What is it with intelligent people? Nerds, for lack of a more colorful but expressive term, make for surprisingly interesting stories. There is something about watching people attain another league of mental skill that humbles the rest of us. Sure, there's the madness that sets in (ala "A Beautiful Mind"), but what about the quiet cheers brought about from a film like that Spelling Bee championship flick, "Spellbound"?

"Wordplay" fits into that category of documentary film-making, as it further instills certain modesty into the lesser minds of us viewers. The film cleverly interweaves the tale of several competitors who rival one another at the twenty-eighth annual crossword puzzle tournament. As their stories develop, and we learn about these individuals, the actual match builds with surprising tension. These stories are told side-by-side interviews with other crossword enthusiasts such as former President Bill Clinton and TV's Jon Stewart who offer their own passionate opinions on the pleasure and overall importance of crossword puzzles. It's a fun, entertaining film that could easily have been otherwise.


I watched this because I love crosswords (I'm an "INK-er" myself, pencils are for the weak! ;D ), but I worried it wouldn't be that interesting. The fact that Jon Stewart had a cameo sealed it for me - so I rented it.

I actually enjoyed it a lot. Personally, I thought there was too much focus on Will Shortz and "NEW YORK TIMES" (as if they're the only ones that do crosswords). I do the NY Times (at least M-TH) occasionally, but I think Mearle Reagle is the best crossword constructor. I like his clues and his humor. I was really glad the movie featured him! Will Shortz just edits other people's puzzles, so I wish they'd featured more of the creators talking about how they make the puzzles.

I learned a lot, I hadn't realized how they make the puzzles or that the patterns are mirror images. I think I enjoyed the earlier part of the film more than the second half that focused on the tournament. I enjoyed meeting the puzzlers (even that self-hating obnoxious whiny woman -was she really the only female in the top 20?) If I was still trapped in CT I would consider going to the next tournament.

I thought they had a good mix of people. Not just throwing in celebrities for no reason or not including 'regular' people. It's true that most of the people featured were Caucasian and probably middle-upper class - but if that is who is doing the puzzles and going to the tournament, you can hardly fault the film makers. Jon Stewart was of course darling - I was amused to see he too is an INK-er. (He's mentioned that he proposed to his wife using a crossword puzzle.)

Seeing Bill Clinton solving a weekend NYT & using it as an analogy for politics was interesting (& yet depressing as it pointed out the disparity in intelligence levels of him & Bushie JR.)

In all a movie I would recommend to anyone that likes puzzles. (Not sure if non-gamers would enjoy, but I would still encourage them to try it out.)

P.S. Did anyone else feel bad for Will Shortz & Merl Reagle - if they're designing all the puzzles and running the tournament, when do they get to play??


Bristling with intellectual playfulness, this worthy homage to one of America's favorite systematic stumpers, the daily New York Times' crossword puzzle, first starts out as a witty documentary on the history of this fixation but eventually evolves into so much more. Beginning with an analysis and introduction into the rarely discussed guilty pleasure, Wordplay evolves it's purpose as the film moves along, initiating the viewer into the lives of these often brilliant and eccentric people who revolve around the cerebral workout NY Times puzzle editor Will Shortz helped cultivate, which climaxes yearly with it's championship competition. Obviously this tiny niche of a documentary may fall flat with people who are television junkies, anti-intellectual or the opposite of inquisitive, as the introduction into this bizarre but honorable subculture does tend to alienate with the history and preparation of these puzzles which can be all too apathetic to your average viewer. Just let the film's character's set root however, and an entirely human element comes into the staunch equation, much like the words that render themselves visible only when filling in others around it for these dictionary junkies. With the chronicling of several potential crossword champs culminating in last year's competition, Wordplay has taken something intrinsically elitist and rendered it universal with the frenzied competition leaving viewers in suspense until the final pencil is dropped, much like the recent spelling bee fad, but to me even more impressive given the insane amount of knowledge needed to seriously compete. Celebreties from all walks of life also help diversify, demystify, and clarify why this underrated tradition will continue to be the true coffee for the soul.


I saw a preview of Word Play. From some of the PR, I thought it was some sort of thriller, but actually it was a documentary about people who do the New York Times crossword puzzle (well actually crossword puzzles in general but the NYT puzzle seems to be the creme de la creme). and it turned out to be a thriller of sorts! This was a very good movie! Anyone who has ever pulled their hair out over some of the clues in the NYT crossword will enjoy this movie, and be impressed by the puzzle solvers.

Jon Stewart is on hand to provide comic relief.

The movie covers just about everything you ever (or never) wanted to know about crossword puzzles, including bits of history and how the puzzles are made.

The central theme of the movie is a crossword puzzle convention and competition. We go behind the scenes and meet Will Shortz, the NYT crossword puzzle editor, along with several of the contestants and crossword puzzle writers.

who'da thunk Bill Clinton, Jon Stewart, the Indigo Girls, Mike Mussina (pitcher with the Yankees), and Ken Burns (documentary film maker) would share a love of the NYT crossword? This was a very enjoyable movie, and well worth the price of admission.


I found this movie incredibly hilarious. I went to see it purely because I knew an acquaintance of mine had a cameo in it. (He interned for Will Shortz and was one of the competition judges.)

I ended up being completely surprised at how funny it was. The witty quips from participants and judges were priceless. I've never played a crossword puzzle in my life and I still enjoyed the film. You'll find yourself rooting for certain contestants to win the competition.

The celebrity cameos are done well and are actually a substantial part of the movie.

I've recommended this movie to the entire English department at my college. You won't regret the price of admission!


This movie is a delightful surprise. We were invited to a sneak preview by our local newspaper. We had no idea in was a documentary as the movie began, we were immediately caught up in the drama of the story line. The stories portrayed were fascinating and well developed. I think the movie is classified as a documentary only because everything in it is a true account of events happening to real people. This movie is about the real people of America - the stars could be our next door neighbors as well as the icons we admire. It is inspiring to imagine that former president Clinton is sitting in his kitchen working on the same Times crossword puzzle that we are. I would nominate this movie for an academy award in the best picture category as well as in the best director category.


Being someone who has enjoyed figuring out crossword puzzles here and there over the last 20 years, I was enthused about watching this documentary and wondered if it would renew the passion I used to have for doing these puzzles. Yes, it did, so kudos to the documentary to make it interesting enough.

Is it enough to hold the interest of a non-crossword player? I doubt it. If the puzzles aren't fun to you, I doubt this movie would be entertaining, either.

The film is in two parts: a look at "celebrities" who play, and some of their comments and to the man who puts together the daily New York Times puzzle. The second part - the largest segment - is devoted to USA Crossword Championships held in each in Stamford, Conn. We see the top players profiled and then are witness to the 200- tournament with it's dramatic 3-person playoff finals.

The first part is simply an unabashed Liberal love-fest with big plugs for the Times and NPR, and the celebs are all big Liberals, from Bill Clinton to Jon Stewart to Ken Burns, the Indigo Girls, etc. If one can ignore the obvious political bias, it's still interesting.

Then, we get profiles of the top players, from the young prodigy who first entered the tournament at 16 and is one of the favorites to win at 20; the veteran who always is in the finals but never can do better than third; to the gay guy who is seen at home playing pinball with his roommate. They kiss each other on the lips. What was the purpose of inserting that in the movie? What did that have to do with the story? Nothing, obviously, and it wasn't necessary but when have Liberal filmmakers ever exercised good judgment?

Also profiled is an interesting woman who won this tournament once but hasn't been close since. Then, we have others such as a guy who plays a guitar and sings and another who is extremely introverted, on and on. Many of them fun to watch. Many of them are amazing crossword talents who can zip off thee answers to a fairly tough one in just a few minutes.

Although not hard to predict given their "past performances," the finale was still dramatic and interesting to watch.

Overall: puzzle devotees - highly recommended; non-players: not recommended.


As I watched this movie, I heard all around me little appreciative chuckles from the audience. I like but don't love crossword puzzles (my mother did the double crostics when I was a kid, which were beyond me) and can take them or leave them, but Will Shortz is a gem and the theme of competition is universal. Heck, I don't usually even like documentaries, but I felt as if this funny, courteous, kind, assortment of people was inviting me into a particularly enjoyable party in which nobody was a wallflower. The film-makers deserve credit for the humor and kindness of this film, as well as for the excellent craftsmanship (and their interesting assortment of celebrity interviewees)


Not many documentaries make it into the movie theaters, but this one did and for good reason. Wordplay is a great documentary that delivers lots of big laughs. At the same time that the movie is entertaining, it is educational -- in particular, the interviews of Clinton and Dole. For that reason, it can draw a diverse audience (families, professionals, college students, etc). It is also a great date movie because it is not long and gives you plenty to talk about after.

You don't have to be a crossword player to enjoy the movie, though it helps. The documentary really is about how people can so enjoy their passions, whether it be crossword puzzles, baseball, work or companionship. Overall, great movie because it has a great message.


This movie was a pleasant surprise. Of course, you have to at least like crosswords to get into the fun, but you don't have to be a fanatic. There's plenty of humor in the mix as well. A blend of documentary on the life and times of New York Times puzzle editor Will Shortz and on the history of the puzzle community and the puzzle itself, it makes for an entertaining hour and a half. Yes, most of these folks are total geeks, and they will make you feel a bit better about yourself. But then, the movie is sure to point out, not all puzzlers are geeks. Evidence? Bill Clinton and Jon Stewart love the Times puzzle. One of the best sequences shows the construction of a Monday Times puzzle. How the pieces fit together, the thinking that fills in the blanks. What kind of minds thrive on this stuff? That's one thing this film is sure to illuminate. So if you want to geek out with the best of them, line up for this one. But make sure you have a puzzle in reserve, because as soon as you leave the theater you'll be ready to try your hand!


I'm shaking my head right now as I notice the high rating for this documentary. I like crossword puzzles maybe like once a year but was very amazed by those who love it. I mean love it. Slamming their headphones when they find out they screwed up only made me laugh. It was interesting to see Mike Mussina talk about his experience with crossword puzzles. And perhaps it was interesting to know that some people can do them in under two minutes but what else can you cram in 80 minutes. It seemed like they just talked about the same old stuff for 60 minutes than they had the competition for 20 minutes.

I guess you can say that I don't get it but others will. A decent documentary and you will learn useless things but for entertainment, it was way below average in my eyes.


I saw Wordplay at the Philly Film Festival without knowing or expecting anything. I'm not a big crossword guy, but I do love a good documentary movie. Real stuff. Since seeing Wordplay about 2 months ago, I've raved about it to everyone I know who enjoys good, out-of-the-mainstream films. Probably the best thing I've seen all year.

It's inevitable to compare this movie to the spelling bee "Spellbound" even as you watch it. I think it holds up. I found it informative, funny, touching, human, and most importantly, compelling. One slight worry: With the cameos by President Bill, John Stewart, the Indigo Girls, etc. I'm afraid the Limbaugh-minded folks will turn right off and start yelling "LIBERAL propaganda" or some such trash. Hopefully not.

I Loved it.


Painfully dull, with nearly the entire movie live action of the actual crossword puzzle championship at a Marriot in Connecticut. This movie was clearly intended to imitate Spellbound, but was not nearly as fun as the latter, a movie that explored the children's backgrounds and family dynamics and THEN showed them at the competition.

O.K. the New York Times crossword puzzles are fun, and created by brilliant people. I get it. But is it any wonder that the newspaper namesake raved about this movie?

Although close-up shots of faces in angst were designed to make the watcher feel the excitement brewing among the contestants, we didn't ever get a chance to know them, or for that matter, care much about them. The closest insight we got to one of the top young contenders was watching him do crossword puzzles rapidly on his computer.


I just watched and enjoyed the movie 'wordplay' but was concerned about the lack of black people featured in the profiles of those who do puzzles.It seemed a bit all-clean-white (male) American to me, which spoiled the excellent story, great cinematography and music. Surely black people do the new York Times puzzle, although due to intrinsic economic and educational disadvantages they may not make the top 10 - this probably goes for women, too. (Its probably no coincidence that the top contenders were predominantly male). Yes, I did notice a few co loured people on the sidelines, but it would have been nice to have one as a feature. Better luck next time.


This is the most epic game I've ever played, with the possible exception of Half-Life 2. You are a young man who climbs atop the backs of giants and has to bring them down by use of your sword and/or bow & arrow. The first giant is beaten simply by climbing onto him and stabbing marked areas of his body, but other enemies are beaten by interacting with the environment around you, which by the way is one of the most jaw-dropping visual features of this game by far. You ride your horse through grassy fields, barren deserts, vast mountain ranges with waterfalls, you name it. The world is enormous and something you totally would not expect a PS2 to be able to handle (I'm guessing it's pulled off due to the fact that there is no interaction with other characters or enemies at all).

Understandable is the criticism it's received for being, in essence, nothing but a bunch of boss battles. There's no real interaction with anybody else in the game. But most would probably agree that what it lacks in terms of rich gameplay it more than makes up for with the freakin' pretty landscapes and jaw dropping cinematic display.

The 16 giants are something you might see in a Lord of the Rings movie. By land, by air or by sea, you find yourself doing pretty much everything. Grip onto the back of a Boeing-sized Pterodactyl of sorts. Cling to an enormous electric eel as it swims under the water. Ride your horse alongside an enormous galloping bull. Every gamer on the planet needs to at the very least RENT this game. See it before you die or you just might not make it into gaming-heaven. I'm pleading with you here, I don't want anybody at all to miss this.

Oh, and as a music person I must stress the superb soundtrack.


This is such a wonderful game! I found myself in total amazement as I wandered through this massive world. The music is perfect, grand epic themes, yet always somewhat sad and wistful too. Just right for the death of an age. You are on a quest to resurrect a strange and nameless girl who has been sacrificed. The resurrection can only happen in the Forbidden Land at the edge of the earth,and only if an ancient power is restored through a deadly ritual that calls for the blood of the sixteen titans that walk this forsaken place. Your only companion is a massive war-horse, Agro, and an ancient black sword that points the way to terror and glory. I fell in love with this game as soon as it started. There are very few games out there that can come close to this one is sheer grandeur, and I have found none that equal the sense of pure loneliness and isolation in a land of crumbling splendor. I would almost never tell someone to buy an entire console for the sake of one game, but this would be the exception. This one is worth it!


This game is one of the greatest games ever made because of how well it was done.

The game's plot puts you as a wanderer who takes a girl to the forbidden land to give her back her stolen soul. But to do this you must go and slay the Colossus. Who roam in the land. I'm not going to lie to you, this game is hard. For example it took over an hour to beat the last Colossus.

There aren't a lot of creatures in this game. It's you, you're horse Agro, a dead girl, and sixteen Colossus that roam. Another great but interesting thing about this game is how you never really communicate with Agro, but you somehow form a bond with him since he's really all that you have.

The graphics may not be the best and sometimes seem a little glitchy, but Artistically this game is unmatched. It really is fun to explore ruins to a lost civilization and wonder why it is that the world in the game is the way it is...

The music is truly the best soundtrack ever put into a game, it has all real instruments which is great for a video game. This soundtrack sounds that of a film! I praise it!

The overall of this game is incredible and that's why I will always support Shadow of the Colossus.

10/10


So the premise is that you play as a character that goes around and attempts to defeat these sixteen colossi in order to save a girl. And that's all he does? Nothing else? Sounds simple, and yet, there is much substance to be found in Shadow of the Colossus. I know this game is older now, but I just got around to playing it about a month ago. I can safely say that this is the best game that I have played all year and the only one that has made me sit down for up to five or six straight hours. Time absolutely flew out the window, that's how captivated and intrigued I was.

You play as Wander, and with your faithful companion and horse Agro, you traverse a vast and beautiful landscape, which is rich with almost every kind of landscape you can think of, and buildings that are marvels of architecture. There are times when all you do is ride for about ten to fifteen minutes, just trying to get to one place. Sounds boring, and believe me, I thought it would be, but it isn't one bit. You'll find yourself just looking around as the scenery changes and even stopping a few times to take a good look around at the marvelous land.

But like I said, the whole objective is seeking out and defeating these sixteen colossi, and that is where the true fun begins. Some are giants (and by giant, I mean like you can barely see their head if you're looking up), some take to the air and some to the sea. No matter the shape and size of the magnificent beast, each one of the battles is breathtaking, and I found myself fighting some of them for an excess of a half hour. It brings the term 'battle' to a whole new level that a video game rarely sees. And because of the story, you'll actually find yourself feeling bad for some of these colossi.

All in all, like I said, the game is incredible. To paraphrase something that another user said, 'if you're a video game fan, you absolutely have to play this game. and if you don't play games, you should still play this game.' It's just an experience that you may not find in a game for a long time.


I can't even begin to explain how amazing this game is, it is beyond words, beyond actions, to explain the precious contents hidden in the case of one of the best games ever made in the entire world.

In all of my years of life, I have not met one person, one living soul that has not liked this game after watching it or playing it themselves.

Yet it all began with me watching my 2 cousins playing it, until I despised it for the playing style and how short it was. It was probably because I was in the middle of my Final Fantasy 8 file and was used to long games. Until I went to their house about a year later and was bored, and decided to play the game to actually feel how it was to play.

I must say it had to be love, I would not put down the controller for anything, not even to watch Full Metal Alchemist at 10:00, I was too concentrated of at the greatness of the game, and the contents it held.

Until I demanded that I borrow the game, I printed out one of the online guides, and played the game all day. For 2 days straight I beat it, after getting about every single fruit and WT lizard that the world could hold, and watched the touching ending that like gasping for breath, and trying to hold back my tears.

But it didn't end there, I did everything there was to do, completed all the time attacks in easy and hard mode, and confirmed the 17th colossi rumor (and btw, it's not real.) It didn't end there either, my cousins were so happy with me that they wanted to borrow my file and show everyone how good I was at the game.

My favorite colossi has to be no.7, the electric eel. I love the water graphics in the game, and the way it moves and how you have to catch onto it's tail. I also love the idea of insignias and the way they look, and how you have to spend breath-taking hours trying to find them, and the colossi acting like a complete idiot trying to shake you off.

But the best thing about this game, is the will and freedom to explore this large and vast land, which takes about 5 hours to cover the entire area, and takes a long time to find all the fruit trees and all the save altars on the way. I would say about half of the area is used for the colossi, the other half is for exploring with your only friend and companion, Agro, the black horse. Be glad that he is with you, for if you would have to travel this land on foot, it would take you about a hour to walk from the top of the map to the bottom, not even thinking about left and right.

This game definitely deserves more praise than people have given it, for it is the best game in the world and got voted 4th on ign.com, (damn that God of War..... DAMN YOU!), but everyone knows, and I know it should of gotten first. So if you find this game sitting alone in EB Games or a movies store, give it a try. You might not like it at first but you will get hooked, like me.


Shadow of the Colossus is one of those games where you can just watch someone else play and have a good time. The person playing will have a good time as well.

As 'Wander', you ride to a forbidden land (with warnings that it is forbidden) and try to save a pretty, dead, brunette girl who is your love. Now, before you all go and say 'Awwwww' I have to say that the story is dark and very gritty. When he gets the hint that he has to defeat 16 giants (the smallest being about the size of a van) to do this, he sets off on this great adventure to slay the beasts.

Seriously, Peter Jackson, we need you to make a movie of this. Itd be awesome.

Slaying these beasts is no cakewalk either... they're all distinct and it takes a fair amount of brainpower to figure them out. Climbing them and slaying them is a whole different story than finding them. It takes about 30 minutes sometimes to roam the landscape to find the next Colossi. So, constant action is a nono here.

It's not for everyone, but a true gamer would really appreciate it.


When I first saw Shadow of the Collosus, my brother had borrowed it from a friend. My brother was battling one of the Collosi and I could not find it in me to tear my eyes away from the screen. It was absolutely HUGE! Inevetibly, my brother bought the game but I was left out as I did not own a PS2 at the time. I have, however, finally been able to play this truly unique game.

When I began play, I immediately noticed one thing. No loading screens as you roam throughout the expanse of this huge world! I had NEVER seen this before. Even the Final Fantasy games, which I consider to be some of the best games ever made, have dozens upon dozens of loading screens, and the area they cover is minuscule in comparison! Next, I noticed how every single part of this game looked like a painting in the making. There was even a time when I HAD to stop while entering a canyon with stormy clouds above. It was simply beautiful.

Also, most of the colossi in this game are simply amazing. My first thought was, "How in the world am I going to be able to beat that!? It's huge!" Finally, my complaints, which are few compared to many other games. (1) Some of this game is fairly choppy. Just watch your character as he runs. It is most likely a side effect of having no loading screens but it still bothered me. (2) Once you are able to get on a Colossi, it is you vs. your grip, rather than the Colossi itself. You would think that they would make a grab at you or something! (3) The camera in this game could drive you absolutely mad! I know that if you hold the right stick in the same position the camera will remain fixed, but try doing that while also holding on to the triangle button, it's nearly impossible! When all is said and done, though, this is definitely a fun game and worth playing through twice, if not several more times afterward. I would not be opposed to a second game as well, especially if the three flaws I stated are fixed.


This is one stunning game. One of the most beautiful, original and amazing experiences i've ever had the pleasure of playing in my entire life. And that's an understatement. Forget everything you've played before- this is a unique experience altogether.

If your'e expecting something like "The Legend of Zelda", then forget it.This is a different type of game than an average adventure game, and if you've the slightest interest in alternative gaming you must give it a go. Granted not everyone will like it, but you have to experience it for yourself- and once your under it's graceful spell it won't let you go. There's no tedious dungeons, no side quests, no missions other than to revive your loved one by defeating some 15 or so giant colossi. Thats it.

There's no rules, no time, no enemies except the ones your'e supposed to face in a world your'e free to explore at your own pace. It's a visual force unlike anything gone before.

Graphics- some of the most beautiful you've ever seen on the PS2. It pushes the hardware to it's limits. Amazing environments.

Gameplay- simple and effective. Straight to the point if you want to progress in the plot, otherwise a virtual world free to roam to your heart's content. And you will be doing this a lot, as the landscapes are are so stunningly rendered- natural beauty unlike anything you've seen before. (Though Ocarina of Time was the pinnacle, SotC turns it up to 11).

Controls- easy to pick up, Simple to master. Does the job.

Colossi- original oddities, unlike anything else. Architecture, animal and landscape environment fused together to make a completely organic creature. Beautifully animated, as is the horse Agro. Oh, and they are HUGE.

Great story and amazing music; epic, tragic, romantic, melancholy, beautiful.

Downsides- the frame rate drops a lot, and it's understandable, the PS2 hardware just can't keep up. But a small price to pay, you get used to it and it doesn't really detract from the game play unless you make it a big issue. I dealt with it and didn't care afterwards.

Other than that small issue, the game is a masterpiece. Art in it's purest sense. I give it 11/10. Period.

You may want to play ICO first as it adds that extra icing that makes SotC experience slightly better, and it ties the games together quite well.


This was a good game, nice graphics and an interesting tale. Maybe it could have used a bit more here or there to spruce it up...maybe a few more characters or something as the game could use some more back story and character development. The game has a young man bringing his deceased loved one to a forbidden valley temple where he is confronted by a voice that tells him of a way to perhaps revive his beloved. He must go out and slay huge beasts which in turn destroys statues that seal this beings powers. So there you have it, you along with your trusty horse must seek out and slay the colossi inhabiting this mysterious valley land. Using the sun to guide you, you track them down using clues given you by the mysterious voice and once you find them you must find a way to climb them so you can find the weak point and bring them down. The fighting is great as it took a bit to figure out what to do here and there, however for the most part I was able to find a way to kill the Colossus without any aid. There were a couple, though, I had to search for the way to kill them on the web. Like I said add some more elements in the valley and this would be really great, because for the most part when searching for the colossi you are simply riding your horse here and there. Still good, but sad.


i got it and when i put it in and it was beautiful the graphics were amazing and searching for the colossus was awesome also the environment was really interactive which was cool the game play was unique and fun and the battles and how you had to find out how to kill them were awesome also the story was the best each colossi was unique and different to kill and the story was a shocker (if you have played Ico then you might have guessed that this game is Ico prequel) this game really pushed the play stations limits though the game is short but it is unforgettable if you have never played this get it and if you have any doubts don't classic 10/10


This game is both a treat for fans of ICO and those who are new to these kinds of games. Don't expect to fight armies, or to even have to defeat a legion of regular enemies (if you've played ICO, you might be expecting to fight off the shadows), but rather a series of Colossi; a being of great power that takes tact to destroy, not random hacking and slashing.

At the beginning of the game, Wander brings a dead girl to a vast, but very much deserted, land and lays her body on an altar. A being named Dormin tells Wander that with the sword he carries, if he can defeat the sixteen Colossi that roam the land, he will be able to bring Mono back to life. He does, though, warn you that the price you pay will be very high, and I will tell you that it is high. However, Wander says that he doesn't care, thus begins your journey to do nothing other than seek out and destroy the Colossi. It sounds simple, but it really isn't. This game will tug at your heartstrings, and the vast, lonely, but beautiful land will leave you awestruck.

The graphics for this game are stunning. In all honesty, I don't think even the PS3 could do much to better this game in terms of graphics! I highly recommend this game. It's simply a masterpiece, and anyone who plays it will feel the same.


Shadow of the Colossus is by far one of the most exhilarating and breath-taking games ever created. It isn't your everyday common shooter, or a repetitive RPG.. no, it's something much different and unique.

I played this game when it first came out to the UK in 2005, and rented it from a local movie store. And at first, it was a very challenging game, and I thought the lack of dialogue might have been a disadvantage.

But no, I was wrong. It was an amazing and epic game. The designs of the colossi are exhilarating, the vast land was fun to explore, the music was incredibly beautiful, the graphics back than were top-notch, the battles were brilliant and fun, and the story was probably the best...

It's a mysterious and quite a sad story, and the ending was unexpectedly tearful, yet wonderfully great! It's left for interpretations, though, but that doesn't bother me one bit.

Of course, the only downfall was the camera and the controlling of Agro haha. Otherwise, perfect. :] This game is one of my most treasured games I own, and probably one of the greatest games I've ever played (And I've played hundreds).

And so, I give it a 9 1/2 of 10. I recommend anyone to play this game, you might even come to love it!


Alright, I just found this game rather bad, and I'm only posting this because I was surprised not to find any other bad comment. And I can't be the only one who doesn't like this game.

First of all, graphics and music are fine, but unless they're awful, I hardly care about these when I'm playing a game. The scenarios and music get old after 5 minutes, and you have to stay there for like 10 hours.

Some people say no enemies beside Colossus makes this unique, I say it makes it boring and it's just the result of a lazy/cheap design. Even the Colossus are basically all the same, and really easy to defeat. I can't think of a way to make this killing Colossus more diverse, but I just believe it's a bad idea to make a game just about that. Oh wait... is not about that, is about looking for them, yes! For every enemy, you will spend about half hour looking for it, and 3-5 minutes to defeat it. Every part of this quest is plain boring and repetitive.

I'm the kind of guy who gets really fanatic with any game and goes around it multiple times, I can't get enough of video games, I never get bored. I must say I couldn't finish this game once. It is the only one game I own, I'm not playing and I haven't finished. And it's 1/10th time consuming of the average game I play... is that boring.

And also, the horse is really stupid.


The Alternate, a story of President's mock-kidnapp that turns into a real hostage situation was aired just recently on nationwide TV here in Czech Rep. I saw it rather accidentally all through to the very end as I really wanted to know if every other minute will be as stupid as all the previous.

The Alternate really does it all, but unfortunately the other way out. All the plot twists (all places tha are supposed to be twists) are really the weakest links - the characters do almost always the opposite of what would any sane person do. The president just sits there (afraid of heights), our main hero makes silly phone calls with FBI in which he only says that he is fine and that he is the guy in the suit, and the bad guy (as well as the good guy) just always miss and in situations that should be filled with action, they just start with lines of stupid chat.

Really nothing in this movie was quite right. The FX were sometimes really silly, the martial fights were oscillating between acceptable quality and total crap and out of the thousands of rounds fired in the movie there is hardly dozen on target.

The act is horrible, but that is mainly due to stupid script and bad direction. You should see this only if you fancy B movies that are so stupid, that you can laugh at them.


When i first saw the movie i couldn't actually determine if it is an action movie or a movie mocking other action movies. I was surprised when they used the ultimate tom and jerry prank were the good guy literally pulled the carpet from underneath the bad guy sending him into a magnificent somersault in the air.

I personally believe that its very naive. there is no plot what so ever. It is a movie about a guy who was so lucky and avoided being killed several times in one day.

The stunts are bad. There was a moment where i could have almost swear that the guy was gonna trip and fall on his face


Warning! Keep a way This movie is a waist of your time and money. I never saw worse acting than this. The effects are ridicules, especially the weapons effects the Special Forces in the beginning of the movie are firing m-16s at the attackers but they seem to hit none, zero then finally they hit the attackers keep in mind that they are using full auto and they are facing each other!!! but the worst scene was when the attackers moved in a small room and the special forces attacked them by entering the room firing rapidly with their m16s and some how they did not hit anyone then the attackers used a smoke grenade to push the special forces outside the small room.


The president of the USA is addressing a charity dinner. Anybody attending is searched for weapons, but they have not reckoned on several of the guests turning up with drinking straw blowpipes that shoot poison-darts disguised as toothpicks at incredible ranges, and with such accuracy that the president's minders get it in the neck every time. What a weapon. I'm going out to buy a packet of straws and a box of cocktail sticks right now, and I'm going to wreak havoc in my neighbourhood.

It's an attempt by sinister forces to get the president re-elected by staging a fake kidnap attempt and have him escape to make himself popular. The president knows nothing about this plot and has a sudden attack of self righteousness, and the fake kidnap attempt turns into a real one.

Eric Roberts comes out of nowhere and does his Die-hard routine. But the difference between Eric Roberts and Bruce Willis as Die-hard is that Bruce Willis actually has a reason to be in the building.

Eric Roberts stymies the kidnap attempt after being shot in the knee, continually whacked by an aluminium pole, scorched with a flame thrower, falling down the side of a skyscraper and again down a lift shaft. He certainly earned the ransom money in bearer bonds that the president said he could keep at the end. But it would have been curtains for Eric Roberts if only one of the villains had thought of puffing a drinking straw at him.

Apart from those few little details this film is perfectly believable.


The original concept, the president sanctioning his own kidnapping to help his popularity, is always an intriguing one. Unfortunately, then finding out that the President didn't authorize anything and that it is the Cia and then not really the CIA and that Eric Roberts is some anti gravity, bullet dodging hero ends any

integrity the movie started out with. Find something else to watch or watch the grass grow. It will provide more entertainment.


Sure Ice-T is cool and Michael Madsen is cool in strange way and Eric Roberts has a cool sister. Unfortunately she wasn't in "The Alternate". I've seen thousands of films and this has got to be the baddest yet, not bad in the good sense, just plain bad. The "action" scenes were among the poorest I've EVER seen, or Eric is just plain good at dodging the several million rounds fired at him. His Glock should be investigated as it held in the neighborhood of 100+ rounds between reloads, perhaps that's why he couldn't hit anything-the thing was too heavy from all the bullets. The director, who's name I choose to forget and I hope Hollywood does likewise, should be given one more chance, to direct a kindergarten play in Spudville, Idaho. I will admit that Eric's use of the action verb "GAACK" several times was one of the thrilling moments of the film, perhaps the apex.


The Alternate (aka Agent of Death) appears to be a take off on a Jackie Chan film. The good martial arts actor declines to use his gun on the moral grounds that he cannot shoot American citizens. The evil martial arts actors uses their guns often, but are very bad shots. The result is a long string of martial fight scenes. In each fight, the good guy is driven from the scene and makes a miraculous return. (This is repeated with several variations). Add to the mix an inpotent SWAT team, bad dialog, and illogical events, and you have a really bad attempt to mimic a Hong Kong martial arts film.

The Alternate would probably do well in the Hong Kong market if the English sound track were dubbed out so the audience would not know how stupid the actors appeared to be. For example, in the midst of a hostage situation, the good guy gets to a telephone and contacts the commander of the SWAT team. Does he tell him how many hostage takers there are? Does he provide information about the condition of the building's security system? Does he report on the President's physical or mental condition? Does the SWAT team leader ask any of these questions? No, he says "Who are you?" and the reply is "I am the guy in the Tux". End of conversation. In none of the scenes that follow is there any further attempt at strategic communication.


Watching Agent of Death aka The Alternate I had the feeling that the movie was going to suck. After all it had a good premise, fake kidnapping of the President goes bad when someone decides to make it real. It also has a cast of famous names, Eric Roberts, Ice-T, and Michael Madsen. Yet the film went direct to video, not a good sign. After watching the film, I know why it went direct to video. The screenplay is filled with terrible dialogue and bad scenes. Several times in the movie, either the bad guy (a bad performance by writer Bryan Genesse) or the hero (a bad performance by Eric Roberts) has an easy chance to kill the other one, but gives it away by talking to them. Ice-T is ok, until his character disappears from the movie right away. Out of the rubble comes the great actor Michael Madsen to save this movie. This might have worked, except they gave Madsen the terrible role of the FBI agent in charge of getting the President back. Madsen is as good as possible, but is given nothing to do. Don't watch this movie.


I got the movie a couple of years ago, on a double pack. It's bad. There's only one good thing about this movie: It's so bad it's funny (for example, the scene with the flamethrower). The plot is OK. It's about presidential elections coming up, and we are introduced to the current president, who wants to win again, but he is quite unpopular. The FBI, or whatever it's called in this movie, try to let everybody think he gets captured, and then gets free again to improve his popularity. But then some terrorists real capture him, and it's up to "The Replacement", or "The guy in the tuxedo" to rescue him.

There are some scenes which are just really stupid, like the scene with the flamethrower, the scene at the swimming pool, the helicopter that crashes, the same car that explodes twice, etc.

The scene with the flamethrower is just hilarious. It begins with some kind of Face Off with the bad guy (played by a certain Bryan Genesse) and The Replacement. First you see The Replacement from a distance. Then it swaps to a closer angle, and you see him closer. It goes to another angle, and then we only see his face. That piece is just unbelievably funny, but you have to see it before you know how funny it is. Then you see this bad guy shoot at The Replacement with a flamethrower, and The Replacement runs through the exact same door 3 times, the only thing that changes is the angle that it's filmed from.

There is also some FBI guy who leads some "special agents" and "tries to rescue the president". Well, actually, he does almost nothing. And those "special agents" are so bad, they're more like random people who volunteered to hold guns.

And what's also really funny is the part where the bad guy falls off the roof. The camera swaps to the FBI guy, who just casually stands and looks a the guy falling from a high rise building.

So, if you want a great comedy, get this movie. But if you want a action movie, don't bother about this one.

2/10


Any fans of unintentionally hilarious action films are in for a treat, this film was a delightful, and I mean DELIGHTFUL piece of cheese.

As I picked it from a bargain bucket there were 3 things I spotted that gave it away; Ice-T for one, the tag line "Kill the president, kill the hostages, escape. A great idea!" which isn't really much of a great idea considering it doesn't mention making it away with millions in bearer bonds, it just promotes violence which is wrong for children, and Eric Roberts' smirking face.

When I sat down to watch it within minutes I was hooked, Ice-T angrily slamming his hands on the table like a bullied 5 year-old, Eric Roberts firing a harpoon into a block of wood, and some INTENSELY bad acting.

The quality in the film only continues to decrease, inexplicable decisions from the bad guy, good guy and a concerned looking Madsen (just watch his face when 3 S.W.A.T. guys plummet from the rooftop...) do nothing to help matters, and neither do the questionable stunt men, plot line, or fight scenes.. or special effects... or dialogue.. actually come to think of it how did this even get made? I propose there is some sort of official ratings board (of which I am a member) that decides if a film should get a stamp of abject disapproval, the likes of which this film thoroughly deserves.

Things to watch out for:

Eric Roberts - Watch this man like hawk. He gets battered by a woman (nothing against women, it just makes it funnier) and his stunt double is NOT CONVINCING.

The Flamethrower Bit - Out of nowhere the main bad guy produces a flamethrower, and just when you think you might get to see Eric Roberts in flames, it produces a measly flame which reaches about 2 feet, not exactly ideal with Roberts at the other end of a 30 foot (at least) corridor.

The Dummies - Two top-class dummy sequences here, the aforementioned S.W.A.T. team receive a spray of bullets from the bad guy with moments of abseiling from a chopper and we get to see 3 very competent looking dummies, twisting and turning the air this way and that.. One appears to have a leg straight out 90 degrees from this body, possibly part of S.W.A.T. training but don't quote me on that

The second dummy sequence is the bad guy's death (not that that can count as a spoiler since it was clearly going to happen, this is the 'Nature of Die Hard' for crying out loud!). This is probably my favourite of the two. It requires THOROUGH analysis with your slow-motion button.

The bad guy falls backwards from the top-floor, but sadly we aren't with him for his whole flight. We catch up with him probably only 50 or so feet from the ground. Looking like a ventriloquist's dummy with a bad wig (even better when you've seen the guy we're supposed to believe it is), it sort of hits the ground and crumples, and for the few bittersweet moments we see the dummy on the floor it looks more like a pile of clothes and hair than anything in the rough shape of a human, bones completely broken or not.

So yeah

Apologies for anyone expecting a proper review I just felt the need GET MY FEELINGS OUT THERE, no matter how incoherent.

10 out of 10!


Eric Roberts and Michael Madsen, wow! This is probably a really exciting, well made thriller...but it isn't at all!! It is one of the very worst movies I've ever seen!

The plot seems interesting for two seconds there but then suddenly Roberts starts pulling a gun and stuff and the movie just keeps getting worse and worse. Roberts being the most pathetic and stupid looking "hero" ever running around like a complete idiot and trying to clean things up while the stupid president is being kidnapped by a wannabe psycho. It doesn't work at all man!!!

The action scenes are so bad edited and directed that I didn't want to agree with what I saw, Roberts getting a iron-stick stuffed into his stomach and banged all over his body too many times don't seem realistic, neither does a jump from a chopper from 30 meters above ground, neither does a safety wire hanging from Roberts' belt on his "super-exciting and super tough" escape from the roof, neither does a over-and-over attempt from Roberts to look where psycho wannabe is standing on the other side of the bathing pool, neither does the extremely dum coffee-idea from Roberts making the terrorist female die from electricity, neither does the car exploding twice cause of bad editing, neither does Madsen's dum performance as the dum negotiater...it doesn't work at all!!

"I know I loved her?" "So why did you kill her?!" This must sincerelly be the worst movie made 4-eva!! In the ending it seems like the makers of the movie thinks they've been making a Oscar-nomination motion picture, with Roberts walking out in the dusty s*it calling himself "the replacement". If you want a really good laugh, this movie is a very good ALTERNATE (title)!! STARS: 1/5 (if zero was possible, this would have been a sure winner of that number)


Fortunately I read the comments on here before viewing this movie and was therefore able to enjoy it purely as the giggle-fest that it is.

The DVD box cover shows a black and white photograph of the Whitehouse, which is also the title screen of the DVD itself. This is only really worth mentioning because the Whitehouse features at no point in the film. This is a clue.

The box also lists its Special Features as Scene selection and Trailer. There is, of course, no Trailer on the disc. This is a clue.

The disc itself is just plain white bearing only the title and certification. This is a clue.

The stunts are laughable, the dummies are appalling (see other comments here for more vivid descriptions of how truly dreadful they are) and continuity errors abound - at one point we see a gun battle from two sides of the same door which has three times as many holes on one side as on the other.

There are many, many flaws in this piece of celluloid nonsense which have been picked apart most ably by others on this site but what truly amazed me was the out-takes at the end which showed what had been taken out but gave no excuses for the ninety minutes which had been left in.


I love action movies. Die Hard, Lethal Wepon, you name it. I would have said exactly the same thing as the previous reviewer. The shootouts were a joke. Why would anyone take the time away from watching their prisoner to drag dead bodies into a helicopter, destroy it and try to get a helicopter to fly away in? He should have just left in the first place.

There must have been 10 million shots fired in this movie. They were all expert marksmen yet no one was ever hit by a bullet.

Not only was Eric shooting at the president who was shielding the bad guy, but he flew Tarzan style across the pool with a gun in one hand shooting as he swung. No aim. How dumb..dumb..dumb.

The actors seemed embarrassed to be in this movie. They should be.


The plot is totally SUPER BOGUS. The action is so awful you'll sleep throuhg it. It's G.I. JOE, fire a 100 shots and still no one's hit. The acting is not even plastic, it's hysterical and pathetic.

The cast made me watch it. BUT 1)Eric Roberts's is a career wasted and the film does'nt add much to it. It even makes you wanna swear you won't watch his movie ever again.

2)ICE T falls asleep in the first half hour and does'nt get up. (Maybe he ran away.)

3)Micheal Madsen looks like he shot for the movie while going for a walk and did it just for the goggles.

Rest of the crew is the hotel staff 9I'm not kidding.)

Save yourselves from it.

I COULD'NT.


I personally was brought up on Mystery Science Theater 3000. In light of that, I have to say that what makes this movie good is the riffability. The plot is weak, the acting's bad, the situations are totally unbelievable. Some highlights include Eric Roberts' constant gasping for air and groaning, the Super Soaker flamethrower, and the bad guy's ability to kick the back of his head.

This movie has terrible editing, terrible action, really crappy fighting. Essentially, it's sheer cinematic punishment. How the bad guy can fling a heavy chain around Eric Roberts' gun holding hand is beyond me. It's not exactly a whip. The reason I don't give character names is because there are none. But I digress. The straw dart guns are fun to watch. Watch for Eric Roberts' sneaker/tux combo when he and his team first enter the hotel. That also leads me to think about the 20 person protest against the President of the United States. What they're protesting, I don't know. It definitely isn't plot-related. Watch for forgotten lines, and this one Secret Service dude who appears in about three other roles. He's kinda overweight with reddish hair.

This movie avoids a 1 rating due to the fact it is so darned funny!

The whole point of getting this turd would be to get in a few cheap laughs. I don't wanna give the other points of hilarity away, but I will say that it is worth the few bucks for a used VHS. Buy it. Take it home. Watch. Laugh and be satisfied.

P.S. Michael Madsen's whole character and his incompetent LAPD is another highlight.


Watch Me When I Kill, or if you like, The Cat's Victims or The Cat With The Jade Eyes is hardly one of the most notable of gialli, enough of a cultish success to get a spiffy looking remastered release in the UK though. I enjoyed it more than the more hardcore giallo buffs seem to have done though it has its share of problems. The film follows Mara, who stops off to go to a pharmacy, but ends up overhearing a killer and thus ends up trying to puzzle out whodunit along with her boyfriend, afraid that she might be in the killers sights. The film moves along for near half its length without really getting into what the deal is behind the killing but director Antonio Bido handles things with quiet style and keeps the film ever watchable, with a sense of mystery that makes the unfolding revelations all the more satisfying. Though in some ways predictable the plot is worked out in solid fashion with a punchy and satisfying finale and while the pace is a bit slow there are enough notable moments to smooth the ride. Murders are fairly few in this one and not gory, the film does however include an absolute rip-snorter of a strangulation sequence, one of the best examples of such slaying I've ever seen in fact. The other kills are nicely done, suspenseful but not spectacular and helped tremendously by an ace, Goblin aping score from Trans Europa Express. The films main drawback is that whilst various elements position it as a giallo the original intention was a serious minded dramatic mystery (the script went through a number of rewrites to make it into a marketable giallo) and so it never really manages to be as tense, twisted or exuberant as the genre calls for. At the same time the giallo stylings dilute the intention of making a more serious film so its more artistic leanings (the odd section set in Padua) end up being fun but out of place. It basically needed a little more on all fronts, more twists, kills and character development. I still had a fine time with it though, Antonio Bido has a good eye and easy command of his art, crafting some cracking moments, and Corrado Pani and Paola Tedesco make for an appealing couple of leads. Though uneven, I was left pretty pleased by the end, it satisfied my craving for some Italian thriller fun pretty nicely. Which is all that counts when it comes right down to it. Far from essential then, but definitely worth at least checking out for genre completists or those particularly curious about it.


I just watched Watch Me When I Kill this evening and found it to be a very good film. This woman stops by a chemist to pick up some painkillers. she is told to come back another day by some voice she hears. the chemist is lying dead in the back of the shop. so she is now involved in a murder case. there were some quite gory senses with throat-slitting, and strangulations, apart from that i found it to be a very good storyline. I though that the director of the film, (Antonio Bido) did i very good job in making the film, i found the storyline to be quite gripping to watch as the story made sense more than some other Italian horrors that i have seen. Good Movie: Recommended


Not the most shocking, nor the most bloody, nor the most stylish of giallo, but it's likable enough and is just that little bit different. Much helped by a very decent performance from Corrado Pani as the cigar chomping guy who seeks to unravel one of the most complicated of tales. Far too many characters and just a few too many red herrings and yet it does keep going and if Paola Tedesco as the female lead does not match the performance of Pani, this may be the fault of the dubbers. Not awash with killings, what there are, are very good. The first one is a bit pedestrian but the fantastic bath scene killing and the one backstage with all the costume are worth the admission price and if the ending is a bit abrupt, it is conclusive and brought a smile to my face. Effective score.


I guess when this was made the director, Antonio Bido, was making a rather valiant attempt to follow in Dario Argento's footsteps. He does manage to succeed on some levels but fails at others. The music in this (by Trans Europa Express) is very much like that of Goblin from Argento's films, and it sounds hauntingly familiar, as in it was lifted almost entirely from "Deep Red" if it's not the same exact music. There's even an attempt to capture Argento's stylishness, but that fails because the film is rather murky and almost grainy at times, unlike the crystal clear work of Argento. Still though, this isn't a bad film, although it's rather typical Italian stuff where you have to pay attention because otherwise you can't keep track of the players without a score card. It begins with a man killed in a pharmacy and a woman who accidentally witnesses the murder and then of course, she's a target. But there are other targets too, and they're all linked to something that happened many years ago, and it's seemingly a series of revenge killings. Overall it's not bad, it's just not top notch stuff. 7 out of 10, recommended for those who like Argento and don't mind "wanna-be's".


I rented this movie and was sadly disappointed. First the print of the DVD was very bad. Okay, so that's not the filmmaker's fault. Fine. Next, the characters were boring and not interesting at all! Usually in a giallo, there are sleazy and/or interesting people. Not here. Secondly, the murders were boring and lacked style. The one thing I will say is that perhaps if I saw a better print of the movie I would have had a better experience. Also, the "raspy voice" of the killer in the beginning was effective. And the whole revelation was pretty plausible for a giallo. Just wait for Blue Underground or someone to put out a better copy.


This, as well as his other masterpiece Solamente Nero, continue a Movie tradition called Giallo in Italy, and at the same time contribute with new and interesting elements. What I like about Bido style is that there is always a subtle comment on something deeper thrown in than just going after the killer, at least in a better way than Bava and Argento might put in if they ever did so. In Solamente Nero, it was about Religion and Guilt. This time is about justice and betrayal. I think this movie works at the beginning as a giallo, and at the end backwards as a vigilante movie, when we realize what the whole thing was about. Another interesting thing about Bidos Gialli is what I would define with a line from an Argento movie: " The fact is that our very lives are governed by dead people". In other words, in Bidos Work, whatever happens in the future, is because the characters could not escape their past. In the end those who do wrong find themselves with only one way out their destiny. Is how they say : " If you want things done right, do it yourself". Chronologically, this is the first movie I have seen with Paolo Malco in it, without the beard and moustache that we saw in Lo squartattore di New York or Quella Villa Accanto di Cimenterio. Franco Citti, a regular in Pier Paolo Pasolinis films, plays the key suspect for the murders, but we only get to see him twice very briefly. Could it be perhaps because such an award winning actor could not stain his reputation doing those vulgar gialli? Do not Know, but while most of the people condemn the acting in this movie, I find him to be the only one to condemn.

The version currently circulating in DVD is dark and grainy, and not to be compared with the one a different company made of Solamente Nero. Everything is anglicized, and I bet you there is also stuff missing. What they should do is to make available in cd this and Solamente Neros sountrack. For locations and sountrack, you leave Bava and whoever else and go Bido. Trans Europa Express sounds both jazzy and progressive, and I am sorry I have not been able to find anything from them yet.

In an interview included as an extra in Solamente Nero DVD, Bido said that he just had finished a Giallo script, and was trying to put it into film. With Argento still working in the genre ( he recently did a real good one called NonHoSonho) I hope it comes back and we have choice other than Scream, the Blair Witch Project and all of those stupid teenager so called " horror" movies.


A series of brutal and bizarre killings takes place.When Mara witnesses one of the murders the black-gloved killer starts terrorizing her-she turns to her boyfriend Lukas for assistance.But will he be able to uncover the culprit before his girlfriend becomes the next victim?Antonio Bido's "Watch Me When I Kill" is an enjoyable giallo,albeit heavily influenced by Dario Argento's works,especially "Deep Red".The film is an above-average effort filled with enough suspense and shocks to satisfy fans of Italian horror.Surprisingly effective murder scenes are another reason to check this film out-in particular,the muder of Fernando Cerulli in a bathtub,set to opera music,would make Dario Argento proud.The performances are pretty good and it's nice to see Fulci's veteran Paolo Malco in one of the main roles.8 out of 10.


The Cat's Victims is reputed to have 'borrowed' all of the elements that have made other Giallos successful. Things such as black gloves, stylish murders, a pumping soundtrack and a gritty look about the film are all present, but unfortunately; so are bad dubbing, terrible acting and a very incoherent plot. Basically, The Cat's Victims is successful for the same reasons that many other Giallos down the years have been successful; but it falls down on things that it could have avoided, given that writer-director Antonio Bido has obviously seen a lot of Giallos prior to writing this one. There's two types of Giallo; namely, urban and rural; and this one belongs to the urban side of the equation. The rural often gives way to more beautiful settings, but the cityscape makes for a better set-up for a mystery. The plot here is muddled, and it follows a young woman who, after witnessing the murderer leave the scene of the crime, finds herself as his next target. Her boyfriend is taking none of this lying down, however, and makes it his business to get to the bottom of the mystery.

One of the most important things about Giallo for me has to be the murder scenes. The ones featured here are very brutal and serve the film well. We get treated to scenes including someone having their face scolded on a hot oven plate, a man being strangled in the bath and a great car park scene. The death scenes are said to take influence from Argento's films, and while none of them are actually the same; the brutality is definitely there. The music for this film is a little over the top and doesn't always fit the scene, but all the same; I quite enjoyed it. It's much heavier than the usual music found in this sort of film, and it actually serves it quite well as the pumping sounds get the heart going, which is generally what you want from a thriller. As for the acting...nobody goes into a film like this expecting greatness on that front, and it's a good job because the acting here is quite rubbish. Of course, the bad dubbing doesn't help matters and it can sometimes be hard to tell which is to blame. Still, if you're a fan of Giallo; this is definitely worth seeing. I'd recommend catching the more highly rated ones first, though.


I was fortunate enough to catch this powerful documentary at the 2004 Hotdocs festival in TO. The film was shot over a period of ten years from 1992 to 2002, and follows a group of Palestinian children as they grow up and turn to violence to guard their refugee camp.

Go see this movie if given the chance. It provides a rare and refreshingly caring glimpse into the personal lives of people usually portrayed as terrorists and monsters. The movie works especially well because the director has a personal relationship with the kids-turned-fighters in the film.

This is not self-indulgent "stick it to the man" left wing propaganda; it's one of the most human films you'll ever see regardless of your political views.

Peace.


The movie was made by Juliano Mer, Arna Mer's son. Arna Mer, a Jewish woman who fought in the 1948 war dedicated her life to helping Palestinian refugees after the 1967 war. Among her feats was establishing a children's theater in the West Bank city of Jenin during the 80s. Using old footage, Juliano Mer returns to the refugee camp after his mother's death and after a devastating Israel Defense Forces operation, to check up on the kids who attended the drama group - Arna's Children, who have grown up under Israeli occupation. Some joined militant groups, went on suicide missions or were killed while defending their home. Though highly political, the film does not take sides and is not dogmatic, just humane and real.


"Arna's Children" is indeed a very powerful movie. The message transcends ethnicity, religion, and class. Arna proved the futility in stereotyping. She showed love and compassion to Palestinian children, not as a Jew, but as a caring and compassionate human being.

Arna and Juliano showed the Palestinian children that if no one else cared, they did. They created the theatre as a positive outlet for creativity and expression. They let the children know that they mattered. Above all, they proved that someone loved them enough to want them to experience the joy and laughter of childhood in the midst of such utter chaos.

To see this movie as glorifying Palestinian militants is to be naive and miss the whole point. What the movie does do is show the ugly and chaotic side of living in an oppressive police state through the eyes of children.

The film brings home the detrimental aspects of how one often reaps what they sow when using violence and oppressive force to solve problems. It reminds us of how today's feeble and fearful child too often goes on to become tomorrow's angry and militant young man.


I saw this movie over 2 years ago, and it still sticks in my memory as one of the best, most shocking, most eye-opening movies I've ever experienced. A movie that makes you smile, and even laugh for a moment, and makes you choke with tears the next,a mesmerizing movie that shows how, even some Israelis, who choose to see the reality as it should be seen, turn against their government for its brutal and discriminating acts against the Palestinians.

But, the more important point I could see is that how the atrocities of the occupation turn the Palestinian people from ordinary citizens into militants. Normal people who, after facing the unimaginable from the occupation forces, decided that the best thing they could do was joining the armed conflict against the occupation. I know many people would argue about how Palestinians are terrorists and some such crap, but the point is: Who started it all? Before you judge someone for carrying out a bombing, you have to first put yourself in his shoes, and picture yourself carrying a 10 year-old bleeding, lifeless girl.

One of the things that stuck in my head is something Arna said at the beginning: There's no peace without freedom. No peace without freedom.


"Youssef died in Israel", states the Narrator. What the Narrator doesn't say is that poor Youssef was a suicide bomber, who didn't simply die - his death was incidental to his mission - to kill as many innocents as possible. Not innocents, you say? Occupiers...and therefore deserving of death? This seems to be what the Narrator, the director Juliano Mer Khamis, says. But once he starts down this evil road - that the Oppressed are allowed to kill their Oppressors, as well as their innocent family members - he loses legitimacy. And he does make this statement when he portrays these poor Palestinian Arabs as the Noble Oppressed and the Israeli army as the Faceless Evil. But it's not so simple as this; there's evil and good on both sides and the Palestinians have no monopoly on sadness, injustice, or fear. He of course has no responsibility to make a balanced portraiture. But let's call this film what it is - a propagandist recruiting film for Palestinian militants.

That this film has won some minor awards is testament only to political correctness - and the kind of political correctness that is merely a fashion. The film is poorly shot, with terrible sound and a haphazard story. Lucky for the director that Arna and the three children died or he'd have no film at all. (Was he really sad when he stood over Arna's lifeless body? To me he seemed to be acting; perhaps he was thinking about his acceptance speech for the Czech One World Film Festival - whatever that is).

I'm sure that the director gets a lot of pats on the back about his "brave" film. Too bad.


Hello I am a fan of this series and as they are not releasing it on DVD, was wondering if anyone has copies of all the episodes they produced and are willing to trade for something? I am based in the UK.

I briefly got a glimpse of an episode in the UK but sadly missed all the others, can somebody help please?

I love Lexa Doig and think the other characters are cool.

The 70's series was good for it's time but we live in the modern world and time/technology has moved on and its seems very dated to me today.

Thanks in advance.

Roger


Oh dear, what an extravaganza in over acting. The characters have a depth a puddle wouldn't envy, and the cringe factor was of the chart. There was no interaction between the characters other than the lines they had been given. The opening scene started with the FBI saying that the CI 5 boys were the best. When has the FBI ever said such a thing, I could only imagine their bravado shrinking into non-existence. I am not comparing this series to the old professionals as I don't think that is fair. My recollection of the old Pro's could be tainted with the passage of 25 years. However I fear that the great writing of Brian Clemens has been turned into a poor directorial debut of someone who should go back to children's programming. The chief then ended the scene with a pathetic excuse for a salute to George Cowley, well you might as well carry the unbelievably to the end. Don't waste your time if you want to be entertained.


A classic of French pre-War cinema, Carnival in Flanders by the great Jacques Feyder is the most devious and cruel satire you might ever come across. Set in early 17th-century Flanders, which had previously been under Spanish rule, the story opens with shots of a busy village preparing for the yearly carnival, when the news break that the Spanish Duke Olivares and his troops plan to stay in town. At the prospect of looting and raping militia men, the flabby mayor of the well-to-do provincial nest called Boom volunteers, as he puts it, "to sacrifice" himself: his plan to pretend he has just passed away, thus hoping to convince Olivares to bypass the mourning town, is eagerly adopted by his timorous menfolk. But while the males go about staging the mock funeral, the women, led by the mayor's energetic wife, take over the action and, in turn, decide to "sacrifice" themselves to the soldiers. What follows is a grand tale of sexual libertinage and deception with a "happy end" of sorts where virtually no-one is redeemed. (The original title, La Kermesse héroïque, literally The Heroic Fête, operates in much the same way as Milos Forman's early satirical masterpiece, The Fireman's Ball, 1967, and the parallels are numerous; no doubt Forman had taken a second look at Feyder's Kermesse during his studies.) What immediately strikes one today is Feyder's directness in exposing his characters' human flaws, which is hardly subdued by the general satirical tone. The way adultery, homosexuality and eroticism but also greed, cowardice and deceit are depicted leaves one speechless at times, and certainly wondering how political correctness and all sorts of profit policies and conservatisms have infested modern-day cinema to a point it would no longer dare think to produce anything like this. Not to speak of the 1930s Hollywood counterparts, for which Feyder would have been light years off the mark, proving the point that there was and still is such a thing as the "French cultural exception". Apart from the latent debauchery creeping out into the open from the cozy interiors of a model town, the film also has multiple strings of side puns that keep its pace up at all times  from spot-on character studies (the mayor, the artist, the butcher...) to hysterical history sidekicks (using a fork for the first time, Spaniards wondering what "beer" is, impious remarks on Dutch painting...). Most strikingly, it is a hallucinatory mockery of the Dutch and their supposed idiosyncrasies: avarice, Protestant pragmatism, self-righteous "middle-class" rule, bogus worldliness, you name it. This goes to such an extent that it has been repeatedly claimed that Feyder had intended an allegory of the Dutch's collaboration with the German occupier in WWI  and from today's perspective, one is tempted to grant it visionary power as well, since substantial parts of the Flamish-speaking population of Belgium were eager supporters of Nazi rule. This assumption makes sense once you've witnessed the cold-blooded irreverence and unmasked sarcasm Feyder uses to unmask his species, which is surpassed only (in literature) by the untouchable Molière. Clearly, all formal issues had to serve this main objective  the Vaudeville acting, the picturesque film set, the matter-of-fact filming, and not least the purpose-built dialogues. So, although you should not expect a formidably audacious experiment in film-making, you will be treated a deliciously immoral chamber piece on sexual banter and other not so politically correct behaviour. Released in 1935, it is also a cruel reminder of how conservative the world  and its cultural output  has become as of late.


"Carnival in Flanders"

This a clever, charming film that depicts the womenfolk of a Flemish village winning over Spanish invaders. The mayor's wife rallies the women to use all their power and resources to seduce the Spaniards--and it works!

There are some very funny moments involving the vigil for the "deceased" mayor (especially when the court midget blackmails him). Most films about the 17th Century are pretty stodgy, but "Carnival" is delight.

I recommend this film.


After sixty years what is still most striking about this film are the evocations of Flemish Art from the opening scene in a market place crowded with Brueghel figurines to the subsequent groupings of the good burghers of Boom in the style of Rembrandt and the Rubenesque womenfolk. Charles Spaak turned in his usual reliable script and Jacques Feyder filmed it more than competently with his wife, Francoise Rosay in a key role. Louis Jouvet is the class act, not unusually but the plot is a little creaky - it failed as a Musical on Broadway in the early fifties where it played under the title Carnival In Flanders and left in its wake an enduring standard 'Here's That Rainy Day'. Certainly worth another look.


This just might e the smartest black comedy (that is a matter of opinion ever made) right up there with Reoir's The Rules of the Game. A female empowerment movie, in a way it reminds one of the movie adaptation of "The Women" with bigger ideas on its mind. Made in 1935, and hailed by all critics as one of the greatest movies ever made, a position it would hold through the fifties, it is a deceptive little tale about the cowardice of men and the bravery of women. The last time the French came through, the little town of Flanders was rampaged ad plundered. News comes again that they are coming through, and the men panic, quiver and run for cover. It is the women who think up the plan to save the city As, I said smile, but very funny with the undercurrent of male an female dynamics underlining every line, phrase and action in this treat. To sum it up, it can be said that the old adage, "Behind every great man is a great woman" a perceptive and illuminating proper edifice.


"Julien Breughel" is called "Jean Brueghel" in other reports of the film. I think that he must be Jan Brueghel the Younger. That real-life painter was the son of Jan Brueghel the Elder. He would have turned 15 in the year the film was set. The Duke mentions Jan's father's painting to Jan.

Jan lived in Antwerp at this time, I think. Boom seems to be a Flemish town close to Antwerp.

The Dutch (at least in Holland) were neutral and not invaded during the First World War. So erniemunger's comment about Dutch collaboration during that war seems wrong. Belgium was neutral until it was invaded. Perhaps the commenter meant "Flemings" when he said "Dutch" (I know nothing about any such collaboration: I'm not making an accusation).


A fun and charming film, but pretty forgettable. I watched it as the first part of a double feature (the second film being Mildred Pierce), and I hardly remember a thing about it. The story concerns the people of Flanders who have to deal with a Spanish invasion (the year is 1616). They are peaceful people and the Spanish are not. The mayor and other regents of the city are sure that there will be rape and bloodshed everywhere. Most of them want to flee. The mayor's wife and the other women don't like their husbands' cowardice. They try to think of a way to avoid violence. When the Spanish arrive, the men are mostly hiding and the mayor is playing dead. The women charm them. The Duke of the Spaniards is attracted to the mayor's wife. Meanwhile, there's a cute little love subplot between an artist and the mayor's daughter. Her father wants her to marry a man of higher class, but her mother perfectly loves the romantic artist. Through the film, she contrives a way for the two to get married without the mayor's approval. There are many better films to search out and watch, but if you think you've seen everything else, I guess this is okay to see. 7/10.


I remember this TV production well. Even in black and white, it was a magical show. The cast was perfect. The songs are all outstanding. The duet with Patrice Munsell and Vic Damone of "It Might Have Been" is really terrific. The whole cast was just right. There have been other musical versions of "Christmas Carol" but this is definitely the best. The story was narrated by the Four Lads as a group of carolers with the excellent song, "Stingest Man In Town".I am lucky to have the cast recording on an LP and also the stage script with the music. Both are real treasures for me. Many of the old TV shows are making their way to DVD now and this is one that definitely should be released on disc. While the cartoon is nice, it just does not hold the magic of the original live broadcast. This is one of my fondest memories of Christmases long ago.


In my senior year of high school (1974), we produced this musical. Ummm, yours truly played Scrooge. I had the LP of the original cast recording, but I'm too young to have seen the B&W original live action production on TV (I agree with the other posters who state that the animated version was disappointing compared to the live action production.

Please let me know when and how a DVD or download of the original B&W live action production of "The Stingiest Man in Town" becomes available.

Thank you, Steve Marcus semarcus1@yahoo.com


I bought the recording in 1956 and have been playing it every Christmas since. I still get goose bumps when I hear the wonderful duet "It Might Have Been" and the song with the lyric "every man shall be my brother" Unfortunately my copy is getting a bit worn and I would like to secure another copy. If only they could show it again or provide a video of this program, but Alcoa has refused to do so. The music is so festive and cheerful that it makes me feel happy over the holiday season. I would like to correspond with others who appreciate this program. Basil Rathborn was magnificent as well as Patrice Muncel. The Four Lads were also outstanding.


This production, and the wonderful music from it, was an important part of our family's Christmas tradition for many years-until the Long Play records were finally broken by one of the grandchildren. Although the story line was obviously very familiar, the stage craft and music gave new life to Dickens beloved Christmas tale. The casting was truly inspired -with Basil Rathbone the best of the lot. The original musical score was extremely clever and well done by some of the best artists (both from popular and classical venues)of that time. It's a shame that a video reproduction of performance is not readily available in tape or compact disc form. It would be wonderful if I could purchase a copy of the record of the musical score or if someone could burn a compact disc from a copy and allow me to purchase the same. Thanks very much.


I've been a fan of John Dye, since his performance in Touched By An Angel on TV and when Once Upon A Christmas first premiered on family channel it looked like a charming Christmas movie. Kathy Ireland's role as the younger daughter of Santa Claus was touching and sweet. What can one expect from two talented stars this movie is about the power of having faith again in the Christmas spirit and at an hour and 30 minutes it's enjoyable without being overdone.

Christmas is about to be canceled because there's a majority of children out there who have been more naughty then nice and Santa Claus (Campbell) is deciding to go away on vacation putting his oldest daughter Rudolfa (Haskell) in charge. However his younger daughter Kristen (Ireland) doesn't like that plan one bit, she makes a deal with dad that if one family's name is returned to the "nice list" then Christmas will go on as planned.

But the task is more challenging than ever because the family chosen is the Morgan clan Kyle (Kirk) & his sister Brittany (Prout) are two spoiled brats because their father widower & workaholic Bill (Dye) is always too busy. Then there's Uncle Johnny (Yorke) who is goodhearted but not the ideal guardian. Once she becomes the nanny the two siblings try everything in their power to get rid of her. During a vacation mostly to do with work the car breaks down and they're stranded at an old house in the middle of nowhere. They try to make the most out of this holiday soon everything begins to change not just in the kids but in Bill whose fallen in love Kristen.

When Rudolfa's plans to stop Christmas goes out of control Kristen will make the ultimate decision for the family she loves.

filled with heartwarming moments and romance Once Upon A Christmas is the ideal holiday movie.


In this movie we meet Kristen (Kathy Ireland) who is the daughter of Santa Claus. And when Kristen, her father, and other magical creatures begin the Christmas season with the reading of the naughty and nice list things don't go well. After seeing that there are more people on the naughty list than on the nice list Santa loses hope in mankind, so he decides to quit. Kristen makes a deal that if she can get one of the families back on the nice list then it will prove that there is hope for mankind and Santa won't quit, but she has to do this before midnight on Christmas Eve so she has to work fast. She soon comes into the lives of the Morgans. As the father is a workaholic, his son is always in trouble, his passed-wife's brother has no job so hes staying with them, while his daughter is more like an adult than a kid. So now Kristen's got her work cut out for her. As she starts getting closer to success her older sister Rudolfa (Mary Donnelly-Haskell) is trying to stop her so she can take control of Christmas and ruin it forever. Soon Kristen starts to realize that everything isn't as easy as she thought it was in the beginning and will soon learn the one part of the Christmas Spirit that she never knew.

This is a fun movie to watch with your family especially on Christmas. It can truly get you into the Christmas Spirit.


This one's good for young, unsuspecting children at best.

But any other age group would find this movie poorly made and actually pretty atrocious. It's so bad, that it's laughable. Everything from the acting to the special effects to even some of the scenery is quite sub-par. I'll admit, the plot had some degree of potential, but all of the aforementioned qualities made this movie one for the birds.

Though some may be able to, it would still be beyond me if you can somehow see through these disastrous details into its "warm-hearted cuteness." Call me a "Grinch", but I still stand by the fact that this is definitely one holiday movie you could go without.


You've heard of "King Midas In Reverse"? Kathy Ireland is Orson Welles in reverse - meaning to say the swimsuit model-cum-actress-cum-designer-cum-Christian's never done a movie as BAD as her debut ("Alien From L.A."). "Once Upon A Christmas" continues this tradition, though not alas for lack of trying.

This TV movie is based on the premise that Santa Claus has become disillusioned with his day job, what with so many naughty people in the world and anti-Kringle websites ("Jingle bells, Santa smells..."); but his good-hearted daughter Kristin (Kathy, but who else?) still feels there's a chance for December 25, so she agrees to try and change the mind of the Morgans, with the future of Yuletide at stake. But the father (John Dye) is business-minded, his children are avaricious and intent on getting rid of every potential substitute mum, and their uncle (Wayne Thomas Yorke, in the movie's best performance) is hardly the ideal guardian. Plus our heroine's sister is little more than the Grinch in human form...

All of which could, in better hands, have proven to be a decent little seasonal movie; it certainly has good intentions on its side, and isn't too shameless in its pitch for the "Touched By An Angel" audience (I knew John Dye had been on it, and I bet myself that Kathy had also been alongside Roma Downey at one point. I was right). But better writing and directing (Steven H. Berman and Tibor Takacs respectively) would have helped, with the amusing earlier scenes at the North Pole wiped out by the poorly handled climax; decent special effects - Kathy's sleigh ride makes "Superboy" look good - and child actors who can actually act wouldn't have gone amiss either. For a movie that's supposed to be about restoring the Christmas spirit, this is fairly low on spirit itself; it's never really as heartwarming as it should be, and depressingly short on humour as well (the villain gets surprisingly little time, with the emphasis on the family).

Kathy Ireland is, however, endearing (as well as looking a treat throughout - as the credits point out, "Special Thanks to The Kathy Ireland Signature Collection"), and the movie is more bearable than "Ernest Saves Christmas" or the "Miracle on 34th Street" remake. It would be nice to think that the sequel ("Twice Upon A Christmas") is an improvement, but I'm not holding my breath. (For those wondering why this is good for royalists, a certain Edward Wessex is one of the executive producers. Well, he has to do something...)


With all the great Christmas movies out there's no need to suffer through this one. This movie has cheap production values / special effects. The formula script show what a severe lack of good writers there are in this industry. Winter storm on que, deserted house, gimmie a break! The John Dye character was married , blessed with two children and yet gets a second chance at happiness. His brother-in-law Uncle Johnny is a bum. We know this because the writers have made him chubby and he wears glasses. WHAT STEREOTYPING. He's not worthy of having Kathy Ireland's character fall for him. The script would have been much better if Kristin and Uncle Johnny are the couple. Finally the happy ending managed by Kristin is ripped off from an old Xena episode. Go rent Miracle on 34th St.


I doubt if the costuming involved in this movie fooled anyone for an instant. Mary Pickford is clearly Mary Pickford. But she was playing a role and the audience of the time -- and I -- have no problem accepting her in the part of a boy, any more than I have a problem with the fact that Peter Pan is invariably played by a woman. I think she is perfect in the role.

This is a warm and funny version of the story, enlivened by Miss Pickford and a wonderful supporting cast, including Claude Gillingwater as the grouchy earl, D.W. Griffith regular Kate Bruce as an old apple seller and Mary Pickford as Fauntleroy's mother. People may have trouble with the sentimental story and tone, but if you accept the tale then you should have no complaints as to its manner of telling. Again, I have no problem with the story and think it compares favorably with the sound version produced by Selznick fifteen years later. True, no one can top C. Aubrey Smith as a grouchy English aristocrat, but Freddy Bartholomew was always annoying as Fauntleroy -- or, indeed, as anything.

No discussion of this movie would be complete without mentioning cameraman Charles Rosher's wizardry. There is a wonderful shot as Pickford as Fauntleroy kisses Dearest on the cheek, done so casually and effortlessly as to make it easy to miss; but it took 18 hours to film correctly. We are also confronted with the fact that Pickford as Fauntleroy seems to be about four and a half feet tall. Miss Pickford was a short woman, but she was a lot taller than that. Fans of the LORD OF THE RING trilogy are doubtless now familiar with the idea of forced perspective and doubled sets; but to watch the results done in 1921 without computer aids, optical printing or computer effects to aid the process and you will begin to get an idea of what a genius Rosher was.

My warmest thanks to the fine people at Milestone for producing this DVD release. The story is that Miss Pickford was going to have her pictures destroyed at her death because she felt that time had passed them by. She was talked out of this fancy. We can only be glad.


Mary Pickford, perhaps the biggest star of all time, stars in two roles in this funny and charming version of the classic novel about a New York City boy who becomes an English earl.

Although the 1936 talkie version is better remembered, Pickford is just wonderful as 12-year-old Cedric Errol and little boy in curls (get it?) who is transported to a world of huge castles and a grumpy old grandfather. Pickford also plays Cedric's mother (on 6-inch stilts) and is charming as the adult.

The trick photography (this is 1921, remember) is flawless and allows Pickford to play both parts in several scenes without even a hint of how they did it. Just amazing. Pickford often played dual roles in her films (Stella Maris, 1918) and it seems she could play just about any part.

The most beloved star of her era (or any era for that matter)--bigger than Fairbanks, Chaplin, or Swanson--Mary Pickford charmed audiences for more than 25 years in well over 250 films as the essence of joy, humor, and high spirits. and Little Lord Fauntleroy is one of her best! Claude Gillingwater is the old earl, Kate Bruce in the apple vendor, Rose Dione is the fake wife, and Joseph Dowling as Havisham.

The film was co-directed by Mary's brother, Jack Pickford.


After you get used to the idea of the then 29 year old Mary Pickford playing a boy, you'll find this silent film is a classic in its own right. Miss PIckford also plays the lads mother incorporating techniques quite clever for its day. Tricks like forced perspective, over-sized sets, and double exposures that reportedly took many hours to film to get it right. The sentimental story's acting is superb all around and encompasses quite a bit of humor as well as drama. The sets are very good and it's amazing how Miss Pickford acts a bit naive like a young boy would but full of genuine heart and compassion for others. Claude Gillingwater is excellent as the cantankerous Earl who sends for the American boy who he had disowned because his late son had married a American commoner. Also excellent is Joseph Dowling as the Earl's lawyer who handles his affairs including being the bearer of bad news. The film has been restored by the Mary Pickford Foundation and a very nice orchestra soundtrack was added in recent years. It all adds up to a timeless movie fill of charm and it's easy to see why Mary Pickford was a superstar in her time. Another note: She became so popular that she formed her own company and along with others like Charlie Chaplin was a founder of United Artist which is an organization of independent film companies.


I have a very good idea how the double exposures were created: Mary Pickford must have been photographed with her body covered in a black body stocking for both of her roles, and then two doubles - one of which may have been Mary's sister Charlotte - were photographed in costume. Then the footage of Mary's head was composited into the scene on the bodies of both doubles. No wonder it took hours to photograph the double exposures: the optical printer as we know it today had not yet been invented, and it had to be done by hand, which took longer than it would have done today with a digital compositor. Therefore, it would have taken a full working day to get the scenes shot and to get them to composite properly together.


I liked the show and wished it could of lasted longer than it did, although I suppose it is a miracle that such a high styled campy escapist detective show like this would even have been revived in the mid-Nineties and went for 27 episodes! In the Fifties to the Seventies this sort of entertainment designed for the small screen went over reasonably well, but now I suspect that there are more humorless TV viewers than ever who possess little patience and even less appreciation of anything with a sense of old school style and flair that BURKE'S LAW had in abundance. Such folks enjoy formulamatic fare like the nightly news, Fox News and CSI and a million copycat shows, they don't and won't try to get something like BURKE'S LAW, which is too bad...

Such easy to understand and digest TV shows around at the same time like MURDER SHE WROTE and MATLOCK were designed to appeal to similar tastes, but with BURKE'S LAW you had to have a more fine tuned appreciation of wit, well timed sarcasm and style plus a tongue in cheek sense of humor to fully appreciate the gifts and sheer force of personality and presence that Gene Barry brought to the screen in his role and to enjoy the campy proceedings at hand. Despite being at the helm of other successful series and in many films, Gene Barry IS Amos Burke, he owns that role!

If you are reading this, then chances are you already know about the original BURKE'S LAW and what it is about, and as others have already written about how the storyline was updated for the 1990's. On this 1990's version, Burke was still as sharp as ever, big name guest stars abounded just like in the Sixties, and for a little while CBS looked like it had showcased a nice revival of a classy Sixties favorite to its lineup. Too bad they didn't order another season


STAR RATING: ***** Saturday Night **** Friday Night *** Friday Morning ** Sunday Night * Monday Morning

Josh Randell (Norris) is in charge of a security at the casino owned by his adopted Jewish father and his wayward son, collecting small debts and taking care of trouble-makers at the casino. But now he faces a new threat in the shape of Romandy (Peter Cavanaugh) a small time gangster's son who wants to take over the casino. When the family refuse to hand it over, Romady turns nasty and Randell is left to take his adopted sister and his lover on a wild journey across the mean streets of Hong Kong in a desperate struggle to stay one step ahead of danger.

In the very early 80s, a little while before Schwarzenegger/Stallone and a good while before Seagal/Van Damme, Chuck Norris enjoyed a period where he was pretty much the number one name in action movies. But they stuck to a pretty repetitive formula and one movie was pretty interchangeable from the other. This would be one such movie, only, as other reviewers have noted, with an even more wooden performance from the lead star. But there's some good kung fu action on display, an appropriately drawn theme tune and a pretty neat revenge theme running through it, so it's one of his better ones. ***


I saw this movie on TV a LOOONG time ago, and the other day I just kept thinking of this Chuck Norris flick where there was a fight scene where it was nothing but silhouettes in a neon light background on a staircase. After flipping through my uncle's VHS collection, I find this! You gotta love the old Chuck Norris flicks; he was what Steven Segal and Van Damme were in the 90s in the 70s and 80s. We see a 'Godfather-type' theme here, it gives for a decent plot for a bare bones martial arts action movie...and Chuck Norris delivers. It's a shame what he's become, because he was just RAW! An all around enjoyable old school action film. Anyone looking for anything else that what's being presented here is just misguided.

*** out of **** stars.


This film kicks and punches. I have seen a lot of action films, and this one has the best direction for action sequences. The karate is just excellent, the one scene with the neon lights with the two dark combatents is way cool. The big man fight is interesting, and the story melts well with the action. This movie is about the action. The scene with the toilet almost killed Chuck in real life.