The title clearly refers to Scorsese's talent, which vanished in a squirt of stage blood about 15 years back. He wasn't talented, he was brilliant -- but that was then. Today he should be making intelligent independent movies, elder statesmanly flourishes of wit and humanity, inspiring a younger generation. Instead, he's humiliating himself with overblown junk. His love affair with hoodlums is tiresome, his critique of Catholicism is ignorant and stupid -- I mean, I dislike Catholicism as an institution, and God knows it doesn't need me to defend it -- but any sociological or spiritual phenomenon with the history and complexity of Catholicism deserves better treatment than the head-kickings Scorsese metes out. And ironically, Scorsese has made his own Faustian pact with the Devil -- he had his years in the Hollywood wilderness and feels he won't get anything thoughtful financed -- so it's better to team up with a bankable but untalented actor and produce these lumbering, brainless sub-epics.

Many people in their comments here have struggled to express quite how deeply bad this film is. I too am at a loss. It's intriguing for a while, then downhill races into one of the worst supposedly classy films EVER MADE. Jack does his Jack Show, because he is vain and because no one has the guts to tell him that it was already self-parody 20 years ago. Supposed hard man Leonardo looks as enraged as a poodle when the canine beautician has gone a bit to close to his ear with the electric clippers. Matt is actually OK in the light comedy bits, which makes one wonder why he has become Hollywood's current Brooding One. Wahlburg -- rubbish. Sheen looks like he's focusing all his energies on trying to deliver his lines without spitting out his dentures. By the way, I reckon the script originally developed the sexual thing a bit more -- as it implies that Damon is not as groovy between the sheets as Leo, and his homophobia and other things seem to hint at his being a gay in denial -- but they decided that audiences wouldn't buy a gay hero, or it scared Damon, or God knows what -- just another loose end in this spaghetti-plate of a movie.

Overall, hardly anyone in this movie (Winstone is an exception) act-ually ACTS. They are all oh so boringly themselves. Consider Olivier in Marathon Man, how his characterisation of an ageing Nazi suggested all sorts of undercurrents of twisted psychotic nastiness -- and then look at Nicholson's leering, over-the-top gurning. Chortling as you pull the trigger on someone is not really quite enough to convince us we are witnessing evil, Jackie baby.

By the way, the film shows cutting-edge developments in cinematic blood-squirting technology. Instead of the wounds exploding using charges that produce a small cloud of smoke, they sort of vaporize -- it looks like it's done with compressed air. A great advance Scorsese can be proud of.

This film has been larded with praise -- by gaga members of the Hollywood money machine. Every year people say Scorsese deserves an Oscar, and it's usually because we remember his early films. Well, they have Lifetime Achievement Oscars if we want to reward a body of work. Now he has to go to his grave knowing he got the Oscar for a Turkey. Only he probably doesn't know. And do any of the egos involved in this mess care? Hollywood cynicism, parodied in Scorsese's last film, The Aviator! What a joke.

Right -- my last word, if you're still reading. We are currently being told by our masters to hate Iran. It has one of the few cinemas in the world that sometimes try to show something true about the human condition. Whereas our civilization produces, as one of the top-billing cultural manifestations of the year, expensive to make, heaped with praise and awards, exported around the world and seen by multiple millions--something about as edifying as watching lions tortured or Christians having limbs lopped off at the Roman Colisseum two millennia ago. What does this say about us?


Lets start with a very slow intro to an amazing story. Then lets compile a dream cast of characters to act out this amazing story. So amazing in fact that it very well could be the best movie of the year. Then once this character had given up everything and risked his life in nearly every scene, lets FINALLY give him the opportunity to hand over the dirty cop and set things straight. Well, we don't have time to finish the story with a great ending, so lets just kill him. Then at the end, lets kill the dirty cop so he can be decorated as a hero instead of turning over evidence so he can be convicted. This could have been the best movie of the year, and the story could have been told in well under 2 hours. They should have just opened and closed with a firing squad and I could have been in and out in 10 minutes with the same results.


I'd have seen this film regardless of the reviews. Scorcese has directed some of the most significant, dramatic and best-told stories of our time, and with Nicholson, Damon, DeCaprio, Baldwin, Sheen, Walberg and the rest, it at least had a solid chance to be a tour de force. It's a mess, though, dragged down to lousy by a screenplay written by the same misguided pen of that disaster-bore-embarrassment "Kingdom Of Heaven". Bad or no structure can't be saved by over-cranking the ragefest volume.

It's hard to say why Marty needs to wallow in even deeper pools of perpetual manic violence and blood at this point in his career. Maybe he still just likes it. Maybe he's feeling like we need to take some people out. Maybe the only way he could punctuate and hold together this cluster was with regular, loud, brain blasting, because if it weren't for the continuous bang-bang-blast, in-your-face-insults and face-punch scenes the story would've resembled a garbage pile. An interesting plot line was strung together by an amateur, though fortunately you've got watchable actors, some wry funny lines and a few outrage scenes that pop.

The screenplay's choppy, the edits and lighting choices are weird, and the script's incongruent in a bad way. It never builds a tempo. That's Scorcese's fault. It was a great shame to see great actors content with accepting performance mania in lieu of characters. So in spite of all the odd-crazy, there're also huge bald spots. Nobody in this film goes beyond one-dimensionally anger-crazed, with the possible exception of DeCaprio. Still, I couldn't understand how Leo didn't explode during this film; he goes from appearing over-stressed and over-drugged to rage-psycho. I felt possessed to snort Ajax watching his crazed eyes and jaw grinding for 2 hours.

I give it a '3' -- there's enough good violence to feel punched up after a numbing week at work.


This movie has three things seriously wrong with it.

1. The dialog is juvenile, evidently intended for kids in the 12 to 16 age group. It seems like every sentence included at least 3 curse words. Apparently the writers were handicapped when it came to vocabulary.

2. The movie does not make use of Jack Nicholson's talents. He is upstaged throughout the movie by inferior actors.

3. The movie has a very poor ending. Most of the characters get shot within the last few minutes, and then the screen says "The End." Nothing was decided.


Over-directed (pointless virtuosic touches that add nothing to what's happening on screen with the plot or characters), over-scored (save me from the freakin' metal Irish jig and the Stones, both heard twice in this thing), over-edited (the movie is awkward: scenes flow neither internally or into each other) and over-acted by Jack Nicholson (so far beyond the point of self-parody that it ceases to be funny), this horrid, horrid film is filled with two dimensional characters (except for Madolyn, the worst psychiatrist who never lived, who lacks even a second dimension) and more profanity and violence than you can shake a stick at.

Really, I've never been a Scorsese fan, but this movie owes any praise it deserves for its twisty, turny plot to whatever was left over from the original "Infernal Affairs". Yes, in case you didn't know, this movie is a remake of a far superior Hong Kong film.

As with "Dreamgirls", another inexplicably over-praised 2006 release, there's just no denying the nudity of this emperor. Tedious where it should be crackling and dull when it should be suspenseful, Marty and crew have made a nasty cinematic mess that really does not deserve the all-too-predictable praise that's been heaped on it. "Instant classic", "best film of the year", etc...

I'm sorry, but the technical competency of the filmmakers is questionable and the emotional impact of the story is zip. By the last few minutes, as blowing a person's brains on the wall is becoming more of a cliché than you would ever think possible, I found myself hoping that some deus ex machina would descend from the sky and just kill everyone so it would just be f**king over already.


I don't want to vote for this movie but I find it very low from the Americans to remake an Asian movie and to get (or will get)a bigger success then the original movie.I want to criticize the American movie industry because they are not original. It is better to search for original ideas then to play the role of the copycat in our society.

I wanted to say my opinion to those who appreciate the American movie industry so much.(and surely this movie)

good examples of remaked movies are : the ring , the grudge , the seven samurai, Godzilla , (masked rider) and more (they planned also to make an American version of Battle royale)

Even if they remake it well they will never win my respect and i will consider it like fake.

thank you


I didn't know who directed the movie until the credits when the name Scorsese popped up, so I saw the movie without any expectations. I must say I wasn't very impressed. First off the infiltration of Costigan into Costello's gang happened way too fast and wasn't very convincing, just like the infiltration of Leo's character in Gangs of New York. Mark Wahlberg's character Dignam felt really fake, the kind of language he used was not very likely to be used by someone in his position, same goes for Baldwin's character capt. Ellerby. The love triangle drama was just pathetic, why would she date some ex con with drug problems when she's already moving in with Sullivan, a career cop who climbs the latter in the department like a sky rocket (i.e. very unlikely). They tried to portrait Costello as this big time mobster but the way he handled business felt more like a small time gangster, stealing pocket change from some corner shop.

I haven't seen the original Infernal Affairs so I can't say weather or not this was worse, but I would really think so. The only part that surprised me positively was in the end when the other mull showed up and blew Costigans brains out, I didn't expect that one. That kind of woke me up, too bad it was just before the credits.


Scorsese isn't what he used to be and as a Scorsese lover this pains me to say so. He must have sat down watched Goodfellas and thought 'hmmm. What did I used to do that made me great? I'll just copy that.' It's Scorsese imitating himself and not doing a very good job of it. The editing is quick and choppy like in Goodfellas but too much so the whole film is like one big montage with very little innovative direction. DeCaprio and Damon aren't great but neither are they bad, they just suffice. The actors that really shine are Mark Walberg, who finally ditches the breathless, confused moron he usually plays and does something way different and innovative with himself. Alec Baldwin is fantastic he has some of the best lines and is an actor who just seems to be getting better with age. Normally I'd say the same for Jack who's performance in 'As Good As It Gets', was groundbreaking but this time he's just playing The Joker in Batman he's too over the top for such a seriously acted movie. He was also made too nasty, just to make us dislike him with no seeming root for all his hostility. The original is far superior the only thing the remake does better is establishing DeCaprio in the gang before the fireworks start. Basically all the elements that make a Scorsese movie great weren't there; The violence was comic book (especially the number of head shots at the end), the film-making is sub-standard. Only the writing remained consistently good but even then it followed too closely the layout of Internal Affairs which is just plain lazy.


This remake of "Internal Affairs", a great movie in its own right, adds a Whitey Bulger-John Connolly Boston twist that just BEGS for brilliance - it's a can't-miss story line with a powerhouse cast.

However, it's a huge disappointment. Despite such compelling material, Scorsese only skims the surface, opting for gloss instead of substance, adding confusing sub-plots that serve mainly to hook the audience. These sub-plots destroy the momentum of the film and pull the whole thing off the tracks. Without these (no spoilers), the film may have had a chance. Scorsese's trademark violence stingers are now overripe at best. Am I the only one who started to yawn when people were getting pounded over a loud soundtrack in "Casino"? I doubt it...

There is some pretty silly ensemble work here, too - we're not talking "Glenngary Glen Ross" or "The Usual Suspects" here by any stretch. Most of the bad highlights usually involve Wahlberg's profane fool of a character. Overall, the individual characterizations seem to be either shrill, as in the case of the annoying Wahlberg and chest-thumping Damon, or flat, like Sheen's police captain. Nicholson's Whitey Bulger take is completely lacking in menace - it's amusing, if nothing else. Only DiCaprio's brooding Billy Costigan stands out, but he's got nowhere to go, both literally and figuratively - the sub-plots basically turn his character to face the wall...

Much has been made of the ending here, but I would describe it with one word - "cowardly". I just couldn't respect this film much, particularly in light of "GoodFellas" and other Scorsese masterpieces. Overall, 4 stars and only because it's him - probably the worst best picture Oscar since "American Beauty".


I am a fan of Martin Scorsese but this movie sucks. This movie is a remake of a Hong Kong movie called "Internal Affairs." If you have never seen the original, then please do so because you will definitely appreciate how well the original was as opposed to this crap made by Scorsese.

Why do I hate "Departed?" First, Scorsese was an idiot putting Jack Nicholson as the crime boss because he is going to steal the whole damn movie. Nicholson is that talented. Plus, Scorsese gave too much part to the crime boss character. He should have been a tangential character with the real crux of the movie focused on Matt Damon and Di Caprio.

Second, Matt Damon's character was too one dimensional or there was no real complexity to his character. He was simply bad. In Internal Affairs, the bad cop was more complex. In that movie, you see a cop becoming annoyed by the crime boss who he sees as a threat to his future.

Third, there was more violence and sex in this movie than in Internal Affairs and I love gratuitous violence and sex in a movie so long as it is done properly. Scorsese just injected more sex and violence to cover up his terrible script adaption of an excellent film.

Fourth, the dialog was fine but again, it lacks intelligent discourse among the principal characters so I cannot say it was great writing. It was simply mediocre at best.

Fifth, and primary reason I hate this movie is that there is no real TENSION between the characters. Oh sure, Damon character wants to kill Di Caprio and vice a versa but there has to more to this than that. In the original, there was interaction between the bad cop and good cop, but you see that the bad cop is not so truly bad and therefore, the audience is torn. What I am trying to say is that there was a subtle buildup to the real tension in that movie which makes you really appreciative of the quality of that movie as oppose to this crap.

That being said, if you have never seen Internal Affairs, then you will like this movie. But if you are like myself and some others who have seen it and have seen this movie as well, then you will be disappointed. In fact, for those who decide to rent Internal Affairs, I can almost guarantee that you will like Internal Affairs much more than Departed. You will like Internal Affairs so much more that you will see what a junk Departed really is.


While eventually the meek are supposed to inherit the earth, first they stop in Japan to inherit two million yen off the Yakuza and Baby Yakuza as portrayed here by the Keystone Kops.

But while our two little wallflower protagonists find a whopping $2MY, the real score is in finding each other. And guess what...pretty soon, they'll be Mr and Mrs Meek.

Yuck...

The characters in this film lack both adrenaline and drive... The casting director I think was too good for the film's own good, and our humdrum hero and heroine just never seem to get the action, nor the romance, in gear.

Granted the mousey librarian of a nurse does get a fashion makeover; who would have ever thought she was so beautiful? Eventually besides a couple of nice outfits, she adopts a bit of matching verve (swoon as she takes off her glasses and almost kisses a boy, savor as she kicks off her heels and chases down a bus).

Yawn...

The acquaintances to the crime are just too quaint, I feel I was the victim here.

3/10


I'll give a "last letter" here ... "D-," a grade that misses "F" only because I HAVE seen worse. Rarely.

Bad script, bad acting, bad everything. "Twelve Angry Men," this is not. Yet, the writer/director somehow thought he'd weave a tale that takes place around a juror's table and VO sepia flashbacks involving the case. Not a respected device for exposition, and this film illustrates why. Not only do twists seem like cheats (i.e. the audience had no shot of discovering it,) but they're just unbelievable to start with.

Stiff, wooden lines do nothing to further the careers of unknowns and past-prime actors here. The ending, unsatisfying and vapid, shows the writer's belief that we'll buy into anything.


This is a terrible, terrible movie. I like bad movies, but I couldn't even sit through this piece of trash. All of the actors (or should I say 'over-actors'?) were terrible caricatures of characters in Twelve Angry Men, the plot is trite (they probably stole a good part of it from CSI or something), and the flashbacks of the murders are terribly shot and filtered with something yellow so they are also physically hard to watch. Unless you have watched every other movie ever made, for Pete's sake don't get this one. If you're looking for jury drama, go with the original version of Twelve Angry Men instead. And if you're looking for an actual psychological thriller, there are hundreds better than this one.


This is the 'so-sad', so impossible to believe tale of a family living next door to a Concentration camp during World War 2. & of the strange friendship of two 8 year old boys, one the Commandants son & the other a sad eyed Jewish boy.

In the late 1930's & early 1940's Hollywood made many films about Nazi Germany & Concentration camps, at that time we did not know of the extent of what was going on, SO the studios made propaganda films such as.THE MORTAL STORM, SO ENDS OUR NIGHT,ESCAPE & WATCH ON THE RHINE (just to name 4) (these are all very good movies), they were pure Hollywood fiction made on studio or back lot sets.They and all the others were more believable than this travesty.

I did not believe that any of them were German,I saw English actors playing Germans etc. The 2 known stars, usually give top notch performances.

David Thewlis as the commandant is not the least bit effective. Vera Farmiga as his wife is equally ineffective. The two boys played by Asa Butterfield & Jack Scanlon are cute, but seem more like todays 8 year 'olds'. The only believable role was old time actor Richard Johnson as Grandpa,he at least knew how to do his character.

Mark Herman wrote the screenplay taken from a novel by John Byrne, he also directed this mess.

The movie was made in Hungary,There was nothing believable about this film in any department.

The ending is supposed to be tragic & sad, if so, how come I was just happy that this bore of a film was over with

Ratings: * (out of 4) 25 points(out of 100) IMDb 1 (out of 4)


I watched this movie with the English subtitles, and found it to be a pleasant, if disjointed, Brazilian comedy. The translation was fairly good, but if you are fluent in Portuguese you'll notice several goofs in translation. The plot of God taking a vacation has been done before and I'm sure that it will be done again. But God taking a vacation in poor, but scenic Northeastern Brazil has not been done and could not be done anywhere else and look as eye-catchingly beautiful. The only thing missing is a side trip to the island of Fernando de Noronha.

See this for the enjoyment of touring a most beautiful and scenic part of the world on the cheap !!!


Man, what a movie. Pow! Zip! It's like an 18-act Italian opera taking place in the center ring of a three-ring circus while bears waltz and elephants stand on their heads on either side.

Every camera trick known to man or beast is put to use. If Anna Batista (Argento), the famous actress, does a line of Special K, it's only to give the camera a chance to show us more phantasmagorical horrors in lurid color. The sink into which she tries to puke turns to rubber and so forth. And there's her mother's ghost.

And it never stops. Well, not exactly. There are occasional pauses in the tumult while Anna and her friends seem to functioning normally, but the pauses are only there as lead-ins to the next bout of victimization.

I lost count of the number of times Anna is roughly assaulted by men. The most memorable (because the funniest) is "the finest writer-director in the world" who summons her to Amsterdam. She's expecting to go over her script for Cleopatra but when she opens the door to his shabby multicolored garbage-strewn room she finds him lurching about, his pants unzipped, jerking in spasms, and managing to moan: "I've been an alcoholic for four years -- and now I'm on SMACK." The poor girl turns her head away in disgust while he shoots up. Then as he flops beside her on the couch and points out his new knife scar, she suggests they talk about the script. But the world's greatest writer-director has other things on his mind. He throws himself all over her, blubbering and pulling at her black slacks, while she squeals and manages to push him away. He calls her a woman of low repute, slaps her several times, and she rushes out the door.

It must be some kind of female fantasy, or maybe it's just Asia Argento's thing, but the whole movie darts from one attempted rape to another. One is committed by some babe with surgically enhanced bosoms the size of basketballs. Another rape -- another rough one -- is attempted by some Hollywood producer of schlock films. He wears a curious beard but no underwear, and he sounds precisely like Dennis Miller.

She has only one true love, an Australian rock singer of no distinctive talent. They meet and immediately go to bed. She winces when he crawls atop her and tells Keith that she's never made love before. "Are you a virgin?" "No, I'm a whore." That one-night stand with a man who turns out to have a wife and children was a dangerous one inasmuch as it impregnates her. On this discovery she runs big-bellied through the night-time streets of Rome until she collapses before a painting of the Virgin and Child. Her lost love appears in the distance, silhouetted by a halo of bright light -- so bright that she must blink when looking into it. It's left unclear whether she'll give birth to the next Messiah or the second Buddha. End of movie.

It's a silly, low-budget piece of trash, and yet it doesn't diminish any respect I might have had for Asia Argento, the writer, director, and star. The writer and the director have thoroughly deglamorized the star. The DVD opens with Argento, sans makeup, looking wanly into the camera and telling us, "I know you might have heard some bad things about this movie. But don't be afraid. After you watch it, maybe you will get to know me a little better -- and I will get to know you." We get to know the character pretty well. For several minutes we watch her tattooed naked body before a bathroom mirror while she shaves her armpits, applies lipstick, and watches tears roll down her cheeks.

The rape scenes are not at all erotic and Argento places the camera so that her body seems less like an object of desire than a dressed cabrito hanging in a butcher shop window. I mean, there is a brief shot of her bare ass as the slime ball Hollywood producer tries to pull her dress up and it the thought this undignified camera angle prompts is not how pretty her rear end is but how vulnerable the character, Anna Batista, is.

The movie may or may not be very autobiographical, but in either case it's not a facile quest for pity from the audience. This bipolar dynamo can take care of herself. She lashes out hoarse, filthy curses at her tormentors in three different languages, a volcano of pejoration.

I wish that energy and that disgust for artificiality had somehow been used as the engine for a better story. Or for any story at all. As it is, I think Argento was right when she said we might get to know her better. We wind up with more respect for her courage and sincerity.


Asia Argento had an introduction to this movie, saying that she hopes people will understand her better or worse. One would hope that there is more to Argento than this movie shows. Her character is flat and, to be honest, really dumb. Anna meets a rock star and after knowing him for, maybe, a few hours, sleeps with him and tells him they made love. Then, she seems surprised when he tries to sneak out in the morning. Basically, that is it. An old man tapping a documentary tries to molest her, a film director tries to rape her, and some random blonde girl gets off on top of her. Then, shock of shocks, the rock star has a wife and doesn't love her. The most honest part of the movie was the introduction, where you can see the longing in her eyes as she asks you to enjoy her movie. It's the only interesting thing in this mess.


I rented this film from my Library. I watched it and thought that i was the biggest fool to rent this film. Someone said it pretty right... If you watch a Bad Film, It is hard to sit through 91 Minutes (Scarlet Diva's Duration) that are about to pass...

Actually Asia Argento according to me was Frustrated to make another GIA. But as they say, Classics are never repeated. Scarlet Diva of course got some Critical Acclaims from some small Film Festivals. But again, Getting acclaims from small Film Festivals are the easiest thing nowadays. Even the small Film Festival organizers very well know that you need a Distribution. I really have no idea how come people get ready to FUND such kinds of movies in first place. Do they really thought they were making another GIA? Please guys grow up! I am so sorry that i do not have GUTS to recommend this film to anybody here because this is a BAD film. Please also don't go on the Good Comments here because i think it was created. If this film was really a good film then how come this film was left behind by Major Distributors? The film is a really Bad Film... With some really Bad Performances (Especially by Asia Argento) as the cherry on the cake...

Please watch it with a strip of 'Asprin' with you!


This is a film that fails dismally by itself, but is redeemed by a truly great DVD special feature.

I truly love experimental movies and imports and this clearly falls into that category. But, the film is not at all well done. It's dull in many places and too often reduces to sex for the sake of prurient interested. The plot, or lack of plot, rambles about and is very confusing. Some of the symbolism is so obscure you won't know it until you listen to the director's commentary. You have trouble identifying with any of the characters because they are so unrealistic.

But, it is in the area of the DVD director's commentary that this film shines brightly. Just out of curiosity, I turned it on after watching the film and was surprised how much I learned about the film, the directing process, the actors, and the director's life. Interestingly enough, the commentary is far better than the actual film. Though the film is meant to be somewhat autobiographical, the real facts of Asia's life are far more interesting and make much more sense, though they be somewhat strange to those of us looking from the outside. So many commentaries tend to be just some trivia about the shoot. This one tells lots of great stories about the people and process. You'll learn so much about stolen shots and when the sex is real and when it's not. I wish more commentaries went out on a limb to tell of truth about what is going on in the creative process as she has done here.


Self indulgent and occasionally sexy... and those are the good points. Asia Argento is trying to make La Dolce Vita and winds up making Syd and Nancy from Nancy's point of view... if Nancy were Scary Spice. Okay... okay... that's unfair. But not by much. Flashes of a good movie are few and far between, but they're there. Not recommended except for fans.


<< some may consider a few things below spoilers, but i do not. they have no impact on the storyline and give nothing away >>

this film was the worst i have seen in quite some time. the first 3/4 of the film have nothing at all to do with the storyline and just consist of drawn out character development for characters i care less than nothing about. the last 1/4 had what looked like the start of a promising thriller in it, but then it all just fell apart. I'm trying hard not to give anything away for those who do wish to see it, but the ending makes no sense in several different ways and there is a very high level of politicking going on here.

its hard to tell whether those who made the film wanted to snipe at the middle east or the Americans, because both will be insulted after seeing this film. our 'terrorist' has rather serious mental health problems, which seems to suggest that he has no rational justification for the acts he planned to carry out. near the end we are given his reasoning but the fact that a Libyan (the only non American in sight) is mentally disturbed and a terrorist is deeply insulting. as for the Americans, well the film opens with the thickest piece of hypocrisy I've ever seen, george bush making a speech. even those who are bush supporters would have to admit that this speech and the propaganda that is spouted by laurens character during the film is at least as true (if not more true) if you replace words like 'terrorist' and 'muslim' with 'soldier' and 'american' or 'christian'.

i fail to see what point, if any, this film was trying to get across to the viewer. its overuse of tertiary characters, the inexplicable decisions made by them, the lack of any drive in the narrative (if you can call it that), and that mentioned above makes this a truly shameful waste of time and money for all those involved and any who choose to see it. i rate this film 0/10, which is rare, because i see no redeeming features in it whatsoever. some, however, may enjoy the sex scenes so for those only wanting to see that, i give it 3/10.


There's an adage in the world of drama, which goes something like this -- "a pistol hung on the wall in Act One must be fired by Act Three". I think it was Chekov who said that but I could be wrong.

There's almost nothing to like about this confused mess of a movie, except for the strong presence of Lauren Holly as the U.S. Senator and Angus MacFayden as her sinister brother. It seems to be totally unlikely that such a clever political operator as 'the Senator,' who is a controlling and driven person, would be unable to rein in her do-wrong brother. He's a bottom feeder, a leg-breaker for some loan shark who has absolutely no scruples.

The goofy drug-addled daughter -- Cassie -- gets to make a very fine presentation of a Martin Luther King speech, but only after she's already dead in the plot.

This movie is a mess, with conflicts presented that have no discernible origins and actions taken by the principal characters which have no discernible back-grounding. It reeks of spy movie clichés without giving the viewer any kind of orientation ....

Yes, the actors do very well with a minimalist script and some nice photography, and the viewer wants to know more about them before the tragic ending turns into 'bathos,' i.e., imitation pathos.

It cannot be recommended for any of those reasons. It is as if the producer/director lost some pages of a much bigger and better script and then ran out of film, money and maybe even time to finish the story. It's not a boring film, it's a confusing and unsettling and emotionally unavailable film, even though the entire presentation of the plot is based on the emotions of the leading characters.

There's lust, there's love turned to hate, there's dissolute drug-induced behavior and two totally a-moral bad guys, one of whom is the brother character. What an absolute and total waste of a potentially great theme, great cinematography, and intensely personal acting.

The DVD is well done. Too bad that the excellent transfer was used to put this absolutely worthless film on digital media. I cannot even recommend it for being so entirely bad, as it isn't, for the reasons I've noted. This film starts well and then descends into a swamp of nihilism and sour, unrepentant, dramatic manipulation.

Too bad IMDb doesn't provide negative numbers for ratings, because this howling dog deserves a minus 10 .....


OK...I think I missed something here. Not to mention I did like the ending on this at all. I watched this a least three time already and is still lost. Was Roger supposed to be some kind of under cover terrorist driving around in that cab? OMG...did I misinterpret this film or what. I keep watching and watching and I'm still lost. The ending could have been better. I'm still looking for more. However i did read the synopsis on this and it was nothing like I thought it would be. Overall there may have been some good shots here but I was very disappointed. And if I had wasted my money to go see this in the movies, I'd asked for a refund...No,no,no better yet... I would've demanded a refund. You disappointed me in this one Guenveur.

Grumble


I have no doubt the guys who made this film had some semblance of creating a complex character study of the post 9/11 political world, but somebody prodded them that drug use by teen hotties and sado-masochistic sex thrown in for good measure might help things along. Everyone in this film is fairly loathsome, with the Muslim extremist possibly coming off as the most sympathetic of the ensemble until the end. There is nothing special about the performances, mostly by b-movie actors. Lauren Holly as a hard line Republican US Senator maybe the most ridiculous bit of casting since Denise Richards was made a nuclear scientist in "The World Is Not Enough".


Bad film-noir, if you could call it that. Its as if the stars involved were sedated through the whole film, and lets not talk about the plot.The worst performance Edward G.Robinson ever gave in a film, with his emoting over his partners death with as much passion as if a waitress served his coffee black instead of with cream. And his bad decisions were responsible for his death to boot. And Geroge Raft-first he's sort of a good guy gangster, then he turns completely cold-blooded brushing off the death of a completely innocent 21year old woman by his partner, then he turns to be a good-guy again because the writers could'nt think of anything else. I LOVE old black and white movies, but don't waster your time with this stinker.


Despite its fascinating writing and editing credits, this movie emerges as a surprisingly dull little "B"-grader, not only paced with the speed of a snail but full of more empty talk than a bag-pipe. The characters could not even justly be described as one-dimensional. They are mere shadows that unconvincingly act out the hollow and threadbare plot. Certainly pros like Robinson and Van Eyck do manage to breath a bit of life into their portrayals, but insufficiently virile to overcome the inertia of Mr Allen's studiously slow, uninvolving handling.

It's hard to believe tutor and text book author, Leon Barsha, had anything to do with the editing. The insertion of stock travelogue footage is clumsy in the extreme. Other credits are likewise patently routine.

Considerable pruning would definitely help the film, although Miss Totter is likely to remain a firm liability. Mr Letondal would also stay far more colorless than the screenplay demands. Last but not least, the unconvincingly patriotic climax is something not easily overcome.


If there's ever an award for "Most Boring Film Noir Ever Made," this little stinker would be in strong contention. It is a miserable, plodding police procedural with essentially nothing to recommend it. About the best you can say is that the last 15 minutes are marginally less dull than the rest. Edward G. Robinson is squandered. Set in Montreal, the film has all the French-Canadian flavor of Frank Sinatra singing "O Canada."

IMDb thinks the above review is too short. Boy, they sure wouldn't think so if they'd had to sit through this turkey. I have already given it far more words than it deserves.


Spriggan is one of the worst types of anime movies one can watch. The characters are undeveloped, the plot is ridiculous and the plausibility impossible.

The main character, Yu, for example, recovers multiple times after being a hair breadths away from death. Likewise, his partner Jean survives every major catastrophe from being run over by a giant snowmobile, falling off a cliff, being torn to shreds by dinosaurs and even being shot by accident by Yu.

The plot of Noah's ark as a climate control and human creating device has absolutely no relevance to the movie. That ark's purpose is to merely serve as an object in which two competing forces - the Pentagon and AROAM, the unit Yu serves - are fighting for.

Many times the duologue goes into ridiculous, incomprehensible speech such as third dimensions, and whatnot.

Other random crap: 1) Only one woman in the entire movie - Maragaret, who plays no significant role - only serves to pull a professor from death by the antagonist, a wire wielding genetically modified toddler 2) Random enemies who were once Yu's partners but whom he seems to enjoy killing mercilessly 3) Jumping from scene to scene with no smooth transition or logical connection at all, such as traveling from Istanbul to Mt. Arrarat In Conclusion: This warped, disconnected plot and unaffable characters make this movie a sure miss. Don't watch it. You'll pity yourself afterwards.


Shame on me. Shame on me for mindlessly buying this movie based on internet recommendations. I went to an anime site that allows you to enter a movie you like, and you will receive recommendations. The movie I entered is Akira. This was the number one recommendation. I cannot begin to conceive how and why this movie came up. Akira is EXCELLENT, in every facet of it's execution--plot, characters, animation, etc... This is sh*t.

To begin to review this pile of garbage is to grant it too much consideration, but I will allow some of that. I think the problem starts with the fact that the object of mystery is Noah's Ark. This of course means hearing scripture. (Remember, I'm embarrassed even to be writing this, because I just bought the movie.) The scripture is quoted *just enough to be vaguely unsettling in the fact that it is Christian. I don't mean to belabor this point though, as you'll probably hear less than 20 seconds of the stuff; but in a movie in which the combined dialogue runs for 5-10 minutes, it's something to think about. The whole plot is right out of Indiana Jones, minus the good movie part.

Really it's just a mindless shoot-em-up with a VERY thin plot, and completely disposable characters. Two of the characters are called Fatman and Little Boy (just brilliant). This should appeal to boys ages 8-10. The dialogue, sparse as it is, is totally laughable: "We can't all be Schwarzenegger." or French Spriggan: "I don't bluff, mon ami." I wish I was a member of the site that recommended this movie, so I could try to attempt to understand how this movie came into comparison with Akira. I would personally rate Akira about a 9. I'm giving this a 2. I was going to give it a 3, because of the animation, but the style of the animation is totally generic; in point of fact there IS no style.

TEN THUMBS DOWN. I was on the verge of crushing the DVD when I considered that there might be some resale value--to some eager young child, or mindless schlub such as myself.


Spriggan should stand out as one of the single most stupid and garbage packed films in anime history. This film is nothing more than a "Rambo-The Teenage Years" mock up. The main characters is totally uninteresting and is relatively indestructible, so there's no reason to have any anticipation what-so-ever.

The story is rather stupid as well, centering around the discovery of Noah's Ark. Apart from that the movie involves many explosions, graphic deaths, and more explosions.

What adds insult to injury is the animation. While rather good and relatively fluid, it shows that more money went into making a lousy movie look good than actually starting out with a decent movie in the first place. Polish a turd and it's still a turd. Also, if you're looking for something along the lines of Akira animation, look elsewhere as this movie has none of the style, daring use of lighting and color, or technique that Akira pioneered.

Another rather bothersome element is the terrible voice acting done by the child in the movie. While original voice actors are always superior to a dubbed voice, I don't see how a dubbed voice could sound more "mechanical" or "forced" than that child did.

This movie appeals to the lowest common factor in people. It offers nothing more than explosions, an idiotic plot, and utterly unlikeable characters. Avoid at all costs.


I watched Spriggan at the local Film Festival back in April '99 and I really think it's a piece of unashamed, over-commercialised, fan-boy rubbish.

There were just too many parallels to Akira, from the art direction to the use of a prematurely-aged, grey-haired boy with blow-your-brains-out pyscho-mental powers,... except, this time the kid is American.

Then there is the "hero" who seems indestructible, is filled with angst because of his traumatic past at the hands of his grotesgue former commander (who is now of course his prime enemy). Said "hero" has kungfu moves so flashy he puts Street Fighter to shame. And when he REALLY gets in trouble - no problemo, he's got an even more-indestructible side-kick who always appears in the nick of time. (Even after he's left for dead in an earlier battle.)

Then the all-explosive "climax" as the doomsday Ark is blown away (was there ever any doubt?). Oh yeah, the fist pumping and high-fives being passed around by the surviving grunts really sent a shiver down my spine. Hard to believe Otomo allowed his name to be associated with this piece of junk.

Avoid, avoid, avoid!


this is just plain bad!!!!!!!!!!not funny at all!!!are they going to take this off the air i hope! good god!!!!!i notice it has the talentless limited no range guy or girl (because hes kinda like pat from Saturday nite live) that made that stupid you tube video shoes!!this guy needs to just come out of the closet!!! he is suppose to be straight in this show god he couldn't be more of a fem!!!!and the rest of them are just not funny!!!!really bad concept as well, caught this once and that was enough for me!!im guessing that some of these comments are from the people associated with the show itself ,cause i watched it with a few people and we felt embarrassed for those involved in this. sorry to be so harsh here,but VH1 has gone down the tubes,pick better shows guys!!


The concept behind this show is good, but the crappy writing, actors and sorry excuses for jokes threw it all away.

I just don't understand how things like this even make it on the air. Why are wonderful shows like "Freaks and Geeks" and "Arrested Development" even considered for cancellation? The acting is bad. Just plain bad. The "jokes" are a slap on the face for its viewers. The only reason I tuned in was for Liam Sullivan, whom I assumed would have more common sense than signing up for this. I hope he finds better work, because this show can not go pass its fourth episode.

And our protagonist, is just HORRIBLE.


Some films have it all. This doesn't. It opens quite ok, a bunch of friends gathered for a wedding. But very soon the movie hits the unthinkable level. I like strange movies, but they have to be somewhat logical, to the characters at least, but there are too many unthinkable, unbelievable actions taken in this movie:

** SPOILERS BELOW ** READ IT, DON'T SEE THE FILM

1) The robber "Hamlet" has to rob the bank on his friends wedding day. Stupid, unnecessary, risky

2) When Buzz comes storming in, he removes his hood, and the two guys uses their real names. Stupid.

3) The other guys drop by, no other person attempts to enter the bank, only these guys, although the bank is full of people. Unlikely.

4) The helicopter pilot all of a sudden gets his hands on a Lynx? My god, he is a lunatic who got fired from the army, no chance in hell is he gonna get his hands on an army helicopter!

This movie sucks, and I regret staying up to see it.


The best way I can sum it up is a cross between a David Mamet movie and Starship Troopers. Here is why... There are two kinds of people. The people who understood STARTSHIP TROOPERS, and those who didn't. These are people who looked at the superficial exterior and then stopped there, failing to see the true brilliance of the satire and the other fascinating qualities it had to offer. These are the kind of people who look at the sand on the beach, and see only dry sand. They then assume that all the sand is dry, even though it is wet just below the surface.

Best men is like Mamet in that the dialogue is not the way real people talk, but is stylized, much like Shakespeare stylized his. The way shakespeare wrote was far from the way people talked back then. BEST MEN actually has close ties to shakespeare, as his work plays a major part in the plot. The film is in a way a tribute to shakespeare and his work. The script is in my opinion one of the best and most layered scripts I have ever seen or heared. Unfortunately I don't know if most people will realize how good it really is. The acting is acceptable for the most part. The only really great performances are turned in by Dean Kane, and Brad Dourif (who is one of my very favorite character actors.

If you are going to see this movie, I would recommend seeing it with a completely open mind, have no pre-notions of what it will be, because you won't get what you are expecting. I didn't, I expected a Drew Barrymore movie, but she actually has a rather small role, but I good one.


Imagine, you have 90 minutes to fill by means of a movie. This movie is supposed to be a thriller, black-humoured, exciting and deep in character. You have five main characters and a couple of supporting characters and now, please press all of them into these 90 minutes and include a background story about each of them. The result is a movie like Best Men with a challenging idea standing at the beginning and apart from that, over-loaded with characterizations created along one of those books on 'How to Write a Damn Good Screenplay'. The dialogues lack ideas because there is no time to develop them, so they have to be reduced to standard phrases. If stretched, however, they would be boring. Another result is that the characters all have exciting and heart-rending pasts but regarding their present situations they remain flat. Maybe they had better not tried to realize that attractive idea.


What a train wreck.

Watching the opening credits the audience is granted some manner of false hope; Wilson, Cain, Flanery, Dick, Ward, and Barrymore...not to mention direction from the talented Tamra Davis. Add in music by Mark Mothersbaugh and you might think you were in for a really entertaining hour and a half. You'd be wrong.

Instead this is 90 minutes of your life you'll be wishing you had back. This movie fails miserably in spite of its passable cast. The script is miserable tripe, with each member of this derelict wedding party recounting their own unique story, one more cliché than the next.

The supporting cast features a bevy of film stereotypes; the distant father, the crazy veteran, the villainous FBI agent...even a black security guard named after a ball player! How embarrassing.

Beyond the bad script, sub par performances, weak story, and average direction, Best Men never really decides where it wants to go. Comedy, dark comedy, action-adventure, drama; as it flounders it never achieves any of these goals.

Don't be fooled by the stars, this is grade A loser not worthy of its cast or its director.


There are some movies so bad,that when you watch them on video or TV,you wonder, "Why did they bother with this?" "Why didn't they shelve it?" That's what I wondered when I caught this unoriginal,cliché' filled movie on late night TV.

The first hour of this movie (including commercials) is truly a mess and completely unbelievable. While I can see the possibility of a man getting out of jail and going to his waiting bride, I could not buy how he and his friends end up helping their buddy "Hamlet" (Billy)in the bank and keeping their fellow towns-people hostage. Even more ridiculous is that because the guys are "nice",they end up basically helping them too.

Dean Cain is really the only convincing male actor of the five (at least in the first 1/2). Although his coming out of the bank,with guns blazing is just plain stupid,along with the fact that he's wearing guns under his tuxedo in the first place.

Andy Dick seems to only be able to play one character his whole career,a strange,nerdy kind of Matthew from "News Radio" boy-man. He really has no place here and his "tell off the wife over the phone" scene has been done way too many times in movies and TV shows,it's completely unoriginal.

As is most of this blatant small town rip-off of "Dog Day Afternoon" (which they at least acknowledge their ripping off). We get a sheriff who's the father of wanted criminal "Hamlet". We also get the cliché' of the crowd cheering for "Hamlet" like he's some kind of Robin Hood folk hero! "I went to high school with that guy!" Says one of them,then they're chanting "Hamlet" over & over.

So,we get the "you we're never there for me dad" plot,which has also been done in movies TV shows. Which made it hard to be sympathetic,but not just in that case,I couldn't sympathize with any of these characters. Even after finding out about their personal downfalls.

The Vietnam vet is so much a cartoon that what could have been a great character is wasted. As are the acting talents of Drew Barrymore. Her presence in all this is spread quite thin.

Then there's the expected FBI converging on the town,with the leader who just wants to blast the bad guys away. He and the sheriff are of course at at odds with each other and the other big city FBI men make fun of the small town's people. "They should be used to shot gun weddings here." (Referring to Barrymore and her boyfriend wanting to get married in the middle of a hostage situation.)

I really only got into the movie when the more truthful and real elements came into play. When Andy is the first to get shot and then the FBI shooting up Cain and "Hamlet's" get away bus in a scene somewhat similar to the ending of Clint Eastwood's,"The Gauntlet". "Hamlet" and father make amends just before that and Dad let's his son get away. (Oh please!)

Then the final two biggest rip off's of all. Barrymore and soon to be husband are given the stolen money by "Hamlet" and they fly of in the Vietnam Vet's helicopter and escape scott free. Shades of "D.B. Cooper"!

Dean Cain and "Hamelt" then have one bullet each in their guns after the bus crashes and their all shot up. Just like the final scene in "Butch Cassidy and The Sundance Kid" they come running out together and Cain takes down the leader of the FBI,who he swore he'd take out.

All the supposed "reasons" these characters have for letting themselves into this mess are contrived and flimsy at best. I would say if this movie had been made a long time ago and had there not been "Dog Day Afternoon",it might seem more plausible but even the intense last half,which did hold my interest,is not enough to like this movie.

Four stars for the final,intense attempted getaway chase scene and "Hamlet's" very well spoken Shakespearian quotes,which do fit in here and the movie thankfully taking a needed turn into reality. Otheriwse,I'd never bother with "Best Men" again. (END)


A good set of dialogue and a nice bunch of actors do nothing with this terrible story. Best Men never develops any of its characters deeply enough for the audience to care about them in any way. We hear briefly about each man's troubled life and how he in one way or another has been treated unfairly or has screwed up his own life. Yet, all of it is so poorly constructed and recklessly thrown together that you never get a sense of why these characters are redeemable. Now I don't necessarily need redeeming characters in movies, but this is what the film was obviously trying to portray. Further still, the film ends with a cute and a tidy ending. A completely unsatisfying film.


"Best Men" can't seem to make up its mind if it wants to be a comedy or a drama and scrambles both while compromising each only to cap the confusion with some mediocre action. A technically okay production with a decent cast of 2nd tier talent, this film is a directorial disaster with a sloppy make-it-up-as-we-go-along storyline. Character development is not sufficient to allow the audience to summon the emotions the film seems to demand and comedic purpose is lost in quotes from Hamlet and a lot of sappy personal relationship issues.


What a pathetic embarrassment this is to Fred Ward, Andy Dick, Dean Cain, and Sean Patrick Flahery. The situations were completely improbably, and the melodrama ridiculous, and none of the characters were even remotely believable. Too grim to be a comedy, too idiotic to be black humor, this movie has nothing going for it.


Let me begin by saying that I enjoyed this movie. It was a light way (despite a few dark moments) to spend a couple of hours, but I wouldn't nominate it for any Oscars, nor would I compare it to the works of Shakespeare as a previous reviewer has.

If you wanted to, you could speak as highly of any film. All this would accomplish is to dilute the praise deserving of the real greats (if you're thinking "Armageddon", stop reading NOW!)

Let's call "Best Men" what it really is, a fun little flic. There's some gunplay, a car chase, a guy who gets the girl, a moment of revelation for a would-be lost friend, and a good helping of comic relief, with an ending reminiscent of Richard Gere in "Breathless". I enjoyed it, but just because a character is endearingly nicknamed "Hamlet", and there's a few (well acted) verses recited, "Best Men" is no Shakespearean work.

Let's call a spade a spade but reserve the real praise for the likes of Citizen Kane, Lawrence of Arabia, or even Titanic.


it starting off okay, but it seemed like the film had an identity crisis for the most part. i suspect that they ran out of money when they were filming and just went with what they had. a big disappointment from tamara davis (although not as big as finding out that she directed a b.spears film - what did mike d think about that?)

2/10


Truly awful. This is a far departure from "No Cure For Cancer". The number one rule for comedians should be: NEVER talk about your kids or pets. Its just not funny. I could care less about how cute his kids are. I want serious comedy. Where's the edge? Where's the drugs, sex and rock n' roll?

Let me put it this way, he used to bitch about cigarettes, now he complains about coffee.


"Turbo: A Power Rangers Movie" is a film that has to be seen to be disbelieved. The first film, 1995's "Mighty Morphin Power Rangers: The Movie", brought the six butt-kicking teens from the Fox Kids series to the big screen for the first time. That movie was not all that bad. It had some decent special effects, a somewhat interesting bad guy (Ivan Ooze), and the six young actors who play the Power Rangers were fun to watch. Plus, that film had a bigger budget. But they went back to the cheapness of the TV show with "Turbo". The special effects, production design, and costumes are so cheap and cheesy that you wonder why 20th Century Fox gave the go-ahead to let these filmmakers (who are close to the TV show) make this film. Also, the script is much worse than it was in the first movie. Bulk and Skull have more screen time here. It has one of the least interesting villains of all time (actually, a villainess). It's very, very, very, very, very, juvenile. And the Power Ranger actors look as if they want to escape this atrosity. So I have one question. Why did they release this movie to theaters? This should have been released straight to video. Or better yet, release it as a TV movie, were this series started in the first place. This movie was totally inappropriate for the big screen.

* (out of four)


This movie takes a giant backstep in concept and evolution by replacing our Rangers' powerful Zords (animal attack vehicles) with cheap looking, souped-up cars...and worst of all, the Rangers now wear atrocious looking headlights and reflectors on their heads!

"Turbo" unfortunately has little going for it. With cheap production values and a boring plot, this big screen vehicle runs out of gas fast...Although the original Power Rangers (Jason, Kimberly, and Tommy) were in it, this film gave them little room for much needed character development. The only good scene in this film was when Rocky (Steve Cardenas) performed a goofy martial arts move that injured his back, and having his place in the martial arts tournament replaced by our heroic Red Ranger Jason (Austin St. John).

I have to admit that the new Blue Ranger (a little boy) performed better than his predecessor, but overall, as most sequels go, this film bites the dust. Avoid it like the Black Plague!

Movie rating: 1* out of 10*.


This movie is one of the typical liberal attempts to rewrite history. It has slaves,Indians,Mexicans and mixed races. Events run from the battle of the Alamo thru Indian wars to the Civil War and then gets to womens suffrage. It's main characters are a rich plantation owner that is part Indian and his daughter who own slaves and her anti-slavery friend that has a slave? and hates Indians. It tries to combine much to much political correctness in way too little time. Of course men are at fault and bashed every 15 minutes. Although most men depicted are wimpy and unrealistic for the time period. I have my disdain for men but I hate to see history warped as this movie depicts. (A regular housewife points out military strategy to General Sam Houston?) Please! Not to mention 50 raiding Indians 15 feet outside a house afraid of 3 women with guns they aren't firing? Half Indian rich plantation owners? I doubt it. Slaves married to Indians? Sheesh. And how did the Indian chief get 50 years older and the girl only gained 10 or 15 years in the same time span? I had to watch this film in 3 sittings as it was laughable to the point of disgust.


The role of women in the settling of the frontier has always been, to say the least, underreported. Most films about the settling of the west portray women as either saloon girls--in other words, prostitutes--or virginal school'marm types. One day someone is going to make a good movie about the role of women in the settling of the frontier. Unfortunately, this one isn't it.

There are several major problems with this film. First, the script. It's simplistic, overwrought, overheated, preachy and loaded with phony dramatics. Second, there's the sttitude. While most films on this subject pretty much inexcusably ignored women at the expense of men, this one does just the opposite, which is just as inexcusable. There's no real chemistry between Dana Delaney and Powers Boothe, who plays her husband. The rest of the cast is weak, too, and the performances range from adequate to junior high school level. The movie also, for some reason, LOOKS cheap. It has that cheesy look to it that a lot of spaghetti westerns had in the '60s. The whole production looks rushed, like they were running out of money and had to get it done on time.

There's a good story to be told here, but the people who made this movie haven't the slightest idea of how to go about it. Avoid this one.


This movie is like two or three movie plots all spliced together--and in my eyes, this isn't done in the most successful manner. First, Lionel Atwill orders an up and coming actress to travel to Hollywood with a fading actor. Almost as soon as these two leave, Atwill has a heart attack or something like it and is ordered to take complete rest in the country. He invites along his secretary as his nursemaid and the stage appears to be set for romance at Atwill's country home.

However, then it starts to get VERY strange. It seems that Atwill's ranch has a runway with lights and a beacon--very posh indeed. And, it just so happens that BOTH a Bonnie and Clyde style couple are seen nearby and are being chased by the police AND a plane is about to crash because it's almost out of fuel and the only place it can land is at Atwill's landing field!! Talk about ridiculous! Now the Bonnie and Clyde-style couple is an interesting idea I suppose but Wallace Ford is given horrible lines by the writers. In particular, he says "oke" (pronounced like "oak") about three dozen times when he means to say "okay". After a short time, my teeth began to grind every time he said this!! In addition to these creeps, once the plane crashes, the survivors all come into the ranch house and the whole thing plays out like a stage production--with almost all the action happening in one claustrophobia-inducing room. While interesting at times (especially at the thrilling conclusion), the whole thing seems ridiculous, very far-fetched and poorly written--as if desperately needing a massive re-write. Not a great film by any standard, but there were a few good scenes here and there that might hold your interest.

Why, oh why, did Wallce Ford need to say "oke" again and again and again--it will probably haunt me for some time to come and I'll start avoiding his films!


Please spare yourself. It is humorless without merit. The dual role played by the unbearably unwatchable and quasi-intense Fiennes (proving acting is not a genetic trait), is excruciating bizarre and Gretchen Mol must have wondered after and hour of plodding dialog how she was not supposed to realize that the new mysterious Hispanic guy was her old flame. It's really bad. The only faintly amusing scene is where Ray Liotta acts so frustratedly since the rest of the cast were so - duh - lifeless. When he later says he is going to kill everyone I really thought it would be Fiennes, Mol, then the director, the screenplay writer (same guy, maybe), the cameraman before turning it on himself. Even the ending is so cheesy I felt the audience should have been on life-support. I kid you not. Terrible. Not for "connoisseurs of the simply awful", it's not that interesting. I'm sorry I couldn't give it less than zero. Some people gave it a ten. How? They misread the instructions? They are in the film, maybe? Liotta would give it a zero, I'm sure. Watch something else!!!


"Forever Mine" is not a good film. The script is highly formulaic and dull, the characters are one-dimensional, there are several holes in the plot, and the ending manages to be both cliched and unsatisfying. It is worth watching only for two nude scenes from the wonderful and lovely Gretchen Mol, who hasn't done much of that at all. If you're a fan of hers, you won't be disappointed here.

Watching this cheese, I was reminded of "Strange Days", where Joseph Fiennes' brother Ralph was locked inside a picture almost as bad as this one. The Fiennes brothers certainly can act, and Joseph does his best here to keep the wooden lines fresh. Gretchen Mol lights up the screen no matter what she's in, but one can only wonder why these very good actors are stuck in such a bad movie. Weren't there any more intelligent scripts around to do than this one? Ray Liotta is strictly on auto-pilot for this film.

The story here is simple - jealousy, adultery, revenge, etc. Movies like this put some basic elements together, and then count on the magnetism of the stars to enlist the audience's attention. But if the characters have nothing but stupid lines to say, how can we care about them? 4/10, and only Mol's scenes make me go that high.


Brazilian Globo TV showed yesterday in it's "gala" time this film. Maybe the complete belief in the 'universal' (rather coprophagous) appetite of the masses for a bit of cheap entertainment between reality show "Big Brother" and the soporifics Late Hour News...

On the other hand, a proof that prestige of American film in general, and of names like Schrader, Liotta, Fiennes are untouched

If I write here right now that we took it as a bona fide self-parody, or maybe an attempt to emulate Ed Wood in producing the worst film possible - Yes, things like that are already been said before on this board, as I read above...

The best point, to place it, after all, above the 'awfull' grade: It's funny, thanks for some sincere giggles and roar of laughters while the whole evolves - in short, a classic in the "worst of" category... (In this mood, don't' miss it!)


How could such an accomplished screenwriter, a man who wrote such classics as Taxi Driver, Raging Bull, etc. be so singularly responsible for such an aggravatingly awful movie?

I don't think anyone will know. Perhaps the joke is on all of us and Paul Schrader is laughing at our reactions. Maybe he set out to make the worst movie he possibly could and in that it is a triumph.

This movie is offensively bad. It will make you mad. A waste of talent, money, time, effort and thought on everyone's part.


I saw this film at the Telluride Film Festival. People were walking out, but I stuck it out. Wish I hadn't. Shlocky story, contrived and boring characters. The only thing mildly interesting was to see the revenge plot play out and that was a disapointment as well. Pass on this one.


Everything in this movie is unbearably implausible, false, phony. How comes a woman doesn't recognize the man she loves, just 14 years after he's disappeared, and when it happens that much more than half his face looks exactly the same it was? What the hell did the main character do to become so rich and respected? After all, how many cabin boys have become that rich in real life? And, most of all, how comes a young woman like that stays 14 years with the man that has beaten her and, to her knowledge, killed the man of her life? Ridiculous. The screenwriter of Taxi Driver has made a film that is a very good candidate to the title of The Worst Movie Ever Made.


I had the displeasure of seeing this movie at the Sundance Film Festival, and my sole purpose of writing this comment is to prevent any sane person from seeing it as well.

When I heard of the premise about a mockumentary about the new-found patriotism everybody seemed to have after 9-11, I was definitely looking forward to The War Effort. After almost two hours of poorly done homosexual-dildo jokes (as if they could be done in good taste), horrible improvised "acting" performances, and overall immature storyline, I am questioning how this movie could even have been produced in the first place.

Perhaps I am being too harsh. If you would like to see a movie that looks to be made by a team of middle-school kids, by all means, enjoy the show!


Catherine (Gwyneth Paltrow) is the 27 year-old daughter of a recently deceased mathematician, played by Anthony Hopkins. Catherine grieves for her father who suffered from insanity before he died. Now, she must confront the possibility that she may have inherited some of her father's mental tendencies. One of her father's students, a young man named Herald, as well as Claire, Catherine's scheming sister, make Catherine's life even more difficult. It's been at least a year since I have watched a film so annoying as "Proof".

You would think that for a film wherein mathematics is a central focus of characters' lives, there would be dialogue references to "differential equations", or "convergent series", or "double integral", or "binomial expansion", or other math concepts. Nothing doing. There's some minimal babble about "prime numbers". But the film goes out of its way to avoid actual discussion of mathematics.

Instead, we have to endure emotional diatribes from Catherine, and her ongoing malaise related to Herald and Claire. Which is itself a contradiction. As a mathematician herself, Catherine's responses should be thoughtful and logical, not emotional. Yet, her reactions are totally emotional and illogical. Clearly, the filmmakers here consider viewers to be mathematical dummies. So they create a phony main character, to enhance verbal conflict, and in so doing evade intellectual dialogue. On the DVD extras, the actors even seem proud that mathematics is not discussed. And that, in turn, made me have an even lower opinion of them.

Throughout the film Catherine whines, moans, sulks, and pouts. I absolutely could not stand her. And Gwyneth Paltrow's annoying nasal voice makes her character almost unendurable.

A much better movie could have been made if they had dumped Catherine, and zeroed in on the Anthony Hopkins character. Watching him, and listening to him talk about the wonders and mysteries of mathematics with Herald, would have been far more interesting and rewarding.


1. What was this earth-shattering paper about? Why did Robert need Catherine to work on it? What techniques made it so hip and prove whatever it was trying to prove?

2. "I feel like I could crack open. Like an egg, or one of those really smelly French cheeses that ooze everywhere when you cut them." Gag!

3. Robert complains that Catherine didn't get up until noon. If you take care of someone, as she is supposedly doing, you are on their schedule, not yours!

4. Catherine is a narcissistic, self-absorbed whiner who doesn't deserve anyone's sympathy.

5. Jake Gyllenhaal. How this guy gets work is beyond me! I never bought he could add 2 + 2, much less, was a math whiz! But I did buy he'd bang Catherine so he could make off with the old man's "sh*t" to "write my ticket"!

6. Claire's determination to convince Catherine that she's nuts and put her in the loony bin. What's in it for her?

7. Who knew mathematicians are a bunch of drugged-out wack jobs? Sophie Germain must be spinning in her grave!


When I rented this flick - despite my prudent dislike - I thought I was going to be served a touchy-feely picture sporting the message that math is not redeeming answer to life but love is, or such Hippy New Age existential hogwash. (Though I prefer that, violent nihilistic self-destruction is the only salvation, as preached by Fight Club) I need bland cotton candy sentiments to balance my diet of bitter misanthropy.

Instead I was dished a geriatric smug rendition of "The Ant and the Grasshopper" fable. I liked the main-character. The fact that she got up as early as noon, complained about everything and dismissed and alienated people around her with sophomoric clever sophism's and incivility made her a character I could really relate too. In the end though, trough the nagging of her aged father and the boring intervention techniques from her equally boring boyfriend she is swayed to abandon her hobo-hedonistic lifestyle and yielded to the white-collar work-ethics all scientists obey (except she isn't motivated by monomaniacal self-important worship of math and greed of course)

Though plaid-shirt wearing math-monkeys feel the sand of human ignorance towards their exalted science grinding in the neat little clock-works of their pedestrian brains, so too my pop-culture filled remnant of gray matter is vexed by the blatant disrespect for human reality , or at least my reality; I never met an interesting mathematician. So I conclude that the lovable socially apt Greenday pet-chimps who know pi to a thousand places are Hollywood creations. (What's next an overrated art-house actor playing a vagrant in a Fantasy world who is the king descending from an ancient bloodline, that fought the Tin Woodsman on steroids in some battle thousands of years ago?)

I say; I you want a movie about social and spiritual redemption go watch "The Fisherking" by Terry Gilliam, he has something math-monkeys don't have - Imagination.


I found the movie so frustrating, I had to turn it off after about 20 minutes. Examples:

High-school-level conversation about insanity between two people who are both supposed to be exceptional mathematicians.

Ridiculous back-and-forth between Gwyneth Paltrow and Jake Gyllenhaal where they keep changing attitudes and even personalities. I know it's based on a stage play, but couldn't they calm it down a bit for the screen?

Lazy screenplay shorthand for bossy woman: talking on cell phone about china patterns while walking through airport. Grrrr!

And finally, what made me shut it off: That insane conversation between Paltrow and Hope Davis, where one thinks the other is hallucinating for no apparent reason.


Yea sorry folks, but this movie did absolutely nothing for me. A friend of mine told me it wasn't half bad and I expected a good story and figured these actors would not have taken the role if it were bad. I was wrong on all accounts because the story left a lot to be desired, I mean If I had cared about the characters a bit more perhaps I would've like it.

Paltrow plays this girl who has taken care of her father for the last few years. Her father (played by Hopkins) was a one time mathematical genius who went crazy. Taking care of her father has made her give up on a lot of her dreams including dropping out of college and she becomes a bit of a headcase herself. One of her father's admirers (Gyllenhaal) wants to go through his memoirs and writing in hopes of finding some sort of amazing proof.

Going through his work he finds himself getting closer to the truth and closer to proof that the craziness his teacher had was heretic and that insanity and genius are separated by a very fine line.

This movie was a nice change of pace from everything being spoon-fed to us in the theaters these days. I watched it and didn't hate it, but it was rather boring and even for a drama it still was a major let down. I cannot recommend it to anyone, the actors were great and that's about the nicest thing I can say about it, but these actors should've picked better roles and spared us all the load of crap that this movie is.


Coming to the IMDb site to review this commercially successful movie, I was amazed at the Oscar recognition it garnered in 1978 for what is, to my eyes and ears a very unremarkable re-make of the enjoyable 1941 Claude Rains feature "Here Comes Mr Jordan", while surreptitiously grafting on the title of another "life after death" 40's classic starring Don Ameche.

I just don't have a lot to say about this vapid entertainment other than apart from transforming the hapless Joe from a boxer to an American footballer (and thus losing some of the universality of his character), it seems almost a line for line, scene for scene, inferior copy of the much superior original. Buck Henry and Elaine May were celebrated comedic writers of the time but I found nothing laugh-out-loud funny in what I saw and heard. The cinematography is merely average, soft focusing around Beatty & Christie's love scenes while the acting gig for all must have been the easiest payday they ever earned. Beatty plays every scene either with bemusement or winsomeness, Christie couldn't even be trusted to adopt an American accent and so we're expected to accept her Transatlantic-hopping English rose character who wins Beatty's heart with one flutter of an eyebrow or flick of her over-permed hair. Add to that the great James Mason seeming to sleepwalk his way in Claude Rains' bigger footsteps, Dyan Cannon in permanent histrionic mode and a cast of many along for the ride. The Oscar nominated score is all sappy MOR muzak too.

I've read that Beatty made this film with one eye on the box-office returns to fund his ambitious "Reds" project, a film I'll be watching soon and hope was worth it. For me this particular movie just demonstrates however the schmoozy, lackadaisical, condescending work which came out of late 70's LA Hollywood studios.


I read a review on Netflix that mentioned there was a menacing mood that permeated throughout The Star Chamber. After 52 minutes, when the plot was finally underway, I was still waiting for something suspenseful. It's not a horrible movie, it's just dull and seemed to go out of its way to avoid action. All the vigilante scenes happen in 30 seconds with some unknown sunglass-wearing white guy. And when they uncover three suspects behind one of the movie's main criminal cases? We're TOLD about their arrest by a third party. There were a lot of little things that didn't quite work (for me, at least)-- The first loophole that Douglas rules on made no sense both logically and legally. All (yes ALL) of the criminals in this movie, no matter their crime, are ridiculously strung out on drugs. The top secret star chamber is located in somebody's house in a room lined with open windows. Yeah I'm being nitpicky, but I was really disappointed by this one, especially given the cast. And why couldn't the judges stop that last hit? They clearly had time and there was no explanation as to how it would compromise their identities. Anyway, hope this helps somebody. Thanks.


An absolutely wretched movie. I caught the first twenty minutes of this on the Fox Movie Channel, and was so intrigued that I rushed out and rented it last night, after finishing a 3 1/2 year project.

Here are 90 minutes of my life I would love to have back. The film has a splendid cast... Michael Douglas, Hal Holbook, James B. Sikking, Sharon Gless (in a thankless role). It begins intriguingly, like a half-breed of 'The Parallax View' and early Grisham - a high-suspense legal thriller that hits the audience with a gripping, involving problem: a young judge (Douglas) is so faithful to the law that he sends a number of sociopaths free on legal technicalities, and then feels overwhelming guilt when innocent citizens are murdered by the scum he released. This is a wonderful and exciting theme; the judge's guilt and anger are palpable.

But the film spends the remaining hour jerking the audience around so frantically that the viewer will feel like jerking back. It goes out of its way to convince the audience that an "illegal" problem introduced to solve its early dilemma -- (a secret society of dissatisfied judges who murder the scuzzbags who have been let loose) is justifiable and laudable, then it doubles back and spends the rest of the movie contradicting itself, trying to prove that such a solution is morally repugnant.

What the hell??!!

The result: one feels a sense of overwhelming nausea and depression. The film traps the viewer in a depressing web of nihilistic futility.

I also found the subplot involving two child murderers and the glimpses of a child's bloodied, severed leg unspeakably depressing.

This is one to avoid.


Put yourself in this position: You're a 30-something judge with a wife and kids whose job is to send people to jail. But when small technicalities get in the way of justice, you have to compromise your morals and let rapists and murderers on the loose--just because the police may have performed a search without a warrant, or taken garbage out of a truck before the lever was pressed and it was dumped into the back with everyone else's trash, thereby becoming "trash" and not the garbage of a certain individual.

You'd probably feel pretty depressed knowing that confessed criminals are being let loose because of a small error in their arrest procedure, right?

Well, that's how Michael Douglas feels in "The Star Chamber," a film about an underground society of judges who are able to convict felons based solely upon what they did--and not on whether they were unjustly apprehended at the time of their arrest.

After having to let two child murderers go free on a slight technicality, Stephen Hardin (Douglas) decides to join an underground community of judges who take matters into their own hands when bad guys are let free--by hiring hitmen to assassinate them. If you think this sounds improbable, you're right. If you think it sounds morally wrong, you're partially right.

The movie knows that audiences would immediately interpret this as sick, or twisted, so Peter Hyams--the director--uses some of the oldest cliches in the book to make us empathize with Stephen. First, we see him let a murderer go after the police who arrested him acted wrongly in the arrest procedure. Then we see the two child murderers let loose on a similar technicality. I'd buy this if it seemed real--but the script is all one big contrivance. It doesn't feel real; it makes the viewer feel manipulated.

Now, I like films that provide deep characters that we learn to feel attached to. I think that's why character-driven films such as "Fargo" and "Planes, Trains and Automobiles" succeed. And I don't feel personally insulted when a film tries to make us empathize with its characters by having them go through certain events. But this just feels fake, and I didn't buy the trial scenes for a minute. Too quick, too stupid, too darn silly.

Would two similar cases appear in front of a judge within a few days? This is the type of trial case that makes the news and is a one-in-a-million-type ordeal--you'd see it advertised everywhere in big bold print--yet the movie approaches it as if it's an everyday event in the life of a judge. Stephen's older mentor tells him that he's had to do the same type of thing an uncountable number of times. Really? Name a few cases.

The entire notion of an underground band of judges who rule out their own personal judgments sounds like a cross between a John Grisham novel and one by Stephen King. I believe that Grisham could handle this with a bit of credibility--but the film approaches the matters as King approaches material: It doesn't make much sense to begin with, and really withers away in the second half. (I loved "The Running Man" novel up until the last hundred pages.)

Alas, "The Star Chamber" is directed with lack of feeling and emotion. If it had setup characters we could care for in more believable situations, then perhaps I would have felt that Stephen's adventures with the underground community of redneck judges would actually mean something. But after all, what does one expect from a film directd by Peter Hyams? Not much.

I hope this idea gets re-done a few years from now. It's an intriguing premise. Too bad it had to be ruined by such a terrible director in such a terrible film.

2/5 stars.

- John Ulmer


Hackneyed, shapeless anthology from the bargain basement. The six tales (that's six on my tape) are all shot outside, all dialogue-lite and all appalling. They were clearly made by people who'd only just found a video camera. Indeed, you actually see the camera twice reflected in surfaces. Vincent Price must have taped his contribution in a single morning and probably didn't remember it a week later. Waste not your time on this. The box says on the back 'in the tradition of The Twilight Zone' - in their dreams. How about saying 'In the tradition of a particularly bad, 80s, made for television scatty fantasy horror which are deeply tedious and insignificant'?


It is sad to see the previously great Vincent Price attach himself to the front and back end of this amateurish production of silly & sad non-spooky shorts. He's in there briefly at the front, and briefly at the end, but the stuff inbetween was made by hacks.


> Escapes is the textbook example of bad film-making. Whenever you've seen a > movie that you feel was horrible, see this one and realize what true garbage > is. One can only guess that Vincent Price was blackmailed into being > involved in this mess. Two bright spots about this film were that it has no > sequel, and that it has a "Mystery Science Theater" quality about it. To me > the most frightening thing about this movie was that I paid .99 to rent this > dog. >


One of the cleverest and most suspense filled books I've ever read. I just had to see if there was a movie. Lovecraft drops barely enough information about the world he's creating to keep you hooked. By the end of the book you'll be aching to know more but be content with it's quick rise in revelations.

So after seeing all the totally unnecessary artistic license taken by the adaptation of the story - things that turn an epic and suspenseful story into an action-hero-vehicle and gore-fest - I wanted to invoke the cryptic invocation whose heading is the Dragon's Tail, sign of the descending node - OGTHROD AI'F GEB'L-EE'H YOG-SOTHOTH 'NGAH'NG AI'Y ZHRO! - reducing the movie to a fine powder.


I'm really confused by other users comments. After reading them I ordered a copy from the states as fast as my fingers could click to Amazon. I'm a huge fan of Lovecraft and to be told that this is the best film adaption of his work and that I'd never even heard of it made me think I was about to get my slime covered tentacles on a forgotten gem. Then it arrived and I must ask the other users, are you all completely bonkers? This is a terrible, terrible film. It's badly lit, shot, edited, acted and scripted. When the femme non fetale first arrives at the PI's office it's this dreadful side shot which just sits there for about five minutes while the two of them fail to act in each others general direction from the opposite sides of the screen. The rest of the film seems to consist of either seen it all before POV's or more of these overly lit side shots, I thought Dan O'Bannon could shoot films? Thank god the flashbacks break up the boredom. In a voice over Ward's wife says something like "He just left the party and said he had to do some work that couldn't wait", at which point Ward in the flashback says "I have to leave the party to do some work that cannot wait." Brilliant! It goes on like that for an hour and forty tedious minutes with a couple of goofy and gooey effects don't liven up the proceedings one bit, until it ends with Chris Sarandon hamming it up for all he's worth while I considered hanging myself from the tedium of it all. Come on guys, us Lovecraft fans have to be forgiving occasionally by the general low quality and/or budgets of his related movies, but we shouldn't let this film off the hook just because it sticks fairly close to the original story. I mean, Dagon is rubbish but at least it's FUN rubbish, this is just plain dull.


This movie is exceedingly faithful to Lovecraft's original story, and I loved the original story ("The Case of Charles Dexter Ward"). So why did I dislike the film so much? Essentially, because it's NOT an "adaptation" of the source material: It's a straight line-by-line reconstruction of it, with no concessions of any note made to the adaptation process, to the differences in story telling technique which are required for film, as opposed to the written word.

In short, it's uncinematic and what works on the printed page does not - most definitely does NOT - work on the flickering screen unmodified. The end result is tedious in the extreme.


I am usually a big fan of most horror movies Dan O bannon is assoicated with { from Dead and Buried to Return of the Living Dead } and I had high expectations for this film. First off, this film is almost 2 hours long but the material contained within the film does not support that long of a time frame. In fact, it takes 56 minutes for the 1st real exciting visual scene to happen. The actor that portrays the investigator is quite amateurish while the lead that plays the female part is awful { take not of the beginning when she is in the detectives office and they are talking. Her performance is pathetic and she plays with her hands for 5 minutes} . The dialog leaves little to be desired and there's nothing inventive or unique about the camera-work. The soundtrack is very uneventful. I have no idea how people can rate movies like this a " 10" . In many ways this is a poor mans Reanimator. If you must see this film, just fast forward the 1st 55 minutes and start from there and even then you may feel very disastified.


... and if this abomination of a movie is a honestly true adaptation as the previous reviewers claim, I really don't ever plan on reading Lovecraft... ever.

I like to start out with the high points. The lighting was very well done... nicely atmospheric. The cinematography was well realized, considering the apparent lack of talent on the directors part. The set design was pretty nice as well.

Unfortunately, that is about the end of the positives. The acting was sub-par at best. The actors in this production have proved themselves to be competent in previous productions. Either the director of this movie had no control over his talent, or his talent gave him way too much control over their performances. Then there is the story. The person responsible for this awful, plodding adaptation needs to read a little more about plot and character development, not to mention the basics of suspension of disbelief. Okay, I understand that the story is about a 250 year old doctor who was brought back from the dead. I am willing to take that leap of faith. What I cannot understand are the little things. The main character, a private investigator, somehow is allowed to accompany police officers on a night-time raid of a dark farmhouse that reeks of death... then assumes the role of hostage negotiator while there is a half dozen armed police officers standing right behind him. And how many high security psych wards do you know of that will walk an unscheduled visitor into a criminally insane inmates padded cell (with it's own window btw) without searching the visitors large suitcase to see if might contain any weapons or drugs or human skeletons... It those little things that are the most insulting to the viewer. Even though it is a sci-fi/horror flick, we in the audience aren't retarded. We expect our fantasies to be somewhat grounded in reality.

If this movie ever comes on Cinemax, by all means it's worth a watch. I have seen worse in my time. But if you are thinking of renting this movie and you are not a die-hard Lovecraft fan, save your money... really.


I was watching this movie, and at first, I was enjoying it and finding it somewhat powerful. The dance sequences were undoubtedly remarkable and as were the performances. I began to enjoy watching it, but about two- thirds of the way through, I began to get tired of the sappy bonds between Baryshikov's and Hines's characters. Also, the escape scenes give the movie an unneeded "Hurry up, GO GO!" feel to it. It is frustrating to know how good this film could have been with how remarkable the performers are and with its powerful storyline.


First, I would like to voice my outrage at the exploitation of Vladimir Vysotsky's talent five years after his death for this piece of Reagan-esquire propaganda. Another dehumanization of the USSR, especially when it was it had only 6 years of existence left. Another contrived plot that has nothing in common with reality. If an artist defected, they would not try to pull him back, this would be beneath them. Besides, he is not a government worker or a military officer--- he does not have any secrets that they would want to keep him quiet about it. This is "so-called" art done for the benefit of Reagan's propaganda. If Americans want to see what Russian society was really like, they should see any of the Soviet films(PREFERABLY of the 60's, 70.s, and 80's) found in abundance on this website.


"Tre Solar" could have been the top Swedish movie of the year, instead it is rather the low-point for the last five years. It's surprising why - we have the current Swedish actor elites, nice filming and authentic outfits and environments. Yet, tre solar doesn't pull much off - due to the really lame script. For minutes barely ANYTHING happens. Woman walks in, sees man, talks to him, he answers in absent words, tragic discover. Next scene. Repeats again. I have absolutely no idea what went wrong during the production, but it seems very strange to me that actors with such experience as these, making all the top roles in recent movies, wouldn't see this coming. Perhaps "Tre Solar" is the perfect example of the majority of Swedish films - some wish-to-be-made movie is granted financial support not because it is something people want to see on the big screen, but rather because it seems like an interesting aim to some people (namely the academy granting money to support Swedish film-making). Much as it pains me, but Tre Solar cannot earn more than 2/10 by me.


** IF POSSIBLE THERE ARE SPOILERS HERE **

Hanna has lived for four years alone with her kids since her husband went abroad to join a crusade (or something like it). Now, a messenger brings the news that her husband is coming home and she leaves her village to go to the harbor to greet him. But danger lurks everywhere, the plague has come to the land. Hanna meets a lot of characters along her journey (which seems to go on forever without getting anywhere). She meets Joel, who has lost his family to the plague and a she meets a girl, abused as sacrifice by a corrupted priest. She meets the imprisoned Torben and the abandoned Emma, whose husband has closed the city gates and refuses to let anyone in. Finally she finds her husband Ulf, but the once powerful and happy man is now an addict to some foreign substance, barely able to speak. Hanna feels that her husband has betrayed her and leaves him, just to come back a few days later to pick him up again. Then the girl get struck by the plague and everything seems to go wrong at once...

A movie with lot of known and good Swedish actors, but many has small roles. This is a road movie, set in medieval times, without any roads. The main character goes around thinking, contemplating and meeting different characters. There are many long shots of riding and few with any real action. The plot becomes very slow and dull. When Hanna actually meets anyone, it seems like all suspense and emotions that lack from other parts must be said in just one sentence. This gives greeting sentences with threats of rape and murder as the norm which seems very uncharacteristic. The dialog which could bring the plot forward instead seem odd and stupid. In addition, Hanna seems inconsistent with herself and her own motives. The only good things are that Lena Endre seem to try to do her best with the material she haves, and that the scenery and outfits are good. However, a real dull experience.

3/10


Sorry about my crappy English. It isn't easy to write this comment without laughing...

And the award for worse wig ever goes to... The entire cast of "Tre Solar"!

I don't think I've ever laughed this much to a Swedish movie before and I doubt that I ever will. This is so bad that... that... I can't find the words to describe how awful this really is. Throughout the entire film I excpected Terry Gilliam & C/o to show up, banging coconuts together, pretending to ride imaginary horses.

Finally, I beg to the producers to NEVER ever show this film outside Swedish boarders. We can't let anybody think Swedish cinema stinks this much. Because if you do, nobody is gonna give us foreign money so we can film the books about Arn.


I came here and read the reviews before I watched this on TV last night. After reading the bad reviews here I thought "it can't be that bad surely, it is at least watchable for novelty value... I like nordic films so from that perspective sure I can get something out of it...". I wish I hadn't wasted my time. It is 100 mins of really badly scripted, utterly irrational nonsense about someone who the script writers can't decide how her emotions and actions should resemble each other, in a continuous manner with regards to the plot, and therefore ends up looking ridiculous and being forgettable. (Forgettable other than the fact I will continue to rue wasting 2 hrs of my life).

There is just no point to this movie. And no I don't "not get it", but what's it about? A woman loves her husband? not overly deep. Human relationships? The weakest movie on this topic I have seen for quite a while. A history movie? The era and the plague don't come in to it at all other than excuses to make the ridiculous script lines excusable on the basis of something like "it's set centuries ago, people talked crazily back then". A middle-ages Odyssee? Stick with the ancient Greek one.

I am just glad I can't speak Swedish (and had to read subtitles), when you listen to the talking you can just tell it would be even more embarrassing to listen to it proper than it would be reading the subtitles.