The name of Neve Campbell made me buy this DVD without any further reference, because I try to see her movies since "Scream". Unfortunately, "When Will I Be Loved" is awful, one of the worse (or maybe the worst) movies of 2004. The story has no development of the characters, taking time to the viewer understand their motives. Mike Tyson, Lori Singer, Professor Hassan Al-Ibrahim Ben Rabinowitz, what are these people doing in the plot? I have not understood the erratic behavior of the amoral lead bisexual character of Vera Barrie in the middle of such mess: she is ambitious, but has a loser as boy-friend; she has a wealthy family that supplies her inclusive with an expensive loft, but prostitutes herself for money. Most of the scenes are too long or even unnecessary. The screenplay seems to be written by a moron or a stupid teenager so imbecile the dialogs and situations are. I love classic music, but the music score is really annoying. How can a producer put money in this crap? Is Neve Campbell losing money in casino or gambling to accept participating and exposing herself in such garbage? My vote is two.

Title (Brazil): Fortunately this movie has not been released in Brazil. I saw an American DVD.


I agree with most of the other comments. The filming was amateurish, and I'd hope that all the actors in it lied about being in such a joke.

I agree that the dialog had a 'Woody Allen' flavor. In fact, his name is mentioned in the movie. I'm wondering if he really directed it, but knew later that it would be such a horrible stinker that he took his name off of it.

Neve is a beautiful woman, and they used her beauty to fill the theaters. Her character was also masochistic. Her 'Ratso Rizzo' boyfriend was a sleezebag who did nothing to help the film. In fact, the Count's character was the only redeeming part of it. I thought he was believable as an aging billionaire who usually got what he wanted. Although he could have gotten prettier and more intelligent women for far less than a million bucks.

All in all, it stank

EverJack

I've seen few films that I would call terrible, but this is one of them.

EverJack


In the commentary it said they filmed this movie in 11 days and it's so bad, it might have been filmed in less. If you have seen the trailer, you've seen everything there is to see about this movie, unless you really want to see the poorly done soft porn scenes. I'm quite serious, the trailer sums up the entire movie without any of the lackluster filler, one is left to drudge through. The move jumps around from one pointless poorly shot scene full of characters one doesn't care about to the next feeling rushed and without focus. Neve is sexy, but I wasn't feeling the "She's the hottest thing on planet Earth" vibe they were trying to get across by showing everyone panting after her like dogs in heat, it just came across as fake. The character of Ford is idiotic tired re-tread, which made me want to skip his half of the movie. Also, I really don't think anyone in real life in the "count's" position would have done what he did in the last part. If it wanted to show a certain sect of New York as vapid, obnoxious, boring and pointless people without even any real explanation of how they became so, then I guess the film succeeded. I think this is the first movie I've ever regretted watching. The film is not erotic or thrilling.

*VAGUE SPOILERS*

The only really watchable scene, was the scene of her with the count. The dialogue and acting during this scene stepped up a notch. Her scene with her female lover might have been better if there had been a history and some character development there. This movie was a total disappointment, not even worth watching to fall asleep.


This movie is horrible. Avoid it. The storyline sucks, and the only redeeming quality would have been seeing Neve Campbell nude, and even those scenes are UTTERLY disappointing. A pathetic attempt for Neve to revive her career. I guess this was supposed to be "artsy", but it missed on that level as well. If Neve was going to do a nude scene, she should have done that in "Wild Things", but apparently she refused to do that. Even the sex scenes are about as erotic as watching grass grow. Do yourself a favor, and don't waste the money even for a rental (as I did). This movie is a complete clunker, and was quite frankly boring. The cameos by such "has-been stars" as Mike Tyson, and Lori Singer make absolutely no sense and add nothing to the story (if you can call it that) whatsoever! One star out of 10.


This movie was terrible. The plot was paper thin. The highlight was the first 2 minutes with Neve showing us all the goods. It was hard to follow what the point was. Were we just supposed to learn not to sell our girlfriend or she will pay back the two male fools that forged this agreement. I felt like it was a waste of 90 minutes of my life. The performances are very weak. Neve never really sells you on her devious side. Weller is so cliché that it makes his role almost cartoonish. They spend almost half this movie trying to explain what a con man he is. They miss the development of any depth of all the other characters. If at all possible don't waste any money or time on this film.


James Toback's slight film When will I be Loved has two important things going for it: First, shower scenes that linger longingly over the truly impressive dancer's torso of the Neve Campbell. Secondly, the fact that unlike many of the beautiful bodies that appear in films, this one belongs to an an honest to goodness actor who infuses meaning, mystery and interest into Toback's otherwise shallow and unconvincing story. Her purposefully understated performance in The Company is clearly revealed a choice, as opposed to, say the blank stylings that characterize the work of the great stone face, Keanue Reeves

Who should see this film in theaters: Neve Campbell completists.


Due to being a fan of the first Scream and having liked James Tobacks Black and White.I was keen on seeing how this film would be with both of them working together,and though it tries to be a smarter Indicent Proposal (a film that is referenced a lot during the movie)is just ends up becoming very boring and painfully slow. The plot:

With her family having just brought her a very up-market New York apartment,Vera wants to start a new,by living the high-life.But sadly she is having trouble reaching that level due to her low down "small hustler" boyfriend.Though when her boyfriend says the he wants her to spend some time "entertaining" a big media mogul,who will pay her what ever she wants (but only when it is just him and her alone),and with this Vera starts to plan away the she can con the media guy and her boyfriend in a very big way.

View on the film:

For the first twenty minutes writer/director Toback gives the film a bit of a similar feel to Richard Linkletters great first film Slacker.With the characters meeting up in very loose over-lapping scenes.Disappointingly after this,the camera for some dumb reason is kept about half a mile away from anyone in the rest of the film,and whilst this could have worked for a few part of the film to give it an "intimate" look.but due to it being constantly used,all the passion and intimacy in the interview in naked scenes is completely lost.And for all of the apartment scenes Toback has a very loud piano playing the same three or four notes,for the whole of the film,which gives the impression that there is a ghost badly playing a piano in the apartment!!. Final view on the film:

A enjoyable start,the is ruined by extremely bad directing.


Like last year's School for Scoundrels, Woodcock is yet another movie in which Billy Bob Thornton plays a violent dick (no pun intended) and fails to be anywhere near as funny as he should be, thanks to a sloppy, almost laugh-less script. To make matters worse, he's not the only comedian whose considerable talents are wasted on this predictable mess; Ethan Suplee and Seann William Scott, two of the funniest men alive, have nearly nothing to do with their characters. Speaking of predictability, here's a cliché for you: Seen the trailer? Then you've seen the movie. Just about every truly funny part was crammed into the commercials.

I love Bad Santa and all, but it has really done more harm than good seeing as another Thornton-acts-like-a-sociopath-and-gets-away-with-it "comedy" gets released every year. He is an amazing actor and totally wasted on these forgettable carbon copies. I'm not denying that I laughed a couple of times ('cause let's face it, Thornton abusing kids is funny by default) but in the end Woodcock is just a half-baked comedy-drama which is neither hilarious nor touching.


I tried to think of funnier Billy Bob Thornton films than his latest tepid comedy, "Mr. Woodcock," and came up with the following: "Bad News Bears," "Ice Harvest," "Pushing Tin," "Friday Night Lights," "Bad Santa," "Monster's Ball" and "Sling Blade." Heck, even "Goodfellas and "Passion of the Christ" had more laughs than this pointless piece of dredge which takes the worst elements of "Meet the Parents" and "The Girl Most Likely To," although with none of the charm, intelligence or humor of these pictures.

After viewing this movie, however, I have a new-found respect for such comedic works as "R.V.," "Are We There/Done Yet?," "License To Wed," "Guess Who?," "Soul Plane," "King's Ranson," "My Baby's Daddy," "Little Man" and any of the "Scary Movie" versions.

So, I suppose the experience wasn't all terrible ...

Ah, but this film was. With two Academy Award-nominated lead actors (Thornton, nominated for "Sling Blade" in 1996, and Susan Sarandon, winner in 1995 for "Dead Man Walking") joining up with Seann William Scott ("American Pie," "Old School") one would think some snickers would result, but few come about.

The plot has Williams as John Farley (where's CHRIS Farley when we need him?), a successful self-help author, whose latest book, "Getting Past Your Past," is climbing the bestseller charts. This notoriety allows him to be honored by his small hometown in Nebraska.

Going back to receive the Corn County Key honor, his trip home only results in the depressing reality that his mother (Sarandon) will marry his old gym teacher, Mr. Woodcock (Thornton). Woodcock was not only an intense physical education instructor, but a sadist.

He humiliates, insults and verbally berates his students, throws balls at them, forces them to run laps and do push-ups as punishment, even those with asthma. But he saves his special vindictiveness for Farley, whom he delights in abusing - mentally and physically. He throws him to the ground repeatedly while teaching wrestling moves; and even forces him to undress and do pull-ups in front of the other students.

Now, if something like this REALLY took place, one of the pupils would have surely mentioned it to SOMEONE, and disciplinary action would have been taken against Woodcock. But, evidently, for over 20 years, no one has ever said anything bout this abuse, so the town decides to honor him as educator of the year - to be given at the same time as Farley's.

Also, everyone in the berg seems to love the old guy, while Farley's significant other, Tracy (Melissa Sagemiller, "The Guardian") admits to having a crush on him.

Meanwhile, dredging up all of those bad memories and combining them with the fact that the evil man is having sex with his mother, causes Farley to abandon his nice, passive, positive philosophy and do everything he can to bring Woodcock down. In this endeavor, he utilizes the aid of his extremely stupid friend, Nederman (Ethan Suplee, "My Name Is Earl"). In fact, the only likable character is Maggie (Amy Poehler, "SNL"), Farley's bitchy agent.

He challenges him to a workout contest, as well as a series of carnival midway games and even a corn-eating contest. None of these situations is even remotely funny in any way, shape or form. During its mercifully-short 90-minute run, I laughed just twice - once at the very beginning, and once at the very end.

That last guffaw was no doubt brought on by the delirium of the closeness of the closing credits, however. And longtime commercial director Craig Gillespie (in his film debut) doses out the "comedy" with large slices of schmaltz, as well as a muddled conclusion, leaving patrons wondering off to movies like "Death Sentence" and "The Brave One" to satisfy their urge to laugh.


Self-help guru who hated his gym teacher goes home to find his mom engaged to said teacher, stilted merriment tries to ensue. The idea is sound the execution isn't. Woodcock, Billy Bob Thorton's gym teacher character is much too one dimensional to really work since he has one expression the whole time. Sean William Scott as the self help guru tries too hard to be wacky and falls on his face. Actually the script just doesn't work since its so obvious where its going. There are laughs and smiles despite of the lack of it all hanging together, and one "Whoa" nervous "oh crap he really got hurt" laugh towards the end. Worth a look on a slow night on cable where you'll be more forgiving of the dull bits on the way to the good ones.


The most unfortunate thing about this movie is the waste of, particularly, an excellent actress like Susan Sarandon but also for wasting Seann William Scott, who has been far better in other comedies (even the American Pie series had more humor and came across as more realistic than Mr. Woodcock) and has also done well in some dramatic/action movies, with comedic qualities in his performance, as in Bulletproof Monk and the Rundown. The only actor in the movie who is enhanced by this entire affair is Amy Poehler, who is far better used here than she ever was in Blade of Glory. She gives an excellent, scene-stealing, scene-chewing performance as Maggie, the press agent and "handler" for Scott's inspirational How To book author character, John Farley.

Sarandon plays his mom and its an age appropriate role for her and she looks fabulous even as a past middle age adult mother in a small, mid-west town. Her over the top roles in projects like Enchanted, or Children of Dune are better 'paycheck' roles for her than projects such as this or say Speed Racer.

The movie is technically proficient from a mainstream studio release point of view. However, it suffers from being a movie that, at least theatrically, barely made its production budget back (approximately $24M, not counting the cost of prints or promotion) -- and you have to wonder how much of that cost went to the director, who clearly did a by the numbers performance (many TV movies, even on basic cable, have more interesting elements in them) and a script that took every simple or easy way out. The script is credited on screen to two writers. It feels and comes across as if they sat around one afternoon thumbing through their old yearbooks, calling a few friends up for some more diverse gym-teacher horror stories, cobbled together the most basic of son/former boyfriend/co-worker/next door neighbor attempts to break couple that seem unsuitable at the start, succeeds, but in the standard-issue feel good ending, they must be brought back together at the last possible moment so the credits can roll on a happy popcorn satiated crowd.

It's predictable, its boring, it's not even mildly funny. There is one part where I laughed out loud, towards the end, a physical bit of comedy involving a pot hole and the Thorton character, Woodcock. However, laughing out loud was reflexive to what was otherwise a set up and joke that one could see a mile away. Just like a pie in the face, one laughs, but it's not what one wants to pay $10 for, plus parking, baby-sitter, gas, popcorn, etc.

Best to avoid, even on basic cable for free.


I saw this because I had nothing else to do... And, really, it seems I should've just stared at the walls for a couple of hours instead of watching this flick.

Thornton plays a gym teacher from hell, that is just so mean to his students and almost anyone else, but his teaching techniques are very appreciated in the community... alright, STOP! Anyone that would stay around someone like him for more than 10 seconds would see how much of an a-hole he is. It's just so "in your face" that it hurts.

William Scott plays some guy that was abused by this teacher and, later on, writes a book about letting go of the past. Yes, he comes back to his home town and realizes he can't let go. I think this is supposed to make fun of all those people that believe this kind of books are of any help to anyone, let alone change one's life. Everyone that says the book changed their lives in the film is a loser.

Susan Sarandon is almost invisible in the action of the movie, even though her relationship with Woodcock (now that's a name!) is the trigger for the storm that follows. Note: I mean invisible as in not interesting, mediocre, just plain stupid role.

I expected more from the end, but then I just realized: this film looks like it's written by a crazy, emotional cripple gym teacher. Throughout the plot, all of Farley's fans are losers and all those that "succeeded" in life are grateful for the humiliation they were subjected to during gym classes. The film ends as John Farley agrees with his teacher's methods and thanks him for the bad way he was treated in school. Although giving up in such a pitiful way has nothing to do with having a backbone, John writes a new book called "Backbone". o.0 Conclusion? It's boring, not interesting, not good and certainly annoying. The only funny things about this film are the gags, and those are mediocre as well. So don't go see it in a theater and don't rent it. Just wait until it's shown on TV, as you might find yourself looking for the remote after 15-20 minutes.


There are many flaws with this film. It is not gut busting funny, irrespective of what the couple behind me in the cinema thought. It is not even toilet flushing humour. It is simply not funny.

It does not contain amazing, thought provoking insights into education, relationships or manipulation of the public and media.

All it does contain is 6 basic characters / stereotypes. The nasty PE teacher whose methods affect children, the fat kid who has overcome Mr Woodcock's teaching to become good who has become famous, the widowed lonely mother who has found happiness in the arms of the bully, the nasty bitch who drinks and is abusive to all, the nice girl who stayed in the town and is a teacher herself and the loser, a loser at school and now a loser as an adult.

This could have had the makings of a very funny, thought provoking story. By limiting it to a 12A, in the UK, Mr Woodcock is not the devil incarnate, but a "pussy with a whistle". If he had made the kids' lives really hell, and this shown on the screen, it could have been both very funny and yet at the same time a poignant reminder of the responsibility of educators to ensure the welfare of their students.

The ending prevents any clear message or purpose in the film. If Mr Woodcock is such a horrendous teacher / person with a history of such abuse of power, how is it that the mother does not know? Surely in a small town in Nebraska, the local PE teacher, who is single, would surely attract attention. Kids talk all the time. If this mistreatment was occurring in every lesson, a teacher would have seen something, a pupil would have said something. Why did no parent see any bruising from the impact of the balls on their child's body? At the award ceremony for 'Educator of the year' numerous people stand up to sing the praises of this supposed monster. The fact that he is the best educator, despite his flawed approach suggests that every other teacher in the town is useless or the way to motivate students to achieve is to throw balls at them, or make them do pull ups in their underwear, or to stand on their backs whilst they perform press ups.

In writing my report on Mr Woodcock, it would have to say that whilst potential was shown, the end result is a disappointing overall effort. Must do better!


i rather enjoyed this movie, but thinking about it afterwards i thought it was a rather disjointed and hollow movie.

woodcock is a teacher, whose teaching style borders on child abuse you see him picking on the small kids, the fat kids and other less than athletic kids.

which is fine by me, child abuse is a good subject for a serious movie. bullshit author and victim returns home and learns things about him self and makes teacher see the error of his ways sounds like a good serious movie.

turn the child abuse into 'tough but fair teaching' and throw in a few gross out larf scenes and it would have made a good revenge comedy.

BUT this movie tries to be both a comedy AND a serious movie, and fails in both guises it fails to be a comedy because the subject is way to serious, and it fails to be a serious movie because woodcock is exonerated at the end of the movie.


I couldn't even watch the entire movie. It was horrible. It just wasn't funny at all. Sean William Scott is a funny guy, I think this was just the wrong role for him. And Billy Bob is a fantastic actor. I don't know where this one went wrong. The premise is great. This could have been outrageously funny given either a different mix of cast or better directing. But in it's current state, it sucked. Big time. I think Jason Biggs or someone who is more of a "straight man" funny-type would have been better in the lead role. But given it's current state, I would advise you to avoid this piece-of-crap. It's just out and out not funny.


You could call Mr. Woodcock the latest version of The Billy Bob Thornton Movie. You know, that movie where he plays ornery elder to assorted subordinates, each insult or physical assault a sign of his arrogance and superiority, even as he's waiting to be revealed as a decent guy who only needs to be appreciated. He is, of course, always smarter and faster than all his opponents. Whether you see him as the bully of your own childhood or the payback that bully so richly deserves, you tend not to see the Billy Bob Thornton character as you.

In the new version of the BBTM, Thornton plays a gym teacher with a tedious name, introduced as he's pummeling little boys with basketballs, tormenting the ones who are overweight, stutter, or have asthma, infusing all of them with lifelong insecurities and nightmares. Johnny, a cute, freckle-faced boy, described by Woodcock as "fat and gelatinous," grows up to be Seann William Scott. In so doing, he appears to have escaped his fellow victims' pattern. In fact, John has written a best-selling self-help book, Letting Go, all about forgetting the past in order to move on.


I enjoy watching the stars of this movie in their other projects so I really wanted to like this movie. I especially liked Billy Bob Thornton in "School for Scoundrels" so hoped this was a lot of more of similar humor as 2 "enemies" try to one up each other. I believed that due to the previews which play up the humor and conflict between the two characters.

Wow, the actual movie is sadly different. The slapstick humor from the previews is noticeably missing and instead there are only a few laughs. Most of those come from Amy Poehler or Ethan Suplee. John Farley (Sean William Scott) just comes across as mean and unlikeable. Jasper Woodcock (Thornton) is dry and unfunny and through various scenes appears to be a person deserving pity almost. Beverly Farley (Susan Sarandon) is similarly sad as her tale unfolds. Rather than the light hearted slapstick comedy I was expecting, I got more of a dark comedy such as War of the Roses. This did not work even as well as that movie, which I also disliked.

To have such a great cast, it is just really sad that this was the movie was they made. I am happy that I did not see it in the theater so I did not lose nearly as much money. This is definitely one I recommend people pass by, or better yet, watch the previews and imagine what you think the movie was. I wish I could do that.


This so-called comedy is horrendous on all levels, and worst of all--it's boring! It's forgettable! This doesn't even fall into the so-bad-it's good category. About the only positive thing I can say about "Mr. Woodcock" is that it's only a little under 80 minutes long. I was looking forward to seeing the flick, since I am a pretty big Billy Bob Thornton fan. Unfortunately, with this movie, he has officially completed the trifecta of duds. First there was "School for Scoundrels," which was mediocre. Then there was "The Astronaut Farmer," which was also mediocre. Now we have "Mr. Woodcock," which is downright awful. There are many actors who I admire and even adore, who have done a fair share of bad movies, but for some reason (before these three movies) I can't think of any less-than-satisfying ones that Billy Bob has done, except for maybe "Waking Up in Reno." It seems like he has reached the I'm-just-here-to-pick-up-my-paycheck phase of his career.

The movie has an interesting premise. We all have had crappy gym teachers in the past. Unfortunately, the plot goes nowhere and flings us into one implausible, sitcom-level situation after another. My main problem with the plot is that we're supposed to believe that Mr. Woodcock is a gem to everyone, except Seann William Scott's character. Susan Sarandon's character supposedly finds this man charming, when in all actuality he doesn't show even an ounce of charm throughout the flick. Maybe it would've been funny if he were really mean towards Scott, yet he acts like the nicest guy towards everybody else. We're even supposed to believe that all the townsfolk in this sleepy Midwestern town think he's a great person.

My second problem with the plot? Seann William Scott transforms from a calm, mild-mannered motivational speaker to an insane wreck...within a matter of 10 minutes! What kind of character arc is that? First of all, Scott is sadly miscast in his role. Personally, I don't think he possesses much range as an actor. He's Stiffler...that's that! Any role that doesn't require him to be a rude, foul-mouthed weasel takes him out of his element. I was never convinced that Scott was a well-meaning motivational speaker with worldwide acclaim. Amy Poehler, of "SNL" infamy, tries to steal the show with her snappy one-liners. Unfortunately, she's just as talentless as the rest of "SNL's" current cast, and does nothing to breathe life into this comatose flick.

The gags are absolutely predictable and brainless. As if this would surprise anyone, this is another one of those comedies where all the good jokes are given away in the trailer. There's one gag involving a video camera accidentally being left running while Ethan Suplee's character gabs on and on about how hot Scott's mother is. It doesn't take a rocket scientist to discover that there's going to be a later scene, where Susan Sarandon walks in as the video is playing on a TV screen. Not to mention each gag is delivered with all the gusto of a student filmmaker.

This movie is such a waste of two brilliant actors. Billy Bob sleeps through his role, keeping the same sneering expression every minute he's on screen. I can't blame him. Like I said before, he probably just did the film to collect a paycheck. Susan Sarandon is forced to play an utterly brainless character, who falls for Woodcock's charm, despite the fact that he has none! I can't recall a worse film she's ever done. I hope her paycheck was pretty huge as well.

Plain and simple, this is another lamebrain comedy you should skip. I wouldn't even recommend this on DVD. If you happen to catch it on cable, please change the channel. I can think of a lot of bad comedies that have come out in recent years, but few as merit-less as this one.


All throughout high school Mr Woodcock gave kids a really hard time in gym class. So hard that one student wrote a book on how to live your life and overcome such obstacles. This young man is all grown up and returns home to hear that his mother is engaged to...Mr. Woodcock. Thus providing more hard times for our lead character and apparently some unfunny situations that we are suppose to laugh at.

Ever since the very funny Bad Santa, there have been a slew of Billy Bob Thorton plays an asshole type comedy. The one prior to this entry was School For Scoundrels. Now, if you play this two movies one after another I guarantee you that you would not be able to tell which character was from which movie, since they are almost the exact same. This film and Scoundrels, both feature Thorton an autopilot. While he still gets the laughs, it's the rest of the film that fails horribly around him, It makes me wonder how many more of these films we are going to get.

Sean William Scott gets no laughs here. He is not playing the perverted jerk (Road Trip, American Pie) nor is this an action comedy (The Rundown, Bullet Proof Monk). So we are treated to a boring character, played by a wooden Scott. I can't help but say that the lead role was horrible miscast here.

The script is nothing new, nor funny. Mr. Woodcock unfortunately falls into the category that hurt so many comedies. The old, "If You've Seen The Trailer, You've Seen All The Funny Parts". It is completely true in this case. I did chuckle here and there, but that's only because Thorton is abusive to little kids.


....trailer I have ever seen in my life. Whoever did the advertising for this "film" should get some sort of special achievement academy award because it had me totally fooled. The trailer did many things to fool many people, as in show scenes that weren't even amusing in the film and then edit them together in a way that actually gave you quite a laugh to see in the commercial. I usually do not say this but I regret having watched this. This crap that got thrown on the wall and did less then just not stick, it boomeranged.

For a bit of a stretch you could say I like others admired some of Billy Bob Thornton's work. Mr. Woodcock didn't exactly push me farther then that feeling of admiration. What it did do though is lose interest in any future projects involving him. As for Susan Sarandon her career like other well respected actors and actresses has turned into a bit of an uneventful one, which is just fine but don't perform in garbage like this. What is quite baffling though is that the director of this film, Craig Gillespie, had simultaneously had another release of his own in Lars and the Real Girl which contrasted in so many ways to Mr. Woodcock. For one, it was at the very least above average. Mr. Woodcock was at the very most, a disaster.

Obviously I would not recommend this film. It is not funny and if you are looking for films that contain the same sort of jokes or themes they're plenty of other films Thornton has made before Mr. Woodcock. If you've already seen those then just watch something totally different. It won't make you laugh and it isn't even corny enough to mildly warm your heart. It is a hollow movie that will only make you remember that you at one point watched one the greatest trailers ever.


Just saw it. Not the worst movie I've ever seen, but never in my life have I felt such hatred for a movie character. I thought Bad Santa looked like Mother Teresa next to this guy. I wouldn't call it great acting on Thornton's part, (he's totally "wooden", no pun intended), he just seems good at being a dick. I literally wanted to bury a claw hammer into this guy's skull, and I'm not a violent person! I kept BEGGING for Stifler to kick his ass. But he was such a puss that I started to hate him, too. Susan Sarandon is still hot, I don't know why she's in this loser. 'Laughed 2 times: when Stifler's buddy got caught on video talking about Sarandon's boobs, and then when that piece of crap Woodcock ate the asphalt. HAHAHA!!! Really hated the end, trying to be all feel good. I wanted to end in Woodcock's death. I know, it's just a movie. The best thing I can say is that it DID get a reaction out of me, I was not apathetic about it.


I was actually looking forward to seeing this movie because I have a step father who I often feud with. So naturally I was hopping this would cheer me up and get me to laugh. But boy did this movie depress me and boy did it make me angry.

First let me go over what I did like about this film before I trash it. It had what could have been a really good and funny plot. Our lead character discovers that the evil gym teacher that tormented him in middle school is now going to marry his mother. Basically think of that teacher from high school or middle school who hated your guts. You didn't do anything he/she just hated you and made it clear. Now imagine if that teacher going to be your new stepfather/stepmother. What do you do? This sounded hysterical and in the films defenses there were a few funny moments. Sadly however those funny moments were all given away in the trailer. This would be the first problem I had with this film. All the parts that come to mind as being the highlights were already spoiled and what's left is okay but not great.

However let's talk about the story a little more. As I said before our star use to be stuck with an evil gym teacher who was out to make his life a living hell. Now he's all grown up and has used his experiences with "Mr. Woodcock" to write a self help book. This book becomes a best seller and he now teaches people how to let go of there past. Things are going well until his past come back to hunt him! Now that also could of bin funny. Watching a mans message of letting go of the past get challenge by the bad things that happen to him long ago. Sadly it does not play out well and I will explain later.

This Woodcock fellow dose not seem to regret any of the mean things he has done to him. In fact he's very mean to everyone and everything. They made him such a jerk to the point you can't bring your self to like his character. The mom on the other hand seem really nice but one cant help but wonder what is she thinking, is she that desperate? The guy makes very rude and mean spirited comments to her son, even going far to make sex comments about his mother. He treats the people in the town like dirt and everything that comes out of his moth is negativity and insults. Some time his abuse gets physical.

So I was starting to think the story was about an evil step father who the son had to save his mother from marrying. After all for some reason he and us the viewer can only see what a bad guy Woodcock really is. But no. By the end of the movie the son must learn to Respect Woodcock and his very abusive ways. So according to the movie women are better off pretending there abusive spouse is a good guy in spite of the fact he treats the world like dirt. For all women can't be happy unless they have a man, even if he is a creep. What kind of message is that to send out! Okay, dose our hero at least manage to persevere his message he has become popular selling? No, by the end he turns back on all of that and decided to take after his mom. Give into stock home syndrome and convinces himself that Woodcock is a good guy. So he finds himself apologizing to an unapologetic abusive jerk. He even declares that all the abuses was good for him. What kind of message are they trying to send out? Well did Woodcock learn any lessons, become sorry for his actions and show off that there is a nice guy in there some ware? As I already said no. They make it very clear he is not sorry for any the things he dose. In the movies Meet the Parents and Meet the Fockers, our lead faced a similar problem with his father in law to be. However that worked out on screen much better. Why? Because by the end the Character who was being a jerk learned his lesson and realizes he was in the wrong. Something that never happens here. The best we get is when Woodcock said "I'm "Basically" sorry" to the mom but after the entire movie one cant help but feel more mad then amused.

To make things a little worse thing are never resolved. Like there a little romance going on between our star and a girl he knew from his old school but it never went any ware. In fact in one moment our "hero" cames off as a bit of jerk to because it seems he did not care much for her at all. So now our lead character not that likable earthier. Then when it gets to the end the movie feels as if it just stops. No laterally, it feels like it stop in mid-moment and then the credits start. Leaving the movie feeling unfinished and made to quickly.

Over all what could of bin a good movie falls apart because things are never resolved, characters are unlikable, and sends out the message that abuse; verbal or physical is cool as long as your mom love him.

That Why Mr. Woodcock gets a 3 out of 10.


It's BAD SANTA meets any Will Ferrell sports movie. Which means it's Billy Bob Thornton in a comedy that really sucks. In MR. WOODCOCK, Thornton is psychopathic phys-ed coach, Mr. Woodcock, who persecutes his schoolboy charges like a drill instructor, hurling insults and basketballs at them, stepping on them, making them do laps until they collapse - you know, like your old phys-ed coach from school.

My recollection of the name "Woodcock" is from BUTCH CASSIDY AND THE SUNDANCE KID (1969) - Paul Newman, trying to convince the Union Pacific Railroad guy to open the train door so the gang won't have to use explosives, flippantly pronouncing the name with that edge of dirtiness, "Hey, Woodcock! You can't want to get blown up again!" There is more humor in that one line from BUTCH CASSIDY than there is in all 87 minutes of this quarter-brain comedy.

A nerd who is bullied by Mr. Woodcock, grows up to be insufferable Seann William Scott, who leaves his small town and returns as a successful author, having channeled all his angst and repression into self-help books. To his horror, he discovers that his mother is dating Mr. Woodcock. Susan Sarandon plays Scott's airhead boiler mother, sleepwalking through the role while Tim Robbins wasn't looking.

Attempted hilarity ensues.

This is Craig Gillespie's second directorial effort. It shows. This is writers Michael Carnes' and Josh Gilbert's first writing effort. We can tell. Amy Poehler nearly steals the show. It wasn't that hard to do.

I swear if Seann William Scott makes that stupid face again, I'm going to scream. Oh, that's just his face...


Amy Poehler is a terrific comedian on Saturday Night Live, but her role in this movie doesn't give her anything to work with. Her character, a publisher's representative guiding a new author on a book tour, is mean, not funny.

Susan Sarandon plays the author's mother who is involved with the sadistic gym teacher (Billy Bob Thorton) the author had when he was a chubby junior high student. Unfortunately her role doesn't require a talented actress. The funniest thing is the way she looks in the awful gown she wears as the queen of the corn festival. There is no explanation of why the corn queen is old enough to have a grown son.

The plot is the stale one of an author who wrote a best selling self-help book and then adopts behavior that contradicts his advice.

Still, it is not the worst movie I've ever seen, and I didn't erase it before watching it.


With stars like Billy Bob and Sean William Scott, and with a name like Wookcock, I was expecting some funny moments. However, I was sadly disappointed. This comedy was hardly funny, which spells disaster for any movie. No wonder it did so poorly at the box office.

Billy Bob delivers a good performance as the balls buster tough PE coach whom we discover has redeeming values in the end. He's played this sarcastic, slightly mean guy in several films. Unfortunately, he was about all this movie had going for it. A corn eating contest is just not funny. And a guy under the bed while his mom gets it on is just gross.

FINAL VERDICT: The laughs are few and far between, skip this.


Mr.Woodcock is a boring comedy which did not produce me any laughs because all the jokes are clichéd and tired.That's a serious problem in a comedy.Billy Bob Thornton is criminally wasted in this movie.He's an extraordinary actor but this movie does not show all his talent.He should appear in more movies like A Simple Plan or Bad Santa,which really take advantage of his talent,and not in craps like School for Scoundrels or Mr.Woodcock.Director Craig Gillespie shows nothing of artistic zeal.His work is simply mercenary.It was very difficult to me laughing with this movie because,as I said,all the jokes are tired and they left to be funny 20 years ago.I do not recommend this movie.


Generally I think I like feature-film spin-offs of TV sitcoms more than most viewers. But this is a dire example of the genre.

I suspect the actors were forced into performing in it for contractual reasons beyond their control. As revenge they then conspired to make a comedy that contained no laughs. If this was the case they were successful.


The story is idealess.

The costumes are laughable.

The set and scenery are boring.

The fights are simple.

The main actress is good looking, the main actor is not. But both are acting bad, together with all the other actors as well.

The music is annoying.

The camera-work and editing are static. Special effects are rare and unconvincing.

There is no climax and the end is unspectacular.

All in all, there is nothing that makes this worth your time. Only for people who really wants to know about every movie of this genre.


Boy oh boy. When you see a film as laughable as this one, you know there must be a hell. Yes, we're back in dodgy Italian barbarian film territory, where well-oiled beefcakes duel with rubber swords against helmet-clad stuntmen who die without being touched. Obtrusive music lurks behind every corner, as our badly dubbed hero must rescue the princess from a fate worse than.. watching this movie again? He must follow the ancient prophesy of marrying her and sitting on the legendary Throne Of Fire before the day is out, otherwise.. THE WORLD IS DOOMED!! DOOMED, I tell ya!! Unfortunately, he proves to be rather inept at his job.. getting captured no less than three times and wasting the spell his dad gives him that makes his body invisible and invulnerable to everything (except fire, conveniently). Some 'hero'. The princess, on the other hand is far more impressive.. she can butt-kick for fun and finishes the film without a scratch on her, despite the fact she is only dressed in a bra and loincloth 95% of the picture. Meanwhile, an eclipse that looks suspiciously like a raisin held up against a light bulb tells our protagonist he is nearly out of time, so he must hurry.. it won't be easy, with all those boom mikes to dodge. Can he make it? Who cares, quite frankly. I'm more interested in the mindset of those who would waste their life watching this kind of nonsense in the first place. (Don't worry about me, I've already gone mad..) And if all that still hasn't put you off, get this.. Our muscular, tough-as-nails lead character's real, non-acting first name is.. PETER. I shall now close this review, because if you're anything like me, you'll spend the next 5 minutes in hysterics. In fact, I can feel them come on again.. HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA etc. 2/10


This cheapjack Conan rip-off is so mightily inept that the villain actually comes off appearing more sympathetic, interesting and intelligent, not to mention handsomer, than the hero. Surely this was an unintended consequence of the poor script and bad acting, the seemingly lumbering stupidity of the wooden muscle-bound hero and the obligatory trotting around cardboard sets in g-strings by these supposedly heroic do-gooders. This makes the Conan and Beastmaster films look like Ben-Hur and El Cid in comparison. The only (accidental)redeeming feature is the striking presence of Harrison Muller, Jr. as Morak a surprisingly appealing "bad guy." Both his person and his character stand out, perhaps largely due to the colossally boring nature of those around him. It's hardly his fault that he was warped by destiny as the plot would have it...the viewer can't help but root for him to succeed since he's the only one of any interest or appeal on scene.


The plot outline for this film promised so much, a group of French/Italian (its difficult to tell) female prisoners break out of their prison, and set out on the run, killing a few police officers and kidnapping a bus load of young tennis players, this seems a perfect setting for an "erotic thriller", but as is to be expected from a very low budget European film from the late seventies, the film fails to live up to any of this potential. This film is a laughable, poorly dubbed, appallingly edited story which tries to be intelligent, managing to achieve the seemingly impossible combination of pretentiousness and stupidity. The film has few redeeming features, but the main one is that it is quite a good laugh to watch with a few mates when drunk, especially at the hilarious musical score and the cheap and nasty production values, (at one point it actually switches from widescreen to normal, then back to widescreen a few minutes later). If you wanted you could probably kid yourself into thinking this was an art-house film since its foreign and attempts to deal with "issues" in societies, which it does rather clumsily, otherwise just watch it and laugh.


This is really bad. Awful dubbing, rubbish acting, badly shot, choppily edited and generally terrible.

I also didn't like the fact that the scummy rapist judge didn't get shot at the end and was allowed to completely get away with forcing himself on another woman! that was a sickening scene and its a fairly misogynistic film.

However, there are 3 plus points. All of them are the foxy women. Erica (Ada Pometti) is particularly sexy and has a great but brief sex scene. Patrizia Funari has a nice backside which is shown off. And the girl who isn't listed here but plays 'Susanna' is very gorgeous.

I shall be checking out more of their films!

However, they were the ONLY three plus points and thats why the film gets 3 from me. 1 POINT for each sexy woman!


The worst Columbo ever was "No time to die." This was the second worst. Why? Because Columbo was completely out of character, and committed reprehensible and illegal acts in trapping his prey: he plainly assaulted the suspect (death threats and ramming his car), held him against his will, extorted evidence (the location of the gun), a confession, and under threat of death a an ongoing covenant to take the fall.

Columbo is supposed to be a sympathetic goody-goody character (albeit a slob), not a felon.


They went to the bottom of the alphabet to get two bottom-of-the-barrel performances. But Yaeger is merely ineffectual. Wendt is spectacularly bad. And the pity is that the interest the viewer could have in the episode lies entirely in how well he pulls off his murder scheme. His character is supposed to be the smart and responsible brother but he cannot get past the boorishness of Normie to give us anything. As a result, this is the worst Columbo movie I have ever seen.


In a decay neighborhood, the asthmatic and allergic amateurish photographer Marvin Montrose (Karl Geary) spends his days and nights confined in his room snooping his neighbors in the next building with his camera. When a boy disappears in the spot and then the local drug dealer Desmond (Keith Robinson), Marvin suspects of a mysterious garbage man (Lance Henriksen) and his sister Rosy (Alexis Dziena) and her friend Carmen (Rebecca Mader) investigate him. Meanwhile, Marvin witnesses the death of Detective Gary Dumars (John Kapelos) and a stranger on the street by two mutant Judas Breed insects and discloses that their prime suspect is the CDC Agent Kirchner.

"Mimic: Sentinel" is a shameful and boring rip-off of "The Rear Window" for approximately forty minutes, with a guy confined in his room and snooping his neighbors. The character of Agent Kirchner is not well developed and the gore action is too brief, with the death of most of the characters in a few minutes. In the end, watching this forgettable movie is a pure waste of time and money. My vote is four.

Title (Brazil): "Mutação 3: O Sentinela" ("Mutation 3: The Sentinel")


Man, this movie sucked sh!t through a straw. First, one has to overcome about more than an hour of nonsensical voyeurism, than - out of the blue - some unrecognizable roaches show up from out of the blue and than, klabbam!, there the pitiful apocalypse: the monsters die and the good guy, his sister and his - to be - lover are miraculously saved and all is well again.

I wonder what the producers were thinking. The first two Mimics I liked a lot. For the disgusting effects and the, more or less, tension throughout the pictures, but this third was a bunch of crap. It was actually rather sad, on the filmer's account, to focus on the breasts of Rosy to create some kind of, whatever, image: an American teenage girl, smoking dope once in a while, looking good and showing off her bra. Well, one good thing; she didn't die.

This movie made no sense. Whatsoever. I'm sorry I watched it.

Dikke Jules (Fat Jules)


I can understand why they chose a different style for this installment of Mimic. Too bad I can't understand anything else, such as:

Why the honored characters (the bugs) have barely but a cameo appearance, and hardly contribute to the storyline other than they are the "mystery killers"? Well duh.

Why the only relationship between the main character (the brother) and the bugs, is that he was one of the surviving children of the plague that the bugs were created for in the first place? Like if it were not for this fact, viewers wouldn't be able to link this installment with the first two.

How is the sister's involvement with her drug dealer associate important to the story other than just about everyone in the neighborhood is purported to be a drug user?

How is it important that the police officer investigating the killings become romantically involved with the mother? And not waste any time either...

Why is the relationship between the brother and the across-the-road beautiful neighbor not carried forward? For that matter, was it important to the storyline in the first place?

Sigh. I was left overly disappointed after watching this. I mean Mimic 2 was bad enough, but sheeze, this is so far worse it's not even worth watching to say you've seen it.


I won't labour the details since I think most of the points I would make have already been made by others. The acting is pedestrian at best. The plot is as thin as clingfilm and is a rather poor homage to Hitchcock's Rear Window (Please note: regarded as something of a masterpiece by many).

Rear window works because we see everything from the main character's (Jimmy Stewart) perspective, namely the wheelchair, in his bedroom. Everything the audience sees is from that vantage point. Jimmy Stewart's character is a helpless observer who plays no part in any activity outside his bedroom. This creates an atmosphere of claustrophobia and racks up the tension continuously. This reaches an unbearable point when he sees the murderer returning home to his apartment, which his girlfriend has just broken into, looking for evidence. This tension is created by the knowledge that Stewart is powerless to warn or help her.

The same scene is recreated in Mimic: Sentinel but is completely flat and offers us absolutely no tension whatsoever. There are various other nods to Rear Window which immediately tells us that the writers didn't really have anything new or novel to say in this film. There are various plot elements that seem to do little other than fill in time (in a film which seems overly long at 78 minutes). For example when he attempts to report the danger to the police, his mother starts an intimate affair with the officer whom she had met briefly once before several years ago? Then there is the kooky, doped up sister, who walks around flapping her arms all the time. The main character is too active to be the impotent character Stewart plays but he's also too feeble to be a real hero character.

Leaving the Rear Window connection, there's very little rhyme or reason to the rest of the plot. No explanation is provided for many plot elements and very little motivation is given to any of the characters. It's all just an excuse for some atmospheric shots of not very scary giant insects dragging people off into the dark and some occasional shots of blood splatter. No attempt if made to create a feeling of impending dread as any real person would have in such a situation. None of the characters are in any way sympathetic and it's hard to get worked up enough to care about the film when we don't care about any of the characters.

We're left with a film which lacks the substance of Rear Window and which fails to provide any substance of it's own. I wouldn't bother spending money to rent it but if it's on TV and you're a completist who liked the other two Mimic films, then go ahead.


Mimic: Sentinel is set in New York where a sufferer of the disease Stricklers which is mentioned in the first Mimic (1997) named Marvin (Karl Geary) lives with his mom Simone (Amada Plummer) & younger sister Rosy (Alexis Dziena) in an apartment block, he can rarely venture outside his sterile room as he is apparently 'environmentally sensitive' whatever that means. So what does he do to pass the time? For the past 10 years he has taken pictures of the people in the opposite apartment block & basically spies on them, we all have to have a hobby I suppose. However his picture taking gets him into trouble when he witnesses a drug dealer name Des (Keith Robinson) get killed by someone. Marvin begins to organise an investigation into the killing & drags his sister into it but they soon find out that what killed Des wasn't human, it was in fact one of the giant mutant cockroaches from the previous films & it's up to him to stop them...

Written & directed by J.T. Petty Mimic: Sentinel is the third film in the Mimic series & you know a series is in trouble when they stop numbering them after only the first two & as if by magic my fears are confirmed with this distinctly average at best horror/thriller. The script is basically Hitchcock's Rear Window (1954) with killer genetically created giant bugs, if that sounds appealing to you then what are you reading this for? Go & rent it. If it doesn't sound appealing then you, like me, may not be that impressed with Mimic: Sentinel. The thing is I don't know if I missed something because the final 20 odd minutes came out of nowhere & I actually didn't really understand what was going on. For instance Lance Henriksen suddenly turns up & I honestly don't know who he was or his significance other than his photo is on the back of one of Marvin's books & he seems to know about the killer bugs. He also has this bag of stuff which I presume is the killer bugs blood so they won't attack him but I'm only guessing because that's what happened in the first film. There are other bits & pieces that I didn't understand either like the 'dead' body Rosy shows Marvin under the drain cover at the start yet even though he takes photos of it it never mentioned or seen again, maybe I did miss something I don't know. Maybe Mimic: Sentinel doesn't have any plot holes or loose ends & it's a deeply complex intricately written & thought out piece of suspenseful film-making that I was too stupid to 'get', or then again maybe it's a cheap straight-to-video poorly written & contrived horror sequel that totally rips-off Rear Window & is basically rubbish, who knows...

Director Petty does OK, the film has that downbeat somewhat gray look & feel about it like the previous two with it's rundown apartment blocks. Am I the only one who found the constant scenes shot through the lens of Marvin's camera highly annoying, I can't be surely? Also was I the only on who thought this film was far too dark to the extent where it actually became almost impossible to see what was going on at times? The special effect's are used sparingly & are OK but nothing that's going to impress you that much, the giant bugs don't feature that much which doesn't help. The gore is minimal, there's some blood splatter & someone is impaled on the giant bugs pincers (or whatever they are) but not much else to get excited about.

Technically Mimic: Sentinel is alright & has that Hollywood polish about it, it's well made enough for sure with decent production values. The acting isn't that good & the always great Henriksen has nothing more than a glorified cameo.

Mimic: Sentinel is an OK watch, I didn't think it was anything special & not as good as the previous two but that's just my opinion for what it's worth. Worth a watch if your desperate but don't bust a gut to see it.


Sequels, by their nature, are supposed to be inferior to the original because they no longer have originality at their side. My my, does MIMIC 3 prove this notion. The film tries to be a thoughtful approach to the series, but it only ends up being tedious, dull, and wholly lacking in entertainment value. Too bad, because the actors do some good work, but the movie, sporting a thankfully short running time, does itself no favors. Dull characters mixed in with a dull story equals a dull movie. Even THE SIMPSONS gave us a better REAR WINDOW retread. And is it me, or did our voyeur photographer always seem to run out of film or forgot to click on his camera whenever the mimics were in view? Well, I guess if he actually took a picture of them the whole movie would be over, and the dumb cop couldn't keep thinking that our hero was nuts. How contrived.

3 out of 10


I liked the previous two installments of the series so I gave it a try and rented this stinker.

First of all, the story had no suspense or action whatsoever. Only the last 10 (or 5) minutes show a little action when the main character (a peeping Tom who only lives to take photos of other people) kills some bugs with an explosion in his kitchen while he hides in the fridge.

The film moves along at snails pace and although it only runs for about 70 minutes or so it feels like 3 hours.

The story also makes little sense and offers no or very little explanation. If you don't know Mimic 1 or 2 you won't have any clue whats going on, where the bugs come from, why they are so big, why they mimic humans and so on. There is NO explanation at all.

All in all, a waste of time and money. When the end credits rolled I was thinking "WTF, it can't end like this?". Very lame.

And what was a great actor like L. Hendriksen doing in such a movie? Did he really need the money?

Guys, avoid this movie. Rent Pitch Black or Aliens instead if you want to see a good monster movie. No wonder this stinker went straight to video. 1/10.


MIMIC 3 (spoilers) is one of the worst movies ever made. The main character (Geary) is someone who supposedly has severe allergies and lives in a sealed off room. However, when it suits the movie, the same guy is walking around in the alleys of the Bronx. Geary plays his character like an early 1950s Jerry Lewis with all the nervous ticks and funny walks that he must have thought come with allergies. Watching Geary constantly twitching and having spastic attacks makes the movie more enjoyable than it should be. Geary spends most of his time in his room taking photos of his neighbors at the apartment house across the street. Apparently none of his neighbors have heard of vertical blinds or window shades, and so they are all walking around naked, arguing, fighting, painting, etc. for the amusement of Geary who is taking photos of these folks (even at night, and without a flash). Even the Cockroach Monster has an apartment, though the issue is never addressed as to how he pays the rent, what bank opened a checking account for Mr. Roach, and how he signed the lease. At some point people start disappearing from the apartments, and Geary starts to see Mr. Roach killing some of them from his window. That is about as exciting as this movie gets. Amanda Plummer plays the mother of Jerry Lewis-Geary, and there is not much of a point to her role in the film. Lance Henrikson was in this movie for about five minutes of some really bad acting. Apparently he needed the money. The ending of this film is pathetic. It has been done in dozens of other movies, Jerry Lewis Geary gets into the refrigerator while the oxygen tanks in his house blow up all the roaches. Geary's girlfriend, who he left outside the refrigerator is not injured either, and his sister, who was sliced and diced by the Roaches (there is more than one BIG ROACH) miraculously pulls through. MIMIC 3 is so bad that the fact that any of the human characters survived just added to how bad this movie was.


Enjoyed this film and the great acting by Karl Geary (Marvin), who did a great job of acting like a person who had Strickland Disease and had me completing feeling sorry for him. Marvin's big hobby was being a simple PEEPING TOM, who enjoyed watching all his neighbor's, old, young and in between. I think his favorite window to look into was Carmen, (Rebecca Nader), who seemed to get hot and bothered over Marvin and his great hobby of posting pictures all over the wall and especially hers! Marvin's sister Rosy, (Alexis Dziena) was the person who introduced Marvin to Carmen and this of course started a wonderful relationship. There is plenty of mystery concerning the horrible habits of a Judas Bug that gets so hungry he tries to break into the trunk of a car. This film is entertaining and does not need to be put under a microscope and studied, if you don't like the beginning, Turn it Off !


Oh man ! I know boring and idiot things exist but I'm all time surprised to see new things like that.

First this movie is not one. It's like a TV series. Second story is so amateur. Like we ask to student to make something about anything.

Man! I give 1/10 for this movie cause it's so bad. Even if actor/actress are not so bad, that technical is not so bad too I can't give more. A movie or TV series is first a story. And when this story is more bore than bore it's not possible to enjoy watching it.

I really don't know how it's possible to have money to "create" thing like that. And people who give money for so bad things like spend their money. Better buy some lottery ticket.

Hope they will not have Mimic 4! Man!


I really loved the first movie Mimic. The second movie, Mimic 2: Hardshell was ok too. It had some very suspenseful moments, and it felt true to the original film.

This third film, written and directed by a young filmmaker, J.T. Petty, who as the documentary on the dvd indicated was just given the premise of "Rear Window with Roaches" and was told to run with it. He did, but he ran as far away from the original concept as he could. This movie plodded along at a snail's pace with uninteresting characters and no real story sense and basically had no suspense at all until the last ten minutes. And it was painful to wade through the movie to get to that part, but I just had to see how this turkey was going to end. I can understand the filmmaker and studio wanting to try something new and different, but this whole story premise was too off the wall and didn't give the viewer what he expected after having already seen the previous two films. This movie was shot in Romania (I can't understand why-----didn't we have any locations available in America?)and didn't have a very good look to it at all.

I can only hope that if there is a fourth movie, it will be made by more experienced and competent filmmakers and will give the viewers what they expect in a franchise horror film. I believe this movie was a straight-to-video release because the studio had no faith in this movie to

stand up at the box office. And they were right.


As a lifelong Agatha Christie fan, and devotee of Joan Hickson's late 80s/early 90s Miss Marple adaptations, I had hoped that these early 80s curios would help fill my need for more Agatha. I can't imagine that these stagey productions would have met with the great lady's approval. Slow moving (especially when Tommy and Tuppence are on screen), and so lacking in dramatic tension that I am surprised more than a couple of episodes were ever screened.

Francesca Annis is dreadfully OTT and arch. Her stage make-up makes her look like a doll or a clown in some sequences. James Warwick is very wooden and emotionless. Reece Dinsdale's comedy cockney is even more annoying.

Tommy and Tuppence are totally unlikeable, and their laboured attempts at flirtation and humour fail at every attempt. Every witticism and remark in the script clunks to the floor under the deadly delivery of Annis and Warwick.

There's a nice range of guest appearances from some actors who went on to great things (Anita Dobson as a maid who bites the dust after two minutes on screen), but the supporting roles are obviously less significant to the two leads. As a result, anyone who tries to bring a bit of life to things (Liz Smith and Joan Sanderson, for example) are shot down as soon as they appear on the same set as Tommy and Tuppence.

The studio sets and studio lighting have aged very badly, and the whole production feels dated.


OK. so i liked some of the films that Star Cinema has produced.... and i thought, why not go see this movie Milan. The crux of the matter is... this is a bad movie. The lead character(Piolo Pascual)is so confused about his existence that his existentialist angst comes as an ABBA song (you know... can you hear the drums, Fernando?) Not only that! This movie offers a picturesque glimpse of italy (oh my god! is that why the movie was entitled Milan?) but that's it. Expect no more. What you'll get from the beginning of the film until the end is pure drivel! A guy loses his wife... he searches her out in Milan... (for the life of me i don't get this, how can you just jump the boat and just sink, sink, sink, happily sink?) and then he finds the loving arms of another Filipina who (surprise!)falls in love with him too and then just when things cannot go on any murkier, he finds his wife who is (another surprise!) a rape victim(!) and is too ashamed to go home so she rejects him and they all live miserably all together! The same goes for the audience.

I just want to puke after seeing this film.

Bad! Teribly bad!


I'm not going to do a very deep review for this. I'll be honest, I saw this movie in a $3.99 bin at a grocery store and read the synopsis, and I had to buy it to see if it was as ridiculous as it sounded. Basically, Freedom Deep is the story of Liam, who, under the guidance of his mentor "Kurt Cobain" (yes, THE Kurt Cobain. The heroine addict lead singer of Nirvana who killed himself), begins to create a new religion based on his teachings. The story follows Liam simultaneously through the year 1998 as a 10 year old kid and in the year 2018 as a friggin idiot. As a kid Liam is shown beat up and neglected. He and has a revelation one night as he hallucinates the image of "Kurt Cobain" (!) at a hippy party. From that moment on Liam knows his purpose in life, though I'm kind of glad he didn't really share it with the audience. In 2018, the world has gone through an apocalypse and Liam is ready to journey to the last remains of civilization to spread the word of Kurt Cobain. And through facing difficult obstacles he does just that! Go Liam! The music is trippy, the acting is great considering there's no dialog, and the film processing attempted to have a fresh hip look, but ended up being annoying. I didn't even get the laugh I was hoping for.


...I'd rate this fourth out of the four I can think of. As Australian post-apocalyptic movies featuring Kurt Cobain's ghost go, Freedom Deep is A-number-one!

So I watch bad movies for fun. That's my excuse. After reading the back of the DVD's packaging, which contains the phrase "we see how his talents are nutured (sic) and developed under the guidance of his spiritual mentor - 'Kurt Cobain,'" how could I not buy it? I could not not, that's how. There's another misspelling in the quote above I'd love to reproduce, but IMDb automatically corrects it every time I try.

Freedom Deep takes place mostly in two time periods, between which it alternates: 1998-ish and 2018, with a little bit of "much later" as well. The nineties bit concerns a young boy named Liam, who has trouble at home and trouble with the other children at school. And, come to think of it, trouble with his teacher at school, a fact which is revealed in an inadvertently hilarious scene. The other prominent timeline focuses on an adult Liam (who, it should be noted, looks absolutely nothing like young Liam) who basically wanders around the desert a lot. To spice things up, sometimes he wanders through the snow. At one point, in a radical narrative departure, he manages to wander in a boat.

Not sold on it yet? Just wait. The best part is that no incarnation of our protagonist, not young Liam, adult Liam or even old Liam, speaks a single word. Not because they're mute, but because it's, y'know, artsy. There's some voice-over here and there, but even that's sparse. I believe it was 28 minutes into the movie before *any* main character actually spoke a word to someone else, and that was through a headset to an unknown party. It's all about as enthralling as it sounds.

Freedom Deep is a mess. It's Gordian's Knot, and I have no idea why anybody tied it. So there's this woman. She's a bounty hunter. Or an assassin. Or a government agent or something. I guess it's possible she's from the future of the future. I couldn't tell you. It's 2018, civilization's presumably in crumbles, and for completely unknown reasons she's been tasked with finding Liam wandering out in the desert. Liam's probably wandering the desert to get away from the society that wronged him, except I think that society has been destroyed for close to 20 years at this point. Maybe whatever society sprung up in its place picked on him too. Liam's had it rough. Anyway, she shoots a camel, finds her quarry, has a confusing wireless conversation, burns her headset, rapes Liam at knifepoint (!), they fall in love, and he never says a word. Your typical boy meets girl, really.

All the while, she reads through the pages of a book Liam has written. It's the same book Liam started writing back in the 1998 timeline. One would hope that's a helluva book. And clearly it is, as she decides to spare his life because of it; she's convinced it must reach civilization.

Meanwhile, young Liam runs away from home and manages to find a surrogate family in the form of a gay couple, half of which is a transsexual "mother" and the other half of which really likes heroin. Liam escapes his troubles, as he always has, through his love of plaid shirts, a horrendous hair-do, Kurt Cobain, and lots of music that sounds nothing like Kurt Cobain's. Music rights cost money. Soon he finds another outlet for his pain (pain best represented in voice-over by the heartfelt words "heal my wounds"). Poetry!

The movie states that young Liam's story starts in 1998; we're told no more. Liam endures school and home life, escapes from it, finds an odd replacement family, takes up writing, gets in a series of publications, and becomes well-known enough to get into a meeting with corporate bigwigs who'd like to put his column in their magazine as a regular feature, all by March 12th of 1998, the movie tells us. Even assuming the rest of it started on January 1st, that little dude can move.

I have no idea what to make of this movie. I didn't mention how Kurt Cobain really fits in because, well, he doesn't. Why does anyone care what a pubescent mute thinks, at least enough to publish him? Who is sending someone to catch and possibly kill adult Liam? Why? Who does our almost-assassin talk to on her headset? Why does she burn the thing afterwards? Are there wireless towers or satellites after the nuclear holocaust? What the heck happened with the cliff scene? Why does the word "prophet" keep popping up in reference to this movie? If Liam arrives at what looks like a fully intact city at the end, was it really harmed in the first place? Is he just some nutjob wandering around the desert for years and all the rest is his hallucination? Why did the writer-director think he could get away with three versions of a main character who never utters a word? I'm baffled.

It's not the worst movie I've seen (I've given out a whole lot of one-star ratings), but it's bad. And it might not be the most confusing movie I've seen, but it's at least top five. As bad movie fare goes, it's entertaining and maybe worth a watch, but isn't a must-see crappy flick experience.

In conclusion, let me present a condensed version of what the experience of watching this movie was like:

Me: Wait, what?

Roommate: I dunno.

Me: Rewind it.

(Rewind.) (Watch it again.)

Together: What?

(Repeat.)


This is probably the worst movie I have ever seen. I actually watched it all the way through to see if it could get any worse than it was at the beginning. It did! It appears to be 2 separate movies spliced together. The only thing interesting about it was the fact that some, if not all of it, was filmed around Melbourne, Australia, where my son attended Veterinary School. If it weren't for the opportunity to pick out recognizable landmarks, this movie would have been unbearable to watch. It was extremely painful to view anyway. It is difficult to tell if the people who put this movie together were serious in their intentions or were just trying for an oddball campy look. In any event it came out badly.


Take "Six-String Samurai," suck every last bit of humor and talent out of it, set it in Australia and it STILL wouldn't be as awful as this unwatchable mess of self-obsessed celluloid.

Not so much a movie as it is a horrendously long, mind-bendingly pretentious music video - "Freedom Deep" may very well qualify for Legendary Bad Movie status. At the very least it has to be one of the most toxically self-indulgent train wrecks since "Lisztomania" - which is an achievement of sorts, I suppose.

The film's story, such as it is, concerns the efforts of Liam to bring the holy word of Kurt Cobain (!) to a suffering, nuke-ravaged humanity. Interspersed with this epic quest are flash backs to Liam's youth when he was a pudgy, abused kid who looks abso-tootly-ootly nothing like his older self.

If the plot of this film sounds even mildly interesting - it's not. It's tedious and trite by turns and the film's only saving grace is that there's no dialog. Indeed, I can't even begin to imagine how teeth-grindingly awful this mis-begotten mess would be if we had to listen to these characters speak.


Just like last years GAB, this sucked. WWE's offer of three excellent PPV's in a row (Judgment Day, One Night Stand and Vengeance) made this writer wonder if they had been made to seen sense, but how wrong I was.

Animal and Heidenreich (possible the worst team ever and an insult to Hawk) beat the best team in WWE right now, Joey Mercury and Johnny Nitro to win the WWE tag team titles in a rubbish match.

Booker T beat Christian in a fair contest, however there was no build up to the match and it seemed that the match was only booked to pad the PPV out.

The Mexicools (Super Crazy, Psicosis and Juventud) won the BWO (Stevie Richards, Simon Dean and The Blue Meanie) in a worthless match.

Orlando Jordan beat, yes BEAT Chris Benoit in a slump. Why Benoit was wrestling Jordan the worst US champ in history is beyond me.

The Undertaker pinned Muhammad Hassan.

Melina beat Torrie Wilson in a p*ss poor match, no one cared about the result and it was understandable.

Rey Mysterio beat Eddie Guerrero in the match of the night.

John 'Bradshaw' Layfield beat Batista via DQ after Big Dave hit JBL with a chair in a lame main event.

Overall Grade - D


Witchcraft 10 ended with LAPD Detective Lutz returning home from England, with the papers necessary to join Interpol's Bureau 17 if she wished. In this one, there's no mention of that, so it seems she chose not to do so. She's reunited with her partner Garner, who had stayed home during her trip, as well as her short skirts and high heels.

Will Spanner is back, with his fiancé Kelly Jordan. I'm supposing this is his girlfriend Keli of parts 5, 6, 7, and 9. However, she doesn't seem to remember having met Lutz and Garner before, or having learned of Will's witchcraft skills, which Keli had. Will and Kelly go to visit her atheist sister Colleen at the Catholic college where she is studying drama.

Colleen is rehearsing for a role as one of the three witches in Shakespeare's Macbeth "Double, double toil and trouble; Fire burn, and cauldron bubble." In fact, writer/director Ron Ford said his original title for this was Witchcraft XI: The Weird Sisters. Their professor is not pleased with how they perform it, and he and the most assertive of the three women, Keri Burston, feel they should go to a ceremony and perform a real witchcraft ceremony to lend their performance credibility. There, they will try to revive three sisters who'd been executed for witchcraft who had tried to conjure Abaddon and open a gate to hell.

The ceremony gives them all an opportunity (one of many) to take their tops off. Naturally, they're spied upon by three horny college guys, and when one of them dies, Detective Lutz and Garner show up to investigate. Meanwhile, the redheaded would-be Shakespearean Maria Fitzwater becomes possessed by one of the witch sisters.

Things get worse, and Will and Kelly try to save Colleen, while Lutz and Garner continue to investigate. There's a lot of nudity in this one, from Kelly, the three lovely young college students (I was surprised this appears to be the only film any of the three have been in), and Lutz. There's considerably more blood and gore than most entries in the series, including a face chomping, and someone being torn limb from limb.

Certainly not a great movie by any measure, but fairly entertaining, and I've found them to grow on me a bit the more titles in the series I see. Acting in this one isn't as bad as in some of the other later titles. There's a curious cameo by early film star Anita Page as a nun who knows something about the three witches; IMDb's page for her has a number of photos of her from the '20s and '30s. The sound is definitely better, with the dialogue being pretty clear at all times, whereas in some others it was poorly recorded or drowned by the soundtrack.


I am one of an increasing aficionados of this series. Having abandoned quality after the first one the series has opted for repeating a formula with usually increasing flesh and hoping that word of mouth and shear deluge of films will make money. The trick has largely worked. I found out about this via an occult and a vampire website where the stage and screen actor Stephen Armourae listed them as minor films with a particular interest, some of the actresses have appeared in sketches by him as well. In this lot thats bare flesh and bad acting. Steve is clearly unimpressed that the word Witchcraft should be attached to this lot: he is an occultism and has written on wicca. OK so here's the deal: Will Spanner returns, continuously since Witchcraft 2, with the delightful if too peroxide Delia Sheppard, here with his fiancé Kelly Jordan who for the sake of the script has not met people she appeared with in previous films. That's not a good sign for a film. The thrust of this one is that Kelly's sister and 3 attractive students can't act better than mahogany and they will murder Macbeth. So they are encouraged to perform a supposed witchcraft ritual to give authenticity to their performances. Gate of Hell inevitably opens and everyone gets their clothes off. This is not rated highly compared to the others in the series by Armourae either. But the sound is better and Anita Page is a bonus: a silent star aged 90 giving this a poignancy it doesn't deserve.


This movie is definitely soft-core porn. That's its downfall. Had this been a straight horror flick it would have been much better. Cinemax, HBO, and Showtime should pay attention to this. Notice:Soft-core horror flicks are bad. Worse than horror flicks. Worse than soft-core porn movies. If this movie is so bad, you may ask, how did I end up looking at it? Well, a friend popped it in, then left the room. You may think, to subject someone to this horrible movie, he's not that good a friend. The jury's still out on that verdict. The sexual interludes actually made this film worse. I was actually checking my watch during the sexual interludes. If this happens to you during a soft-core porn flick that's a very, very bad sign. In fact if this movie had just resorted to removing the sexual interludes I no doubt would have scored it higher than a 1. But I bet you're wondering, how do the sex scenes in a soft-core porn flick make it worse. If anything that's supposed to make it better, right? For Witchcraft XI, WRONG! If you haven't seen this flick yet and want to (though if you do, I feel very sorry for you, my friend), you may want to skip the next sentence and read on, cause I think I may be dropping a spoiler. This is why the sex scenes made this movie worse: In one scene one of the witches resurrects one of her sisters, then they proceed to get naked and have sex. I actually had to stop and say, "What the F***!" And I don't care if it is a soft-core horror flick, Spirits holding you down, pulling your shirt up, and raping you is never a good idea in a movie. Almost as bad as the tree-rape scene in whatever movie it was. I did have to admit that Officer Lutz deserved it more than anyone else, a payback so to speak for her being such a Queen C*nt throughout the movie. And with those hoish clothes she wore, more suited to a streetwalker than a police officer, I kind of had the feeling something sick like that would happen. I mean, when the first scene of a movie is a sex scene, you know two things. 1. That it's a soft-core porn flick. 2. That it's gonna be one good movie. Well, I was right about the first thing, but horribly, horribly wrong about the second. If you value a critic's opinion (and most people don't), then listen to what I have to say. I've seen plenty of horror flicks and plenty of soft-core porn flicks as well. If you're a fan of either (I happen to be a fan of both), avoid Witchcraft XI (and the other Witchcraft movies if they're any bit as bad as this embarrassment) like it's a person with the flu and you haven't had your flu shots. It's that bad. If you see this movie, I promise you will regret it.


I can't write much about this game, except that it has the worst movement controls I have ever experienced in any game. Ever. And I've got several hundred boxes on my shelves here.

I was excited about playing another sneaker, after the Thief series was lacking the third part for a long time, so I thought I give splinter cell a try. The training mission was good and interesting, and quickly brought me into the "I want to play this" mood. The movement controls/logic, however, were so extremely bad I didn't play the game further than the second map - it is the second game ever I threw away. Really.

If you plan to spend money on this game, make sure you can test play it a bit before, so you can decide for yourself whether you get along with the movement controls.


Watching a movie about four guys visiting microbreweries and drinking and like being the designated driver on a pubcrawl. After ten minutes, you're dying for a beer, yourself. There's simply no point to it and you get nothing out of it. The four beer travellers/drinkers do nothing to movie this movie along. If anything, they slowed it down. You can easily leave half this movie on the cutting room floor and nobody would know the difference. It seems like a student film, or a home movie that was never edited. If you want to learn something about beer, there are plenty of books on Amazon.com to read. If you want to be entertained, your spit out of luck.


I think I only watched and suffered through this dud so I could come here and warn everyone. Do NOT watch this film unless it's under pain of death!!

Richard Losee is the star, director and producer of this. If this was someone like Clint Eastwood, it would be a commendable achievement but not in this case as Losee lives up to his name and is inept and incompetent in each role. As an actor, he's stiff and wooden, the action scenes are bad enough but the love scenes are cringe worthy in their total lack of passion, cold as a fish comes to mind. As a director, he lacks the ability to make any scene interesting or exciting and flubs every chance to do so, couldn't direct traffic. But he fails worst as producer as that makes him overall responsible for putting this mess together in the first place!

The plot, what there is, concerns the kidnapping of a small child who turns out to be Losee's son (in real life as well), when he's hired to be the ransom driver for the child's family. Taking it's cue from Dirty Harry but doing it badly, Losee has to drive in his souped up car from ransom drop to the next to get instructions.

Cue lots of fast cars driving around for no discernible reason and a ludicrous 'drag race' with a bunch of rednecks who are even lower on the evolutionary scale than the rest of the cast. It all comes to an end much slower than you are wishing it will, if only the film had moved as fast as the hero's car. Perhaps if you thought that the 'Dukes of Hazzard' is about the best that it gets, you might enjoy this film, but I doubt it.....

Give this bomb a sidetrack and put up the detour sign.


This movie is not really anything like the title implies it is about. When I think rebel, I think bikers with leather jackets, or people who laugh in the face of the law. Here it is three losers looking for a break all for varying reasons. Well not all that varying as they all want money. One, is an unemployed actor who has a lovely wife and is apparently a bad actor. One, is a writer who is shopping around a book that is bad. The other guy is just trying to escape his mother's shadow or something...was not quite as sure about him. Well, a man who runs a rather crappy establishment has assembled these men to perform a robbery of an armored car. So that is about all there is to it. They take a train to Chicago, rob the armored car and get on the train and head on back home. Except, once on the train things begin to unravel as greed takes over one of the guys, another gets jumpy and then dead bodies begin to turn up. It is rather interesting to watch in places as it does move fairly quickly and the lead guy is likable enough as is his wife who stands by him. You also get to see the chief from Get Smart as the mastermind behind the heist. However, you also get to see a chase scene at the end that is to long and rather anti-climatic and the other guys in the heist are rather bad in how they are presented.


In the same tradition of "The Beatniks" comes this little gem, from our friends on the Satellite of Love. And if you are thinking you know what a beatnik looks like, then think again. About the only thing this movie has in common with a "beatnik" is the club at the beginning of the movie. Beatniks are really nothing more than the backdrop and comedy relief. It's like they're part of set.

The movie itself resolves around the schemings of "Mr.T". If you are thinking of a tough and athletic black man with many gold chains and rings when you hear that, then is the wrong movie for you. Instead this "Mr.T" is a bald white male, accessorized with a "sitting cane", removable goatee and cigarette holder. He is a Beatnik because he plays chess there as his front. The rest of his crew is a bunch of drunks, losers and squares. Perhaps it is the director's subtle message that radical and subversive behavior exhibits itself in the mind of regular looking and average drones. I should stop thinking so much as this is a bad movie. Trying to analyze it any more, just makes my gums hurt more.

If you haven't figured it out already, this is a heist picture with a twist. If you have seen any of the Ocean 11 movies (Frank,Dino,Sammy,Brad,Matt and George versions are all prime and easy examples of the type of story this is attempting) or any of numerous heist related movies (too many to name),there are good and better ones than this one.

Do yourself a favor and stay away from this movie if it is not accompanied by two robot friends and a guy in a red jump suit. They are the only reason to watch this movie at all. I also recommend some Bulleit Bourbon with it, 5 shots-worth. Spread it out evenly, as the slow parts will require medicine. It is a homage to a true beatnik, "Moonie" : "I KILLED THAT FAT BARKEEP!!!"


Pretty to look at, _Behind the Sun_ is nonetheless typical of the painfully conservative international films Miramax increasingly chooses to bring to U.S. audiences. Its symbolism is obvious and heavy-handed, its dialogue melodramatic, and its performances insultingly broad. It conforms perfectly to the feel-good foreign fluff that has flooded the market at least since _Cinema Paradisio_; that is, it embodies to a "t" the safe, lowest-common-denominator American conception of what a foreign film "should" be. As a result of Miramax's market dominance, more dynamic international films that seek to surprise us or advance film language in some way get marginalized, going largely unseen in the U.S.


Although the plot doesn't indend to do anything else, it could not move me at all. The story, in its essence, is about unbearable poverty and despair. But it's not told this way. Besides the bloodfeud and the poverty, it makes the impression of a rather picturesque life.

Instead of focusing on the characters tragedys, instead of trying to make one feel the protagonist's hopeless situation, of making the lives' barreness tangible through corresponding photography, the film luxuriates in pompous, satiated and abundant pictures.

Thus the movie never makes one really understand many things, e.g., why the protagonist isn't just going away, as he does anyway in the end, why the heads of the families insist on continuing the feud, why the fire eater girl returns, why she returns on her own, in the middle of the night, by foot, why she leaves ahd so on.

Behind the sun hardly touches the surface, and tries to sell actually heavy stuff as pretty romantic drama in soft and colorful pictures -

WHICH MAKES ME PUKE


I've seen a lot of foreign movies and enjoyed them. I rarely comment on any film whatsoever, but this one came so highly praised and so poorly performing that I had to comment on it and warn others. What the &*^$ where the people at Cannes thinking when this was given the Jury Award? I have no idea...

Get ready to watch a very slow account of two traveling teachers as they accompany other travels on their way across the Iraq/Iran border. I could not stop watching the movie because I was waiting for something to happen. It didn't. The teachers constantly try to teach people how to read and write, but everyone ignores them. I mean, seriously ignores them. Every time one of them asks a question they have to repeat it about 5 times The others travelers are permanently depressed and silent. Its hard to have any sympathy for them: there is extremely little known about the characters, no development, they show no willingness to accomplish anything except trek across the next mountain and hide from unseen helicopters and soldiers.

The one positive comment I could make is that the landscape backdrops are quite amazing and the people are realistically gritty.

By far the biggest disappointment.


okay, now i know that this won an award at cannes but i can only presume that this is because the judges were working under the principle that seems to afflict literary critics from time to time. if it is incomprehensible then it cant be really bad, and who knows it might be great.

in a handout which i picked up in the cinema the director confesses to the fact that after each days shooting she then went and wrote the screenplay for the next days filming! now i am no movie mainstream boy, i like to be challenged by films and i like films that require effort. however, i do like films that appear to have something to say, not necessarily a simple beginning, middle, end storyline but at least something in terms of character development if not plot development.

it just makes me wonder what the reaction to this film would have been if it had been made in Britain or the USA or France? would everyone be saying its breathtaking and moving and a truly political film? or would we have been saying to the director 'next time work out what you want to say or how you are going to say it...or even better both'. last comment must go to my faithful fellow cinema goers who laughed when the titles came up and someone was credited with writing the script. the smile on my face was not so much through laughter as a wince of uncomprehending pain.


Blackboards is at its best when considered a dreamy, surreal take on real-world issues. It's a shame though that the film's style doesn't match it's content  if it had then it could have been truly affecting and memorable. As it is, it pairs the visual and conceptual silliness of men running around with blackboards strapped to them, and the visual and conceptual non-silliness of innocents meeting trouble on the hills of the Iran/Iraq border, which confuses the message. Further, shooting the otherwise farcical adventures of the blackboaders in the (ever popular) faux-documentary realism style undermines Samira Makhmalmaf's attempt to consider issues such as imprisonment, gender equality, education and communication, which are all jumbled around in the text fairly loosely, and not in the regimented way the style would have enhanced.

Not only are these issues trampled on by the blackboarders, but the characters are not exactly equipped with the faculties to make them engaging for 85 minutes. They are moronic, moribund individuals, trapped on empty endless hillsides or engulfed in smoke which might as well be a metaphor for their foresight. They are not interesting. The trouble is it's unclear whether the director is mocking them or pitying them. One assumes the former, but unfortunately the message is, like the writing on the boards, incomplete.


terrible....boring,and these people acted like morons.....i turned it off after getting tired of listening to these guys repeat every question a million times. they just say the same crap over and over.....and the marriage scene made me sick. annoying little bastards.

I'm sure the movie was powerful in its own right,and i really wanted to see the hardships these guys went through, but i just couldn't get over how they talked to each other....the constant nagging gave me a headache,they were reminding me of 4 year olds bugging mom at the toy store.

i would have like to have seen what happened after the marriage,but i couldn't get through it.....im sure this movie was great n all,but personally i like my films to not put me to sleep.....just didn't really need to be a flick,as far as im concermed. im sure you al think im shallow,but think what you will,i have a healthy respect for film,and im not the Hollywood lover you might assume i am. film doesn't need to be boring to make a statement.


I had expected to be impressed by the landscapes, charmed by the story, engaged by the politics. But no. The plot, dialogue and characterisation were as featureless as the scenery. The filming was unimaginative. I was bored by every minute of this film.