable with this morally void young man.
Even worse, the drunk Yakuza's mother and girlfriend seek revenge and Shiro becomes surrounded with a group of people who, like him, all have sins to hide.
Director Nobuo Nakagawa boldly answers this question as the final act of the film literally takes place in Hell and eternal punishment is brutally given out to Shiro and the sinful individuals that came to surround him.
The film takes a surreal turn as Nobuo gives us a visually haunting portrayal of hell and the diverse punishments suffered by those who find themselves there.
It is a slow paced film but, that serves the story as we experience Shiro's guilt and the lack of morality by those around him, then are taken to Hell with them to see them receive their punishment.
Jigoku (1960) ** 1/2 (out of 4) A college student (Shigern Amachi) has his life literally go to Hell after he and a buddy accidentally run down a drunken gangster who jumps out in front of their car.
For the student to be damned to Hell for what he did and to have to suffer through various deaths just seemed a bit too much for me and this dragged down the first hour of the film for me.
After the hour mark when we finally get to Hell is when things begin to pick up with the bizarre visuals and (for the time) graphic death scenes.
Most reviews of this remarkable movie understandably focus on its last 40 minutes, which constitute the most bizarre, gruesome and sadistic scenes in any country's studio-produced feature films up to that time.
Shiro, seized with guilt for his complicity in the drunken Yakuza's death (which consisted entirely of suggesting the route they took), wants to make a clean breast of it, but Tamura refuses, setting in motion what becomes a Buddhist story of guilt and punishment, both here and in the afterlife.
In all of its bloodshed glory, Jigoku is also a frightening cautionary tale, which - through its brutally vivid imagery – introduces the important religious matters, such as the afterlife and what it really means to repay one's sins in hell.Two students – the first (Tamura) is the incarnation of pure evil; the second (Shiro) is a friendly guy, who just can't get rid of his devil friend – run over a drunkard somewhere during the night.
But, before he ultimately is killed, you get to meet his family and friends--who ALL turn out to be selfish and evil people.Once Shirô dies, the film enters a very surreal second portion where he is shown the various levels of this Shinto version of Hell.
But on top of that, some cheesy editing and special effects (the car accident scene with the taxi is just badly done) and too much spook house gore make this an interesting but very dull film after about 80 minutes--and it runs 106 minutes.
For a glimpse at a more traditional Japanese vision of Hades, though, one need look no further than Nobuo Nakagawa's 1960 film "Jigoku" (or, "hell"), a picture whose reputation seems to be on the rise lately, thanks in part to this great-looking Criterion DVD.
It might also be the first true gore movie, though it is too artful to really be mentioned in the same breath as Herschell Gordon Lewis or Eli Roth.The film's protagonist, Shiro, is a college student who is engaged to be married.
It starts with a back-road, hit-and-run killing of a drunk Yakuza boss and ends up with all the protagonists (including an unborn baby) dead and in hell (there is no heaven!).
Hell scenes are more like a theatrical stage production than a movie, and consist of a very effective blending of lighting and superimposed analog special effects.
Jump-cut editing especially in hell can be effective, but mostly serves to generate confusion even with extensive voice-over narration (there is little or no inter-scene continuity through out the film); the result often resembles a series of review skits.
But, the film's gimmicky draw is Nobuo Nakagawa's artistic vision of hell.
You just have to see the concoctions Nakagawa comes up with supplying surreal images of several characters suffering torments in hell.
Jigoku (aka Hell or The Sinners Of Hell) is a film that follows one man who seems to be forever burdened with hellish events.
there was Jigoku: a Japanese film which encompasses just about everything the horror genre would later come to gratify.
This may not be a perfect film but it has aged very well and it is a very effective horror movie – the very first to utilise gore in such a way. |
tt0113071 | First Knight | The film's opening text establishes that King Arthur (Sean Connery) of Camelot, victorious from his wars, has dedicated his reign to promoting justice and peace and now wishes to marry. However, Malagant (Ben Cross), a Knight of the Round Table, desires the throne for himself and rebels.
The film opens with Lancelot (Richard Gere), a vagabond and skilled swordsman, dueling in small villages for money. Lancelot attributes his skill to his lack of concern whether he lives or dies. Guinevere (Julia Ormond), the ruler of Lyonesse, decides to marry Arthur partly out of admiration and partly for security against Malagant, who is shown raiding a village. While traveling, Lancelot chances by Guinevere's carriage on the way to Camelot, and helps spoil Malagant's ambush meant to kidnap her. He falls in love with Guinevere, who refuses his advances. Though Lancelot urges her to follow her heart, Guinevere remains bound by her duty. She is subsequently reunited with her escort.
Later, Lancelot arrives in Camelot and successfully navigates an obstacle course on the prospect of a kiss from Guinevere, though he instead kisses her hand. He also wins an audience with her husband-to-be, Arthur. Impressed by Lancelot's courage and struck by his recklessness and freewheeling, Arthur shows him the Round Table which symbolizes a life of service and brotherhood, and warns Lancelot that a man "who fears nothing is a man who loves nothing."
That night, Malagant's henchmen arrive at Camelot and kidnap Guinevere. She is tied up and carried off to Malagant's headquarters, where she is held hostage. Lancelot poses as a messenger to Malagant only to escape with Guinevere and return her to Camelot. Once again, Lancelot tries to win her heart, but is unsuccessful. On the return journey, it is revealed that Lancelot was orphaned and rendered homeless after bandits attacked his village, and has been wandering ever since.
In gratitude, Arthur offers Lancelot a higher calling in life as a Knight of the Round Table. Amidst the protests of the other Knights (who are suspicious of his station), and of Guinevere (who struggles with her feelings for him), Lancelot accepts and takes Malagant's place at the Table, saying he has found something to care about. Arthur and Guinevere are subsequently wedded. However, a messenger from Lyonesse arrives, with news that Malagant has invaded. Arthur leads his troops to Lyonesse and successfully defeats Malagant's forces. Lancelot wins the respect of the other Knights with his prowess in battle. He also learns to embrace Arthur's philosophy, moved by the plight of villagers.
Lancelot feels guilty about his feelings for the queen and loyalty to Arthur and in private announces his departure to her. She cannot bear the thought of him leaving and asks him for a kiss, which turns into a passionate embrace, just in time for the king to interrupt. Though Guinevere claims to love both Arthur and Lancelot – albeit in different ways – the two are charged with treason. The open trial in the great square of Camelot is interrupted by a surprise invasion by Malagant, ready to burn Camelot and kill Arthur if he does not swear fealty. Instead Arthur commands his subjects to fight, and Malagant's men shoot him with crossbows. A battle between Malagant's men and Camelot's soldiers and citizens ensues, and Lancelot and Malagant face off. Disarmed, Lancelot seizes Arthur's fallen sword and kills Malagant, who falls dead on that same throne he so desired. The people of Camelot win the battle, but Arthur dies of his wounds. On his deathbed, he asks Lancelot to "take care of her for me" – referring to both Camelot and Guinevere. The film closes with a funeral raft carrying Arthur's body floating out to sea, which is set aflame. | romantic, murder, flashback | train | wikipedia | Exciting medieval story that deals with a love triangle between legendary characters as Lancelot , Guinevere and Arthur.
The classic story of romantic adventure come to life enriched in glamorous color and with such great stars as Richard Gere (roving spirit Lancelot), Julia Ormond (wonderful Guinevere), and of course the great Sean Connery (upright Arthur) in the classic love triangle .
Meanwhile, a violent warlord attempts to seize power from Arthur and his Knights of the Round Table , as they set out in fight against the traitor Prince Malagant (Ben Cross), a Sir Mordred-alike .
This is an overwhelming tale with adventures, villainy,romance and heroism in the grandeur of big screen although in television set is lost its splendor .This sweeping movie displays adventures , thrills , a romantic love story , breathtaking battles and epic confrontation with a terrific climax final for a mortal confrontation .
Excellent main cast as an attractive Richard Gere , a gorgeous Julia Ormond , and exceptional , as always , Sean Connery as Arthur , an aged and war-weary king who is forced to go to battle one last time .
Other movies on the matter of legends of Arthur are the following : MGM's first wide-screen film titled ¨Knights of the Round Table¨ 1953 ( by Richard Thorpe) , the musical ¨Camelot¨(Joshua Logan) , the fantastic ¨Excalibur¨(John Boorman) and recently ¨King Arthur¨(Antoine Fuqua).
The story concerns when the Romans had withdrawn Britain and the Empire dissolved into chaos,then rules the king Arthur, he achieved to maintain the Christianity and civilization in the west of England ,though no exactly congruent with the VI century , time was presumed to have lived but the film is developed in a high medieval panoply ..
Merlin and the Sword were key players in the typical Arthur legend, but this adaptation is good because Morgana often confuses people.It squashes what Camelot really is - an ideal - into about two and a bit hours of movie.
Instead of Guinevere and Lancelot cheating on Arthur, it becomes more of a love triangle, with deeper issues, as all three love each other (in different ways.)All this said, it isn't the greatest movie despite some excellent acting - the movie had a weak plot and Maligant is not a very convincing villain.
The Arthurian legend gets another reinterpretation in First Knight with an impressive Sean Connery as King Arthur.
Julia Ormond is a fetching and beautiful Guinevere any knight worth his salt would saddle up and rescue her.Richard Gere is Lancelot and try as he might he comes off as way too American.
My first guess would be that Gere was a box office name, but certainly Sean Connery in the cast would take care of that.Some elements of Knights Of The Round Table got into the plot here.
Cross is also thinking in terms of real politik, Guinevere's domain of Lynness lies adjacent to Camelot, good base for an invasion.Gere joins the Round Table brotherhood in part because of sincerely believing in the Arthurian ideals, but also to be close to Julia Ormond.
I am a regular Hollywood movie buff, and heavily rely on IMDb user ratings, before watching any movie than relying on any other sources, and I prefer to watch movies which are usually rated at least 7 out of 10.So when I had a chance to see the movie First Knight, I was in a doubt whether to watch this movie with a low rating of 5.6/10, even with great actors like Sean Connery and Richard Gere, or to skip to some other movie.Luckily I decided to give it a shot, and oh what a movie it was.
As reading some other reviews revealed earlier, that this is an adaptation of Arthurian legend, and not a true story, so I didn't bothered about the facts in the movie.It scores really high in terms of acting, fight sequences, chemistry between actors, and especially keeps you engrossed throughout the movie.
This film deserves recognition for what it is : a good interpretation of part of a legend, with an excellent casting.Who else but Sean Connery as an ageing and dignified King Arthur ?Julia Ormond is a convincing and stunning princess with her graceful, touching beauty; her looks are also refreshing and different from all the ever-present boring blondes who get a part in anything because of their hair colour.As for Richard Gere he is as handsome, charming and fearless as Camelot would be.This film is not for historians or purists nor does it claim to have a documentary value.
This movie is a compelling love triangle between King Arthur, Guinevere and Lancelot, while also being an exciting action-adventure involving a traitor to Camelot who threatens to destroy it literally and figuratively.Sean Connery is perfectly cast and superb as King Arthur.
Every medieval word and mannerism she produces is believable.Action fans will not be disappointed as this film has some amazing sequences, especially when Richard Gere runs the gauntlet.
Every Arthurian movie that has ever been reviewed on this site has some version of these "It's not accurate", It's not historic", "So and so Knight was not like that", "It didn't look like Arthur", "It didn't look like Lancelot", "It didn't look like Guinevere", etc.
Any movie with Sean Connery, Richard Gere and Julia Ormond has to be good, and this definitely was.
The movie retells King Arthur and the round table in a very entertaining way, with fighting, romance, action, and very satisfying ending.
The story, however, not the sound, was the main appeal of this film for me.The three main stars in this movie were very appealing: Richard Gere as the cocky-but-good guy Sir Lancelot; Julia Ormond as Guinevere and Sean Connery, aptly cast as King Arthur.
Sumptuously filmed in various picturesque British locations it moves along quite nicely showing Lancelot as a loner swordsman who finds himself drawn into something bigger by King Arthur, excellently played by Sean Connery.
Richard Gere isn't bad as Lancelot, who joins up with the knights of the round table for reasons beyond his wish to see justice for all.
Julia Ormond is a little trembly as Guinevere, the person who wishes to do her best by her people and Arthur but cannot deny her love for Lancelot.
I love this movie,Richard Gere (Lancelot) was the hero, that won the heart of Julia Ormond (Guinevere).In this movie she was to marry the King.Which she did even though she loved the first knight.When they met he was just a common man that fought for money.
This a very good film, may be it isn't really mach King Arthur and others story, but in all other ways it is great.
How on earth did Sean Connery, Richard Gere, Julie Ormand, Ben Cross, Sir John Gielgud, and other actors of note, ever get roped into making this awful atrocious movie?
Almost as silly as the gas fire in the middle of the Round Table.I don't think that Britain was actually mentioned in the script, so perhaps if this re-telling of a powerful story had been set anywhere (a planet somewhere in the far reaches of Andromeda comes to mind) instead of in and around Camelot, and with a different set of characters, the movie might have been acceptable.
Except that it wasn't meant to be one.Richard Gere as Lancelot has to be the one of the worst casting mistakes in movie history, that is if you discount John Wayne as Ghengis Khan (and the "Surely this must be the Son of God!" Centurian), or a 30 yr old Robert Taylor as Billy the Kid. And Sean Connery as King Arthur doesn't rate much better.
I absolutely loathe this movie - it is one of the most awful screen adaptations of the Arthur story to date.First of all the casting is all wrong - Julia Ormond as Guienevere and Richard Gere as any kind of historical person is simply laughable.
The Arthur story, especially the love triangle between Arthur, Guinevere and Lancelot, contains a lot more depth than this movie shows you.Also, the fight scenes are meek and the armour worn by the knights seems more like something from Star Trek than any kind of actual medieval protective gear.If you want to see a good Arthur movie, I'd recommend Excalibur, Merlin or even the latest installment; King Arthur.
Camelot itself looks like part of Disneyland.The story centers around Richard Gere as an unappealing Lancelot, Sean Connery as a doddering Arthur and Julia Ormond (Guenevere) who, despite being the high point of the film, is completely unable to convince us that she has any affection for the wizened Arthur.Bad guys grimace, music sweeps heroically, rousing speaches and predictability ensue, followed by a forgettable conclusion.Not worth it even for fans of the genre..
Best Arthur/Camelot Movie I've Seen - Excellent Lancelot/Lovestory.
Not only is the relationship between Lancelot and Guenevere well done, but it is the best Arthur/Camelot movie I've ever seen.
Gere's Lancelot is a wandering mercenary in a medieval land who becomes a Knight at Connery's round table, and ends up clashing with Connery's Arthur over his bride,Julia Ormond, amid the backdrop of a land under threat from a tyrant.
Among the things that make this movie great are the cinematography, the sets(especially Camelot and the beautiful Welsh countryside), the superb score, the action sequences and the refreshing aura of innocence and lack of cynicism which is reinforced by some of the minor characters like Peter and Mark.
Ben Cross is excellent as Gere's Nemesis, Connery adds his big presence and Ormond looks good as the lovely lady of Lyonesse..
She shined all the way through.The scenes in the forest with Gere and Her was the best part and is what i remember most about this fine movie.Another reason is my liking was the adventure, these kinds of films often provide great setting`s and beautiful landscapes, First Knight provided it, especially the forest scenes were a treat for the eyes.
The action was well staged and suspenceful.Maybe Richard Gere isn`t everybodys dream for the part as Lancelot, but i liked him, he is a good actor and his hair was fine.
It's very well written, not the bigger than life tedious epic that movies of this genre tend to be (such as Troy), but rather a simple yet touching story about the boundaries of friendship and loyalty.I can't say enough good things about Connery's performance in this film.
I completely disagree that this movie is barely watchable, i found this movie very interesting.Aside from the fact that casting, sets, plot, and many other physical aspects are all very high quality; this film manages to portray honer, love, and the perils of leadership exceptionally well.The film builds the character interactions in a way so that you actually begin to feel for each of them and their choice of actions.
I think the ending is especially moving.The only thing i could say negatively is that Sean Connery obviously plays a very good role as king Arthur, and its probably his presence that pulls the film up to 9 stars, however it is still a worthwhile watch..
If you have a problem with big movie star names playing ancient characters (Gere distracted many with his performance, but I felt he did a great job), or if you don't like deviations from the 'real' legend of Camelot, you probably won't enjoy this adventure/doomed romance for what it is..
William Nicholson's screenplay focuses on the "love triangle" formed with Richard Gere (as Sir Lancelot) falling in love with Julia Ormond (as Lady Guinevere) on her way to marry Sean Connery (as King Arthur).
Stripped of its magic, the still noble "Camelot" is a nice place to visit, but you wouldn't want to live there.****** First Knight (7/7/95) Jerry Zucker ~ Richard Gere, Julia Ormond, Sean Connery, Ben Cross.
Julia Ormond is perpetually dazed as Guinevere, Richard Gere plays Kevin Costner as Lancelot, and in the worst shock of all, Sean Connery can't seem to muster up a single emotion or facial expression.
Even Arthur's death is so poorly acted and terribly filmed that it elicited laughs from the entire audience.If you're looking for a good retelling of Arthurian legend, see Excalibur.
This film is all about the love triangle between Arthur, Guinevere, and Lancelot.The casting is atrocious.
Otherwise, I enjoyed the film, as Julia Ormond's wonderfully-acted Guinevere is one of the few versions of the character I actually like and sympathize with.
First Knight is not a particularly good film of King Arthur.
A good thing about this film is the sword fights and battles were well done.This film isn't worth watching, and is one of the reasons why I don't rate Richard Gere as a actor..
Richard Gere is totally missplaced as Lancelot (One of the funniest scenes was the one on the battlefield in slowmotion that looked more like a shampoo commercial than a historical movie).
The love triangle between King Arthur, Guinevere and Sir Lancelot is, however.The movie has three main elements.
I found this film very touching, surprisingly delightful, and well-produced, acted, and developed, with enough suspense and action to keep me riveted and just the right amount of romance.I despised Lancelot from the moment I saw him, adored King Arthur, and loved Guenevere.
When I got home and realized my error I figured, 'Go ahead and watch it, how bad can it be?' Heck, it has Sean Connery, Richard Gere, Julia Ormand, and Ben Cross in it!The answer is that it can be pretty damn bad and a complete waste of time.
Sean Connery is the best, but I think also Richard Gere have used all his talent to do this film.
Again a movie based on the story of Camelot and King Arthur.
After all I would offer this film to people how love Julia Ormond, Richard Gere, John Gielgud, Sean Connery, Ben Cross...
Bad. Let's see, a big budget update of the Arthurian legend with Sean Connery as King Arthur.
really i do I am serious it was sad because Arthur Dies it wasn't a bad movie Richard Gere and Julia Ormond did a very good job they did!
I watched it 5 knights in a row:) Richard Gere is good in this movie.
Both actors were outstanding, Gere as Lancelot, and Connery as the legendary King Arthur.
Richard Gere should play detectives or cowboys but not Knights.This is the worst King Arthur movie i have seen in my life.He really is too American and besides the whole story is just bad.Before and after have been much better movies telling movies about King Arthur,Beides there should be less of an age gap between King Arthur and Lancelot.This movie is like a meal at McDonalds it feeds you but its not a good meal..
Not Even Connery Can Save It. First Knight (1995)Plot In A Paragraph: Lancelot (Richard Gere) falls in love with Guinevere (Julia Ormand) , who is due to be married to King Arthur (Connery).
As a lover of the medieval period and all stories about King Arthur and Lancelot, I had great hopes for this movie despite the bad reviews.
The Authurian legends are great filmic material - apart from spectacle and lavish display, there are feuds, and a large number of intrigues.This film looks at the story of Lancelot (First Knight), played by Richard Gere, and of Arthur (played by Sean Connery).
But forget the intrigue a musical such as Camelot might produce; this film ends in a cop-out way: inaccurate and unfaithful to the legend, the historical period and the cultural customs.Should you be au fait with the story of Arthur's love for Guinevere and Lancelot, and the dilemma this brings to the Round Table, AVOID First Knight.
I like the Arthurian legends, Sean Connery, Julia Ormond and Richard Gere.
Acceptable cast, mostly wasted: Sean Connery is a natural choice to play King Arthur, but why couldn't he have done so in a better movie?
This is probably one of the worst films I have ever seen.I watched it at the cinema shortly after it was released and would rather have been at the dentist.The plot is terrible, Connery is badly miscast and, as usual, does nothing to hide his Scottish accent (shame Arthur was Welsh/ English)Richard Gere is absolutely terrible as Lancelot and, the costumes were totally ridiculous - looked more like a panto than an Arthurian film........and so much more.I hope the cast are suitably embarrassed at having been associated with such inane rubbish.Absolutely dreadful - it should never have been made..
The actors may be the worse part of the work : Richard Gere turns Lancelot into an old American gigolo, while Sean Connery seems to have spent more time playing golf than playing Arthur.
The characters in the movie were not believable at all, nor did they have any similarity to the people you find in other tellings of the story of King Arthur.
If you want a good movie about King Arthur, get Excalibur..
Sean Connery is a very good Arthur in love with a much younger Guinevere.
It's hard not to fall for Richard Gere's charm as Lancelot and Julia Ormond's innocent and beautiful Guinevere, but it's far from a great medieval war film.There really isn't much war to this film anyway.
(As a note, I have not read much King Arthur history/literature, so my comments will be made purely out of the content of the film, and not in comparison to how it may deviate from what people expect from the original story.) I like the first half of this movie.
Since the Legend of King Arthur has been around for a long time, it seems a bad move to not trust it.They made up some villain rather than using Mordred or Morgan LeFayThey changed Lancelot's backgroundThey changed the whole dynamic of the triangle that this story is supposed to be based onand all that enhanced by one of the worst scripts you can think of.I wish I had never seen this movie... |
tt1753813 | Les adieux à la reine | In 1789, on the eve of the French Revolution, the court at the Palace of Versailles still live their routines, relatively unconcerned by the increasing turmoil in Paris a mere twenty miles away. The routines are seen through the eyes of the young Sidonie Laborde, who serves Queen Marie Antoinette.
When news about the storming of the Bastille reaches the Court, most aristocrats and servants desert the Palace and abandon the Royal Family, fearing that the government is falling. But Sidonie, a true believer in the monarchy, refuses to flee. She feels secure under the protection of the Royal Family. She does not know these are the last three days she will spend by the Queen's side.
The Queen orders Sidonie to disguise herself as Yolande Martine Gabrielle de Polastron, Duchess of Polignac, and serve as bait so that the latter can safely flee to Switzerland. This Sidonie does, despite a prior warning from one of the Queen's ladies in waiting. Sidonie is stripped naked and then redressed in a green gown. The coach carrying Sidonie is also occupied by the real Duchess and her husband, dressed as her servants. They treat her with disdain during the journey but she plays her role convincingly enough to enable the party to safely cross the border. As the film ends, she remarks that she has no connections other than her position as reader to the Queen, and soon she will be a nobody. | violence | train | wikipedia | Farewell, My Queen is a French film that covers three days in the life of servant Sidonie.
A different take on the oft-told story of Marie Antoinette and the storming of the Bastille, this French film focuses on the difficult behind-the-scenes life at Versailles.
The film does a credible job of showing the majestic costumes and lavish clothes and settings where Marie Antoinette lives, but at the same time it shows the dark and dingy place where Sidonie eats and sleeps and basically calls home.
Written and directed by Benoît Jacquot and based on the novel by Chantal Thomas, Farewell, My Queen explores the death throes of the French monarchy over a period of three days in July, 1789.
Set in the Palace of Versailles at the beginning of the French Revolution, Sidonie (Lea Seydoux), known as the reader for Queen Marie-Antoinette (Diane Kruger), is responsible for selecting books and reading them aloud to the queen.
Because of her closeness to the monarch, she is able to act as a spy, securing information about events taking place inside and outside the palace, pressing selected servants for information, and eavesdropping on conversations to gather the most up-to-date gossip to pass along to Marie.The film is seen from Sidonie's point of view, a vantage point that illuminates the sharp social divisions inside the palace with the servants living in crowded rat-infested quarters, and the royals dwelling in opulent accommodations.
Kruger portrays Marie-Antoinette as sensual and hedonistic and there is a hint of more than Platonism in the way she interacts with both Sidonie and the Duchess de Polignac (Virginie Ledoyen), a relationship that tests Sidonie's loyalty.On the morning of July 15th, news spreads rapidly that the king had been awakened at two in the morning.
When the King travels to Paris and the Queen decides against an escape to Metz, an aura of inevitably descends on the Palace and the nobles begin to abandon ship, competing for places on the coaches seeking a safe haven.Antoinette makes every effort to continue with business as usual, looking at magazines to admire new styles and colors for the coming season, paying scant attention to the fact that her name is number one in a list of 300 targets for the guillotine.
Even though Farewell, My Queen is historically questionable and may hold us at arms length emotionally, it provides a fresh view of events that we know about only from history books or stuffy costume dramas.Jacquot captures the authenticity of time and place and also the human side of the power struggle.
Farewell, My Queen is a sumptuous visual treat and faux-historical romp from French writer and director Benoit Jacquot.Set mainly in Versailles over three days as the Bastille is stormed and the French Revolution gains unstoppable momentum, this is a lavish production with superb costume design and sets.Shown mainly from the point of view of the servants to the royals and aristocrats, the film makes good use of France's palatial architecture and neatly shows the difference in the opulence of the super rich compared to the squalid conditions of their largely loyal and deferential lackeys.
The film is beautifully shot, both inside and out, and allows the audience to feel they are being given a personal guided tour of one of France's greatest museums loaded with fine art and antiques.The story focuses on seduction and loyalty between protagonists within the palace and their reaction to the unfolding history which is mainly off-screen.
Queen Marie Antoninette (Diane Kruger) is hold up at Château de Versailles with her court and her book reader (Léa Seydoux).
Sidonie knows which servants to press for info, whose palms need greasing, and in which particular dark corner of the room to stand to eavesdrop on conversations to acquire the most up to date gossip on how the queen is feeling, who woke the King up in the middle of the night, and how close the revolutionaries are getting to the outside walls.Unfortunately, what sounds like deep palace intrigue and an interesting history lesson in the French Revolution mostly lands with a thud on screen.
Marie Antoinette (Diane Kruger), the Queen of France, however, has escapism on her mind – she sits in bed, skim-reading the latest fashion pages.In this task, she is aided by a number of ladies-in-waiting and her reader, Sidonie Laborde (Lea Seydoux).
Brilliantly directed by the Benoit Jacquot (who also co-wrote the much less impressive script) and starring Diane Kruger as Marie Antoinette and Lea Seydoux, who plays one of the Queen's readers named Sidonie Laborde, and is also the protagonist of this film (for some reason) "Farewell, My Queen" is advertised as the story of the last days of Marie Antoinette, but it's more like the somewhat muted story of the two months before the "last days" of Marie Antoinette.
So, even though "Farewell, My Queen" is a better movie than Sofia Coppola's ill advised, indie rock inspired, "Marie Antoinette", due to the faux-final-days story structure, in conjunction with the fact that "Farewell, My Queen" uses Marie Antoinette as a side character, telling the story from the point of view of Sidonie Laborde (a nobody) this is a film which may have many audiences scratching their heads as to why the need to show this particular moment in the life of Marie Antoinette.As I alluded to above, "Farewell My Queen" chronicles a miniscule portion in time during the last months of Marie Antoinette's reign.
What I mean by this is there are almost no visuals of the actual Revolution, plus (and more importantly) we don't actually get to witness the final days of Marie Antoinette's life simply because "Farewell, My Queen" curiously plays out through the eyes of one of her ladies-in-waiting.
I mean, there are some scenes which do attempt to create a somewhat intriguing love story, an aspect which must be fully accredited to some fantastic mood setting by Jacquot, but in the same vein, this film never rises above said simplistic love story.Side Note: Another issue many audiences will likely come across is how frivolously "Farewell, My Queen" throws its viewers right into the deep end of this story, with little exposition.
In fact, the greatest individual flaw which hinders "Farewell, My Queen" will be seen in the audiences immediate realization that neither Jacquot's visuals or the engaging performances (which I will speak about later) are going to give those not formally versed in the players of the French Revolution and the fall of Versailles, the background information they may desperately desire, as this film half-introduces more and more characters of seeming importance.
So, do yourself a favor, if you are going to see "Farewell, My Queen" (at the very least) peruse the Marie Antoinette Wiki page before going to see this film.With that said, the visuals (the set design in conjunction with the director) are somewhat breathtaking at times, due to Jacquot making some very brave directorial choices, including tons of long takes which trail behind characters as they weave in and out of crowds, giving audiences an intimate feeling of the atmosphere of late 1700's France, and a few beautifully constructed shots of the landscapes.
But even if Kruger's interpretation of Antoinette is one of the best I've ever seen and Seydoux is so captivating to watch as she effortlessly takes control of the movie every time she is on screen, there is simply not enough in the story or the writing to give reasoning to the eccentric behavior or motives behind the actions of Marie Antoinette or (more importantly) give a reason as to why Sidonie is so infatuated with her.
So, even though, in the latter half of the film (more than an hour in) Jacquot does create an atmosphere which allows these characters to somewhat blossom, many will find it hard to care about a Marie Antoinette story that contains no beheadings.Final Thought: Based on a "last days" plot which attempts to imitate a much better film like "Downfall", even with some spectacular direction and two engaging female performances, "Farewell, My Queen" is nothing more than this year's "My Week With Marilyn", telling a story which focuses on characters nobody really cares about, rather than simply creating a storyline around the life/last days of (in this case) Marie Antoinette.
In fact I was very annoyed and mad about it because it is inexcusable to see such a careless handling of such an interesting and disrupted character like the last French Queen.Actually I honestly am quite surprised as to how few movies actually give justice to the real historical personality and how few details of her biography are told.
It tells the story about a French servant and seamstress who lives in a room at the Palace of Versailles in France with a friend named Alice.Distinctly and precisely directed by French filmmaker Benoït Jacquot, this quietly paced fictional tale which is narrated by and mostly from the main character's point of view, draws a gripping portrayal of a person who before the establishment of the French National Assembly, the March on Versailles, a speech by a French attorney named Maxmilien François Marie Isidore de Robespierre (1758-1794) where he articulated a transcending motto which may have appeased the ingrained and unwavering advocates of total equality by adding a word which in all fairness is just as significant and during the beginning of the French Revolution (1789-1799) and the Great Fear when an announcement regarding citizens of the then Kingdom of France (843-1792) who were to be guillotined for the sake of a reform was announced, aspires to serve a Queen of Austrian origins named Marie-Antoinette Joséphe Jeanne de Habsbourg-Lorraine (1755-1793).
While notable for its atmospheric milieu depictions, majestically cinematic cinematography by cinematographer Romain Winding, production design by production designer Katia Wyszkop and costume design by costume designer Christian Gasc, this character-driven and dialog-driven story about famine, monarchy, social insurrection and a pivotal time in French history when present political ideologies were being developed and where a royal daughter, sister, wife and mother who did not chose to be a royalist is imprisoned by her passions and a person who isn't of the aristocracy plays on her mistress' passion, using herself as an instrument, to gain her objective, depicts an enigmatic study of character and contains a great and timely score by composer Bruno Coulais.This historic and understatedly romantic silent dance of glances within interior surroundings which is set in the late 18th century in France during the reign of King Louis-Auguste XVI (1754-1793) and where a reader understands whom she has to reach to get to where she is headed, is impelled and reinforced by its cogent narrative structure, subtle character development, rhythmic continuity, comment by Marie-Antoinette: "Have you ever been attracted
?" and the reverent acting performances by French actress Léa Seydoux, German actress Diane Krüger and French actress Julie-Marie Parmentier.
I liked Diane Kruger as Marie-Antoinette, Queen of France.
Most viewers I'm sure will find the "climax" to the main thread regarding Sidonie's final personally dangerous task for her queen, anticlimactic, rather than suspenseful as it should have been.Overall, though well-acted and of marginal interest, Farewell My Queen is a pretty insignificant film, set amongst one of the most significant periods of European history.
Benoît Jacquot's Berlin Golden Bear contender in 2012, FAREWELL, MY QUEEN taps into a beguiling re-imagination of Marie Antoinette's (Kruger) impassioned affinity with Gabrielle de Polastron, duchess de Polignac (Ledoyen), on the eve of the French Revolution in 1789, without delving into more scandalously graphic details of their lesbian relationship, and unlike Sofia Coppola's palatially sumptuous MARIE ANTOINETTE (2006), Jacquot complies to Chantal Thomas' source novel and the film narrates entirely from the viewpoint of the Queen's young servant Sidonie Laborde (Seydoux), who often reads for her, which signifies that preponderantly viewers are invited to get a peep of the back rooms of Palace of Versailles for a change.Needless to say, the royal mise-en-scène has its sublime allure to those addicted to the period grandeur, often in passing glimpses wherever Sidonie drifts around in her fretful steps, this proves to be a cunningly economical stratagem of shifting the focus to the characters' mood swings when an impending uprising is in the pipeline.
When Marie Antoinette bestows her the ultimate mission, it hits her like a sledgehammer, inwardly, she might have a faintest hope that Marie Antoinette would indulge her like a forbidden fruit, in a more peaceful time, maybe, but not at that crunch, when monarchy is hanging by a thread, all she can do is to silently accept her fate as an honored decoy, the last thing she could ever do for her Queen, then for the first time in her life, she wallows in her moment of superiority, however facile and ominous it is, and the story just ends there, when she forever departs from Marie Antoinette's life, she, Sidonie Laborde, becomes a nobody.Admittedly, the film feels foreshortened, even myopic when considering such a sensational commotion is undergoing, there must be something more theatrically pressing can be projected on the screen (even Marie Antoinette's own story has many colorful facets), but in this unapologetically feminist reconstruction, Jacquot gallantly attempts to deconstruct the undertow of this particular situation (from a servant's perspective) fraught with attraction, disaffection, perturbation and self-deception, exclusively among women from different strata.Léa Seydoux gives a patchy incarnation of Sidonie, often casts her customarily inscrutable gaze masked with an air of stuck-up insouciance to the camera, but short in supply when a young maiden's ingenuousness is demanded, she seems more impenetrable than all her more worldly seniors, which considerably deflects Sidonie from being a queen-stuck virgin as she is.
This film is a wonderful study of what the last days of the French royalty in Versailles, particularly of the way, Marie Antoinette behaved and delivered her commands.
"Farewell, My Queen," a dramatized account of the relationship between Marie Antoinette and her personal reader in 1789 Paris, so frequently comes within a hair's breadth of being a salacious lesbian melodrama that one wonders why director/co-writer Benoît Jacquot didn't go all out and actually make it that way.
When it doesn't tease us with longing stares, burning confidences, impassioned tears, and even an instance or two of full-frontal voluptuousness, it drags us, at times kicking and screaming, through a backstage labyrinth of wild rumor, juicy gossip, and dangerous political tidings, the French Revolution inching ever closer to the sheltered world of Versailles.Adapted from the novel by Chantal Thomas, the film is told from the point of view of Sidonie Laborde (Léa Seydoux), a Lady in Waiting for Marie Antoinette (Diane Kruger), who assigns her to read passages from her favorite stories, mostly plays.
In this movie, it's mostly based on during the French revolution year with Léa Seydoux as the Queen Marie Antoinette's reader.
Diane Kruger gives us one of the more believable portrayals of Queen Marie Antoinette in recent times.
But the film goes further, probably in line with the recent trend among historians to view Queen Marie Antoinette in a more positive light.One final note about the supposed pornographic nature of some scenes, pointed out in the reviews of others (mostly Americans); there is nudity, a kiss, and some longing stares.
Les adieux à la reine (Farewell, My Queen) is a luxurious, visually stunning film about the moments before the citizens of France stormed the Bastille and headed for Versailles.
This film is more about the manner in which Marie Antoinette functioned as a queen and as a woman with needs than it is about a precise description of what was occurring outside the palace walls.In July 1789, the French Revolution is forming and gaining momentum.
Seemingly oblivious to the people of France, at the Château de Versailles, King Louis XVI (Xavier Beauvois), Queen Marie-Antoinette (Diane Kruger) and their courtiers keep on living their usual carefree lives.
To pass her time away when the Duchess is not available for assignations, Marie fills her hours looking at materials, fashion books, and she has a lady in waiting reader - Sidonie Laborde (Léa Seydoux) - read stories to her.
Farewell, My Queen is relaying on Diane Kruger to make the film good.
"Farewell, My Queen another story about Marie-Antoinette this time with a great performance by Diane Kruger as the women herself"Marie-Antoinette is one of the most hated women in all history and once again she appears on the screen.
This film tells the story of Sidonie Laborde (Léa Seydoux) a book reader to the queen of France Marie Antoinette (Diane Kruger), over the course of three days we see into the running of the palace and how the royals hold complete power until the Bastillle is hit by the rebellion of the time.
The costumes and sets are very well suited to the time period and they way they move also is great to see that the crew behind the film took to time and effort that goes into a period piece like this.Léa Seydoux plays the main women of this tale and she gives a fine performance but she is not allowed to emote which is what the character had to do because she was a lower class worker and that is why even though she is in almost every scene she does not get to stand out as others, also she mostly comforts people feeling pain.
In her final scene we see the true villainies of Marie as she sacrifices her book reader in order to save her lover which is something a normal nice women would do but an evil one would do it.The film overall as some great production displayed mainly in it'costume but the fact the main character is not interesting is a major problem with the film but it is made better every time Diane is one the screen making the film the better to watch.MOVIE GRADE: C (MVP: Diane Kruger). |
tt0482629 | The Ultimate Gift | When his rich grandfather, Howard "Red" Stevens (James Garner), dies, Jason (Drew Fuller) does not expect to inherit anything from his multi-billion-dollar estate. He strongly resents his grandfather because his father had died while working for him. There is an inheritance, in fact, but it comes with a condition: Jason must complete 12 separate assignments within a year in order to get it. Each assignment is centered around a "gift". Gifts of work, money, friends and learning are among the dozen that Jason must perform before he is eligible for the mysterious "Ultimate Gift" his grandfather's will has for him. Red's attorney and friend, Mr. Hamilton (Bill Cobbs), and his secretary, Miss Hastings (Lee Meriwether), attempt to guide Jason along the path his grandfather wishes him to travel.
On his return after completing the first task, everything he values is suddenly taken away from him – luxury apartment, his restored muscle car, and all his money – and he is left homeless. His trendy girlfriend, Caitlin (Mircea Monroe), ditches him when his credit card is rejected at a fancy restaurant. After his mother (Donna Cherry) tells him she cannot help him, as part of the agreement, he miserably wanders the city alone. While sleeping in a park, he encounters a woman, Alexia (Ali Hillis), and her outspoken daughter, Emily (Abigail Breslin). Jason befriends the two, and then asks them to go to the attorney's office and confirm themselves as his "true friends" in order to pass his assignment, but afterwards Jason walks away and ignores Emily's request to see him again. However, Jason accidentally discovers that Emily is suffering from leukemia, and sees a chance to develop a strong bond with someone.
From that point, he tries his best to help Emily have a great life while it lasts, and Emily encourages a romance between Jason and her mother. Another of his tasks requires him to travel to Ecuador and study in a library his father and grandfather built to help the people there. This brings him to address his resentment over the death of his father there, and he makes a trip into the mountains with a local guide to see where it happened. Jason learns from his guide that the story he had always believed about his father's death was a lie, fabricated by his grandfather out of guilt and shame for trying to push Jason's father into the oil business. Jason and the guide are captured there and taken hostage by militants for several weeks, until Jason manages to ensure their escape. He returns to America and discovers that Emily's condition has deteriorated, so he arranges for Gus the ranch-hand to host a belated Christmas celebration at his home for them.
Upon completing his twelve tasks, Jason is given a sum of $100-million to do with whatever he pleases, and all of his property is returned to him. His former girlfriend, knowing that he has regained his wealth, makes an attempt to win him back but he declines her offer. With his inheritance, Jason chooses to build a hospital, called Emily's Home, for patients with terminal illnesses, but before the building begins, Emily dies. After the groundbreaking for Emily's Home, Jason is recalled to the law firm for one more meeting and told he has exceeded the expectations of his dead grandfather, and he is given the final gift of over $2-billion, rewarding Jason not only for his completing the tasks, but for using the $100-million to help others. That night, Jason is seen sitting on a bench in the park, when Alexia joins him. He thanks her for the help that she and her daughter gave him. Then they kiss, as a butterfly, representing Emily, flies around them. | inspiring | train | wikipedia | null |
tt2763304 | T2 Trainspotting | It has been 20 years since Mark "Rent boy" Renton stole from his friends the money they had made in a drug deal and fled the country. He has apparently made a decent – but unfulfilling – life for himself in Amsterdam, and returns to Edinburgh to make contact with those in his former life. Daniel "Spud" Murphy continues to struggle with his heroin addiction, which has caused him to lose his construction job and estranged him from Gail Houston and their son Fergus. Simon "Sick Boy" Williamson, now a cocaine addict, runs the Port Sunshine pub he inherited from his aunt, and with his Bulgarian girlfriend Veronika attempts to blackmail men by luring them into sex videos. Francis "Franco" Begbie is serving a 25-year prison sentence and is denied parole due to his violent temper.
Mark stops by his childhood home, where his father tells him of his mother's death while he was away. He visits Spud at his flat, narrowly preventing him from committing suicide. Spud initially resents the intervention, but Mark offers to help him out of his addiction. Mark visits Simon at the pub intending to apologize and pay back Simon's share of the money he stole. They get into a fist fight, but ultimately make peace.
Begbie escapes from prison, then reunites with his wife and meets his university-bound son, whom he wants to instead join him in burgling houses. Begbie visits Simon, and learns that Mark has returned. Simon pretends to collaborate with him in getting revenge upon Mark, but keeps both of them unaware of his contacts with the other.
Mark, Simon, and Veronika become partners in various crimes, using the money from their deeds to begin renovating the Port Sunshine into a brothel. They fraudulently apply for an EU business-development loan, and are given £100,000. But friction develops as Simon slips ever deeper into his cocaine habit and Veronika begins an affair with Mark. One of Simon's blackmail targets reports him to the police, and Mark seeks legal advice from his former girlfriend Diane Coulston, now a solicitor. A menacing encounter with the owner of a rival brothel intimidates Mark and Simon into ending their plans.
Begbie and Mark accidentally meet in the toilets of a nightclub, resulting in a chase that ends with Mark barely escaping Begbie with a knife injury to his arm. Begbie visits Spud for help finding Mark, and discovers that Veronika has encouraged him to begin writing a memoir of events from the first film. From the drafted pages spread throughout Spud's apartment, Begbie learns for the first time that Renton had left Spud his £4,000 share of the £16,000 drug deal earnings. When Veronika stops by, Begbie takes her phone, which he uses to trick Mark and Simon into meeting him at Simon's pub.
Veronika tries to convince Spud to go away with her, promising him half of the money they received from the EU loan and their other schemes, but he refuses, saying he would only spend it on drugs. But he helps her by forging Mark and Simon's signatures to move the money to her bank account.
Simon and Mark meet at the pub, and Spud arrives to warn them of Begbie's trap. Begbie arrives and succeeds at knocking Simon unconscious. He traps Mark upstairs, who falls and gets caught in loose cables from the renovations, strangling him. Simon revives and works to save Mark, but Begbie is about to shoot them with his shotgun, when Spud knocks him out with a toilet bowl.
In the epilogue, Begbie has been left by his former friends in the boot of a car parked at the prison he'd escaped from. Veronika returns to Bulgaria with the money she took from Mark and Simon, where she reunites with her son. Spud begins a new career as a writer and begins mending his relationship with Gail and Fergus. Mark reconciles with Simon, and moves back into his father’s home, embracing his father before going into his bedroom and playing "Lust for Life" on his record player. | revenge, flashback | train | wikipedia | null |
tt0097635 | Jésus de Montréal | In Montreal, an unknown actor named Daniel is hired by a Roman Catholic site of pilgrimage ("le sanctuaire") to present a Passion play in its gardens. The priest, Father Leclerc, requests Daniel "modernize" the classic play the church has been using, which he considers dated. Despite working with material others consider to be cliché, Daniel is inspired and sets out on intensive academic research, consulting archaeology to check the historicity of Jesus and drawing on alleged information on Jesus in the Talmud, using the Talmud name Yeshua Ben Pantera for Jesus, whom he portrays. He also includes arguments that the biological father of Jesus was a Roman soldier, who left Palestine shortly after impregnating the unwed Mary. Daniel assembles his cast, discovered from low-profile and undesirable employment, and moves in with two, Constance and Mireille.
When the play is performed, it receives rave reviews from critics, but is regarded as unconventional and controversial by Father Leclerc, who angrily distances himself from Daniel. Daniel's life is further complicated when he attends one of Mireille's auditions. Mireille is told to remove her top, causing an outburst from Daniel in which he damages lights and cameras. He begins to face charges for property damage. As the higher authorities of the Roman Catholic Church continue to strongly object to his Biblical interpretation, security forcefully stops a performance. The audience and actors object to the stoppage and Daniel is injured in an ensuing accident.
Daniel is first taken by ambulance to a Catholic hospital. He is completely neglected there and leaves. He then collapses on a Montreal Metro platform. The same ambulance takes him to the Jewish General Hospital. Despite immediate, skilled, and energetic efforts by the doctors and nurses to revive him, Daniel is pronounced brain-dead. Daniel's doctor asks for the consent of his friends to take Daniel's organs for donation, since Daniel has no known relatives. Daniel's physician states that the staff would have been able to save him, if he had been brought to them half an hour earlier. In the wake of his death, his friends start a new theatre company to carry on his work. | comedy | train | wikipedia | With actual events, people, words and thoughts from Jesus' life being transposed to our modern times.
Daniel Coulombe is recruited by Father LeClerc to jazz up the traditional Passion play (a dramatic representation of the events leading to the passion and Crucifixion of Jesus) staged in Montreal's Catholic Sanctuary.
Together, they workshop a controversial and moving Passion play which leaves audiences awestruck and the priests reeling, as the production challenges the dogma and hipocrisy of the Catholic church.Director Denys Arcand weaves a remarkably deep tale which comments on commercialism, selling out, spirituality, theological scholarship, fidelity, loyalty and more- but in a manner that is relatively subtle and humorous, so the film never feels didactic.
The story itself is well constructed, and its somber denouement drives home the suggestion that resistance and a revolutionary viewpoint are liable to bring ill fortune...You don't have to be Catholic- or even 'religious' - to enjoy "Jesus Of Montreal": this is a film for anyone who has ever contemplated the difference between spirituality and religion, or who has had to make a decision between doing what the system demanded and doing what they believe is the honest thing to do..
This film has meant so much to me over the years, with its simple, powerful messages of artistic freedom, personal redemption, perseverance during a personal quest...and how heartbreaking the world, and reality, can be.The male lead has a beautiful Zen-like quality about him during this film...meaning the character as well as the actor.
"Jesus of Montreal" is a beautiful film about the real meaning of spirituality.
Pitted against the inflexibility of religious institutions, Daniel (played wonderfully by Lothaire Bluteau) shows his rag-tag disciples the real meaning behind the teachings of Jesus of Nazareth.
Director Denys Arcand subtly begins to blend the story of the biblical Jesus with the day-to-day lives of a group of actors performing in a play about the last days of Jesus.
But this film is not about the traditional Christian concept of Jesus; rather, it illustrates only the human aspects of the man who is, to me, God incarnate.
As I got angrier and angrier at what was going on in the film, a sudden chill went down my back as I realized I was thinking just like the Catholic church sponsors in the movie, AND just like the Pharisees and Sadducees of Jesus' time.
Denys Arcand(The Decline of the American Empire,1986; Love and Human Remains,1993), a founder of Canada's National Film Board, creates a contemporary passion play in the metropolitan streets of Montreal.
Jesus de Montreal is successful on many levels, from biblical parallels to Christ's own legendary life to the challenging views on religion adopted by many people today.
A priest in a large Catholic church in Montreal thinks the church's annual passion play is getting stale and needs updating.
The actors indeed come up with a play that has the play's audience moving from location to location for the performance of each station.The passion play performed in this movie gave me a better appreciation and understanding of the power and significance of the Jesus myth than anything I have ever read or seen.
Director/writer Denys Arcand is clever in the way he presents the parallels.Daniel is tempted by a publicist who tells him he can make him rich and famous and details some of the techniques.
The movie is filled with such pointed commentary.In passing Arcand touches on the deficiencies of the Canadian health care system (an emergency patient is told to take number forty-eight and wait in line), a topic that he would expand on in "The Barbarian Invasions." As a subtle commentary in the context of the story, Saint Mark's Hospital is seen as hopelessly chaotic whereas the Jewish hospital is shown as professional and efficient.As Daniel and his troupe of actors take on more and more of a modern day version of Jesus and his disciples the question arises as to what the reaction would be to Jesus in our modern society.
As in other Arcand films he uses music by Francois Dompierre mixed with some classical compositions (in this case Pergolesi) to great effect.I came to this movie after having seen and enjoyed Arcand's "The Decline of the American Empire" and "The Barbarian Invasions." After now having seen "Jesus of Montreal," I think I can say I am an Arcand fan.This is a clever, humorous, satiric, and absorbing film..
You do not need to be Catholic or, much less, Quebecois to understand and appreciate this work of art.Jesus of Montreal is an act of sublime spiritual discovery and should be required viewing of all who call themselves Christian.
In this film, we see how the Spirit of Christ is born and grows in one man (Lothaire Bluteau), and how the evildoers around him react.We see the evil pharisees who judge and condemn Lothaire (Jesus).
These are the people like the American President bush who proclaim loudly to one and all how "holy" and "Christian" they are, all the while killing babies with his bombs and bullets and sanctions.Go see this film with an open mind, and you will see and hear the real message of Jesus Christ!.
Jesus of Montreal is an engaging movie detailing some historical facts about the life of Jesus Christ while also discussing the nature of faith in 20th century Montreal.Every year a Passion Play, detailing the final days of Jesus Christ, is staged at St.Joseph's Oratory, a cathedral and shrine on Mount Royal in Montreal, Canada.
The priest in charge of the play, Father LeClerc (Gilles Pelletier), finds Daniel, a young actor (Lothaire Bluteau), to play the part of Jesus and puts him in charge of finding a cast to play the other roles.
Daniel gathers together some of his acting friends to stage the play, and decides to present an update of the play with revised dialogue and incorporating much more historical information about life in the time of Christ.Daniel starts the movie as a cosmopolitan young man, but as the film progresses, the challenges he faces in his life and in the staging of the play provide parallels to the life of Christ.The movie discusses some deep themes of faith, the life of Christ, existentialism, the waning role of religion in French-Canadian society, and the good and bad of the entertainment industry.
In fact, Jesus OF MONTREAL was expected to emerge victorious at that year's Academy Awards as the Best Foreign Language Film: facing stiff competition from the likes of CAMILLE CLAUDEL (1988) and CINEMA PARADISO (1989), the honor was eventually bestowed on the latter - a nostalgia piece with child interest, it was an altogether safer bet (though I've yet to catch the film in its entirety myself!)...Despite their over-familiarity, the 'Passion Play' sequences are quite powerful - thanks also to excellent performances all around.
Lothaire Bluteau is quietly impressive in the demanding central role (of an actor who eventually goes mad from playing Christ!); incidentally, he followed this with another spiritual film - BLACK ROBE (1991).
This film tells the story of Jesus the man; allowing him to live in history without the burden of deification.
The cowardice of the priest in the film is an allegory for the intentional self-blinding of the Church itself when it comes to the topic of the deification of Jesus.
Acting doesn't pay much these days, and a team of very good, yet impoverished actors has to work for the church in a show re-creating the life of Jesus.
Daniel Coulombe (Lothaire Bluteau) is asked to modernize a passion play written 35 years ago.
Jesus of Montreal is a play within a movie; in this case The Passion Play.
One of the is that a Roman soldier was Jesus' real father and left right after the Savior's birth; ouch.Daniel, the actor playing Jesus, has an accident and is taken to a Catholic hospital and he is ignored.
The film is an allegory on the life of Christ, using Daniel, as a parallel figure.
A group of young actors put on an updated, radical version of the passion play, and find new meanings in their lives, spiritual and otherwise along the way.At the same time, they battling the hypocrisy of the Church that asked them to 'freshen up' the text, but are unprepared for a questioning, complex work of art.
Denys Arcand "Jesus of Montreal-1989" is a movie from a director with intelligence & refined sensibilities.
He also made The Barbarian Invasions a film which I enjoyed very much It won best foreign film Oscar 2004) Plot: A group of actors putting on an interpretive Passion Play in Montreal begin to experience a meshing of their characters & their private lives as the production takes form against the growing opposition of the Catholic church.
In a sense, "Jesus of Montreal" is a movie about the theater, not about religion.
This is a very impressive film, partly because of the powerful performance by Lothaire Bluteau, who combines authority and vulnerability in his portrayal of both Daniel and Jesus, but also because of the original way the film creatively reworks the story of Jesus, and especially his passion.
There is a lot to think about and it is a film to watch more than once, I think.There are just one or two wonky features: the equation of the established church with the pharisees is a bit clichéd and simplistic, and the stuff about new archaeological discoveries and Jesus being the son of a Roman soldier is a load of piffle, but I suppose the writer wanted a dramatic excuse for the changes in the script of the traditional passion play.All in all, it's excellent and I heartily recommend it..
If so, this film by Denys Arcand is for you.A great movie for Easter, "Jesus de Montreal" tells the story of a young, idealistic actor in Montreal who sets up - with the help of his talented troupe - a "Passion Play" for the local Catholic bishop in the heart of Mount Royal.
And the production goes way beyond what society and clergy expect.Lothaire Bluteau and Catherine Wilkenning give their hearts and souls to their roles of Daniel / Jesus of Montreal and Mireille / Mary Magdalene.
Asked to helm a stage play about the life of Jesus Christ that would appeal to modern audiences, a Montreal stage actor sparks controversy when his play proves a success due to its blasphemous nature in this Canadian drama.
That said, 'Jesus of Montreal' is encapsulating at its best as the protagonist becomes more and more like Christ while rehearsing (and playing) the role and as the Church figures start to show their real colours with their sponsoring of his show; "not everyone can afford psychoanalysis, so they come here" bluntly states one such official at a pivotal point.
A group of actors put on an unorthodox, but acclaimed Passion Play which incites the opposition of the Catholic Church while the actors' lives themselves begin to mirror the Passion itself.I imagine what makes this movie so appreciated is its parallels between the Bible stories and the lives of the actors.
The choice is up to you.Director Denys Arcand has really done everything he could to bring back Jesus to a mere historic figure, social worker, son of two humans, instead of the Son of God the Holy Spirit and Mary, Who opened Heaven again for us.
The film depicts a theologian bringing some "modern findings" to the actor who plays Jesus in the Passion Play, who happily incorporates them in his play.The depicted priest who runs the sanctuary where the Passion Play is performed in Montreal has a sexual relation with one of the female players of the Passion Play instead of showing his love for God through celibacy.
More often than not the director's abhorrence of the Church is clearly visible.The director has tried to make a parallel between Jesus' life and the Passion Play actor's life.
A film like "Jesus of Montreal" on the other hand, while not being as successful in terms of dollars, has reached a much broader spectrum of people.
It has played in theaters across Canada and the world, and was even nominated for an Oscar for best foreign language film.
Most writings on "Jesus of Montreal" focus on it being a modernization of Christ's story.
I mention these points for a reason, because, among other things this is one of the key themes of "Jesus of Montreal".Of course, the film is about other things as well, but it is important to remark on the interesting parallel between the story that takes place in the film and Arcand's real-life situation.
In real-life of course, it is not the Church that prevents Arcand from making films, but still, the popularity doesn't help either Arcand or Daniel produce their art as often or as easily as they would like to.
Arcand's film after "Jesus", "Love and Human Remains", although in English and not up to his usual standards of quality, was by no means an escapist film, and was clearly not made to rake in easy money.Of course despite the message in "Jesus of Montreal" that trying to create meaningful art without selling out is a constant uphill battle, the film is not cynical.
As far as treatments of artist as God and manipulator of his world, this is one of the best.(And -- Arcand maintains this theme wonderfully in The Barbarian Invasions by having the same priest, also played by Pelletier 15 years later, still seeking to commercialize and monetize the art spawned by his religion.).
This was shown in many ways, one of which was how the lives of all the members of the troupe improved once they joined Daniel in doing the Play (of course analogous to Jesus' disciples.)The complaint that the films smears the priesthood by having the priest in the film be in a sexual relationship with a woman acting in the Passion Play -- that complaint seems awfully quaint now, after the huge real-life sexual abuse scandal involving so many priests.
Really a great film which to me says, the way to glorify Jesus is to live for what he stood for, not just keep up appearances..
The plot is not original: an actor is recruited by a church to play Jesus in a Passion play, and as he works himself into the part, he becomes increasingly Christ-like.
(Nicos Kazantzakis took a similar line in his novel 'Christ Recrucified.') However, its modern-day setting and iconoclastic approach mean that 'Jesus of Montreal' really does have a flavour all of its own.The church that has recruited him in the first place becomes alarmed at the radical interpretation he and his carefully-picked cast give the Passion narrative, and nervous at the hit they have on their hands.
The parallels between Christ's life and that of the young hero become closer and closer, when he destroys the equipment a set of a morally bankrupt advertising agency (a la Jesus throwing out the money-makers from the Temple.) The film is packed with humour: the lead actor is interrogated and then arrested by the local police at whilst still on the cross.So does the Resurrection happen too?
I like to think the film tells about Jesus in a modern vernacular that many people who cannot stand church or who have been hurt by church can relate to.
The passion play that is portrayed in the film contains quite a bit of non-Biblical material that tends to humanize Jesus and de-emphasize his divinity.
A relatively unknown actor is asked by a hypocritical priest to re-write and perform the passion play at a shrine in Montreal, Canada.
After a while, the actor who plays Jesus begins to lose himself in the role--acting out scenes such as chasing the money-lenders out of the temple and the actual death and resurrection of Christ.
It is about a man who is hired by the Catholic Cathedral in Montreal to put on a fresher rendition of the passion play but his ideas end up causing a lot of controversy among the priests while bringing thousands to see it.
The film itself parallels the life of Christ, even though some of the concepts in the film are incredibly controversial.Arcand questions the origins of the gospels, saying that Jesus existed through the evidence of other Roman writers, there is absolutely no doubt about that.
If this is the case then there is much more to Christ than simply relief for the poor.Jesus of Montreal is a very existentialist film, but also there an undermining of this philosophy.
We see Pilate addressing Christ as if he were a human and not God.We see another parallel in the way that the people love the play while the Church, who organises the play, hate it.
Arcand beautifully merges the play with the movie around him as the central figure attacks the priests using Christ's words.
He stands up for his friend, going as far as destroying a film studio like Christ destroys a marketplace in the temple who are ripping people off.This movie is phenomenal and it raises many questions.
Jesus of Montreal is an incredibly powerful movie, more powerful that any that I have seen of late.
The story is incredibly obvious: A group of independent actors stage a Passion Play and, in turn, they start to live out the lives of the characters they play.
A young actor is commissioned to update an annual Montreal Passion Play (starring himself) but is a little too convincing in his role, drawing unfriendly criticism from the Catholic Church and finally suffering his own crucifixion (and state-of-the-art resurrection).
Director Denys Arcand wants to demystify the Gospels (the performance of the Play itself might have been called 'Everything You Always Wanted To Know About Jesus But Were Afraid To Ask'), but his film works better as a media satire than as a modern-day theology lesson. |
tt3290276 | Jailbait | Randy (Pitt), a 20-year-old convict, is taken to his cell. He is greeted by his new cellmate, Jake (Guirgis), a veteran prisoner serving a life sentence. Randy explains that he is serving 25 years for spray painting his neighbor's Mercedes-Benz.
The next morning, Jake begins telling Randy a story about the worst sexual encounter he ever had. The story terrifies Randy, who begins to realize that Jake's motive may be more than just friendship. The conversation turns toward how Jake feels homosexuality is a state of mind. The breakfast bell rings and the story is interrupted, much to Randy's relief. Jake seems to drop the topic and return to his more friendly demeanor. However, Randy is quickly brought back to the horrible reality of his situation when Jake forces him to wear his shirt in a feminine style and to hold his hand as they go to lunch (See prison sexuality).
Several months later, Randy's mother (Laila Robins) visits him at the prison. Randy lies to her and says his cell mate and he are getting along well. The brief visit only highlights Randy's isolation, as his mother is powerless to do anything to help him.
Moments later, Jake again prods the now bruised and bloody Randy to tell him about his "worst fuck." Randy tells Jake about his first sexual experience: he was 17 and drunk in a Tijuana strip club, and paid a stripper $35 for oral sex in a room above the dance floor. Afterwards, he saw the same stripper perform a striptease in which she revealed that she was a pre-operational transsexual. Randy then tells Jake that he "thought that was the worst it was ever going to get," insinuating that his current situation as Jake's sex slave is far worse. Jake appears angry and offended, but then seems guilt ridden. Again, Jake snaps out of his more tender feelings and, replacing them with cruelty, forces Randy to perform oral sex on him. Afterward, Jake makes pleasant conversation as Randy lies in the fetal position in his bunk.
That night, as Jake sleeps, Randy creeps silently to his cellmate's bedside, preparing to stab him in the throat with a pencil as the older man sleeps. Randy hesitates and Jake wakes up. Jake doesn't attempt to physically restrain Randy, but instead tells him that he doesn't have the heart to kill a man in cold blood, and that even if he did he wouldn't kill him. Jake tells Randy that he is all that Randy has, that he is his protection, alluding perhaps to an even more brutal sexual slavery among other inmates were he not tied down to Jake. He sincerely tells Randy that he is his only friend. Jake then tells Randy to go back to his bed and think about all the things he will do when he is finally released.
Jake then tells the now nearly tearful Randy why his mother stopped writing back; she had died and no one told him. The prison authorities had refused to let him go to his mother's funeral. Jake then tells Randy to make sure that he gets to see his mother's funeral, that it is very important to be able to say goodbye. | violence, murder | train | wikipedia | Jailbait: The harrowing true story of how beautiful Thai model Sara Malakui Lane became contractually obligated to make movies for The Asylum production company.
Well here is another one, and it is dreadful but you are still going to watch it for the same reason I did, because Sara Malakui Lane is fine as hell and she takes her shirt off more times than Matthew McConaughey on a hot day in Austin.
There simply is no other reason to watch this movie folks, unless you enjoy spending an hour and a half watching a movie so bad it looks like their entire technical crew was picked up daily from the parking lot of a Home Depot, and half the cast to boot..
Since this is not really a movie/film I guess I should just review the main character; the boobs.
The frequent appearance of Anna's exceptionally and obviously enhanced (You could see scars beneath each breast and in the armpit) boobs were a BIG PLUS (pun intended).The dialogue was horrible and the violence was more cartoonish then troubling or excessive.The acting was marginal, I'd really give this a lower score but let's face it-Anna is a knockout so I shouldn't be too hard on this movie.The funniest thing of all, when you watch the scene where she gets her letter from the parole board you will find that these incredible cheap movie makers only typed the first couple sentences and the rest of the letter (pause the movie if you do not believe me it is HILARIOUS), is actually a scene from another movie or a script or story.
While "Jailbait" tries to accomplish a lot of things with its fairly stereotypical and way too unrealistic storyline, then director Jared Cohn fails to make a lasting impact with this movie.The story in "Jailbait" is about Anna (played by Sara Malakul Lane) who is sexually molested by her step dad and accidentally kills him.
Going to a juvenile rehabilitation center, Anna ends up learning how life inside the prison walls can be with all its hardships, alliances and abuse.From an entertaining point of view then "Jailbait" was actually a good enough movie to watch because it wasn't boring and it kept on a brisk pace.
Nothing about the things happening inside the juvenile rehabilitation facility is really realistic, and things are portrayed fleetingly and just allows the audience a brief look at the surface of things.What kept the movie afloat the pace of the storyline and the fairly good acting performances put on by just about everyone in the movie.But all in all then "Jailbait" is good enough entertainment and scores a solid 5 out of 10 stars from me..
This is a story whose main characters are the lead actress's breasts with implants, which appear in most scenes.
Rabid prison girls in heat...that's the gist of the story, but this achieves nothing credit-worthy in the way "Caged Heat" once did.
I only went into this movie knowing that it was an Asylum film.
So, a young woman or teenage girl (her age isn't exactly made clear, but the actress playing her is in her 30's) accidentally kills her stepfather, who was trying to rape her, while she was defending herself.
Okay, I know we're supposed to check reality at the door when watching a film, but there's a line.
There's a lot of skin in it, sure, but even the sex in the movie is incredibly awkward.
Not at the least I believe this 30+ year old woman is portraying a teenage girl, but it's honestly hard to tell since they never come out and say her supposed age.
In the scene where her stepdad dies he clearly falls on something and slits his throat open, yet later in the movie another inmate claims she knows why she was there and that she pushed her stepdad out of a window, even though that's clearly not what happened.
You know, a film that focuses on a plot instead of cheap nudity to get attention.
It's not a comedy like 'Orange' largely is – but nor is it a serious film about what life is really like inside a woman's prison.
In short, if you're looking for an exploitative sex film and are prepared to put up with the most wooden acting you've ever seen then you'll have a blast..
Finally a new women-in-prison movie, and it's pretty good.
Anna has a parole hearing coming up and the warden promises to put in a good for her if she continues doing him "favors." When the day arrives, of course, he doesn't keep his word which forces Anna to think of another way out.I'm glad to see The Asylum going beyond wild sci fi movies and copies of Hollywood films and returning to its roots by trying something more original.
Jailbait is a sexploitation movie of the women-in-prison variety, the kind no one makes anymore, which is why so many reviewers seem to be surprised.
And as a B- movie there's going to be production and acting issues.
The problems are the usual- weak acting by secondary characters, unpolished story, sound issues, odd sets, etc.
Sara's acting is a bit flat though but you do end up caring for her.
The story itself is good but the script needed a bit more work, and the main characters more depth.I'm giving this movie a high score because it resurrects women-in-prison movies that have all but vanished.
Jailbait is not a good movie but it is entertaining.
What this movie did right was prison life some of it was unrealistic but some of the concepts they showed in this film were spot on another bonus is the sex scenes with Sara Malakul Lane lol what more can you want.
I could spend hours talking about how bad this movie was but it was a guilty pleasure with a satisfying ending.
So if your're bored and have time to kill then I would suggest Jailbait which is free on hulu and Netflix plus even with it's multiple problems I'm sure you'll find some entertainment in this like I did..
Anna is a nice girl, a good student, plays the cello and is raped regularly by her old stepfather.
Anna is a nice girl, a good student, plays the cello and is raped regularly by her old stepfather.
Anna meanwhile keeps getting herself in trouble, rejects the help of Kody, ends up in solitary confinement repeatedly, and starts injecting hard drugs.
Anna meanwhile keeps getting herself in trouble, rejects the help of Kody, ends up in solitary confinement repeatedly, and starts injecting hard drugs.
Anna has a parole hearing coming up and the warden promises to put in a good for her if she continues doing him "favors." When the day arrives, of course, he doesn't keep his word which forces Anna to think of another way out.
About the only exception is the well-acted sleezey warden character.More than anything, this felt like a film intended solely to feature Sara Malakul Lane.
Beyond the humor, watch this for great soft core nudity, and terrible acting...
I was hoping for a really intense female prison film; however, the only thing I got was a depressing story and low brow acting.
If you like to see a girl get raped and beat in prison without a compelling story to make up for it, then this is the film for you..
In my view this movie portray the dark side of all-girl prison, though the plot was dramatized a bit for entertaining purpose.
The lead character, played by Sara Lane, conveys how a timid is bullied in the prison jungle.
She successfully portrays how a frightened young prisoner looks like.
The Asylum are notorious for making and releasing bad movies, often terrible, so expectations were relatively low viewing Jailbait.
Jailbait is far from great and is going to leave people very disturbed in a negative way, but for The Asylum it is one of their more tolerable and least amateurish movies.
The setting is suitably gritty and cold, actually looking and feeling like a prison setting, while the filming matches that and is complimented by some fairly stylish directing from Jared Cohn.
And the acting is better than average, in fact it's quite good(usually the acting in Asylum movies is so bad it's not worth expanding on sometimes) the best being Sara Malakul Lane who is very affecting as Jailbait's most identifiable character, and Steve Hanks who seems to be enjoying himself as the sleazy warden and brings some menace to him as well.
Jailbait despite these good things also shares a lot of problems.
A lot of the movie felt like one brutal scene after another strung together and when there was some storytelling like at the beginning it isn't just clichéd but it lacks depth- attempts at emotional moments didn't feel so natural or properly believable- and doesn't ever really ring true.
Of the characters, the only really engaging character was Anna, and Lane's performance is a big part of why, Anna mental journey and transition is very touchingly portrayed- nice to see some hint of subtlety and hope in a not so subtle or hopeful movie- that you do identify with her and hate characters like the warden.
The script is just as shallow and the dialogue has a lot of banality and can feel stilted, again like the story it is swamped by the subject matter and by the content.
Speaking of the content, with the rapes, drug use, girl gang fights and beatings Jailbait is very violent and brutal, which did give it a hard-hitting edge initially.
The problem is that while prison is most likely to have fighting, beatings and maybe drugs depending on the level of security the prison is the movie generally and in the end did come across in places as too brutal and rather too much to take, so much so it and what the character goes through to overcome her mental pain and journey swamps almost everything else.
It will leave a bad taste on some people's mouths, hence why the term "not for the faint hearted" is in the review summary and others will question how much of Jailbait is realistic, there may be prisons with rape and predatory guards but most likely not that many and certainly not to this extent.
In conclusion, not bad but not great, it looks competent and is competently acted(especially by Lane and Hanks) and directed and the score is good but the brutal content swamps the story, characters and script to the extent that they barely resonate.
Actually a very good movie.
This very attractive girl has been raped numerous times in and out of prison and she deals with it with rational self-defense.
It is very much like a Lifetime Channel movie without the nudity censored.
One of the best womens prison movies made..
Instead of a strong female lead the movie was like a low budget soft porn movie starring a women who looked like a trafficking victim with huge silicon implants (she was supposed to play a 17 year old A-student).
This should have been a good movie.
Not a new tale but the premise that slippery slopes can lead to desparation should have been a good story.
The best part of the movie, the actors, not just the lead, and not just the boobs that for some reason popped up far more often than necessary..
Only 31 reviews for a movie that has been out on Netflix for 4 straight years...yeah, people don't want to admit that they watched this.And I can see why, for starters this is part of the infamous WiP films that had their heyday with Pam Grier in the 1970s...but it doesn't star Pam Grier so you don't really have that..."No but honey, Pam Grier is in it," excuse to be watching it.And then the title "Jailbait" well its not going to have many reviews with a title like that...but I guarantee you that it's going to have a lot of views on the Netflix.So anyway, the plot of this movie is to see Sara Malakul Lane naked.
The entire point of making this film is to show the viewers full frontal views of Sara Malakul Lane.
And the entire reason that people sit down and watch this movie is to see Sara Malakul Lane naked.So...mission accomplished and in spades.The dialogue?
You remember many things from this movie including her gorgeous boobs..
wow this movie was bad on so many levels.poor acting,poor filming,poor script,poor soundtrack...everything is so lame in this movie.
Basically this is a movie about a molested girl who kills her stepfather by accident.Of course he is a molester.So the girl is brought to juvenile jail.We are supposed to believe she is a girl of 16 or 17.She looks nothing like that.The girl doesn't look like a teenager at all.
If you are triggered by sexual abuse, incest, drug use, mental illness, then do not watch this movie.I'm not impressed that sexual assault seems to be the driving force behind this film.
It was extremely graphic, and at some points, highly unnecessary.The storyline was all over the place, and so was Anna's character - one minute she's shy and reclusive, the next she's addicted to crack and attacking guards, and one day she's having sex with her roommate and the next she's banging the gang leader?
The continuity was pretty poor.This movie was clearly low-budget and I don't even know why I wasted an hour of my life that I'm never going to get back..
Don't watch this movie!
This movie is poorly acted, and very poorly filmed, and anything that you think of as a story is so completely stupid, and childish.
I did not Enjoy this movie, I really watched it, and for that I am sad.
I feel like this film was made by a horny fifty year old man that was desperate for money.
I don't know how I just watched this entire movie...
But before I go, I just have one more thing to share: the back story of Anna, the way they depict prison life in the movie, and all of the drugs randomly appearing was such crap.
Anna Nix (Sara Malakul Lane) kills her step father in self defense.
She is sentenced to be in a nubile prison sexplotation film filled with drugs, shower scenes, a rapist warden, and girl/girl action.
Oh yeah, she plays a cello.The acting was what one would expect from an Asylum film as they used their regular stars.
The dialog wasn't great, but if the object is to watch 30 year old Sara Malakul Lane undress looking like 17, then the film achieved its goal.
It is a prison girl film.
This may contain spoilers.This film does have a happy ending, which comes quite suddenly, as though the makers of the movie had run out of nasty things to do to the heroine and decided that, maybe, the poor girl had suffered enough.
It started with a girl sitting in her bedroom doing one of the worst imitations of a musician I've ever seen on film.
After that, she spends some time in a maximum security prison of course, where they basically try to piece together nearly every story line from the first two seasons of 'Orange is the New Black' (only got through two seasons of that show until we got tired of it).
Like Very Bad Lesbian Porn.
She is found guilty of manslaughter and is sentenced to several years in a maximum security juvenile detention centre "Hold on Theo surely that's self defence and if it was self defence she wouldn't be guilty of anything ?" Yes but that would be realistic and would mean there wouldn't be a film and after seeing JAILBAIT that wouldn't have been much of a loss either!!!!!
The story and scenario is every bit as fake and plastic as Anna's silicone boobs .
There's no character development and no credibility to any of this and the only remit the production team have is to include as much nudity and lesbian sex as possible regardless of how much sense it makes and how it fits in to the confused narrative You can work out the ending as soon as someone mentions they've got an I-phone and this will come back to haunt the prison warder who apart from looking like a cross between an aging Tom Berenger and Dubya Bush is also an obscene sexual predator who also uses Anna as his sex toy .
Pretty much a movie showing her fake breasts and showcasing her laughably-written joke of a character..
I cant believe how great this movie omg roflotfl.
I Honestly Thought This Was Going to be one of Those Christian Movies.
*I'm sure there's a spoiler in here somewhere* I kind of like those direct to video church produced movies where they attempt to tackle the "tough subjects." I was looking forward to watching some director dance around things like sexual assault, murder, homosexuality, drug use and violence without actually having to show much of it.
So while I did get all the flat settings and uninspired dialogue- the lazy direction and try hard performances I've come to expect from those slow Church movies, JAILBAIT doesn't really deliver that face melting joy with it's final Kumbaya.Quick plot summary: Anna Nix played by the very attractive Sara Malakul Lane gets sent up the river for killing her stepfather.
Then, in the name of self preservation, she has sex with any character that has more than 4 minutes of screen time- except that black girl.
And is way naked a lot.There's a lot of personal grooming going on at this reformatory, which I found a little unrealistic, and while in the end Nix plays the cello like Yo-Yo Ma it's just not the same as finding life everlasting. |
tt1456941 | Tomorrow, When the War Began | The film begins with a video log by Ellie. She asks the camera how she can tell their story. She suggests to herself "from the beginning."
Country high school student Ellie (Caitlin Stasey) sets off on a camping trip to "hell's Gate", with close childhood friend Corrie (Rachel Hurd-Wood), together with Corrie's boyfriend Kevin, Ellie's next-door neighbour Homer, high school crush Lee and friends Robyn and Fiona. After driving Ellie's parents' Land Rover into the mountains, they hike down into a remote valley known as "Hell".
During their second night camping, Ellie wakes to a sky full of military aircraft. Upon arriving back in town, the group finds their homes abandoned, without power, internet and telephone lines down. From the hill overlooking Robyn's house, the group sees that the only lights on in town are at the hospital and showground. Upon reaching the showground, they find that the citizens of the town are being detained by a foreign military group. Ellie witnesses a man being executed with a shot to the head, and in her horror retreats too quickly, being spotted by a searchlight. They flee but are pursued by soldiers into the backyard of a house. Ellie, using Kevin's singlet, lighter and the fuel tank of a ride-on lawn mower, creates an explosion that eliminates the squad.
On return to Corrie's house, they find that Lee and Robyn are missing. Ellie and Corrie witness an RAAF jet fighter being shot down by enemy aircraft. Whilst the group gathers inside to plan for their return to Hell, an enemy helicopter performs a close examination of the house. Homer shoots out the helicopter's searchlight, which retreats after dropping flares. The group barely escape with their lives, after a jet destroys the home.
That night, Ellie and Homer sneak back into town and find Robyn in her house. Lee has been wounded, and is being treated by Dr Clements (Colin Friels), the local dentist, who informs them that the invading forces are bringing in their vehicles and equipment from ships moored in Cobbler's Bay over the Wirrawee Bridge. After a brief skirmish with a pair of armed buggies, Robyn, Homer, Lee and Ellie meet back up at Corrie's home. They decide to return to Hell.
On the way, they stop at a house and are greeted by school mate Chris, who is incredibly stoned and has no idea that a war is going on. Chris joins the group. They return to Hell, with plans to use it as a secluded hideout where the enemy forces will not find them. While there, they hear a radio transmission revealing that Australia has been invaded by "The Coalition Nations" from nearby Asia, who believe that they have a right to the country's vast natural resources and wealth in order to sustain their growing populations. The transmission also reveals one of the three main ports being used to deposit soldiers into the country is nearby Cobbler's Bay, the only exit from which is the Heron Bridge, which the group then makes plans to destroy.
The group sneaks back to Wirrawee, and devise a plan to blow up Heron Bridge. Ellie and Fi steal a petrol tanker from the council depot. They park it near the bridge and, while waiting for the rest of the team to take their positions. After being discovered by guards, they rush to drive the tanker forward under the bridge. The plan necessarily brought forward, Homer and Lee scare a herd of cattle onto the bridge, forcing the sentry guards to flee their posts, allowing Ellie to park the tanker under the bridge unhindered. Working together, they manage to explode the tanker, which utterly destroys the bridge. Corrie however is shot as the group escapes.
Despite certain capture, Kevin decides to drive Corrie, who is seriously wounded, to the hospital and remain by her side. The group return to Hell. Ellie then finishes her video log, revealing their ongoing guerilla war, the necessity to fight, and that they have yet to be found. | violence, action, murder, romantic | train | wikipedia | The cast is good enough and you can't complain about the visuals but the script is flawed, due to the makers eagerness into focusing on the teen- romance aspects of the movie instead of the survival aspect.For instance there is a scene where the gang have a potentially lethal mission going on and 2 girls can't stop chatting about the boys they like, asking if this or that person is a good kisser etc.And stuff like that happens throughout of the movie, so what everyone they know is either dead or prisoners of war does that really mean we can't go on a date right?Yeah...
But when it's not focused on that it's fairly entertaining.The violence is very minimal which takes away a lot of the tension that could have been in the movie, okay it's aimed at teens but still war is never pretty.There's also very little action for it to be listed as a action-movie and the poster makes it look like it's actionpacked as well but it's really not.In the end of the movie which ends with a cliffhanger of sorts it's kind of obvious that it was always intended as a trilogy or something with this movie being the first part.And it appears that the sequel is being made as we speak, I'd watch it but I hope they don't focus on too many love-triangles but of the actual war/survivor-story that time..
DOP Ben Nott has done a superb job of capturing some of the beauty of Australia's bush and mountains, alternating with that serenity, the fast paced action sequences, with gun fights, car chases, explosions and general mayhem.Although there are a number of small technical criticisms I noted, this film still rises way above the average fair, and its 143 minutes duration literally flies past, leaving you a little disappointed for want of more.I have not read the seven book novel series, written by John Marsden, which the film is based on, so I was seeing the film and judging it on its merits, and I know the youth, in particular, who are familiar with the books, will love the film, as will many older folk who do not know Marsden's work.The actors generally put in strong performances; however, there are a few awful character clichés which more than jar, which does disrupt one's involvement momentarily.
In the film the only time they were driving freely was when they were outside of the city limits, where there were never soldiers.When you play close attention to the small details you will notice things like that rather than writing in a review you found the movie "laughable." I loved the human interaction and how the movie was crafted to not just be a war movie, but something much deeper about people from different walks of life coming together for a cause.The acting I felt was also very well done, as well was the script.
"Tomorrow When the war Began" is the First book in the Series known as the "Tomorrow Series", a series of seven books and a further series known as "The Ellie Chronicles" by Australian Author John Marsden.This Book was Year ten English reading for many Australian schools in the late 90's and early 00'sTomorrow when the War Began concerns itself with seven Australian teenage friends from a rural town who go on a camping trip to "Hell" (the name given to the destination), and while on this camping trip find the way to an area many thought myth, a place well hidden, while camping in this newly found place Australia is invaded by an unnamed country, changing their lives forever.The Movie does live up to the books, though it is ten years since I last read them, I still choke up at the thought of several of the scenes depicted in the book, and seeing them on the big screen, depicted as well as I could have hoped has left me yearning for the rest of this series to be as well done.I will be purchasing the DVD as soon as it comes out.Good work.10 out of 10!.
Yeah, it's dumb (good dumb though ;P), but at least it isn't an American movie shot in rural Australia, starring Australian actors portraying clichéd American teen varsity students.
Based off the best selling Australian Teen novel of the same name Tomorrow When The War Began is the first in a series of books by John Marsden about a group of high school students who take a camping trip before school starts and return to find that the country has been invaded by an unknown force, and they make a stand to fight the enemy using guerilla tactics The cinematography and action in this film is fantastic, from the second the first gunshot is fired the adrenaline really picks up and boy does it deliver big time, the explosions in this film are great, and what makes them great is not their size but the debris and characters they send flying, I mean there were pieces of debris that missed characters by cm's and it really ads extra dimension with close calls if this film had been shot in 3D it would have been incredible to see the film just for that.Unfortunately what drags the film is its script, the dialogue is extremely corny and clichéd, and the bulk of the characters are blatant stereotypes and this is apparent with the way the characters are introduced, in fact I can go though each of them right now, Ellie - Farmer's Daughter, Corrie - the lead's best friend, Kevin - The coward, Homer - The rebellious bad boy, Fiona - the pampered city girl, Robyn - The upstanding religious girl, Chris - The stoner, and the biggest stereotype of them all Lee - The Asian, don't believe me about the Asian?
let me give you his character background: He's an expert piano player, his parents own a Chinese restaurant, he moves swiftly like a ninja as evident when he's climbing down a mountain, he stops a fast moving snake with a stick in one strike, he speaks one or two proverbs I mean I was half expecting him to bust out some Kung Fu with the way the filmmakers were treating his character thank god they didn't go that far.On the topic of the characters the one that really stood out for me performance wise was the character of Homer, Actor Deniz Akdeniz handles his character really well being as charismatic and witty and probably has the second most character development out of all the characters next to Ellie.To be fair though this is the first in a series of books so there is defiantly room for improvement if the next movie comes out.
Notice I said "if" not "when" that's because being an Australian film it has to do really well domestically if it has even a chance of getting made, if it doesn't do well bye bye The Dead of The Night (the next movie in the series) Overall the film is enjoyable despite the poor dialogue, it defiantly needs a better script writer for the next film, though leave him doing the action, Stuart Beattie did that well and pretty good for a directing debut.7/10.
When they return, they find their country invaded by an unknown force, their families forced into a concentration camp, and take it upon themselves to begin a resistance movement.I have not read the book, but as an Australian I really wanted to enjoy this movie, and I did, but I also came away thinking that it could be a lot better.
The film does not start quickly.The action scenes are generally implausible: petrol explosions are all too frequent: a crime to intelligence that Hollywood itself has committed numerous times but don't we know better than that now?
Only one character - Robyn Mathers - actually looked like a real school girl (except her clothes were so cliché-conservative Christian that even she looks a little unbelievable).Action scenes were implausible: I like the idea of a movie where a bunch of teenagers outwit an invading force.
My boyfriend had been nagging me for weeks saying that we had to go watch "Tomorow when the war began" as soon as it came out, i really did not want to see this film, as i didn't think it would appeal to me and i thought it would be another "BOY" movie.I went into the cinema with that thought and came out loving the movie, wanting to see it again!
It was fantastic the actors in this movie where incredible, they felt so real and made you feel like you where involved with the story.It did scare me, and i covered my eyes and jumped at a few scenes but i also had laughter and moments of happiness and sadness.
for those that have seen red dawn (and for those that haven't) you can start this movie select any scene and know exactly where the plot line is, where it has been and what is about to happen.
both movies share same bad acting, weak plot and predictable story lines.For god shake, Casablanca has a 8.8 rating here and this dumb teenage film a 7.5??!!!!!
The producers should should be charged for wasting $20 million on this drivel.The worst film I have seen all year so bad it has has prompted me to review it in an effort to save others wasting 2 hours of their lives and any of their hard earned money (Thankfully I had some free passes) The action scenes are good but the acting and story line scupper any chance this film had within the first couple of minutes.The cast should go back to neighbors/Home & Away as quick as they can before they are hunted down by angry cinema goers.I cringed in my seat and would be very surprised if they make a sequel surely even die hard fans of the book (which I haven't read) cant like this?
Here's one way to please the brain dead masses:Take a few good looking oversexed teenagers with crushes on each other (typical teen drama aka Beverly Hills 90210/Dawson's Creek/etc/etc...), mix in the storyline from the 1984 film "Red Dawn", and you got yourself a moneymaker!
The general premise of the film is quite good, I especially like the movie being set in rural Australia.
sure if you're a little kid you might find all the explosions entertaining, but aren't adults the one's who vote for these awards, I think something fishy is going on there.Throw in a few jokes and it would have been a great comedy, but unfortunately it was supposed to be a serious movie.I like the instantly exploding trucks, and the utter useless invading force who although they are supposed to be military do things like sneak up on people at night using torches.I am now ashamed to be Australian..
Although I haven't seen red dawn or read the books, simply as a viewer I was on the edge of my seat - I cried, I laughed, i cheered and I gasped in shock and yelled "For gods sake turn around!!!" I found this film very refreshing amongst all the other Hollywood glamorised garbage, and also appreciated the cinematography (not the best but still greatly shot).
oh and they also blow stuff up, its these kids are smart determined and country bumkins that GSD (get s#*t done) LOOK DIRECTORS i may not be the best reviewer or have the best grammar ever but please if there is going to be a NEXT (The dead of the night) please pay attention to the details, the little things (what Australian have you ever met that calls a ute a truck ) yeah you might not have a big budget for a Aussie movie but that doesn't mean you cant do some research before making what could be an amazing film.PLEASE AND THANKYOU.
Schoolies flocked to this film and if they want to watch TV teen soaps each night or go see one like this at the movies, then good luck to the people marketing this film.
i've read a lot of comments about this film trying to be an American block buster....ITS NOT this movie is based on a book done in 1991 and compared to a modern day American blockbuster i.e piranha 3d this movie is miles ahead the script is almost perfect character development, cinematography was excellent and the action scenes were ground breakingly awesome piranha 3d on the other hand lets face it the only real cinematography was close up shots of boobs and pussy and come on the only real reason people are seeing it is because of the amount of gore.
I hope the people involved never make a movie again and I know that it tanked at the box office so I pray the studio has gone out of business for accepting a screen play that was written for crap.I try to make my film views more diverse but this is pushing me to watch only American Made Movies!!!!Get a clue Australia and write a good script, the actors in this were very easy on the eyes but the story line was total rubbish!How crud like this gets from Paper to Production is way beyond me....
At moments, TWTWB feels like a bad horror movie, where the characters lacking sense of urgency during life-threatening moments is at odds with the seriousness of their situation, which dawns more often during moments of relative safety.Despite their actions being hard to believe, the characters are, at least, well-varied and make a watch-able team.
It is an action movie with very little action, but with large gloopy dollops of the most naive philosophy including long static discussions on religious angst, bravery and cowardice, duty to parents, rich versus poor and - most original - how "you should never judge a book by its cover!" Its actors - all beautiful and so carefully chosen to include all races and political groups - are not bad, but are so obviously dying to be given a script with some real acting in it, that it quickly becomes embarrassing to the point of being almost unwatchable, as they champ through their lines with as little impact on the film as the directing.
The movie started with well - good character establishment, good scene setting in the Australian countryside and an excellent sound track: And then the war began.
The plot about a bunch of teenagers going on a weekend camp and returning to find an invasion force has taken over is familiar in quite a few previous attempts at this subject but what "Tomorrow When the War Began" does well is character development, interplay between the characters, and not trying to create superhuman heroes.This is largely thanks to some excellent acting from the young cast (especially Caitlin Stasey) and a storyline that obscures the bigger picture by allowing us to follow the activities of the one small group.
Were these aspects present in the books and in my youth I missed them, or are they just the result of trying to convert the book into film.If they'd cut the film down to just the shots of scenery/nature parks, it would have been a decent watch as the location is spectacular, but sadly the final cut included the actors/characters.It felt like they tried to directly pull scenes from the book as is and then stitch them together with no attempt to interlink them, creating a disjointed feel and making the characters actions seem sudden and odd..
the fact that the movie doesn't try to be some sort of horrible action flick ( as i expect the new Red Dawn to be ) only highlights the talent involved.the director has done a wonderful job of not only framing the character interaction , action sequences and story making shots but also some of the most beautiful Australian landscape i have seen on film .
I have to say i am just after watching this movie and i was extremely surprised how good it is, its the best war-drama film i have seen in a long time.
This is still absolutely a factor in the film, and is handled relatively well, but I felt like the greater emphasis on action in the movie hurt the realistic feel that was present in the books.
In some ways it might be a worthwhile film to see because the fallout might be not insignificant and worth understanding.Tomorrow When The War Began is all around a solid film with a very good script, decent action scenes, and decent actors, all of which comes together in quite a neat little package.
Australian movies are not usually as good as this and thats a fact when it comes to acting, budget, scope and writing (most of the time).Based on the first in a series of novels by Author John Marsden.
The young Australian cast are remarkably good, portraying each of the characters almost exactly how I imagined them in the books.Now, I wouldn't class this as just an action film, it's not Die Hard.
For Aussies who have see the long running TV series 'Home & Away', you will understand my title.For all others, I found the Scenery 'Absolutely Beautiful', the acting 'over-acted', the score 'deafening'.I went and watched the Premier because the story line interested me.I haven't read the books, but that doesn't make up for bad/over acted script or the overall 'tele-movie' feel to the whole production.The start was OK, you began to know the characters through embarrassing over acting, but not enough to make you walk out, then the crap hits the fan.
As a homegrown, big budget movie, Tomorrow, When the War Began represents a positive shift from the Australian film industry of recent times.
I find it humorous another reviewer said that the book series is read in Australian schools, because if this film follows the book, than it is a clear rip off, and almost plagerization of Red Dawn.The movie was a good one, the actors are a little over the top sometimes, but not bad over all. |
tt0110944 | Rapa Nui | There are two classes of people: Long Ears and Short Ears. Long Ears, marked by large wooden plugs in their earlobes and a certain tattoo, are the ruling class. The working-class Short Ears have no ear plugs and a different tattoo. Young men from each Long Ear tribe compete in the annual Birdman Competition. The winner’s tribe gets to rule the island for a year.
Ariki-mau has been the Birdman (Island King) for 20 years. He has a conviction that one day the gods will arrive in a great white canoe and take him to heaven. His advisor tells him to build more and bigger moai statues to curry favor with the gods and encourage them to come sooner. Ariki-mau petulantly rejects the latest statue—which stands over 20 feet tall—as too small. The Short Ear workers are forced to build an even bigger statue in an impossibly short amount of time. The king’s advisor ruthlessly enforces the rules and status quo by publicly killing a Short Ear fisherman who had accidentally caught a taboo fish.
Long Ear Noro (Jason Scott Lee) and Ramana, a Short Ear, are both rejects in their tribes—her father was banished for building an unlucky canoe. Noro’s father stole a canoe and sailed away and is accused of abandoning the tribe. They have a secret relationship and have fallen in love.
Ariki-mau tells Noro that he has to compete in the Birdman Competition so Ariki-mau can continue to rule the island. Noro asks if he can marry Ramana if he wins the Birdman Competition. The king reluctantly agrees. The king’s advisor claims that Ramana's skin is too dark and that she should be purified by spending the time from now until the Birdman Competition (six months) in the "Virgin’s Cave". He checks her virginity and snidely remarks to Noro, who is watching Ramana being lowered to the cave, that she isn’t right for the Virgin’s Cave and that it will be their secret. Ramana takes one last look at the sunset and goes into the cave.
Noro approaches Ramana’s banished father, a canoe maker, and asks him to help him train for the Birdman competition. He initially refuses, because it is Noro’s fault that his daughter is confined to a cave, but later relents and trains Noro. While training Noro he explains that he and Noro's father were great friends once and that he gave the canoe to Noro's father. He further explains that Noro's father sailed away after discovering a piece of a shipwrecked Spanish galleon, thus breaking the long-held belief that Rapa Nui is the only land left with people on the Earth.
Meanwhile, the Short Ears are beginning to starve because the king insists on them working on the new statue instead of growing food but continues taking the full quota of their remaining food for the Long Ears. The resources of the island are being rapidly used up and depleted (with the last remaining tree being cut down), due to the extensive Moai construction and overpopulation. Noro is the only person worried about the resource depletion, but his concerns are dismissed by the increasingly senile Ariki-mau.
Noro sneaks some food to his Short Ear friend Make (Esai Morales) and shares his plans to marry Ramana. Make reacts badly and Noro realizes that Make loves her, too. Make declares that they are no longer friends and runs off. Separately, Noro and Make visit Ramana at her cave, bringing her food and talking to her through the barrier at the mouth of the cave. They both declare their love to her. She always responds, but she sounds despondent.
After a supply shortage results in the death of one of the Short Ears (Heki, the former master carver), they demand half of the wood, food and other materials and that they are allowed to compete in the Birdman Competition. The King's advisor initially refuses and orders their death. However, the King gives in to their demands after realizing that if the Short Ears die no one will build the moai. The King, however, only allows them to compete after the moai has been completed. He makes the condition that if the Short Ear competitor loses he will be sacrificed. Despite these conditions Make accepts the position of the Birdman Competitor on the condition he marries Ramana if he wins. The King agrees and Make spends all his time working and training, leaving no time for sleep or other recreational activities. Meanwhile, work on the great Moai has become so important that the Short Ears sacrifice their food to complete it.
Finally it is the Birdman Competition. Nine competitors must swim to a close-by islet surrounded by pounding surf, climb the cliffs to get an egg from the nest of a sooty tern and bring it back. The first to return wins for his tribe. Noro barely wins and Ariki-mau gets to be the island's ruler for another year.
Ramana is brought from the cave, pale from her long underground stay and very pregnant. Before anything is decided about the fate of Ramana or Make, an iceberg is spotted off the coast. Ariki-mau believes that the iceberg is the great white canoe sent to take him to the gods and goes out to it with some of his followers. After the iceberg has carried Ariki-mau away, the advisor attempts to seize control of the island, but Make kills him and the Short Ears stage a rebellion, slaughtering and even eating the remains of the Long Ears. Noro alone survives, as Make allows him to live, and Noro, Ramana and their baby escape the island in a canoe Ramana’s father built.
An after-movie credit states that archaeological evidence proves that Pitcairn Island was settled some 1,500 miles away, providing hope that Noro, Ramana and their daughter made it to a new land. | historical, murder | train | wikipedia | This was the first film in a long time that truly forced me to get involved with the characters, not in a cliched good versus evil kind of way, but a good versus good "how the hell are they going to get out of this one?" kind of way.
Okay, so some aspects of the film do not deliver with the same power, and some of the accents do tend to waver a little, but the beautifully constructed central storyline held me until the end..
I am saddened that so few people seem to have seen this film; It is worth watching for the lush photography alone..
It takes some getting used to the accents of the actors, and many lines may not be clear on first viewing.I have read many books about Easter Island and the mystery surrounding its statues..
This film attempts to answer some of these mysteries (how the statues were moved, why work stopped so abruptly on then, what happened to all the trees on the Island, etc.) First read up in an encyclopedia on Rapa Nui (Easter Island) and then watch history (or at least a good guess at it) come to life.
Film making and story telling at it's best, along with an athletic competition at the end unlike any you have ever seen..
Was it a lack of promotion the presumably R rating?.I found this to be an excellent film all the characters main and supporting are very intriguing the setting is breathtaking , and the actors all played their roles superbly and with passion.I did not find a problem with the English speaking actors I feel the director wanted to get the point of the movie across without tiring the audience out by having to read subtitles.This is a movie after all not real life, one cant expect things to be exact.This movie is far different then most of what Hollywood churns out the plot is simple as the time the movie takes place the story is very believable and understandable with some historical elements thrown in.
As one watches this film they will come to see that's there's no simple answer to the protagonist problems they will have to take them selves back to that time and place.As far as a love story goes i feel its an epic one easily as touching if not more so then Star Wars or Titanic, Also similar to 10,000 BC.
Rapa Nui is more than just a bunch of Polynesian (and Hispanic!) actors running around half-nekkid.
Rapa Nui is the Polynesian name for Easter Island, that famous dot in the Pacific Ocean with the mysterious statues.
The Long Ear tribe has effectively subjugated the Short Ear tribe, forcing them to carve Moai (statues) in order to placate the gods.
Director Kevin Reynolds uses the island and the carving of statues as an effective backdrop to illustrate the enmity between the tribes, as well as a power struggle for eventual spremacy of the island.
The film was shot on location and despite liberties taken with history, it is an absorbing look at a mysterious culture that has virtually disappeared.1400 years ago, Polynesian seafarers settled on the most remote island on earth, Easter Island or Rapa Nui as they called it.
Although most of what is known about their history is speculation based on archaeological evidence, it seems the island went through an intense period of statue (moai) building, followed by an equally intense period of tearing them down.
To regulate their dwindling resources, the islanders conducted an annual ocean race with the winner's tribe ruling the island for a year under their leader, the Birdman.Kevin Reynolds' movie is about these events.
In fact, every event in the island's history is in the film.
Time compression is one of the major criticisms of the film.The writers constructed a Romeo and Juliet love story around the characters played by Jason Scott Lee, Sandrine Holt, and Esai Morales.
However, these are exceptions; the rest of the script effectively moves the story along and explains why things are happening to this doomed culture.The making and moving of the moai are highlights of the film as is the birdman competition; an event so gruelling that by comparison, a modern triathlon seems about as difficult as an egg-and-spoon race.
A traditional score may have worked but this one is inspired, delivering a sense that time is running out for Rapa Nui.Much bare skin is exposed in the movie and nearly all the women appear topless.
Historical evidence suggests the costume designers got it right, which probably pleased the marketing people who no doubt had an eye on the box office.Rapa Nui offers a very different cinema experience.
The island itself is stunningly beautiful and the film makes good use of this, especially the race at the end which is compelling in its apparent difficulty for the actors.
As well as a love story there is a competitive element, and an explanation about what happened to the island.
If Easter Island interests you this film will entertain.
and I am very glad I did.I had not seen the movie prior to going there 6 months ago, for two reasons: people told me it was boring, and when I started watching it, I was bothered by the orangey hue of the movie.I'm glad that this time I persisted.
I went to Rapa Nui because I was mesmerized with the idea of an ultra-isolated island where an ecological tragedy happened because of huge stone heads.
One of 4 films (and the most unclad) that Jason Scott Lee made in a short time, and even more athletic than his Bruce Lee biopic, 'Dragon', although dramatically J.S. Lee's most memorable performance was as the Inuit halfbreed Avik in 'Map of the Human Heart.' Sandrine Holt as his beloved is luminous, while Esai Morales is the villain-- -again.
Grade B All The Way. I had two actors in here I usually enjoy watching: Jason Scott Lee ("Map of the Human Heart") and Sandrine Holt ("Black Robe").
It had also had beautiful Easter Island scenery and it had a bunch of pretty half-naked women.What's not to like?
I couldn't enjoy the beautiful Holt because she was sent to a cave early on and wasn't seen again until near the end of the film.How people, including one of the few national film critics I like - Michael Medved - could rave about this film is totally mind-boggling.
Like many, I was jolted to hear a bunch of ancient Polynesians sounding like "valley girls" and their boyfriends, but let it pass since at least they were all speaking the same language as they would have been anyway, unlike movies like "Seven Years in Tibet" where Austrians spoke English to Austrians, Tibetans spoke English to Tibetans, and otherwise people who wouldn't have been able to speak with each other all conversing in perfect English...
As for the different accents in Rapa Nui, I assumed it was a way to show class differences (after all, Jason Scott Lee has proved he can handle about any accent): the chief spoke hoity toity British, Lee sounded like a poor little rich boy (which he was in the movie), so it kind of made sense.
And as a great Jason Scott Lee fan, it doesn't matter how well- acted or historically correct or whatever else the movie is or isn't (and by the way I found it completely passable in those senses) as long as we are treated to generous footage of Jason Scott Lee showing off his perfect physique -- and in this movie he nary wears a stitch.
Anyway, to avoid redundancy, I basically agree with the other positive things other reviewers have said about the movie, and believe one reason it didn't do great at the box office was due to its unusual subject matter -- something that John Q Public isn't always great at handling..
I love this movie.Briefly, "Rapa Nui" is the native Polynesian name for Easter Island, and this story is set during a highly speculative, yet resonant, depiction of an end of an era that saw high superstition influence the Long-Ear ruling class to ruthlessly subjugate laborers of the Short-Ear clan for building and erecting ever larger giant stone-carved-statued "Moai" to placate seemingly ambivalent ancestral gods while depleting all their natural resources in the pursuit of this sole aim.
Featuring a great primal adversarial dynamic between Jason Scott Lee and Esai Morales, as former childhood best friends, equally noble but from different social castes - both competing in a breathlessly filmed islandwide triathlon of running/swimming/climbing contested by the various clans to decide who rules them all as "Birdman" overleader - as well as a private wager between the two men for which will win the hand of their lifelong romantic ambition, as personified in the lithely loinclothed Sandrine Holt (at her most naturally rapturious).
"Rapa Nui" is a finely acted, well spun, sweepingly romantic historical epic tragedy with stunningly photographed oceanic vistas, harrowing action sequences, and an incredible ethnic music score from Police drummer Stewart Copeland!
And certainly one I am always pleased to expose more people to.I've heard writer/director Kevin Reynolds subsequently express disappointment with this film.
A new more finely tuned retrospective ought to be commissioned to accompany a long overdue restoration release of this film, assembling original existing behind the scenes promo featuerettes with more candid contemporary interviews.
Classical mythologic hero's journey archetype done to perfection.Sadly, as of the writing of the review, for some fool reason one of 1994's most beautiful films "Rapa Nui" is not readily availible, not attractively so anyway.
So someone in charge please chose to do the right thing and preserve this film properly."Rapa Nui" really is deserving of discovery and reassessment.
This film shows one classic historical example, the deforestation of Easter Island.
What I meant was that the film showed that it was raw human muscle and ingenuity that got the statues built, as opposed to extra-terrestrials or Atlanteans which some fringe theorists believe..
Every year, each tribe sends a warrior to the Birdman competition to see who will rule the island.
Noro (Jason Scott Lee) comes from the ruling tribe 'long ears'.
He is in love with Ramana (Sandrine Holt) from the tribe 'short ears'.
The demand for Moais has eaten up the resources of the island as scarcities and ecological damage rule.The problem for this movie is the foreign nature of everything.
After noting that by the time of the first visits of Europeans to Easter Island in the 18th century the island had been stripped of all its trees, and that some of this lumber would have been used for building, cooking and the like, Ponting continues: "The most demanding requirement (for lumber) of all was the need to move the large number of enormously heavy statues to ceremonial sites around the island.
As a result by 1600 the island was almost completely deforested...."Thus in its broadest outlines the story told here is correct, and there must have been a kind of apocalyptic dread among the more enlightened of the residents, as the island was inexorably denuded.This portrait of a dying society, if done well, would have alone been enough to make Rapa Nui a highly interesting movie.
Lines like this, and "don't bother me, I've got chicken entrails to read", and other idiotic plot twists that would constitute spoilers, dash cold water on this film as the tragic if formulaic reenactment of the final days of a doomed civilization.As others here have said, Easter Island itself is breathtaking; the beauty of the setting is one of the better things about Rapa Nui. And the story had great potential.
Sharon Bolling reviews Rapa-Nui and gives Sandrine Holt FIVE KISSES out of FIVE!!!.
It must be sad to think the story or facts have anything to do with the true pleasure of watching this film.
This film shines for one magic reason: Sandrine Holt, topless.
stupid!!!) For that reason I have to say I enjoyed Pocahontas more given that she's in that film more (and just as gorgeous!).
My advise is to get Rapa-Nui and as soon as they stick her in the cave, rewind, and watch the first half again..
Okay, there is one love scene, but it's tame by Hollywood standards and it happens early in the film.
This could be a good movie for young people to watch with an adult, if only to see people treating each other normally when their skin is showing.The plot is a bit comic-bookish, but it makes for an easy-to-follow story and good entertainment.
This movie is well worth the viewing if you're into period films with full frontal nudity, even if it means that Roxine Holt's breasts change their shape whenever there's a close-up.
The historical fiction used by this movie try to explain the statues on Easter Island but relies too heavily on the tired theme of the incompetent leader being manipulated by overly ambitious advisors.
Surely, if the people were as technologically advanced as the movie suggests, they may have transcended racism and their bizarre class structure.And yet again we see Jason Scott Lee playing the naive, young aboriginal, a part for which he has been typecast in movies like "Map of the Human Heart."If you enjoy Polynesian scenery, and have a mute button to squelch the pathetic English/Hispanic/American/Canadian accents that vary from character to character, and you can stomach the pointless love story in between graphic scenes of gratuitous frontal nudity through the efforts of beautiful body-doubles, you still won't enjoy this movie..
Noro is the son of the chief of Easter Island, he wants to marry Ramana, but, before, he has to win the Egg Race, a race in which he will risk his life in order to chose who will be the chief during the next year.
To sum up, a long boring film that you should avoid to watch to.
You have to look at this film differently; of course you can not take what is being showed to us as the true history of the easter island, but you also can't look at it as just some failed flick.
Whether long or short ears, whether upper or lower class: To build the statues they most likely used all the little forest they had left...
for starters let me clue some of you in on this, the researchers who study Easter island only have theories as to how these people came to be there, who they were, and how they lived.
one woman said ''this movie gives an in depth look into who these people were, and how and why they built the statues''..i think you might want to make a trip to your local library, use that 5lb hunk of gray matter and read a book instead of believing a so-called ancient legend of history dreampt up by a bunch of crazed american writers and producers.
but in RAPA NUI you can clearly see them [the natives] swimming for fun and surfboarding for christ's sake!In short this ranks up there with all the b******t sterotype pieces of fake ethnic b-movies from ''SHAKA ZULU'' the mini-series to ''KUNG FU''they're all taken from the imaginations of complete gits..
An odd subject of Civil War on Easter Island is the primary focus of "Rapa Nui", a dry and dull would-be love story from director Kevin Reynolds.
The richer and more powerful group wants the poorer citizens to make larger Moai statues (those famous heads that still stand even today) and it becomes clearly evident that this could mean more loss and degradation for those with little say.
The only good thing about this film is the scenery.
Rapa Nui goes somewhere else entirely.
The road less travelled as it were.Set on Easter Island, isolated as it is literally thousands of nautical miles from its nearest neighbour, the movie fleshes out the most pivital time in that islands history, as we understand it from the archeological evidence available.
They settled a small, utterly remote island in the South Pacific and developed a unique, centuries-old way of life known worldwide for creating monumental stone statues to evoke and venerate their ancestors.
There is nothing like their astonishing achievement in the annals of civilization.Writer/director Kevin Reynolds distorts and insults the noble heritage of this island and its proud people with this tawdry epic.
To wit: -There is no archaeological evidence of cannibalism on Easter Island.-The Long Ears and the Short Ears, supposedly separate races or clans, probably never existed, and thus never engaged in genocidal warfare.
Alas, with RAPA NUI, they are still out of luck.It's supposedly a love story, but the heroine is out of sight, shut up in a cave for most of the movie.
But such moral suasion hardly offers a compelling motive for the Short Ears' elective servitude.Rapa Nui's troubles are often regarded as a microcosm for the dangers of reckless exploitation of the environment.
The finder did have to bring it back up the cliff intact, but doing so was not part of the race).Despite being filmed entirely on location, there's a sense of artificiality about the statues.
Makes for a dramatic shot but absurd archaeology.Statues the Short Ears carve in the film look fake, big props lacking the contours and color of the originals.
Styrofoam just doesn't shatter like rock when it hits the ground.Production of this $20 million flop in 1994 has had lasting effects for today's inhabitants of Rapa Nui. The sudden influx of film money into a hardscrabble sheep ranching existence brought about a startling transformation in island life, shifting the entire basis of the economy to tourism with remarkable swiftness.In a rather eerie redux of past ecological disasters, the island's resources now strain to accommodate 90,000 visitors per year.
The standard of living in what was formerly a very sleepy place has improved exponentially.RAPA NUI, this violent, almost sadistic movie that debases the island has, ironically, presumably made it a more livable locale. |
tt0234652 | Sanctimony | In an anonymous American town, Tom Gerrick is a Wall Street Whiz Kid. He's also a serial killer. Six victims have had their eyes cut out, six their ears cut off and three their tongues removed. By the time he gets to his fourth 'tongue' victim, Gerrick is getting sick of his success. Detectives Jim Renart and Dorothy Smith are under pressure from their superior to capture the killer, and they finally get a break when Gerrick offers himself for questioning. He calls the police himself, claiming to have found the body of the sixteen-year-old girl on the street. He wants to get caught, but first he wants to play with his captors for a while. His initial sensitivity to the crime is soon replaced with a psycho-smirk and a high priced lawyer. By the time the police find out he is the killer, he is on a shooting spree, first on live television during an interviews on "the secret of success", then at his ex-fiancés non-wedding party. Actually catching Gerrick proves to be a difficult matter, especially with the feds set to take over the case in mere hours. | murder | train | wikipedia | null |
tt1699199 | Thor: God of Thunder | The game begins in medias res with Asgard being invaded by the Jötun (frost giants from Niflheim). Thor, meanwhile, is training with Sif and his brother Loki. Their training is interrupted, however, by the arrival of the jötuns. While Loki leaves to inform Odin about the invasion, Thor is left to fight alone after Sif is frozen by one of the arriving jötun. After quickly fending his enemies off and setting Sif free, Thor goes to Odin's castle to defend Asgard. The invasion is stopped, but Sif is fatally wounded in the process. After Thor is denied retribution for the invasion, and Sif's condition, by Odin, Thor disobeys his father's orders and travels to Niflheim aided by one of Loki's projected clones (who is revealed to be the mastermind behind the invasion). While Thor travels to Nilfheim, it is shown that Odin manages to save Syf from dead and then he proceeds to enter the Odinsleep. As Thor arrives to Nilfheim Loki tells him to find Ymir, Lord of the Jötun and Ruler of Niflheim. Thor finds and, after a long battle, defeats Ymir inside the Cave of Ages. There, Thor finds the source of a power that, as Loki says, can destroy the entire realm of Niflheim. Ignoring Ymir's warnings, Thor activates the source which transforms into a golden, metallic, minotaur-like creature known as Mangog that instantly vaporizes Ymir. Loki then sends an unaware (and guilt-ridden) Thor to Vanaheim instead of Asgard, as Thor originally wanted, as Loki (who wants to prove himself to Odin as a rightful heir to Asgard's throne) had previously stroke a deal with Ulik (Lord of the Vanir-trolls-and ruler of Vanaheim) for him to "delay" Thor's return to Asgard (while Loki stops Mangog) and, in exchange, Loki would repair Vanaheim's Frostgrinder (the Vanir's faulty replica of the Bifrost) and allow Ulik to leave Vanaheim.
While Thor makes his way through Vanaheim, back in Asgard, Mangog wreaks havok throughout the city. Loki tries to stop Mangog, using the freezing casket from Niflheim. His plan backfires, as Mangog easily breaks free from the ice due to the fire that it emits. Mangog summons an army of Jötun and Infernir, forcing Loki to change his plans and ask Ulik to allow Thor to use the Frostgrinder but Ulik (having waited to leave Vanaheim for decades) betrays Loki. Thor, meanwhile, reaches the doors of the Frostgrinder. There, he discovers, through a historical record of Vanaheim, that it was Odin who originally created Mangog after the Vanir had declared war against Asgard. The Vanir were unable to control and defeat Mangog, but they found out that Mangog's only weakness is a god-created mineral called Scabrite (which was used by Odin to forge the chains used to restrain Mangog) Thor eventually confronts and defeats Ulik. As Loki tells Thor about the state of Asgard, Thor reveals Mangog's only possible weakness to Loki. Loki informs Thor that Scabrite can only be found in one realm: Muspelheim, home of the Infernir.
Thor then travels to Muspelheim, where he faces Surtur, Lord of the Infernir and ruler of Muspelheim. Thor manages to defeat Surtur, and claim his sword Twilight. Thor then destroys Twilight, which releases its Scabrite-filled-enegry which in turn is absorbed by Mjolnir. Thor then returns to Asgard, where Loki tells him that before he faces Mangog he has to help Heimdall and a fully recovered Sif retake the Bifrost's obvservatory. After Thor successfully helps Heimdall and Sif, he goes to face Mangog in combat, aided by Loki and a weakened Odin. After a long fight, Thor defeats Mangog. He then apologizes to Odin for releasing Mangog out of anger and pride, but Odin says it is he himself who should apologize as it was he himself who created Mangog in the first place. Odin then releases the souls of the Vanir trapped within Mangog (which also gave Mangog power) to their fate in afterlife as the game ends. | good versus evil, violence | train | wikipedia | I looked at this game tonight wondering why I left it lying there for nearly a year... now I have removed all doubt. I can play some movie based games. However I think exploring what has basically been seen on the big screen has it's problems. One of them being the movie has too little action and the result then is constant padding to it (like the Iron Man game) or it is extremely rushed so you don't have a decent product. Thor: God Of Thunder is the latter.The plot differs from the movie. Frost Giants attack Asgard and Thor goes to Yodenheim and fights them off... Or at least that is the amount that I have played. Seriously, on Yodenheim there is this one stage where enemies are constantly trying to kill you while spikes of ice pop up from the ground in an un-sequenced order.You really have little chance of getting out of that even on easy mode and this is coming from someone who has played the Deus Ex games (even the second one) but unlike the Deus Ex games where if you can't face the conflict you can sneak around it or some other such tactic, here you have to fight in conditions like that.Not to mention that the controls are just bad. The buttons that can be pressed simply have Thor's hammer hitting other people on it's own... no lightning, just on it's own. There is one button used to activate a special attack from wind, lightning or thunder but wouldn't it make more sense if you had attacks like that to battle the Frost Giants? I mean seriously, why not electrocute one while spinning another with the wind while still using the power of thunder and Mjionir to attack another? Don't say I wouldn't face a challenge that way because when you make a level more seemingly complex with even stupider decisions in controls than Deus Ex Invisible War - stop making video games.So I would only recommend to fans of Thor. I however am not a fan of Thor and think he is a bland character, someone gave this game to me as a gift and only tonight when I picked it up again I could see why the game was one that I put on the shelf. I do believe that superheroes can make awesome video games it's just... not like this. |
tt0030293 | Joy of Living | Margaret 'Maggie' Garret is the star of a new musical show, 'Glamour", having come up the hard way, following the family tradition of stage performance. She now earns a large salary but is devastated to learn that she is deeply in debt. She has worked extremely hard to make the show a success, but spends huge sums on a palatial home, and supporting her parents Dan and Minerva, her sister Salina (also her understudy) and Salina's work-shy husband, Bert Pine.
After the show one night, she forces her way through her adoring fans and is accosted by Dan Webster, who latches on to her and won't be put off. Taking him as a 'masher', she drives to the police station, but Dan charmingly talks his way out of the charge. When it happens again, Dan is forced to appear to court and demands that Maggie appear as a witness. The judge finds the charge proved and sentences Dan to six months in prison. Maggie, who is slowly taking a liking to Dan's debonair manner, begs the Judge to commute the sentence to a suspended one. He agrees, but appoints Maggie the 'probation officer', to whom Dan must report twice-weekly.
Dan, now revealed as an easy-going pleasure-seeker from a rich banking family, claims to own an island in the South Pacific, bought with family money. He continues to pursue the hard-working Maggie, attempting to convince her to take time off and have fun - as he does.
Eventually, they fall in love and marry. Dan wants to immediately board his boat and sail to his island, which he calls 'Paradise', but Maggie has a show to do. She must make a choice.
Maggie returns to the family home and confronts her sponging family. She tells her Parents, who have spent a fortune on acquiring antiques, to go into the antiques business. She tells her sister that this is her big chance - tonight she will take the stage and (perhaps) make her name.
Maggie and Dan sail off to Paradise. | comedy | train | wikipedia | That's what people wanted to see, to keep their minds off their troubles.And they wanted to see beautiful people and certainly stars Irene Dunne and Douglas Fairbanks, Jr. fill that bill.
Dunne is a musical comedy star on Broadway who has these leeches of a family dependent on her.
Experience the Joy of Living.I'm convinced part of the charm of this movie at least for the men is the notion they could escape with Doug and Irene by signing on as a deckhand.
And the women sat in the audience hoping that a Fairbanks would come into their lives.Well, maybe if they sang like Irene Dunne.
Playing a musical comedy star gave her to sing some tunes from her favorite composer Jerome Kern.
Besides Joy of Living, Irene Dunne did four other films with Jerome Kern scores.
From the score of Joy of Living, Just Let Me Look at You and You Couldn't Be Cuter sold quite a few 78 rpm platters back in 1938.Escapist stuff like this depends on the charm of it's leads and charm is what Fairbanks and Dunne have in abundance.
Joy of Living is not one of Irene Dunne's five best movies, but she does what she can with a plot that often seems like a blend of "Theodora Goes Wild" and some of her earlier heroines she played so seriously and so well.
In my opinion, it never quite gets off the runway, even though it has a long list of well-known character actors such as Eric Blore, Alice Brady and Franklin Pangborn and some able talents such as Douglas Fairbanks and Lucille Ball.The trouble I had with "Joy of Living" is the fact it's too close to previous roles Irene Dunne played with distinction.
The sequences in the roller skating rink were not well done; and the one real highlight of the film was Irene Dunne's impishness when she finally lets loose.I don't blame Irene Dunne for making this movie; but the director failed in my opinion to develop it in such a way as to draw out and highlight her monumental talents.
But I'm afraid Irene Dunne spoiled me with efforts like "Back Street"; "Ann Vickers"; "Consolation Marriage"; "Theodora Goes Wild"; "The Awful Truth"; "Love Affair"; and "I Remember Momma" and this movie simply isn't in that league..
The elegant and circumspect soprano Irene Dunne, the charming and sophisticated Douglas Fairbanks Jr., the vivacious and witty Lucille Ball, a host of character performers, including Alice Brady, Warren Hymer, Eric Blore, Phyllis Kennedy AND Franklin Pangborn, with a score by Jerome Kern and Dorothy Fields...
"Joy of Living" (RKO-Radio 1938) contains all of this and more, considering the wisecracking antics of Margaret Garret's (Miss Dunne) Assistant, Harrison (Jean Dixon), who helps to advance this film's plot whereas most other characters--including that of leading man Dan Brewster (Douglas Jr.)--are written without very much in the way of dimension.Here, it is (quite naturally) up to Irene to serve as Moral Center and Douglas (with able assistance from Miss Dixon) to advance the story of Musical stage star Margaret Garret's decision to continue along with her overly-demanding career or to sail away in a carefree lifestyle.Whether or not she may balance both entities isn't an option granted to Margaret Garret, although Irene would play the character as responsible as the script allows.Sometimes one wonders why Miss Dunne would pass on a script like "Follow the Fleet" (RKO 1936) - an Irving Berlin scored picture - in order to embark upon a lesser Musical later on.
In many another film, Irene Dunne conveys to an audience her characters' motivations and decision-making processes, enriching her pathos therein.
Here, she explains to her Assistant (Miss Dixon) her reasons for desiring to support her family (which hadn't much in the way of material wealth before she arose to Broadway fame) and toward her feelings of the moment for Dan, usually when she loves him not.Margaret's family consists here of parents, Minerva (Alice Brady) and Dennis Garret (Guy Kibbee), sister and brother-in-law Salina (Lucille Ball) and Bert Pine (Frank Milan) and twin toddler nieces, Dotsy (Dorothy Steiner) and Betsy Pine (Estelle Steiner).Minerva cherishes Margaret's theatre wealth to purchase antiques, Dennis to stock up on alcohol, Bert to sponge idly.
After being "received" by family and admirers in her cramped dressing room, she exits the theatre to be hounded by a mob of autograph seekers, who uncontrollably begin to usurp her wrap and accessories.Enter Dan Brewster, to whisk Margaret to the safety of his limousine; yet, from there, upon her appreciative rejection, he begins to stalk the star for his own purposes, which include his attempt to free her of her responsibilities to career, fans and family.Along the way, Margaret cleverly ushers Dan to a police station, to have him arrested although he does not seem to mind in the least, laughing off this action as he does most throughout the film.
But if you listen at low volume, then you may miss a deal of conversation involving our soft-spoken stars.Douglas appears in four comedies in 1938, "Joy of Living," the first and longest.
He plays his leading roles in the other three a bit more seriously than as Dan Brewster, here: as Jim Trevor in "The Rage of Paris," at Universal, co-starring the lovely Danielle Darrieux; as Chick Kirkland in "Having Wonderful Time," back at RKO, opposite the glamorous Ginger Rogers; and as Richard Carleton in "The Young in Heart," at United Artists, along with the perky Janet Gaynor, in her last feature film starring role.Irene, however, makes her sole 1938 feature appearance in "Joy of Living," which she sandwiches between two other RKO productions, "The Awful Truth" (1937), opposite Cary Grant, and "Love Affair" (1939), co-starring Charles Boyer.Alice Brady marks one of her last appearances in "Joy of Living," with a mere two to follow before her untimely passing.
Actually, Miss Brady and Miss Dunne share an age difference of six years, a shorter span than the difference between Irene and Douglas, one of her youngest leading men in a Romance.So, whether or not you may consider "Joy of Living" a film classic, it still serves as a gem in the Golden Age archives because of the elegant and circumspect soprano Irene Dunne, the charming and sophisticated Douglas Fairbanks Jr., the vivacious and witty Lucille Ball, a host of character performers, including Alice Brady, Warren Hymer, Eric Blore, Phyllis Kennedy AND Franklin Pangborn, plus a score by Jerome Kern and Dorothy Fields..
Irene Dunne is glamorous Maggie Garret, famous Broadway star, who is supporting her family in "Joy of Living," a 1938 comedy also starring Douglas Fairbanks, Jr., Alice Brady, Jean Dixon, Guy Kibbee, Lucille Ball, and Eric Blore.
When Dunne meets the wealthy, carefree Dan Webster, he tries to show her what it's like to have fun and also to convince her that her family is freeloading off of her.This film is so lightweight it practically drifts upward.
The roller skating sequence is very funny; the scene in the bar goes on a little too long.Fairbanks, a very versatile and charming actor, is lively and attractive as Dan. Lucille Ball has a small role as Maggie's whiny sister/understudy.
This ecstatic little musical comedy pageant must sport the highest level of springy, rambunctious, impromptu optimism of any film, right down to the lighthearded silliness of the whole movie which, at the same time one can feel underwhelmed by it, the filmmakers are holding true to the spirit of its characters, allowing no room for ardor of any kind.Douglas Fairbanks, Jr.'s supposedly self-styled sprawlingly open and adaptable stream-of- consciousness maverick is not a very good person.
This, however, is no matter, because by means of the movie's completely detached, carefree spirit, it doesn't matter what he's like.Joy of Living's philosophy seems to border on reckless, Fairbanks and gradually Dunne feeling overly optimistic and expansive, disregarding the resulting difficulty with commitment and trustworthiness as the itch for fun and free-flowing unpredictability of events call the shots.
Comedy about a famous singing sensation Maggie Garret (Irene Dunne) who is constantly hounded by the press and rabid autograph hounds, and that's not all - a man (Douglas Fairbanks Jr.) who is crazy in love with her from afar is busy chasing after her too, but she doesn't seem to care for him and sees to it he is arrested for "mashing".
Soon they out on the town boozing it up on gigantic mugs full of beer, becoming very, very drunk to the point where they are playing face slapping games with other and end up stealing a bunch of signs from local businesses - h'm, at this point she actually begins to really like him for the first time, I guess all it took was the drink.Nothing great here - but still entertaining, silly, and fun to watch.
I didn't find this film particularly laugh-out-loud funny (except for the scenes with Billy Gilbert which ARE quite funny) - but it is amusing and has a number of scenes featuring favorite comic actors from the thirties including not just Billy Gilbert, but Franklin Pangborn, Eric Blore, even Lucille Ball - all seen in very small parts.
The film also features a number of catchy songs performed by Irene Dunne, especially "You Couldn't Be Cuter" - so catchy, in fact, I am still singing it aloud as I type.
Thus, without a strong central core, the movie flounders despite such other comedic talents as Kibbee and Ball, who are given far too little to do.Neither, for that matter, does director Garnett manage to get the material to gel, simply going from one hectic set-up to the next in uninspired fashion.
Irene Dunne plays a Broadway singer who serves as her family's meal ticket.
Her family, including sister Lucille Ball, don't do much, other than enjoy the wealth and status (by association) Dunne's success brings them.
Fairbanks manages to charm his way out of jail time and even gets Dunne appointed as his probation officer.
As she gets to know Fairbanks, Dunne finds out that he comes from wealth but has chosen to live his life as a pleasure seeker.
He also claims to own an island in the South Pacific and urges Dunne to leave her stress behind and live in paradise with him.Lucille Ball is good as Dunne's younger sister (and understudy), but her part is so small, she doesn't really get to make much of an impression.
Irene Dunne is the Broadway star being bled and bullied by a family of sponges; Douglas Fairbanks, Jr. is the handsome free spirit stalking her and- of course- just the medicine she needs.If you've seen Jean Harlow's 1933 screwball masterpiece "Bombshell", you've seen a fairly similar story done much better, but "Joy of Living" comes off just fine- thanks mostly to two terrific leads at the top of their game, given plenty to work with.
Dunne and Fairbanks spar with wit and energy to spare, and wonderful dialogue and funny situations keep this one rolling, even if it can't quite decide to go full-screwball.One of those great thirties casts, with Jean Dixon, Guy Kibbee, and Eric Blore (and quick drive-bys from Franklin Pangborn and Grady Sutton) adds another touch of class.
The songs of Jerome Kern and Dorothy Fields (including "You Couldn't be Cuter"), and Dunne's wonderful talent as a singer, bring enough extra to make this one special..
Douglas Fairbanks, Jr. seems a little lightweight acting opposite Irene Dunne.
It's refreshing to see Irene Dunne let go and enjoy herself as her character Maggie embraces the "Joy of Living" for the first time.
I have, since falling madly in love with her in "The Awful Truth," every movie made by Irene Dunne -- at least every one listed in the filmography here.
There is something static about the presentation of her songs here.My favorite Irene Dunne movies are "The Awful Truth," which I consider the funniest comedy ever made; "Show Boat"; "Unfinished Business," which is a real heartbreaker and one of Gregory La Cava's very best; and "Anna and the King of Siam," which I consider a very beautiful movie, despite the politically incorrect casting of Rex Harrison as the king..
All in all, this is a terribly forced comedy--one that isn't particularly funny and one that marks a low point in the careers of both Dunne and Fairbanks.
Did the audience cheer when Dunne dumped her grasping family and abandoned her Broadway career for Fairbanks and an island in the South Seas?
He's an OK actor but not equivalent to Cooper, Gable, or even Scott or McCrea, not that any of these talents could have made a silk purse out of this sows ear of a character.Fairbanks introduces the career-oriented Dunne to the Joy of Living, which is accessed via getting intoxicated on pitchers of beer.
He's besotted with the Great Star, but she's spent so little time with him that she doesn't know him or have any realistic idea of what life with him on his island will be like.
Instead, as there were no other suitors, she tumbled to Fairbanks, who made noises like Donald Duck to show his displeasure and demonstrated his joie de vivre by whooping it up like an Indian brave going into battle.Yes, I do understand that this is screwball comedy, but it falls far short of the great classics such as My Man Godfrey and Dunne's The Awful Truth.
Still, despite the poor script, Dunne's performance makes this film worth watching..
Lovely Irene Dunne plays Maggie, a popular Broadway musical-comedy star saddled with a possessive, extravagant and selfishly-annoying family.
Dan (Douglas Fairbanks Jr.), a handsome stage-door Johnny, is the Prince Charming who wants to rescue Maggie from her relatives.
Dan teaches the repressed Maggie how to have fun on little to no money by taking her roller-skating and to a German restaurant where she takes the lesson to heart and gets drunk on cheap beer.
Fairbanks and Dunn are first rate as is the supporting cast: Lucille Ball, Billy Gilbert, Jean Dixon, Guy Kibbee, Eric Blore and Franklin Pangborn..
Screwball comedies started out during the great depression with films like IT HAPPENED ONE NIGHT and BOMBSHELL (1933).
Joy of Living (1938) stars one of the best actresses of the genre, the inimitable Irene Dunne who was Oscar nominated 5 times.
Honing her craft in such classics as THEODORA GOES WILD (1936) and THE AWFUL TRUTH (1937), Dunne plays a successful Broadway singer in JOY OF LIVING whose freeloading family is literally draining her of happiness as well as her money.
RKO stock company players that you will recognize from Astaire & Rogers films are: Eric Blore (flustered butler); Franklin Pangborn (as the put upon orchestra leader); Alice Brady (as the antique collecting mother); Guy Kibbee (as the former actor and now current alcohol loving father); Jean Dixon (know-it-all best friend and smart-aleck personal assistant) and Warren Hymer (gum chewing chauffeur who was actually a graduate of Yale University!)There is a charming scene where Doug convinces Irene to make a record at a sidewalk store front recording studio.
But its Lucille Ball everybody will recognize in an early role as the sister and jealous understudy who just needs a break to become a star!You'll see Irene notice a picture on wall Doug's four brothers, I think they are all Doug in different make-up & costumes.
JOY OF LIVING starts suddenly and lavishly with Irene Dunne singing "What's Good About Good Night?" on a Broadway stage in an exquisite white gown with a dozen tuxedo clad escorts before she is quickly mobbed by fans as she tries to exit the stage, the dressing room and even the theater.
Great stuff, but I really miss the days of free music files online!Irene's performances are so good I think they could give Jeannette MacDonald a run for her money.The picture also isn't helped by Fairbanks as the male lead.
It would have been a much different and improved picture with Cary Grant in the role.Slow and even embarrassing (dubbed Donald Duck voices) at times, watch it anyway for some catchy tunes and an earful of Irene Dunne singing them..
If you want to know why Douglas Fairbanks, Jr. was never in the upper echelon of acting, this film ought to show you why.
One of the worst that I have ever seen that I watched all the way through...constantly thinking that with Irene Dunne as its star, it must get better.
Even Jean Dixon, who usually brings fun to most any picture, is disappointing here.The one scene in the film which could have really been fun -- at the skating rink -- was so fake looking that you simply couldn't buy into it.
In certain scenes Douglas Fairbanks sounded just like Ronald Colman.This becomes a mad caper type of film where Broadway luminary Irene Dunne meets up with fan Douglas Fairbanks who is a care-free guy and after a day of frolicking together, they decide to wed.Guy Kibbee and Alice Brady play her parents and Lucille Ball her sister, who is also her understudy in the Broadway production and is quite envious of her.It is at the end of the film that Dunne realizes that the 3 are nothing more than parasites who are living off her fame and fortune and see Fairbanks as a threat to all that.The drunken scenes and ice skating scenes just add to the flavor of a very average film.
"Joy of Living" is a pleasant film that is suitable for the whole family.
Irene Dunne and Douglas Fairbanks Jr. are the leads, and do well as Maggie and Dan. The screenplay is weak for a plot that surely needs some injections of laughter and energy.
When the owner, played by Billy Gilbert, makes the announcement, Dan and Maggie act like other patrons and look in a direction to see the famous singer.
Is it?""Joy of Living" is nowhere near the funniest or best films by Dunne or Fairbanks. |
tt0110889 | Priest | A centuries long war between humans and vampires has devastated the planet's surface and led to a theocracy under an organization called The Church. They constructed giant walled cities to protect mankind and developed a group of elite warriors, the Priests, to turn the tide against the vampires. The majority of the vampires were killed, while the remainder were placed in reservations. With the war over, the Clergy disbanded the Priests. Outside the walled cities, some humans seek out a living, free from the totalitarian control of the Church.
Priest (Paul Bettany) is approached by Hicks (Cam Gigandet), the sheriff of Augustine, a free town. Priest learns that his brother and his wife, Shannon - Priest's girlfriend before he entered the priesthood - were mortally wounded in a vampire attack, and Priest's niece, Lucy (Lily Collins), was kidnapped. Hicks asks for Priest's help in rescuing Lucy. Priest asks the Clergy to reinstate his authority, but Church leader Monsignor Orelas (Christopher Plummer) does not believe the vampire story and refuses. Priest defiantly leaves the city and Orelas sends three Priests and a Priestess to bring him back.
Priest and Hicks arrive at Nightshade Reservation where humans called Familiars, people infected with a pathogen that makes them subservient to the vampires, live alongside a number of the surviving vampires. After a fierce battle, the pair discovers that most of the vampires have taken shelter in Sola Mira, a vampire hive where Priest lost several of his comrades during a major battle. Priestess joins them at Sola Mira, revealing a bond with Priest. The trio destroys a Hive Guardian vampire, then discover that the vampires have bred a new army and dug a tunnel out of the mountain towards a town called Jericho. The other three Priests have arrived at Jericho just as night falls and an armored train arrives, unleashing hundreds of vampires upon the population. The vampires are led by a powerful and mysterious human wearing a black hat. When the three Priests reject Black Hat's offer to join him, he kills them all.
The next morning, Priest, Priestess and Hicks arrive in Jericho and discover the town empty and the three dead Priests crucified. Priest and Priestess share an intimate moment where she makes her move, hoping that now that Shannon has died, he would no longer feel bound to her. Priest, who is clearly not over Shannon, gently refuses. Priest realizes that the vampires have been using the trains to travel by day and attack the free towns by night, with the walled cities at the end of the train line. Hicks believes an attack on the cities would be unwise because of the sun, but Priest reveals that factories, producing massive clouds of smoke and ash, have permanently deprived the city of sunlight, so the vampire attack would be a slaughter.
Hicks threatens Priest, claiming he will shoot him unless he promises to let Lucy live whether she's been infected or not. (Priest had earlier revealed to Hicks, who is in love with Lucy, that if they discovered Lucy had been infected as a Familiar, he'd kill her.) Hicks doesn't understand why Priest, who is basically a stranger to Lucy, cares so much about her. Priestess reveals that Lucy is actually Priest's daughter, and that his brother, Owen stepped in as a husband and a father when Priest was taken by The Church.
While Priestess rushes ahead to plant a bomb on the railroad tracks, Priest and Hicks board the train to rescue Lucy. Battling vampires and Familiars, the two are finally overpowered by Black Hat just as they find Lucy. Black Hat is revealed as one of the Priests who was defeated in the final attack on Sola Mira and a close friend of Priest. After being captured, the vampire Queen gave him her blood, turning him into the first Vampire-Human hybrid who can survive the sun. As Priest fights Black Hat, Lucy discovers the truth about her parentage. Priestess battles several Familiars, finally placing the explosives on her motor bike and crashing it into the train engine. The explosion and subsequent derailment kills the vampires and engulfs Black Hat in fire, while Hicks, Priest, Priestess, and Lucy are able to escape.
Priest returns to the city and confronts Monsignor Orelas during Mass, telling him of the burnt train containing the vampires' bodies, but not the queen's. He proves this by throwing a vampire head onto the floor and shocking everyone in the room. Orelas still refuses to believe him, declaring that the war is over, while Priest says that is just beginning. Outside the city Priest meets Priestess and she reveals that the other Priests have been notified and will meet them at a rendezvous point. Priest sets off into the sunset. | brainwashing, romantic, queer, entertaining, flashback | train | wikipedia | 'Priest' is a complex film, dealing with hard issues of incest and homo-sexuality, but first with the conflict between the priest mission as a moral leader and the Procustian laws of the Catholic church he needs to obeye by.
Father Greg Pilkinton (Linus Roache) is a young, dedicated, idealistic and yet conservative (comparing to his colleague, Father Matthew Thomas, played by Tom Wilkinson) priest who has recently arrived in his new parish.
Later on, a school girl, Lisa (Christine Tremarco) confesses to him that her father has been sexually abusing her, Father Greg faces his inner struggle on whether to reveal the truth to the authority, or remain silent in order not to break his vow.Confused and frustrated, Father Greg goes to a pub and meets Graham (Robert Carlyle) and later they have sex.
A casual pick up turns into an affair which in turn becomes a personal and professional disaster as an equally intolerant society pushes him towards wrongful arrest and a verdict of "guilty." Father Greg becomes the object of derision and hatred by the bigoted, close minded community, itself a reflection of all the young priest exhibited in but a show of intolerance and sanctimoniousness.The real heart of this picture occurs in the confessional when a desperate young girl tells of ongoing sexual abuse at the hands of her father.
Eventually, this information becomes a test of faith for Father Greg as he questions his spirituality, the laws of the church and God himself.During all of this the older priest, Father Matthew, preaches of "the trappings of power" that the Church has saddled itself with - and how the trappings have gotten in the way of the message of God, of love, of tolerance, of patience and compassion.
As might be expected, the Church's higher ups have little patience for this sort of talk - and the congregation itself shuns Father Greg turning mass into an explosive show of blind eyed fanaticism.As Father Greg, Linus Roche gives a searing, searching performance as the young tormented priest.
Film is an emotion charged look at the Catholic Church's problems and cover-ups concerning a closeted guilt ridden gay priest's sexual desires, and a little girl being molested by her disgusting father who relates in the confessional not for penance, but to tell the priest it is his right and not to interfere.
"Priest" is VERY MUCH that movie.The old priest's clerical replacement comes in the form of Father Greg (Linus Roache, in a star-making role), a young, fair-haired, boyishly handsome visionary who, with typically youthful verve, strives to bring the Catholic Church directly to the people (well, to the Catholics, anyway), and receives his actions with decidedly mixed feelings.
In one particularly chilling confessional scene, a male member of the parish practically flaunts his sexual desires while "justifying" his incestuous advances toward his teenage daughter."Priest" is an important, ambitious project and yields emotional power in its depiction of moral adversity.
The Catholic's Church's unyielding, unprogressive, medieval doctrines are brought to task here, never more pointedly than in the scene where Father Greg, agonizing over whether to prevent the continued sexual abuse of the young girl and report the father to authorities, or respect the confidentiality of the confessional and remain silent, reluctantly chooses the latter.While I deem this movie to be a stronger platform for social tolerance, `Priest' still drums home beautifully the message that organized religion is still used as a tool to govern instead of instill moral standards, particularly in other countries, and as a persecutive weapon against certain sectors of society that do not conform to those rigid standards.
As a consequence, the Church has provided a comforting harbor and hazardous safety zone for certain "acceptable" bigotries.We need more brave, topical films like "Priest" to confront such important social issues and display them front-and-center..
I just re-watched Priest after 12 years, and I think it is even more powerful and relevant now it was then, given the scandals in the Catholic Church and the rise of religious militancy and fundamentalism in the world.While occasionally teetering on the brink of preachiness and soap opera, Priest is saved by tight direction and very fine acting.
As a writer, I was blown away the first time I saw this movie because the script is so excellent: every character in the film, from the lead priest to the maid, seems to have something at stake in the plot, be it religious morals, sexual happiness, love, personal fulfillment, honesty, duty or physical safety.
After the script, another reason to love PRIEST is the performances: it is one of those few movies where absolutely everyone is excellent, from Roache and Wilkinson, down to bit players like the irate Housekeeper at the priest retreat and the young reporter who tries to corner Roache after his hearing.
A young handsome Catholic priest Father Greg (Linus Roache) starts at a new parish in London.
Priest, by Antonia Bird, is very beautiful and also provocative film about faith, church, forgiveness and tolerance, which all have as many shapes as there are human beings.
The film tells the story of a priest who arrives to new town and soon he notices some things he don't consider too acceptable, and learns also that incredible and selfish evil lives inside every human being, including himself.The film is a powerful study about religion and many ways to interpret and obey its orders.
Forgiveness and love are the most important things and the film ends in extremely beautiful scene at the church, as at least one little person forgives the priest for his "crimes" and sees into the heart and soul of the priest.
Priests are not often the heroes of movies:some famous predecessors were Robert Bresson's "journal d'un curé de campagne" (1945),Luis Bunuel's "Nazarin" (1958) and Jean-Pierre Melville 's "Leon Morin prêtre" (1961).But none of these directors went as far as Antonia Bird .Their movies were perhaps esthetically better,but nothing shocking for people who were brought up religiously ,nothing like the pictures of this priest lying on a bed with his lover.One will add that Bunuel's movie was looked upon as "very Christian" by the Spanish censorship when it was exactly the contrary.But it's difficult to consider Bird's work a fable:it's a realistic story,where sex occupies the center of the plot:sex between the other priest and the housekeeper,sex between the father and his daughter,sex between Rochman and Carlyle .Bird's style,though depicting the poor sides of Liverpool is very different from Kenneth Loach's .Her pictures are polished up ,like the one in confessional where the incest father is speaking through the grille ,or the two lovers on the beach.Bird's movie is very interesting because it broaches the problem of celibacy in the catholic religion (protestant priests are allowed to marry aren't they),and,as the hero remarks "Jesus did not ask for chastity did he?"A hero who is not always very smart:"be discreet" he tells to his colleague who sleeps with the housekeeper,but he kisses his lover in a car in broad daylight.The final battle in the church is particularly interesting,because it's a battle of words,repeating quotations from the Bible,and there are so many ways of interpreting its meanings .It seems that the priest uses the New testament ( judge not lest...,Mary Magdelene, forgive not seven times but seventy)whereas his enemy draws from the old one (a man sleeping with a man is an abomination).The seal of the confessional subject is not that much new however:even in 1953,Hitchcock made "I confess" in which Montgomery Clift was confronted to the same problem.Best line;the older priest ,telling a shocked congregation that God is probably too busy to care about what men do with their d......
The striking opening sequence of 'Priest' depicts an enraged elderly cleric, having learned he is being pushed into retirement, utilizing a large crucifix as a battering ram and raiding the offices of the bishop; the climax of the film is one of the most powerful, emotionally shattering scenes I have ever seen, imbued with forgiveness and redemption and humanity at its shining, courageous best, in the face of humanity at its self-righteous worst.
Father Greg Pilkington (portrayed with astonishing clarity and mesmerizing, gut-wrenching passion by Linus Roache) is a young, idealistic priest who is more than a little put-off by his unorthodox partner, Father Matthew Thomas (a wonderful performance by the great Tom Wilkinson), who sings karaoke at the neighborhood pub and sleeps with the housekeeper.
I liked the ending the best - the only one in the Church capable of forgiving and accepting the gay priest, was the young girl who had been abused by her father and who had confided in the priest.
The film is NOT ABOUT being a gay priest.It speaks to any thinking person who has ever questioned their faith only to find that there are no answers and that faith is all there is.Father Greg (Linus Roche) is gay and conflicted.
The main character tries to keep morally and spiritually centered - despite handicaps - and in my opinion that's worth tuning in for.This film is NOT an indictment of the Catholic church or ABOUT a homosexual Priest.
And his love interest, Graham, seems remarkably unaware of the potential for problems that a priest might face if discovered to be having a gay affair.Given the church's history of burying such problems rather than dealing with them, the reactions of the bishop may or may not have been realistic, although an amazing number of people seem to be borderline drama queens in this film, not least Father Greg who turns the focus of everyone's problems onto himself even before he manages to hit the headlines.Probably the most convincing acting came from the angry parishioners and other priests whose cranky approach to Christianity was underscored by their behavior.I would say that the screenplay didn't play favorites.
THis movie just points out that the writers think that celibacy is bad and that the Church is out of date and should let all those poor priests just have partners and everything would be great.
Aiming not so much to question the values of the church, it is a humorous and uncompromised journey, examining the title character's ideals and his approach to realistically facing the problem of conflicting standards, modern versus tradition.The talented British cast are more than merely believable in their roles, to my surprise even after seeing them in different memorable contexts, for example, "Wings of the Dove" and "The Full Monty".While the film excels in story-telling and to convey emotional issues, it does not necessarily offer a satisfactory solution to the questions it raised.
Love, sex, controversy, pain, anger, injustice and all the natural and unnatural twists and turns of life affect the clergy in ways that we who have not taken the vows cannot possibly understand.PRIEST revolves around the troubled life journey of Father Greg, whose major struggle is one of sexual orientation.
It is here that Fathers Greg and Matthew lay out the simple arguments of pro and con that support the premise of this thought-provoking and intelligent film.Aside from a hokey scene where Greg sheds his Roman collar, opening his "closet" to reveal a hidden black leather jacket (oddly reminiscent of Barbara Gordon's Batgirl costume behind a revolving bookcase), PRIEST doesn't make a false step, even in it's sensual and delicately constructed sex scenes.At times, PRIEST almost threatens to try to cover too much territory - a close-up of a girl alter-server is blessedly as far as female director Antonia Bird goes with the quandary of the role of women in clerical life.
[...]Anyhow, the movie uses that dramatic conflict and mixes it with another story-line of a sexually abused little girl who confess to priest about it while asking him to keep it a secret.Soon enough everything goes for a big emotional climax.
And for a film about a gay catholic priest who has deep emotional problems with choosing to live by his religion or come out as a gay priest, things are made too easy with the girl who tells him inside a confessional that she is sexually abused by her father.
The story of an individual torn apart by conflicting beliefs and forces is indeed fascinating and "Priest" deals with this in a powerful and convincing fashion.The success of the movie lies largely in the truly stunning performance of Linus Roache.
one of the best movies to openly challenge the hypocrisy of the world, especially that of the Catholic church.A very human story, cleverly depicts Father Greg's torment when he is faced with a dilemma.
Our hero, the Priest, is basically evil.He breaks his vow of celibacy numerous time, he has homo-sexual relations (I don't care what you think on this, a priest is supposed to believe it is wrong) and causes the girl more harm than good by being indecisive.This movie is divisive not creative.
In fact the video packaging fails to mention that Fr. Greg (Linus Roache) is gay, and that his gayness consumes this Catholic priest as much as the other, awful issue his oath of the confessional won't let him reveal, tearing him apart.Some saw this as an anti-Catholic film, but the script clearly distinguishes between disparaging the Catholic religion and certain hypocritical Catholics who seem incapable of "hating the sin but loving the sinner." As the movie points out, we are all sinners, some more than others, but confession brings remission though not always in this lifetime.
Linus Roache plays a young British priest conflicted over his vocation, by the Catholic rules governing him, and by his sexual orientation (he picks up a lad for sex in a gay pub, and we are to assume this isn't his first time at the rodeo).
Antonia Bird's Priest revolves around Father Greg Pilkington (Linus Roache), who is just assigned to St. Mary's Church in Liverpool.
It's a frightening scene, and although Roache doesn't handle the crying and the more dramatic elements with immense conviction, it's adequate enough, especially when edited together ostensibly to create an "act of God" circumstance in response to Father Greg's persistent pleading.Priest is more an impressionistic soap-opera regarding the church than it is a drama.
Father Greg Pilkington (Linus Roache) is torn between his call as a conservative Catholic priest and his secret life as a homosexual with a gay lover, frowned upon by the Church.I did not know what I was getting into watching this, but found that it was above and beyond anything I could have expected.
He is also struggling with his own homosexual feelings towards Graham (Robert Carlyle).This movie has a lot of things going on and it's trying to make a point about sex and the church.
Because of the traditional Catholic doctrine of the "seal of the confessional", he is unable to notify the authorities, even though he is sorely tempted to do so."Priest" was one of the most controversial British films of the 1990s because of the way in which it dealt with the issues of homosexuality, incest, child abuse and religious celibacy.
Both (although they are tempted to leave the priesthood) remain loyal to the Church as an institution, believing that it is through the Church that they can best serve God. That doesn't seem to me to be either anti-Christian or anti-Catholic.At times it appears as though the scriptwriter Jimmy McGovern is arguing against traditionalist religion and in favour of a more inclusive Catholicism which accepts married priests, takes a more liberal line on homosexuality and focuses more on social issues than questions of sexual morality.
It is also a powerful psychological drama, with excellent performances from the two leading actors, Linus Roache and Tom Wilkinson, and an important contribution to the distinguished British tradition of social-realist film-making.
Father Matthew (Tom Wilkinson) was also a wonderful character, showing that despite his religious role, he was rather open-minded, defending Father Greg multiple times against bishops of the Church and even homophobic members of the local parish.One of the biggest subplots was with the girl Lisa, who confessed to Father Greg that she was being molested by her father.
Father Greg wanted to tell her mother, but he knew he couldn't break the Seal of the Confessional, an important sacrament in the Catholic Church.
The storyline was powerful, and I'd say it was just as important a plot point as being gay in the Catholic Church."Priest" is one of the best movies I've seen about being gay and religious, and it showcased each identity with compassion.
However, the movie was pretty critical against the Catholic Church, illustrating that their ideas are outdated such as Father Greg not being able to reveal Lisa's secret and help her.
Sin is awful and bad, unless of course, it is the priest doing it and then, hey it is all right after all.There are some impressive performances at play during Priest, not least Father Greg Pilkington – Linus Roach and his love interest, Graham played by Robert Carlyle.
There is absolutely nothing to complain about the main actors - Linus Roache and, more or less, all the cast from "The Full Monty" (brilliant: Tom Wilkinson) but I didn't like the way the story in the film develops and the worst thing in it is the end, at least in my opinion.
The second scene that I thought was particularly powerful was when the gay priest was praying and telling Jesus that he had it so easy because He knew everything and basically yelling at God for being Godif that makes any senseGod was answering his prayer by exposing the girl's father as a molester.
Roache gives a marvellous performance as the religious man struggling with the pressures of his beliefs, Wilkinson gets his moments as his fellow priest friend, and Carlyle is also effective as the gay lover, this is a thought provoking story filled with compassion, harrowing material and a real sense of how beliefs overpower people, a great British drama.
In Catholic church, homosexuality is a really controversial topic and in Priest, the main character turned out to be a man who is in love with another man. |
tt0064155 | Charro! | Jess Wade, a former member of a gang of outlaws led by Vince Hackett, is tricked into believing that an old flame of his and Vince's, Tracy Winters, wanted to meet him in a seedy Mexican saloon. Jess later sees Billy Roy Hackett, Vince's younger brother, summoning Vince and the other members of the gang into the saloon. Jess, realizing he was set up, orders the bar patrons to leave as a shoot out later ensues. After making a break for the door Jess is later stopped by another gang member, Gunner, and is trapped. Forcing Jess to relinquish his gun and to go with them to their hideout in the mountains, Vince later tells him that the gang had stolen a gold-plated cannon that was used by Emperor Maximilian in his ill-fated fight against popular Mexican leader Benito Juarez. After explaining to him about them stealing the cannon, Vince tells Jess that he let the word get out that, although a now-deceased member of the gang named Norm was the one who helped steal the cannon that it was Jess who stole it and had sustained a neck wound as a result of being shot by one of the guards, according to a wanted poster out on him. Ordering his men to subdue Jess on the ground, Vince takes a branding iron and burns a wound to his neck. Taking Jess' horse, Vince and the gang later leave Jess and take off. Jess does manage to capture a wild horse in the desert and break it in. The gang's motive is to force a ransom from the town they stole the cannon from, but the gang also uses the cannon to hold the townspeople at bay. Only Wade can save the people from his former gang. | cult, violence | train | wikipedia | In it was "Charro." I thought it looked refreshing to see Elvis play a more serious role instead of the usual musical.
Elvis Presley plays Jesse Wade who tries to leave a gang of thieves led by Victor French.
I don't know what makes me enjoy this movie more, being an Elvis fan or being a fan of western movies (my favorite is El Dorado).This movie shows some pretty good acting, an impressive soundtrack, beautiful cinematography, some wild action and an Elvis, that is pretty rough and tough.
Warren hadn't made a movie for ten years before "Charro" and I think he shouldn't have been producer, writer AND director.
The story reflects a lot of Elvis' own career, most obvious: the bad guy in "Charro" USES the Elvis character to make money, which is exactly what Elvis' real life manager did, too, in fact that guy (who called himself Colonel, although he wasn't) was highly unscrupulous and Elvis too weak (sorry fellow fans but let's face the truth!) to have his own way.
Let me add that this movie is NOT a musical; in one scene Elvis is opening a door to look into a saloon where a band is playing, in one of his awful musical comedies, the man would jump onto the stage and perform some tune, but here he turns around and closes the door..
The plot is as good as any other western movie I've seen, John Wayne notwithstanding, and the acting (again for the genre) was quite good.
As much as I like most of his musicals, the three dramatic ones (Love Me Tender, Flaming Star, and Charro) and his supporting appearance in Change of Habit, were by far the best and the ones that showed his real talent for acting..
It's pretty cool that he only sings the title song over the opening credits of Charro!
It's the only movie in which Elvis does not sing at all (the theme song is played over the main titles).
Elvis acts well throughout but not as well and convincingly as in the other Western drama that he did, 1960's "Flaming Star." The passage of eight years had dulled Elvis' enthusiasm for film-making and, hard on the heels of the taping of his phenomenal 1968 TV special (taped in late June) and one year before his July, 1969 return to the stage, Elvis' mind was on other things.
Elvis does a competent job in "Charro!" but at some points he does not really seem to be 'into it.' I find that somewhat surprising, because Elvis loved guns, horses, and playing cowboys and Indians or cops and robbers and the film could have been a blast for him to do.
It's got a definite made-for-TV look and feel about it, especially compared with the contemporary 'spaghetti westerns' that were so popular (and by which "Charro!" is obviously inspired) but even with older Hollywood fare like "Shane." After a promising start, "Charro!" comes across to me as a little bit dull.
His role as Jess Wade is just a little too soft -- well, what I'm saying is that if his role were more directly like Clint Eastwood's Man With No Name I think it'd play to some of Elvis' greatest acting strengths.
Just as I think that Elvis' character could have been at least a little harder, so could Victor French's bad guy have been...well..badder.
If only "Charro!" was a creative progeny of the excellent "Flaming Star," steeped in a late-60s spaghetti-western sensibility..
With the late Ina Balin and the late Victor French as the bad guy, this movie has a strong supporting cast..
The "branding" is, possibly, the most gruesome scene you'll see in a Elvis movie.This film has a classic Western Plot: Elvis is the representation of the Law - Badman gone good, friend of the Sheriff, and rival for a woman (Ina Balin).
In that way, it's like many westerns - and as good as several "classic" John Wayne films.Again, this is a rough-around-the-edges film - my vote for the roughest edges are: The background music is too hokey and repetitive; and, I found the Sheriff's wife's betrayal too abrupt to be believable - it is interesting in that it shows the relationship between Elvis and the Sheriff is stronger than the relationship between the Sheriff and his wife; although Elvis' first intent is to meet the Badman's demands by releasing the prisoner, he decides to honor the Sheriff's wishes.The title song is very good; appropriately, there are no additional songs.
It sounds like an apology (because Elvis Presley made so many awful films), but I enjoyed "Charro!" ******* Charro!
(1969) Charles Marquis Warren ~ Elvis Presley, Ina Balin, Victor French.
It's a fairly good spaghetti western film even if you are not crazy about Elvis.
is right up there with the movie Flaming Star (another western Elvis film).I cannot say that Charro!
is an outstanding film - it does not have the quality of The Magnificent Seven or The Good, The Bad and the Ugly but Charro!
it's not that bad of a movie either.Elvis' acting in the movie Charro!
The movie Charro tried to save Elvis' acting career,unfortunately it was a case of too little too late.
the movie had a lot of promise, a great musical film score,good supporting cast,and even a tolerable script, but you can see the interest has gone from Elvis'acting.
It is obvious they based a lot of this on the successful Clint Eastwood "spaghetti" westerns but it lacks the sparkle of Sergio Leone direction.Compare Elvis' acting in this to Flaming Star and the difference is sadly noticable..
Ex-outlaw Jess Wade (Elvis Presley) tries at going straight but is curtailed when his old gang finally catches up with him, and head bandit Vince Hackett (Victor French) has come up with a truly messed-up punishment.
If nothing else, "Charro" shows that Elvis could've easily been a Western hero in Eastwood's league if he chose to keep with it and got better scripts.Elvis' acting in the movie Charro!
Jess Wade (Elvis Presley in a straight role , being the only character in which he wears beard) is a reformed outlaw confronting against the members of his old band .
Only Jess Wade can save the town people and his previous girlfriend (Ina Balin , in one of her few movie roles) from his former bunch .Elvis in a different kind of role , his third Western after 'Love me Tender' and 'Flamingo Star' ; being shot on location at the Apacheland Movie Ranch .
Elvis did agree , exceptionally , to sing the title credits , but there are no songs within the body of the movie .
Elvis sports a scruffy beard and a gritty look whose model was obviously the Sergio Leone's Spaghetti Western .
Although the film provided Elvis with one of his opportunities to play tough roles , the movie's producers were nervous about the reaction of fans .
However , the film was a modest hit and had awful critiques , it was not particularly well received by the legions of Elvis Presley fans who were disappointed by the lack of musical numbers .
In fact , this is the only movie in which Elvis doesn't sing , the only song is the one during the titles .
Compare this film with FRANKIE AND JOHNNY; KISSIN' COUSINS; PARADISE, HAWAIIAN STYLE; and especially horrible films like HARUM, SACARUM, and CHARRO looks pretty damn good.
Elvis plays it straight equipped with a beard to fight his former gang of 'friends' - the leader of which is Victor French in a tour-de-force performance.
A fine supporting cast which includes Ina Balin and Solomon Sturges turning in two admirable screen performances, helps to give Elvis' movie career a boost at this point in the 'Comeback' era of his musical oddyssey.
"Charro!" is a fresh and uplifting western and is a welcome change to hear EP only sing one song in a movie, and this one is over the opening credits.
Elvis delivers a good character portrayal of Jess Wade, and isn't as stereotyped as some of the previous characters from the other films from his mid-60's celluloid repertoire.
Great acting in all parts,and it was the ONLY movie where Elvis Presley didn't get up on a stage surrounded by lots of girls and sing a lot of songs,but NO siree,here is "the king" finally in a role where he plays a tough guy who gets even with a bunch of rowdies who set him up for something he didn't do.
I am a lifelong fan of Elvis Presley and love actor, Victor French, who has appeared in a lot of television westerns such as "Gunsmoke" and "Bonanza".
I am also a lover of Western films and think that "Charro" is a darn good movie..great storyline and characters and the music is just great.
This movie only includes one Elvis song which might be good for some and disappointing for others.
For years Elvis Presley had been desperate to do a movie as a drama character with a non singing part.
Spaghetti westerns were still hot so he thought he had finally found the project he was looking for.This was intended to be a TV movie and Elvis thought this would be an opening for him to take his movie career in a different direction.
He is not quite as cool as Eastwood or Wayne at their best, but he does deliver a solid and reasonably intense performance.The first half of the movie is fine as it sets up a confrontation between ex-outlaw Jess Wade (Presley) and the gang that he rode with.
Vince (Victor French) the head of the gang is vicious, especially to his own gang members, but he does care about protecting his idiot brother , Billy Roy (Solomon Sturges) so he is at least a two note character.In the second part of the movie, believability falls apart with the outlaws using a single cannon to threaten to blow up a town.
For some inexplicable reason, he chooses to hold Billy Ray prisoner for shooting the previous sheriff, but does not arrest his brother, gang leader Vince, for kidnapping, torture, and blowing up half the town, among other felony crimes.
Released in 1969, "Charro" stars Elvis as Jess Wade, an ex-outlaw whose former gang seeks to pin the blame on him for stealing a gold cannon from a Mexican shrine.
Wade ends up trying to protect the Arizona town that holds one of the gang members in jail from the gang's cannon assault.If nothing else, "Charro" shows that Elvis could've easily been a Western hero in Eastwood's league if he chose to keep with it and got better scripts.
Obviously influenced by the rise of the Spaghetti Westerns of the mid-late 60s, this is easily Elvis' best Western of the three he did, the others being 1956' "Love Me Tender" and 1960's "Flaming Star." These prior Westerns had too much of what made Westerns in general laughable before the 60s.
"Charro" is the least guilty of these sins of Elvis' three Westerns."Charro" has a good first and last act, but a weak mid-section.
The only singing you will hear from Elvis Presley in Charro is the title song over the credits at the beginning.
He even wears a scraggly beard to emphasize this film won't be your usual Elvis funfest.I liked the idea that Elvis was expanding his range as an actor and maybe he might have done more westerns after this if Charro!
Presley had done two previous westerns Love Me Tender and Flaming Star and he acquitted himself well in both.But this one was plain ridiculous.
Victor French and his gang which includes his idiot brother Solomon Sturges steal a solid gold cannon from the museum in Chapultepec near Mexico City and then schlep the item to the border where French then proceeds to pin the crime on former gang member Elvis Presley.
Never mind that, French threatens to use the cannon to level the town because he was smart enough to bring powder and shot and has in James Sikking one of Stonewall Jackson's old artillery men.In that other film about a cannon, The Pride And The Passion the weapon was symbolically a phallic symbol and the illusion is drilled into our heads, especially with the ridiculous ending that Charro!
has.Colonel Tom Parker whose instincts for film properties were pretty good and knew Elvis's type of films were going out of vogue in the late Sixties, tried to take him in a new direction cinematically with Charro!.
the fans know the story...Elvis wanted to make a real WEstern, no songs.
Victor french, whom you may remember from "Highway to Heaven" or "Little House on the Prarie," did a much better job of acting than Elvis.Maybe the film would have been better if that actually added the Hootchie Kootchie girl, Charo, to the cast..
(1969) * 1/2 (out of 4) Elvis plays a gunfighting outlaw who decides to go straight but his old gang pulls him back in to steal a cannon, which is a priceless gem from the Mexican Revolution.
That, however, is as far as things go because while it was interesting to see a different type of film from Elvis this is still a pretty poor movie when looked at as a straight Western.
Victor French is pretty good in his role but that's about all the film has to offer..
Arguably, Elvis Presley's worst movie--certainly his least interesting--improbably casts the now-bearded star as a former outlaw in the Old West who is abducted by his former gang and set up as the fall guy for a priceless steal: a gold-plated cannon once belonging to the emperor.
I like Elvis as much as the next person and enjoy watching his movies more for his music than anything since most of them were so bad (yes there are exceptions that were fairly acceptable, King Creole being my favorite) but this movie was just bad - plus no singing.
After 30 films of watching Presley sing to everyone including the guy he just beat up, can you imagine trying to take Presley serious in a western?
Presley sings only the title song and only a fan with more time on his hands than brain power could sit through the first 30 minutes.
Presley was showing obvious signs of extreme boredom during this film and you can tell his movie contracts were close to being finished.
The unshaven, dirty western appearance of Presley was not tolerated by fans in 1969 and fans have not changed, So even from the biggest fan, Charro does not come with a recommendation..
A surprisingly good Elvis film.
It was a very good film that kept me interested.Charro!
By chance, Vince's crazy brother Billy Roy (a brilliant performance by Solomon Sturges) comes in and tries to stir up trouble, but Wade is there.
The Hackett gang now threatens Wade (who's now temporary sheriff) and the town to let Billy Roy go or have their town destroyed via the cannon.I found the movie quite intriguing.
The soundtrack is weak; Elvis sings the theme song at the beginning, but the rest of the music is just generic Western acoustic with that 60's flavour.Still, this was a lot better than the Video Movie Guide rated it.
Elvis Presley plays bearded soldier-of-fortune Jess Wade who is framed for the theft of a historic Mexican Victory cannon in writer & director Charles Marquis Warren's explosive horse opera "Charro!" by his chief nemesis Vince Hackett.
In "Charro!," Elvis sings only one song, the title tune.
After he captures Jess during a gunfight in a sleepy town and burns his neck with a branding iron to simulate a bullet crease, Vince lets the word spread that his former friend stole the cannon.
No sooner has Elvis arrived in town than Vince's young, hot-headed brother Billy Ray (Solomon Sturges) shows up itching for liquor and woman.
Elvis' fans didn't respond to this Spaghetti-style western.
When I first saw Elvis in the film as the bearded desperado Jess Wade, I thought Wow!
Back when Elvis was lean and good looking, the independent wrangler approach might have taken him into spaghetti Westerns, and since he could also sing, one can only imagine the possibilities.As it is, Presley provides a fairly competent presence to his character in "Charro!", but as the film wears on, so does he.
Do you think he ever sent for her?If for no other reason, "Charro!" is worth seeing for a non characteristic look at Elvis Presley in a role that would have served much better at the beginning of his career than near it's end.
Nevertheless, "Charro!" differs from all other Elvis movies.
"Charro!" opens as Jess Wade (Elvis Presley) rides into a sleepy Mexican village.
Jess gets the surprise of his life when his old nemesis, Vince Hackett (Victor French), appears with two trigger-happy gunmen.
He shoots Sheriff Ramsey, and Jess takes over for his friend and jails Billy Roy. When he learns about Billy Roy's predicament, Vince threatens to destroy the town with the cannon!
Elvis Presley never played a hero like Jess.
from Elvis's previous westerns Love Me Tender and Flaming Star is the ending.
qualifies as Elvis Presley's most unusual movie.
What hadn't changed was Elvis' eminent ability to entertain.Charles Marquis Warren, who produced, wrote, and directed CHARRO, has an unimpeachable place in the Western pantheon: He developed for television both GUNSMOKE and THE VIRGINIAN and created RAWHIDE.
Elvis' first film, LOVE ME TENDER, was a straight Western, as was FLAMING STAR in 1960.
Maltin rejects CHARRO because it doesn't fit his preconceived expectation of what an Elvis movie should be.
Deep down, I know FLAMING STAR was a better produced and weightier movie and features a better Elvis performance, BUT...
Advertised as "a different kind of role" for Presley upon its release; this movie was supposed to be the launch of his 'serious' film career. |
tt1843221 | Nadunisi Naaygal | Samar (Veera Bahu), an eight-year-old motherless boy lives with his father in Mumbai. The father leads a colourful life indulging his sexual passions. Samar is sexually abused by his father and is rescued by his neighbour, a middle aged single woman Meenakshi Amma (Swapna Abraham). She names him Veera, takes him under her wing and protects him. Daunted and chased by the ghosts of his painful past, Veera rapes Meenakshi Amma. She, though reluctant at first, indulges in the act. After coming back to her senses the next morning, she refuses Veera's apology and decides to marry her colleague. On her first night, where they consummate their marriage, Veera stabs the man brutally and sets him and the room on fire. Meenakshi Amma is injured in the fire. After treatment, he brings back the scar-faced woman to his bungalow. After a few weeks, Veera meets a girl named Priya (Priya) on the Internet and they fall for each other. He invites her home and they grow intimate, interrupted by a loud scream from Priya, because Meenakshi Amma stabs her brutally. She orders Veera to cut off Priya's hair as she wants it.
In the following years, Veera kidnaps women, rapes them and finally kills them in cold-blood. As the murders continue, Veera stumbles upon Sukanya (Sameera Reddy), a girl he fell in love with in 10th grade at a theatre with her boyfriend Arjun (Ashwin Kakumanu). He lies to her that he had gone with another girl and offers her a ride home. An upset Sukanya agrees but does not know that Veera had been stalking her. Veera suddenly slaps her, making her unconscious and kisses her. Disgusted and terrified, Sukanya then finds Arjun in a pool of blood, in the backseat of the car. Sukanya tries to escape, engages in a fist fight with Veera but is stabbed in the abdomen. Police surround the car and take Sukanya to a hospital.
A bystander who had sensed something fishy with Veera's car follows him to his bungalow and informs the Assistant Commissioner Vijay (Deva). Veera takes Sukanya to his bungalow and informs Meenakshi Amma that he loves this girl truly and is going to live the rest of his life with her. Sukanya tries to escape but is captured by Veera. Veera says to Sukanya that Samar is responsible for all these events and murdered all the victims and even Meenakshi Amma. He says Meenakshi Amma is actually dead, but Samar still thinks she is alive. In a few moments, Vijay arrives at the residence and is confronted by four Rottweilers ready to pounce on him.
Alarmed by this, Veera tries to fend him off. He returns to take Sukanya into a hidden basement, where another two girls are captives, with their heads half-tonsured. He locks her in the basement and fights with Vijay. Sukanya, meanwhile, finds a way into the bungalow, takes a gun and shoots at Veera. He is shocked as he thinks it was Meenakshi Amma who shot at him. All this is recorded on tape as Veera narrates it to the Assistant Commissioner. Finally he is taken to a mental asylum where another patient (Samantha Ruth Prabhu) is also shown as a psychopath, victimised due to child sexual abuse and the end credits roll. | violence, murder | train | wikipedia | null |
tt0064055 | The Babysitter | Jennifer (Alicia Silverstone) is a beautiful teenager who is hired to babysit the children of Harry Tucker (J.T. Walsh) and his wife, Dolly Tucker (Lee Garlington), while they attend a party hosted by their friends, Bill Holsten (George Segal) and his wife, Bernice Holsten (Lois Chiles). Harry often fantasizes about Jennifer, while Dolly misinterprets Bill's compliments as a sign of attraction and fantasizes about him. Meanwhile, Jennifer's ex-boyfriend Jack (Jeremy London), whom she broke up with after he began pressuring her for sex, runs into his estranged troublemaking friend Mark (Nicky Katt), Bill and Bernice's son, who once had a fling with Jennifer and still harbors feelings for her. Throughout the night, Harry, Jack and Mark have increasingly racy fantasies about Jennifer.
Jack calls Jennifer and asks to visit her at the Tuckers' residence, but she refuses. Mark later steals beer from Bill's party, where they run into Harry, who becomes fixated on the notion Jack might go to his house to have sex with Jennifer. Jack and Mark get increasingly drunk and show up uninvited to see Jennifer, but she refuses to let them in. They then spend the rest of the night stalking around the house and spying on her through the window. Meanwhile, Harry gets drunk and falls asleep in his car, where he has a nightmare of Jennifer and Jack having sex, which drives him to rush home and confront them. In his absence, Dolly makes a pass at Bill, who rejects her, but agrees to keep her secret and offers to drive her home.
At the Tuckers' residence, Jack and Mark force their way in while Jennifer is taking a bath and, after a tense argument, Mark knocks Jack unconscious and attempts to rape Jennifer, who runs out of the house. Mark pursues her and ends up being fatally run over by Harry, who is arrested for drunk driving just as Bill and Dolly arrive and hear about the accident. Before being escorted home, Jennifer confronts Jack, who is being questioned by the police, and asks him, "What were you thinking?" before leaving an ashamed and guilt-stricken Jack behind. | cult | train | wikipedia | Surprisingly hard-edged Patricia Wymer cult film.
This familiar story of an older man/younger woman is surprisingly hard-edged.
Bikers, hippies, free love and jail bait mix surprisingly well in this forgotten black-and-white indie effort.
Lead actress Patricia Wymer, as the titular "Candy," gives the finest performance of her career (spanning all of 3 drive-in epics).
Wymer was precocious and fetching in THE YOUNG GRADUATES (1971), but gives a more serious performance in THE BABYSITTER.
Leads Wymer and George E.
There are enough similarities between THE BABYSITTER and THE YOUNG GRADUATES to make one wonder if the same director helmed the latter film as well.
She also appeared as a coven witch in the popular 1969 cult drive-in shocker THE WITCHMAKER.THE BABYSITTER has finally made its home video debut, as part of the eight-film BCI box set DRIVE-IN CULT CLASSICS vol.
3, which is available from Amazon.com and some retail stores such as Best Buy.Late 2011 update: the original camera negatives for THE BABYSITTER were found!
Code Red released a far superior DVD of the film, mastered from the uncut negatives.
I watched The Babysitter as part of BCI Eclipse' Drive-in Cult Classics (featuring Crown International Pictures releases) on DVD.
I think it is a very good film.This movie packs a lot of story into a very short time.
You have hippies, rock music, bikers, lesbians, sexual impropriety, blackmail, and murder, all in one spot!
And, I found the intricately woven plot to be believable and interesting.However, the supporting cast, primarily the bikers, delivers a stilted performance, particularly when asked to deliver lines with more than just a few words.
A couple of the characters, in particular, were exceptionally believable.The musical score is absolutely spot-on, for the times, the tempo, and for moving the story forward.
I noticed in the opening credits that the movie featured the music of "The Food," I googled them; but, couldn't find anything...In any case, George E.
Carey who wrote, produced and starred in this movie liked the idea so much (of a wayward married man brought to redemption through trials and tribulation; and, a little help - of course) that he wrote, produced and starred in "Weekend with the Babysitter.".
Classic Drive-In Exploitation + American Beauty = The Babysitter.
Candy, by the way, says things like: "Wow, man--I totally dig you--you really turn me on!" and "Ciao, baby!" Unfortunately, a murder case he's working on involving a motorcycle gang prompts the gang leader's "old lady" to blackmail him for her boyfriend's release.
Patricia Wymer is smokin' hot as the bubbly, music-loving not-quite-a-hipster babysitter.
Fun little movie!
One of the best in the Drive-In Cult Classics collection..
This is ostensibly a tale of an older man falling for a young girl but turns out to be such fun because the film makers, clearly worried that their tale might not hold up, pepper the movie with colours, music and dialogue of the moment.
This may have seemed crass at the time but now makes for a wonderful time capsule of a movie.
There is a sub plot involving blackmail that could have held up proceedings but instead makes for more nudity and even bloody violence.
George E Carey is effective as the older guy and Patricia Wymer a lovely and very willing babysitter.
With nothing taken too seriously, this makes for a super drive in movie, for once worthy of the moniker, 'classic'..
A teenage babysitter seduces a middle-age assistant DA, causing trouble with his wife, and also causing him to be blackmailed by a biker's girl who wants her guy acquitted of murder charges.Sure, the flick never rises above cheap exploitation.
Even the plot manages a few wrinkles beyond the clichéd teen-age temptress and older man.
Too bad Wymer (Candy) looks the part, but has trouble with her lines.
There's also a 60's counter-culture subtext where Candy tempts middle-age George with the hippie credo of "free love".
An assistant DA (George Carey) is prosecuting a biker for a vicious murder.
The lawyer's home-life meanwhile is a wreck: He has a nagging, frigid wife and a newborn son, and his adult daughter is a lesbian.
Things go from bad to worse, however, when he is unable to resist the charms of his seductive underage babysitter (Patricia Wymer).
Meanwhile, the girlfriend of the biker befriends the prosecutor's daughter, hoping to get some photos of her with her lover so she can use them to blackmail the father.
She really hits the jackpot though when she stumbles upon the man himself en flagrante with his babysitter mistress.
. .This movie would be a lot more believable if the hero was a handsome thirty-year-old guy rather than someone like Carey who looks more like the elderly FATHER of a thirty year old.
(Even in the "free love" 60's his sexual affair with a teenage girl really beggars belief).
For instance, the first time the babysitter, "Candy", is left alone in the house she calls a couple of "friends" over, who turn out to be a loud rock band complete with a couple of girls who dance naked to their groovy music!
This movie is surprisingly hard to find these days, even though its sequel "Weekend with the Babysitter" is readily available.
This is the better of the two by far largely due to Patricia Wymer.
Carey, meanwhile, not only starred in both movies, but he also wrote and produced both of them as well (which makes you wonder what kind of dirty old man he was in real life).
Tom McLoughlin, who went on to do "The Born Losers" and "Billy Jack", directed both movies, but HE had the good sense to use a pseudonym.
I'd recommend this movie I guess (if you can find it), but I wouldn't bother with the sequel..
Babysitter, The (1969) ** 1/2 (out of 4) Fairly crazy drive-in flick has the future D.A.
Carey) about to take on an important case of a biker killing a woman.
He's having trouble at home with his unloving wife (Anne Bellamy) but soon finds comfort with his underage babysitter Candy (Patricia Wymer).
The biker's girlfriend plans on blackmailing the D.A. because his daughter is a lesbian but she gets better stuff when she realizes the babysitter is doing more than just watching kids.
This thing packs a lot of "story" into its short 75-minute running time but that's okay because it makes for one wild ride as far as "B" drive-in films go.
This is certainly one of those "groovy" movies aimed at teenagers at drive-ins and on that level the film works because it's not a great piece of art yet it does keep you entertained with its nudity, silly story and insane dialogue, which includes plenty of "peace of love" hippie talk.
Another great line is when the D.A., taking the babysitter out, says that he respects teens because of their willingness to try new things like tacos!!!
Wymer does a very good job in her role as the young babysitter who wants to experience life as well as teach an older man how to life.
Stone, who wrote the story for himself; imagine that, is pretty flat in his role, which doesn't demand too much except getting turned on by a teenager.
He's pretty weak in the role, which doesn't help the film any.
The nudity, silly rock music and wild story make for some decent fun as long as you know what you're getting into..
This Crown-International release was in one aspect out of date when released, since it was in black and white, when that format, even in the B movie world, had pretty much passed on.
Though despite the dated appearance of the movie, the filmmakers did manage to pack in a respectable amount of sleaze, including (but not limited to) lesbianism (the movie's two lesbian seduction sequences are unintentionally funny), nudity, sex, and a middle-aged man having an affair with a very young woman.
This stuff is kind of fun, but the enjoyment from it is deflated by a very slow moving story that seems VERY padded, even though the running time is only 75 minutes.
I personally don't think the movie quite makes it to a recommendation, but others here on the IMDb liked it, so I think this is one case where you'll have to watch the movie and decide for yourself..
I'm sitting here stunned after watching The Babysitter.
This movie addresses nearly every controversial topic of morality: Adultery to begin with, but the list only begins there with everything from blindly loving a murderer, blackmail, under age trolling by an older married man, sexual assault, etc.
don't work em out, have an affair with a young chick who can promise you the moon - mentality is such an immature way of viewing an affair, and that's exactly what bothered me about this film.
Not here, as Grandpa dives right in and loves him some young lovin.OK, so this is the wrong venue to get philosophical, but I just had to mention it because this film, more than a lot of the other drive-in trashy movies, dealt with issues of betrayal and hurt in a very raw, unfiltered way, and I am left to consider what it is I'm looking for in movies, and, as someone who is trying to write scripts, what it is people in general are looking for.Rating: 20/40.
Just watched this little piece of exploitation and somewhat enjoyed it.
The idea that a eighteen year old baby sitter would be able to sneak her friends into her employer's house for a groovy band practice while they're away is ludicrous yet pretty damn funny.
That she turns out to be a tramp is believable but her vicious side toward the end seems a bit too much.
I don't feel like I'm giving too much away by saying this seems almost like the fantasy of a square henpecked lawyer who wants to take advantage of the freedoms of sexual liberation without facing any of the consequences.
For someone like myself who didn't grow up in that era, a lot of its seems alien and laughable at times.
I guess i would prefer this movie too some rosy glasses colored film that really thought peace and love would conquer the world's overwhelming problems.
A star rating seems really hard to do with something like this.
Overall, its trash but I didn't feel like I'd completely squandered my time..
It stars Pamela Wymer as the (not particularly beautiful) babysitter, who ends up sleeping with her D.A. employer.
The convoluted plot has a biker chick trying to blackmail the D.A. with the potential revelation of his daughter's homosexuality (just, for good measure, to put some not particularly sexy lesbian sex in the movie) to get her murderous boyfriend released.
Wymer helps the D.A. turn the tables on the biker chick.
There's some decent nudity (Wymer is the least attractive of the naked women), and, the one thing that makes it almost worth checking out, it has an awesome '60s soundtrack.
I especially loved the theme song, "Candy", which sounds a little like The Assocation's "Windy"..
Actually, I was very surprised by this movie.
There are some very bad scenes but that's what makes it so campy.
Patricia Wymer lights up the screen as Candy , The Babysitter!.
Watchable movie especially as 1969 time capsule.
While based on the old man having an appear with a younger girl, the relationship of the man with his wife adds great dramatic effect.
Of course there are the mandatory bare boobs for a film like this.
This movie turned up as a recommendation on my Amazon Prime in July 2017, and like many of the obscure titles that have come up, this is hardly a diamond in the rough.
(Think "Poison Ivy" meets "Slouching Towards Bethlehem.") The affair/blackmail plot at the center of everything probably would've worked with a younger actor, but maybe Don Henderson and George Carey were looking at this like wish fulfillment.
At its best this is a competently made "message" movie bordering on exploitation, bogged down by one-dimensional characters and flat, hygiene-film acting..
A really happening late 60's drive-in exploitation blast.
Frustrated middle-aged Deputy District Attorney George Maxwell (a fine performance by George E.
Carey, who also produced this picture) can't stand his naggy, frigid wife Edith (a perfectly bitchy Anne Bellamy) anymore.
Worse yet, poor George is further saddled with a newborn baby sun and a lascivious lesbian teenage daughter (dishy brunette Sheri Jackson).
George has an adulterous fling with lovely, enticing and free-spirited swinging hippie babysitter Candy Wilson (delightfully played with sexy aplomb by yummy blonde knockout Patricia Wymer).
Complications ensue when George finds himself being blackmailed by the bitter Julia Freeman (a nicely venomous turn by Kathy Williams), who wants George to spring her psychotic biker boyfriend Laurence Mackey (a frightening Robert Tessier, who sports a head full of hair here) from jail.
Director Tom Laughlin (yep, the same dude who portrayed Billy Jack!) and screenwriter James McLarty cram the splendidly seamy story with a winning and highly entertaining surplus of delicious female nudity, sizzling soft-core sex, and raw violence.
Moreover, they accurately peg the whole wild'n'easy uninhibited sensibility of the 60's youth culture and relate the plot in a tight 75 minute running time, thus ensuring that this movie doesn't overstay its welcome.
One definite highlight occurs when Candy invites her groovy friends over the Maxwells house for an impromptu basement bash complete with pot smoking, wailing rock music, and, of course, hot naked dancing chicks.
Best of all, this flick rates as a marvelous showcase for the utterly charming and fresh-faced pixie Patricia Wymer, who positively lights up the screen with her sweet, bubbly personality and captivating beauty.
I love this movie.
Bikers, switchblades, pot smoking, rock n' roll hippies, go-go dancers and tacos!
In this story you may find a wide range of sleaze and perversion but I also noticed a real sweetness to the movie.
It's about a man who feels like he has lost touch wife and starts to have a wondering eye for the babysitter.
What was unique to me was the fact that neither Candy the babysitter nor Mr. Maxwell seemed inherently evil.
This film doesn't only exploit sex and violence but the, 'youth culture,' of 1969.
The babysitter in question is perfectly named, Candy.
She just wants to laugh and dance and have a good time.
"If that what it takes to be a hippie, I guess we all have a little hippie in us," says our hero George Maxwell.
There is also a subplot that seems to be taking place on Spahn ranch in Death Valley about a bad ass biker chick trying to blackmail George to set her boyfriend free.
She photographs the affair and boasts that she will take the photos to his wife and his boss if he doesn't set her convicted murderer boyfriend (her, "Old man," as she puts it) free.
She also tries to photograph George's potato faced daughter, in one of the most horrifying lesbian scenes of all time!
Each shot of this scene looks like the last known photograph of either party.
This film is so much better than the bigger budget and in color remake, "Weekend with the Babysitter 1970." Watch this with some good friends and you might be surprised how much you get into it.
The director of the movie, George Carey, plays an assistant District Attorney who has an affair with a babysitter (Patricia Wymer), meanwhile being blackmailed by a biker's girlfriend (Kathy Williams).
It is not a movie that I would recommend to anybody but the exploitation completist.
It has some funny moments -- such as when Carey's character accuses his girlfriend of being "kind of a hippie." It has all the obligatory exploitation bits -- implied rape, lots of nudity, some violence with a knife.
The production values are a bit higher than most drive-in films from this era, as if the director hoped to actually make an impact on the mainstream.
His film is hopelessly naive and has little to offer an audience then or now..
Carey) is a mild-mannered Assistant District Attorney who has been given the task of prosecuting a motorcycle gang member for committing the horrific murder of a young woman.
His wife, "Edith Maxwell" (Anne Bellamy) has gone completely frigid after having a baby 8 months earlier and as a result George is both lonely and frustrated.
It's at this time that Edith hires a sexy babysitter named "Candy Wilson" (Patricia Wymer) who promptly goes about trying to seduce George.
At first George is able to maintain his discipline but eventually he succumbs to Candy's charms and things take an immediate turn for the worse after that.
Now rather than reveal any more of this movie and risk spoiling it for those who haven't seen it I will just say that this particular film was one of eight included in a DVD set titled ""Drive-in Cult Classics, Volume 3" which contains motion pictures typically seen at drive-ins in the 60's and 70's.
In most cases these movies were at best grade-B offerings meant to partially augment the lack of quality films available to drive-ins during this time.
Most of them are low-budget, sexploitation projects and this particular film is no exception.
Although filmed in black-and-white, this specific movie has a couple of things going for it which raises it a notch or two higher than some of the other pictures of this type.
First, it has the luscious actress Patricia Wymer in a leading role and she practically carries this film all by herself.
Carey performs in a professional manner which also helps this movie to a lesser extent.
In short, while this certainly isn't a great movie by any means, I found it to be satisfactory for the most part and I rate it as about average. |
tt0246674 | Harikrishnans | The Harikrishnans ( Mohanlal and Mammootty ) are one of the most famous lawyer duos in India. To avoid confusion one is called as Krishnan (Mohanlal) and Hari(Mammooty) the other as . They head the organization called Harikrishnan Associates, which consists of around 300 lawyers. They get engaged in a murder case of Guptan, who was allegedly killed by Gabriel. Gabriel is a friend of Hari's sister and Harikrishnans become the defense lawyers upon her request. Harikrishnans begin investigation and come across Meera (Juhi Chawla), a friend of Guptan. Both of them fall in love with her. After some trouble over the matter, they rediscover their friendship and get involved in the case again. They discover that Guptan actually died due to poisoning by his relatives who were doctors. At the end Meera decides to go for a random method of choosing her lover as she liked both Harikrishnans equally. Two different climaxes of the film show either of Harikrishnans winning the toss for being Meera's friend; the losing person presumably becoming Meera's lover. | murder | train | wikipedia | Well made commercial entertainer. Harikrishnans is a well made commercial entertainer by Fazil which has all the typical ingredients like comedy , drama , romance , action and suspense. The real highlight of the movie is the amazing chemistry between the lead actors Mammooty and Mohanlal , their comic scenes are too good.Their combination scenes are really well taken by the director. The music is also really good. Juhi Chawla also gives a good performance in her only malayalam film.The search for Mohini Varma and the innovative climax are other highlights. On the negative side at some places the script feels contrived to suit the star images and to give them equal importance.Overall a must watch for the coming together of the Giants of malayalam cinema .. Irritatingly Cheesy !!!. Extremely loosely based on Bollywood movie Deewana Mastana. With a big starcast the director Fasil worked more on appeasing fan following of each star. Plot, acting and dialogues came a distant second. Juhi Chawla did not have a major impact in the film hence her presence seemed unnecessary. Overacting during comedy scenes used to cover up overall deficiencies in the film. Watch only out of desperation. |
tt0038300 | Angel on My Shoulder | After his release from prison, gangster Eddie Kagle (Paul Muni) is killed by his partner in crime, Smiley Williams (Hardie Albright). Kagle ends up in Hell, where "Nick" (Claude Rains) offers him a chance to escape hell and avenge his own death in exchange for help with a problem. Kagle looks exactly like Judge Frederick Parker, an upright man who is causing Nick distress because he is entirely too honest. Nick fears that Parker/Kagle may cause him more anxiety in future, as he is running for governor of his state. Nick wants to destroy Parker's reputation and Kagle readily agrees to have his soul transferred into Parker's body.
As soon as Kagle appears as Parker, odd things begin to happen. Kagle pursues his goal with evil intent (though often at cross purposes with the Devil), but everything he does to ruin the Judge Parker's reputation somehow results in making Parker look better. Along the way, Kagle falls in love with Barbara Foster (Anne Baxter), the judge's fiancée, causing him to question his whole outlook on life and eventually rebel against Nick.
Nick presents Kagle the opportunity to shoot Williams, but instead Kagle confronts the man with the truth. Shocked and frightened, Williams backs away and falls out an open window to his death.
Exasperated and defeated, Nick takes Kagle back to Hell, leaving Judge Parker in a much better position than before. Nick threatens to make the reformed man's punishment even more painful than usual, but Kagle blackmails his would-be tormentor; in return for not revealing Nick's blunders, Kagle wants to be made a trustee. Nick has no option but to agree to Kagle's demands. | revenge, romantic | train | wikipedia | Judge Parker and Eddie Kagle are both played by the great Paul Muni.
And he does a few "Scarface" pantomime moments, brief elegant gestures, that show what a truly great screen presence he could be.The crucial scene in ANGEL ON MY SHOULDER is where Eddie, brought back from Hades by the Devil and now inhabiting the body of Judge Parker, is having a picnic lunch with his secretary/fiancé.
Fine support is given by James Flavin (who, in addition to his role as politico Bellamy is also heard off-screen as a district attorney, a very curious happenstance), George Cleveland (as the Judge's valet), Erskine Sanford as a minister, Hardie Albright as Smiley Williams and Fritz Leiber, Noble Johnson and Kurt Katch as residents of Hades.This is not a great film.
what's not to love?"Angel on My Shoulder" (1946) offers up classic performances by such legendary stars as Paul Muni, Anne Baxter, and Claude Rains.
Uncomfortable in Hell, Mr. Muni hooks up with wicked Claude Rains (as "Nick"), who seems to know his way around the underworld.
There, Rains arranges a body-switch with look-alike Judge Frederick Parker (also played by Muni).
Muni is promised revenge on the crook who crossed him; and, Rains is unhappy with the Judge, who hasn't been sending many souls to Hell.So, criminal Muni embodies good Muni...Archie Mayo's "Angel on My Shoulder" isn't as well-remembered, or as original, as other films visiting the same territory; but, watching Muni and Rains makes up most of the difference.
Perfectly cast Hardie Albright (as Smiley Williams) is no slouch; in once of the film's best scenes, he holds his own with Muni and Rains in the room.
Others haven't as much to do, but they do it well.******* Angel on My Shoulder (9/20/46) Archie Mayo ~ Paul Muni, Claude Rains, Anne Baxter, Hardie Albright.
Paul Muni is a dead convict brought back to earth by the devil in "Angel on my Shoulder," a 1946 film also starring Claude Rains and Anne Baxter.
"Angel on My Shoulder" is along the same idea as "Here Comes Mr. Jordan" and "A Guy Named Joe," and a close brother of "Heaven Can Wait" and the later "The Bishop's Wife." This is an excellent example of the genre, with top acting by Paul Muni, Anne Baxter, and Claude Rains.
He's elegant, charming and manipulative, and gets plenty nervous when he sees things aren't working out as he planned.Wonderful film, and a good chance to see the fine actor Paul Muni in a lighter role than he usually played..
Paul Muni is hilarious, mugging outrageously when he's not leaping through the air to rumble with devils or thugs.Never been the biggest Claude Rains fan--his prissiness wears on me midway through any film he's in--but he makes a good, nasty Satan.
And it also is the only time that two of the best actors of the golden age of sound films worked in a film side by side in the same scenes of a movie.* I am referring to Mr. Paul Muni, who played Tony Carmonte in SCARFACE and Mr. Claude Rains, who played that beacon of heavenly fairness and decency Mr. Jordan in HERE COMES MR.
But Paul Muni played Benito Juarez, and shared no scene with Rains as Napoleon III of France - the two leaders never met.)Muni's Eddie Kagle is a reprise of his Tony Carmonte, complete with Carmonte's deadly looking slit-like stare.
Rains realizes that if Kagle can replace Parker, then he can ruin the Judge's campaign for cleaning up the corruption in his state.So Rains makes his offer to the eager Muni: if Kagle agrees to this switch, playing the role of Parker while the latter is in an enforced coma, and undoing Parker's campaign, Kagle will get a chance to even the score with good old "Smiler".
Kagel/Parker is not condemned in the papers but praised for his bravery against the gangsters.Also, as the film progresses, Muni meets the Judge's girlfriend Barbara Foster (Anne Baxter).
He falls for her, and she slowly "corrupts" him - he starts wondering if the Judge and Barbara don't have the better view of the world.The film is a good fantasy, that resolves well - a kind of a twist, in fact, on the conclusion of CASABLANCA, with Muni and Rains walking off together, tied by the knot of their agreement.
Picture concerns about a gangster called Eddie Kagle (Paul Muni) who is based his way of living on what Omar Khayyan once said : ¨Live fully while you may and reckon not the cost¨ .
He leaves the State Penitentiary where was imprisoned accused of murderous , Eddie makes a covenant with the devil (Claude Rains) and returns to earth for vengeance as an important judge .
He becomes incarnated a kind judge and the problems emerge when is romanced with his girlfriend (Anne Baxter) , falling in love with her , but the good-heart mobster spoils the relationship .It's a romantic movie with a supernatural love story .
Bemusing fantasy with excellent interpretation by Paul Muni (Scarface) in a comic character while he usually played historical or dramatic roles .
The motion picture is well directed by Archie Mayo (Bordertown , Petrified forest , Black legion) in his last film , he's a specialist on noir cinema and worked with almost all Warner Brothers biggest stars (Paul Muni , James Cagney, George Raft , Humphrey Bogart) though also directed some comedy , as this film and with Marx Brothers, ¨One night in Casablanca¨ which had more pace and spirit that some of their later works .
Angel on My Shoulder (1946)It's great to see Paul Muni in another role--he's a great actor who did too few films--and it's never bad to see Claude Rains.
Claude Raines is a smooth Devil who will cut Muni a deal if he goes back to Earth and ruins the name of a good and upright man.
Paul Muni is tough, funny and at times sensitive, Anne Baxter is a long suffering fiancé and just the kind of woman for whom a tough mug like Muni's Eddie could turn over a new leaf, and Claude Raines makes an excellent "Nick", both funny and ominous.There is a nice twist at the end and the closing scene is one of my favorite finales in filmdom..
Paul Muni leads a talented cast in Archie Mayo's dark comedy about a wise-guy (Eddie Kagle/Muni) who, murdered, finds himself entangled in one of Satan's (Claude Rains) schemes to outwit his arch-rival and steal the soul of a righteous judge who happens to look exactly like Kagle.
But living vicariously in the life of a good man (Judge Parker), loved by an even better woman (Barbara/Anne Baxter) Kagle begins to question the evils of his life.While Angel on my Shoulder is not quite a redemption story, it endows its characters with just enough conscience to make them sympathetic.
Eddie Kagle (Paul Muni) is shot dead by Smiley (Hardie Albright) but is given a second chance at life by Nick (Claude Rains).
However, circumstances don't go as planned and Nick hadn't counted on the influence that Judge Parker's fiancée, Barbara (Anne Baxter) exerts over Eddie......This film is a comedy that is very funny due to Eddie's out-of-character behaviour as Judge Parker.
Claude Rains is a stylish devil while Anne Baxter is a strong-minded woman who holds her own in the face of her husband's character transformation.
Paul Muni and Anne Baxter express their separate heartbreaks very convincingly, while Claude Rains is always amusing in his role.It's a fun story.
Nick, the Devil, (Claude Rains) allows murdered gangster Eddie Kagle (Paul Muni) to return to life in the body of a lookalike judge, hoping to destroy the judge's good reputation.
But neither Eddie nor Nick counted on the judge's fiancée (Anne Baxter), whose love may put Eddie on the side of the angels for once.Very entertaining movie.
however, once Claude Raines (The Devil) and Paul Muni (a hood who had been killed and sent to Hell) returned to earth and the latter became romantically involved, the film bogged down.Muni assumes the body of "Judge Parker" but still talks and thinks like the thug he was as his old self.
I stayed with the film the whole way, and it wasn't bad but I wouldn't watch it again.For those who don't believe there is a Devil, this is a good movie to see as it effectively shows how he whispers attractive things in one's ear and how persuasive he can be....all the while ruining you..
Archie Mayo's curio "Angel on my Shoulder" is virtually unknown despite a cast headed by Paul Muni, Claude Rains and Anne Baxter.
Muni seems totally lost in the role of a dead gangster fuelling the fires of Hell before he's brought back to inhabit the body of a 'good' judge the Devil is trying to get his hands on, (watching this you would never think Muni was once considered a great actor).
Of course, considering he's the Devil, Rains seems singularly unprepared for Anne Baxter's sweetness-and-light fiancée whose goodness messes up his plans somewhat.
******SPOLILERS****** Gangster Eddie Kagle, Paul Muni,serving his latest stretch in prison,is released and picked up by his fellow hood Smiley Williams, Hardie Albright.
Eddie becomes a good and decent person and even worse Eddie likes what he became!"Angle on my shoulder" is one of those life after death movies made in the 1940's like "Here Comes Mr. Jordan" and "A Guy Named Joe" where Eddie becomes the good Judge Fredrick and makes up for his life of crime and redeems his soul by doing it.
MY RATING-7.4Impossible to fail with a formula like this- A gangster is killed by his partner and the Devil gives him the chance of coming back to the world of the living in the body of a judge, to corrupt people.
Paul Muni is very nice here, spoofing his own image of gangster as well as Claude Rains, who we believe is really Satan.
Most actors in the 1930s and 1940s did NOT do accents, even though by today's standards, we consider this a requirement - but not Paul Muni.Having just watched "The Life of Emile Zola", Here his portrayal of Eddie Kagel blew me away.
But even Rains gets quite a handful when Paul Muni makes a sudden trip their courtesy of Hardie Albright.This part of the story is taken right out the plot of Angels With Dirty Faces.
And Muni finds himself falling for the judge's fiancée, Anne Baxter and slowly changing his ways.Angel On My Shoulder was a charming fantasy that marked only the second time Muni returned to a gangster role other than his famous Scarface portrayal.
Angel On My Shoulder is an entertaining fantasy, but far from the work Paul Muni did in the Thirties..
I always liked actors Claude Rains and Paul Muni.
Even though I never saw any of the remakes, I will still say that the original would still be my favorite version, because I love old movies, and I always liked Claude Rains and Paul Muni, they were fine actors..
Paul Muni is fine and plays our main protagonists dual personality with credible verve, and Claude Rains is clearly enjoying himself as the devil of the piece, and I heartily applaud the dark shift the film took for its final reel, yet it is a hard film to reckie unless you can see and hear it properly.I have no hesitation in watching this film again if a restoration comes to pass, but until then I say approach with caution.
JORDAN - centers on Eddie (Paul Muni) a gangster shot to death by his presumed best friend and sent to Hell as a result.
Paul Muni gives a great performance as Eddie Kagle, gangster turned good guy.
ANGEL ON MY SHOULDER (United Artists, 1946), directed by Archie Mayo, stars Paul Muni in one of his finer film efforts in his latter movie career.
Rather than playing an Italian accented gang leader who becomes the "shame of a nation," this time Muni does one better, that of a tough-talking American mug who never got passed the third grade who learns a moral lesson during his second chance in life.Opening title: "This story is about Eddie Kagle, who based his way of living on what Omar Khayyam once said: 'Live fully while you may and reckon not the cost.'" After serving a four year prison term, Eddie Kagle (Paul Muni), gangster, walks out freely into the world where he's greeted by his boyhood pal and partner, "Smiley" Williams (Hardie Albright).
Because Eddie happens to be the spitting image of a Judge Frederick Parker, an honest politician running for governor, Nick (Claude Rains), the devil, wanting to take more souls with him into hell, allows Kagle temporary freedom outside Hades to avenge his killer in exchange for he assuming the body of Judge Parker to dishonor his good name.
Having found love with Barbara Foster (Anne Baxter), the judge's secretary and fiancée, the devil uses every possible motive to tempt Eddie into sin, even to a point of having him come face to face with Smiley.
Changing the emphasis from Heaven to Hell and Claude Rains assuming similar duties from guardian angel to guardian demon, with parallel ideas in different directions, the film overall is quite entertaining.
Having seen it now for a second time, I admit I was wrong,its not that good bit not as bad as I had ythough as an 18 yr old wise guy Paul Muni doesnt overact as badly as he usually does .
Paul Muni and Claude Rains really seem to be enjoying themselves, Muni as the stereotypical tough guy Bronx gangster with integrity and Rains as a Satan who acts more like a bemused business executive then the king of the underworld.
Paul gets sent to Hell, where he unknowingly makes a deal with the devil, Claude Rains.
I hope Claude had fun, playing a head angel and the devil himself in the span of five years!Of course, complications in Claude's master plan ensue once Paul meets the judge's sweet fiancé, Anne Baxter, and starts to fall in love.
Who doesn't love Claude Rains & Paul Muni?
Claude Rains was my favorite actor as a kid, and he may still be, and I clearly recall seeing this film when I was about 10 or 11 (1949/1950) and never having heard of it before, probably because it came out the same year I started going to movies by myself (yes, in those days one could go to a movie by himself - especially Saturday or Sunday afternoon Westerns and the like - when he was seven!) and maybe I missed its original release by a few months.
(For the first half of the century, I would nominate as America's greatest star character actors Walter Huston, Spencer Tracy, Fredric March, John Barrymore and Paul Muni, in any order you like, all of whom also played occasional leading man parts.) 3.
Muni could be anywhere from his late thirties up as Eddie Kagle, and Baxter really does come over as a lot older than 23, simply because she exudes the kind of maturity of style and presence that so many of the classic film actresses of those days possessed - think of the roles Garbo, Loy, Davis, Hobson and Hepburn played while still in their twenties (Hobson, in THE WEREWOLF OF LONDON and THE BRIDE OF FRANKENSTEIN, was 18!).
It was my first look at Paul Muni, who expresses a wide range of emotions as the murdered gangster who returns to Earth in a switcheroo for a judge who's been restoring victims to a place in society at the expense of the Devil (Claude Rains).
A story of redemption and sacrifice...Claude Rains gives a spectacular performance as Satan and Paul Muni captures something missing in todays films ...an honesty and pain that too many "actors" are afraid to show.
Taken by his performance in the superb 1934 Film Noir Crime Without Passion,I was excited to recently discover that the BBC had shown a rarely mentioned Claude Rains movie,which led to me looking at my shoulders.The plot:Freed from jail,gangster Eddie Kagle gets picked up by his old friend Smiley Williams.
Returning to earth,Kagle soon begins to feel that he does not want to leave it in the hellish state he last left it.View on the film:Going to hell in a hand-basket within the first 5 minutes,director Archie Mayo (who argued with Paul Muni during production) kicks his final movie off with a blazing opening that covers the title in a devilish Film Noir atmosphere,as burning pits of fire and risqué clothes give the afterlife an ultra-stylised fetish gloss.
Paul Muni plays a gangster who is murdered towards the very beginning of the story and is sent to Hell.
This gangster seems an awful lot like his character from the movie SCARFACE (1932) and although Muni's acting is far from subtle, it is very entertaining.
The Devil is also entertained by how awful the man is--especially since this evil deceased gangster looks just like a nice judge who he wants to discredit.
Gangster star Paul Muni plays a thoroughly bad egg who dies and goes to Hell, where he meets the devil (an inspired bit of casting in the form of Claude Rains).
I like how it's different because we see a deceased gangster who was trapped in a polite judge's body in order to kill his killer.Paul Muni's attitude and accent was just so spot.
Here Paul Muni plays a thug who gets out of the joint, is instantly killed but returned to life in the body of a judge, and can't let go of his sense of vengeance.
Second half a performance good enough to make me want to see much more of Paul Muni.There are some things that work here.
Then Raines will let Muni give Smiley what's coming to him.Well -- the best laid plans, you know? |
tt0119123 | Fire Down Below | After the Korean War, Americans Tony (Lemmon) and Felix (Mitchum) own a tramp boat, the Ruby, which they use for small-scale smuggling around the Caribbean, along with a third crewman, Jimmy Jean (Edric Connor). One day, their bartender contact, Miguel (Anthony Newley), introduces them to an American businessman who has been enjoying the company of beautiful but passport-less European goddess Irena (Hayworth). He has to return to Detroit, but wants to arrange for her to get to another island. They are reluctant, but $1,200 proves very tempting.
On the voyage, Tony starts falling in love with her. Knowing the kind of woman she is, Felix does his best to protect his partner by warning Irena to stay away from Tony. However, Felix starts falling for her himself. When she disembarks, Tony goes with her, ending his partnership with Felix.
Tony and Jimmy Jean take on a shady job, but are intercepted by the authorities. They have to abandon ship and swim to a nearby island to avoid arrest. Tony takes a job on a cargo ship to get back to Irena. He also plans to kill Felix, correctly suspecting that his former partner tipped off the customs agents to get rid of the competition for Irena. However, while Tony is away, she goes to Felix and confesses she loves him.
After a collision, Tony is trapped below deck under a girder with time running out; the ship is aflame and carrying a highly explosive cargo. Doctor Sam Blake (Bernard Lee) offers the only way out, by amputating Tony's trapped legs, but he would rather die. Felix goes aboard and stays with him. An explosion frees Tony from the wreckage, and Felix carries him to safety.
After Tony has recovered, he confronts Felix and Irena in a bar. It is there he realises that Irena loves Felix and not him, leaving him to walk away and cut his losses by saying, "some days you win some days you lose". | violence, flashback | train | wikipedia | Steven Seagal is one of those actors with a totally winning personality
He is simply an authority figure, a killing machine with a heart of purest gold
I can't help it; I like the guy.In 'Fire Down Below,' he is an outsider posing as a church sponsored carpenter while he works for the Environmental Protection Agency to stop a greedy coal baron from dumping extremely large quantities of toxic wastes in abandoned coal mines
Those dangerous chemicals could destroy the drinking water for thousands of miles and kill a bunch of people around the hills
Seagal gallantly promised not to leave the small town until the poison from the air, the streams and the earth is taken out
Many thugs (with snakes, sticks, guns, and big trucks) are hired by the uncaring mining magnate to get rid of our action hero but Seagal remains virtually untouched
'Fire Down Below' highlights new environmental message but fails to come up with the expectations
First, Seagal's amorous interest with the sad country woman seems artificial, used in the film to grant the 'new visitor' easy access to statements he might need
Second, the motion picture lacks the best villain whose prowess could equals Seagal's...
Steven's character never really faces much of a challenge
In fact, the fight scenes are too short and extremely fast and easy
If you are a fan of country music and you want to see Seagal playing guitar and singing, and you like to explore sweeping vistas with glorious sunsets, don't miss this movie!.
folks,this kind of stuff goes on everyday and it's films like these sneak a message into you without beating you over the head with it.those who are expecting plenty of guns and bodies flying all over the place every 5 seconds will be disappointed,but those who have a better view of the movie genre can enjoy this film better..
However, now she's a very familiar face thanks to the hit CSI television show.Anyway, the movie was a typical Steven Seagal film in that he's the likable hero, you had despicable villains that were easy to hate, and every action scene is Rambo-like in which Seagal never misses injuring his foes.
Of course, the nice scenery was probably due to the fact Seagal played an Environmental Protection Agent ("Jack Taggart").Also different was the fact that Helgenberger ("Sarah Kellogg") was not the typical gorgeous young sexpot normally paraded out in these martial arts films, but was rather plain with no makeup.
More examples: good-guy Seagal bows his head in prayer at church but also tells Helgenberger that "I don't hand out bibles." He also mentions UFOs and Zen to a sick little boy but also mentions "God's work" other times.
It is a lot better than Steven Seagal's more recent films, like Exit Wounds and Half Past Dead.
Seagal plays EPA agent Jack Taggart, who moves to a small southern town to investigate allegations that a major business figure (Kristofferson) is dumping tons of toxic waste into a supposedly safe area.
This movie had expert action scenes and great filming of a southern/midwestern town.
This is probably Steven Seagal's best movie and I would recommend it to anyone who enjoys action films.
This film is different compared to Segals other films,it hardly has any action and they seem to be focused on the plot more, rather than the action.The plot of the movie is Steven segal plays a E.P.A. agent undercover as a maintenance man to investigate a corrupt company that has been dumping toxic waste in Appalachian Mountains of Kentucky.
Most of the villains in this movie are country singers,Randy Travis has a cameo appearance.Segal falls in love with a woman everyone in the town dislikes named Sarah Kellog (Marge Hellenberger)because she was falsely accused of murdering her father when she was a child, it was actually her creepy brother Earl(Stephen Lang).
The movie was in deed a good idea,People only care about money and there gain being finacial or political for the damages they are doing to our home (earth).I think Mr.Segal was an excellent actor in this movie,I enjoy his sincerity in all of his movies.People need to see past him as a sex symbol.He is much more sofisticated in many ways and has alot of true knowledge.Mr.Segals movies should hit home with viewers who see/allow themselves to see past it just being a movie.Lets face facts,this is also a realitiy which people do not see happening.Mr.Segal I hope with inspiration will continue to do movies like Fire down below,I am not an activist only 1 person who tries to see past the movie and can honestly see the big picture.Keep it up Steven you have my vote, Sincerly Melissa.
I don't know if it's the amount of Seagal I was given or the mood I was in but this movie delivered me an entertaining time and a glimpse at one of his last better films.
It ended up being enjoyable enough to recommend to an action junkie or someone who wants to watch Steven Seagal's watchable movies..
From what I saw of it I liked it and though I maybe in the minority here I thought it was interesting and plan on watching it from start to finish.I must say I am not a real big Steven Seagel fan, I've seen little of his work and his movies do have a reputation for being extremly action oriented and violent.
Since I'm not a fan of these types of movies, I have not gone out of my way to see his work.What I liked about this film was there was a solid plot, even though I came in late I was able to grasp(something) of what was going on, I thought the acting was good, the violence was less then I imagined it would be(of coarse who knows what occured that I MISSED!!), I like Marg Helgenburger, and lastly being a big fan of atmosphere and good photography in movies, the vivid country scenes really caught my eye, they were very picturesque and I liked the country feel and mood to those scenes.
This is a unique Steven Seagal movie.It is different than his earlier films.It has good acting and the fighting scenes while not as graphic as in other Seagal films are very good.I like the story and the country side of the movie.It also stars Marg Helgenberger,Kris Kristofferson, Stephen Lang,Harry Dean Stanton, and Randy Travis!If you like Steven Seagal watch this entertaining fighting film!.
Not only was this movie terrible, as most all Steven Segal movies have been but Warner Brothers came to Eastern Kentucky to film this movie and they left town without paying several people who worked as carpenters and forgot to pay their bills and local hardware and electrical stores.
FIRE DOWN BELOW (1997) Zero StarsStarring: Steven Seagal, Marg Helgenberger, Kris Kristofferson, Brad Hunt, and Stephen Lang Director: Félix Enríquez Alcalá Running time: 105 minutes Rated R (for strong violence and some language)By Blake French: "Fire Down Below" is a dead zone of an action film.
It's a real nice movie with beautiful Kentucky scenery with a theme, a plot, a storyline that just relaxes the viewer into a real nice, comfortable evening of watching our favorite hero fighting evil, and with the persona that ONLY Seagal can do it with.
Average action movie that has a super hero formula to it.Simple but good action sequences although nothing spectacular and also there was one very bad action sequence that should have been cut out.....the scene at the Diner/Gas Station where Seagal shoots a flare from a villians hand and then shoots it again while in mid-air to snuff it off.That paricular scene was too exagerated and out of place.Still worth a look for fans of the action/martial arts/superhero genre and for big fans of the lead actors.........
The martial arts scenes were great, (showing that Seagal is the greatest martial artist to hit the movie screen), and I liked the idea of him being in the Environmental Protection Agency beating up a bunch of Hillbillies who dump toxic waste.
making the movie dreadfulSeagal stars as an agent who is investigating a cover up where toxic waste is being put in the mountains.The movie would have been at least mildly entertaining had the fights been nicely done but the fights are far to cartoony and there's nothing to like only for Seagal die hards......Not as bad as On Deadly Ground but pretty close.* (Out of four).
"Whoa." I thought about that before mentioned movie and the only thing that I can come away with is how good it was that Burt Reynolds shot those country -inbreds and thanking God that you were not the one with the sore back-end!!!"Fire Down Below", was a little of a 'departure' for Seagal I think.
Because Seagal can take out any number of bad guys regardless of the time and place, there is really no conflict in a movie like Fire Down Below and ergo, no sense of even a moments tension.
This is why the movie is neither thrilling nor riveting or any synonym, it is just amusing, at least it is enough so to make it worth watching if there is nothing else on.Seagal is Jack Taggart a fed (and a carpenter) who is sent out into the Kentucky hills to investigate the possible dumping of toxic waste by a crooked mining corporation.
Could action movies be more dull and tedious.Seagal plays Jack Taggert, an EPA agent, sent to a small (and literally sleepy) town to investigate some illegal dumping of toxic waste.
Other than fighting against thugs at the countryside, Taggert also has a relationship with a country woman, played by Marg Helgenberger and hangs out with city folk like like Harry Dean Stanton.There is one major action scene with a truck chase, but that isn't much to satisfy the film's overall running time.
Rather, let me just put it in the context of other Seagal films: it's better than "On Deadly Ground" but not as good as "Hard to Kill" and not even in the same league as "Under Siege".
But this show is pretty good since for most of the movie seagal does not act like a tough guy, just an EPA investigator trying to convict some businesses of polluting the area with toxic wastes.
Several good fight scenes in the movie that i liked but you have to ask why don't these bad guys ever carry a gun and just shoot seagal??
Steven Seagal continues his awful streak as Jack Taggart an environmental agent of some sort (The movie is unclear in this regard) who goes to a small town to fight thugs sent by a toxic waste dumper (Kris Kristofferson) in this preachy and laughable "message movie" If Steven Seagal really cares about the environment he'll stop making movies like this, which is a form of pollution in any regard..
love him or hate him,you have to admit,Steven Seagal's movies pretty much follow the same tried and true formula,which basically involves Seagal ending up on someone's bad side,and then proceeding to show off his martial arts prowess by beating up everybody in sight.well not everybody.just the bad people.this movie is no different.but hey,it works.it's nothing new or original.but if you're a Seagal fan,this should quench your thirst.like his previous movie,On Deadly Ground there's an environmental theme here too.Marg Helgenbberger(CSI Las Vegas)plays the love interest and does a good job with her character.Harry dean Stanton is also very good.There are also a lot of country stars in the movie,including Kris Kristofferson,who is very impressive.there are nice fight sequences in this one.for me,Fire Down Below is a 7/10.
Don't let the low IMDb score fool you, it's a fairly decent film.Why people may be disappointed with it is because there is more plot than action, as opposed to other Seagal films.I counted about 4 or 5 action scenes in the entire film.This may also explain the G-rating in Quebec.The fight scenes are not all that great either, but I still enjoyed the film.Seagal is his usual "not afraid of anything" kind of guy, He plays an FBI agent who is sent to a small southern town to investigate oil spills in the water.Like in "On Deadly Ground", the oil companies are again the bad guys.While Seagal is there, he befriends this woman who was accused of murdering her father back when she was a teen.We find out more about this as the story unfolds.The people who work for the oil company try to stop him, but of course Seagal can kick all of their butts.When watching this movie, do not expect wall to wall action.
this is the last seagal film that looks like it was made for the theaters - almost everything since has been intended for the video market and cable t.v.the film is actually very good, all the way up to the final ten or so minutes; unfortunately, those final scenes are so glaringly bad, they overshadow everything that's come before.there is beautiful camera-work, beautiful on-location filming, lively supporting acting, strong action scenes, a timely plot and good dialog that is sympathetic to the characters without patronizing them.
If anybody (and I mean anybody) were playing the lead role except Steven Seagal people would think this is an OK movie.
She plays opposite Steven Seagal; who is Jack Taggart an agent sent undercover(for about five whole seconds of the movie) to a tiny hick town, to try to find a witness that will testify to the suspected dumping of toxic waste in the coal mines near the town.
I've seen enough Hong Kong martial art movies with the likes of Jet Li, Jackie Chan etc, to know what looks good on film.
As for Steven Seagal, the real-life aikido master, police officer (I'm serious), blues musician & actor (I was going to include CIA agent in that list of achievements but I'm not exactly sure if Seagal ever worked for the agency for real), he tried to reinvent himself as an environmental activist, making a trilogy of films in the mid-to-late 1990s that were eco-thrillers (ON DEADLY GROUND, Fire Down Below & The Patriot)
at least in basic plot thematics, that is.Excepting On Deadly Ground, these pro-environment films almost killed Seagal's career stone dead, mainly due to being ridiculously heavy-handed – the villains are all very shrill one-dimensional cardboard cutouts & clichés; the scripts are poorly written; & the most serious flaw of all – the action scenes are poorly staged.Fire Down Below starts out in a way that seems to indicate that Seagal is planning to forsake his customary martial arts sequences for some good old fashioned investigative skills.
Of course this scripting idea first manifested itself during Seagal's debut film ABOVE THE LAW & continues in this one, with Kris Kristofferson's businessman being an evil coward who spends his working hours in the company of female escorts.The other actors are quite competent in their performances, especially Marg Helgenberger as the love interest (I kind of liked the idea to give her a shady past, but the film indifferently throws this away by making her brother turn out to have committed the deed) & Harry Dean Stanton (Brain from John Carpenter's ultra cool sci-fi classic ESCAPE FROM NEW YORK), who gives a good impression as the hick local who proves to be Seagal's greatest asset..
Marg Helgenberger was great, her part was very interesting as the forsaken woman of the town; Stephen Lang plays his usual sinister figure in a twisted character; Kristofferson was quite good and funny; and Levon Helm was the best on scene.
Classic Steven Seagal Action Movie ...
Released in 1997, "Fire Down Below" stars Steven Seagal as an EPA agent who goes undercover in SE Kentucky to investigate the evil deeds of a corporate mogul played by Kris Kristofferson & his minions, which includes dumping toxic waste in abandoned mines and murder.
Seagal has real chemistry with the lovely Marg Helgenberger and the environmental plot was solid.Seagal play an EPA agent who smells corruption in a small town, he befriends lonely widow Helgenberger and tires to clean up the town, he's thwarted by bad guy Kris Kristofferson ( in a surprisingly good performance), How he gets through is amazing, the fight scenes are excellent.The ending is the best, Seagal just walks into the casino, all cool and clam, and set Kirstofferson on his ass.
Taggart ends up blowing up almost the entire state of Kentucky leaving it contaminated and unlivable for the next hundred years; so much for Jack Taggert, or in real life Steven Seagal, being concerned for the environment.Taggert really gets into action when he has it out with Orin Jr and his gang "Working Good O'l Boys".
Few movies can.Jack Taggart (Seagal) is an EPA Agent / Professional Ninja / Carpenter extraordinaire assigned to investigate a company illegally dumping chemical waste near a small town in Kentucky.
I of course expected some martial arts work by seagal, but that's something that should be expected in any of his films (much like one would expect lots of killing in a Friday the 13th horror film).The action scenes were well done, but i found myself enjoying everything else the movie had even more.
this may sound odd, as seagal movies typically don't offer anything more than some fight scenes and a paper thin plot.The characters and the setting were what really made me want to watch.
A latter-day beat-em-up starring action man Steven Seagal in the midst of his environmentally friendly persona, this is actually better than one might expect and it turns out to be one of Seagal's best movies.
Although a shoot-out in a toxic mine is mishandled, each and every other moment of action in the film is cool and worth waiting for.Aside from Seagal, delivering once again a quietly-spoken, impassive, and eco-friendly hardman like in all of his other movies, we have some good actors turning up in the supporting cast. |
tt0238924 | The Dangerous Lives of Altar Boys | Set in the early 1970s in a suburban town in the Southern United States, the film follows the lives of protagonist Francis Doyle (Emile Hirsch), and three of his friends, Tim Sullivan (Kieran Culkin), Wade Scalisi (Jake Richardson), and Joey Anderson (Tyler Long). The four boys all attend a private Catholic school named St. Agatha's, which they detest. The boys rebel by smoking pot, drinking, obsess over girls, listening to hard rock music, and playing pranks on their teachers, such as stealing their school's statue of St. Agatha and keeping it in their clubhouse. The four friends dedicate much of their time to a comic book of their own creation titled The Atomic Trinity in order to escape the monotony and avoid the difficulties in their own lives.
After receiving a love note from Francis, which was actually written by Tim, Margie Flynn (Jena Malone) becomes a major character in the film and weaves her way into the lives of these four friends. She and Francis have an obvious connection that progresses into much more. At times, Francis must choose between his friends and Margie, which causes the group of friends to fall apart. The boys' lives are also translated into segments of animation based on the characters of The Atomic Trinity: Brakken, The Muscle, Captain Asskicker, and Major Screw; Nunzilla, based on their peglegged, overly repressive Catholic school teacher Sister Assumpta (Jodie Foster); and Sorcerella, based on Margie Flynn.
After a school field trip to the zoo, Tim and Francis have the idea of playing another prank on Sister Assumpta. They decide to drug the cougar at the local zoo and then transport it to Sister Assumpta's office to scare her. When they learn how serious Tim and Francis are, the other half of the Atomic Trinity wimp out, which leaves an unlikely group of friends consisting of Margie, Tim, and Francis. Francis soon learns that Margie had been sexually assaulted by her own brother. During gym class, Donny (Arthur Bridges), Margie's older brother, bullies Tim during class. Tim, out of pressure and his own impulsive nature, insults Donny for molesting his own sister. He regrets telling Donny, and then tells Francis who becomes angry with him. Donny takes Tim and Francis's comic, The Atomic Trinity and gives it to the nun. The violent, blasphemous and inappropriate drawings in the notebook cause Tim and Francis to be suspended, pending expulsion from the school.
In an act of final retribution, Tim, Francis, Wade, and Joey attempt to steal a cougar to place inside the school to cover up a wrecking of the school they did that night. At the zoo, a makeshift tranquilizer created from several narcotic drugs is used to put the cougar to sleep. The other three boys go down to the gate to retrieve the cougar in a cage, while Tim impulsively climbs over the fence into the cougar's den. He checks to see if the cougar is alive, and happily replies that it is. When the other boys reach the gate to retrieve the cougar, another cougar leaps at Tim, mauling him to death. At Tim's funeral, Francis quotes the poem "The Tyger" by William Blake, whom Sister Assumpta earlier condemned as a "dangerous thinker". Francis places the book at the stolen statue of St. Agatha in their hideout, and starts a new comic series dedicated entirely to the character based on Tim, Skeleton Boy. | revenge, cruelty, romantic, prank | train | wikipedia | 'The Dangerous Lives of Altar Boys' is actually a great coming-of-age tale set in the Catholic school setting of the 1970s.
or their interpretation of it.The two boys in 'The Dangerous Lives of Altar Boys' are Francis Doyle (Emile Hirsch - The Girl Next Door, The Emperor's Club) and Michael Sullivan (Kieran Culkin - Igby Goes Down, Home Alone).
The film contains some funny moments, and as the story unfolds Francis (Hirsch) becomes interested in the girl who lives next door to him Margie (Jena Malone - Saved!, Cold Mountain), a cool, nice, beautiful and independent girl with a deep and dark secret that challenges Francis.
Culkin gave an equally amazing performance in Burr Steer's neurotic and darkly hilarious film debut 'Igby Goes Down' which was released the same year as 'The Dangerous Lives of Altar Boys'.
The Dangerous Lives of Alter Boys is kind of like a cross between The Virgin Suicides and Stand By Me. Set in the 70's (featuring many cool 70's haircuts) in small town Georgia, the story focuses on Francis, a 14-year-old dreamer and troublemaker.
Group of Catholic schoolboys in the mid-1970s are obsessed with comic books, girls, and wreaking havoc on their most hated teacher, Sister Assumpta (Jodie Foster, in a nun's habit, somewhat uneasily cast but still quite good).
"Dangerous Lives of Altar Boys" is very similar to "Stand By Me," with the nice addition of a non-stereotyped girl and a stereotyped nun (played by producer Jodie Foster) in the mix.
Young love is shown the sweetest I've seen in a long time (oy, I'm still apologizing to a certain boy in my head when he was so sweet to me at that age and I didn't know how to handle it; oh well, I didn't have a script based on a book to follow.) Emile Hirsch and Jena Malone are marvelous, especially with the very serious sides of their lives, though the lousy parenting is only vaguely shown with shouting.
THE DANGEROUS LIVES OF ALTAR BOYS (2002) *** Kieran Culkin, Emile Hirsch, Jena Malone, Jodie Foster, Vincent D'Onofrio, Jake Richards, Tyler Long.
Funny and poignant coming of age story centering on two Catholic school adolescents (Culkin and Hirsch both superb) whose penchant for juvenile acts of defiance is only underscored by their innate desire to fit in and be loved while pitted against their arch nemesis, their teacher Sister Assumpta (a dourly cheeky Foster, who also produced the project), a one-legged harridan from Hell.
"The Dangerous Lives of Altar Boys" is one of the best books I've read in awhile, so I was pretty stoked to see how it translated to film.
The story revolves around Francis Doyle (Emile Hirsch) and Tim Sullivan (Kieran Culkin, who's very good), altar boys with a comic-book fixation and a resentment of authority (represented here by Jodie Foster's peg-legged Mother Superior); also on hand is Francis' love interest, Margie (Jena Malone), who reveals herself to be a complicated, tragic figure.As far as revisiting adolescence is concerned, "The Dangerous Lives of Altar Boys" is accurate, funny, and even sad.
'The Dangerous Lives of Altar Boys', directed by Peter Case, is a coming of age story about two boys, Francis (Emile Hirsch) Tim (Kieran Culkin) who supplement their boredom at Catholic school and their home lives by playing pranks and working on their own comic book.
'The Dangerous Lives of Altar Boys' has been praised for its creativity and the mixed genres, (the film turns into a Todd McFarlane produced form of anime at times) but even these moments were just plain boring.
Jodie Foster, as always, is wonderful in the film, but despite the fact that she is supposedly the evil nemesis, she has an aggregate screen time of perhaps ten minutes, so there wasn't enough of her to truly enjoy.Generally, films that deal with topics such as incest, ghosts, and untamed youth are at least thought-provoking, but 'The Dangerous Lives of Altar Boys' didn't provoke anything in me but boredom.
The movie doesn't try to stay out of the argument, mind you, it just seems very confused as to what it thinks.The animated sequences, meant to illustrate the lead character's emotional thinking, are the best element of the film.
Bottom line, read the book, or rent this movie in a few months (if you can find it) only to admire Jena Malone and the fairly interesting animation from that guy who did "Spawn." The character interaction was horrible, the story was muddled and unrealistic, and what was an amazing novel is now a pointless movie...I've been wanting to make a film out of this book for years, and now its been done and destroyed.
I couldn't quite reconcile seeing her in a nun's wimple, and playing a stereotypical "bad nun." On the other hand, the casting of Emile Hirsch as Francis, Kieran Culkin as his best friend Tim, and the unrecognizable Vincent D'Onofrio as Father Casey was brilliant.
Religion, School and Pranks gone Bad. This film, set in the religious environment many adults grew up with tells the story of four boys, who's personal lives become intertwined with their fertile imaginations.
Well now we have a film that tends to capture some of the child's mind qualities of "stand by me" mixed creatively with some creative cinematic and an interesting plot line.The story follows four friends going to a catholic school and getting together causing trouble drawing comics and otherwise being boys.
`The Dangerous Lives of Altar Boys' is NOT, as you might expect, a film about predatory priests, but rather a slice-of-life tale about four malcontent Catholic schoolboys who spend most of their free time devising preposterously elaborate and life-threatening practical jokes to play on the faculty members of their school.As a coming-of-age drama, the film is fairly conventional in its plotting - i.e. young boys, in their rebellion against the uncomprehending adult world, experiment with drugs, first love, sex and general rule breaking - although there is a tricky and touchy incest-related subplot that is handled with a certain amount of delicacy and sensitivity.
The highlight of the movie is the outstanding performances delivered by youngsters Emile Hirsch, Kieran Culkin and Jena Malone, whom you might remember as the young Jodie Foster in `Contact.' In fact, Foster herself appears in this film (in addition to co-producing it) as the uptight nun, Sister Assumpta.
Unfortunately, her character is probably the least well developed one in the film, a fact that seems more obvious than it otherwise might if an actress of Foster's caliber were not playing the part.The film also displays a nice feeling for its early-70's setting and does a good job capturing the way young people actually speak and communicate (the cast members have their nonverbal expressions and gestures down beautifully as well).
Working from the novel by Chris Fuhrman, screenwriters Jeff Stockwell and Michael Petroni, along with director Peter Care, interrupt the live action at regular intervals to provide animated sequences that are ostensibly derived from the anarchic superhero comic book on which the gifted boys are collaborating.
We know that these sequences are intended to provide a kind of fantasy alternate universe for these troubled kids who seem to find no meaning in the restricted world of religion and rules in which they find themselves, but the fact is that these sections of the film, not very creative in themselves, merely serve to thrust us out of the story at crucial moments.`The Dangerous Lives of Altar Boys' is an odd and somewhat misleading title for this film, since most of the `danger' these boys face is, primarily, a product of their own stupidity and not of their religious upbringing.
`The Dangerous Lives of Altar Boys' is an uneven film, but the superb performances by its youthful cast members make it ultimately worth seeing..
Somewhat brash and completely unapologetic, Altar Boys delves the minds of 14-year-old boys in all their hormonal and conflicted glory; from the imaginary alter-lives they lead in the collusive effort of creating comic book heroes to Frances's first love testing the bounds of their friendship in ways both startling and completely expected, to an riotously-14-year-old-inspired plot to kill the nun they so detest - played with great reserve, yet to great effect by Jodie Foster - by loosing a cougar into her office, it's no-holds-barred and (at least I expect) dead-to-rights in depicting the indefatigability of boys' imagination and penchant for mischief.I am all about the characters and these were interesting and charming and exasperating; silly and rotten and exhilarating.
I love how they put the cartoon bits in at exactly the right time and still let the movie run smoothly.It's a very tragic portrayal of 4 young boys', but mostly focusing on Francis and Tim, journey in growing up, and learning some of life's hard lessons.If you liked this movie, I strongly recommend reading the book.
The two main characters, Francis Doyle (Emile Hirsch) and Tim Sullivan (Kieran Culkin) really capture the realism of going through the changes that happen around the era of 13-16 years of age.
it's kind of funny how things happen, though, because the first time i attempted to watch this movie the dvd broke right when they were stealing the statue, and up until that point it had been really funny, so when i went to watch it again i figured it would be a really funny movie, but right after the statue part it starts getting serious, and also really good.the acting is solid all the way around, but kieran culkin is the best actor of the bunch.
THE DANGEROUS LIVES OF ALTAR BOYS is the latest in a long tradition of coming-of-age stories, and a pretty good one at that.
Francis discovers about life, death, love, and pain, and all these revelations surprise the audience just as much as they surprise Francis.Live action in the movie is interposed with the comic book adventures of Brakken and the Muscle, the superheroes who are Francis and his friend Tim's alter egos.
It's a wonderful addition, adding a physical journey to Francis's confusing emotional journey.All in all, a very competent film, made more so by wonderful performances from Kieran Culkin, Jena Malone, and Emile Hirsch..
The Dangerous Lives of Altar Boys is a darkly comic, touching coming-of-age story that could have turned into by-the-book teenage drivel, but is rescued by the performances of Kieran Culkin, Emile Hirsch and Jena Malone and some very cool animation by Spawn creator Todd McFarlane..
I'm not Catholic nor a teen, but I found this movie very interesting and entertaining.The interaction between all the kids was pretty real and the dialog did not seem juvenile.Although not normally a fan of animation, that portion worked OK in this movie because it was the outward expression of the kids' imagination.Of the 7 primary actors, Jodie Foster had the weakest character as "nunzilla".
Perhaps it was just the nature of the character.Vincent D'Onofrio was entertaining as the smoking, swearing priest (and apparently in the book he was a womanizer, too.)The 4 boys were all pretty good, but Jena Malone probably had the toughest role as the girl with a secret, and she was very good.The whole cougar plot-point was a bit much, and the dog scene came from nowhere, but the rest was very satisfying.The extras on the DVD were good, too.P.S. Originally I could not get this DVD to play in "widescreen" as it was advertised from Amazon.
This is a great and wonderful film and i think that everyone should see it.I really related to it.I went to a catholic school like the boys in the film and are the same age as they would be now.I dealed with drinking and girls just like the boys did.The film will bring back old memories and remind you how hard it was being 14.It's a great film with comedy and drama.It really shows whats going on inside their heads.I also recommend reading the book its even better.
Hollywood, and the public in general, loves a good coming of age story (or a bad one, for that matter), and so film makers produce a score of them each year.
The only problem is that Hollywood has developed a formula for such movies, with the result that they have become increasingly cliched."The Dangerous Lives of Altar Boys" is the least cliched coming of age story I've ever seen.
As much as I loved this movie and related to the characters, I never felt the obligatory twinge of nostalgia for the "good old days" that so many movies of this genre try to evoke."The Dangerous Lives of Altar Boys" is one of the best films I've seen in a long time.
But the real stars of "Altar Boys", Kieran Culkin, Emile Hirsch, and Jena Malone produce outstanding portrayals of American teenagers.
This movie is one of my favourites.It is filled with emotion,love and the lives of four teenage boys, who try to find their way through a comic book.This movie completely indicates teenage-love and what is going through a normal average teenage boy, through girls,drugs,revenge on their nun-teacher, and yes even life it's self.This movie will open you up into a whole new way showing two boys trust and friendship for one another.If I could understand how their gut feeling was,there's no doubt in my mind you won't either..
The Dangerous Lives of Altar Boys is a wonderful movie different from all others, and that is why I liked it so much.
Culkin and newcomer Emile Hirsch carry the film ably as Tim and Francis, a pair of trouble-making Catholic School boys who spend their days dreaming about women, mischeif and comic books.
It's a solid performance, though he fails to make any real connection with the audience, most likely due to the fact that Tim is quite simply not an easy character to embrace.The most subtle and understated performance in the film is turned in by Jodie Foster, who though she lacks enough screen time to adequately develop her character nevertheless manages to succinctly reveal exactly who she is and what she's about.
i just watched this movie last night and i must say it's one of the best indie-style films that i've seen all year...the acting was amazing, as one has come to expect from all of jena malone's films...the plot was light enough to give you a laugh and dark enough to make you cry...the dangerous lives of altar boys dives into many issues including puberty and catholicism...a must see for any indie buff....
'The Dangerous Lives of Altar Boys' follows the adventures of a group of fourteen-year-old boys that express their rebellion against their Catholic school upbringing by drawing comics and plotting exotic vengeance against their nemesis - Sister Assumpta (Jodie Foster, also a co-producer).
The focus is on instigator and plotter Tim Sullivan (Kieran Culkin), whose family life is so dysfunctional it's given attention in morning prayers in class; and dreamer and storyteller Francis Doyle (Emile Hirsch), who is the heart and soul of the piece and the creator of the Atomic Trinity - the comic-book alter egos of the boys.
The Dangerous Lives of Altar Boys, the film, is about four 14-year-old boys (two main ones, two friends) and their comic-book altar egos (illustrated by Todd McFarlane and intertwined into the story) coping with life, love and adolescence in the wake of the 70s and Catholic School.
Tim Sullivan (Keiran Culkin), Francis's best friend, attempts to totally escape reality by engaging in a series of childish pranks geared towards p***ing-off their teacher, Sister Assumpta (Jodie Foster), a one-legged nun (the other is prosthetic) who is actually trying to help the boys, but it seen as a cruel authority figure.
I think the Dangerous Lives of Altar Boys is a great movie, the best I've seen so far this year.
Despite veering wildly away from the novel, the film does a great job of transposing moments of boredom-inspired adolescent lunacy with aching transcendence (the scene in which Francis, the protagonist, akwardly talks to his dream girl Margie for the first time made MY heart flutter, and I haven't been 14 for a while!)Still, I wished that the scriptwriters had stuck closer to the book in some respects, especially detailing Francis' home life, which would have given greater insight into WHY he uses his drawing as an escape(and he has a heavy-duty reason to escape).
Despite veering wildly away from the novel, the film does a great job of transposing moments of boredom-inspired adolescent lunacy with aching transcendence (the scene in which Francis, the protagonist, akwardly talks to his dream girl Margie for the first time made MY heart flutter, and I haven't been 14 for a while!)Still, I wished that the scriptwriters had stuck closer to the book in some respects, especially detailing Francis' home life, which would have given greater insight into WHY he uses his drawing as an escape(and he has a heavy-duty reason to escape).
This movie has a lot of elements seen in other works about coming of age, such as "Stand by Me" and "Dead Poet's Society." The young actors are engaging and well-directed, and Jodie Foster puts in a great supporting role as a comically desperate nun trying to keep them in line.
To wrap it all up, it was a great movie for anyone who remembers life at 14, it was a new and exciting concept mixing McFarlane cartoons into "the dangerous lives" of these 4 "altar boys"..
A group of adolescent boys attending a Catholic school get into trouble through their various shenanigans, and they imagine themselves as superheros fighting a group of evil nuns on motorcycles (superb animated sequences by Todd McFarlane run parallel to the live action film).
Let the coming of age movie begin.Francis and his friends have one problem Sister Assumpta (Jodie Foster, Panic Room).
Kierian Culkin does a wonderful job.Heartbreaking, and actually pretty funny at times, THE DANGEROUS LIVES OF ALTAR BOYS is indeed one of the best films I have seen all year. |
tt4468634 | Certain Women | Certain Women explores a handful of intersecting lives across Montana.
Lawyer Laura Wells (Laura Dern) has been dealing with a disgruntled client, Fuller (Jared Harris), for eight months. Out of work after a work place injury caused a disability he has taken to visiting Laura repeatedly at her office. As he will not listen to her advice she takes him to another lawyer who, after assessing the case, tells Fuller exactly what Laura told him; that though his company was at fault for his injuries he can no longer sue them after accepting their initial nominal settlement. On the way home from visiting the second lawyer Fuller feuds with his wife and is kicked out of their car and takes a ride back with Laura. On the way home, he tells her he wants to shoot his former employers.
That night Laura arrives at Fuller's former place of employment where he has taken hostage a security guard. After being prepped by police Laura goes and finds Fuller who has her read the case file his company has on him and the lawsuit. Laura reads the entire file which details how Fuller was cheated out of his settlement. He decides to let the guard go and then asks Laura to stall for him by going to the front and telling the police of his demands as if he has a gun pointed at her while he slips out the back. Instead Laura immediately tells the police where Fuller is and he is arrested.
Gina and Ryan Lewis (Michelle Williams and James Le Gros) are a married couple with a teenage daughter building their own home from the ground up. Gina feels that Ryan constantly undermines her with their daughter and is annoyed by his behaviour. On their way home from the campsite of their new home, they decide to stop at the home of Albert (René Auberjonois), an elderly man they know, to try to persuade him to sell them the sandstone on his property. As they talk Gina tries to persuade Albert to sell her the sandstone, but he interrupts her repeatedly and seems only interested in talking with Ryan. Eventually Albert tentatively agrees to give the sandstone to Gina and Ryan, and Gina, who has been secretly recording the conversation, signals that they should leave. In the car on their way home she finds it ridiculous how easily she was able to obtain the sandstone.
Sometime later Gina and Ryan arrive and load up a truck full of the sandstone. She notices Albert watching from his window and waves at him but he does not wave back.
Jamie (Lily Gladstone) is a ranch hand living in isolation during the winter, tending to horses on a farm outside Belfry. Heading into town one night, she sees cars turning into the school and follows them. She learns she has stumbled onto a class on school law taught by a young lawyer, Beth Travis (Kristen Stewart). Jamie goes out to eat with Beth after class, and Beth explains that she lives in Livingston which is a four-hour drive away, so she must make the eight-hour round trip twice a week to make it back in time for her real job.
Despite having no interest in education law, Jamie returns to class week after week. One week she brings one of her horses to class, and she and Beth ride the horse to the diner. The following week, she is stunned when she learns Beth has quit and a new teacher is brought in as a permanent replacement. Jamie then immediately leaves the class and drives straight to Livingston. Spending the night in her car, she spends the morning driving to law offices hoping to find Beth. Locating her address, Jamie sees Beth in the parking lot and told her she drove over knowing that if she didn't she would never see her again. Beth fails to respond and so Jamie leaves abruptly. On her way home, she falls asleep at the wheel and plows into an empty field.
Laura visits Fuller in prison where he tells her his wife left him for a man in prison and implores Laura to write to him.
At the site of their new home Gina looks at her pile of sandstone with satisfaction.
Back at the ranch Jamie tends to the horses, still painfully alone.
The three stories intersect in passing: Laura is having an affair with Gina's husband Ryan, and Jamie inquires at Laura's firm while searching for Beth. | romantic | train | wikipedia | Pretty much every day life for some of us, nothing exciting, as much drama as watching the neighbor let the dog out...and sometimes that's more interesting than this film was.Apparently this is one of the director's best works.
Writer/director Kelly Reichardt (Wendy and Lucy, 2008) has adapted the short stories from Maile Meloy into a film with 3 segments focusing on the daily perseverance of three women in small town Montana (including a rare Wyoming joke).The first segment has lawyer Laura Dern returning to the office after an
umm
"long lunch meeting".
The issues on display here include the lack of respect for a female attorney, her unsatisfying personal life, and the one-way trust that can happen in times of desperation.In the next story, we follow Michelle Williams and her husband James LeGros as they meet with a lonely elderly neighbor (Rene Auberjonis) and offer to buy some limestone blocks that have been sitting on his property for decades.
The subtlety of the conversation embodies the missing respect and power of Ms. Williams' character.Emotions are exploding beneath the surface in the third segment featuring horse handler Lily Gladstone as she stumbles into a class being taught by Kristen Stewart, and is immediately captivated by the smart young teacher.
And let's not get started on assertions that it's "required viewing."And like all independent films that are directed by people so entranced by their own sense of magnificence, this film ends abruptly with an unprompted, unmotivated CUT to black in the middle of yet another meaningless scene.Reichardt's choice of when to end raises the burning question: Why wait for this dull, repetitive, meaningless scene when virtually every scene before it would have served the same point?What disturbs me most, is that someone thought this was worth funding..
This movie has great actors and was playing at Amerst Cinema which usually shows only very good films, many independent.
into the movie but to tell you more of the plot would spoil your viewing experience, you'll just have to see for yourself how it all plays out.Couple of comments: this is the latest movie from writer-director-editor Kelly Reichardt, the acclaimed indie movie director who previously brought us "Wendy & Lucy" and "Meek's Cutoff" (both starring Michelle Williams, who returns here as well).
The movie brings three basically unrelated stories (based on Maile Meloy's collection "Both Ways Is the Only Way I Want It"), and they all involve very ordinary people and ordinary lives that are shook up in one way or another (I'm biting my lips here, but won't spoil anything).
I feel rather sorry for that person that he or she cannot appreciate a high quality movie like "Certain Women" (it is not a coincidence that this is rated 96% fresh on Rotten Tomatoes)."Certain Women" premiered at the Sundance film festival earlier this year to great acclaim, and finally opened this past weekend at my local art-house theater here in Cincinnati.
You know from the movie previews and the rumblings from the multiplex's adjacent theater that today's movies are heavily weighted toward "action films." Writer-director-editor Kelly Reichardt could singlehandedly reverse that trend with Certain Women, which can most succinctly be described as an "inaction film." It's kind of hard to get used to Reichardt's pace, so you might watch this and think "Wha---?" Here, the drama is at the deep inside the characters, hidden from all views except the closest.
Big Sky Country, Montana, is the modern setting: Billings, Bozeman, and environs, the places where three women are ignored by men, misunderstood by both men and women, and call many of the shots that may end up putting food on their tables and courage in their hearts.Although feminists should be proud of the three heroines in Certain Women, their actions are not so much the stuff of heroics as they mostly navigate around misogyny and sloth in a world that mostly listens to men first even if the women are right most of the time.Laura Wells (Laura Dern) is an attorney with not really a thriving practice, but she gets along.
That she is the one to confront him, and not a crisis squad, is one of the stories' touches that clarifies why the heroines are "certain" women.Gina Lewis (Michelle Williams) is building a prairie house, part of which will be built with a pile of stones, she, not her husband, tries to convince an old man to sell.
The real drama bleeds out of the actors' interior depictions, the personal strength that overcomes diminishment by the vast plains, snow-capped mountains, and weak men.Because the three episodes are derived from native Maile Maloy's short stories, Certain Women is a tour de force of feminism disguised as rambling stories of women making a hard living in a hard West.
This trilogy feels like a film school end of term project.Nice try and some good shots, but if you want to get paid...Might get an academy award if there was one for "three slices of boring lives."MY GF and I searched long and hard and after significant stretching decided the theme here might belawyers get involved with strange, lonely people and need a lot of discipline to detach from those who cannot be helped and sometimes, especially women, they are stuck to their tar baby clients...Though it's not clear the one certain woman is a lawyer, she might be.This will have great value for film students as a lesson in how to make a nicely shot movie that goes nowhere.
Kelly Reichardt surely makes films like no one else right now, and without really trying too hard to be different, edgy, or unique.
Weaving together four reserved women's lives in Livingston, Montana may not sound like the kind of film that could climb its way into your innermost guts and set up a campfire; But that is exactly what this revelatory film did for me.Reichardt's all-star cast members give some of their greatest recent performances, led by Laura Dern as a lovelorn lawyer, Michelle Williams as a persistent progressive parent, and Kristen Stewart as an obliviously motivated 20-something.
Like all of Kelly Reichardt's previous treasures — OLD JOY (2006), WENDY & LUCY (2008), MEEK'S CUTOFF (2010), NiGHT MOVES (2013) — her understanding of classic American cinema is boundless, allowing her to re-envision those stories and images, breathing her very particular brand of stoic yearning into each and every gesture.Review is from my 2016 Sundance Film Festival wrap up at www.48hills.org.
I expect that certain social justice warriors and some feminists will be attracted to it because it presents and it frames the vignettes in ways that are supposed to tell the stories of the characters depicted therein from a gynocentric perspective and, indeed, people who don't consider themselves to be social justice warriors or feminists should be able to pick up on that, but in the end, it all seems a little too self-conscious and affected for my tastes.
It made me feel in a way I have never felt before watching a movie with how real and how much I, and most people can relate to her in life whether someone is alone, or just lonely in our heads.
Set in the rural West, the film features an impressive cast that includes Laura Dern, Michelle Williams, Kristen Stewart, and newcomer Lily Gladstone All are complex and resilient characters, yet individuals who resist any outward expression of their inner feelings.
In the longest and most powerful of the three stories, lawyer Beth Travis (Kristen Stewart, "Personal Shopper") has to drive four hours each way to teach an evening class on Education Law. One of the attendees, Jamie (Lily Gladstone, "Subterranea") is a lonely rancher who shows up each week to the class even though she is not registered.
Apparently physically attracted to the instructor, they meet after each class at the local diner, but the conversation about Beth's awful drive to and from work is less important than the poignant expressions on Jamie's face, looks that longingly search for clues that her attachment to Beth might be mutual.Though not overtly sexual, their ride on Jamie's horse back to her car is as subtle and as lovely an erotic expression as I've seen on film and Gladstone's rich and heartfelt performance deserves to be remembered at Oscar time.
Like other Reichardt's films, Certain Women moves very slowly without the aid of any background music to cue our emotions and can be challenging for those uncomfortable without thrill-a-minute action.
Viewers who appreciate grounded stories about resilient and intelligent characters, however, will be moved by the film's honest portrayal of real people.
He understands what the couple wants, and he says OK, but it's never clear if he grasps exactly what is going on.In the third episode, Kristen Stewart plays a young lawyer, who works in Livingston, but has taken an extra job teaching educational law to local teachers in a town four hours away.
The three stories of Certain Women are all set in and around the same small town in Montana and are also loosely connected (a few side characters show up in different segments which are more of a distraction than a convincing narrative thread).
The women of the three stories are Laura (Laura Dern) a personal injury lawyer dealing with a disabled and embittered client who won't accept that he signed away his rights, Gina (Reichardt's muse Michelle Williams, working with her fort the third time) an uptight woman trying to get the material needed for her dream home, and Jamie (newcomer Lily Gladstone, amazing), a lonely rancher who unexpectedly falls for a lawyer she meets in the strangest of circumstances.
In Kelly Reichardt's haltingly beautiful Certain Women, three seemingly disparate stories play out in Montana.
Contrast the "hardships" of their lives with those of hard-working Native American Jamie, played so beguilingly by newcomer Lily Gladstone, and it's difficult to feel much sympathy for them.In my favorite of the three stories, Kristen Stewart's character, Beth, is particularly devoid of empathy.
I'm italian and the only purpose I can see in this movie, besides wasting two hours of my life watching it, is to let me understand how empty and boring some american lives are.My message to the director: please do a favour to yourself and to everybody else and change employment, for example find a ranch and attend horses....
In each episode the development of characters is done progressively the more the story goes on as each is introduced, the first episode focuses on Laura (Laura Dern) a lawyer whom is very praised in her work place and her case is to focus on a man Fuller (Jarred Harris), who has no will of life and she has to try to make that better.
Overall Certain Women is a very quiet story that focuses on the aesthetics of passion, life, longing with a severe amount of patience and strong-willed people with flaws and human senses, it's a beautiful mix of themes in the characters and has a gorgeous mid-western setting surrounding the film, and it's as if this story came out of nowhere.
Laura Dern and Jacob Harris take up the most successful story, and Lily Gladstone (who makes a connection, whether it's fully romantic or not will be up to each audience member to decide) the most emotional, and the one that doesn't work is Michelle Williams's segment, where the story feels too flat.I don't necessarily need a lot of 'stakes', in screen writing parlance, to get through this film, but there's at least with the Dern and Gladstone stories something that is driving the story forward, something firm that they want that can make those moments where Reichardt's camera and editing take on their leisurely pace (some may want to say languid but that's not totally fair.With the Williams story, where it's about her and her husband visiting an old friend (who may have lost some of his memories) and seeing to get some rocks or stones for their new home, it feels too slight to be substantial, at least to me.
I understand in the slimmest terms what it connects to the other women in the story - having that constant struggle to persevere with what life gives you, whether it's a nutty client (Jacob Harris' character, one of the best things about the film, which may be ironic depending on what you look to get out of it) - but there still wasn't enough *there* there in such a brief number of minutes.It may sound like I'm hard on the film, but it's only because Kelly Reichardt is one of the most singular and beautifully low-key voices in American independent cinema, regardless of gender.
Certain Women seems to me like the sort of production that used to be much more common at the Sundance film festival in the 1980's, albeit with more of a "name" cast here to an extent, where the focus is about characters facing deceptively simple but significant dramatic obstacles in their small town lives, whether it's finding a connection to another person (Gladstone to Stewart, the former gives an amazingly restrained performance and all the better for it in her context, Stewart too though she's mostly oblivious to any stronger feelings from the other character), or unable to connect (Dern to Harris).
For us, the combo of Kelly Reichardt's terse visual style and Maile Meloy's subtle, affecting stories of Montana life was irresistible.The first two episodes flit by pretty quickly, like pages from an indie sketchbook, and don't have all that much impact, tbh: A small-town lawyer (Laura Dern) has to intercede when a difficult client (Jared Harris) tries to take the law into his own hands; a couple (Michelle Williams, a Reichardt standby, and James Le Gros) pay a call on a neighbor (Rene Auberjonois) who has a heap of sandstone on his property they covet for the house they're building.In the third, and most substantial episode, a shy ranch girl (Lily Gladstone) wanders into an adult ed class "because I saw people goin' in" and imprints on the teacher (an unglamorous Kristen Stewart).
Not much is said, and very little happens, but this final episode leaves you with a very strong feeling--almost more like a real-life experience than a movie--of the loneliness and isolation of this beautiful, empty country.
Certain WomenThe problem that itches throughout the course of these kind of movies is that it focuses on separate characters individually and the audience might not have the reason to hold on to it all the way to the end if there is nothing binding them all but still the writer-director Kelly Reichardt's attempt is plausible as the first hour runs by smoothly.
In rural / small-town Montana, three stories interact: a lawyer (Laura Dern) seems unable to set boundaries with an ex-client (Jared Harris) who is unhinged and deranged; a rather uptight woman (Michelle Williams) tries to find motivation in building a new home even though her husband and teenage daughter are growing more and more distant from her; a young rancher (Lily Gladstone) is infatuated with a recent law graduate (Kristen Stewart) who arrives in her town twice a week to teach an educational law night class."Certain Women" is written and directed by Kelly Reichardt and based on short stories by Maile Meloy.
It doesn't seem as though indie darling Kelly Reichardt will be changing her directing tact anytime soon.Becoming well known for her intimate, slow-moving and character driven character studies (that more often than not star Michelle Williams), Reichardt's film aren't for everyone but there is often a quiet power to Reichardt's stories that can't be denied.Hitting a peak with lost dog drama Wendy and Lucy and losing her way with the sleep inducing female driven western Meek's Cutoff, Certain Women is middle of the road Reichardt that see's the Florida born filmmaker examine the lives of 3 separate women in the American state of Montana, each going through their own various journey's in this great big world.There's barely an ounce of character development or backstory as we're thrust into these women's everyday lives, from Laura Dern's lawyer Laura dealings with Jared Harris's potentially dangerous client Fuller, Michelle William's hardworking mother and wife Gina and Lily Gladstone's The Rancher's strange fondness for Kristin Stewart's class instructor Elizabeth and while these women's stories are intriguing to a sense, there's never a good enough set-up or reward to truly make this intertwining story truly memorable.As per usual with a Reichardt film, Certain Women looks great in a quietly poetic way and the acting is universally good, without ever delivering any big character moments or situations for Reichardt's cast to shine at their brightest levels but it's hard to fully invest yourself into a film that feels rather emotionally cold and a problem that sometimes manifests itself in such narrative structures, some of Certain Women's most interesting plot points seem to end as we're thrust back into another characters life, making us feel as though we're being a little ripped off by a story that had more to give us.Final Say – Reichardt's ponderous and deliberately paced drama will be a treat for her small yet passionate fan base while for the rest of us, Certain Women is a well-intentioned and finely acted drama that never hooks us into its world in a way that would've made it more readily accessible and easily recommendable.2 ½ short-legged farm dogs out of 5.
Three key stories of women didn't catch my attention so I felt myself like I was watching some rough material work for some reason.
A very pro women movie to be certain but for the stories it told, things made sense and never felt preachy.
Oh wait, yes, the woman in the third story had a crush on Kristen Stewart's character, a lawyer, who worked in the same town as Laura Dern, though not even at the same law firm. |
tt0071773 | Lost in the Stars | In August 1949, in the South African village of Ndotsheni ("The Hills of Ixopo"), the black Anglican priest of St. Mark's Church, the Rev. Stephen Kumalo, learns from a letter from his brother (John Kumalo, who lives in Johannesburg) that their sister is in trouble. Stephen decides to travel to Johannesburg to help his sister; he will also seek his son, Absalom, who works in the mines ("Thousands of Miles"). In Johannesburg, Stephen learns that his sister will not leave but she asks him to take care of her young son, Alex.
He finally locates his son Absalom, who had been in jail. Absalom now plans with his friends to steal, so they can get enough money to avoid a life in the gold mines. Absalom's pregnant girlfriend Irina tries to convince him not to take part, but he goes ahead with his plan ("Trouble Man"). During the robbery, Absalom kills Arthur Jarvis, a white friend of his father, Stephen. As Absalom is jailed, Stephen wonders how to tell his wife, Grace, and he realizes he is facing a crisis of faith ("Lost in the Stars").
Stephen knows that his son could either tell a lie and live or tell the truth and die. He prays for guidance ("O Tixo, Tixo, Help Me"). At the trial, Absalom's two friends lie to the court and are freed, but Absalom, truly repentant, tells the truth and is sentenced to hang ("Cry, the Beloved Country"). Stephen performs a wedding between Absalom and Irina in prison and then returns home to Ndotsheni with Irina and Alex. Alex and the child of Arthur Jarvis meet and start to become friends ("Big Mole"). Stephen tells his flock he can no longer be their minister, and their faith is now also shaken ("A Bird of Passage").
On the still-dark morning of the execution, Stephen waits alone for the clock to strike ("Four O'Clock"). Unexpectedly, the father of the murdered man pays him a visit. He tells Stephen that he has realized that they have both lost sons. Out of recognition of their mutual sorrow, and despite their different races, he offers his friendship, and Stephen accepts. | murder | train | wikipedia | Worthwhile Yet Rarely Seen Version Of The Broadway Musical. Alan Paton's novel CRY THE BELOVED COUNTRY made for a dramatic musical with a score by Kurt Weill. American Film Theater's adaption of it contains excellent performances by Brock Peters, Clifton Davis, Melba Davis, Paula Kelly (her musical number is one of the film's highlights) and Raymond St. Jacques, but sadly is rarely seen. The movie itself is a little slow, but the score is beautifully rendered by the cast, and contains the heart of Paton's story.. tribute to Brock Peters. I waited a long time for AFT to release their films from the early 70s, and this one was one of the best I've seen so far. It is truly one of the best screen musicals of all time, the songs being more operatic in that they are so charged emotionally and delivered with great feeling. You will not be humming a catchy ditty after the movie ends, but in its place will be a sense of sadness as well as buoyant nobility. As an indictment of apartheid, it stands supreme in film, with the possible exception of "Amandla!" which of course was made later and gets to have the happy ending of the long struggle.I have also long been a fan of Brock Peters, who died last summer, and watching "Lost in the Stars" only emphasized how much I missed him in film after his career started with such great roles in "To Kill a Mockingbird," "The Pawnbroker," and "Porgy and Bess." He did have a long and consistent career in TV and voice-over work (one of the greatest voices ever!) but film roles were few and far between. His singing and acting here are nothing short of grand.. Reconciliation And Hope. The one musical production of that batch of classics that the American Film Institute produced in 1973-1974 is this classic Kurt Weill-Maxwell Anderson adaption of Alan Paton's Cry the Beloved Country. Lost in the Stars is listed as a musical tragedy and that is an apt description. There are few laughs in this one.There was a non-musical film of Cry the Beloved Country done in 1950 under British auspices that was shot in the Union of South Africa right under the noses of the apartheid government. Canada Lee was an impressive Stephen Kumalo in search of his runaway son in Johannesburg. Brock Peters ably fills those shoes and sings the Weill-Anderson songs magnificently.Kumalo is a minister who's son Absalom, played by Clifton Davis, like his biblical namesake has grown up to be a major disappointment. While in Johannesburg he falls in with bad company, impregnates Melba Moore, and participates in an armed robbery gone bad where he shoots a wealthy white landowner's son. As it turns out the deceased was quite the liberal on race relations which complicates a difficult situation.Still Peters does what he can to pick up the pieces of his tattered family and together with the father of the deceased try to mend their lives. The two are aching symbols of a country torn terribly apart by racism.Weill's best known songs from Lost in the Stars are the title song and Our Little Grey House and Stay Well. Bing Crosby recorded both of the last two which are sung by Peters and Moore respectively on the film back when the show was in its first run on Broadway. Frank Sinatra did a superb version of Lost in the Stars on his album The Concert Sinatra and that song is sung by Peters in the film.Brock Peters had done a revival of Lost in the Stars on Broadway in 1972 so we are lucky indeed to have his performance preserved on film.Lost in the Stars was a tragic show that carried a message that men of good will can still live together despite the awful things we do to each other. Though Alan Paton died before the apartheid government finally fell, Brock Peters lived long enough to see the peaceful revolution of South Africa, remarkable as our own civil rights revolution or the change in government in India where whole societies did not raise the sword to create change. The show is about reconciliation and hope and should not be missed.. An interesting variation on Paton's book & the Kurt Weill/Maxwell Anderson musical. This film, based loosely on the acclaimed Broadway play (1949-50; '58; '72) of the same name, was one of 14 film adaptations of plays (& only its second musical) produced by Ely Landau, for an organization he called the American Film Theater. All AFT produced films were seen only in a pre-paid subscription series over 2 seasons ('73-'74, '74-'75) in 500 theaters in 400 cities. These AFT films were released in a KINO DVD set in 2003. (this info from Wikipedia)Stars: Brock Peters (the Rev. Kumalo), Melba Moore (Irina), Raymond St. Jacques (John Kumalo), Clifton Davis (Absalom), Paul Rogers (Jarvis). Plot: A rural, black Anglican priest, the Rev. Kumalo, in 1940s apartheid segregated South Africa searches for his son, Absalom, who'd gone to Johannesburg and stopped contacting his family. Kumalo eventually finds Absalom and his pregnant girlfriend, Irina--but also that Absalom's being charged with murdering a young white man (Jarvis's son), a man unlike his father who'd been very active in helping blacks and opposing apartheid. (The translation of "apartheid" is "aparthood" = legalized racial/ethnic segregation).The "Lost in the Stars" Broadway musical from which the music of this film is taken is based on Alan Paton's VERY influential 1948 novel, "Cry, the Beloved Country." Paton's book (banned in South Africa for many decades) helped foster civil rights changes in the USA as well as probably many diplomatic pressures on South Africa that helped end apartheid (1948-94). "Cry, the Beloved Country" has been published world-wide in 20 different languages and made into 2 other films (1951, 1995) of that name.Paton was a devout Anglican ("Anglican" = Episcopalian in the USA) South African who strongly opposed apartheid as did a number of other South African people and denominations (e.g., Roman Catholic, Methodist, Presbyterian, etc.; but even altogether, these denominations were a political minority in South Africa).Kurt Weill's & Maxwell Anderson's Broadway musical "Lost in the Stars" closely followed but simplified Paton's narrative. This film adaptation takes great liberties with their narrative version of Paton's book although keeping its title and most of (or all?) the music.The plot is essentially a modern day morality play with 2 major protagonists: the black Rev. Kumalo represents Christian ideals that conflict with the wealthy white landowners' (Jarvis's) desire to preserve apartheid segregation. A slightly lesser but significant figure is the Rev. Kumalo's brother, John. He takes a political, NON-religious, angry stance (opposed to his brother's faith-based non-violence) exhorting blacks to oppose & defeat the empowered whites who keep blacks permanently disenfranchised and in extremely inferior status.This version of the stage musical isn't like those Hollywood musicals in which narrative actions stop for singing; in this, the songs always seem very integral to the narrative's development. But it presents its own version of Paton's book and certainly bears little resemblance to Weill's & Anderson's Broadway play except for the music.Several emotional interactions seem more intense (IMO) than in the original musical OR in the '95 film, "Cry, the Beloved Country." The ideological conflict between the Kumalo brothers is emphasized perhaps more than in the '95 film. BUT, inexplicably, in THIS musical film version--sadly--the concluding, hope-giving, emotional reconciliation between these two fathers (prominent in the book, the Broadway musical, the '95 film) who lost their sons is quite diminished and almost totally absent.My ratings: 9 (of 10) for its representation of this era's events, 8 (of 10) for entertainment, 7 (of 10) for fidelity to the musical and the book. |
tt0301390 | The Heart of Me | In 1934 after the death of her father, Madeleine, a proper and repressed well-off housewife, invites her free-spirited sister, Dinah, to stay with her and her husband Rickie in her elegant London home. The couple have a young son, Anthony. Madeleine has always been secretly jealous and resentful of Dinah, a raffish bohemian painter, who is the despair of her conservative sister and their mother, Mrs. Burkett. Madeleine at last contrives to get Dinah engaged to a respectable, well-off man. Dinah announces her engagement at a family dinner, but later that night Rickie, who has long harbored an attraction for her, tells her to end the engagement.
Rickie and Dinah fall in love and, during a New Year's Day party, they become lovers. Rickie helps Dinah to settle in an apartment that becomes their love nest, but leave his marriage intact. Things get complicated when Dinah gets pregnant. She decides to leave London with her friend Bridie and await the birth and Rickie's arrival in the south of England. During a snowstorm, Dinah gives birth to a stillborn daughter and almost dies from blood loss due to complications during the birth. Rickie, on his way to reach her, suffers a car accident and arrives too late. Grief-stricken, Dinah turns Rickie away and ends their affair. Rickie becomes lost in despair, but tries to hide it (unsuccessfully) from Madeleine. Months later, Madeleine receives a letter in the mail from Bridie who writes of the affair, leading Madeleine to the realization of what had been going on for quite some time. Rickie is adamant that the affair is finished, but he is unapologetic. Eventually Rickie meets unexpectedly with Dinah. She has a nervous breakdown at a restaurant and Rickie, still in love with her, tells Madeleine that he is leaving her.
Things, however, take a turn for the worse when Rickie collapses and is taken to the hospital, unknown to Dinah who is still home waiting for him. Dinah is prevented from seeing Rickie and is told by her mother and Madeleine that he has decided to return to his family, while they tell Rickie that she has gone back to France. Several more months pass and the lovers eventually meet again when Dinah is leaving the apartment that was being financed by Rickie, and he discovers that she had been there the entire time and not in France. Dinah, who is too hurt by things past, refuses to continue the affair and the lovers part for the last time.
During the war (World War II), Anthony, Rickie's and Madeleine's son, dies in battle. Rickie is killed during an air raid while going to claim a bracelet for Dinah that he had ordered from a jewelry store with the engraving: "And throughout all eternity, I forgive you and you forgive me". The film ends with Madeleine and Dinah finally reconciled to the past and learning to forgive each other. | romantic, flashback | train | wikipedia | The story of an upper class English man falling passionately in love with his wife's sister was so involving I completely forgot myself for the duration of the film (and from what I could see,so did the rest of the audience).
One of the wonderful things about it was that during the course of the story I both liked and disliked all the characters.
This seems impossible given what Madeline has endured at the hands of her sister, yet Williams makes us believe in that forgiveness.
She falls passionately in love with her brother- in- law and from that moment on the film takes you on an emotional roller-coaster ride that I still can't get out of my mind.
It's also a ravishing looking film (maybe that's why I cant get it out of my mind) and yet the powerful images never interfere with the story but add to it all the time.
I love Helena Bonham Carter and Paul Bettany.
On screen, the characters are so believable that I forget that I am watching a movie.
Despite the poetry in the film, it is mainly a movie of action, of eyes, beautiful, intense eyes.
Set primarily in the 1930's, the film tells the story of two sisters caught in a passionate and quasi-incestuous love triangle.
Madeline (Olivia Williams), the older of the two, is an uptight woman whose weak-willed husband, Rickie (Paul Bettany), falls in love with her younger and more free-spirited sibling, Dinah (Helena Bonham Carter).
These two in-laws, soul mates for life, carry on a torrid love affair until Madeline discovers the truth and even for a time thereafter.
Instead, thanks to truly brilliant performances by the three principal actors and an intelligent, thoughtful screenplay, the film becomes a wholly absorbing drama that offers profound insights into the realities of the human heart.
The film becomes a fascinating study of what happens when clanging passions are hemmed in by the restrictions and proprieties of a strict, morally repressive upper class society.
What makes the film special is the way in which it allows the seemingly cold-hearted Madeline to become as much a sympathetic figure as the two impassioned lovers.
Thanks to Williams' impeccable performance (she played Penelope in the TV movie version of `The Odyssey'), Madeline is allowed to live and breathe and have her own say, making her, in many ways, the most intriguing of the three main characters.`The Heart of Me,' which is beautifully detailed in costumes and settings, transcends the limits of its genre to deliver a heartbreaking tale of love, loss, lament - and hope..
And that's what we have in this dark hued English drama whose scenes alternate between the pre-war social frivolity of affluent men and women unaware that their time was almost up and postwar scenes tieing the story together.Helena Bonham Carter is Dinah, a free spirit given to studying, and perhaps evangelizing, the gospel of malcontents and revolutionaries in that nonthreatening and oddly endearing manner that insures both bemusement and acceptance by well-to-do English gentlefolk.
Olivia Williams is her married sister, Madeleine, a hostess with the mostess, married to businessman Rickie, played by Paul Bettany.The focus of the film is on this trio, not a menage a trois but a coruscating set of characters wracked by love, lust and confusion leavened by sporadic betrayal and reconciliation.It's really simple: Rickie sort of loves or at least very much likes Madeleine but his heart and other body parts desperately seek and need Dinah.
Dinah loves her sister and her charming adolescent son but she must have Rickie.
Helena Bonham Carter is renowned for her period pieces (she can do much more and she does) and she fits into London's prewar world and its gray aftermath as if she actually experienced those times.
Special mention must be made of Olivia Williams who captures the pathos, hope and desperation of a decent woman swept up by acts of betrayal she never envisaged as possible.
It is a European-style film that takes the time to give exposition and background to the characters.
Helena Bonham Carter and Olivia Williams play sisters.
Helena's character begins to fall in love with her brother-in-law played by Paul Bettany and they have an affair.I was pleasantly surprised by Paul's acting.
I've only seen him before in "A Knight's Tale" and "A Beautiful Mind" where he has played light-hearted best friend characters.
Director Thaddeus O'Sullivan presents this story of love and betrayal with a style that is surprising.
The material in which this film is based is the novel by Rosamond Lehmann, that shows a slice of the life in London among the upper classes in the 30s, prior to WWII and adapted for the screen by Lucinda Coxon.The story of this love triangle involves Madeleine, a young society matron, married to Rickie, a successful bank executive.
She is a young woman who couldn't care less about being int the right places, or to mix with the right crowd.Dinah and Rickie begin an affair.
The relationship among the three principals will never be the same.Helena Bonham Carter plays Dinah with abandon.
Paul Bettany is convincing as Rickie, the man torn between love and duty.
at heart the story maybe about an illicit affair of forbidden love, but in reality it seems much more.
all three characters, Madeleine, Dinah and Ricky, are left unsatisfied and the pain that they feel makes the film challenging viewing - it is simply so sad.
what i liked most about the story is its time frame, as we weave through fifteen odd years and see the story, or rather the affair through the different perspective of time - it is such a clever technique because our sympathies never rest- we switch allegiance constantly and recognise that for these three people there could be no happy resolution.there is so much else to love about this film, i loved the way the large elegant house, appeared to take on the appearance of Madeleine's state of mind - all bright and happy in the beginning and then grey and sterile at the end.the film does have a fault i would say, though.
i do not like Helena Bonham carters performance.
it was partly because both Olivia Williams and Paul Bettany gave such wonderful performances that hers appears forced and insincere.
she grated on me because i really needed to believe that this woman was worthy of Ricky's obsessional love and i didn't.
Beyond the beautiful photography and brilliant performances in this fine film, it brings us an intimate view into one of this life's great challenges.
Having almost stepped into Ricky's shoes myself, this story clears away the fog of imagined outcomes to reveal the most essential, critical and invariable costs with their likely and possible consequences.These three characters, the husband Ricky, the wife Madeleine, and the sister Dinah, live lives well examined, know well the agony and the ecstasy of true love, of loving without reservation, and that life is short and then we're gone forever.
That true loves makes the gods jealous of our mortality.Perhaps there is a marriage of reason, and then an affair d'amour.
But this is their lives: this situation has much more depth than a simple love triangle, or a man lacking reason.
Can Ricky choose to not love Dinah?
And this story will help.The film steps through the traversal of events in quick succession, depending on our keen understanding to comprehend what may and may not possibly be happening to each character.
Helena Bonham Carter and Olivia Williams show how to perform with perfect pitch the same sort of roles that Nicole Kidman, Meryl Streep and especially Julianne Moore trashed with overacting hyperbole in The Hours (although they were actualy models of restraint compared to Ed Harris - I couldn't wait for his character to throw himself out the window).
They are ably supported by Paul Bettany and the wonderful Eleanor Bron.This is not a movie for the 18 - 24 year old male demographic of course, but it will hold every intelligent viewer for its full 96 minutes (how wonderful - a moview well under 2 hours edited with self restraint)..
Overall the film affects great seriousness, but cannot escape the melodramatic and contrived nature of its source material (a pot-boiler-ish novel by Rosamund Lehman dating from the 1960s).
This is everything one could possibly want a modern British period film to be: brilliant, sensitive, perfectly made, enthralling, revealing, informative, stimulating, and inspired.
2002 was a bumper year for Helena Bonham Carter, when she delivered possibly the two finest performances of her distinguished career.
Maybe because she had found personal fulfillment with Tim Burton the year before, it was in 2002 that she made first this film and then 'Till Human Voices Wake Us', in both cases delivering performances which are staggering emotional masterpieces of the acting art.
(And let's hope she does become Dame Helena one day, for that matter, as she already deserves.) Not to be outdone, her sister is played by Olivia Williams.
The man caught in the middle between these two lovelies is Paul Bettany, who is perfectly cast, whose performance is perfectly judged, and is delivered with such pervading melancholy and resignation to the Fates that it elevates this tragic love story to Olympian heights.
The film was so emotional and intense that when I saw this it triggered tears, because one of the most traumatic episodes of my entire life was being with Rosamund the day she died in 1990.
Rosamund's two great character flaws in her otherwise wonderful personality were female vanity and uncontrollable romantic and sexual passion (as shown in the character played by Helena Bonham Carter).
Rosamund was intensely passionate right up to the end, and can literally be said to have been in love on her deathbed, and was straightening her hair and reaching for her lipstick.
I am glad that this film, a perfect testament to Rosamund's amazingly brilliant talent and insights into human emotions, has been rendered on the screen.
The film traces the life of two English sisters who have a man in common.
The one he marries is structured like himself, but then he falls in love, or lust, with the other, a neurotic Bohemian whose child-like passions rob him of reason.There is a fatalistic element to this plot, however.
What is missing from this story is not love, but reason..
This film reminded me of those drawing room dramas that used to play in English theatres in the 1940s and 1950s - like a Noel Coward, with more sex but not a trace of wit.
Williams is starchy, Bonham-Carter is flighty but weary (the usual thing - I think this probably just how she is in the flesh), Bettany is agonisingly caught between the two.
I am not sure what the purpose of this film, The Heart Of Me, a remade The Wings Of The Dove also starring Helena Bonham Carter is but it is pale in comparison however more true to life it could be.
However if you like romantic tragedy or character weakness with listen dialog The Heart of Me is quite possible for you.
Helena Bonham Carter normally a fairly good actress in these period pieces seems absolutely lost and not sure what her character is to accomplish and she comes across that way, unsympathetic where in Wings on course she has the part in her hands.
Olivia Williams new to me acquits herself well but still Paul Bettany seems to be the target or missing portion of The Heart Of Me not sure his character is growing or coming out of hiding.
Despite the valiant efforts of Paul Bettany and Olivia Williams this is fairly forgettable stuff, in territory which has been done before and much better.
Helena Bonham Carter must feel like she's in Groundhog Day. That said, Paul Bettany and Olivia Williams made the best of pretty mediocre base material filled with predictable unimaginative contrivance, to give performances which show each to be capable of moving and powerful acting.
All in all, a worthwhile night out if you like your romantic period pieces, but no more, enlivened by Bettany, who hopefully will go on to do better things, and Williams, who really deserves the chances to move her career up a gear..
Except THIS movie stars the wonderful, the splendorous and the truly MAGNIFICENT, Helena Bonham Carter!
Olivia Williams, who plays her sister in this period piece (1930's and 1940's), is a treat to behold, also.All I can say to conclude is, ONLY the British can pull a film like this off.
In the first place, i checked this one out because of Paul Bettany--encouraged in the venture by a comment that Helena Bonham-Carter goes into new dimensions with her character, Dinah Burkett.
A love story with ugly triangle is not easy territory in which to find people particularly appealing.
Bettany, Bonham-Carter and Williams all cover a heart-wrenching range of human feeling--not just the big stuff (anguish, desire), but the subtleties as well (self-doubt, tenderness, quiet resentment).
The look of the film honorably frames each moment of this powerfully acted story.
Since one cannot "tune out" the way a film looks, the audience wins big-time in this regard.
It was entirely unexpected that Rickie rapes his wife Madeleine, somewhat close to the end of the story.
I love costume drama, I'm a fan of Helena Bonham Carter, but this film was too slow even for me.
Yes, it had its moments of visual beauty, but the story dragged and the characters were unengaging.
Paul Bettany plays - or at least recites the lines of - Rickie, object of desire for two women.
One woman is his wife, Madeleine, played by Olivia Williams.
Helena Bonham Carter plays the arty, bohemian sister, Dinah - easily identifiable as a bohemian type because her clothes don't fit properly, her hair is uncombed and she wears too much dark eye make-up.
I left not long after the affair between Dinah and Rickie was discovered by Madeleine.
But when I couldn't find it in my heart to care what she did about it, I knew it was time to give up on this film.
A beautiful love story..
Set in England during the 1930's The Heart of Me tells the story of two sisters Dinah(Helena Bonham Carter)and Madeleine(Olivia Williams).They both fall in love with the same man Rickie(Paul Bettany).However in terms of marriage only one can really have him.One marries Rickie and the other begins a passionate affair with him.This is a moving and gorgeous film.The costumes are beautiful and the performances are really good especially from the three leads.Helena is one of my favourite actresses and she doesn't disappoint here in her role as Dinah.A well made romance that looks good visually as well.Worth renting or buying on DVD..
Rickie is a man who tells his sister-in-law not to marry (although she was ready to) a man with whom she is not in love.
A painfully beautiful film about love (spoilers).
Beginning in pre-WW2 London the story, based on Rosamund Lehmann's novel 'The Echoing Grove', concerns two sisters - Madeleine (Olivia Williams) and Dinah (Helena Bonham Carter) - who love the same man - Ricky (Paul Bettany).
Ricky is married to Madeleine and they have one son when he and Dinah fall in love and begin a torrid and emotional affair.
Such are the vagaries of fate and circumstance that Ricky is never reunited with Dinah though he loves her until his untimely death.
Many years later the sisters meet for lunch and the events surrounding the affair form their conversation.All the leads are excellent: Williams has the most difficult role as her character is emotionally cold and the least sympathetic.
His love for Dinah aches and proves his unwitting end.A very emotional and beautiful film cut through with tragedy, misunderstandings and missed moments.
It seems that many reviewers blame Paul Bettany's character's weak will and Bonham Carter's character's lack of moral compass for their affair.
For another, Olivia Williams' Madeleine seems to have lost her passion for her husband at least by the time the affair is revealed to the audience.
Did anyone notice the challenge in Bettany's voice when, after the affair is discovered, he kisses Williams and tells her that this is what she has coming back to her revealing the lovelessness (at least physically speaking) that would likely have doomed their marriage regardless of outside influence?Carter does not, for me, possess the kind of fatal beauty that would make her character irresistible to a happily married man and I don't think the film intends for us to feel that way about her.
Williams is much more classically beautiful and if the sister character (Carter) had been supposed to be a femme fatale then the roles of sister and wife would have been better switched.
It was love that brought the husband and sister together not just a submission to passion by two morally weak characters.
She might have decided that, love notwithstanding, the great wrong was not necessarily being with a married man but being unfaithful to her own sister.
Very little exploration of Bettany and Carter's life together and despite the fact that the war plays a big part in Bettany's character's demise there was very little sense of the times for the part of the film that takes place before and during the war.
I wouldn't recommend this film to anyone except hard core fans of the leads (and Eleanor Bron who was so great in "Help)and as a chance to see more of Olivia Williams who deserves better than the clunkers ("Born Romantic","The Postman","To Kill A King") she's appeared in.
Dinah and Madeleine obviously should have been swapped: Olivia Williams is irresistibly sexy even when playing a frigid wife, while the squat, pinch-faced Bonham-Carter has to plaster on the make-up to persuade her 40 years to look more like 30 (and definitely not 20). |
tt0116422 | Glory Daze | 22 year-old Jack Freeman is graduating from the University of California, Santa Cruz with a degree in art, and is hurting from a recent breakup with his ex-girlfriend Dina. He shares a house called "El Rancho" with four friends: Rob is also graduating, and preparing to move to Los Angeles with his girlfriend Joanie, though he is worried about settling down and living so close to Joani's mother. Dennis is a perpetual student with three degrees who, after six years at UCSC, is moving on to an MBA program in Michigan. Mickey is a cartoonist with a year of college still to go, and has feelings for their friend Chelsea but is too shy to reciprocate her affections. Josh, aka "Slosh", had a promising academic future but failed out of college in favor of a life of drinking and working a series of menial jobs.
Art professor Luther criticizes Jack's final sculpture project for expressing an uninteresting, suburban, middle-class worldview, but praises Dennis' thesis—a photo-essay of Slosh getting drunk and working at dead-end jobs—and offers him an apprenticeship; Jack suggests that this is only because Luther has a homosexual attraction toward Dennis, a notion Dennis dismisses. Not wanting their college days to end, Jack convinces his friends to postpone their respective plans and stay at El Rancho for another year. They celebrate the decision by throwing a party, at which Chelsea, tired of her feelings for Mickey going unrequited, makes sexual advances toward Jack. He turns her down, and she leaves the party embarrassed. Rob gets into an argument with Joanie, causing her to leave angrily.
After the commencement ceremony the next day, Rob reconciles with Joanie and meets her mother, and they end up getting along. Jack argues with his parents over his future, and they leave abruptly. Jack encourages Mickey to pursue a relationship with Chelsea. Luther makes a pass at Dennis during a faculty luncheon, confirming Jack's suspicion about his ulterior motives. Dennis and Jack vent their frustrations with Luther by cutting down a totem pole that his sculpture students spent two semesters creating.
At a beach bonfire that night, Slosh tells Jack that it was Jack's carefree attitude that inspired him to give up on college, and that he does not regret his decision because he no longer fears what the future may hold. At Slosh's encouragement, Jack attempts to win back Dina, but she rebuffs him. Back at El Rancho, Mickey admits his feelings to Chelsea, and the two share a kiss. Jack and the others realize that they should not really stay another year, that it is time to move on with their adult lives. To preserve their memories of the house and prevent any future residents from despoiling it, they proceed to smash their furniture and belongings, culminating in the destruction of the bar counter that they had built together.
The next day, the five friends go their separate ways: Rob leaves for Los Angeles with Joanie, Dennis heads off to school in Michigan, and Mickey and Chelsea begin dating. Slosh moves in with a group of new students he has befriended, and hangs the El Rancho sign on their house. As Jack leaves town, he stops at a restaurant where Dina is eating with her new boyfriend, and writes "angst for the memories" on the window as a farewell message to her. | romantic | train | wikipedia | Like many people have said before, if you've ever been in a similar situation, this film will resonate deeply!
Obviously that makes just as much sense as people who loved it, not everyone can relate to the story or understand the journey, but i wouldn't want people to be put off from seeing it purely on the strength of the negative reviews.
Great performances from the whole cast, perfectly balanced with a brilliant punk soundtrack.
I'm a big fan of the examination of teens and young adults (being a teenager myself) and Glory Daze is a great story of a group of best friends on the eve of adulthood and how basically all of them are terrified of moving on from college and into the real world.During the movie we discover the various characteristics, interests, styles, dreams and aspirations of the various leading characters.
All of the plots involved in Glory Daze are simple, but flow smoothly and steadily in the backdrop of campus parties and bonfires.
The acting is superb and the cast is simply perfect(of course it's better to watch the movie now when most of the actors (Ben Affleck, Sam Rockwell, and French Stewart) all become more well known names.
I love the end of the movie (but I won't spoil anything).
I recommend this movie to anyone, especially teenagers, who just want to watch a movie about the fun and anxiety of the last days of real youth.
I also recommend Dazed And Confused, a great teen movie..
But, as a fan of this film, I've grown to see it for what it most likely was intended to be...a pleasant, relatable buddy flick whose characters could have only been based almost entirely on personal relationships.
Growing up, and out of your comfort zone is all too common of a post adolescent's defining hour and that is exactly what this movie explores.The music and sense of humor in Glory Daze are proof of a personal reliance towards the materiel and not just some A-hole producer/director trying to cash in on the maturing sentiment.
I'm gonna end with Kevin Smith on this one, I like Affleck, cause he's just a good dude, and so it seems are the rest of the cast and those involved in the creation of Glory Daze.
Good dudes, who think, what more could you honestly ask from this movie?.
A better college movie than "Animal House".
Ah, what a wonderful little gem "Glory Daze" is.
Everyone extols the virtues of "Animal House," calling it the greatest college comedy ever, but for my generation of college students, I bet "Glory Daze" would be seen as a far better film (if only people would SEE it).Ben Affleck is great in his portrayal of Jack, the ultimate purveyor of suburban angst.
He gives a most memorable performance.The best thing about "Glory Daze" is its honesty; even the tough, angry Jack breaks down when it comes to love.
Give this one a chance; any college student should relate (especially those male ones who are free of the fraternity lifestyle)..
Any one who a had a social life as a student at U.C. Santa Cruz, will love this movie.
It has just really helped me (nearly 10 years later) to find a bit of closure with what the heck happened back then during the greatest time of my life!
I love the scenes of Santa Cruz and especially liked the bus scene between Ben Affleck, Lhea Remini, and Brendan Frasier.
There is a strong moral in the movie, it's hard to find but it can be gleaned from any college graduate.
As for any banana slugs out there, save this movie when your thirty and you'll completely realize why you did what you did, and how Santa Cruz will always be on your mind.
That's a good thing I believe, because we lived in a very special place that seems to create amazingly talented and successful people.
Watch this movie with an open mind.
Its so cool, funny and intelligent and I love Ben Affleck in this.
Not to give anything away, watch it if you like to think about your past and reflect on all the good/bad times.
Before you get excited about a cast that includes the likes of Brendan Fraser, Matthew McConaughey, Matt Damon and Leah Remini, ("The King of Queens"), let it be stated for the record that the sum total of screen time for these four players is something in the region of three minutes.
At the time they were marked as new talent to be watched; before they became stars.College comedies tend to be crude and downright stupid.
While "Glory Daze" does have it's moments of such things it is redeemed by some good ensemble playing.
Being the story of a bunch of guys renting a house it's crucial that the bond between the characters of this disparate group be palpable.
While dealing with the serious issue of making decisions which will affect the rest of one's life, "Glory Daze" remains light, never losing sight of what it set out to be; a fun movie.
Ben Affleck is surprisingly good in this early role, but that in itself is a back handed compliment, since it also indicates how little he's developed with his elevation to big star status.
French Stewart is less irritating that one may expect as too is Alyssa Milano.Interesting mainly for the cast, "Glory Daze' has a nice feel to it, but not one to seek out..
Great Movie but watch it only once.
Ben is superb in this angst-ridden comedy about the end of senior year in college at a west coast university.
Ben is ONLY SUPERB when there are over 4 other cast members with a lot of speaking parts.Affleck is like The Eagles.
I don't have to list his flops."Glory Daze" is pretty much a guy flick.
I enjoyed the destruction of the frat house, the woven scenarios of the other cast members and the fact the writer/or director finally had an Asian actor in a role that had lines.Afflect re-visits his "Chasing Amy" depression and whining that was tolerable, but we've been there before.
However for Ben fans who haven't seen "Chasing" its a whimpering treat.In summary, rent or just buy the DVD for the funny French Stewart lines, the destruction of the frat house, the Asian guy who actually has lines, that Milano chick, the music and the fact that there is no happy ending.
PCU and Animal house are very slapstick and obvious, while Glory Daze is more lifelike.
Excellent casting...excellent setting...hilarious characters...great lines !.
God, on the outside, "Glory Daze" is a crude, depressing movie.
It is what most movie makers dream of making: something entertaining, yet so substantial that you can't help but say "whoa" as the impact of what happens hits you.
"Life is ever-changing," it says to you, "and we all try to stop it from changing at some point, but then we realize that we can't and find it better just to move on and continue to live.".
It's two days before Jack Freeman (Ben Affleck) graduates with a liberal arts degree from University of California.
He lives with his friends cartoonist Mickey, long-time student Dennis (French Stewart), Slosh who keeps quitting his jobs, and Rob (Sam Rockwell).
He wonders if he could extend his glory daze.There is an aimlessness to the movie much like Jack.
Matt Damon makes a cameo like Ben's lap dog which is fun.
Two days before graduation, Jack (Ben Affleck) is having serious doubts about the future.
The old gang is breaking up; Rob is moving to LA with his girlfriend; Dennis (French Stewart) is finishing his third degree and going to grad school in Michigan; Slosh has dropped out of school and stays drunk all the time; and Mickey (Vinnie DeRamus) seems tired of the scene and wishes he had the guts to tell his friend Chelsea (Alyssa Milano) how he feels about her.
You have to love this incredible cast (including some who went on to much bigger and better things), with some nice cameos from Matt Damon as a hated ex-roommate and Matthew McConaughey as an alcoholic rental truck representative.This is one of the many mid-90s slacker films, alongside "Stoned Age", "Suburbia" and others.
The film has some laughs (French Stewart is great), but there's nothing here to make me care about the characters.
I felt like I was watching cardboard cutouts skate boarding, drinking, sculpting, partying, and trying to get laid, all covered with a thin veneer of angst.
If you pounded beers in college than you'll relate to this film.
Smart writing, and great performances make this flick above the usual beer blast caught on film.
Don't be fooled by the new cheesy cover art with Affleck and Milano on it, this film is raw and a good time.
There is a shot or two depicting a clock in this film that totally make the movie for me.
Being a male in his early twenties I love this film.
I saw this movie a few years ago.
I remember watching it twice, back to back cause I liked it so much.
I just remembered French Stewart, Ben Affleck and Brendan Frasier were in it.
I came to this site to find out what the name of the movie is and was appalled to find negative comments about "Glory Daze".
Were those of you who didn't enjoy this movie actually watching it?
I explain why Glory Daze (Last Contact)is a great movie.
Hello, i just want to comment the admiration i feel for Glory Daze.
This is a very good film.
If you see it once, you are loosing many things, and you could think "what a simply movie, or just kids destroying a house".
I think it represents many people, and i felt identified with it a lot.
Its a film based on some intelligent and very good people punk-rock guys.
Least I can say, this is a great movie.
Least I can say, this is a great movie.
Extremely funny and moving, as well as a great punk reference movie.
This is simply a great movie.
This is simply a great movie.
If you're a fan of Kevin Smith, if you like "Good Will Hunting" then this movie is bound to be in your top ten list.
If you're new to low-budget films, "Glory Daze" is excellent proof that good films don't require loads of money and dazzling special effects.The actors are top notch!
Rich Wilkes did a great job of including different aspects of the social circle while avoiding the stereotype syndrome.
Didn't feel like I was on the outside looking in at all!The bus scene is a riot!
Not that this is the only funny scene, you'll be laughing throughout the entire movie.
http://us.imdb.com/Quotes?Glory+Daze+(1996)
Any teenager, especially any teenager who understands the references to Camus, should love this movie.
Ben Affleck turns in a wonderful performance, as per usual.
If you happen to listen to punk music, well then, you should adore this movie's soundtrack as well.
It is so fitting to every scene (with the exception of the live band.) The movie is worth watching for the cameos alone: Matthew McConaughey, Brendan Fraser, Janeane Garofalo, Matt Damon; all wonderful, but tiny, parts.
This is certainly one of the best movies I've seen in a long time.
Any one who liked Dazed and Confused, to Empire Records, to (aiming a bit higher here,) The Breakfast Club, should love this movie.
Slick like a MTV video, rap pulsating in the background, punky post-grunge set and clothing, Glory Daze amuses, but it's shallow, clichéd amusement.
The senior year at college winds down and all the stereo-types jam a run down student's house.
Bad movie with some great scenes and rockin tunes.
OK, "Animal House" it's not, but the film did have it's highlights.
Scrap most of the movie and FF to the bus scene for a hilarious one-on-one between Ben Affleck and Jay Lacopo.
youth, life and the future (+great music!).
glory daze would definitely be on my top 10 movie list.
jack, the central character, is still infatuated with his ex-girlfriend as well as facing the disappointment of his parents for getting a degree in art.
these three are joined by "slosh" a college dropout and mickey, a cartooninst who just can't seem to tell his love interest, played my alissa milano, how he feels.
glory daze could have been a typical "party and have sex at college" film, but it surpasses mediocracy and delves into great character development and hilarious dialouge.
glory daze explores these emotions, not from an adults perspective, but from the point of view of young adults about to face to world.
add to this a great soundtrack with music by the vandals, NOFX, bad religion, the mr t.
This movie was well informed as far as the music references go...
"SPALDING GREY is the most exciting character in the movie." -wow.
Surprised anyone could rate this movie 8/10 or higher.
I wish I would of came on here to see some of the ratings off this movie before actually watching it.
Some people actually liked it which I am surprised but I guess everyone has their own opinions.
I think this movie is very poor and do not recommend it to anyone.
This movie I thought would be about teen life and the steps taken when you face the real world but all I saw was confusing story lines that went nowhere.
This movie is not funny or entertaining at all.
If you wish to see a movie about stupid teens watch Dazed and Confused.
Dazed and confused is a much better movie and I recommend to see that and never to see this.
This movie is my youth which makes it close to my heart.
Most people that watch it will think that it might be worthy of "B" movie status.
I totally understand but as a young punk in the 90's this movie is amazing.
It does a great job of capturing the angst of the "affluent white male" which as our good friend Luther let's us know in the film no one gives a damn about.
When I want to smile and reminisce about the good old says I put this film on(until recently on VHS!) and it makes me remember great times at Florida State.
I rented Glory Daze at a little film place in West Davis, CA.
I left Davis, CA and started a new career, only to come back here for her...the wrong reason, but my life is better just the same.
I'm here, and I loved this movie, especially after I got to know Santa Cruz a little bit.
It's a very local NorCal flick mixed in with some good faces, I loved it, and it really does speak to the graduating, broken hearted NorCal crew.
I didn't have very high expectations for this movie and when I saw Mr. Affleck and his haircut, I was thinking to myself (or maybe I even said it out loud), oh no here we go again, another Gen-X "look at us" type flick.
Glory Daze deals with a lot of issues near and dear to our hearts (us in the 18-23 age range) and even gave me some hope.
Be a deadbeat for a while and get your career started whenever you feel like it, yeah!
French Stewart, yes, Ben Affleck, yes, Spalding Gray, yes...
Glory Daze, what a movie.
Not only is the acting superb (it's because of Ben Affleck's brilliant performance), the whole atmosphere of the movie is true to today's world.
Represented by modern issues, this movie allows room for thought and justification towards what the characters are really feeling.
Days before graduation college students have doubts about moving on to the next step in life, well, in-between beers they have doubts..
What do Ben Affleck and Sam Rockwell, have in common?
They are both now famous, respected actors, and movies like 'Glory Daze' helped shape their careers.
The movie, set in the 90′s, follows a group of college students that just might not be ready to let go of the party life.
Ben Affleck conveys the perfect combination of anger and uncertainty in life, and when you throw in relationship issues he becomes a pretty evolved character.
Rockwell, the one with the girlfriend in the movie, faces an issue of every graduating guy in his position, "do I stick with her and get serious, or do I go get some strange?" His struggle is uncomfortable to watch, in a good way, especially when Matthew McConaughey makes a cameo showing him what his life could be if it goes terribly wrong.
To avoid forming a list here I will just say the others also did a great job playing their parts, especially Slosh (Vien Hong), the former computer geek, current party animal.Unlike some college movies that play off of pretty much every college stereotype, 'Glory Daze' seems more realistic and genuine.
I actually found myself believing that these actors could be college students.
They looked a bit old, but it was a far cry from the thirty year olds playing high schoolers on 90210.Writer Director Rich Wilkes (Airheads) does an admirable creating believable characters, but does have some trouble with the flow of the story.
A movie like this should be almost like the perfect mix tape, you start of strong, drop it down a notch, then right back up.
Instead we start of with "Thunderstruck" and get twenty minutes of Coldplay, and no one wants that Speaking of mix tapes, 'Glory Daze' has a soundtrack that is filled with that 90′s music that is sure to ignite that nostalgic feeling of "oh yeah, I remember that " so sit back, enjoy the ride, and remember how much better things were the 90′s. |
tt0094037 | Stewardess School | Philo and George are about to land a plane, only for Philo to accidentally knock out his contact lenses and Philo cannot see the controls, causing the plane to malfunction and crash into a skyscraper. The destruction is then revealed to be a simulator and the duo was taking an exam in pilot school, causing the two to be attrited for unsatisfactory performance. Unemployed and out of options, the duo enrolls in Weidermeyer Academy, one of the top stewardess schools in the country. George and Philo get put in a group full of misfits, to include a lady wrestler whose fiancee got cold feet, a frumpy overweight girl, a nymphomaniac whose probation officer arranged for her to enroll in Weidermeyer as part of a work release program, and a woman with astigmatism who recently got fired from an orchestra (believing she is doomed to fail). The group has standard classes about emergencies, etiquette and antiterrorism, which they work through. Also as part of a test is a full-size replica of an airplane with people to wait on, and some difficult people are selected such as a surly ex-NFL player who refuses George's orders not to smoke. The group starts to gel together, with George learning to start applying himself to a career and Philo finding common ground with the "jinx girl" due to his similar eye problems.
However, by happenstance, the group gains the ire of the school dean, a matronly martinet who believes all stewardesses to be attractive "flying waitresses", not tough, nerdy, chubby, promiscuous, and certainly not stewards like George and Philo. As she fails to wash them out, she resorts to her secondary plan as she is responsible for jobs. When everyone graduates, stewardesses are given jobs with reputable airlines such as Delta, Pan Am, or TWA, and the entire group has been detailed to Stromboli Air. The group is introduced to their owner, Mr. Stromboli, a kindly immigrant whose airline is on the verge of Chapter 11 unless his final flight can prove reputable. The group agrees to work together to make it a profitable flight. Still not content, the school dean has gotten herself assigned to be purser, saying she will oversee them and if Stromboli goes bankrupt, they are doomed to unemployment. The flight is a mixture of ordinary businessmen and a blind people's convention, which starts to run into trouble when an unexpected rain squall hits and a "mad bomber" (in an ironic sense) calmly and quietly sets his plan into motion, drugging the drink of the man sitting next to him with a powerful hallucinogenic, then taking advantage of the turmoil to sneak a gas pellet into the captain's cabin to knock out the pilot, then to the cargo hold to place his bomb, then jumping out into the sky. | pornographic | train | wikipedia | Good 80's film..
This is another film that is not as bad as it's rating.
Yes it is a comedy that gets most of it's laughs from sex jokes but that is definitly nothing new.
The acting in the movie was okay for some but of course it does not take much acting in these films.
It was really a naughty film and does show nudity.
Makes me wonder why the guys who watch this film are complaining.
Were they expecting an intellectual piece when they rented this film.
It is not the best movie of all times but for a few good laughs see if you can find this film and watch it sometime..
A Classic USA's Up All Night Film!!!.
This is a must see if you watch USA's Up All Night with Gilbert Godfried & Rhonda.
Simply put, it's a corn-ball movie with sex as a major theme.
However, this movie contains one of the funniest scenes ever.
Wendy Jo Sperber finds a a bomb on the plane.
You have to remember that a great many of the movies from the 80's were designed for people who were either too stoned to pay much attention, or too busy working to spend a lot of energy on plots.
This movie is entertaining, not because of the plot which is stupid, or the acting, which is mediocre at best, but because of the array of characters.
These characters behave as we expect and the one-line jokes hit more than miss.
Watching this movie is a great way to waste a couple of hours..
Campy slapstick spoof with many familiar faces living it up while majoring courses in stewardess school (Does such a school really exist?).
Although cheesy, it's become somewhat of a cult classic.Kind of hard to find in video rental stores today but airs frequently on cable TV's Comedy Central station.
Most notable for one of Donny Most's rare appearances outside of 'Happy Days'..
I laughed the whole time!.
If you want to watch a movie with no point but hilarious lines rent this.
I actually liked even the plot.
The characters are hilarious and there are some lines that you will never, ever forget!
Rent this today!
Even think about buying it!.
Pack your bags, you're going on a laugh filled trip.
How funny is this movie.
Bloody funny.
Much the way Moving Violations started, showing individually how some of the unlucky group ended up back in traffic school with their blunders, we see the unlucky few here making a change of vocation, where their last one ended with disastrous results.
One female wrestler, throws her opponent mistakenly on to her small nerd of a boyfriend sitting front of crowd, next to an obese woman with a raucous laugh, which is one hoot itself.
A rich family send their unmannerly daughter to this Stewardess School, where the father gets her biker boyfriend this new spit shine bike.
He's entrance into the Stewardess School is a classic.
Her "I'll miss you" to him, ends with him belching, then pulling a donut, before shooting off back down the hallway and steps on his new prized possession.
There are so many cheap laughs in this infectious b comedy.
The plot here has anyone joining and put through a rigorous ten week program, where at the end they're demoted to the worst airline, Trimboli airlines, where they're ulterior motives at hand here.
On this airline, there so happens to be an undercover officer, surveying this show, and when revealed right at the end, you'll be engaged in hearty chuckles.
Most is so funny too, like at the start where he lets one go in an elevator, a one liner prompting this, or like when he asks a couple of girls if they wanna play hide the salami, or when he mistakes a girl's smile off campus, as an invitation, where Mr better looking approaches, and we can't forget his chesshire cat grin when he mistakes the showers as communal ones, where our naked Sandrahl Bergman (Murphy's Law) literally tosses him out.
And like all these type movies, our students beat obstacles, and come out good.
Judy Landers, almost resembling a particular scene in Doin Time, is great if you're overweight and require a physical.
See how she causes the director of the school to mispronounce his lines.
So many funny moments, so many funny mentions, this is a truly overlooked b comedy, that runs consistently, all the way through.
The movie is called "Stewardess School", although stewardesses are by definition female, and there are men at the school too, some of whom are main characters.
That does not inspire confidence.I guess it's another in the line of movies about a group of wacky misfits trying to make it through training to become...
Think of "Stripes", "Police Academy", "Young Doctors in Love", "STITCHES".You might not have heard of the last two, and there's a reason for that: the're garbage, like this one is."Stewardess School" seems to have not that bad a budget, but it just doesn't work.
It's not funny in the least, most of its attempts at humour being more confusing than anything else."Stripes" worked because it had talent like Bill Murray, Harold Ramis, John Candy, Judge Reinhold, John Larroquette, Warren Oates.
Even "Police Academy" managed some memorable characters.
"Stewardess School" has...
"Stewardess School" has...
A spoilt rich girl who is slumming it as a biker punk girl...
but after the movie introduces her, in a bizarrely out-of-place scene, it forgets about her for about another hour or so, leaving you thinking, "what was the point of that scene with the rich biker punk girl?" Why introduce her, and then do nothing with her?These problems could have been solved with some basic screenplay maintenance.
Maybe trim the endless list of forgettable characters.
They could have combined two or three of these character traits into one character and made the whole thing a little easier to follow.What it is, is a mess.
An endless mess.
A mess so bad I had to start writing this review to distract me from the movie's final act, which is obviously supposed to be the point where all the wacky characters' crazy traits actually come in handy and save the day.The movie does have a few people in it you might recognize.
And Earl Boen, whose name you may not know, but you've definitely seen him in at least one - probably two - of the "Terminator" movies.
And lastly, Don Most, providing a great indication as to why his post-"Happy Days" career went absolutely nowhere.While writing, planning, filming, editing and marketing this movie, did anybody stop to ask the question: do they even HAVE schools for stewardesses, anyway?
Do you really need to go to "school" to get that job?
At least "Stripes" and "Police Academy" were send ups of organizations that actually exist..
Assorted misfits train to become flight attendants at a special college and get up to mischief while living on campus in this curious attempt to cross 'Animal House' with 'Airplane!' and 'Police Academy'.
Long unavailable on DVD, the film does not have the most positive of reputations, but it does have a small cult following and it easy to see why.
The gags that misfire are absolutely groan-inducing (flatulence in an elevator; a zillion pratfalls), but the ones that work are highly memorable - the best of which being the way one very innovative stewardess 'relieves' a stressed-out claustrophobic passenger.
Another memorable part involves a prank on the female change rooms gone awry.
Juvenile as some of the gags are (a literal salami to hide), the chief pitfall of the film is the lack of well developed characters.
The two main male characters do not have much in the way of charm and charisma, while the female characters are barely defined beyond what they were before becoming stewardesses: spoiled rich kid, prostitute, etc.
The fact that there are no big name stars in the cast has probably also contributed to the film's descent into obscurity (though Wendie Jo Sperber is great as always).
This is, however, a far more decent film than one might expect with some positive and affirming messages about the ability of outcasts and those in the periphery to band together and succeed as a team.
It would be an overstatement to describe 'Stewardess School' as an inspirational film, but it is an offbeat testament to the power of teamwork at the very least..
bad 80s sex comedy.
Philo Henderson (Brett Cullen) can barely see without his contacts or glasses.
He and best friend George Bunkle (Don Most) fail out of flight school.
George gets them into stewardess school's four week course.
Cindy Adams (Corinne Bohrer)'s rich parents bribe her biker boyfriend Snake to send her back to school.
Kelly Johnson (Mary Cadorette) is jinxed and caused chaos as a concert drummer.
Wanda Polanski (Sandahl Bergman) quits wrestling for a chance at love.
Former hooker Sugar Dubois (Judy Landers) is on probation.
Jolean Winters (Wendie Jo Sperber) is weight-conscious.Brett Cullen is not good enough to be the comedic lead.
To make matters worst, Don Most is the comedic side-kick.
The actresses have some characters with comedic potential.
Who knows if the girls could have been better on their own.
I don't think they're sharp enough either.
A few of them have played opposite comedians and Wendie Jo has some skills.
This is a weak comedy with no laughs..
Campy 80's Comedy Classic.
I'm not going to try and pretend and be some professional reviewer.
If you love campy 80's flicks this is one for you!
The three most memorable scenes, the effeminate helping the old lady with her belt buckle, the ex prostitute relaxing the freaking out passenger lol.
Oh and one other when the chubby girl and ex prostitute go for their physicals.
This movie is so underrated and deserves more than three stars.
After 20 plus years it still makes me laugh and deserves a 10+.
I don't know how long my 23 year old VHS is going to hold out!
This movie is right up there in my books with these other campy classics: One Crazy Summer, Cleo Leo,Gung Ho,Short Circuit,Mannequin(hollllllywooood),My Mom's a Were Wolf, The Munchies, Baghdad cafe and so many more..
Horrible.
I saw about 20 minutes of this on TV-the worst movie I have ever seen!Nothing funny, it's just trying to be another Airplane!1/10.
Soars like a turkey....
Judy Landers - Stewardess.No, her career hasn't finally upturned.
But it should have, thanks in no small part to "Stewardess School", which tries to be the "Police Academy" of airline training movies.I'll let that sink in for a minute.Ready?
Okay, let's go on.Not only does the bustier of the Landers sisters have a part in this fiasco, but so does Don "Donny" Most (Ralph Malph from "Happy Days"), Wendie Jo Sperber (Amy from "Bosom Buddies") and Mary Cadorette (Whatever-her-Name-Was from that "Three's Company" spinoff...you didn't know there was a "Three's Company" spinoff?
It even had Sherman Helmsley (George Jefferson from "The Jeffersons").
If not for the nudity, crudity and language, this could have been one of those movies NBC makes for sweeps week.
It had the talent (long, drawn-out throat clearing).If you've seen any "Police Academy", you've seen "Stewardess School".
And it ain't as funny, either.
You didn't think "Police Academy" was funny?
Then you may want to rent something a little funnier than this film.
Like, say, "Platoon"?One star.
No redeeming laughs.
No funny situations.
No wonder Mary Cadorette hasn't done more films.When are they going to learn you don't do these films without Leslie Nielsen?.
Sherman Hemsley, RIP.
I nearly laughed myself to death watching "Stewardess School".
True, it's basically an "Animal House" knock-off, but it is SO HILARIOUS!
Don Most basically reprises his role as "Happy Days" goof-off Ralph Malph.
This time, he and his hapless friend (Brett Cullen) train to became flight attendants (I don't think that anyone says stewardess anymore).
The training consists of pranks and partying, with some scenes looking lifted from "Porky's".
But without a doubt the best scene occurs on the plane.
When a man starts losing control of himself, sexy babe Sugar Dubois (Judy Landers) figures out how to calm him down using a method that any guy would give all his limbs for.It's just an enjoyably silly flick.
The only other cast members whom I recognized are Vito Scotti (who appeared on just about every TV in the 1960s), Wendie Jo Sperber (of "I Wanna Hold Your Hand" and "1941") and the recently deceased Sherman Hemsley (best known for "The Jeffersons", which I've never seen).In conclusion, I really AM gonna take you on a sea cruise..
Avoid like the plague.
Simply put, one of the stupidest and least watchable movies I have ever had the displeasure to encounter.No redeeming value to it.None..
I unfortunately seen this film at 1am on free to air TV whilst at work, so I didn't have the opportunity to change channels.
The film is that bad that the local station placed it's community service announcements, instead of paid advertising in the commercial gaps!
Honestly, this movie is crap.
If you enjoy a bit of a tit flick (my workmates certainly did!), crude sexual references & stereotyping of the worst kind, this film is for you.
For me however, I did not see any redeeming features at all (although the community service announcements were informative) & considered the whole film a waste of time..
A bad copy of "Police Academy".
It's a bad copy of the great "Police Academy" series.
Two guys (included Don Most of "Happy Days"), go to a Stewardess School for fly and for know girls.
Like "P.A.", the team comes transferred in one small society in ruin.
They will be just save the company from the closing.Comparison with "Police Academy": The story is the same.
Only in that case draft of policemen who must save from the ruin their school.I council this film for who has seen the series of "Police Academy".FINAL VOTE: 4/5.
Lighten up people, it's a comedy!.
"Stewardess School" is one of those movies you THINK you've seen because of the overly familiar title but you haven't.
Much like the early "Airports" it's a spoof with a lot of former television actors you may have forgotten...but in this film they all give really good performances.
That's why the movie shows up all the time on comedy cable stations.
if you're not feeling like rushing right out and renting it, just wait, it'll be on a channel near you shortly.
It's fun, innocent and funny but unfortunately got stuck with a title that makes it seem like something it isn't..
Like the nice girl in high school with the bad rep: "Stewardess School" is worth getting to know better..
Without the help of Sherman Hemsley cast as a blind airline traveler in shades, STEWARDESS SCHOOL would have been much worse than a major overseas hijacking on board.
This is by far the closest thing to POLICE ACADEMY I've ever seen, and it shows itself among all other rip-offs in its class.
Bras and undies don't rescue a sour tasteless comedy!
Hard to put in words how bad this movie is.
I knew going in that any movie with Vito Scotti, Judy Landers, Sherman Hemsley and Donny Most was going to be a waste of my time.
I just happened to be in one of those late night moods that called for a waste-of-time movie.
The fact that I knew it was going to be a bad experience and I was still peed off afterward oughta tell you what a pile of refuse this thing is.
Just...frickin'....HORRIBLE.
And that freeze on Donny Most's mug at the very end is enough to gag you.
Those four "actors" should meet at the ATM, withdraw $20 each, buy the perpetual rights to this abomination and then burn every copy in existence..
I saw this film on HBO in the Bahamas in 1988, and my life was indelibly and profoundly changed as a result.
Sometimes a film just touches your heart.
Great art does that.
Stew School did that.Following my seeing this film..this masterpiece..my life took on new meaning.
Every day was like a gift.
Not a day in my life goes by that I don't think of this film.
Why it was not included in AFI's 100 movies of all time, I'll never understand.
Why, "Big chunks" did make AFI's 100 best movie quotes is beyond explanation.
Thank God I went to the Bahamas in 1988.
Thank God I got a horrible sunburn and had to stay inside watching TV.
Thank the lord the hotel had HBO.
And I shudder to even think how empty my life would have been had Stew School not been on HBOs lineup in February of 1988..
Small Bits and Pieces of Humor Here and There.
After being kicked out of pilot training, two young men named "Philo Henderson" (Brett Cullen) and "George Bunkle" (Don Most) decide to try their luck at a local stewardess school in the hope of meeting some attractive young ladies.
What they don't count on is that this particular school has lowered its standards to such a degree that all of their fellow students are predominantly losers as well.
And this creates all kinds of problems for everyone trying to graduate.
Now rather than reveal any more I will just say that this specific movie was essentially a recycled version of "Police Academy" with a few minor tweaks added in order to portray a slightly different setting.
There isn't anything really new or original here.
Yet having said all of that there are still small bits and pieces of humor here and there that might entertain a viewer on a rainy day.
If nothing else it has a few attractive actresses like Mary Cadorette (as "Kelly Johnson"), Judy Landers ("Sugar Dubois") and Julia Montgomery ("Pimmy Polk") to brighten an otherwise lackluster film. |
tt0142244 | Doragon bôru Z: Sûpâ saiyajin da Son Gokû | Dragon Ball Z picks up five years after the end of the Dragon Ball anime, with Son Goku as a young adult and father to his son Gohan. A humanoid alien named Raditz arrives on Earth in a spacecraft and tracks down Goku, revealing to him that he is his long-lost big brother and that they are members of a nearly extinct extraterrestrial race called the Saiyans (サイヤ人, Saiya-jin). The Saiyans had sent Goku (originally named "Kakarrot") to Earth as an infant to conquer the planet for them, but he suffered a severe head injury soon after his arrival and lost all memory of his mission, as well as his blood-thirsty Saiyan nature. Goku refuses to help Raditz continue the mission, which results in Raditz kidnapping Gohan. Goku decides to team up with his former enemy Piccolo in order to defeat Raditz and save his son, while sacrificing his own life in the process. In the afterlife, Goku trains under Kaiō-sama until he is revived by the Dragon Balls a year later in order to save the Earth from Raditz' comrades; Nappa and the Saiyan prince Vegeta. During the battle Piccolo is killed, along with Goku's allies Yamcha, Tenshinhan and Chaozu, and the Dragon Balls cease to exist because of Piccolo's death. Goku arrives at the battlefield late, but avenges his fallen friends by defeating Nappa with his new level of power. Vegeta himself enters into the battle with Goku and after numerous clashes Goku manages to defeat him as well, with the help of Gohan and his best friend Kuririn. At Goku's request, they spare Vegeta's life and allow him to escape Earth. During the battle, Kuririn overhears Vegeta mentioning the original set of Dragon Balls from Piccolo's home planet Namek (ナメック星, Namekku-sei). While Goku recovers from his injuries at the hospital, Gohan, Kuririn and Goku's oldest friend Bulma depart for Namek in order to use these Dragon Balls to revive their dead friends. However, they discover that Vegeta's superior, the galactic tyrant Lord Freeza, is already there, seeking the Dragon Balls to be granted eternal life. A fully healed Vegeta arrives on Namek as well, seeking the Dragon Balls for himself, which leads to several battles between him and Freeza's henchmen. Realizing he is overpowered, Vegeta teams up with Gohan and Kuririn to fight the Ginyu Force, a team of mercenaries summoned by Freeza. After Goku finally arrives on Namek, the epic battle with Freeza himself comes to a close when Goku transforms into a fabled Super Saiyan (超サイヤ人, Sūpā Saiya-jin) and defeats him.
Upon his return to Earth a year later, Goku encounters a time traveler named Trunks, the future son of Bulma and Vegeta, who warns Goku that two Artificial Humans (人造人間, Jinzōningen, lit. "Artificial Humans") will appear three years later, seeking revenge against Goku for destroying the Red Ribbon Army when he was a child. During this time, an evil life form called Cell emerges and after absorbing two of the Artificial Humans to achieve his "perfect form," holds his own fighting tournament to decide the fate of the Earth, called the "Cell Games". After Goku sacrifices his own life a second time, to no avail, Gohan avenges his father by defeating Cell after ascending to the second level of Super Saiyan. Seven years later Goku, who has been briefly revived for one day and meets his youngest son Goten, and his allies are drawn into a fight by the Kaioshin against a magical being named Majin Buu. After numerous battles resulting in the destruction and recreation of the Earth, Goku (whose life is permanently restored by the Elder Kaioshin) destroys Majin Buu with a Genki Dama attack containing the energy of everyone on Earth. Goku makes a wish for Buu to be reincarnated as a good person and ten years later, at another martial arts tournament, Goku meets Buu's human reincarnation, Uub. Leaving the match between them unfinished, Goku departs with Uub to train him to become Earth's new defender. | good versus evil, violence | train | wikipedia | It's not that bad.
This is one of the worst DB Z movies but non of them sucked so this is a pretty good movie.
I liked the storyline , a namek (like Picolo)wants to turn Earth in a spaceship and he starts by clouding the sky.
After the intro they start fighting and fighting and fighting and fighting and when they finish fighting they fight some more.
What sucked in this movie was the final battle.
That was the most boring part of the movie.
Goku fights the namek, who is not a namek but a super namek which means that he's as big as the statue of liberty, turns into a Super Sayan beats the crap out of the huge super namek and clears the sky.
Thats about it.
If it wasn't for that ending the movie would have got a 8.5 but because of the huge super namek sh*t i say 7.7.
Just alright.
As a huge "Dragonball Z" fan, I thought this wasn't that good.
It was just typical of the movies.
It did seem like just a long episode of the show, albeit not that long.
I'll never understand how these movies got released in theaters with such short running times.
Anyway, this movie features a villain named Lord Slug coming to Earth and...that's about it.
It's not bad.It's just that there's nothing unique about it.
Villains like Cooler and Broly were much more interesting.
Cooler was uh, cooler, hee hee.
Still, there are some twists and storytelling and it's a completely harmless movie.
If you want a better DBZ movie, you probably are better off watching the other films.
Of course, it's no "Dragonball: Evolution"...
Enjoy this more than DBZ Kai. I actually like this more than the recently Remake of the series (Kai) which released on the channel "Kix", so anyways this film was what I always wanted, my favourite rock band "Disturbed" composed some songs in it and the voice cast from Kai in it (except for Gohan and Bulma I think), don't know why people don't like the English ver, I just think that the rock music fits in with all the action and I couldn't be bothered watching it in Japanese because I couldn't understand it, I can't be bothered reading the subtitles, Goku has a stupid chipmunk voice and the cr*p music.
It's just my opinion so if you want to watch it in Japanese thats fine, but the English offers more if your into rock and anime..
Fast paced DBZ adventure..
I enjoyed this Dragonball Z film, it did not have quite the story or length as the first film featuring Broly, but it makes up for this fact by being fast paced.
It is especially fast paced when compared to "The World's Strongest" and "Tree of Might".
The English version I got of this one also did a pretty good job of syncing a rather good rock soundtrack to this one.
The film has a mysterious alien force has descended upon Earth.
Its goal, to turn the Earth into a spaceship, the villain a being known as Lord Slug.
Enough with the introductions let the fighting begin.
There are your typical fights with characters such as Krillin and Gohan.
Piccolo also shows up to lend a hand.
Still, most of the others do not do so well and then Goku shows and proceeds to wipe the floor with all the baddies.
That is until he faces Lord Slug who gives him one heck of a nice fight.
I am guessing this took place right before Goku turned Super Saiyan for the first time in the series as they sort of have a brief transformation of Goku to a state that is not quite Super Saiyan.
All in all it is a rather good movie, the action is fast and the rock music soundtrack in the English version is just so perfect for this one.
They would try again to do that in the Cooler movie, but it doesn't quite work in that one..
Pretty nice, but the dubbed version sucks!.
I watched the dubbed version of this movie first, so I'll begin with it.
First of all I would like to state that the music in the American version was simply atrocious and even a bit insulting for DBZ.
The dub voices are slightly better than the ones from Ocean Group but still aren't very good.
At least none of them are as annoying as most of the Ocean voices were.The thing I most liked about the original version was the music.
Superb, as always.
The Japanese voices are really cool (also as always), although Goku's voice is quite annoying and too feminine.
I think they should have replaced Masako Nozawa with a male actor for DBZ.Anyway, on to the plot - certainly not as nice as the ones of the previous movies, but still better than the plots of most animes and since it's DBZ it's pretty good.
But they used an almost totally different definition for the term "Super Namekian" than they did in the series.I recommend the previous three movies more than this one - not only because they have better plots, also because the dubbed versions have the original music score in them, because of which I'm willing to put up with the annoying voices..
Not very good.
Well, this is the fourth of the DragonBall Z movies, and its a stinker.
The fight scenes are great, and the new music used in the US release adds an edge, but overall, the plot is childish.
I mean, look at it: The indestructible Namekian is brought down by one boys ability to whistle.
What the heck?!
You want something good, go see Coolers Revenge..
Arguably one of the worst Dragon Ball Z movies ever made.
This is the fourth Dragon Ball Z movie released during the series Japanese TV run.
A planetoid is averted by Goku and Krillin and later explodes and descending upon it is a band of sun-sensitive alien nomads led by an aging Super Namek named Slug, who uses the Dragon Balls to regain his youth and plans to terrafreeze Earth into a starship.
Defending the planet are Goku, Krillin, Piccolo, and Gohan.
This movie suffers from an extremely shallow and ill-conceived plot.
It seems that this movie's screenwriter did this movie's story in a very hurried and half-hearted effort (which made a lot of sense, considering that by this point, Toei Animation called for 2 Dragon Ball Z movies to be released annually in March and July to be screened at Toei's annual anime fairs and in theaters).
Nearly ever aspect of this movie looked like it was put together without much thought, including the villains, the plot, the animation (from time to time), and in many of the scenes such as how Slug is stopped.
The plot often repeats elements found in the previous DBZ movie, Earth's Ultimate Deciding Battle a.k.a. The Tree Of Might.
This DBZ movie, purely seen as a regular movie, is one of the worst.
If you are a hardcore Dragon Ball Z fan, I'm sure you will find it at least watchable.GRADE: 1 out of 5 stars.
The subtitled version is the best.
I have watched the kiddy American version of Dbz and I have to say that the original Japanese versions are much better (of course the Japanese created Dbz).Not only that, the one American writer should have pointed out that the dubbed version of Dbz and their movies cut out several scenes, and insert their own corny and kiddy dialouge instead of the original Japanese language.Goku, Kuririn , Mr. Piccolo are at the super best when you watch them subtitled.The movie rocks.Oh yeah, I have all dbz from 1-13 all uncut.
Eat your heart out all English dbz fans, because Cartoon Network has still showed the same mediocre English for 5 years now..
Mediocre but highly entertaining DBZ flick..
While meditating near a waterfall, Piccolo senses great danger coming to Earth.
And that's another alien invasion lead by Lord Slug.
The last decedent of the extinct Super Nameks.
A more powerful type of Nameks that were once living on Planet Namek.
Lord Slug intends to collect the Dragon Balls to gain eternal youth and freeze the entire planet to claim his own after being exiled for so long from his old planet.
The Z Warriors try with all their might, but all hope seems lost after seeing what a Super Namek can do.
But that's not the case when Goku finds a way to defeat this green menace.The story is average and with the movie only being 46 minutes long.
It could of been awesome if it were longer than that.
If that happened then it would include a whole lot more to the story.
But instead it feels like watching a episode like the previous few movies of DBZ.It's another alternate storyline of the TV series, and it mostly takes place after the "Tree of Might film" cause this one doesn't fit anywhere in the any of the TV series sagas.Overrall it's a good flick, but not the best Dragon Ball movie compared to the others.
Only recommended to the fans only while it'll be turn done by the non-fans..
Highly Underrated.
I really don't see why people don't like this movie.
I did like it and it was finally a Dragon Ball Z movie that I liked every aspect of.
Lord Slug was a pretty cool villain and beat Goku pretty bad.
Actually I liked the beating.
My favorite part was when Goku became a sort of Super Sayian.
I call it that cause all that happened was his hair went up like a SS and his eye color left, almost Kaioken, not the blonde hair like the regular one.
The animation was cool, going into the much better animation that came into the show at the time of this movie.
The voices were great too.
These were the voices that made the characters who they are.
Goku and Gohan especially..
The best one yet.
Out of all the DBZ movies I've seen so far, this has the best balance.
A great balance of humor, heart, and action that the show always had.
Even though Lord Slug has no real introduction, he still comes off as a major threat, and I liked how Goku had to go False Super Saiyan to really put a dent in him.
It even works in some references to the Saiyan and King Piccolo Sagas, which is fun.
A great all-around DBZ movie, and the best one I've seen yet..
DBZ Movie 4: King Picc...I mean, "Lord Slug"....
Where the first three DBZ movies gave fans a lot of what they wanted (including the mind-blowing action sequences that were used in the opening credits for the show, "Rock the Dragon!"), the fourth movie, "Lord Slug," is a major step down, especially considering that they should be a lot more powerful by now.The plot is as follows: A killer comet or some such space rock is headed for Earth, somehow causing a bunch of natural disasters in the process.
Just when it seems that all hope is lost, though, the meteor is diverted...only for a new threat to descend on Earth from the asteroid.Enter Lord Slug, the enigmatic tyrant from beyond the stars who has come to claim the Dragon Balls and turn Earth into his new frozen, barren homeworld.
It's up to Goku and co.
to stop him!
I remember getting this on VHS when Mom and I were at Target (I don't remember which one of us actually paid for it though lol).
It was this one and "Big Daddy," and unfortunately the tape has since been eaten by my cheap VCR so I can no longer watch it.
It's decent for an action film (though nowhere near the first 3 movies), and the fight sequences, while lacking the intensity of its predecessors, are at least memorable.
This so-so direct-to-video movie is somewhat redeemed by a heavy metal-type soundtrack including Disturbed and what's-their-faces.
(Of course, the version which aired on Toonami had a different soundtrack, which made it feel kinda like a let-down.) This movie tends to suffer from what I call "GT Syndrome." The fights are okay, but the animation and frankly the movie as a whole is bland and kind of rushed, even compared to other movies in the series.
Its place in the main timeline is also a question for the fans, although there is the possibility that it takes place after Goku arrives back from space and he simply hasn't learned to control his SS powers yet.
The overall plot is okay and even the threat to the planet seems halfway plausible (the aliens in space-suits, their takeover of the planet), but the end seems kind of tacky (think "Tree of Might," only instead the tree is a mass of clouds).
Even the main villain isn't that original...Highlight: Goku transforming into something that King Kai abruptly calls a "Super Saiyan," but it doesn't look like a Super Saiyan, act like a Super Saiyan, or seem half as strong as a Super Saiyan.
Wikipedia calls it an "Enraged Super Saiyan," or "1/2 Super Saiyan," an SS transformation driven by pure rage which pushes him about halfway into it.Final ruling: Basically sets the bar even lower for DBZ movies.
It doesn't fit in the timeline, the animation is so-so, and it's not even as fun to watch as most of the other movies.
Basically, only for those who have the money to waste and/or are hardcore fans.
(Why release 2 movies a year if this is the end result?).
The Best at the Point.
This was the best DBZ movie that was ever made at the time of it's release.
While the first three weren't that great and the fourth was the in my opinion the awakening of the films, the fifth was when the movies came into their own.
Cooler is a really cool villain and much better then Frieza in a lot of ways, (1 way is he doesn't sound like an old woman who smoke for 50 years)Cooler is also the first really awesome villain in the films.
Probably one of the best in the whole DB franchise.
He's everything that Frieza should have been.
Also I like how Goku still couldn't go Super Sayian whenever he pleased and still needed anger to do it.
All in all I really enjoyed this movie and recommend it..
My first review..
SPOILERS AHOY, MATEYS!
Welcome to my first review.
Well, let's cut to the chase.
I am a Dragonball/Z/Gt fan.
I was skeptic about buying this on DVD, when I was told it was a sucky movie.
I decided to buy the uncut version on DVD, and I'm glad I did!
It is about when an asteroid is about to strike earth.
No problemo, Goku can just blast it to bits, right?
WRONG!!!!
It is inhabited with life forms, and Goku doesn't want to hurt the extraterrestrials, yet if he doesn't, everyone on earth will die.
Rather thorny situation.....
Until the rock changes course, and explodes, but not before a spaceship speeds out of it.
Then emerges LORD SLUG and his minions!
He is the ultimate enemy, and is tearing Goku and hes friends apart!
Will earth fall at the hands of this villian?
Not before slug and Goku turnb to their uuber-cool super forms for one final deathmatch in the ruined city!
Don't miss this one if you're a DBZ fan!
If you buy it, be sure you get the uncut PG-13 version, the edited for tv one is just plain sorry.10/10.
10 stars.
(Warning Spoilers)this a great dragon ball z movie, lord slug comes to terra freeze earth and make it a satilite, this is an awesome movie and i recommend it for true dragon ball z fansstars(1-10)**********.
Great Hidden Dragonball Gem not yet seen by US DBZ Viewers.
I am very surprised that none of the so-called Dragonballz experts have commented on this movie.This is the 4th Dragonballz movie after the Tree Of Might in 1990.
A great new DBZ movie focusing on a Namek Alien called Lord Slug who wants the 7 dragonballs for everlasting youth, so he will never die and cannot die.The DBZ Anime has incredible effects that would make US Animators fall flat on their behinds.
I like the way they made a big Getta Star Spaceship descend on the earth, illuminating the threat that has struck the earth.Gohan, Oolong, and Bulma head off to see this new ship and are shocked to see that the Space Men by Lord Slugh have captured many people on Earth and made their slaves.Gohan still maturing after his battle with Vegita in the Dragonballz series and Raddittsu, tries to interfere from the Space Men conquering the earth, and even manages to catch the eye of Lord Slug who is watching everything from his hologramic computer.Goku, Piccolo, Kuririn, are all in this movies and it has many great battle scenes.One of them is when a henchman who is part leech tries to kill Goku and Piccollo but is defeated.The great effects are when Lord Slug becomes 50 feet tall and tries to kill Goku.I am such a fan of Dragonballz that I have uploaded a site reviewing all the episodes and movies including the originall Dragonball series.10 stars,way better than American depictions of Dragonballz. |
tt0097136 | Cutting Class | The plot revolves around the return of Brian Woods (Leitch), a "problem teen." He has just been released from a mental hospital; he was admitted after the suspicious death of his father, who crashed and died while driving a car with cut brakes. He falls in love with classmate Paula Carson (Jill Schoelen), but the local basketball star Dwight Ingalls (Brad Pitt) is already Paula's boyfriend. Meanwhile, the lecherous school principal also seeks Paula's affections. Then horrible murders start happening with no one certain of the identity of the culprit. The main suspects are Dwight, whose control of his anger has never been perfect; Woods, who may not have been fully cured at the sanitarium; and the principal, who seems to stop at nothing in his attempts to bed Paula.
The film opens with a paperboy delivering newspapers. A paper is delivered to Paula Carson's house. Paula is approached by her father, Bill, who is an attorney, who has planned a hunting trip. He warns Paula to do her homework, not to allow boys in the house, and most importantly not to cut class. Paula then puts the newspaper in the bin, showing its headline: "Boy who killed father released from Mental Asylum."
Bill Carson drives to the swamps for his hunting trip. As he takes shots into the air, someone is hiding nearby and holding a set of bows and arrows. The person calls over to Bill Carson and fires an arrow into him. Bill cries out and then falls down to the ground.
Meanwhile, Dwight Ingalls enters class late after avoiding two accidents on his ride to school. Dwight is questioned by his teacher, Mr. Conklin, and a girl sitting next to Dwight whispers the answers to him. Dwight tells her to shut up when she teases Dwight for not knowing what H2O is.
Later, Colleen and Paula are taking out gym equipment. Paula walks past a set of bows and arrows and notices a leaf hanging off the arrow. Paula picks the leaf off and then eats it. Meanwhile, Brian is told to climb a rope by the P.E. coach, but Dwight caused him to fall.
At a hot dog stand, Colleen, Paula, and Gary are waiting for Dwight. Brian approaches, and Colleen insults him before suggesting that Brian has a crush on Paula. Dwight then pulls up in his car and starts talking to Paula. He asks her to go to her house, as her father is away, which would give them the opportunity to be alone. Dwight then goes to buy Paula a hot dog, but he is beaten by Brian who hands her one and says, "You had that look." When Dwight returns, he tells Paula to get in the car and makes it clear to Brian that they are not friends anymore and to leave him and Paula alone. They all then drive off in Dwight's car.
Brian and Paula nevertheless become friends, and she starts to trust him. Dwight warns her to stay away from him. A teacher is murdered in the copyroom, and the students notice that the killer made copies of the killing on the copy machine. The teacher's face is shown smashed into the copy machine glass along with a ring on the killer's finger. The ring belongs to Dwight. Soon they think that Dwight (Brad Pitt) is the killer instead of Brian.
Brian tries to kill Paula, Dwight, and a math teacher in the school, and the janitor happens to be around at the time. Every classroom they run into, Brian starts talking to Paula and the math teacher through the PA in the principal's office. Paula still thinks that Dwight is the killer, and she is still running from him. Soon Brian goes into the classroom after hacking the math teacher to death. Dwight enters and gets Brian off of Paula, and they run out to the shop class and hide after Brian exclaims, "YOU'RE A YANKEE DOODLE DANDY TOO; YOU TWO MUST KILL OR DIE!" Brian knows they are in there, so he follows them while locking them in and turning on all the equipment.
Brian corners Dwight and puts his head in a vice and points a drill towards his face. Paula ends up striking Brian in the head with a claw hammer, making him fall onto a moving circular saw, which goes right through his torso as Paula frees Dwight. They leave the school and are in Dwight's car when, all of a sudden, they see Paula's dad - he has been on a trip but in actuality he was the lawyer that put Brian in the sanitarium. Brian had kidnapped Paula's dad, and he had escaped and made it home. Paula points out that it is her dad. He is on the road, but Dwight cannot stop because Brian cut the brakes earlier. They swerve and miss hitting Paula's dad. All he says is, "Shouldn't you be in school? You're not cutting class, I hope!" The movie ends with the camera's freezing on Paula's face. | revenge, mystery, murder, violence | train | wikipedia | The killings take a back seat to comedy scenes starring Martin Mull and Roddy McDowell, the latter of whom is pretty funny (Although McDowell often took crappy parts just for a paycheck- It's hard to imagine him getting excited over the script for "Laserblast"- he was never dull).To the film's credit, the identity of the killer is kept a pretty good secret till the film's amusing enough climax in the school's metal shop.
One of the main suspects is played by a young Brad Pitt, but he doesn't embarrass himself like future star Matthew McConnehey did in "Texas Chainsaw Massacre 4".
Brad Pitt, Donavan Leitch, and Jill Schoelen star as the trio of youths the film centers around.
It's embarrassingly fun to watch a bunch of actors fully knowing they're stinking on scene, trying hard to look authentic and reliable, in this sort of parody of teen slasher flicks.
A pretty good trash, now with a heavy cult following from Brad Pitt fans who are curious in seeing one of his earliest roles.
This teen slasher flick doesn't try to be different from others in the genre, but it has everything to succeed : it has a hot female lead character, sex related scenes, and gore.And for the girls : it features a young Brad Pitt.The 3 main characters of the movie are well developed, and the ending may be predictable but it works.
The story is typical of 80s teen slashers, and the movie does have a strong likeness to Prom Night, Slaughter High and Return to Horror High, which isn't a bad thing.
The gore is cheap and fake(impalements, axes in the head, hammers in the head), the acting sucks (although this film has some semi-decent names attached:Brad Pitt, Donavon Leitch, Martin Mull), and its SO 1980's.
Jill Schoelen stars as virginal and studious teen Paula Carson, object of affection for two ex-best-buds, overbearing basketball jock Dwight Ingalls (Brad Pitt) and creepy loner Brian Woods (Donovan Leitch).
When Paula is left on her own for a week while her father, a district attorney, goes duck hunting, she promises to behave, but with rival friends fighting for her attention, the school principal (Roddy McDowall) perving over her ass, and a crazy murderer bumping off her schoolmates, staying out of trouble is going to be harder than she thinks.Cutting Class certainly makes sure to pack in all the standard genre clichés, with red herrings and misleading clues a plenty (hands up who though that sodium chloride would actually save the day: I know I did), but veers awkwardly between silly humour (Paula's bumbling dad somehow surviving to the end of the film) and genuine attempts at horror (the killing of the school's vice principal), delivering crappy gore featuring patently rubber props and uninspired direction along the way.The acting also does little to improve matters, with future A-lister Pitt being unmemorable, unlikeable and offering no hint of star quality, Leitch giving an equally unimpressive turn, and a performance from poor old Roddy McDowall that can only be described as extremely embarrassing.
Jill Schoelen is convinced that the killer is either a formerly crazy friend (Donovan Leitch) or her popular, good looking boyfriend (Brad Pitt, yes that's right BRAD PITT in an early role!!!)Rated R; Nudity, Violence, Sexual Situations, and Profanity.
Trivia: Brad Pitt and Jill Schoelen were an item during and after filming.
Sometimes all that it requires to take your mind off of everything is a simple-minded, bone-headed 80's slasher, especially if it's one that stars a young, hunky and still unknown Brad Pitt as the high school jerk and Roddy McDowall as the dirty-minded principal.
Of course, in this type of film, it takes an awfully very long time before any of the dim-witted characters realizes something's wrong and "Cutting Class" is no exception.
So Brad Pitt is just one of the many line of actors more or less starting out in the horror genre and he'll sure won't be the last.Basically the story goes there's a killer on the loose in a local high school and it's up to our plucky young heroine Paula (Jill Schoelen) to figure out who it is, could it be her boyfriend Dwight (Brad Pitt) the high school jock or Brian (Donovan Leitch JR) who just got out of the mental hospital for killing his father and he's attracted to Paula and plus she's slightly interested in him as well.Cutting Class is a campy fun horror movie that shouldn't be taken too seriously, the attempts of humour do fall flat in some places and plus there is zero tension and some of the performances fall flat in some places too.
Martin Mull even shows up as Paula's father who gets shot with an arrow at the beginning and spends the rest of the movie walking home which is totally unrealistic and plus Two kids and a teacher disappear
AND NO ONE SAYS ANYTHING!
I guess the budget couldn't include a cop car or a fake badge for the sake of credibility.When you first see this movie, yes it is surprising to see Brad Pitt but after a short big he blends in with the rest of the woodwork, Jill Schoelen does a fine job but she does fall flat in some places (The Stepfather) was her better horror movie in which she turns in a much better performance and Donovan Leitch JR is OK but you can't whether it's his intention to not take himself to seriously or is he just a bad actor but anyway I enjoyed his emotional performance, he's really funny.Anyway Cutting Class isn't a total waste of time but there are better high school slashers out there and that does a better job of covering up who the killer is in the very end like in this movie it's totally obvious..
It actually has a good cast featuring Jill Schoelen, Brad Pitt, Roddy McDowell and Donovan Leitch.
But even with these actors the movie is a complete failure, in my opinion.Leitch plays the part of Brian who has been released from a psychiatric ward for murdering his Father fives years ago.
Suddenly, teachers and students are turning up missing or dead and it comes down to whether Brian is the killer or Dwight is the killer.I saw this film many years ago and had trouble sitting through it then.
The story is boring, the actors may look good but play quite bad (incredible Brad Pitt became so succesful after that trash film) and the jokes make you wanna cry.
But like I said: When you wanna have fun and make a video party and don't wanna watch intelligent films like "Nightmare on Elm Street" (every movie's intelligent when you compare it to "Cutting Class"!) then go and see that one!.
He was listed third in the top billing but he gets a lot of screen time being the boyfriend acting like a jerk.The story is about students who are being murdered one by one, and as an audience we keep on guessing who the killer is until the finale in this "whoduit" concept.
If you want to watch slasher film that you don't need to take seriously or need something to watch while doing something else or if you're just curious about seeing Brad in his first major role before he became a star, then this movie may be for you.
The lack of a story line usually does not pose a serious problem for most "B" movie fans as long as there are other components of the film that make it fun to watch.
if you're looking for a decent horror movie with brad pitt, go for it, but if you're looking to get scared, look elsewhere.
brad pitt doesn't seem like the type of person who would have any desire to be a murder type character, but i can see him being someone who is aggressive and passionate about killing the killer.
She promises her father she won't be "Cutting Class" while he goes on a hunting trip, or have brawny basketball boyfriend Brad Pitt (as Dwight Ingalls) sleep over.
But, the best role (perhaps the film's ONLY good role, a manic janitor) is essayed by Robert Glaudini (as Shultz).**** Cutting Class (1989) Rospo Pallenberg ~ Donovan Leitch, Jill Schoelen, Brad Pitt.
The acting ranged from very bad to very good; with the best performance coming from actor Donovan Leitch (The Blob, Glory.) I bought a copy on VHS, now if they would just release it on DVD.
"Cutting Class" is easily one of the most awful slasher flicks from the late 80's.Brian returns back to college aged 18 after spending five years in a mental asylum for killing his father.He tries to worm his way back into the lives of his ex-best friend Dwight and Paula his old flame.And suddenly a bunch of people start dying,in the most bizarre and stupid ways in slasher film history.There is for example death by pottery kiln,death by photocopier,but my favourite is the old classic,flagpole under a trampoline so the fascist Gym teacher gets impaled on the American Flag."Cutting Class" is a stinking piece of crap filled with silly jokes and a little bit of gore.The acting is downright horrible and the characters are completely flat.There is no suspense and the killings are lame.This film is clearly as bad as "Hollow Gate" or "Return to Horror High".Avoid it like a plague.1 out of 10..
Jill Schoelen is the only good thing in a movie where every other character SHOULD get killed.
The movie begins with us finding out that a teenage boy who killed his father is being released from a mental institution, clearly the writers wanted us to suspect him from the start.
Brad Pitt plays short tempered Dwight who is going out with Paula (Jill Schoelen).
We get a lot of classroom scenes and love triangle scenes which, at times, make 'Cutting Class' feel like more of a teen drama rather than a slasher film.
It was interesting to see Brad Pitt in one of his early movies, he did a decent job given the material he had to work with.
Roddy McDowell and Martin Mull had comedic roles, but didn't really make an impact on the movie at all.What stopped 'Cutting Class' from being a great horror/slasher film was the lack of scares and the lack of kills.
(** out of *****)Notable mainly for starring Brad Pitt in an early role (and foreshadowing some of the morally ambiguous characters he would later play), this mediocre horror-comedy also stars former Pitt-girlfriend Jill Schoelen (from "The Stepfather") and Roddy McDowall and Martin Mull in humorous cameos (Roddy as the school principal who has a thing for the student body -- the female student body, that is -- and Mull as a yuppie duck hunter who spends the entire film staggering home with an arrow in his chest).
When people talk about the greatest Brad Pitt films - Cutting Class rarely gets a mention, and I just can't understand why.
The film takes place at a high school and top student Paula Carson's father has gone away on a hunting trip.
Around the same time, her boyfriend's former friend Brian Woods has been released from a mental hospital and his appearance has coincided with a string of murders at the school.Naturally the biggest talking point of this film is the lead performance from Brad Pitt.
The other two leads are not so great; Jill Schoelen (best remembered for role in the 1987 classic The Stepfather) is awkward, while Donovan Leitch looks a bit ridiculous in his long black coat.
Cutting Class (1989) 1/2 (out of 4) Incredibly bad slasher film sat on the shelf for many years but finally got released after Brad Pitt became a huge star.
This is a really bad film and there's no way around that fact but seeing someone like Pitt in a movie like this makes it somewhat entertaining.
Martin Mull plays the girl's father and his scenes are the strangest of the film as they come off as a spoof yet these scenes go against everything else going on in the movie.
He falls for sweet lovable Paula (Jill Schoelen) but she loves "bad boy" Dwight (Brad Pitt).
Pitt is a bad actor in this & still is a terrible actor now...The problem with this film is the acting, plot, setting, music etc....
A slasher flick is a slasher flick, but when the dialog is terrible and the actors aren't much better, it becomes just another ho hum event; one that I am sure that Brad Pitt would like to forget.Pitt had his first credited movie roles in 1989.
With Roddy McDowall, Martin Mull, and Ione Skye's brother (Donovan Leitch) as the slasher, it was fairly predictable; down to the lame attempt at humor with the cheerleader taking off her panties before the game.I am surprised that the American Legion or VFW hasn't protested the use of the American Flag in this movie.
And don't forget about some gratuitous female nudity as well (so keep your eyes peeled).The story surrounds a would-be love triangle between high school outcast Brian Woods (Donovan Leitch), cheerleader Paula Carson (Jill Schoelen), and her basketball-hunk boyfriend Dwight Ingalls (Brad Pitt).
Now that he's been released, it isn't long before a series of gruesome murders begin occurring on campus and low and behold, Brian is the main suspect."Cutting Class" does has some pretty cool deaths - a burning in a pottery kiln, an impaling here, a death-by-copy machine there, an ax to the brain - that are flawlessly executed.
The film builds him up to be a sympathetic, misunderstood outsider but instead he turns out to be way too creepy, sneaking around in the dark and even once appearing in Paula's bathroom as she washes her hair."Cutting Class," perhaps if the filmmakers weren't busy cutting class themselves during their film school years, maybe they could have made a better than average teen slasher flick.3/10.
its a good movie, it gets your heart thumping (the storyline that is not Brad Pitt), and if you like a good 80's high school murder horror, you'll love it, but it definitely not A class.
When I bought this movie (for a very cheap price) I considered it could not be to bad, because Brad Pitt is one of the main actors.
And Roddy McDowall as the perverted high school principal, looking up the cheerleader's skirts (And we get to see too!).People start turning up dead, and the movie actually does a nice job of keeping us guessing who the killer is.
I guess its the "I've been in too many horror films and not enough 'decent' films" syndrome that has caused her demise.Cutting Class is yet another I-get-picked-on-too-much-at-school-so-now-I-will-put-an-axe-in-your-head movie.
Brad Pitt plays the jock, Donovan Leitch plays the mental case, and poor Jill, like in many of her movies, gets stuck in the middle of it all.
Not so much for a horror movie, but because you miss those cheesy 80's teen slasher flicks.
Brad Pitt is pretty funny as the school basketball star, he obviously has no skill, and the over all set up of the "psycho kid" is hilarious, I mean that guy is everywhere, and the whole missing dad thing is stupidly hilarious too.
"Cutting Class" is a rather run-of-the-mill slasher.**SPOILERS**Left alone for the week, Paula Carson, (Jill Schoelen) watches father William Carson III, (Martin Mull) go off on vacation in the woods.
Going to school as normal, she meets up with boyfriend Dwight Ingalls, (Brad Pitt) after-school, while new student Brian Woods, (Donovan Leitch) looks on.
This pretty bad slasher film would be completely forgotten today, if it did not feature an early appearance by future super-star Brad Pitt.
The parts with Dwight are quite enjoyable, particularly during the start where he is driving his car to School late, and near to the end where he saves Paula from Brian.It's all good, and very enjoyable to watch.
This is probably one of the worst slasher flicks that came out in the 80's and that's something to say.Jill Schoelen is the best thing about the movie.
It may surprise you that Brad Pitt in my opinion was not the stand out actor in this movie it was Donovan Leitch jr.
You could easily play a drinking game to Cutting Class where everyone has to take a shot when Jill Schoelen bends over and you would be wasted when this flick is through.
Most of them are him drooling at Schoelen, like every other male character in the movie.Not a huge gore level, but some interesting kill scenes.
A neat little off screen death with a teacher being melted in a kiln takes place, also.There is also an enjoyable tool duel at the end with obvious stunt doubles a blazin'.IT said that Brad Pitt and Jill Schoelen were engaged after starring in the movie together, but split up shortly afterward.
Is it her hot-headed boyfriend Dwight(Brad Pitt)or the recently released(from a mental institution, no less)Brian Woods(Donovan Leitch), often hiding behind bushes and other objects to stare at Paula?
The film follows Paula's uncertain search for the killer;as the film continues, she's not quite sure if it's Brian(who does seem like an appropriate suspect)or her beloved Dwight.CUTTING CLASS is the 80's slasher formula on it's last legs..the well has dried up and creativity is lacking.
I'm going to guess that 'Cutting Class' became a cult classic only because it stars a very young pretty boy that we all know as Brad Pitt.
About ninety percent of the movie plays out like an after school special, focusing on the troubled life of the aggressive pretty boy, Dwight (Brad Pitt).
He's the jock who often finds himself competing with former mental hospital patient, Brian Woods (Donovan Leitch) for the attention of the classic horror movie virgin, Paula (Jill Schoelen).
Taking place in a high school with the typical cast of characters, focusing on three...cheerleader chick Paula(Jill Schoelen), basketball star and self-proclaimed stud Dwight(Brad Pitt)and an obligatory crazy guy Brian(Donovan Leitch). |
tt0036443 | Titanic | In 1996, treasure hunter Brock Lovett and his team aboard the research vessel Akademik Mstislav Keldysh search the wreck of RMS Titanic for a necklace with a rare diamond, the Heart of the Ocean. They recover a safe containing a drawing of a young woman wearing only the necklace dated April 14, 1912, the day the ship struck the iceberg. Rose Dawson Calvert, the woman in the drawing, is brought aboard Keldysh and tells Lovett of her experiences aboard Titanic.
In 1912 Southampton, 17-year-old first-class passenger Rose DeWitt Bukater, her fiancé Cal Hockley, and her mother Ruth board the luxurious Titanic. Ruth emphasizes that Rose's marriage will resolve their family's financial problems and retain their high-class persona. Distraught over the engagement, Rose considers suicide by jumping from the stern; Jack Dawson, a penniless artist, intervenes and discourages her. Discovered with Jack, Rose tells a concerned Cal that she was peering over the edge and Jack saved her from falling. When Cal becomes indifferent, she suggests to him that Jack deserves a reward. He invites Jack to dine with them in first class the following night. Jack and Rose develop a tentative friendship, despite Cal and Ruth being wary of him. Following dinner, Rose secretly joins Jack at a party in third class.
Aware of Cal and Ruth's disapproval, Rose rebuffs Jack's advances, but realizes she prefers him over Cal. After rendezvousing on the bow at sunset, Rose takes Jack to her state room; at her request, Jack sketches Rose posing nude wearing Cal's engagement present, the Heart of the Ocean necklace. They evade Cal's bodyguard and have sex in an automobile inside the cargo hold. On the forward deck, they witness a collision with an iceberg and overhear the officers and designer discussing its seriousness.
Cal discovers Jack's sketch of Rose and an insulting note from her in his safe along with the necklace. When Jack and Rose attempt to inform Cal of the collision, he has his bodyguard slip the necklace into Jack's pocket and accuses him of theft. Jack is arrested, taken to the master-at-arms' office, and handcuffed to a pipe. Cal puts the necklace in his own coat pocket.
With the ship sinking, Rose flees Cal and her mother, who has boarded a lifeboat, and frees Jack. On the boat deck, Cal and Jack encourage her to board a lifeboat; Cal claims he can get himself and Jack off safely. After Rose boards one, Cal tells Jack the arrangement is only for himself. As her boat lowers, Rose decides that she cannot leave Jack and jumps back on board. Cal takes his bodyguard's pistol and chases Rose and Jack into the flooding first-class dining saloon. After using up his ammunition, Cal realizes he gave his coat and consequently the necklace to Rose. He later boards a collapsible lifeboat by carrying a lost child.
After braving several obstacles, Jack and Rose return to the boat deck. The lifeboats have departed and passengers are falling to their deaths as the stern rises out of the water. The ship breaks in half, lifting the stern into the air. Jack and Rose ride it into the ocean and he helps her onto a wooden panel only buoyant enough for one person. He assures her that she will die an old woman, warm in her bed. Jack dies of hypothermia but Rose is saved.
With Rose hiding from Cal en route, the RMS Carpathia takes the survivors to New York City where Rose gives her name as Rose Dawson. She later finds out Cal committed suicide after losing all his money in the 1929 Wall Street crash.
Back in the present, Lovett decides to abandon his search after hearing Rose's story. Alone on the stern of Keldysh, Rose takes out the Heart of the Ocean — in her possession all along — and drops it into the sea over the wreck site. While she is seemingly asleep or has died in her bed, photos on her dresser depict a life of freedom and adventure inspired by the life she wanted to live with Jack. A young Rose reunites with Jack at the Titanic's Grand Staircase, applauded by those who died. | intrigue | train | wikipedia | Really exiting is the film from collision till sinking, i.e. when the real drama emerges and the splendid special effects do their jobs; not one aspect of the outlined drama is forgotten, it is fast-paced and very well directed.Of the cast it is Sybille Schmitz who excels, while other members also do a very good job; they must have done so otherwise the whole propaganda aspect would not have come across.
It is often said that he speaks his lines as a Wehrmacht officer on duty, but for me his machine gun like delivered lines sound more like the staccato of the regular commentator of the Deutsche Wochenschau (compare this, when you have the possibility).Though this film is obviously anti-British, it is rather anti English capitalist establishment and their decadence than anti-British per se *; an anti-capitalism not so much based on (to generalize) theoretical arguments, but (as most of fascist ideas) on the petty bourgeois middle class mentality and jealousy towards others who are better off.
It has been ripped off at least twice, first in 1958 for A Night to Remember (a story widely known) and recently by James Cameron who for his Titanic but boring endeavour stole quite some story ideas and complete scenes; check this when you have the opportunity.It is often written that this film was not released in Germany cause of the death (suicide, murder?) of its first director Selpin.
That's what happened to co-director Herbert Selpin in 1942 before the release of Germany's film contribution to the Titanic saga.
The retrospective made many think about the complexity of life in 1933-1945 Germany.One of the films I saw was the 1943 "Titanic" which had a small premiere followed by an order from Goebbels pulling the movie.
After she goes down, what else is there really to say?There are some interesting special features on the disc including an early commercial short made by the White Star Line showing the amenities of RMS Olympic, another luxury liner built before Titanic (technically, Olympic wasn't a sister ship of its more famous and briefly triumphant successor but the differences aren't important).This is an important release for Titanic buffs but also for those interested in film-making in Nazi Germany.
In fact, it's very surprising that the German film industry was able to mount such a first class production as this in the midst of the war.Which brings me around to the propaganda aspect of the film: to my mind it's been very much over stated in accounts on the film that I've read.
And while it is true that Bruce Ismay is turned into a first class villain, driving his ship without regard for safety straight into the iceberg -- it's also been that way in every other Titanic film in which he's been portrayed (for example, the recent TV mini-series TITANIC -- which shows Ismay down in the boiler room screaming at the stokers to make the ship go faster -- like that really happened!).
And if the film portrays the rich millionaires like John Jacob Astor as people who will use money, class, and power to achieve anything -- well, it's no worse than some of the stories -- printed amid all the bravery and self-sacrifice slop -- that appeared in 1912 newspapers.
Remember, after the disaster Ismay and the White Star Line were acquitted, people were led to believe all the First Class men died bravely, Captain Smith was blamed for everything, and the poor souls who lost everything when the ship went down never got a penny in restitution.
Thus, in the end, considering all the un-truths and legends that have sprung up around the Titanic story, I believe this film plays a lot less like a Nazi film and more like an anti-capitalist one.
This German Titanic of a film is a definite "must" see for anyone interested in the fascinating and tragic story.
There are also several other story lines running through this film, including a healthy dose of romance, so don't think its all business.While some of the interior model shots of the sinking are obviously models, the scenes of panic and the real human drama makes this a film to watch.
Frankly There is so much to discuss that I'm having a hard time keeping this entry brief.If you love film, if you love Titanic stories, if you love seeing something different then see this movie.7 out of 10, but you'll be talking about so much more than most other movies you've seen in years..
So along with the usual drama of love and chivalry and overconfidence, there is a story of stock trading and of racing the ship at top speed in order to break the record and raise the company's value per share.All of which isn't totally improbable, and as a weird Nazi view of the world it's pretty fascinating.
The interpersonal acting is uneven and a bit stiff going, usually, with some caricaturing used as a way to avoid character development.If you want a classic older Titanic film for the pure drama of the disaster, I suggest the 1958 A Night to Remember (a British production) over the American 1953 Titanic which has star power but is boring by comparison.
Filmed during the dark days of WWII, this German effort lacks none of the luster or acting quality of important cinema produced under less stressful conditions.The film shows some obvious political propaganda, aimed at pointing out the "greed and ruthlessness" of British stock market speculators.
At the same time it has to be admitted that it's a BIG improvement over the 1950s American version with Barbara Stanwyck and Clifton Webb, basically a soap opera with a tacked-on ship sinking.Is there any propaganda value in the film?
A German officer aboard repeatedly clashes with Ismay, President of the White Star Lines, over the heedless speed at which the ship is traveling.
Despite the fairly obvious pro-German edge on it, and no matter what the politics behind it stand for - there is probably some truth in the depiction of the English, and that is something that is worth sitting through Nazi propaganda for..
In this spectacular depiction of the TITANIC's disastrous voyage , the stories of many passengers are told, including the British shipowner Ismael, whose greed is responsible for the disaster, and the ship's first officer a fictive upright German who tries to forestall it.Scenes of the sinking were used uncredited in the 1958 British film `A Night to Remember'.
Directed by Herbert Selpin - who shortly after died in a Nazi prison this film features a strong cast an some impressive visual effects.After seeing this film, Propaganda Minister Goebbles thought the scenes of mass panic were not appropriate viewing for Germans who were then being subjected to British bombing.
The "Titanic" disaster movie sails again; and, this time, it's a German World War II propaganda film.
While the shot of the Titanic (using a model) was incredibly sloppily done (with VERY fuzzy camera-work to try to hide that it was a model), the rest of the film looks pretty opulent and the acting was very convincing considering it was made in 1943-- as things were turning VERY bad for the Germans.
I don't mind movies changing history, or taking various different variations on a story but this movie is nothing more but a piece of Nazi propaganda, used to especially make the English look bad this time.
The did the story in such a way that it seemed as if the greed and lust for money was the reason for the Titanic to sink.But of course this angle could had also been taken years later, in basically every other Titanic, so I'll judge this movie as a movie, rather than a propaganda piece.At this point, I have seen every relevant Titanic movie.
Once one gets past the oddity factor of having a German hero and hearing these "Britons" talking in German, the end result is a very interesting version of the Titanic disaster: my rating veered between ***1/2 and *** all the way through the film and, though it definitely has its faults, I decided to go with the higher rating because of its undeniable artistic qualities – not to mention the singular and decidedly fresh viewpoint offered for this oft-filmed ship-set drama.The characterizations offer a microcosmic dog-eat-dog world in which various financiers (and other upper-crust members of British society) teeter on the edge of bankruptcy and are further tensed up by petty jealousies, a theft of jewelry and, finally, the sinking of the ship itself; the stock market element (a major plot point) recalls another disaster film, THE END OF THE WORLD (1916), which I've just watched.
Still, the most interesting character is perhaps the female lead played by the beautiful and tragic Sybille Schmitz – she had appeared in Carl Dreyer's VAMPYR (1931), and her life story would eventually be fictionalized in Rainer Werner Fassbinder's VERONIKA VOSS (1982).To get now to the cons I mentioned earlier: the ship only sinks at the very last minute (although, while one shouldn't expect much spectacle, the special effects are very well handled for the period) and the courtroom epilogue is somewhat anti-climactic as it reveals that many of the despicable protagonists survived the tragedy (which was perhaps a mistake).
Ironically, while the film was intended by the Nazi regime as anti-British propaganda, TITANIC was eventually banned in its native country because of the intensity of its scenes of panic and terror!.
The torpedoed liner went under in less than half an hour, and "Titanic"'s depiction of lifeboats falling from the davits to spill people into the water or swamping from being piled high with frantic swimmers once at sea again looks more like a scene from a "Lusitania" film.
The story of this film project is almost as interesting as the story of the Titanic itself.At the height of the war, Goebbels started planning a massive movie spectacular that would present the Titanic story as a parable of Anglo-American capitalist greed, with a fictitious German officer heroically battling the cynical boardroom villains, out to secure the Blue Riband at any cost, to save their shipping line from bankruptcy.
The film would only come to light many years later, as a historical curio.As this version was pure propaganda, we get all the Titanic clichés we expect (before they became clichés), with heavy emphasis on fine dining in gorgeous evening dress with a grand orchestra, while the freezing water pours into the engine-room and then rises steadily into the cabins.
Aside from the mind-boggling incongruity of it being made in war-time Nazi Germany, this movie is a jumble of gross caricatures tied together loosely with idiotic story lines.The "English" (and John Jacob Astor)are money-grubbing financial types.
Titanic (1943) *** (out of 4) Very interesting and highly entertaining version of the disaster told through the eyes of a German director and cast.
However, it is influential in the continuing "Titanic" pantheon and merits a viewing by students of the tragedy.First, yes, this was made by Nazi Germany mid-way through World War II, and was designed to make the English (or more accurately, Imperialistic Capitalism) look bad.
The women in the film - and they are almost all quite stunning - take offense at this attitude in their men from time to time, but the real hero is a fictional, moralistic (ha!) German officer who has all the benefit of hindsight but a complete inability to do anything to avert the catastrophe.Scenes from this film were stolen in most later versions - apparently all the people in the lower decks do in these Titanic films is gather 'round and watch one of their members dance or play an instrument - and the similarities to James Cameron's 1997 version are inescapable (e.g., the blue diamond heist, the lifeboat farewell scene, Captain Smith left alone on the bridge).
There are a few outstanding performances by the women, Sybill Schmitz shining in particular as a weird sort of German stand-in for the famous Molly Brown, but the male leads are almost all caricatures (Astor is portrayed as a financial thug still making deals as the ship sinks, Captain Smith is a cipher controlled by Plutocrat owner Bruce Ismay, and so forth).Speaking of Ismay, he is portrayed as the arch-villain of the tragedy, orchestrating an attempt to break the speed record to New York in order to support his company's stock value (it wasn't publicly traded, so this was completely fictitious).
Not only is the film of historical importance as a pluperfect example of Nazi agitprop, the backstory's as tragic as the events unfolding on screen:Third Reich Propaganda Minister Josef Goebbels heartily endorsed the project because he thought the tragic tale was "a classic case of British incompetency" but, ironically, after its completion he banned the film in Germany, thinking the scenes of panic and despair hit too close to home for a beleaguered populace in a time of heavy Allied bombing.
The RAF commanders ordering the strike reportedly thought that the ships carried escaping SS officers." More than 5,000 lost their lives that night (five times Titanic's death toll and the second worst maritime disaster in history) and it's said that survivors in the water were picked off by Nazi snipers as they tried to swim ashore.
The protagonist of the film is Hans Nielsen, a fictional (I assume) German first officer who insists to the head of the White Star Line company that the Titanic is not ready, as well as reminding him and his captain that they are moving too fast through iceberg-infested waters.
I think this version is interesting and had some good scenes – the lowering of a lifeboat from the passenger point-of-view – as well as telling a complete story as it includes the inquest at the end.
This version of Titanic is a propaganda movie created under the swastika during the Third Reich era in Nazi Germany.
On the side, the courageous Germans on the sinking ship try to save the passengers and are not able to be corrupted and controlled by shareholders, thieves and rich women.Apart of some wrong historical facts and the negative description of British and American values, the movie is though rather an entertainment movie.
BACKGROUND: "Titanic" was a pet project of Nazi Germany's evil propaganda minister, Dr. Goebbels.
Direction was entrusted to Herbert Selpin who had successfully handled movie versions of other maritime disasters, despite the fact that Goebbels was well aware that Selpin had little love for the Nazi regime.
it was just kind of fun to see what a German movie about English speaking characters sounds like.I LIKED IT WAY BETTER THAN the 97 version with the ridiculous running around shooting while the ship is sinking over problems domestic and I loved when the cable channel introduced this film saying "nobody was king of the world in this version." at the same time this version delivered happy endings for some of the little lambs...instead of the drawn out tragedy of "my heart will go on and I will give the blue diamond (as in the almonds?) a dramatic trajectory..." cornball almond joy saccharine schmalz Hollywood poo.Well, I prefer, actually, being pandered to with a few people living happily ever after.
This 1943 German version of the story of the sinking of the Titanic is pure German propaganda.
While remarkable that a film such as this could be produced while Germany was at war, the film is full of historical inaccuracies, and many real life people had their roles in the sinking fictionalized.In the film the British and the wealthy are the villains, not the iceberg.
In the film Astor is attempting to buy the majority of the stocks of the White Star Line so that by the time the ship reached NY he will own not just Titanic, but the entire shipping line.The heroes of the film are, SURPRISE, all German.
The fictional second officer in command Peterson who all along warned the owner and the captain that there was ice ahead, and a wealthy Baltic woman, one of the thought to be villains of the film, who comes around at the end and tries to save some people.
The film portrays the crew and wealthy passengers of the Titanic, as well as the chairmen and managing directors of the White Star Line, as being slimy and despicable, concerned only with winning awards, profit, setting records and making money.
Director Herbert Selpin was himself executed for expressing anti military sentiments.Unlike the German version of the tale, the 1953 "Titanic" has little to offer modern audiences.
Some snippets of steerage life are shown with a remarkable scene involving a rather sensual Gypsy dancer - hey weren't the Nazis trying to wipe them out too?The special effects were reasonably decent and thanks to German war policy the filmmakers had their pick of idled German ocean liners using the ill-fated Cap Arcona - whose sinking a couple years later would kill over three times as many people as died on Titanic.
"Titanic" is a German 1943 film, so this one is almost 75 years old.
The German government, more precisely the minister of propaganda Joseph Goebbels approves a movie that features social injustice, denounce wrongdoings by a major institution (White Star Line and its owner) which always claimed to be flawless, we build a ship that doesn't sink, he approved such project when it was written and then when it was made yet later the Nazi arrested and killed the movie's director because they noticed the parallel made with the nation who was killing millions.
What draws attention in this version is the sole fact of this being a story focused on the human error brought by the arrogant White Star Line president, Mr. Ismay and his way to rush the ship to New York in order to profit with the company's actions. |
tt0074384 | Death at Love House | While on a tour in Hollywood, a young couple, Joel and Donna Gregory (Robert Wagner and Kate Jackson), arrive at the house of Lorna Love, an infamous actress who died in 1935. There, they meet with housekeepers Clara Josephs (Sylvia Sidney) and Oscar Payne (Bill Macy), to investigate the mystery behind Lorna and finish a book that they are writing on the actress, an interest that came out of the discovery that Joel's father was her lover. While staying at the mansion, strange incidents occur. The couple immediately notice a portrait of Lorna, painted by Joel's father, and shortly after, Donna catches a 1930s-dressed woman at the center-located shrine in the garden.
At their first night, they are visited by Conan Carroll (John Carradine), a film director who directed Lorna in her first breakthrough film Gone of Desire. Conan claims that Lorna ruined his life, and that Joel Sr. was the only person ever to walk away from her, after telling her that she had no soul. He quickly wants to exit the mansion, leaving Joel and Donna with even more questions. As Conan leaves, he is attacked by an unknown creature, and falls in the fountain, in which he drowns following a heart attack. While processing this information, Donna finds a mysterious blade that was commonly used in witchcraft and one of her photos torn apart. Joel, meanwhile, tries to find out more on a locked room, and finds out through Clara that it was Joel Sr. and Lorna's bedroom.
Later that day, Joel and Donna visit Denise Christian (Dorothy Lamour), an aged actress and former rival of Lorna at a set for a commercial. Denise explains that Lorna tried to blackball her at every studio as soon as Denise became as big of a star as her. She continues to tell that she first met Joel Sr. at the studio - where Joel Sr. was working in the art department - and that Lorna stole him from her just to bug Denise. Denise concludes to reveal that Lorna contacted a healer for eternal beauty and youth, and could not sleep ever since: after Joel Sr. smashed all the windows and left, she lived in a spiritual world of eternal fire.
Back at the mansion, Joel finds a book about witch spells, and becomes obsessed with Lorna, fantasizing about her (Marianna Hill). Moments later, the same man who scared Conan tries to murder Donna through carbon monoxide poisoning in a locked bathroom, and Joel and Clara are only just in time to save her. Donna initially insists on leaving, but decides to support her husband as he explains that he is near discovering Lorna's secrets and thus can't leave yet. They next meet with Marcella Geffenhart (Joan Blondell), Lorna's self-proclaimed best friend. She tells them about "Father Eternal Fire", a spiritual man, though refuses to elaborate on the witchcraft blade that Donna found. After the conversation, Donna claims that Marcella is the woman who ran past Lorna's shrine on the first day of their arrival, and wants to continue meeting with Marcella. Joel, however, forbids her from doing so, explaining that Lorna deserves to have secrets.
That evening – in an obsessed rage - Joel breaks into Lorna's bedroom and reads about details of Joel Sr.'s affair with her. Donna, meanwhile, has again spotted the woman from day one and reaches out to Joel for help. The next morning, Donna pleads to leave, but Joel again protects Lorna and refuses to go. Donna then meets with Oscar who reveals that part of the healer's activities involved fire, and that her husband is not safe in the mansion. Donna hurries to save Joel, and finds a terrified Marcella at the mansion along with the witchcraft blade cut through a photo of her. As she looks around, she finds out that Clara Josephs is actually a very alive Lorna. She rushes to save Joel, but he does not recognize her and instead turns to Clara/Lorna. While under her spell, Joel kisses her at the shrine and fire breaks out. Donna goes in to save Joel, and leaves Clara/Lorna to burn to death. | paranormal | train | wikipedia | However, this film deserves it's place among the campy horror flicks of the 70's and early 80's.
Along the lines of "The Monster Club" and "The Night Stalker" .Starring The one and only Angel herself, Kate Jackson, this film is almost an exact replica of her earlier film debut, "Night Of Dark Shadows".
Obscenely slow paced and with a rather mundane , molasses slow script.Death At Love House moves at a much faster pace and is 10 times more entertaining .
Stars such as John Carradine, Dorothy Lamour and Joan Blondell make the most of their cameo appearances and add to the films charm.
Just like Hall in Night of Dark Shadows, Sydney is not utilized enough.Robert Wagner phones in his performance as the doomed love interest of Lorna Love, played by Mariana Hill.
I agree with the previous reviewer, Hill (while stunning) is about as convincing as silent film star as Brittney Spears.
Wagner and Jackson are married writers doing a book on "legendary" 1930's screen star Hill.
They move into her estate (governed by a Mrs. Danvers-Lite type of housekeeper played by Sidney) and begin to research the life and career of this tempestuous talent.
Wagner, whose father was her lover, slowly becomes enraptured by her appeal and begins to have flashbacks (possibly enhanced by witchcraft) of his father and Hill while Jackson frets and faces various spooky obstacles.
It's nice to see Sidney in her usual crusty, tight-lipped mode (wearing what has to be THE reddest lipstick available!) There is also an opportunity for real-life Hollywood veterans Blondell, Carradine and Lamour to do something other than "The Love Boat" and keep their health insurance going.
Attractive husband and wife writing team Robert Wagner (as Joel Gregory) and Kate Jackson (as Donna Gregory) arrive at the spooky mansion of actress "Lorna Love" (actually, silent film star Harold Lloyd's house).
Mr. Wagner and Ms. Jackson are contracted to write the silent movie star's biography.
Wagner has a personal interest in the project, since his father was once the famed star's lover.
This is very much a "Night of Dark Shadows" variation, co-starring genuine "Dark Shadows" alumni Kate Jackson, who knows and plays her part well.
Bill Macy (as Oscar Payne) is good in a part that would have been played by John Karlen (in a Dan Curtis production).There are smooth cameos by Joan Blondell, John Carradine, and Dorothy Lamour.
Ms. Lamour's delivery resembles Joan Bennett, which begs the question: why didn't producer Aaron Spelling get more of the original "Dark Shadows" regulars?
Director E.W. Swackhamer was Bridget Hanley's husband; he worked with Ms. Blondell on "Here Come the Brides", and with Jackson on "The Rookies".
"Death at Love House" has, arguably, a tighter storyline than the "Night of Dark Shadows" film; it differs in the movie star angle; and, in its "Father Eternal Fire" ending, it more closely resembles the TVseries' "Laura the Phoenix" storyline.
**** Death at Love House (9/3/76) E.W. Swackhamer ~ Robert Wagner, Kate Jackson, Sylvia Sidney.
Cheezy but kinda fun, this low-budget TV movie is set mostly in and around a 36-room Hollywood mansion, dark and sinister, wherein long ago lived a silent movie goddess named Lorna Love, but who now is entombed in a glass "shrine" on the mansion's grounds.
Into this creepy world comes husband and wife writers researching Lorna Love for a book.
And background music is your typical nondescript, off-the-shelf elevator music.Probably the best element is the casting of several older actresses including animated Joan Blondell, and wonderful Sylvia Sidney, whose gruff voice and thick red lipstick give her a unique, one-of-a-kind image.
As husband and wife, Robert Wagner and Kate Jackson have minimal chemistry together.
Wagner seems bored.This film looks and feels very 1970s.
With major changes in the film's plot, geared to realism, might we envision the film's premise about Lorna Love being applied to that deceased person?.
While doing research for a book about a long-dead Hollywood Star, strange and sinister happenings take place..
This movie, made for TV was very well cast, with excellent players, including Robert Wagner, Kate Jackson, John Carradine, Bill Macy, Joan Blondell, and others.The screen writing was WEAK and failed to provide believable scenarios.
EG: A serious, nearly successful attempt to murder Kate Jackson's character happened with no-one calling the Police, no questions asked, when there were ONLY three people in the mansion at the time - implausible at the least!
Our Silent-Era Hollywood Star was dressed and groomed more in keeping with the styles of 40-50 years LATER than when the scenes were supposed to be taking place.
Instead of modeling Lorna Love closely after Clara Bow or Jean Harlow, in this production, she more closely resembled Madonna.It was almost too painful to watch, as this cast was made up of some of my favorite actors and actresses.
Spelling and Goldberg should have been sued for wasting a golden opportunity to have produced a classic horror film.I rate Death at Love House "5" strictly based on the valiant efforts of the cast, to overcome shoddy direction and lousy production values..
I'm only giving this 5 stars because of the old-timers who appeared in this cheesy TV movie: Sylvia Sidney, Joan Blondell, John Carradine, and Dorothy Lamour.Robert Wagner and Kate Jackson play a married couple researching a book on a silent old film star, Lorna Love, and her affair with Wagner's father.This is a little like The Shining in that the spirit of the house takes over Wagner like five minutes after their arrival.The actress playing Lorna Love, Marianna Hill, looked like something out of Charlie's Angels, not a '20s film star.
After hearing for the entire film how irresistible she was, I still didn't get it.Campy TV movie..
An incredibly dumb young couple move into the gorgeous mansion of long dead movie queen.
To be blunt it plays like an extended Fantasy Island segment, which is no surprise since the movie and the show are from the same creators.
But it's worth a look for some clever stunt casting of Hollywood legends.
And it's filmed at the Harold Lloyd estate which alone is worth the time.
TV fans might find some interest in a young Kate Jackson who is really quite attractive with a mid 70s natural look and Robert Wagner who either is trying to play extremely cool or is just plain bored..
Aaron Spelling attempted to dabble in horror with this flick, concerning two married journalists doing research on a long-dead Hollywood star.
Lorna Love was the top star of her time, and it seems that she employed more than charm and talent to get to the top, namely, witchcraft, and seems to be employing it from beyond the grave on the husband(Robert Wagner), who is the son of Lorna's former love.
Or will the wife(Kate Jackson)save her husband?
Kinda weird...even for an "ABC Movie of the Week" film..
Robert Wagner and Kate Jackson play Mr. and Mrs. Gregory, a couple who are writing a biography of a famous silent film star, Lorna Love.
Apparently decades before, Mr. Gregory's father had an affair with Love but ended up leaving her....and the son is really fascinated with the lady.
In addition, they find various Satanic paraphernalia about the Love mansion as they stay there as well as learning about Lorna's guru, Father Eternal Fire.
What also is there is a weird glass coffin in which the dead Ms. Love resides!
Well, also weird are an attempt on the life of Mrs. Gregory as well as her husband becoming bizarrely infatuated with the dead woman!
What's going on here?This film suffers from a bad cliché, as Robert Wagner plays the son as well as the father in flashback scenes.
It also didn't help that Lorna looked nothing like a silent film star but like a woman right out of the 1970s...SOME effort to make her look like a silent era lady would have made sense.
Lorna Love looks like a '70s showgirl, not a 1930s screen goddess....
A biographer and his wife move into the old Hollywood mansion of 1930s movie star Lorna Love, who died at a young age and whose body lies in state on the property--embalmed and behind glass.
The couple is writing a book on Lorna and want to be close to her spirit, but get more than they bargained for (surely other books about such a world famous star had been written before, but the movie doesn't take details like that into consideration).
The agenda here is to have the writer, whose own father once had a torrid affair with Lorna, become hypnotized by the girl's portrait and turn against his wife, all while someone dressed in black is lurking around causing trouble.
Tacky TV-movie from the prolific producing team of Aaron Spelling and Leonard Goldberg, here working with a fifth-rate script, a cheap rehash of 1968's "The Legend of Lylah Clare" (itself a mishmash of movie memories).
Kate Jackson runs from room to room in the mansion calling out for husband Robert Wagner, who isn't doing any writing; Sylvia Sidney is the faithful housekeeper, still on staff in the empty house; and Joan Blondell is a friend from the old days who hints that Lorna and she were involved in witchcraft.
The sepia-toned flashbacks are well done, though Marianna Hill is all wrong as Lorna Love (she's too modern), and James Barnett's teleplay is full of dead ends and deadly talk.
A twist at the finish line brings up more questions than Barnett or director E.W. Swackhamer could ever hope to answer, while Wagner's book (a MacGuffin, as it turns out) appears to be permanently shelved..
Kate Jackson and John Carradine.
Although broadcast on Sept 3 1976, "Death at Love House" carries a 1975 copyright, an indication that, for once, producer Aaron Spelling figured he had a real loser on his hands (this wasn't "Crowhaven Farm").
What doesn't work is just about everything else, in particular the poorly filmed footage meant to be from the 1920s, which looks as modern as actress Mariana Hill, whose unspectacular career would end sooner than veteran costars Sylvia Sidney and Dorothy Lamour.
Robert Wagner also looks out of place in the flashbacks, and not too well in the current storyline, leaving the dependable Kate Jackson to do all the heavy lifting, with an assist from MAUDE's Bill Macy.
Wagner and Jackson are not only married, they are also collaborating on a biography of the mysterious Lorna Love (Mariana Hill), a Clara Bow-type silent screen siren adored by all, except for the few who really got to know her well before her untimely death.
As movie director Conan Carroll, who had actually been in love with Lorna before she betrayed him for another, John Carradine is able to share some of his bitterness with the would-be authors before expiring near Lorna's shrine of beauty.
Dorothy Lamour gets good mileage as Lorna's greatest screen rival, and ever vivacious Joan Blondell displays her darling dimples yet again as the president of Lorna's now defunct fan club.
The prime cast member turns out to be Sylvia Sidney, her career actually dating back to the 20s, as the longtime caretaker of Lorna's estate, who knows just how deeply the star truly loved her departed Joel, lookalike father of Robert Wagner's character.
Had there been more meat in the script we might have had reason to fear as Kate Jackson does, but Wagner's writer comes off as a cold fish, hardly worthy of any women's eternal devotion.
As weak as the whole thing plays out (nothing supernatural or ghostly goings on) the climactic twist is actually worth the wait, though DARK SHADOWS veteran Kate deserved better, and had shared the screen with Carradine in one episode of her earlier triumph THE ROOKIES, just before CHARLIE'S ANGELS took off..
"Death At Love House" is the tale of two writers (who are married to each other) that move into the former estate of dead actress Lorna Love to write a book about her.
However, strange things start happening around the house and the husband starts becoming a little too obsessed with Lorna Love, and the woman has to find a way to end the madness once and for all!
This was surprisingly a well-done film that featured an all-star cast and a good storyline.
"Death At Love House" also features a good plot, with twists and turns that keep you interested throughout the entire film.
A Golden Age 70s TV Movie that's more mystery than horror.
NYC writers Joel Gregory and his pregnant wife, Donna, move into the estate of long dead Hollywood sex goddess Lorna Love to research their latest book.
Years before, Lorna had had an affair with Joel's artist father and when he left her she turned to witchcraft to ensure he'd come back to her one day...
This low budget Aaron Spelling ABC MOVIE OF THE WEEK has future boob tube icons Robert Wagner and Kate Jackson in the leads as writers who's marriage and lives are in jeopardy when it looks like Lorna's returned from the grave to pick up where she left off in her love life.
It was filmed almost entirely on the old Harold Lloyd estate and has the late Miss Love's preserved body under glass in the garden tended by her sinister housekeeper (old-time Hollywood star Sylvia Sidney).
1960s starlet Marianna Hill is the lovely Lorna in flashback with cameo appearances by John Carradine as the movie queen's former director, Dorothy Lamour as her one-time cinematic rival, and Joan Blondell as her adoring fan club president.
The story itself is more mystery than horror and nostalgia for Hollywood -and the "Golden Age Of TV Movies"- is the main reason for tuning in..
It's the old story of a house and/or ghost possessing one of the new owners.
We've seen it all before and one better.One final thought: I don't understand why Robert Wagner's character would fall for the long dead movie star when he's married to Kate Jackson for goodness sake!!!.
"Joel Gregory" (Robert Wagner) and his wife "Donna" (Kate Jackson) are writing a book on a former movie star by the name of "Lorna Love" (Marianna Hill) who captivated audiences with her sex appeal before dying in the prime of her life.
What they soon discover is that Lorna spent a great deal of money to hire a specialist in the occult who could give her immortality along with her lover--who just happens to have been the father of Joel.
Soon mysterious things begin to happen to both Joel and Donna which not only threatens their marriage but also their sanity and their lives.
Now rather than reveal any more I will just say that this was a fairly entertaining mystery film which was greatly limited by the made-for-television format.
While two of those films in my summary are all-time classics and the other one is a camp classic, this one won't fit into any category other than bad 70's TV movie of the week where a fictional 30's legend has become the subject of research by a married couple (Robert Wagner and Kate Jackson, how more 70's can you get?) for a book and possible movie.
Wagner's look-alike father was once involved with the late legend whose portrait dominates the Beverly Hills mansion she lived in and whose body apparently lies in permanent state at the mausoleum where she intended to remain beautiful forever, much like "She who must be obeyed".The problem with Lorna Love is that she looks nothing like any 30's love goddess, especially any of the tragic figures who died early on.
Her whole style is 60's schlock, and with Marianna Hill playing the part in flashbacks, newly filmed movie clips and dream sequences, it totally defuses any indication that she would have out-done Jean Harlow, Rita Hayworth, Joan Crawford or even Dorothy Lamour who plays a rival here, seen filming a coffee commercial then telling both Wagner and Jackson how evil Love really was.
Hill is never convincing in this part, and at one point, is filmed looking more like a department store mannequin than a human being, grossly made up and seriously badly acted in movies which are supposed to take place during the silent era and early sound era.The cameos of 30's stars are more than welcome, with Lamour still gorgeous even without wearing a sarong, Joan Blondell totally outrageous as her fan club president who has an obvious obsession with the dead star, and John Carradine as her former director who was destroyed when no studio would hire him after Lorna had him blackballed.
"Maude's" Bill Macy is briefly seen as Wagner and Jackson's agent.
Veteran 30's leading lady Sylvia Sidney plays Lorna's all-knowing housekeeper, a mysterious woman who says little but drops enough hints to give away the plot twist at the end.
A few scary moments including one where Jackson is locked in a bathroom with leaking gas are intense, but the continuous shot of a man in an obvious Satanistic robe is just plain silly and never resolved after a scene where Carradine sees this character during a rainstorm.The 1970's had a lot of nostalgia with fond looks back at the past, several remakes of classic movies, and biographical looks back at stars like Gable and Lombard, W.C. Fields, a young Judy Garland, Bogart and Bacall and Rita Hayworth.
The same theme would be better done without the horror elements when Billy Wilder went back down "Sunset Boulevard" movie with the underrated "Fedora"..
A couple decide to live in his father's love nest so they can write a book/article/newsletter on his fling with a famous tragic Hollywood starlet.
Apparently the directors thought the movie was getting too long, so towards the end they stopped pointing their camera to a kind of creepy image of the starlet and brought in plot enhancers to wrap this thing up.
Don't waste your time - even the tried and true horror/intrigue classics fail in this movie. |
tt3121860 | Backtrack | Troubled psychotherapist Peter Bowers suffers from nightmares and eerie visions ever since the death of his daughter Evie in a street accident a year earlier, which he blames himself for after he was briefly distracted by something in a store window and failed to notice her veer off the sidewalk. His wife Carol suffers extreme depression and rarely gets out of bed while he works in his practice, meeting some clients referred to him by his mentor, Duncan. One client, Felix, apparently suffers from anterograde amnesia, believing that it is still the 80s; another, Erica, talks of her suicidal thoughts, but finds herself unable to commit suicide; and another, Elizabeth Valentine, is a girl who is apparently mute and who reacts with fear to the sound of the train passing by Peter's office, and before she flees, she writes a series of numbers on one of Peter's notepads: 12787.
Elizabeth returns unexpectedly, and Peter finds her looking out of his window to where the train will pass. Again, she is disturbed by the sound of it and begins to choke; she hits the window, leaving a handprint. Peter records her, but she disappears before he can speak to her further. He plays the recording to Duncan, who claims he hears nothing and believes that Peter is hallucinating Elizabeth out of guilt from failing to prevent his daughter's death, pointing out that her initials sound like Evie's name. Later, Peter hallucinates Elizabeth saying that "we have her" before turning into Evie and then vanishing, and later, he has a nightmare about Erica, who says she wasn't able to commit suicide because she's already dead. Doing research, Peter discovers that Elizabeth died in 1987, along with all over the other clients who had been seeing him. The numbers that Elizabeth wrote on his notepad was a date: July 12, 1987. Perplexed, he calls Duncan and asks to speak with him later, and then has a vision of his deceased patients on the train outside of his window.
Duncan comes over, and Peter worries about his sanity and questions how Duncan could have referred the patients when all of them have been deceased for decades. He then notices that Duncan doesn't appear in a mirror, and he, too, is a ghost. Now fully disturbed, Peter uses a map to discover that all the deceased patients lived along a train line leading to his hometown, False Creek. He travels there alone and meets with his father, William, a retired cop. Going to the bar, Peter meets with a childhood friend, Barry, and tells him that there is a weight on his conscience that he wants lifted. Barry alludes to a horrifying event that happened in their youth that they promised to keep a secret, and tells Peter to leave him out of any confession.
When the two were teenagers, Barry led Peter to a secret location that his brother mentioned, where couples would apparently have sex in their cars. The two left their bikes at the side of the train tracks and went to go spy on a couple in a car. Peter panics when he hears a train whistle, and he raced to move their bikes; in the process, he saw what he thought was Barry, running ahead of him. However, neither got there in time, and the train was violently derailed, killing 47 of the passengers on board. Peter saw several of the victims, all of whom would be his deceased future clients. He is then terrorized by the ghosts of Evie, Felix, and Elizabeth.
The next morning, Barry drives to the train tracks, and Peter goes to the police station. There, he meets Barbara, a constable, and confesses the incident to her. She tells him that he will likely face no charges, as it was an accident that happened when he was a teenager, and the statute of limitations has expired. Peter also discovers that she was the daughter of Erica. He apologizes, and Barbara tells him that her mother was the only local killed in the accident, and that William was kind to her at the funeral, inspiring her to become a police officer.
Barbara investigates the accident while Peter tries and fails to burn his newspaper clipping of the accident. He is drawn to a closet, where the ghost of Elizabeth briefly strangles him. Duncan then appears, telling him that there was no way that bicycles lying against the tracks would have derailed the train, and that there was more to the accident. He also urges Peter to remember exactly what distracted him on the day of Evie's death. Peter recalls looking into a toy shop window at a railroad set, specifically, a model of a switch tower. The next morning, he investigates the switch tower beside the tracks and finds Barry, who has committed suicide, inside. When the police arrive, Peter confesses to Barbara that Barry was there the night of the accident, but he intentionally left him out of the confession. Later, he tells her about his hallucinations since Evie's death. When she does not believe him, he tells her details about Erica that he wouldn't otherwise know. Rattled, she orders him to leave.
A police officer finds an old and encrusted pin lying on the floor of the switch house and gives it to Barbara, who discovers that it's the insignia of Elizabeth's high school. As Peter once more returns to the scene of the accident, she pays a visit to William and tells him that during her investigation, she has discovered that the road he apparently drove to get to the aftermath of the crash was blocked off, and he would have only been able to drive there if his car had already been near the tracks. Furthermore, Elizabeth was the only victim with a cause of death that the coroners deemed inconclusive. Meanwhile, Peter sees Elizabeth's ghost once more, and, taking the same path he did as the night of the accident, he realizes that it was not Barry he saw running ahead of him, but Elizabeth. Going up to the switch house, he suddenly remembers all of the night: he looked through the windows of the house to see his father strangling Elizabeth. In her struggle to survive, she left a handprint on the window (the same one he saw earlier), and she also accidentally pulled the levers of the train tracks, leading it to derail and kill the passengers. Afterwards, William placed her body at the scene of the crash.
Barbara asserts to William that she knows Elizabeth was not a victim of the crash, and she believes that Peter saw something that night that William wanted covered up. William knocks her unconscious and puts her in the trunk of his car. Peter returns and tells William that he knows the truth: the couple that Peter and Barry saw in the car was really William raping Elizabeth, and he saw William kill her; he asks William if Elizabeth was his only victim. William pulls a gun on him and tells him to get in the garage. Inside, Peter hears Barbara regain consciousness, and after a brief struggle, William knocks him unconscious as well.
The next morning, William drives out with both Peter and Barbara restrained in the car. A gun is on the passenger seat. However, the ghost of Elizabeth appears in the road and in the car, startling William and making him lose control of the car. In the process, Peter is thrown out of the backseat of the car and ends up a safe distance away, with the gun. William ends up on the train tracks, the engine dead and the doors locked as a train begins to approach. He tries and fails to escape and yells to Peter for help. Peter attempts to shoot out a window so William can escape, but only succeeds when the train is extremely close. The trunk opens and Barbara manages to climb out, and Peter pushes her off the tracks to safety. William, held back by Elizabeth's ghost, is crushed by the train. As Peter and Barbara stand on the side of the tracks, Peter can see the ghosts of the victims on the train, and sees a tranquil Elizabeth turn and depart.
Later, Peter is on the beach with the ghost of Evie, who gets up and walks into the ocean, finally moving on and at peace. His wife joins him and asks what he's thinking about; Peter tells her that he's thinking about kids. Carol smiles, and they embrace. | paranormal | train | wikipedia | null |
tt0117774 | The Substitute | Jonathan Shale (Berenger) is a mercenary and a Vietnam veteran who returns home to Miami after a botched covert operation in Cuba in which three men from his platoon were killed. He surprises his girlfriend, Jane Hetzko (Diane Venora) at her apartment and is warmly welcomed. On the outside, Jane is a schoolteacher at inner-city Columbus High School, an institution with a considerable gang problem. She is particularly disliked by Juan Lacas (Anthony), leader of the KOD ("Kings of Destruction") gang. While jogging one morning, Jane is attacked and has her leg broken. Jane and Shale believe this to be related to the KOD, which prompts the latter to go undercover as an Ivy League-educated, government-affiliated substitute teacher for his girlfriend's class.
Shale arrives at Columbus High School and is, at first, taken back by the lowly conditions. He is unable to control his class of poorly-educated students on the first day, but decides to use his street-smarts and military tactics to gain the upper hand. Soon enough, he is able to take command of the students by displaying his combat self-defence techniques when students attack him. He is warned not to use such methods by Principal Claude Rolle (Hudson), but gains the respect of his students when he bonds with them over the similarities between his early gang and Vietnam War experiences and their involvement in petty crime and street gangs. During this time, he befriends fellow schoolteacher Darrell Sherman (Plummer) and also crosses paths with Lacas, one of his students.
Suspicious of odd conditions within the high school, Shale sets up surveillance cameras throughout the building. He discovers that Lacas orchestrated the attack on Jane. He also discovers that Lacas is secretly working with Rolle to distribute cocaine around Miami for a major narcotics ring. Shale and his team raid a drug deal, using the stolen money to buy music and sports equipment in the form of a "school donation." While Sherman initially denies Shale's discovery, Sherman and a female student inadvertently witness the drugs being loaded into one of the school buses later that day. Sherman tells the student to warn Shale and Hetzko, and sacrifices himself by creating a distraction.
Rolle, who at this point is aware of Shale's interference orders a "car accident" for Shale, and sends Lacas after Hetzko. With the help of another student, Lacas is killed and Shale saves Hetzko, learning the full story from the female witness. Shale and his team garrison the school grounds to enter combat against the remaining K.O.D. members, a rival mercenary company led by Janus, and Rolle himself. Ultimately, Shale and Joey Six end up as the sole survivors of the battle, walking away from the school grounds discussing future operations as substitute teachers. | violence, humor, comedy, murder, revenge | train | wikipedia | But as a B-movie where the teachers get revenge, the bad guy dope-peddling punks and principal get their due, it is a virtual "The Patriot" for the high school system.
You can't help but smile and root and rejoice when punk after punk gets thrown out the upper floor window by Beringer while the principal relaxes in his office, assuming the punks will prevail.Beringer plays a mercenary who becomes the substitute when the real teacher is injured by the punks.
This is one of those action films that will entertain you as long as you don't try to apply logic to it or take it seriously.The story has a professional mercenary (Berenger) and his army pals looking for work after they are cut loose from active duty following a botched mission in Cuba.
After Berenger's girlfriend is attacked by a ruthless street gang (led by Latin heart-throb Marc Anthony, no less) he and his pals end up trying to weed them out of the high school where she teaches.
Berenger poses as her substitute teacher, and once he gets an inside look at the problems at the school, he realizes there may be more than just a gang of punks causing the trouble.
It's up to Berenger and his merc pals to try and rid the school of its criminal element, and make things safer for the kids.You cannot deny the good intentions of the plot, even if it is a bit preposterous.
There are plenty of shoot-outs and explosions to get the viewer's blood pumping, and it's nice to see someone make a stand in a tough environment like an inner-city high school.This movie has spawned a few sequels which I won't comment on since I have only seen one of them, and they have no connection to the original.Overall, this film is definitely worth watching if you are into action and revenge type themes.
Nowadays films like these go directly to video or television and the ambition that was invested in these films is today nonexistent.The terribly underrated Tom Berenger plays a mercenary whose girlfriend is a teacher at a lower class high school.
Naturally Berenger, along with some of his mercenary friends, take action and attempt to stop this operation which culminates in a massive shoot out on school grounds.While this is an action movie at heart, it also tries to relate some well meaning messages about today's youth.
That one scene explains a lot and it's moments like these that actually make The Substitute a little bit more interesting than many other films of similar nature.But the film doesn't go too far into social matters and quickly gets down and dirty with the action, which is well served and the film never slows down too much.
After a failed mission in Cuba with three casualties, the mercenary Jonathan Shale (Tom Berenger) and his team composed by Joey Six (Raymond Cruz), Rem (Luis Guzmán), Wellman (Richard Brooks) and Hollan (William Forsythe) return to Miami.
Meanwhile, the history teacher at the Columbus High School Jane Hetzko (Diane Venora) is threatened by the gangster Juan Lacas (Marc Anthony), who is the leader of the dangerous street gang Kings of Destruction.
Shale summons his crew and decide to clean the school and eliminate the gangsters."The Substitute" is one of those action movies in the style of "Rambo" or "Death Wish" franchises that are brainless but in the same time highly attractive.
The cast has Tom Berenger still in good shape in the role of the hero and many great villains.
The story is quite far-fetched but interesting in any case and actors like Tom Berenger, Diane Venora or Ernie Hudson do a solid job.
Think Dangerous Minds crossed with Death Wish and you'll have a pretty good gist of things here.The ever excellent Tom Berenger stars as a tough as nails mercenary who seeks retribution after his teacher girlfriend is viciously assaulted on the orders of a high school gang calling themselves the Kings Of Destruction.
Tom Berenger's fine performance in "The Substitute" makes the movie worth watching.
****SPOILERS**** "The Substitute" starts off like a solid inner city drama about violence in a high school in Miami with teacher Jane Hetzko, Diane Venora, after being threatened by one of the schools violent thugs Juan Laucas, Marc Anthony, goes to the schools principal Claude Rolle, Ernie Hudson, for help.
Jane's boyfriend Shale, Tom Berenger, who happened to be an unemployed mercenary looking for work got a job at the school, in fact the very same class, that Jane worked at as a substitute teacher after a friend of his working in the Miami record office falsified a background check for Shale as a licensed teacher.
The movie starts to take a turn when Shale/Mr.Smith notices that something just isn't right about the school with students driving around with $50,000.00 BMW's and wearing as much as $100,000.00 gold watches, including principal Rolle.
Implausible action drama that does have it's moments as Tom Berenger battles school thugs and drugs pushers.
With the drugs being distributed by Rolle's personal "Deans List" the gang that runs and terrorizes the school, Columbia High, the "Kings of Destruction" or K.O.D. Tom Berenger is quite good as the Soldier of Fortune, Shale, turned concerned citizen and high school teacher, Mr. Smith, who with the help of his mercenary friends cleans up the school and smashes the K.O.D gang and Glades drug mob in the process just for good measures.
Action-packed movie that looks more like a Steven Seagel or Burce Willis slam-bang action flick then a film about school violence like "Blackboard Jungle".
Unlike in most of these type of action movies with Seagal & Willis, especially Seagal, where the hero completely overpowers his opposition with very little or almost no damage to himself the hero in "the Substitute", Mr.Smith/Shale, takes a lot more then he dishes out from his opponents.
Shale/Smith is also very sweet with his girlfriend Jane and does show genuine concern for his students as well as his co-workers in the school so that even with the somewhat unbelievable plot Tom Berenger's acting does make you forget just how ridicules the movie really is.
Ernie Hudson as the corrupt school principal and former corrupt cop Rolle played it a little to much and it made you wonder how he's been getting away with his drug dealing operations.
He also uses the K.O.D to knock off anyone who's a threat to his drug operation in his high school like when he tried to knock off Shale/Mr.Smith, without success, without any fear of the local police.
The final shot-out in the school with Shale and his mercenary friends with the Glade mob & K.O.D gang was as good as anything that you would see in this type of movie.
Berenger gives the performance of his life here as a mercenary who goes undercover as a teacher at a school run by drug dealing thugs.
Even J Lo's present squeeze Marc Anthony gets into the act as the surly gang leading nemisis to Berenger's good guy portrayal.
The beach scene where Berenger's girlfriend played by the lovely Diane Verona a perfect example of why this movie is a real standout.
There are alot of different movies based upon school disruption, but the best ones I've seen thus far are The Substitute and 187.187 has a bit more meaning to it, but a little less action.
Tom Berenger has always made a believable tough guy (just look at Platoon) I recommend this movie to anyone who enjoys action flicks.*** 1/2 out of *****.
Claude Rolle (Ernie Hudson) is the corrupt principal.This is another one from the genre of white teacher saves gang-ridden school.
Tom Berenger is known for playing tough guy roles as he's always good at it.
I suppose that's what kept me going: this movie was so bad it was funny.From a pure action standpoint, the scene where Tom Berenger confronts the punks in the library is telling.
What could be a very powerful drama in the same vein as Dangerous Minds fails due to the fact that Berenger is not threatening in the least bit and then the movie turns into a violent action flick?
The only worth while part of this film is the action packed ending even though it takes place in the halls of a school and isn't really given any logical explanation for happening.
With the way society is, this film has a strong message on how to deal with scumbag students who won't tow the line (yeah, call me Dirty Harry!) I love Ernie Hudson who plays a very unlikely principal, as well as Diane Venora and William Forsythe.In an age where action demands being either CGI or stylized choreography, the action here at least, kicks ass.
and 90 minutes later you know you're gonna be tired tomorrow, but that's okay because you got to see a cool movie?It's a pretty 'A-Team' sort of plot - a MERC becomes a substitute teacher to crack a drug-distribution ring (and there was some sort of personal vendetta too, involving an attack on his teacher girlfriend - but I missed the beginning).
In some ways, you'd WANT a guy like Shale - A.K.A. Smith (Tom Berenger) - to sub at your local high school if the school is THIS dangerous!
But the story goes like this -Shale's an ex-mercenary seeking out whoever it was who beat up his teacher-girlfriend (who BTW, looks MUCH too young for the craggy yet eternally handsome Berenger!
He finds her attacker, impresses the students with his 'don't mess with me' attitude, discovers a huge drug ring that the principal (Ernie Hudson) is running inside the school & calls for 'back-up' from his other ex-mercenary pals when this unbelievable action film is almost at its end.
Some of my disappointment might be down to how the story plays out , seeing as it`s about a former merc becoming a teacher in an inner city ghetto school in Miami I was expecting something along the lines of DANGEROUS MINDS , but this movie plays out totally different .
In many ways it`s like a revenge thriller produced by Cannon from the 1980s with some absolutely ridiculous plot twists and bizarre scenes which is unforgivable because THE SUBSTITUTE is a good film in parts , namely when Mr Smith talks about his experiences in `Nam .
The Substitute is every bit as good as Die Hard and Rambo, switching these backgrounds for a gritty school in LA.Berenger stars as Shale (isn't that a great name for an action hero?), a battle scarred mercenary who's still haunted by a number of casualties after a recent mission to Cuba.
He gets home to find his girlfriend (Diane Venora), a teacher, kneecapped, most likely a result of her resistance to drug kingpin/student Juan Lackas (Marc Anthony).Shale gets the remaining members of his mercenary team together for a crackdown on the corruption of not only the students, but the possibly sleazy Principal Claude Rolle (Ernie Husdon).
this movie was not bad.it's a little too dramatic for my tastes.there is some action,just not as much as i'd hoped for.i was bored for a lot of it.there's a lot of talking in this movie,but nothing memorable about that aspect.the concept has likely been done before.a new substitute takes over teaching duties usually in a classroom full of troubled teens/gang members,delinquents,etc.but this sub is no ordinary sub.he has skills.in fact he isn't actually a teacher.but he pretend to be.he has ulterior motives.usually,someone he knows has been either killed or seriously injured.so he poses as a teacher to find out the truth.he usually teaches the students,some of them anyway,respect for themselves and tries to get them on the right track in life.that's pretty much the plot line for the substitute,among other similar movies.if you like that kind of movie,and you don't mind a fair amount of dialogue,with a bit of action,you might like "The Substitute".i didn't like it all that much,so i'd have to give it a 5/10.
Tom Berenger stars as Shale, a mercenary who becomes the substitute teacher taking in for his girlfriend after she is temporarily crippled by the gangs that run the school, figuring out that the principal is in on it, Berenger and his crew of mercenaries (William Forsythe and Luiz Guzman among them) break up a drug ring while Berenger actually likes to teach.
Tom Berenger is a CIA agent living in Miami whose wife is beat up by a gang member so Berenger goes undercover a substitute teacher at a high school where many of the gang members go.
Shale is a substitute teacher at a school where the headmaster imports drugs.
Shale goes undercover as a substitute teacher in Jane's class and finds evidence that drugs are being sold within the school possibly with the support of someone inside the school.
The film does prove entertaining but only if you turn off your brain and get lost in it's macho world of marines and fighting!Berenger is a more believable marine than Treat Williams (parts 2-4) but not a better actor, so he is a bit too gruff and combat ready he's OK but behind his eyes you can see a sadness that reveals his inner longing for Oliver stone to come and rescue him with another good role!
Forsythe is OK and begins the `Things to do in Denver When You're Dead' connection that continues in every film and Hudson is good (but predicable) as the first of the Oz connections (BD Wong is in the second!).Overall this is an average action movie that is a little uneven and has no real surprises.
THE SUBSTITUTE is the only Tom Berenger movie I own -- because it shows him playing a character that is fairly sympathetic and NOT merely a militaristic bully, as has been his earlier roles.
Tom Berenger stars as Shale, a mercenary who returns to his Miami home and discovers a local gang is harassing his girlfriend.
Their are some effective action scenes, especially the one at the end, and Ernie Hudson gives a solid performance as the Principle of the high school.
The Substitute tracks the exploits of a mercenary, Tom Berenger, who enters a Miami high school to find the students responsible for an attack on his girlfriend.
Ernie Hudson, as the principal of the high school, and Berenger place this film above similar fare..
Here, Tom BERENGER again, plays a vietnam veteran who this time shows his skills in high school, to prevent some gang kids from the drugs and so on.
A bit entertaining but that´s it, Maybe he should do movies like PLATOON or SNIPER, in which such mercenary-performances will come better to play.
Berenger is well-cast as a professional mercenary who travels to Miami to visit old girlfriend Venora, a beleaguered teacher at a gang-ridden, drug-infested high school where the students seem to run things and the teachers are just puppets.
Contrived, to say the least, the film delivers the usual messages about school violence and the evils of gang membership, but good action scenes and effective casting make it at least worth a look if you're in the mood.
Tom Berringer is believable as a mercenary who seeks to find out why his girlfriend is attacked by a high school gang by becoming a substitute teacher.
If you like gritty, real, down-to-earth action with high school kids who are more than cardboard characters, this is a movie you'll love.
KOD (not to be confused with "Youth of the Nation" band POD) is led by Juan Lacas (Anthony), so Shale, now teaming up with not just his merc buddies but also some teachers and a few of the better students, try to get to the bottom of all the criminality going on at that particular Miami high school.
Needless to say, this would never make it to the theater today.If you take all the "bad school" movies that have been with us for such a long time - everything from Blackboard Jungle (1955), to The Principal (1987), Class of 1984 (1982), Class of 1999 (1990), Dangerous Minds (1995), Detention (2003), and, of course Class of 1999 II: The Substitute (1994), not forgetting the parody of such films, High School High (1996), and amalgamate them, and add some "Mercenary Humor", you get The Substitute.
A really good team of character actors that are great fun to watch, its just a shame we don't more of them in action together.Most of the film is a huge stereotypical montage of standard scenarios you can see coming a mile away.
Tom Berenger plays the head of a mercenary team who return home from Cuba after a failed mission to find out that his girlfriend, a high school teacher has been injured during a high-school raucous.
"The Substitute" is an absolutely unrealistic drama--"To Sir With Love" meets "Mission: Impossible." On the other hand, it's a lot of fun to see gangs get beat up on their own turf and see a high school being reclaimed, the way you might wish it could happen in real life.Tom Berenger does a credible job as marine turned mercenary posing as a substitute teacher--subbing for a girlfriend he met in Nicaragua and who was kneecapped by gang members from her school.
I didn't like the way most of his team dies in the final engagement.On the whole, it was much better than I was expecting and I would recommend it for people who want an interesting action movie with some funny moments but don't want to have to think much while watching it..
This film came out three years after Sniper, and it suffers from a serious identity crisis.The film wants to be every good-teacher-cleans-up-bad-school movie you've ever seen.
Then, at the end of the film, it basically turns into Rambo/Sniper but set inside of a school.It's quite entertaining to watch Berenger discipline an unruly class. |
tt1595656 | To the Wonder | Neil (Ben Affleck) is an American traveling in Europe who in Paris meets and falls in love with Marina (Olga Kurylenko), a Ukrainian divorcée who is living with her 10-year-old daughter Tatiana (Tatiana Chiline). Basking in their new romance, the lovers travel to Mont St. Michel, the island abbey off the coast of Normandy. Neil makes a commitment to Marina, inviting her to relocate with Tatiana to his native Oklahoma. Neil takes a job as an environmental inspector, and Marina settles into her life in the United States. After some time, the couple’s passionate romance cools. Marina finds solace with the Catholic priest Father Quintana (Javier Bardem), who is undergoing his own crisis of faith. Tatiana begins to feel homesick due to not having made friends at her school, and complains that Neil is not her real father. Sometime later, Marina tells Neil that her visa has expired, and she and her daughter return to France.
Continuing his work as an environmental inspector, Neil reconnects with Jane (Rachel McAdams), a childhood friend. Jane tells Neil that her farm is going bankrupt because her former husband encumbered it with his huge gambling debt. Neil begins a romance with Jane. Back in France, after giving Tatiana back to her father (Marina's former husband), Marina finds she misses Oklahoma and is unable to find a job. Due to Neil's unwillingness to commit to Jane, their relationship disintegrates.
Returning to Oklahoma, Marina reconnects with Neil. The couple marry in a civil ceremony. After going to the doctor to discuss removing an intrauterine device in order to be able to conceive, Marina begins to feel isolated again. Although they also had a religious wedding ceremony, the couple's relationship begins to deteriorate. Meanwhile, Father Quintana ministers to prisoners and local people. One day, Marina approaches Charlie (Charles Baker), a carpenter who had given her a wind harp. She follows him to a motel where the two have a tryst. While in a drive-through at a fast food restaurant, Marina confesses the event to Neil and asks his forgiveness. In anger, Neil pulls over and leaves Marina stranded by the road. Shortly after, Neil returns to pick her up.
Neil later seeks counselling from Father Quintana. Marina appears to have borne a child since her encounter with Charlie but there is ambiguity about the identity of its father. Neil accompanies the priest as he ministers to the poor, learning forgiveness and humility. Eventually offering Marina forgiveness, Neil kneels before her and kisses her hands. Neil and Marina appear to divorce, and they are last seen together as he leaves her at an airport. Marina tells him, "I want to keep your name".
The film's closing moments depict Father Quintana in his work tending the aged, the poor and the imprisoned with voice-over from the priest reciting a variation of the prayer of St. Patrick ("Christ with me. Christ before me. Christ behind me..."). A few years later, Neil is seen with what looks like his family. Marina is shown walking in a rain-drenched, pastoral setting. In a state of ecstatic discovery, she turns to see a brilliant, golden light pass over her face. "The Wonder" – Mont Saint-Michel – remains rooted to the earth with its spire piercing heaven. | boring | train | wikipedia | null |
tt0060261 | I crudeli | Colonel Jonas is a fanatical and unrepentant Confederate who led a regiment called the Hellbenders in the recently ended Civil War. Similar to Edmond O'Brien's character in Rio Conchos, he is determined to reorganise the Southern Army and defeat the Union. With his sons Ben, greedy Nat, and rapist Jeff, he massacres Union soldiers transporting a consignment of banknotes and conceals the loot in a coffin supposedly belonging to a deceased Confederate officer, Captain Ambrose who was killed in the Battle of Nashville.
A drunken prostitute, Kitty, pretends to be the officer's widow. When Kitty is killed attempting a double-cross, Ben persuades Claire, a combination saloon hostess and professional gambler, to take Kitty's place - they fall in love. They consummate their love during a gunfight between Jonas and a local bounty hunter.
The cool Claire proves her worth when feigning grief to a sheriff's posse who stop the wagon and wish to search the coffin suspecting the party may have been responsible for the theft and massacre. The party has another close shave when they stop in a town where the local minister who knew the late Captain Ambrose forces the party to stay for a memorial service where the town can pay their respects.
Later the party is attacked by Mexican bandidos but is rescued by the US Cavalry who capture several of the Bandidos. Heeding Claire's wishes, the soldiers escort the wagon to the fort where Captain Ambrose was a former commander.
Claire, resentful of Jonas' fanaticism, arranges for the coffin to be buried in 'her' husband's fort. Jonas orders his sons to sneak back into the Union fort, dig up the coffin, and return the money to the buckboard; in the meantime, he whips Claire and makes her stay outside of the cave where the group takes shelter in the storm, leading Claire to become deathly ill from pneumonia.
The group moves on - but their horses are killed what appears to be a mad beggar but is a thief who wishes to rob them. They later fall afoul of Indians who were thought to be 'friendly' and would be agreeable to selling horses to the Hellbenders. The chief demands that Jeff (who raped and murdered his daughter with a bayonet when he should have been buying horses) be handed over to him. Ben denounces his family's fanaticism and offers the Indians all the money in the coffin, only to be caught in the crossfire between his arguing brothers, who shoot each other over the money; satisfied, the Indians ride away. The mortally wounded Jonas discovers that he has dug up the wrong coffin that contains the remains of the Chief Bandido who promised Jonas they would meet again. Jones crawls away like a real hellbender dragging the coffin which falls into the river, as the flag of the fictional Hellbenders regiment floats down the river to the Jonas ranch. | western, cult, revenge, violence | train | wikipedia | null |
tt2091384 | Panjaa | Jaidev (Pawan Kalyan) is an accomplished hitman and the most trusted aide of Bhagavan (Jackie Shroff), who is the supreme don of Kolkata. Jaidev remains loyal to him as he helped in seeking revenge with the people who raped his mother and sister when he came to Kolkata in his childhood after his father's death. They share a business rivalry with Kulkarni (Atul Kulkarni), who aims to overthrow Bhagavan. Things are smooth until Bhagwan’s son Munna (Adivi Sesh) returns to India. He is a psychotic and highly impulsive youngster. He has his eyes on club dancer Jahnavi (Anjali Lavania), but she rejects him as she adores Jaidev.
Jaidev meanwhile comes across Sandhya (Sarah-Jane Dias), who is a soft-spoken environmentalist and tree lover. A mutual admiration for each other leads to a romantic involvement between the two. Munna meanwhile, continues to go crazy about Jahnavi and a tragedy ensues.
Sabhapathi (Paruchuri Venkateswara Rao) works for Bhagavan. Munna mistreats Sabhapathi, but Bhagavan doesn't care. Sabhapathi joins Kulkarni's gang to protect himself. Jaidev kidnaps Sampath's (Sampath Raj) son. Munna kills Sampath's son due to laughter over Jahnavi loving Jaidev. Munna confronts Jahnavi at Jaidev's flat. Munna brutally murders her. Jaidev kills Munna by throwing him from his flat. This scene is seen by Guravayya (Tanikella Bharani), an associate of Bhagavan who is an informer to Kulkarni. He reports this to Bhagavan to get rid of Jaidev.
Jaidev is forced to decide whether to retaliate or leave Kolkata completely. He chooses to leave out of loyalty to Bhagavan and heads to Palasa, the village of Sandhya where Sandhya's brother Ashok (Subbaraju) is a valiant and kind-hearted cop. He comes across S. I. Paparayudu (Brahmanandam), and he solves the problems of the village by cleverly using Paparayudu. Jaidev cannot hide the truth from Sandhya anymore. Jaidev tells Sandhya about his life in Kolkata. Jaidev tells Sandhya that he made it look like that Paparayudu solved the problems of village. Since Jaidev told the truth, Sandhya still loves him.
On the other hand, Bhagavan cannot rest until he seeks out Jaidev for revenge. Firstly, Bhagavan kills Chotu (Ali), Jaidev's best friend and associate. Meanwhile, Sandhya gets kidnapped and taken to Kolkata. In a fit of rage at losing Chotu and Sandhya, Jaidev returns to Kolkata and starts hunting his rivals. He goes to Kulkarni's house with heavy ammunition and kills everyone except Kulkarni, as Jaidev promised him that he would not kill him. Kulkarni dies in his attempt to kill Jaidev. Later, Jaidev kills Guruvayya, as he gets information that Guruvayya was responsible for this saga. At last, Jaidev reaches Bhagavan, who actually kidnapped Sandhya. Although Jaidev tells Bhagavan that Munna killed Jahnavi, Bhagavan still believes that Jaidev should not have murdered Munna. After an emotional sequence, Jaidev shoots Bhagavan in his chest as Bhagavan shoots Sandhya. Sandhya survives, but Bhagavan dies. Jaidev unites with Sandhya, and they both start a new and happy life. | romantic, murder | train | wikipedia | null |
tt0317198 | Bridget Jones: The Edge of Reason | The film begins shortly before Bridget's mother's (Gemma Jones) annual Turkey Curry Buffet. Bridget (Renée Zellweger) is ecstatic about her relationship with Mark Darcy (Colin Firth). However, Bridget's confidence in her relationship is shattered when she meets Mark's colleague, the beautiful Rebecca Gillies (Jacinda Barrett). Bridget meets her ex, Daniel Cleaver (Hugh Grant), at her job for Sit-Up Britain and is offered a position as the "Smooth Guidess". Bridget initially refuses, declaring that Daniel Cleaver a "deceitful, sexist, disgusting specimen of humanity". Bridget is delighted when Mark invites her to the "Law Council Dinner", assuming he will propose afterwards, but the night does not end well.
After the "Law Council Dinner", Mark and Bridget have an argument and she walks away from him. Mark goes to Bridget's apartment, apologizes, and tells her he loves her for the first time. Later in the night, Mark asks Bridget if she'd like to go on a ski holiday in Vorarlberg, Austria. Once on the slopes, she learns Rebecca recommended the vacation spot to Mark. While on the holiday, Bridget thinks she's pregnant; after an argument concerning the future of children, the pregnancy test proves negative. After they return home, Bridget and Mark have lunch with both of their parents. When the subject of marriage comes up during conversation, Bridget is hurt by Mark's comment that it's not something they're even thinking about yet.
Bridget hears a message from Rebecca and discusses the message with one of her alleged "friends", who advises Bridget that if Mark says "I refuse to dignify that question with an answer", then you know he's having an affair. Bridget, hearing that answer, breaks up with Mark and goes with Daniel to Thailand to film "The Smooth Guide" with her friend, Shazzer (Sally Phillips). Bridget and Daniel flirt in Thailand. Bridget loses faith in Daniel again when she is in a hotel room and notices that a Thai prostitute has arrived for him. Daniel later says that the "gorgeous Thai girl" was revealed to be a "gorgeous Thai boy".
While packing up for their trip back home, Shazzer asks Bridget to put Jed's (Paul Nicholls) gift in her bag. Bridget is arrested and sent to a Thai prison after airport security-dogs detect a large stash of cocaine inside the gift. In prison, Bridget spends her time sharing relationship stories with the inmates and teaching them Madonna's "Like a Virgin". Mark arrives to tell Bridget that his superiors have sent him to put her release in motion. Bridget identifies Jed in a picture as the man who gave Shazzer the hidden cocaine. Mark walks away after clearly stating that he was just the messenger and declaring that her sex life does not interest him. In Britain, Mark confronts Daniel for not helping Bridget when she was arrested, and they start a fight outside a museum. Eventually, Daniel swears off Bridget for good and sarcastically suggests that Mark "just marry her".
Bridget arrives at Heathrow Airport as an international human-rights celebrity. She is greeted by her parents, who have been busy planning their vow renewal ceremony. At home, she is surprised by her friends, who inform her that Mark personally tracked down Jed and forced him into custody in order to free her, in the process stirring into action the British Government, MI5, Interpol and many other diplomatic big-wigs. Hopeful that he still loves her, she runs to his house. She finds Rebecca there and assumes that there is a romantic relationship between Mark and her. Rebecca reveals that she is not seeking an affair with Mark; she is instead infatuated with Bridget, who is flattered, but politely turns her down.
Bridget confronts Mark at his legal chambers and asks him to take her back. Mark proposes to Bridget and she accepts. The film ends with Bridget's parents renewing their vows and Bridget catching the bouquet. | absurd, comedy, psychedelic | train | wikipedia | It doesn't even look like they bothered to send Renee to makeup or wardrobe she (as Bridget) was pleasantly plump in the first film, but never dowdy.
And the movie makes it seem like Mark is at that point never tries to change Bridget, never gets angry and her constant mishaps amuse more than annoy.
Note to filmmakers: dirty has to actually BE funny to be funny.This feels like a movie about a woman made by men who think wet clothes, girl-on-girl action and butt close-ups get it done.
However, this movie was frankly ridiculous.My problem with the film in main was that the character of Bridget was over-parodied.
They have nothing in common, the reason they break up at the beginning is not believable in any way, and the reasons they reunite are just as difficult to comprehend.I also felt that the characterisations were not as layered as in the first movie, and the stupid lesbian twist didn't seem to make any sense.It is a shame that they were so close yet so far with this new film, because in a way it negates the success and hilarity of the first one, which was a classic, intelligent portrayal of a 30-something singleton looking for her man.
First rule of comedy: Be funny.But the makers of "Bridget Jones: The Edge of Reason" don't bother with such trivial matters.
Not when they've deluded themselves into believing that merely bringing back Renée Zellweger, Colin Firth, Hugh Grant and a few others would automatically make the sequel funny, too.
By the time we get to an excruciatingly long and unfunny prison sequence featuring yet another sorry moment that tries desperately to be funny - a chorus of Madonna's "Like a Virgin" - this film has gone so way off the tracks, there's no hope of it ever getting back on.
"Bridget Jones: The Edge of Reason" is lousy storytelling, rotten acting and awful film-making..
The first book was not-so-loosely based on Jane Austen's "Pride and Prejudice." The first movie left a lot of that in, and even included a lot of "inside jokes" for those of us who are familiar with that delightful book and the filmed version starring Colin Firth as Fitzwilliam Darcy.
Then some time later, Bridget accepts a dinner date with Daniel, and even buys condoms "just in case." He comes to Bridget's flat and makes a pass at her before Bridget comes to her senses and throws him out.Granted, they expanded Daniel's role quite a bit for the film, but I happen to love his sleazy charm.
(I did expect Pat Benatar's "Hit Me with Your Best Shot" to break out at any time, and was quite disappointed that they didn't choose it as background!) The fight is fantastic, and totally in context with this movie - there is a good reason for it.6) Bridget already had her happy ending in the first film, why do we need another?
But I suspect that most viewers will not be as troubled by it as I.)So yes, the movie's not perfect, and it's not everything that a die-hard Bridget Jones fan would want.
(I don't know that any movie could live up to those celestial expectations.) But it is v.g., and those who are Bridget fans will probably want to watch it many times.
Those who prefer explosions and gun shootouts should probably go elsewhere.Since this is a review, I should also mention that Renee Zellweger was better than ever as Bridget (when I read the books, I now picture her as Bridget); Colin Firth was absolutely gorgeous, of course, and managed to crack his haughty Darcy-esquire facade with melting smiles on a number of occasions; and Hugh Grant was the very portrait of a posh cad..
Just endless scenes of Bridget making a fool of herself.They always say sequels are worse than the original movie, but I've never seen one so much abysmally worse than the first..
He looks happy/sad/confused/amused/pained all at once, result; a hilarious mix of ridiculousness and good looks all for the price of one.certain bits have been missed out, which is a shame, as they would have been really funny, and other things have been changed, such as the character of Rebecca.
In the case of Bridget Jones: The Edge of Reason, it was inevitable that the freshness and sheer pleasure of a funny, heartfelt love story of Bridget Jones's Diary, would be a hard act to top much less follow.
No Oscar nominations are forthcoming this time.Not a couple months have passed as our favorite British journalist (played with gusto by Renee Zellweger) is dating her dream beau, Mark Darcy (Colin Firth returns as a noble steed).
Just one of his story lines in Love Actually is as good as or better than anything in Edge of Reason.Perhaps the biggest problem with this film is that it is a chore to find anything truly engaging or to feel any sympathy and concern for Zellweger's character.
One person in our party watching this movie in fact called it "painful".The original Bridget Jones Diary worked very well, at least in my opinion.
i read both books shortly after the first bridget jones came out, and to say that this movie is suppose to be The Edge of Reason is selling the book short.
Of course, the movie had to have another sissy fight between Firth and Grant in the hopes of getting a laugh but is just stupid and repetitive.Overall, this movie attempts to be a romantic comedy, but turns out to be a blundering and repetitive sequel.
People will like it and it will probably make loads of money, but it wasn't for me (or most males).Anyone who has seen the first film will know the plot as it almost identical, except for some desperate seemingly tack on plot parts (including Bridget ending up in a Thai prison teaching a cell full of prisoners Madonna songs).
This worked reasonably well in the original, but surely a sequel has to be more than a rehash of a one trick pony.Zellweger is good as Bridget, just as she was in the first film (her English accent is excellent), Firth solid, but yet again it is Grant who steals the show as the gloriously smarmy, and downright seedy Daniel Cleaver.
People slagging this film off is really doing my head in!I've seen it three times, and still say (which i never say?!?!?) that it is better than the first one!people keep saying that Mark Darcy isn't as sweet in the 2nd 1...but wasn't he an arrogant arse at the beginning of the 1st film?????And there is no such thing as a happy ending in romance, and those people who think that life is a bed of roses after the rainbow need to wake up...this is reflected very well in this movie.And people complaining that the characters haven't changed!
The narrative is very shaky and the first half of the movie was one embarrassing gag after another with only a few allusions to the original book (it veered off severely at certain points and made Bridget's friends and family very periferal to the story).
Darcy never stopped caring for Bridget and he fought for her (literally) because he wanted to protect her from all of those who though he deserved better than her.Overall, this movie is uneven but good because you can identify with the characters.
Bridget Jones returns in a second and incredibly pointless installment that sees her still struggling with her boring love life.I hated this film, it had no redeeming qualities whatsoever, just a mindless, contrived and extremely painful film to watch.
Colin Firth's character was terrible, as was Bridget Jones, with Renee Zelwegger putting on a lame British accent.
But I should have stuck to my guns because any redeeming features from the first film are utterly ignored in favour of a plodding, dreadfully dreary rom-com that almost seems determined to spend its duration going absolutely nowhere.Renée Zellweger returns as the famous 30-something singleton who is now happily seeing nice-but-dull lawyer Mark Darcy (Colin Firth again).
Writing in her new diary, she details the despair as they grow apart, her dilemma when unwelcome ex-boyfriend Daniel Cleaver (still Hugh Grant) returns and the various (should that be hilarious?) misadventures and misunderstandings that are poor Bridget's trademarks.Difficult to know where the blame lies for this unamusing mess.
Essentially a retread of the first film, "Bridget Jones: The Edge Of Reason" offers a frankly bizarre story that never really gets going.
So although Bridget is now happily in love, we must see her getting into more embarrassing situations (which are this time around extremely convoluted and mostly not very funny), questioning her newly acquired relationship and, of course, somehow falling for Hugh Grant yet again (in the most ridiculous and unbelievable scenario imaginable).
Without all these interesting supporting characters being antagonistic to Bridget Jones, there isn't much to watch in the movie, except Renee stumbling along saying her lines in a wishy washy script.
In London, the clumsy, fat and insecure Bridget Jones (Renée Zellweger) is in love with the human rights lawyer Mark Darcy (Colin Firth), but they break their commitment due to her jealousy.
Bridget travels to Thailand with Daniel Cleaver (Hugh Grant) to shoot a show, and she gets involved in a serious international incident, and is saved by Mark.The sequel of "Bridget Jones's Diary" is very irregular and not so good as the original movie.
If the viewer watches this movie with open heart and without expectations and comparisons with "Bridget Jones's Diary", I believe he or she may like it as I did.
Guess which is which?Anyhow, I watched Bridget Jones: The Edge Of Reason with a very skeptical eye, feeling that all the story had been told in the first film and nothing more needed to be said.
This is like a greatest hits compilation, a movie for people who want a repeat of the first film but don't want to see the original again..
so we get encores of the unfortunate bottom close-up live on TV incident, sexually graphic phone messages being heard by all the wrong people, the fist-fight between Darcy and her treacherous ex-beau Cleaver (Hugh Grant, not nearly in the film for long enough) and even the snowman sweaters get a second showing, as if they couldn't be bothered to think of any new jokes.
It loses some of the charm of the book due to time constraints (and the fact you can't very well have Bridget interview one of the stars of the movie as himself - Colin Firth).
Regurgitating amusing moments from the original does not an entertainment make, yet the audience must once more endure repeated backside-to-camera close-ups, pointless fisticuffs between Darcy (Firth in a thankless task) and Cleaver (Grant doing his best with tired gags), and Bridget having another bad hair day.
Next time, before tampering with a perfectly good character, Renee Zellweger would be wise to read the script first.It's obvious that some potentially film-saving scenes involving Bridget's parents have been unceremoniously dumped.
Experiencing the remake of this film was much like attending Bridget Jones' mum's Christmas dinner - a rehash of predictable clichés served with good intentions.I felt like a focus group was consulted prior to story development."What were the key scenes that you liked in the first movie?"giant panties "OK, let's have more of those in the second film.
Hugh Grant made an excellent end to his film career doing this movie.
Daniel Cleaver (Hugh Grant) also adds an effortlessly smooth comic act, and is the complete contrast of the serious top lawyer Mark Darcy (Colin Firth) as they fight metaphorically and literally for Bridget.
I realize the character of Bridgett is a bit overweight and frumpy, but Rene looked very cute I thought in the first film, whereas in this movie she just looked sloppy.
The whole Daniel Cleaver love triangle was boring the second time around and basically, like all sequels I've seen the plot was just recycled, ie; the fight scene, the misunderstanding between her and Darcy, and the inevitable reconciliation.I have one last comment about this film.
I'm complaining that the atmosphere and the attitude of the script are completely different from the original.Helen Fielding's Bridget was the average woman - not fat, but not exactly thin; not a mind genius, but not a complete idiot either; not entirely satisfied with her carrier, not confident how to keep her boyfriend or handle life, constantly making promises to herself to improve and reach perfection and you name it what else, and all at the same time she was fresh, she was funny and she was lovable!
A fat Renée Zellweger spend much of the movie being depressed, smoking and doing all sorts of wacky things that leave you wanting to gouge your eyes out (or bang your head against the wall, should you be lucky enough to sit next to one, like I was).I'm trying to find redeeming features of this film, and all I can think of is this: at least it's under 2 hours long.If you're of the male specimen, avoid it like the plague..
BRIDGET JONES: THE EDGE OF REASON (2004) ** Renee Zellweger, Colin Firth, Hugh Grant, Jacinda Barrett, Gemma Jones, Jim Broadbent.
If there was an on-going theme of what was wrong with this movie, it was that the director neverengaged the characters the way the first film did.
The continuing gag of Darcy working and Bridget interrupting was funny the first time, but with each successive situation it lacked spark and went in the negative column for how could this man love this woman.
First off, did Bridget have more weight on her in this movie - Renee Zellweger must have loved adding every pound because it seems she is larger than ever.
which makes Bridget feel silly yet again (but who's keeping score?) Grant and Colin Firth re-stage the climactic sissy-fight from the first movie...
i can say that this is only for hardcore fans of renee zellweger and hugh grant (the best British actor in the whole f'n world) but it's worth a night of popcorns with some friends and your girlfriend that looooves goofy bridget ; ) oh and one more thing, the musical score is very goodi give it 6 out of 10.
I saw the original Bridget Jones and really enjoyed it very much, and roared with laughter and looked forward to see Edge of Reason.
Are happy endings remote for single women in their thirties?This DARLING movie will be happily enjoyed by anyone who loves the first film, Bridget Jones' Diary.
the first one was a good little comedy fresh and funny, rene was excellent in the role, but this absolutely dire sequel has the character change into a put upon whingeing charisma free dollop, and worse the film goes thru the exactly same plot twists as the first, complete with repeating same jokes and scenes.
The film has pretty much an identical plot to the first movie, the love triangle between Bridget, Colin and Hugh, but for good measure a lesbian is thrown in, with other nice surprises.
In 'Bridget Jones' Diary', she had many transitions: Falling in love, dealing with her broken heart, quitting her job and finally ending up a more confident woman.The sequel simply starts it all over again, Bridget starts off a total wreck, completely attached to her new boyfriend Mark Darcy.
Writing Bridget Jones: The Edge of Reason presented a major challenge for scriptwriter and director Helen Fielding: to simultaneously present two films to two entirely different audiences.
A great soundtrack and the delightful performance of Renee Zwelleger aren't good enough reasons for this "Bridget Jones" sequel: "Bridget Jones: The Edge of Reason," the 2004 film starring Hugh Grant and Colin Firth as Bridget's suitors.
I'm not sure where this movie came from, because it certainly didn't come from the sequel to Bridget Jone's Diary.
I am a big fan on the Bridget Jones films.
The original Bridget Jones movie was very good, atypically witty and well acted for a film of its type.
Each scene, each theme, each joke that had made Bridget Jones' diary such an enjoyable laugh-out-loud endearing movie was painstakingly played out and enacted again in this uninspired sequel.
I really enjoyed the film however I didn't think the story was a smooth as the first Bridget movie.
Like most sequels, "Bridget Jones: The Edge of Reason" continues the gags created by its predecessor, making the gags seem old and repetitive.
I thought that this film was funnier than the first Bridget Jones, which is very unusual for a sequel.
However, I thought the book "The Edge of Reason" was funnier than "Bridget Jones's Diary".
I laughed until my sides ached when Bridget ate the magic mushroom omelette, and the fight scene between Mark Darcy and Daniel Cleaver was even better than in the first film.
Bridget Jones: The Edge of Reason, was a wonderful escape into the world of film.
It's been so long since I saw the first, but I think this sequel was even funnier.Renee Zellweger is adorable as Bridget Jones and the role fits her like a glove.
Bridget Jones: The Edge of Reason, however, is a continuation of its original film release (somewhat like a television miniseries) where the audience gets more character, more depth, more of a storyline that builds into more complex, nuanced consequences of the continuation of the story.
In particular, like what Bridget Jones says in the beginning of this movie - what happens after they live happily everafter.
'Bridget Jones's Diary' was an immensely enjoyable film.
The comedy is too far and between and feels too much of before without any of the things that worked so well in 'Bridget Jones's' Diary'.
The movie is about it's main character Bridget Jones discovers that life with her new beau, Mark Darcy, isn't everything it's cracked up to be. |
tt0210061 | Final Fantasy VI | === Setting ===
Final Fantasy VI takes place on a large, unnamed world. During the course of the game, its geography and landscape change due to various developments in the game's plot. During the first half of the game, the world is divided into three major continents and referred to as the World of Balance. The northern continent is punctuated by a series of mountain ranges and contains many of the locations accessible to the player. Most of the southern continent has been taken over by the Empire, while the eastern continent is home to a large patch of land called the Veldt where monsters from all over the world can be found. Halfway through the game, the world's geographical layout is altered, resulting in its three large continents splitting into several islands of various size situated around a larger continent at their center. This altered layout of the game's locations is referred to as the World of Ruin.
In contrast to the medieval settings featured in previous Final Fantasy titles, Final Fantasy VI is set in what is now known as a steampunk environment. The structure of society parallels that of the latter half of the 19th century, with opera and the fine arts serving as recurring motifs throughout the game, and a level of technology comparable to that of the Second Industrial Revolution. Railroads and steamships are in use, and a coal mining operation is run in the northern town of Narshe. Additionally, several examples of modern engineering and weaponry (such as a chainsaw and drill) have been developed in the Kingdom of Figaro. However, communication systems have not reached significant levels of development, with letters sent by way of carrier pigeon serving as the most common means of long-distance communication.
A thousand years before the events of the game, three entities known as the Warring Triad initiated a conflict that would come to be called the War of the Magi. This quarrel grew to catastrophic proportions, unleashing magical energy into the world which transformed afflicted humans into espers—magical beings who themselves were used as soldiers in the war. Eventually realizing the horrific calamity wrought by their hands, the Triad returned free will to the espers and sealed their own powers, becoming stone statues. Their only request was that the espers ensure their power remain locked away so it might never be used again. The espers carried their stone gods to a hidden land, sealing both the statues and themselves off from the realm of humans. The concept of magic gradually faded to legend and myth as mankind built a society extolling science and technology. At the game's opening, the most advanced nation is the Empire, a cruel and expanding dictatorship led by Emperor Gestahl and his clownish general Kefka Palazzo. Approximately eighteen years before the events of the game begin, the barrier between the espers' land and the rest of the world weakened. Soon after, Gestahl takes advantage of this and attacks the espers' land, capturing several of them.
Using the espers as a power source, Gestahl initiated a research program to combine magic with machinery and infuse humans with magical powers, the result being a craft known as "Magitek". Kefka became the first experimental prototype of a line of magically empowered soldiers called Magitek Knights, drastically impairing his sanity. Magitek innovations have allowed the Empire to supplement its forces with mechanical infantry, armed with Magitek-powered weaponry. At the opening of the game, the Empire is on the verge of rediscovering the full potential of magic by reopening the gateway to the world of the espers. However, Gestahl's military dominion is opposed by the Returners, a rebel organization seeking to overthrow the Empire and free its territories.
=== Characters ===
Final Fantasy VI features fourteen permanent playable characters, the most of any game in the main series, as well as several secondary characters who are only briefly controlled by the player. The starting character, Terra Branford, is a reserved half-human, half-esper girl who spent most of her life as a slave to the Empire, thanks to a mind-controlling device, and is unfamiliar with love. Other primary characters include Locke Cole, a treasure hunter and rebel sympathizer with a powerful impulse to protect women; Celes Chere, a former general of the Empire, who joined the Returners after being jailed for questioning imperial practices; Edgar Figaro, a consummate womanizer and the king of Figaro, who claims allegiance to the Empire while secretly supplying aid to the Returners; Sabin Rene Figaro, Edgar's brother, who fled the royal court in order to pursue his own path and hone his martial arts skills; Cyan Garamonde, a loyal knight to the kingdom of Doma who lost his family and friends as a result of Kefka poisoning the kingdom's water supply; Setzer Gabbiani, a habitual gambler and thrill seeker and owner of the world's only airship; Shadow, a ninja mercenary, who offers his services to both the Empire and the Returners at various stages throughout the game; Relm Arrowny, a young but tough artistic girl with magical powers; Strago Magus, Relm's elderly grandfather and a Blue Mage; Gau, a feral child surviving since infancy in the harsh wilderness known as the Veldt; Mog, a Moogle from the mines of Narshe; Umaro, a savage but loyal sasquatch also from Narshe, talked into joining the Returners through Mog's persuasion; and Gogo, a mysterious, fully shrouded master of the art of mimicry.
Most of the main characters in the game hold a significant grudge against the Empire and, in particular, Kefka Palazzo, who serves as one of the game's main antagonists along with Emperor Gestahl. The supporting character Ultros serves as a recurring villain and comic relief throughout the game. A handful of Final Fantasy VI characters have reappeared in later games, such as Secret of Evermore. Additionally, Final Fantasy SGI, a short tech demo produced for the Silicon Graphics Onyx workstation, featured polygon-based 3D renderings of Locke, Terra, and Shadow.
=== Story ===
A mind-controlled Terra Branford participates in an Imperial raid on Narshe in search of a recently unearthed frozen esper (later identified as Tritoch; Valigarmanda in the GBA retranslation) found in the city's mines. The esper then kills Terra's controllers and breaks the Imperial control over her, but she is unable to remember anything about her past. Locke Cole, a treasure hunter, promises to protect her until she can regain her memories and helps her escape to the hideout of the Returners, a group of militants opposing the Empire. Along the way, they pass through the Kingdom of Figaro and meet Edgar Roni Figaro, the king, and his estranged brother, Sabin Rene Figaro, who join them. Banon, the leader of the Returners, asks for Terra's help in their struggle against the Empire, and she agrees. Just as the resistance is preparing to return to Narshe to investigate the frozen esper, the Empire attacks South Figaro. Locke heads to the besieged town to slow the Empire's advance, while the rest of the group makes their way via rafting down the nearby Lethe River. However, Sabin is separated from the group after a battle with Ultros, self-proclaimed "octopus royalty" and a recurring antagonist, forcing the various members of the Returners to find their own ways to Narshe in three different scenarios controlled by the player. In Locke's scenario, he must escape the imperial occupied town of South Figaro without detection. Sabin has been swept to a distant continent and must find a way back while Terra, Edgar, and Banon will continue to float down the Lethe River back to Narshe.
Eventually, the original party reunites in Narshe. Locke brings with him Celes Chere, one of the Empire's own generals, whom he saved from execution for defying the Empire's ruthless practices. Sabin brings with him Cyan Garamonde, whose family was killed during the Empire's siege of Doma Castle when Kefka Palazzo ordered the water supply poisoned, and Gau, a feral child he befriended on the Veldt. In Narshe, the Returners prepare to defend the frozen esper from the Empire. After the player successfully thwarts the Imperial invasion, Terra approaches the frozen esper, prompting her to transform into an esper-like form herself. She flies away, confused and horrified by her own transformation.
The Returners set out to search for Terra and eventually trace her to the city of Zozo, though they are still shocked by her apparent existence as an esper. There, they also meet the esper Ramuh, who tells them that if they free various other espers from the Magitek Research Facility in the Empire's capital, Vector, they may find one who can help Terra. Vector is on the southern continent, to which the Empire does not allow maritime access, so the Returners go to the Opera House and recruit Setzer Gabbiani, who is believed to be the owner of the Blackjack, the only airship in the world. They then travel to Vector and attempt to rescue several espers, including Maduin, who is revealed to be Terra's father. However, the espers are already dying from the experiments at Vector, and choose instead to give their lives to transform into magicite—the crystallized remains of the espers' essences that form when they die and allow others to use their powers. The dying espers bestow their magicite upon the Returners. Before the group can then escape, Kefka arrives and causes the Returners, including Locke, to momentarily doubt Celes' loyalty, much to her anguish. However, she provides proof to them of her support by covering for the group while the rest escape. The rest of the group then returns to Zozo, where Terra reacts to the magicite of her father, prompting her to gain knowledge of her past and accept herself as the half-human, half-esper child of Maduin and a human woman.
After reuniting with Terra, the Returners decide that it is time to launch an all-out attack on the Empire, and Banon asks Terra to attempt contacting the espers' land in order to gain their support. Terra succeeds in making contact, and when the espers learn that the others captured by the Empire previously have now perished, they become infuriated and enter the human world, where they destroy much of Vector. When the Returners arrive in the capital, they find Emperor Gestahl claiming to no longer have the will to fight, inviting the Returners to a banquet to negotiate peace. Gestahl asks Terra to deliver a truce to the espers on his behalf, to which she agrees. Accompanied by Locke, Shadow (a ninja mercenary hired by the Empire for the mission), Generals Celes and Leo, the player must then guide Terra to the remote village Thamasa in search of the espers, where they meet Strago Magus and his granddaughter, Relm Arrowny, who also accompany them.
Soon, they find the espers and Terra convinces them to accept a truce with Gestahl. However, during the negotiations, Kefka attacks the espers, killing each of those still alive and capturing the magicite that remains from their essence. Additionally, he kills General Leo, who is appalled by Kefka's dishonorable tactics and attempts to defend the espers. The Returners reunite, now aware that the peace was a ploy for Gestahl to obtain magicite and the stone statue remains of the Warring Triad within the espers' now-unsealed land. Kefka and Gestahl travel through the open gate to the esper world, find the Warring Triad, and prompt the island on which the esper world is located to detach and fly in the sky as an ominous Floating Continent. The Returners attempt to stop them from causing further damage, but despite their efforts, they are unable to prevent Kefka and Gestahl from gaining the power of the statues. Now empowered, Kefka promptly kills Gestahl and moves the statues out of their proper alignment, upsetting the balance of magical power and causing the destruction of most of the surface world. In the disaster, the Returners are separated from one another as Setzer's airship is torn apart.
One year later, Celes awakens from a coma on a deserted island and learns that the world has been devastated by Kefka, who now dominates it as a god-like ruler. Much of the human population has died and plant and animal life are slowly being killed by sickness, punctuating humanity's despair. Celes sets out from the Solitary Island to try to reunite with as many of her friends as she can find. Celes is only required by the game's story to reunite with Edgar and Setzer, who leads them to the Falcon, an airship that belonged to a deceased friend; however, in a series of mostly optional side-quests, the player has the opportunity to gather the entire group, all still alive, as well as new allies Umaro and Gogo. Together, this quantity of Returners launch a new offensive against Kefka's Tower. Inside, the Returners battle their way through Kefka's defenses and destroy the three statues, the source of Kefka's newfound power. When destroying the statues, once the source of all magic, does not cause any noticeable reaction, the party realizes that Kefka has successfully drained the Warring Triad of power and has become the source of all magical power.
Making a final stand against Kefka, the characters destroy him, but since the gods' power had come to reside in him all magicite begins to shatter and Kefka's magically-maintained tower begins to crumble. The Returners make their escape, though if Terra is present, she begins to weaken due to her half-esper heritage. However, before her father's magicite shatters, his spirit informs her that by holding to the human side of herself, she may survive the passing of magic. In the end, the party escapes Kefka's Tower aboard the Falcon. Terra survives, and the group observes the world's communities rejuvenating themselves. | good versus evil, insanity, tragedy | train | wikipedia | The most powerful moment in the game, in fact, is easily Celes' decision to end it all when the world goes to hell (though the opera scene is truly emotional as well).This game changed gaming.
It's 16-bit graphics often tell more story and emotion than the others can even hope for, and it's got the best villain ever (Kefka is the man).
I played this game for the first time in 1995 (i was thirteen at the time) and i didn't know much about rpg's except for Zelda which is also a very good game.
In the beginning i didn't understand the gameplay and i thought it was boring and almost turned off the snes to never play the game again.Luckily i continued playing and after a couple hours (when you choose between Sabin, Edgar and Locke groups)i realized that it wasn't just another good game, it was like entering in a parallel magical world which you don't want to comeback.
It was so perfect in all the sense of the word, music, story, plot, game play etc etc that i just want to be part of the returners or a soldier of Figaro or something.This is not only the best video game ever, this is better than any movie, book or anything as well.
Now i'm 22 and i still haven't feel this with any other game (including ALL the others final fantasy) and i think i'll never feel it again.There's a gigantic difference between a very good RPG like Chrono Trigger, FFVII, FFVIII, etc and the mighty FINAL FANTASY VI..
You know, the wonderful gameplay isn't this game's best feature.
The game start off, like many Square Soft games (like FF4 and 7,) with the main character doing the dirty work for the evil side.
Final Fantasy VI is one of the best games I have ever played.
Final Fantasy VI is the only video game ever to capture me so completely with its narrative that I've never forgotten it.
Many people have complained that the great amount of characters detracts from the game's success, but really it adds much needed replay value.
You have to understand, I first played this game when I was 11 years old and it was one of the most amazing and emotional things I'd gotten involved with at that age.
Sure, I read books all the time, but video games added the element of interactivity and that made me feel more involved in the story.
I scribbled quotes from the game all over my notebooks and dreamed about being part of the cast of characters.That said, this game is from the SNES days, and if you've played RPGs from that era, you may understand that the standards for writing and translation were significantly lower than they are today.
Everyone fixates on how graphics have changed over time, but I think that the level of writing is a more significant and noticeable difference and I think that if people want to judge a game by fair standards, they have to take that into consideration as well.The music, as many people have said, is one of the strongest points in the game.
If you've played any Final Fantasy game, you have some idea of what to expect.I kind of wish that they could remake this game and help it live up to its potential.
From the moment you power on your SNES or PSX to the moments the final credits crawl across your screen this game will hold you under it's spell for hours at a time.
The quality of this game can be seen in every part of it be it the music, Uematsu Nobue the Character design Yoshitaka Amano or simply the amazing story this game shines above all the rest even through it's age.
Simply put for those who never had a chance to play this masterpiece back in 1994 do yourself a favour and buy the rerelease on the Sony Playstation because if you can enjoy a good movie you can enjoy this game..
Easily the Best Game I Have Played, Better Than Most Films.
Released in the United States as Final Fantasy III originally, this role playing game contains a combination of drama, science fiction, and action into something resembling an independent film noir turned into a video game.The story starts by explaining what has happened in the world up to that point in an intro story, and we are then introduced to three soldiers of the Empire in their mechanical Tek Armor: Vicks and Wedge, two bland troops, and Terra, a brainwashed prodigy.
Since this is a video game, seeing the story progress depends on you being successful in the game, and you can achieve slightly different outcomes depending on your actions.Terra is the center of the game, with Locke, Edgar, Sabin, Celes, and Cyan also as lead characters (did I mention the cast is big?).
Supporting characters include Shadow, Gau, Strago, Relm, Umaro, Gogo, Mog, Setzer, General Leo, Getsahl, and Ultros, with Kefka as the resident villain.I am a big fan of film, television, literature, and video games (I have no life), and am familiar with all four mediums.
I have to say, Final Fantasy III is better than most movies I have seen, and I have seen a lot of good movies.
Easily the best video game of all time, and better than most movies..
The main character in the story, Terra, has to go through many variations of life.
I never played this Final Fantasy chapter as a kid, I only really got into the series after VII and eventually played this one on the Playstation V and VI anthology, so I don't have a particularly nostalgic connection to it, but I certainly found it to be another vast, rich and rewarding RPG that was very well worth the effort of getting into, and was a great world to explore and uncover, especially after you properly unlock magic and learn how to manipulate that stat system so that everyone could be a great fighter or magic user if you so wanted.
There are a lot of them, but you do grow attached to and care for the huge cast of playable characters that include such colourful types as girl who later changes into a flying naked magic goddess, a sketch artist, a wild jungle boy who I found too troublesome to fully utilise, a good old-fashioned mysterious black-garbed ninja assassin who hops in and out of your party whenever he feels like it, a Mog and even a yeti who attacks by hurling the other party members at enemies during battle!
To say there were so many characters, there's a great job done of establishing each of their personalities and motivations for joining in the fight against tyranny, some a little more than others, but it all gives the game a greater depth and level of detail that I really love.
Some don't like to read such excessive text, but if you ask me if that's your attitude then what the heck are you playing a Final Fantasy game for?
That's what's awesome about Monsieur Kefka, amongst the classic villains gallery he's the one that for all intents and purposes, succeeds in bringing about the end of the world...only the story of this game doesn't end there, and after you've located your scattered friends in the crippled world that Kefka has wrought, you scale the labyrinthian tower that he has raised on its ashes and battle the ultimate psycho clown atop a twisted pillar of effigies where he takes the final grandiose form of an angel, which is anything but an angel of mercy!
Definitely one of the best games on the SNES with its gorgeous visuals, sweeping musical score (courtesy of Nobuo Uematsu), engrossing narrative and a memorable cast of ensemble characters (my favorites include Terra, Edgar, his bro Sabin, and Celes), and one of the most unforgettable villains in video game history: Kefka.
The sixth installment in the most famous role-playing game series was another major turning point in the saga for introducing lot darker atmosphere than before.
The story about stopping a powerful empire from using magic for complete world domination is full of toughing twist and turns.Part of the story's charm is colorful cast of charismatic characters who all have well-thought personalities.
This is notably bad for the young magic-casting woman Terra (Just what she was doing all these years before the game starts?) and the empire's insane top general Kefka who now feels somewhat out of place.
It also annoys that the story can't decide between Terra and ex-general Celes who its main character is.Music is just amazing, the atmosphere is perfectly caught with many awesome pieces including the tearfully beautiful world map theme and truly epic Dancing Mad for example.
Game's battle and level up system is interesting and functional despite being little clumsy and offers multiple choices for character building.
There's also a downside in this: it's way too easy to build your characters super killing machines that can destroy the hardest bosses just by touching them.Even though time haven't been friendly to some of its technical solutions Final Fantasy VI can still, even after 15 years, to touch people by its pure magic..
Final Fantasy VI is undoubtedly the best RPG of the time it was released.
This is the best game I have ever played for SNES.
The game is an RPG in a world controlled by an empire, there are strings of rebellion such as the Returners and the characters themselves and they go on fighting the empire until a disaster happens.
The best characters are Shadow the Loner Ninja, Cyan the warrior, Sabin the martial arts expert, and of course Kefka the brutal General.
Rudra no Hihou, much better Super Famicom RPG, in my own opinion) had a lot of characters, but at least they separated each four main characters' scenarios, so they could get full characterization, makign you feel like you were playing a game-within-a-game!
Tina is the insecure heroine whining about how she should love, Lock is a tough boy treasure hunter with a soft spot, Edgar is a flirt, Mash is a macho-wannabe, Cayeene is just a man who lost his family and wants revenge (he whines about this thoughout the whole entire game!), Shadow is a cold hearted loner, Celes is such a whiner, Mog is your happy-go-lucky Mogri, Gau is your run of the mill wild boy, Stragus is a fuss bucket and Relm is such a little snob.
It has been hailed as the greatest Final Fantasy game, the greatest RPG on the SNES, or even the greatest JRPG of all time.
However, I didn't feel any of the same investment or enjoyment while playing Final Fantasy Vi. Though featuring a large cast of characters, few (if any) feel like real people.
The massive end-of-the-world and end-of-magic stakes don't really leave any impact on me because I don't care about the characters.If you're an RPG fan, sure, it's worth playing.
Final Fantasy's swan song on the SNES is a very good game.
It starts out very strong adding many cool features that at the time I had not yet experienced in a role playing game.
It is just at a certain point in the game, it just kind of weakens a bit as the story tails off for a bit and nothing new and inventive really comes into play anymore.
Obviously, I do not think it falters too much as I still give this game a nine as a score.The story has an empire that is trying to gain the powers of magic to rule the world.
Every character in the game can learn all the magic spells as you equip summons (here called Espers) and they help you learn many spells.
The story is strong and features great villains, that is until the second half of the game in a place called the world of ruin where the bad guys just consist of monsters and you do not see Kefka again until you face him in the final battle.So this game is very fun and one of the best role playing games on the SNES.
Final Fantasy III would have done much better as just the story itself.
As with Final Fantasy II, playing was half the fun and enjoyment.
Even though I do admit, though FF6 is better than most Final Fantasy games (which is kinda like chossing from various snakebites), it still is not that good of a game.
It just drove me nuts how the Final Fantasy games try too hard to be emotional, but fail badly.Get yourself out of the FF web and play some actual worthwhile RPGS.
I liked this game but i thought the graphics weren't good, but don't get me wrong it was a cool game until Final Fantasy begun with the 7th for the playstation way back in 1997 and it continued for the playstation until the 9th classic.
Then in 2001 Final Fantasy begun for the PS2, better graphics, new characters, and i new storyline, i think the graphics for the ps2 one is better than the orignals, (Nes, Snes, PSOne).
The best Role Playing Game ever made....
Do u remember playing many games where each character has his/her own musical theme?This game is a musical tour!
There are get many versions of its soundtrack on cd as well.One has really to love music to get into this game as i did & cleverly choose it as the best ff ever.
(also ff4 & 9 are amazing) Only bad point about the music is that it has the very same music for all the field battles & that's annoying considering that over 40% of the game consists on them.This game is literally true to the "role playing" The characters are one of the strongest points in this game, here you get real human beings, not the typical anime hero (cloud in ff7 for example or chrono in chronotrigger, or the dozens of pilots of those hitech robots like mazinger).
One falls in love with all the characters, each one taking important roles in specific parts of the game.Kefka (the main bad guy) having a little lack of background i agree, but he doesn't need it as well.
The only stereotyped character is the ninja (i mean so many ninjas in video games already!).
As well is an amazing character with many secrets that you have to uncover to find his interesting spot in the game.
If i go deep into each character this post would take pages so it's up to you to find out about the rest :)The battle system is neat (tho the best battle system is ff4 since each character was very specific in its use & u could choose 5 at a time!)Has the best music & the best ending i've ever seen in a video game so far.
If you want to get into the world of final fantasy come & play this marvelous piece of art, storytelling & music instead of watching the boring movie :O).
I just love Kefka.I think he is THE BEST CHARACTER in "Final Fantasy VI"!
Every time I play this game,I always want more of Kefka!
Final Fantasy VI (or III in the U.S.) is the most excellent video game I've played (Maybe exceeding above Zelda and Metal Gear).
almost as good as final fantasy 2.
this game is a great game and i could play it anytime but still it is not quite as good as final fantasy 2.
the story is focus's on more then one charecter and that is one good thing about the game.
This is quite simply one of the best RPGs I've ever played.
From the main story, to the game-play, everything shines in FF6, but what everyone remembers really about FF6 is the incredible "acting", evocative scenes, and endearing characters.In my opinion, the characters make this game entirely.
such a throwaway component to the game's overall plot, even still not as significant to the characters themselves.
Whether it was the character arcs or the individual stories, the acting, the character interaction, the game sucked you in and made you care for these little guys.This doesn't really read like a review, but I would have to admit that it isn't.
In the end, what a good dramatic RPG, Film, or Book wants to do is get you to feel real emotion, and to identify with the characters and scenes it presents.
So this is what I would say to someone who hasn't played ff6: Even though its storyline is certainly not the most complex in the world, even though the graphics are decades old, even though there's no voice acting, even though there is no full orchestral score, even though all these things may be true, you will still fall in love with all of the main characters in it and you'll be surprised you did..
Just plainly kinda annoying.I liked playing it though, boy, Square Enix knows how to get ya hooked to a game.
I'm not a huge fan of the Final Fantasy series, but this is a fantastic game.
I wasn't born at the time the game was released but I played it a year ago.
Meh, there are Final Fantasy games that were so much better....
The first have is really well done, but this was the first FF game in my books to have some really, truly annoying one-dimensional characters in it.
Out of all the 14 characters in this game, only Tina, Lock, Celes, Shadow and Edgar are truly developed.
None of the main playable characters die, like they do in the other FF games.
This is the only thing that I found remotely flawless about this game.Overall, FFVI is okay, but it's not the best RPG ever made in my books.
If you want good "Final Fantasy" games, play FFIV, FFV, FFXII or even the FFVII franchise. |
tt0120728 | The Last Days of Disco | In the "very early 1980s," Alice Kinnon and Charlotte Pingress, two recent college graduates, work in a New York City publishing house as poorly paid readers. After work one night, they are able to enter an exclusive disco nightclub, where Alice is hoping to socialize with Jimmy Steinway, who works in advertising and uses the nightclub to entertain clients. Jimmy is ill-tempered because he has been barred from bringing clients to the nightclub and is eventually kicked out by his friend Des McGrath, who works as a manager at the club but whose job is in jeopardy for allowing Jimmy and his clients inside. After Jimmy leaves, Alice takes Charlotte's advice to go home with her second choice, Tom Platt. At work the following morning, Charlotte and Alice talk with other editors about how to fast-track their careers. They also decide to move in together with a third girl, Holly, as they cannot afford to pay rent on their own. Despite Alice's reluctance, the women eventually settle on a railroad apartment.
Returning to the club, Alice is upset to learn that Charlotte has designs on Jimmy. She is further upset when Tom tells her that when he slept with her, he had a long-term girlfriend he was separated from and his one-night stand with Alice convinced him to return to her. Des then begins to pursue Alice.
At work, Alice decides to pursue the publication of a book on Buddhism, written by the Dalai Lama's brother, that Charlotte had previously recommended rejecting, and Alice gains the editors' respect. It is discovered that the author is not in fact the Dalai Lama's brother, but Alice maintains the book is one of the best she's ever read. Meanwhile, Charlotte, now dating Jimmy, is openly insecure about Jimmy and Alice's apparent friendliness.
At the club, in front of a group of various friends, Charlotte loudly announces that Alice has gonorrhea, after figuring it out when Alice refuses to drink. Charlotte later apologizes to Alice but tells her not to be embarrassed, as it will make men think of her as more accessible. In fact, after learning this, Des does become more interested in being with Alice, and they start dating casually.
Alice has dinner with Tom to confront him about giving her gonorrhea. He initially denies it, arguing she could have contracted it from someone else, but Alice tells him he was her first sexual partner. He then admits he also gave her herpes.
Meanwhile, Josh Neff, a D.A. and friend of Jimmy's who also frequently attends the club, asks Alice to lunch to pitch a book to her. At lunch, he confesses he is interested not in writing a book but in Alice. Alice and Josh go on a real date, and he tells her he is on medication for manic depression. Upon returning home from the date, Alice discovers Charlotte being taken away in an ambulance after a miscarriage and being told by Jimmy that he is moving to Barcelona. At the hospital, Charlotte asks Alice if Jimmy ever expressed interest in being with her; when Alice admits that he did, Charlotte reacts with tears and tells her she will be moving out.
The nightclub is raided by the police for tax fraud, and Des tries to run away despite Josh's promise to protect him, believing that Josh's interest in Alice will cause him to act unfairly. They later discover that even before the club was raided by the police, disco records were no longer selling and attendance was down.
Alice and Charlotte learn that their employer has merged with a larger publishing house and that layoffs are to be expected. Some time later, Charlotte, Josh, and Des are seen leaving the unemployment office. Josh tells the group that he is going to Lutèce for lunch, treated by Alice, who is celebrating her promotion (her book was published after she switched it from nonfiction to self-help). Des and Charlotte talk about how their big personalities are too much for normal personalities like Alice, Josh, and Jimmy. Des also says that pairing off monogamously detracts from their glamorous lifestyle, and Charlotte agrees.
On the subway on their way to Lutèce, Alice and Josh discuss their future prospects. As the end credits begin, they break character to dance to "Love Train", and are eventually joined by the entire subway station of passengers when they arrive at their destination. | clever | train | wikipedia | No, not a rehash of Boogie Nights, but the third instalment, following Metropolitan and Barcelona, of Whitman's `yuppie' odyssey.This New York yarn centres on publishing assistants Charlotte (flawless snotty American accent by Kate Beckinsale) and her best friend/biggest rival Alice (Chloe Sevigny).
A bit like Friends, only without dumb Joey and flaky Phoebe.Although, aesthetically and visually Whitman's film doesn't quite ring true clothing looks too 90s and they'd never be able to talk so much in a club the dialogue is fresh and chances are you'll be grinning from here to Bolivia when the "Love Train" rolls through the subway at the end.Ben Walsh.
I think the song "Bette Davis Eyes" would have been a good choice.If you are looking for a celebration of Disco, this film isn't it.
This film really does feel like theater in many ways, especially the funny and clever, tightly written dialogue.Superb performance by almost the entire cast (the one exception being McKenzie Astin, who was fairly awful, but was barely onscreen so it was shrugable), raised the film to a level above its potential.
Kate Beckinsale was the perfect bitch, so annoying that I wanted to pull her out of the screen and shake her repeatedly;) Christopher Eigeman nearly stole the show as Des, he played the character perfectly, his voice and tone always on edge, the defensiveness and womanizing, the stories he told, all a brilliant package.
But Chloë Sevigny more than held her own, with her best performance that I've ever seen...everything from her line release to her body language stuck out; she became Alice.This film is a definite must see...a great soundtrack, great sets, brilliant writing and better acting.
If not, not.This movie is FAR more like Stillman's others (Metropolitan and Barcelona) than like anything you've seen about disco - which is simply the background.
I was surprised that these yuppie characters were so freely admitted to Studio 54 (the set of the film), but perhaps it indicates disco's waning popularity by the early 1980s.
I have met people who have lived through the Disco era and waxed poetic like Josh towards the end of the movie.
I just fell in love with this film and its characters, characters who could only exist as they did and together in that very late disco period.Actually, Stillman got some things wrong, and maybe he did so on purpose.
Their post college adolescence is over.My favorite parts - Robert Sean Leonard as an environmental lawyer who seems sensitive at first yet denies his sexual partners certain vital "need to know" information, a hilarious deconstruction of Lady and the Tramp as only Harvard grads could do it, and the closing credits superimposed on what could almost be called a music video featuring "Love Train" that sends the film out on a joyful hopeful note.
With an investigation in the disco's financial dealings and the end of disco approaching the friends attempt to carry on as normal.Director Whit Stillman tends to go for comedies that look inward and have strong comedic dialogue that follow social observations and comment on different cultures and periods.
But the story is almost non-existent and this is a slight problem.Overall a clever, funny look at the life of a couple of party girls around the time disco started to suck.
However, I can't ignore the fact that the audio mix was terrible, 90% of the shots in the nightclub were too bright, the general vibe of the time period being depicted was wrong, the dialog sounded like it was from the 1930s (complete with numerous lengthy monologues), the street fashion was almost completely inaccurate, and that pretty much every male character in the film talked in almost the exact same manner.There were at least five points in this movie at which I said to myself, "What the hell is this film?" This is one seriously bizarre production.
It's clear that either the writer was never actually there in the late 1970s and early 1980s or they have no memory of it and had to reconstruct their 'experiences' based on watching old black and white movies.Ultimately, if you want to watch a warm and fuzzy film filled with lengthy overly-formal dialog then this is the one to see.
They might surmise that disco was incredibly dull,frequented by boring individuals with no redeemable features to their characters ( there was hope for the Chloe character), with clothes and music as bland as the 90s,and maybe there was some connection with disco and going to Harvard.I thought Studio 54 had plumbed the depths shallow, superficial films about disco- this went one step further, and it was all the way down.
( By the way, Boogie Nights and Summer of Sam portrayed disco beautifully).There were shreds of a plot- (sort of like St Elmo's fire but not; far less interesting) and and there was a problem with the editing -so one had to guess what the time intervals were between various "events"- .And unfortunately, you just didn't care one or another about the characters; they were fairly unconvincing, in fact.Fairly interesting dialogues, but nothing you haven't heard before in a film or indeed on a college campus ( if you were unlucky).And what arrogance to think that disco's role was to be a somewhat exotic backdrop for these uninteresting neurotics.
I stayed with this film: cos I was thinking this has got to get better and I was amazed that a film could be so bad.This was about a group of lame, empty, self-obsessed Yuppies, whose horrible dancing was the most entertaining thing in the movie, and who I suspect were responsible in their own sweet way for the demise of disco ( why would you go to dance disco in a tie and suit?).
Rather than a movie about the demise of the disco it's more about a group of uninteresting recently-left-college-and-got-jobs-in-New-York embryonic yuppies.
In particular Bernie (the owner cum drug-dealer and money-launderer) and Dan (Bernie's right-hand man who ensures only the `right' people are allowed in) would surely have made for a good story.I assume the eulogy to disco offered by one of the characters towards the end was meant as a joke.
I don't mind a movie with no plot, but I need something to keep me interested--which this film does not deliver.The acting is uniformly stiff.
Only Kate Beckinsale occasionally rises above the mediocrity with a crisply acted scene.I suppose there are people who talk the way these characters do, but I've never met them.
The characters try to elevate disco to cosmic meaning, but the film makes the inside of the club look dull.
The TV miniseries "Tales of the City," famously set in 1970s San Francisco, had several totally believable period scenes in clubs & bars, as have many other movies in which discos figure heavily into the backdrop (Carlito's Way comes to mind).
(Chloe Sevigny is generally about to fall asleep, so she didn't make much of an impression either way.)I thought the commentary of the "intellectual" character Dan marked the low point, until I reached Kate's non-ironic rendition of "Amazing Grace." Really.
I didn't care about any character, the plot was nonexistent, and--for a movie that was set in the late seventies/early eighties--the look was exceedingly nineties.Frankly, I can't say enough bad things about this movie, but I can sure try.
well it's not that I need a plot to enjoy a movie, just that the dialogue used to carry this one emanated from characters I really didn't like.
Two New York chicks, Alice (Chloë Sevigny) and Charlotte (Kate Beckinsale), live in New York at the time when disco was extremely popular.
This could have been given more time, and made the movie more interesting.Good things with the film are the gals.
All those great disco-songs were in here, which was a real treat.But the music doesn´t save a movie, that contains way to much uninteresting dialogue for it´s own good.* * ½.
I feel certain that "unusual" all by itself goes a long way toward getting a good review from people who have to watch an unending parade of painfully similar, simplistic and bad Hollywood films.His dialogue is uniquely his in much the same way Woody Allen's is in his movies.
6. it's too long!I actually enjoyed watching two of the main characters get severely beaten up by a redneck in a "disco sucks" T-shirt.HOWEVER: what saves this movie from a 1 or 2 is of course the wonderful Chloë Sevigny, who's playing the lovable alternative reactionary girl who of course gets a job promotion and "the right" boyfriend in the end, while the others' splattered lives can only be seen as disappointments..
I love movies about the glitsy disco days so, from my thinking a movie's gotta have something missing if it can't even hold my interest on an interesting subject matter.I also enjoy movies that are dialogue driven but in this movie's case, for some reason, the extreme talkiness detracted from my enjoyment for some reason.
And, it doesn't really show you what partly brought about the demise of those heady days; A thing called AIDS.Dazed And Confused, Thank God It's Friday, Saturday Night Fever, even 54...These are better 'coming of age' or 'rites of passage' movies, which are set or actually made during the aforementioned time..
The characters were drab and not as Des professed "larger than life".it's difficult to say what the film should have been, but one thing I'm certain of is another director could have come up with a far more entertaining movie given this idea and budget..
Yes, yes, I got the point of their lives being boring and shallow and that the characters being portrayed this way was intentional, but that doesn't make it an interesting film by any stretch of the imagination.
The dialogue was elementary at best, the set designers obviously have never been in any kind of club (except for maybe chess club-i mean, who talks at a normal level in a club?), and the music, although some songs were decent, could have included a MUCH better selection of unforgettable songs in a rather forgettable decade....This movie is a HUGE WASTE of time, and i'm that much closer to becoming a bitter old man because of it...
Matt Keeslar does very well as the slightly disturbed, taking no for an answer Josh.There is cynicism is in the real life moments of drugs, sex, disease - but the film is quite naive and sweet in how the good guys get the goodies in the end.The mood is well done - the disco club exciting, but the conversations in the club were almost incomprehensible over the music.
The only thing it had going for it was a good performance from Kate Beckingsdale.Chloe Sevigny is such a dull and emotionless actress that I couldn't stop wondering how she ever gets parts in films..
The Last Days of Disco is essentially an incidental theme to Stillman's third film, the plotline really revolves around young Americans falling in and out of love at the same time as commenting on the various mores of their social set.
I do not mean it as an aesthetic judgement, just a sort of an essay in translating in logical terms the hard to pin down effect it had on me, for all the shallow characters on display, it is affectively rich.It is a film difficult and at the same time deceptively simple to summarize - the only way I feel I can do it is pin down the tone as I see it: Chloe Sevigny plays Alice who is not in Wonderland or Oz (even if the occasional characters appear in Discoland) but actually seems more like Voltaire's Candide, candid even when confronted with her "best friend"'s common, constant, bitchy smugness, who in fact turns into some kind of likable caricature in the end, likable that is when you think she is some kind of irony's scapegoat: she simply HAS to end up in TV, that is the crippled purgatory she deserves.Along with Alice, Josh (Matt Keeslar) has his Candide moment in the end, as outsider spokesman for the disco era: I do not think Stillman is ironic here - and the reason why is that in the comedy of human flaws Stillman wants to present us, we get our ironic portion of that in Chekhovian levity, so I do not think that anyone would end up something in a flat note.The film ends in a lively manner that is also nostalgic and shorthand, that is affectionately shorthand as, one supposes, all Stillman's films are.
The reason given by the writer and director (this is my opinion based on the way I saw what was showed on the screen) Whit Stillman why Disco was through is that everybody focused on their work, they didn't have much time to go party, to dance and everybody's frustrated in their relationships (sexual relations and/or not helpful friends).
Chlöe Sevigny ("Boys Don't Cry"), Kate Beckinsale ("The Aviator"), Mackenzie Astin ("The Evening Star"), Robert Sean Leonard ("Dead Poets Society"), David Thornton ("Alpha Dog"), Matt Keeslar ("Splendor"), Chris Eigeman (I didn't remembered any other work with him but he's got a tremendous job in this movie), Matt Ross ("American Psycho") and Jennifer Beals ("Flashdance").
Your opinion of the movie will depend on whether you think that dialogue was put into the characters' mouths to satirize the dopey, witless, shallow denizens of the discos.
Do not see this film unless you are attracted to snotty waspy rich ivy league grads waxing intellectual.Period.After about 10 or 15 minutes, I asked my wife, "They've introduced all the 'bad' guys, so when are we going to meet the good guys.'"About two minutes later, after watching a dark-haired little pixie 22-or-so year old blather on intelligently and pretentiously about this or that, I decided I had had it up to here (pointing to well above my eyebrows) with this stuff.
Stillman is interested here in expanding some of his favorite motifs such as, of course, disco, intellectualism (for lack of a better word), wit, snobbery, and relationships, and sacrifices very little for a mainstream audience: thus, a lot of loose ends, difficult to follow dialogue, disagreeable characters, and a generally scattered storyline.
Wrong.If this movie is meant to be a comment on the virus like spread of Reagonomics into every aspect of American culture throughout the 80s, then having a grand Disco as the setting pretty much mandates that the film be a broad parody.
Eigeman always comes out looking good, however, and delivers some of the funniest lines in the film.After playing a kind, upper-class helper in Cold Comfort Farm, Kate Beckinsale is a surprise as Charlotte, a girl with a "big personality" who puts Chloe Sevigny's Alice through hell for much of the film.
Alice (Sevigny), a self-contained sylph dithering about making the right decisions - don't be judgmental, be sexy, always at the bidding of her more popular but stuck-up friend Charlotte (a fresh-faced Beckinsale, looking ghastly under the slap), both girls work in the same publishing house and mingle with the likes of Tom (Leonard), a spiffy environmental lawyer, Jimmy (Astin), an enterprising adman, No.1 and No.2 prospects on Alice's infatuation list, then there are Josh (Keeslar), a young assistant district attorney and Des (Eigeman), a college-dropout who becomes one of the managers of the said nightclub, both take a fancy on the quiet but intelligent Alice.Gender study and sex politics are thrown into the mix where philandering and mendacity (using "gay excuse" to break off relationships), gender double standards (you are a titillating slut, I will not forfeit our chance of a one-night-stand, but afterwards, we are finished.), treacherous friendship (Beckingsale is totally in her wheelhouse as the paradigm of the so called "green tea bitch", avant la lettre), even venereal disease, collectively roil the dynamism of their pairing-off games, to somewhat wacky but consistently buoyant vibes, however, a byplay relative of an undercover police investigation is only patchily introduced as a frivolous plot device, fails to emphasize what is at stake, and the manic-depressive Josh, accorded with a forthright quirkiness and spontaneous elocution, potentially the most fascinating character among the posse, is wasted by the wooden, stilted performance from the blandly handsome Keeslar, whose recapitulation of the film's tenor near the finish-line comes off as a deleterious overkill.However, club-scene hasn't died out, has been continuing luring new generations of hipsters and scenesters with theme-specific variations to this day, over three decades later, THE LAST DAYS OF DISCO is, to each their own, a sparkling eulogy of Whitman's own youthful abandon and disillusion, and on a sociological level, a zeitgeist-reflecting conversation piece that thankfully doesn't belie its maker's undue conceit and guile..
I loved Whit Stillman's other films and enjoyed Last Days of Disco as much as Barcelona and Metropolitan.
Most people's lives are filled with mostly dialogue, just like this movie.
Maybe it's a bit of a stretch, but in a limited way, the Last Days of Disco is as good a meditation on the end of its era as The Great Gatsby is about the end of the Jazz Age.Some people won't like this film because they'll have a hard time relating to the yuppies who are the major characters, but the character development (or lack thereof) is one of the movie's major strengths.
If you like The Last Days of Disco, you will almost certainly enjoy his two earlier films, Metropolitan and Barcelona..
The movie never picks up, never gets more interesting, just like the lives of these characters.I can't call "The Last Days of Disco" a bad movie, because it isn't.
I've seen two of Whit Stillman's three movies -- Metropolitan and now Last Days of Disco.
Once again, Eigeman does a great job with a multi-faceted character, while Chloe Sevigny and Kate Beckinsale hold the movie together relatively well at its center.. |
tt0245562 | Windtalkers | During World War II, USMC Cpl Joseph F. 'Joe' Enders rallies himself to return to active duty with the aid of his pharmacist, Rita. He previously survived a gruesome battle on the Solomon Islands against the Imperial Japanese Army that killed his entire squad and left him with a scar on his neck and almost deaf in his left ear. Enders' new assignment is to protect Navajo code talker Pvt. Ben Yahzee, and carries a promotion for Enders to Sergeant. Sgt. Pete 'Ox' Henderson also receives a parallel assignment protecting Navajo code talker Pvt. Charlie Whitehorse. The Navajo code, as it was known, was a code based on two parts: 1) the Navajo language and 2) a code embedded in the language, meaning that even native speakers would be confused by it, referring to a tank as a turtle, for example. The code was close to unbreakable but also so difficult only a few people could learn it.
Yahzee and Whitehorse, lifelong friends from the same Navajo tribe, are trained to send and receive coded messages that direct artillery fire. Enders and Henderson are shown evidence that captured Navajos are tortured to death to get the code and instructed that it cannot fall into enemy hands. This implies that they are to kill their code talkers if capture is imminent. As Enders and Henderson meet Yahzee and Whitehorse, it becomes apparent that the two experienced Marines are less than happy to be babysitting their Navajo codetalkers. The Navajos must endure racial harassment by the white soldiers, notably Private Chick. But during their missions, Henderson and Whitehorse discover a mutual love of music, Whitehorse with his flute and Henderson with his harmonica. As their practicing becomes more and more melodic, Henderson intones that their music is turning into something. They become not just soldiers, but friends. Enders and Yahzee also discover that they have much in common, notably their Catholic upbringings.
The invasion of Saipan is Yahzee's and Whitehorse's first combat experience. After the beachhead is secured in vicious fighting, the Marines come under friendly fire from U.S. artillery (during which Pvt. Nellie is killed saving a badly wounded marine). Yahzee's radio is destroyed and the convoy is unable to call off the bombardment. Yahzee suggests that he disguise himself as an Imperial Japanese soldier and slip behind enemy lines to commandeer a radio. Enders goes with him as a prisoner and eliminates several Japanese soldiers. Yahzee is forced to kill for the first time before he can redirect U.S. artillery fire onto the Japanese position. For their bravery, Enders is awarded a Silver Star by the commanding officer, with Yahzee's role almost ignored until Enders points him out but still credits Enders. Enders sees Cpl. Pappas praying by Nellie's hastily dug grave and, knowing he was alive because of Nellie's actions, gives the medal to Pappas with instructions to send it to Nellie's wife. Later, after a night of sake drinking, Yahzee performs Navajo rituals over the unconscious Enders to protect him with the spirits.
That night the Marines camp in a village, Tanapag, thought to be secured. Yahzee is temporarily assigned back to the command post to translate a code. Enders becomes increasingly torn because, despite his orders, he cannot imagine killing Yahzee. He demands to be relieved from his unit but this request is denied. The next morning, Japanese soldiers attack, Pvt. Harrigan (the squad's flamethrower man) is shot in the flame tanks and burns, forcing Enders to killed him. Later in the battle, Whitehorse saves the life of Chick, the racist who beat Yahzee for being Navajo. Henderson takes cover with Whitehorse and the two hold off numerous Japanese. Running low on ammunition, Henderson he realizes Whitehorse is in danger of being captured. He presses his pistol against Whitehorse's chest as the Navajo watches horrified, asking his friend "Why?" Hnderson cannot bring himself to pull the trigger on the man he has grown close to. Turning to meet the enemy, Henderson is beheaded by a Samurai sword and Whitehorse is about to be captured by the Japanese. Enders sees Whitehorse being beaten and dragged away by the Japanese and tries to shoot the captors with his pistol, but it has run out of ammunition. Enders pulls out a grenade but hesitates as he makes eye contact with Whitehorse. Whitehorse, realizing the Japanese will torture him for the code, vehemently nods to Enders, who grimly primes the grenade and throws it at Whitehorse's feet. The ensuing explosion kills both Whitehorse and the Japanese captors.
Yahzee returns to Tanapag and, seeing Whitehorse's body, screams at Enders to explain what happened as the village was thought to be secured. Enders, exhausted, mutters that he killed Whitehorse, but does not reveal that Whitehorse was willing to die to protect the code. Outraged, Yahzee aims his weapon at Enders but cannot bring himself to kill him in cold blood. Enders confesses that he hated having to kill Whitehorse and that, like Henderson, his mission was to protect the code above all else.
The Marines are mobilized on another mission and are again ambushed, this time near a deadly minefield on Mt. Tapochau. After fighting out of the kill zone they are ambushed again and Gy/Sgt Hjelmsted is wounded in the chest and later dies of his wounds. Enders, Yahzee, Chick and Pappas (the last of the Marines) take cover on an old battle-torn ridge, the Marines see Japanese artillery fire from the top of the ridge attacking U.S. Marines below their position. Still enraged over the death of Whitehorse, Yahzee charges the Japanese line fearlessly, and in so doing, fumbles the radio needed to call in the coordinates for an effective bombardment. Yahzee and Enders are both shot as they retrieve the radio and call in an airstrike on the Japanese artillery. However, surrounded and knowing the Japanese will capture and torture him for the code as they almost did with Whitehorse, Yahzee entreats Enders to kill him. Enders, grimly determined that no one else will die that day, manages to carry Yahzee to safety after taking a shot in the chest. Friendly planes arrive and the Japanese position is successfully destroyed. Yahzee rejoices in their success but finds Enders mortally wounded. With his last breaths, Enders reverts to the religious upbringing he earlier claimed he had abandoned, and recites a Hail Mary.
Returning to the U.S., Yahzee, his wife, and his young son George Washington Yahzee, sit atop Point Mesa in Monument Valley, Arizona, and, wearing the sacred necklaces and other Navajo ceremonial dress, performs the Navajo ritual of paying respects to the man who saved his life. He tells his son that Enders was a fierce warrior and Marine and, that if his son ever tells a story about Enders, to simply say that he was Yahzee's friend. He then cleans Enders' dog tags in holy water, reaffirming his own religious doctrine. He lifts them to the sky while chanting in ritual, sending Enders' spirit reverting to the Earth as the vast palisades surround and watch over them.
An epilogue explains that the Navajo code was crucial to America's success against Japan across the Pacific theater and that, during the war, the code was never broken. | cult, suspenseful, murder, violence, flashback | train | wikipedia | I just watched the director's cut on DVD after having seen the theatrical cut some time ago.Plot summary: In WWII, a code based on the Navajo language was used to securely communicate between US troops in the Asian Pacific, without the Japanese eavesdropping.
We follow two Navajo code talkers and their US Marine "bodyguards" as they go into combat on a Japanese island.A lot has been written about this somewhat flawed John Woo movie.
When watching the trailer of Windtalkers, one gets the impression that this film is about the Navajo indians and how their native language was used to create a code that could not be broken by the Japanese.
However, it turns out that this film is really about a white army seargeant (Nicolas Cage) and how he eventually befriends the codetalker (Adam Beach) that he is responsible for protecting.Director John Woo doesn't disappoint with the action sequences.
This was accomplished both by using the Navajo language and also using coding within that language to add a complication that the Japanese were never able to overcome during World War II.Sounds like an interesting story, right?
A war movie done John Woo-style sounded like such a good idea on paper.
Same goes for the deeper and sentimental meanings of the movie.It's obvious John Woo wanted to make a "Saving Private Ryan" realistic like war movie but the movie gets stuck somewhere between Hollywood action/war entertainment and a serious war movie.The battle sequences look too fabricated and planned out, which is of course a killer for the movie its realism.
"Windtalkers is a war movie, not science fiction!"Let's see...Cage's character fires his pistol in no particular direction yet takes out large numbers of enemy soldiers who also seem compelled to present themselves as clear targets at the most inopportune moments during the countless firefights.The bodies of enemy soldiers are hurled through the air in unbelievable symmetry as a result of conventional World War II ordnance detonations that contradict the laws of physics.While under ferocious enemy attack, a Navajo code talker invokes the code (his native Navajo tongue) to request air strikes from the American battleships offshore.
Apparently it wasn't."Windtalkers" was as much about the American Indian's (90% Navajo) unique contribution to our prevailing in World War II as Tom Sizemore's character -- collecting souvenir soil samples -- in "Saving Private Ryan" contributed to the study of geology..
The main thing is that the story is interesting.With a John Woo-directed film, you know are going to get tons of action, almost always too much, and that's the case here.
Anyone who has seen John Woo's appallingly comic-bookish early HK actioner, Heroes Shed No Tears, will understand the summary line after watching Windtalkers.I'm a HUGE fan of Woo's Triad shoot-em-ups, esp Hard Boiled, but his lackluster Hollywood efforts have taught me to keep my expectations low.
However, there are some redeemable qualities such as the fine acting, a good amount of action, and a solid score by composer James Horner.John Woo's film is about two U.S Marines named Ben Yahzee and Peter Anderson who are assigned to protect several Navajo codebreakers from falling into the Japanese hands.I did like the acting of the film.
Christian Slater does a good job as Anderson, and I also liked the performances of Mark Ruffalo and Noah Emmerich.Overall, Windtalkers is a war movie that is driven on a clichéd story.
I noticed Windtalkers got bad reviews, but everybody must admit it was good for what it had.Windtalkers is about a group of soldiers (including Nicolas Cage, Christian Slater, Mark Ruffalo, and Noah Emmerich) during World War II who must protect two Navajo soldiers from the Japanese, as they are the only ones that understand the codes in Navajo language.
Following the justifiably forgotten Hard Target, the formulaic Broken Arrow, the magnificent Face/Off and the trash metal Mission Impossible 2, Windtalkers marks the next step in John Woo's unsteady path through Hollywood, and his most mature mainstream movie yet.The plot revolves around Sergeant Joe Enders (Nicholas Cage) and Private Ben Yahzee (Adam Beach), two members of the U.S. Marine Corps during World War II, and their burgeoning friendship in the middle of their battalion's costly advances on the Japanese army in Saipan.
"Windtalkers" (2002) stars Nicolas Cage as a follow-the-orders-at-all-costs soldier who's assigned to protect a code talker (Adam Beach), a Navajo who speaks his native language on radio transmissions to conceal the data from the Japanese.
I say 'surprised' because it lacks the mass hoopla surrounding other WWII films, like 1998's overrated "Saving Private Ryan" (don't get me wrong, the first act of "Ryan" is great, but the rest of the movie leaves a lot to be desired.
The film was made by John Woo who knows how to make an exciting and colorful action flick, as witnessed by 1996' "Broken Arrow." "Windtalkers" cost a whopping $115 million to make and you definitely see it on the screen; unfortunately, it 'only' made back $75 million worldwide.Both 1998's "The Thin Red Line" and "Windtalkers" involve the Pacific Theater of WWII and the taking of Japanese-held islands.
That's the impression I got with the opening scenes of the Battle of Saipan in "Windtalkers." Some complain that not enough emphasis is put on the code talkers, but the two Navajos are major characters throughout the story, particularly the one played by Beach.
Though it was obviously a war movie, and poor at that, I think Woo should have gone more in deep with the Navajo people and their way of life.We don't get to know the characters.
"I'am (Cage)going to stand straight up and shoot a pistol at hundreds of Japanese soldiers, killing all of them, at the same time protect a Navajo man with no military training who doesn't use his language maybe but twice in the movie and not even get dirt in my eye, not to mention getting shot." It was way below realistic.
Adam Beach, Native American actors, of talent are hard to find, so to cast anyone else would've been a shame, he's so much better than this drivel.Frances O'connor is striking out left and right, may i remind you of "Beddazled" Brian Van Holt, after "Whipped" should be getting at least a few offers Nicolas Cage, seems to know how to pick movies not to watch, if he's not careful, he'll end up being another Kevin Costner, and everyone will wonder how "he keeps getting work" This movie, is sentimental drivel, i'm all about patriotism, i've always thought the story of the the navajo code talkers was cool, and i like to see native american representation, but this movie was awful, the first thing to pick apart would be the score, I think this film would've been ten times, no really ten times better, which would've made it viewable, and not a waste of my 2&1/2 HOURS, but no, every instrument stands out, so that you can't help but hear how forced the whole score is, and putting a super forced and artificial score, on top of a super forced and artificial script, where character development is a point of praise, kind of, but the film also lacks a narrative, a plot, it has a story, but theres nothing to tie it together, instead it's a series of scenes which move on for no real reason, other than they kill time basically, but no real narrative thread other than, Joe, likes Ben , everyone else learns to like ben, and kill japs,The one part of the film that is a point of dramatic tension, the need to protect the code "at any costs", is so overplayed that it loses all efficacy.
And then the action, okay, all this crap aside, my friends warned me, it was bad, but it's JOHN WOO, the name among names and he was just lost, he was trying to reincarnate the worst of pekinpah, he never took a chance with the film, the whole thing was so expected, and the comparison to saving private ryan, is ridiculous, Spielberg in the first twenty minutes of that movie, shows you the horrors of WWII, in a way that you never imagined, because he shows it to you without fear, he makes bold decisions, and more than anything else, the sound, and the camera work, are explicit, you're looking at this guy get shot in the head in a one shot, wide angle.
What Yahzee doesn't know is that Enders has been ordered to protect the code at all costs, which means that, if necessary, he will kill Yahzee to prevent him from falling into enemy hands."Windtalkers" uses the buddy-buddy format, a familiar plot device in both war films and other genres (such as cop dramas).
Adam Beach might "look like a Jap" to a bigoted soldier who cannot tell one non-Caucasian race from another, but I doubt if the Japanese themselves would have been fooled.Second World War movies were something of a rarity in the eighties and early nineties, but have made a modest comeback since the success of "Saving Private Ryan", and "Windtalkers" seems to have been modelled on the earlier film.
There is no special depiction of the baddies (the Japanese in the movie) because it's not about them, it's just about the war (any war) & the code (this one during WWII) & understanding, getting along with each other.There are a lot of John Woo trademarks symbolisms & memorable quotes, but being taken into the world of Joe Enders (Nicholas Cage), my memory failed me.
Cage is a really good action actor with that special touch of sentimentality without being labeled anything less than being a real man, a hero, or whatever we call these type of strong characters nowadays.A must see for everyone, because of its reality face of war (any war, in today's world even), its reality face of humanity & it can also be something pure entertaining if you don't think too much about it.Besides Cage, Adam Beach's eyes talk too!
Nicolas Cage stars as a soldier who has to protect a Native American code breaker in World War II along the way there are many battles and people fight it out and this reunites Woo with Christan Slater and Nicolas Cage.
But there's an interesting performance from Nicolas Cage as a tormented World War II Marine assigned to protect (along with counterpart Christian Slater) the code needed to attack the Japanese on Sai-Pan; that the code is held by two Navajos is less important than the code talkers not being captured alive and forms the crux of Cage's dilemma as he begins to form an uneasy bond with one of them (Adam Beach).
Suicide MAY have been an option discussed, MURDER was not.I have neither the time nor patience to list all the faults and inconsistencies with the movie, technical, tactical, moral and simply good storytelling.Director Woo and lead actor Cage owe the Marine Corps and the American people an apology for perpetrating this travesty on the public.And for the record, the Navajos were neither the only nor the first native Americans who used their native language to foil enemy communications intercepts..
Nicolas Cage, Adam Beach, Roger Willie and Christian Slater unsuccessfully attempt to salvage a film that has lost so much with its writing and senseless action sequences.Following my exit of the theater, I had to ask myself one question: Have there been too many war films made in Hollywood?
Director John Woo missed the mark, Cage and Slater made the wrong choice to star in "Windtalkers" and Beach starred in the wrong movie.In conclusion, "Windtalkers" is a film for those who don't mind watching an overblown action film with zero story development and no character development..
WINDTALKERS is a World War II movie that takes a close look on why the US forces won the Pacific...the Navajos and their code.
Along with them came John Woo's style of story telling, namely human relationships between characters ala 1989's THE KILLER.Nicolas Cage plays Joe Enders who is assigned to protect the force's Navajo codetalkers but most of all, protect the code at ALL COSTS.
Christian Slater, who expectedly did not have that much screen time as one might think, plays the friendly soldier Ox who is assigned to another Navajo named Whitehorse.Cage's performance in this movie is nothing less than excellent, in fact I believe it's his best performance since his award-winning role in 1995's LEAVING LAS VEGAS.
It is John Woo's most violent film since his Hong Kong movies, but they are not as graphic as that of Spielberg's SAVING PRIVATE RYAN.
Why all this?I have just seen Windtalkers with Nicholas Cage directed by John Woo, possibly the best war movie I have seen this year.
This is probably the WORST war film I've ever been subjected too, if I had not been part of a group, I would have most probably walked out on the film.Normally, my friends and I are very talkative and love to debate our favourite movies, Windtalkers, my GF, my two best friends and I walked out of the theater, and just didn't say anything, we didn't want to aknowledge that travesty.Jon Woo, get your ass out of the director's chair when it comes to movies, you want to make a Hong Kong Blood Opera, I will not stop you, but don't insult the heroes of World War II.A Native American on my discussion board said he's boycotting the movie because "it's a movie where an American saves an Indian, where are the movie cameras to cover where they screwed our women, took our land, gave us smallpox and got us loaded on alcohol for a few centuries?" I tend to agree with the fellow.Also, I never knew one Marine could be such a deadly weapon, Cage slaps a magazine into his Thompson, burns down a half dozen Japanese RUNNING with the gun at the same time, drops the mag, puts a fresh one in, then repeats afte r awhile, a pile of dead Japanese soldiers and he's unscathed with no ammo left, fascinating isn't it?semi-Romantic sideplot: Uh-Huh, helping a bitter marine with impaired hearing get back into combat so he can kill people forms a special bond of love doesn't it?Acting: What's that?Fight Scenes: Cinematography was allright, but the way he set it up was abysmal at times, he's got no respect for what happened in World War II, period.Realism: Again, what is that in this film?All in all, a travesty of filmmaking.I'm not a huge movie buff either, I appreciate a good action film that's a tad corny, but this, I don't want a refund on the money as much as the time that was RIPPED from me..
Nicholas Cage doesn't look like a war worn soldier that he's supposed to be.This is one of the early John Woo film that's made by Hollywood.
this Second World War film directed by John Woo has it's good moments and it's not so good moments.the action sequences are spectacular.the acting is good,as well.what doesn't work so well are the dramatic moments.they really slow the momentum of the movie down.in some spots,it's downright tedious to get through.the film focuses on one battle during WWII in which Navajo Marines used their language as a radio code the Japanese could not break.another Marine would be assigned to protect the "code talker" at all costs.the movie is inspired by a true story,so how accurate it is,is anyone's guess.for me,Windtalkers is a 5/10.
In the movie Japanese positions were wide trenches and some lightly covered gun positions, something one would never see in war.And Nicholas Cage was supposed to protect his Navajo Codetalker.
While the theme of the film - the belated recognition of Navahos in a unique role - is new to the screen, "Windtalkers" follows closely in the wake of many World War II movies and especially those honoring the Marine Corps.
Director John Woo has given a gift of love to his adopted country and I say "thanks."Before the end titles rolled I would have liked to see a screen telling viewers that many Indians served in the Pacific and not only as windtalkers (this is mentioned in one passing sentence in the film).
Finally, hyper-kinetic action and overwrought crises of friendship and conscience in a Hollywood movie.Nicolas Cage's Sergeant Enders has a Navajo code talker to protect and kill, if necessary.
Finally, hyper-kinetic action and overwrought crises of friendship and conscience in a Hollywood movie.Nicolas Cage's Sergeant Enders has a Navajo code talker to protect and kill, if necessary.
Of course if this is all you are after then it is probably noisy and violent enough but you should bare in mind three things: 1) there are more exciting action movies out there, 2) there are more meaningful war movies out there and, 3) there are much better John Woo films out there.
Plot: During World War II, a Marine Sergeant (Nicholas Cage) is assigned to guard a Navajo Indian (Adam Beach), who's entrusted with a secret code never broken by the enemy.
Windtalkers isn't a bad film, but even though I love war movies and explosions, John Woo's latest action movie perhaps crosses the line from cool explosions and amazing death sequences to having a fetish for explosions and death.
Instead we got Nicolas Cage as the oldest corporal in the history if the modern Marines Corps, lousy directing, lousy locations (filming in the desert when the action is supposed to take place on a Pacific Island--do they think viewers are stupid?) After watching this, I really felt like the director and studio just threw this together as quickly as possible after the actual code talkers were recognized by the US govt.
John Woo is known as an action-film director and I've never been a huge fan of Nicholas Cage.
it's a great story without all the cheesy Hollywood war effects and Woo's absurd action scenes. |
tt2196844 | American Burger | American Burger follows the stories of a bunch of stereotypical American school students (Nerds, Jocks & Cheerleaders) on a culture trip through Europe. Among the students are Fat Nerd (Liam Macdonald) & Preppy Nerd (Benjamin Brook), Camera Nerd (Charlie Petersson) & Wonky Eyes Nerd (Ben Thorton) and Nice Cheerleader (Aggy Kukawka), Adorable Cheerleader (Madeleine Borg) & Ponytail Cheerleader (Hanna Nygren). Heading the group is the enthusiastic Teacher (Lena Bengtsson) who tries her hardest to ensure the children appreciate their trip.
The students soon find their way to the mystical country of Kraketch, whose main source of economy is the American Burger Factory run by Demented Butcher (Fredrik Hiller). The school students are invited to tour the factory, but not before Demented Butcher orders his Butchers to kill the students and bring them into the factory. Several students escape and form unlikely pacts: Fat Nerd, Preppy Nerd, Wonky Eyes Nerd (whose name is later revealed to actually be 'Mike) & Ponytail Cheerleader and Camera Nerd, Jock, Quarterback & Nice Cheerleader for the other. Adorable Cheerleader loses the others and runs off by herself as does Teacher.
Slowly, the Butchers hunt, stalk and kill the students. Preppy Nerd is kidnapped by butchers, thinking he is already dead; Adorable Cheerleader hilariously loses almost all her clothes and now speaks with a lisp after eating poison berries; Fat Nerd steals a dead Butcher's outfit and escapes to the main road leading out of Kraketch and Nice Cheerleader & Camera Nerd run to escape a horde of butchers.
Whilst at the American Burger factory awaiting to be slaughtered, it is discovered that Preppy Nerd is actually a Canadian. A disgusted Demented Butcher apologises profusely and allows Preppy Nerd to leave with his blessings. Preppy Nerd then locates the student's bus and drives away from the factory.
On the way out of Kraketch, Preppy Nerd locates some of his classmates. He first picks up Adorable Cheerleader, then Fat Nerd & Teacher before saving Nice Cheerleader from a horde of Butchers. The gang drive away in the school bus and leave Kraketch for good. | comedy, murder, violence, flashback | train | wikipedia | null |
tt2802850 | Fargo | In the winter of 1987, Jerry Lundegaard, the sales manager at a Minneapolis Oldsmobile dealership, is desperate for money. He floated a $320,000 GMAC loan and collateralized it with nonexistent dealership vehicles; GMAC is asking questions. Dealership mechanic and paroled ex-convict Shep Proudfoot refers Jerry to Gaear Grimsrud. Jerry travels to Fargo, North Dakota, towing a new car from his dealership, and hires Gaear and Carl Showalter to kidnap his wife, Jean, and extort a ransom from his wealthy father-in-law and boss, Wade Gustafson, in return for the dealership car and half of the $80,000 ransom.
Jerry pitches Gustafson a lucrative real estate deal, and he agrees to front $750,000. Jerry considers calling off the kidnapping, then learns that Gustafson plans to make the deal himself, giving Jerry a finder's fee. At Jerry's home, Carl and Gaear carry out the kidnapping. As they transport Jean to their remote cabin on Moose Lake, a state trooper pulls them over outside Brainerd for driving without temporary tags. When the trooper hears a sound from the back seat, Gaear kills him, then chases down two eyewitnesses and kills them.
The following morning, Brainerd police chief Marge Gunderson discovers that the dead trooper was ticketing a car with dealership plates. Later, two men driving a dealership vehicle checked into the nearby Blue Ox Motel with two call girls, then placed a call to Proudfoot. After questioning the prostitutes, she drives to Gustafson's dealership, where Proudfoot feigns ignorance and Jerry insists no cars are missing from his inventory. While in Minneapolis, Marge reconnects with Mike Yanagita, an old classmate who tells her that his wife, another classmate, has died, and makes an awkward pass at her.
Jerry informs Gustafson that the kidnappers have demanded $1 million, and will deal only through him. Meanwhile, Carl, in light of the complication of three murders, demands that Jerry hand over the entire $80,000. GMAC gives Jerry 24 hours to prove the existence of the vehicles or return the loan.
Carl is attacked and beaten by a furious Proudfoot for involving him in the murder investigation. Carl orders Jerry to deliver the ransom immediately. Gustafson insists on making the money drop himself. At the prearranged drop point in a Minneapolis parking garage, he tells Carl he will not hand over the money without seeing Jean. An enraged Carl shoots and kills Gustafson. After fleeing the scene, Carl is astounded to discover that the briefcase contains $1 million. He removes $80,000 to split with Gaear, then buries the rest alongside the highway. At the cabin, Gaear has killed Jean; Carl says they must split up and leave the state immediately; but after a heated argument over who will keep the dealership car, Gaear kills Carl.
Marge learns that Yanagita's dead wife is not dead, nor his wife. Reflecting on Yanagita's convincing lies, Marge returns to Gustafson's dealership. Jerry continues to insist that he is not missing any cars. Marge asks him to inventory the lot, then spots him driving away from the dealership, and calls the State Police. The next morning, she drives to Moose Lake on a tip from a local bar owner who reported a "funny-looking guy" bragging about killing someone. Outside a cabin, she finds the dealership car; nearby, Gaear is feeding Carl's dismembered body into a wood chipper. Marge shoots him in the leg as he tries to flee and arrests him. North Dakota police arrest Jerry at a motel outside Bismarck.
Marge's husband Norm, whose mallard painting has been selected for a 3-cent postage stamp, complains that his friend's painting will be on the first class stamp. Marge reassures Norm that lots of people use 3-cent stamps; the two happily anticipate the birth of their child in two months. | violence, dark, murder | train | wikipedia | You don't have to have seen the original Coen film to enjoy this series, nor does it spoil anything for you if you have seen it: the new TV-show 'Fargo' is entirely its own beast.
So far, the only thing the series and the film do have in common is the title and the (fake) premise that both are - allegedly - based on true events that happened somewhere in Minnesota.The writers (and the actors!) do a great job in creating new characters that are as strange and somewhat over the top as most of the iconic Coen creations we've come to love over the years - and Billy Bob Thornton's 'Lorne Malvo' (from season 01) has the potential to reach cult status.
Now whether 'Fargo' will appeal to a larger audience despite its quirky characters and non-mainstream look the way a show like 'Breaking Bad' did remains to be seen, but I would strongly recommend this to anyone who enjoys black comedies in general as well as pretty much anything the Coens ever did.
From the very start, from the opening shot of the cold dark icy road and the background music starting to play, I knew this would be something different, something awesome.Coming from someone who hasn't watched the 1996 film by the Coen brothers, I really didn't know what to expect.
Great cast , great story, scenario , pacing, and that feeling about wanting more and more !I watched the entire 1st season, now the 1st episode from the 2nd season , and i can say ,this is something especial .I hope you can watch, and after you do that, please review this amazing show ,and be pleases to leave a 10 as i did.
Even though it was quite extraordinary I wouldn't rate it higher than Breaking Bad as this one has little flaws and I didn't really like the ending of the second season(Although some people loved it) but if you're just looking for some real piece of art then Fargo is a must watch..
Some of you may feel that I am going overboard with this, but I think this show may surpass even the movie on which it is based, and that is saying something.The whole cast is doing an amazing job, specially Billy Bob, i mean it seems as if the guy was born to play the role of Lorne Malvo.
Then I tried another one, Fargo and I was so tied with the story and great acting that I watched all 8 episodes during one night, recommending to everyone!The only thing that bothered me - are these events really based on true story?
maybe it's even better ;)I really don't know much other TV shows (OK OK maybe i do, like Stargate, Breaking Bad, etc.) that make me addicted but Fargo - definitely can be added to my list of MUST_WATCH, solid 10/10 !.
The first couple look great with some good acting and strong story lines but the third series falls apart.All the actors do a great job, especially Ewan McGregor as 2 parts, but the series 3 story is too slow, too simplistic and the bad guy is given too much time to waffle on with tales that don't enhance the story - they just bog it down more.The setting in the snow are superb, you can really feel the chill, and there are some great set pieces but ultimately the series seems to have been given different writers by the third series.To summarise, watch the first 2 series - they actually come to an ending, but only watch the third series if you're intrigued by how the show develops.
We are drawn to a similar snow filled landscape that is covered in a perpetual array of white desolation in the first scene, which draws inspiration from the environment created by the cinematography of the original Fargo.What really was a show stopper for me was the acting and the witty dialogue that encompassed both a dark yet humorous tone.
The acting is very nice but the script is shallow, over the top and pointless when you look at it from beginning to the end as a whole.The so-called "true story" gimmick rescues it by keeping it attached to a possible reality.Actually in some way that is synonymous to cheating.Massive plot holes and side stories leading nowhere shows it was made for just TV for a predesignated duration.After all unreasonable escalation of the tension and curiosity, plot concludes with a disappointing ending.Another overrated series at least.....
I have to acknowledge the fabulous cast in Fargo Season 3, however the story line this time around was a bust!
It is still unclear to me what the final outcome was.Quite frankly I was bored after the second episode and only continued because of the "I've started so I'll finish" mentality that I have when it comes to books and TV series!It is a shame because the cast was good, the scenery was good; it's a pity that the script didn't allow the cast to do it justice.Quite frankly I do not understand how this series received so many high scores from reviewers.
The script, the writing, the flow, the characters, actors were stellar, not too mention the excellent capture of the Fargo (movie) experience.
it is definitely one of the best first-episode TV series that i have seen and i'v seen a lot.so if it gets better episode by episode,i'm absolutely sure that it will be one of the top ten series of all time and in crime-drama genre maybe just maybe as good as True Detective.now about the first episode,the plot is dark,cold and a little funny(in a dark way i mean) but it's not that mysterious like true detective was.the acting is solid,all the cast do a great job to make scenes believable,the reason i mention believable is that,after watching the first episode you might find it difficult to find sense and good reason behind some scenes but i believe that crazy people do crazy stuff and ordinary people do unexpected things under pressure and stress and if the actors and actresses achieve those characteristics which i think they did then the scene is believable.anyway the writing is compelling and solid that keep you interested and it is also complicated enough to make good crime characters which i think is very important in a crime-fiction.overall if you like crime genres,then i highly recommend it..
Great pilot.Very true to the spirit and tone of the movie - love those accents and adorably eccentric characters up there in Fargo.Billy Bob is one of those creepy villains whose silences and simple turn of phrases speak volumes.
Colin Hanks and Bob Odenkirk of Breaking Bad are also well-casted, played their role very convincingly, with just the right note and intensity.Bad news, Billy Bob's portrait of Malvo, though convincing as the chief villain, is OVERLY painted as a character by the writer and director - too petty and anal in a juvenile text-book sociopath way, like the creative team is trying to jam every psychology textbook bad behaviors onto one Look He Is SO BAD person.
The movie version of him was a lot more consistent, focused, complicated yet logical, hence convincing, and truly menacing.Martin Freeman did his accent OK, but overacts like the recent crop of English actors appearing on Newsroom - their animated-ness too English slapstick, and jarring.
But minus 3 points for the excessive grotesque for its own sake images that Coen brothers have taken to enjoy shoving at their audience, the whole writing/directing team's autistic preoccupation with banal and boring baddies, and the minimization of the true driving force of Fargo, the far more interesting lead female character.update 19/06The annoying Billy Bob's Malvo villain character got more annoying as the story progressed - more Malvo's petty and passive-aggressive bullying of your average goodie two shoes family sort.
It has the same vibe as the movie, takes place in or around Minnesota has similar characters but is it's own thing apart from the movie.I just finished watching Season 3 and wow it was a doozy.
Regarding the first season, it should be noted that I am not a fan of Billy Bob Thornton, but he was so good at being bad that he won me over.
Characters are wonderfully developed; they are people you could meet on the street at any time and the acting is of such sterling quality that even movie stars like Ewan McGregor manage to convince instead of just being variations of their real personas.
After some episodes, it quickly becomes evident, that this series is completely empty at its core: From the beginning the plot doesn't make all that much sense and the longer it continues the more arbitrary and implausible it get's, it's like you can palpably feel the screenwriters making up arbitrary sh*t as they go along.
I talked about the story being essentially a sequence of random events and briefly want to get back to that: Namely that he major catalyst of everything that is happening in Fargo is basically the utter stupidity of various characters in the series.
Macy and Frances McDormand, who carried the entire film even in it's weak moments; Fargo season 1, was carried by Billy Bob Thornton (creepily great), Martin Freeman (in one of his finer performances), Colin Hanks (a little underrated) and Alison Tolman (very convincing); all good performances, all entertaining.
I had such high expectations of a venture co- sponsored by the Coen brothers, Billy Bob Thornton and Martin Freeman and supposedly based on a great movie.
The 10-episode anthology series is putting together a terrific cast , as part of the growth of the show includes an expanded casting , this has an ace acting by Billy Bob Thornton as cold killer , Martin Freeman as botcher insurance sealer and Allison Tolman as obstinate police much more astute than her staff .
This malicious dark comedy was compellingly written by writer Noah Hawley and efficiently directed by Randall Einhorn , Adam Bernstein , Colin Bucksey , Matt Shakman and Scott Winant ; all of them confirmed that both the series and movie from the Cohen Brothers take place within the same universe .
This is a nod to the way that the 1996 source movie Fargo started , also by claiming that its events were based on a true story .
The writer ¨showrunner¨ Noah Hawley mentioned that season two would be "a lot bigger" than the first season , he says that the new season will not only draw inspiration from Fargo, but also from other Coen Brothers movies such as Miller's Crossing and The Man Who Wasn't There ..
The amazing thing is that eventually a lot of people might consider this as the ultimate entertainment.I'm not sure whether i've seen too many movies and TV shows or i'm simply too old to be the target audience, yet i wasn't able to connect with Fargo.
I am yet to see a few other promising TV series that were broadcast this year, but I have no doubt that as good as they may be (and some are according to echoes so far), this 3rd season of 'Fargo' will still be among the best.
The ten episodes continue to explore the universe of the mid-North United States which was first created in the Coen Brothers 1996 film although for the first time in the history of the film and series the story does not happen in Fargo, North Dakota but in Minnesota.
The guidance of Ethan and Joel Coen who sign as producers of the seasons is felt in the coherence of world which is being brought to screen despite the different locations, characters and casting.The good woman cop in the small town is now called Gloria Burgle (acted by Carrie Coon in a manner consistent with the previous similar characters in the series), she has now a teen-age son and is divorcing her husband who left her for a man.
It is very seldom that such a level of acting happens in TV series.A lot can be written (some was already written) about the action, how it is constructed, how much role the coincidences play, whether there are big holes in the story, continuity problems or gaffes, or whether some of the shorter (the East Berlin opening, the Holocaust survivor intrusion) or longer (the full episode about the comics SF writer grandpa) side stories add value or distract the attention.
Season 2 review:Coming off of no doubt a flawless season 1 filled with amazing characters created by Noah Hawley and one of the best villain played by Billy bob Thornton, how can you possibly top season ones season??
You soon find out why so many people call Noah Hawley a genius (and this too feels like an understatement).The first as well as the second season are masterpieces and definitely worth watching.
I watched this show (I bought it on DVD) because I absolutely love the original Fargo movie.
If you love the movie Fargo, I wouldn't recommend this series to you at all..
i loved season 1 and 2, great memorable characters, well paced and lots of dramaseason 3 however is a huge letdown, there are entire scenes where nothing important happens, just mind numbing conversation it is so slow paced, the characters nicki swango and carrie coon are both annoying and not very attractivethe worst character is VM varga,every time he is on screen he rambles on about nonsense,he has to give a 5 minute history lecture, i wished someone would blow his head off the first time i saw him, compared to lorne malvo and the villains in season 2 varga is patheticmcgregor is excellent as always, another viewer complained about the music, i completely agreeto sum it up,the director obviously wanted this season to be quirky and thats exactly what it is, so you have quirkiness in favour of entertainment and drama.
Derogatory characterization of Midwestern whites, pointlessly violent, moronic dialog...a horrible take off on the original film...the Coen brothers showed the culture with humor and good natured parody...this show was crude, insulting, and exaggerated to the point of being idiotic...the scenes were unrealistic in terms of behavior to the point where I swore they were actually making a parody of the movie...then I realized they were merely trying to be imitative...the fact it averaged 9 stars is truly sad but not surprising ...I have to say I only watched one episode but I could not stand another one...I'm sure if blacks or Jews had been parodied and made to look this idiotic and depraved, the ADL and NAACP would have been all over the producers in a NY minute....
and if not why not make a series about the "Billy Bob Thornton" character I was doubtful about the casting of my fellow countryman Martin Freeman in the role but he has made it his own...
Fargo season 1 is simply the best TV mini series i have ever seen.
i cannot remember me having good time watching a TV series as this, of course after breaking bad.
after knowing that martin is going to be in this series i just couldn't understand why they involve a man with different accent from the region.actually, after 15 minutes from the first episode i got really shocked from his way of acting.
Fargo deserves a high score in it's first outing for originality and character development, Billy Bob Thornton and Martin Freeman are class acts here.
I liked the movie Fargo, but this series is so much better.
Each Fargo season is an original story, well written and superbly acted.
At the close of episode 6, Mr. Friedman has the truly brilliant understated acting moment of the series, so watch for it.
The first season with Martin Freeman of The Hobbit and Sherlock giving us a brilliantly befuddled schnook who gets caught up in a strange web of crime and Billy Bob Thornton as one of the weirdest and most wonderful assassins you are ever likely to see, shares the film's repressed and impotent humour and its cold dark fire.
But if you loved the film, or many of the other Coen bother films, then you need to watch all three seasons of Fargo, the television series.
I decided to give this a watch as I enjoyed the movie so much and love Billy Bob Thornton.
Rule no 1 of fight club XXXXXXXX sorry IMDb reviews:.If it's a 9 rated movie then it's been hyped.With a current overall of 9.0 and an S02E01 rating of 9.2 then this is a prime example.Setting a series in the past does not mean that the standard of acting should be set back into the cheesy quality of a 50s B movie (that said I love B movies) and re-hashing successful old plots should not be done for the sake of it.Not clever or ironic, this is a lame and contrived performance of tired subject.I thought Ted Danson did an excellent job of re-inventing himself in the CSI expansion but he has undone much of that credit in this performance.Frances McDormand killed the character of Sheriff Marge Gunderson in the 1996 original and no follow-up is necessary other then to line the pockets of greedy producers.
Anyone wanting and ongoing taste of excellence should just re-run the original movie once every week or two and you will have a far better feeling then watching these re-hashed series.Current rating of the Oscar winning 1996 original is 8.2 which is about right.
FARGO is a very trippy multi-season miniseries involving mayhem and murder -- like the movie, which is also quite good.
Fargo TV Series (2017 Season 3) Every episode of this acclaimed show, presented on FX, starts with the disclaimer, "This is a true story.
Season 1 blew me away with it's great story, superb acting by Billy Bob Thornton, Martin Freeman, Allison Tolman, Colin Hanks and the rest of the cast.
Fargo is a new Fx series which plays as somewhat of and add on to the 1996 movie of the same name.
Season 3 of the series "Fargo", episode #3 "The Law of Non- Contradiction" absolutely blew me away. |
tt0110186 | Jason's Lyric | Jason (Allen Payne) is a responsible young man who has a job in a television repair shop and lives at home with his hard-working mom (Suzzanne Douglas). Joshua (Bokeem Woodbine) is the younger brother just released from prison. He is a volatile, disturbed ex-con who is obviously bound for a violent end. Joshua deals drugs for short-term cash and joins a crew plotting a bank robbery.
When Lyric (Jada Pinkett Smith) walks into the shop to buy a television, Jason meets his perfect match. She has dreams of escape, and inspires Jason to do romantic things like borrow a city bus to take her on a date. Their relationship continually grows and blossoms into love. The height comes when Jason and Lyric take a romantic ride in a rowboat, then make love in the woods.
In a series of flashbacks, Forest Whitaker plays the boys' father, Mad Dog. Throughout the film, Jason has nightmares about a tragedy in his childhood. Either Jason or Joshua killed Mad Dog while he was drunkenly attacking their mother. After being comforted by Lyric, he learns to deal with his past. Alonzo tells his gang and Joshua about the bank robbery plan. Lyric, eavesdropping on their conversation, tells Jason about the bank robbery.
The robbery does not go as planned; Joshua comes late. Most significantly, he causes bedlam by independently terrorizing and beating the customers of the bank, nor promptly gets in the getaway car when the heist is over. As punishment, Joshua is flogged by the rest of his gang. Joshua returns home. Jason realizes how badly he's been beaten, so he confronts the leader of the gang, Alonzo (Treach), who is Lyric's brother, and the two have a vicious fight in a public restroom.
Jason then meets Lyric at the bayou and tells her that he can't leave with her. His nightmares occur because Jason took a gun from Joshua and accidentally shot Mad Dog in the chest, which is why he feels obligated to his family.
Things get worse when Joshua hears his mother tell Jason to leave town with Lyric because he doesn't owe her or Joshua anything. Joshua believes that Jason is leaving not only because of Lyric, but because Alonzo may take revenge. Joshua plans to kill them all in order to keep his brother from leaving.
Jason hears about Joshua's plan and heads to Alonzo/Lyric's house, but he's too late. He sees what has happened and rushes upstairs looking for Lyric. He finds that Joshua has a gun pointed at her neck. He draws a gun as well and is able to convince Joshua not to kill her. However Joshua's arm moves, causing him to accidentally pull the trigger and shoots Lyric. Jason carries her out of the home to a growing crowd outside the house. Lyric is injured, but still alive. Joshua is fed up with his life and decides to end it all by killing himself (off screen), in earshot of everyone outside. The film ends with Jason and Lyric riding a bus, leaving town; however, some versions do not show this part. | violence, flashback | train | wikipedia | Unforgettable..
Boy meets girl.
There are a mountain of movies that attempt to tell a love story and disappoint and fall flat.
JASON'S LYRIC is...
unforgettable -- a love movie to enjoy many times.The greatest strength to this love story is the same as the key strength in the world-wide hit LONG VACATION tv series exported from Japan: as the story unfolds the viewer deeply and personally cares about the boy and the girl.
The characters become real and we feel as they feel.
Intense.
Intense.
Unforgettable.Highly recommended, but keep in mind that there is grit, drugs and depictions of violence in this movie..
Well crafted film and splendid acting!.
It isn't often that you get to see a compelling film that deals with human sacrifices, love and the courage to find a true identity to lead a good moral life.
. .Jason's Lyric was one film that became that testament of many issues combined.
For me it's not just a film but more in terms of reaching out to those unfortunate souls living a somber life and helping to reflect on those wishing to make a change for the best.Allan Payne, Jada Pinkett and Bokeem Woodbine all give electrifying performances.
One of the strongest issues the film dealt with was Payne's relationship as a brother to troubled Woodbine.
The disturbing part for me though was Forest Whittaker's performance as the father who go's berserk after the Vietnam War, losing all sense of morality for himself and his family.A brilliant film, I can't recommend this film enough.
Nothing short of exquisite.
One endeavor in filmmaking that quite frequently doesn't turn out well is mixing genres.
"Jason's Lyric" combines crime drama, love story, and ghetto film-and does it surprisingly beautifully.
The acting is remarkable, the script is remarkable, and the emotion is remarkable.
This movie could have turned out very pretentious and very cheesy.
Apparently, the directors, writers, and producers completely acknowledged this, and refused to let that happen.
The characters are very well developed and, while the movie doesn't justify Josh's actions, it does convey compassion for him.
It also provides new insight on what it's really like to live in a ghetto.
If you can find this movie (after all, I saw it on Showtime and haven't the video in any stores) totally see it!!!!.
Great story; original cast.
Jason's Lyric is a truly great love story with a superb cast.
The performances by Bokeem Woodbine as Josh, and Forest Whitaker as MadDog are strong and convincing.
Complemented by a superb soundtrack, this movie should not be missed.
Jason's Lyric should have received more theatrical exposure letting the main actors and supporting cast shine..
The most personally captivating movie since "Imitation of Life"..
All of the characters had a back history.
I could see the cause and effect (why the characters were the way they were) in the film.
The actors were believable.
Each time I watch it (at least twice a week), I see something new.
"Jason's Lyric" has inspired me to get on the bus and stop watching it go past.
The symbolism in the movie was refreshing.
The cinematography was excellent as well, every part of the film enhanced the whole.
"Jason" gave me hope that a man can commit in a relationship; he just has to want to do it.
He made me dream again of lovely words and warm embraces.
"Lyric" assured me that closing up was not the answer but trying to love again is the way to get the magic back.....
Excellent Movie, I own the rottweiler puppy, Lyric that was in this movie.
I was very surprised at how good this movie was.
My rottweiler, Lyric, who is now 13 years old was in this movie when she was 7 weeks old.
I named her Lyric after the role of Jada Pinkett.
Lyric went on to be an American/Canadian Champion.
Von Traeger's Lyric.
The movie took place in the 3rd Ward in Houston, Texas.
It was awesome being on the set during the filming of this movie.
I am looking at showing Lyric at the "Reliant Center World Dog Show" in Houston this next Month.
She will be shown in Veterens Class 12 years and older.
This is a rottweiler specialty show.
Thank you for letting me share.
Kerri.
Good, But Could Have Been Better.
This film pretty much came out at a time when more and more films featuring blacks in positive images were coming out.
This film came out around the same time as another film that Jada Pinkett was in, The Inkwell.
However, this film tries to be three films at once.
First its a story about the tragic events in the brother's past.
The second story is almost an urban version of "Romeo and Juliet".
The third plot revolves around how Jason's brother constantly gets into trouble leading to his tragic end.
The love story would have been enough for me because it shows that African Americans can have very loving relationships and can be romantic.
Unfortunately, in the end it turns into a typical bloody shootout, but it does have a twist ending and that helped to save it..
Great stuff...
Jason's Lyric wasn't a great film theatrically, as it had small promotions.
Judging by the title and cast, i didn't expect a good film.
It was actually a great film with powerful performances.
It tells the story of Two brothers (One good and One Bad) living with their mother in a rough area.
Jason played by Allen Payne is sensible and taking care of his younger brother Joshu.
Joshua played by Bokeem Woodbine is a little crazy and has a violent side to his personality.
Its a half love story and half action movie thats worth the watch.
Allen Payne delivers a good performance.
Bokeem Woodbine is terrific, see him in Dead Presidents also.
Jada Pinkett looks ultra sexy and plays the love life of Jason.
There are some fabulous Sex scenes, Jada looks fantastic.
Overall, Good realistic storyline and deserves a chance..
A urban love story.
Jason's Lyric is clearly one of the best urban love stories ever put on film.
The direction by Doug McHerny showed real talent as did his screenpaly.
Allen Payne and Jada Pinkett both showed early lead acting roles in this good film.
Finally I think Forrest Whitaker and Bokeem Woodbine both deserved Oscar nods for their work.
Lisa Nicole Carson.
When it comes to Lisa Nicole Carson it is just as important WHAT she plays, as HOW she plays it!
In the "Homeywoods" of America, a woman that is: big bottomed, small waisted, chested is the ideal woman!This is regardless of whether she is a buggy-whipped armed ballerina, or a plus-size shot putter.
This standard of beauty was NEVER expressed in mass media until Jackee Harry played the sophisticated Sandra Clark in the sitcom "227".
A perfect throwback to this is Lisa Nicole Carson.Lisa gave a heartfelt performance in Jason's lyric as Marti.
She made you feel for Marti in her hopes to find a romantic like Lyric did.
However she will never play a romantic lead because those roles are reserved almost exclusively for women who are little more than hair and bones!
Women that had physiques like Lisa Carson were called "healthy" until the 1960s; then skeletal British model Twiggy changed everything!
All Lisa has to do is act, so that she can open the door for REAL WOMEN to advance in the discipline of acting!.
The film's direction is plain, simple and obvious - in a bad way....
There must be 10+ setups for each scene, where the lighting is perfect, as if it was a student filmmaker's first 35mm film.
There's absolutely no style, and no thought of how the film would work as a whole.
Most of the pickups are wasted coverage.
There's hardly any genuine suspense, and the ending feels totally forced, as does the last tacked-on song.Why is it that most new filmmakers are too busy trying to prove they can run a film production, run a show just like the pros?
Why can't they focus on the end point - how the film will affect those who witness it?
This filmmaker makes absolutely no point in what he does, except to show how unskilled he is as a storyteller.Not to compare the two, since they are completely different types of films, but if you want to see real amazing direction, in which the story unfolds with tremendous, unsuspecting power, see THE PIANO.
Jane Campion's direction could teach many that it's not the coverage, and multiple set-ups, but the performances, pacing and story that goes first..
gritty, violent love story.
Jasons Lyric did have its moments.
I saw what they were going after, but it's as if they had the map, but no treasure.
Needless sex scenes seem to combine one after the other ( including a graphic scene where they make love outside, leaves get stuck to his butt...oh, heavens, why am I watching this.) It misses a few key points, but all in all, it is a tender story that goes off track with needless violence and use of drugs.
Not for all, but was watchable..
Is blood thicker than water?.
Two young men living with a single parent mother,and one has to step up to be the man.
You have one brother that always in and out of trouble,and the other trying to make a living by selling TVs and helping his mother.
Though Josh is back home he cannot work no ordinary 9 to 5 due to his past life as a drug-dealer.
Jason on the other hand falls in loves with a waitress who's brother lives for the life of crime.
By Lyric(the waitress) overhearing a plan to rob a bank that involves Jason's brother(Josh) she tells Jason not to get between that,meaning this could end their relationship.
So Jason confronted Josh about it but Josh went on and foiled their plans,leaving Josh beat up and bloody.
Jason felt he had to do something and not let Lyric's brother nearly kill him.
As the day Jason and Lyric plan to elope,Jason arrived at their meeting place late with Lyric suspecting he got involved.
Jason felt that his brother Josh knows he all he's got so he felt responsible.
Lyric became heart-broken and left him.
As Josh plans to murder the guys who nearly beat him to death.
Friends of Jason tells him that Josh has lost it and is going after the guys who beat him down.
But Jason had arrived to the scene a little too late as Josh corners Lyric at gunpoint to tell him where her brother is and to leave his brother alone.
Josh accidently shoots her and Jason was devastated and carried her lifeless body out the house.
WOW!
I don't know why this movie didn't win an award for urban drama.
This movie should have been as popular as it's soundtrack.
The decision where Jason had to choose between his brother's life or turning his back on him to leave with a lover.
This can't get anymore dramatic as that..
The underused Pinkett and Payne shine in this urban love story.
If Hollywood was more equitable in its hiring practices, Jada Pinkett would be in the league with Halle Berry, Sandra Bullock, and others of her generation.
Pinkett, who gave a bravura performance (along with Queen Latifah) in the earlier "Set It Off," is no less than brilliant as "Lyric," sought after by the hard-working "Jason," played by another neglected thespian, Alan Payne.Both Pinkett and Payne deliver as the lovers torn between the attraction to each other and the responsibilities of family and work that interferes with their relationship.Forest Whitaker is marvelous as Payne's father, a man that must deal with his own personal demons, along with an estranged relationship with his wife, wondrously played by Suzanne Douglas.
The rest of the cast (Bokeem Woodbine, Lisa Nicole Carson, Eddie Griffin, among others) are exceptional in a story that is both tragic and uplifting.And the "love scene" between "Jason" and "Lyric" is enough to make the most open-minded of viewers blush..
Brilliant Jada Pinkett Smith movie!.
This is definitely one of her best movies on the year I was born and it's mad that it'll be nearly 23 years old, I feel old when saying this lol!
Anyways this movie does show African American culture but in a sad way that the two main characters were falling in hard times when their father came out from the Vietnam war.
It was even more sadder that it screwed up one of the boys and made them into a serious psychopath!
Thank Christ Jason and Lyric survived, especially by being shot by Joshua on the heart!
It's just so unfortunate that Jason didn't have a good family background with his father and brother.
However at least he got his Lyric, so it says on the title!.
Worth watching for Allan Payne's performance.
What I really liked about this film?
The performance of Allan Payne.
I don't know how I've never noticed this guy before.
I was impressed with him here.
He was able to walk that fine line between the good guy...but still having some "street cred".
And, that it was stunning, but Jada Pinkett Smith was good here.On the other hand, this is just another thug-type character role for Bokeem Woodbine.
He's never impressed me; he didn't impress me here.
The most I can say is that he fulfilled what was needed for the character.
Eddie Griffin...this wasn't a role for him...it was a caricature.The story itself...well, I can buy into one aspect of it -- some families have a black sheep that they ought to just set free and disown...and that's really what this is about.
On the other hand, some families have a true "good guy"...that often gets pulled down by the black sheep.
In a nutshell...that's the plot..
The best, heartbreaking love story about an Afro-American couple back in the day..
SPOILER...
I am sure I have seen this movie before, but never really "saw" it until I found it in WalMart's movie bin.
I have always wanted to just watch old shows and movies when I retired, and now, I can see movies completely.
It is an old movie, but by far the best movie I have ever cried over.
Jada does not wait until she is older and more experienced to rock.
The story contains lives of Afro-Americans who work for a living, hang on the streets, do time in prison, love, mistake love, crime and reality.
When Jada meets the love of her life, (a hunk), they decide to move away, riding the greyhound bus.
The very ending will make the strongest person in the world cry.
Their love had problems as her boyfriend is the man of his house, helping mother to raise a troubled brother.
The younger brother spends lots of time locked up, while Jason is troubled with nightmares.
We find that one of the children shoots and kills their father when he once again abuses their mother.I am leaving out a lot because it is so wonderful to just watch this movie and wonder.
You will not be sorry.
Thanks to the makers, I found this film on a DVD that also included three other movies, all starring Afro-American Women.
GET THIS MOVIE!
Seeing it once will not satisfy you, and each time you will cry.The music to the movie is fantastic and the ending song will bring back the flood of tears..
Timeless....
This film is captivating!!!
It brilliantly tells a story of Love and Sacrifice.
This cast was the perfect group for this production.
Payne, Pinkett, Woodbine, Wittaker...
Everyone has already stated how well their performances was; but, one that mustn't be forgotten is Lisa Carson (Marti - Alonzo's girlfriend/Pinkett's co-worker)...
Her character left an impact on me because of how she faced her reality by quoting others.
She played her facade but her hurt began to shed light during her last conversation with Lyric...
I don't want to give away too much but I will say that if you're looking for a nice movie that will tap into your senses, make you laugh and cry, and one that is very relate-able...
Give Jason's Lyric a try!.
Good!!.
The Movie Is Good and Worth The Money To Rent.The N.C-17 Version Has The T.V. Shop Sex Scene Where Allen Payne and Lyric Are Bumping Against And On The Counter.
The Movie Express Good Moraling And A Little Suspense Of Who Shot The Step-Dad On The Abuse Scene....
Advise This To Teens And Early Aged Adults...
*Spoiler: The Forest Sex Scene Show's More Than You Need To See Such As: Lyric Breasts and Ass and Allen Payne Butt, Which I Really Didn't Dig. Go Rent It Today.. |
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