Imagine my surprise and my glory when I saw this puppy at my local blockbusters, having appeared out of nowhere. I was excited about this all last year because it was a collection of B-movies star to make you proud. Don Wilson, Cynthia (Jubblies! I like the Jubblies!) Rothrock and Lorenzo Lamas. Unfortunately it ended up being standard Don fare with a ludicrous plot about a virtual reality fighting game that goes haywire and in essence is an excuse for loads of fights. The fights are very routinely done and Don Wilson continues his annoying trend of pulling his punches and forcing out the choreogrpahy slowly and without timing. I have never seen him look lightening quick in a film. Granted I have not seen all his movies but for a legendary kick boxer her certainly looks like he can't fight when it comes to his movies. Dan Mayid, who plays his son in this film puts him to shame and looks like he could have a bright future as an action star, he is certainly a better actor than his mentor. Mayid was interestingly enough cast at a marital arts convention. He is a big fan of Don, he showed him a few moves and they cast him as his son. Great stuff.

Problems in this film arise because there are loads of fights and most are from Don, while Mayid and the other leads have a lot less to do. Rothrock has one fight which is good and she still kicks but like the best of them, whilst showing her ample jubilee off in a cleavage boosting low cut dress. Lorenzo has a brief bit but he is essentially a cameo part, which is a shame because he is the best actor of the lot, by far. I'd have preferred him in the lead because he fights better than Don. The film is still reasonably fun though because it is so cheesy and they have some clichéd and hokey drama in it that is so badly done you can't help but laugh.

The film also features a score from Vince DiCola responsible for two scores I loved in the 80's in Transformers and Rocky 4, however this is not 80's style and his score is mostly generic, aside from some moments that have the Vince pazzazz. Overall this film has great curiosity value but for those expecting something great, you'll be disappointed. It was a fairly ambitious idea for a Don film but is letdown by poor execution on most parts. Only Rothrocks boobies and the potential of Mayid (An amazing athlete, and young enough to develop into at least an acceptable actor)make this worthwhile but that's about it. **


This movie is kung fu crap.It's campy,corny,cheesy,and just appalling.Anyone who can enjoy the random,badly choreographed,slow paced,ridiculously amateur martial arts fight scenes is clearly off their rocker.The storyline screams bad and the plot barely progresses at all.The unbelievable cheesy storyline involves a martial arts student receiving a video game from his grampa in which he and his father get sucked into they then realize that in order to escape they need to beat all of the fighters in the game.Wasn't this on an episode of something like Kim Possible.Hard to believe but the film actually started out OK but after 15 minutes the film becomes a steaming pile of crap.The dialogue is like taking the dialogue from the Mortal Kombat Films,Power Rangers,3 Ninja's,and the English dubbed version of Japanese anime Naruto and creating a hybrid of them all.Don The Dragon Wilson sucks at acting just like the entire cast of this brutally corny film.Stay as far away as you possibly can from this direct to DVD piece of garbage rent something better instead don't waste your time.


Please do not blow your money on this DVD, I should have just tuned into the science fiction channel instead of wasting my time on this low grade soap opera disguised as a science fiction movie. Mediocre plot, terrible fight sequences, horrible acting. Don "the dragon" Wilson seemed like he needed a few more lessons, along with his son Brad Tanaka. Dan Mayid was more of a spoiled child than a convincing actor. The cast seemed like a failed attempt to reunite actors who were prestigious martial artists, but lacked a flow.

Overall, don't expect much. If you view it as a cult-comedy, you may have a better time sitting through it.


Don "The Dragon" Wilson stars as Jack Tanaka a father of a teenager who goes inside a video game to save his son from a virus which controls his mind. Along the way Wilson is helped by fellow fallen action stars Cynthia Rothrock and Lorenzo Lamas. You would think a movie with so many trained martial artists, in a video game plot which would be nothing but wall to wall fights would be at least mildly diverting campy fun, and if made ten years ago you would be right. X-Treme Fighter is the pits. A movie so bad that it makes one pine for the days of Expect No Mercy, Arcade and Virtual Combat. Indeed those three movies I often sited as the worst examples of said genre where "Guy ends up playing video game in real life when game comes alive." but next to the really lame X-Treme Fighter, these come off as the work of Tron or Dreamscape. It's a really awful picture. Starting with the fight sequences, the video game itself has nothing that would indicate that it takes place in a video game world, outside of the phony costumes. The fight sequences are all very badly staged, for a movie featuring so many martial artists, all of them past their expiration date, don't put out any effort to indicate that anyone choreographed these fights without anything but the least amount of effort. The plot element ripped off from hundreds of movies is derivative and ridiculous. However that's not what bothered me. What bothered me was the complete lack of effort in giving us enjoyable villains, a charismatic hero and indeed intense fight sequences. In a film where the fighting is the main point such must be done well. It isn't here. Lorenzo Lamas has hardly any screen time, Cynthia Rothrock doesn't fight and basically this is a replay of Virtual Combat. A replay that is much, much worse.

1/2* Out of 4-(Awful)


Story in short - old man wants to train fbi agents, buys gamecube, puts sticker over said gamecube and turns it into a powerful combat training game.....WHICH GOES BAD! Bad story, half arsed effects and crap choreography aside this isn't a bad film. If you should think that there is anything besides those three points. Well, there is some quality face-pulling.

The only reason i would give this a two is because its so bad its laughable, and the monkey ninja is hilarious in the fact he doesn't actually do anything other than hop about like a monkey. On the floor. I could get a 9 year old to do just as good a job, and he'd probably do it with more gusto.

In summary, rent/buy if its amazingly cheap (like a quid) or you really have nothing better to do. If you like Forbidden Warrior, you'd probably sit through most of this without laughing. I send out my pity.

Go see Kung Pow or Shaolin Soccer instead. Now.


Having knowing some of these people IRL and having taken karate, I really have to fault the director for this one being bad. All of these people are capable of putting better than blue-belt level fights and acting better. It was a nice treat seeing Danny Mayid do his form at the end, it's just a shame he couldn't come out of his shell anymore in his intro film. It looked like a safe, conservative karate movie where the insurance didn't cover the level of fights that people expect. I've seen better in karate class and on demo teams.

Sorry if I offended any of the actors with this, because this was clearly not their fault.

-James


Widowed father Jack Tanaka (Don 'the Dragon' Wilson) feels that his son Brad is drifting from him. After catching his son drinking one sip of beer at a party, he grounds him for a week. The grandfather makes a custom virtual reality game in hopes of bringing the father and son closer together again. But when Brad get stuck in the game Jack has to follow him in and save him. No, it's not a exceptionally good film, but what the hell were you thinking when you rented a film starring The Dragon? Hamlet? I didn't think so. If you like Don, you probably will like this one , all others steer clear.

My Grade: D+ (would be higher if it didn't have the Monkeyman in it)


i'm really into war films but this has to be one of the worst. i think Oliver Stone should stay clear of war films. he just doesn't make them well. Platoon isn't a favourite of mine either even though its rated high. Oliver Stone did make Platoon pretty well though but it doesn't even close to Apocalypse Now, Saving Private Ryan or We Were Soldiers.

i think Tom Cruise did a half decent job of an injured war veteran that has been rendered to living in a wheel chair. Tom Cruise really is a fantastic actor but i didn't feel for him as much in this.

the film is really showing its age too. films like Apocalypse Now still looks absolutely fantastic even today but every time i give born on the fourth of July another try it gets worse.

you should watch this film if your a war fan because its not a rubbish film but you will agree with me that its no way as good as other war classics

i really have no idea why this film won 2 academy awards either. there was nothing special that stuck out of the film that made it worthy of two academy awards........ 4/10.......j.d Seaton


No, this isn't THE next big swedish movie. If you are looking for something like Lasse Hallström's "My life as a dog", you better keep looking. The script is poor, the characters are heavily undeveloped and the cinematography is full of clichés. This movie gets a 3/10 only because of Esa Vuorinen's photo (superb) and Nadine Kirschon's debut as the young sister.


This is another one of those overly contrived "Geeks overcoming odds to become hero" hollywood-ish story.

This theme has been played to death. It is nothing more than another left wing ideology with the weak overcoming the strong. Anders (Jacob) is the typical king of dweebness. He lust after Sofia (Ulving), gets to have his way with her and then finds true love with another girl at the end. What a cool nerd?

Unfortunately, we have been over-saturated with this kind of motion picture propaganda. Nerds and geeks no longer have to fear Darwin's rule of nature. They have these movies to promote their cause worldwide. At the end, it was just another bad attempt on filmmaking. Watch at your own peril.


A travesty and one reason why Hollywood shouldn't be let within a million miles of a story like that of Veronica Guerin, the Irish journalist whose stories in the press about Dublin drug barons lead to her murder in 1996. Guerin may not have been a very likable person, journalists seldom are, and it could be said that her reckless style of reporting didn't just put her own life at risk but that of her family as well, (she never courted anonymity). But equally it could be said she was one of the bravest of contemporary writers who did her best, in the only way she knew how, to put right the wrongs she encountered in Irish society. She moved in a violent, shadowy world and there is no doubt her story could have made a pertinent, realistic and moving drama. But this isn't it.

This is Hollywood's idea of 'realism' which, as we all know, has absolutely nothing to do with 'truth'. There is not a single moment in this dire film that rings true; everything is exaggerated. No New York crack den can be as bad as the Dublin flats where young kids are injecting themselves with heroin like some drug-fueled pubescent orgy; (outside there is a playground littered with syringes). Of course, this just might have been believable or at least acceptable if the tone of the film weren't so self-congratulatory.

But then are you surprised when you see that the producer is Jerry Bruckheimer, (there is a lot of action), or the director is Joel Schumacher, hardly known for his subtlety in the past or for making films of a 'crusading' nature. Worst of all, the film has the only bad performance I've seen from Cate Blanchett as Guerin. I've always thought great actresses, (and I believe Blanchett is a great actress), could redeem anything but given the dreadful dialogue she has to say and the fact that Schumacher's direction is so ham-fisted she was always fighting a losing battle.

So has the film got anything going for it, beyond a story that in itself is of interest? Well, hardly, although I admit the Irish actor Gerard McSorley's performance as John Gilligan, the man who supposedly ordered Veronica's murder, gives it a momentary kick, not because his character rings truer than anyone else's but because McSorley makes Gilligan such a monster he actually makes him entertaining which, of course, is the one thing this film should never be. Best you just avoid it.


That's about the start and the finish to it. This movie portrays a woman lusting not after the greater good, but after the celebrity that accompanied her work - irregardless of whether or not her family suffered consequences of her actions.

After being threatened with the kidnap and rape of her child, she still goes on television telling her story, it became obvious to me that this is not the tale of a hero, but the story of the self-obsessed idiot who only cared for her own career.

Terrible film, poor acting and the make-up crew screwed up on John (tan face, white hands) so badly I actually laughed. In summary,I wouldn't recommend this film to my dog. Nothing else can really be said about it.


(Vague Spoilers...?)

I really wish that this genre of 'tragic true story' could be wiped from the face of this earth - nothing makes me more sick than to see what could essentially be a moving (though I'm rarely moved, especially where 'the media' and its monkey-slaves are concerned) story ripped to pieces and turned into a vomit-inducing cheesefest of a film.

Obviously, because it's a true story, everyone's nervous to criticise the storyline, to suggest that just perhaps, it really wasn't that tragic. I wasn't aware of the story before I saw the film, so I don't know how true to life it all was, but let's just say I felt no sympathy for the "angelic", martyr-like character of Veronica and her irritating personality traits. Perhaps Cate Blanchett's acting just didn't do her justice. Right from the beginning, as I watched her tiptoe through a sea of filth and syringes (oh, and filthy syringes), gasping at the junkie children all around her, I knew this film would be hideously over-the-top and unrealistic, desperate to yank that salt water right out of the audience's tear ducts.

The fact that she herself was a self-confessed lover of speed and felt no shame at her blatant disregard of the law (laws which are there to - wait for it - STOP PEOPLE FROM DYING) where 'trivial matters' like speeding are concerned hardly bumped up my sympathy-meter. Sorry to say this, but I found the "EVIL" drug-dealers far more likable.

In short, I hated it. But as always, everyone else will love it.


This could have been a great movie. Director should have let Cate Blanchett just act. When she is allowed to, she's amazing and carries the film up. I was with others, and we were split on the film, so some may love it. I found its script tedious with all the info-giving; it made me cringe at times. And all the shots of Guerin (Blanchett) smirking sideways at the camera -- it seemed like the filmmakers lost perspective. The story is remarkable and important, and there is so much talent in this movie, it's a pity that whatever happened in the execution didn't work to show the film's story as the amazing tale it is. I do not like criticizing films harshly, but for people with so much money and talent and resources -- what happened? The fact is, this movie should have been great. The story is great. One thing at least it does accomplish is get the woman's name and possibly some of her story out to the world.


I was expecting this movie to be much better. Unrealistic, boring, packed with low action tricks, very emotionless as a drama though dealing with such a painful topic. For me this has been the worst and very annoying performance of Cate Blanchett since the Bandits, though she is one of my favorites. Neither do other actors give a impressive performance. There are some good names in this movie, but almost everyone failed to capture by acting. I don't know if the portrayal of the characters was accurate, but their behavior is just so not realistic, as well as some events. The ending is too long and boring, too. I was really surprised how bad this film turned out to be.


Although I do not question that IMDb fans love movies, I sometimes think their critical faculties have fallen through a crack in the floorboards. I grew up literally 200 metres from the place where Veronica Guerin was shot, so the issue and the politics have been common currency and the story was well known to me before I belatedly saw this film. The cast and locations were pretty convincing, as was sense of tawdry, sleazy amorality which is the reality of crime. But the real crime here was the woeful miscasting of Cate Blanchet, and this I think, is why the movie never really took off at the box office.To any Dubliner, or indeed Irish person, her accent is just wrong, and given that she is surrounded by native Irish actors of some account, her pain is palpable. She chokes on her lines, and is never steady in any scene. She doesn't seem to have a real relationship with anyone, and is like a ghost in the world of the living. I felt genuine sympathy for this talented actress. All in all, a waste of a fine cast,and a fine leading lady.


G-MEN FROM HELL (2 outta 5 stars)

I *wanted* to like this movie, I really did... I've always been a great admirer of Mike Allred's comic book work... and this movie was based on an early, odd strip of his. The movie is actually pretty faithful to the "plot" of the original... even down to the nonsensical appearance of a superhero known as "Cheetah Man". There are a lot of familiar names in the cast (William Forsythe, Bobcat Goldthwait, Paul Rodriguez... and Robert Goulet as the devil). The story is about a pair of overly-zealous FBI agents who die, get sent to hell and escape back to earth so that they can do some good deeds and earn a place in heaven. Sounds like fun... but it just doesn't quite work. Director Christopher Coppola (yes, he's related to all those other Coppolas... go figure) likes to frame everything in weird angles reminiscent of the old "Batman" and "Monkees" TV shows... but filming shots from odd angles doesn't necessarily constitute a "stylish" film. The script doesn't have much going for it... outside of a few good lines (most of which probably came from the comic). The acting is either lamely amatuerish... or is too wildly over-the-top... with the exception of Forsythe who does a pretty good deadpan, hard-boiled tough guy and Gary Busey as a weird, gay cop. Sure, Robert Goulet playing the Devil is a pretty cool idea... but I don't think the execution exactly lives up to the promise. It's a nice enough movie if you are really into wacky, low budget, cult comedies... but it all sounds better on paper than it actually looks onscreen.


William Forsythe is one of my favorite character actors, so I wanted G-Men from Hell to succeed. In fact, I tried just about everything possible to get into this film, but it just wouldn't work. In the end, it just seemed like one big incoherent, underdeveloped mess, although I felt it earned 3 points for the combination of Forsythe's performance, the odd usage of Gary Busey, the cinematography and the production design.

The story, based on comics by Mike Allred, tells of two FBI agents, Dean Crept (Forsythe) and Mike Mattress (Tate Donovan), who begin the film literally in Hell. Apparently they were corrupt FBI agents, so when they were set up and killed, they ended up in the underworld, which is ruled over by Robert Goulet as the Devil. The Devil transports himself back and forth from the Earth using a crystal (there are later logical problems with this, but that's the least of the film's flaws). Crept and Mattress steal the crystal and attempt to do enough good deeds that they can redeem themselves. They set up shop as private detectives and begin tackling cases. The case shown in this film involves Greydon (Barry Newman) and Gloria Lake (Vanessa Angel), and Greydon's association with Dr. Boifford (David Huddleston), who has been attempting human cloning experiments and lots of esoteric weirdness where he transfers "essences" and such.

Like far too many comic-based films, director Christopher Coppola (Nicolas Cage's brother) and his handful of scriptwriters try to do way too much in 90 minutes. I'm not familiar with the particular Allred comic, Grafik Musik, that served as the basis for the film, but it must have had a relatively lengthy run, or otherwise it must have also been a mess in terms of story. Every time we turn around, there is another character. Most of the characters remain unexplained. Besides the characters mentioned in my summary above, there are three characters who are made to look very similar, including one played by comedian Bobcat Goldthwait (who eventually gets turned into a robot--don't ask, it doesn't make any sense anyway), there is a sentient puppet, there is some other wannabe superhero guy named Cheetah Man, there is a "zombie" from Hell played by comedian Paul Rodriguez, there are a couple women who look similar, there are a couple detectives (including the gay one played by Gary Busey), and so on. All of these characters occasionally pop up throughout the film, say a couple lines, and then leave just as quickly. Little is done to establish who they are, what their relationships are to one another, why they're doing what they're doing, and so on. Occasionally scenes appear to begin and end randomly, and they even seem to be integrated into the film randomly. The characters begin to resemble decorations more than people, as if Coppola had decided to move a bunch of potted plants around his sets and locations.

The basic tonality of the film is a tongue-in-cheek spoof of film noir with a superhero comics attitude. It also has inexplicable elements of sci-fi thrown in and Little Nicky (2000)-styled supernaturalism. The only aspect that even halfway works is the film noir spoof, and that's primarily because Forsythe is so skilled as an actor that it would be difficult for material centered on him to completely fall apart. He's good at droll humor, especially when he gets to play against Busey. It would be nice to see both of them do more material in that vein. The sci-fi stuff needs exposition to work, but even that would be chancy, as too much exposition would have equally killed the film. The Little Nicky-flavored stuff just seems like a horribly lame Saturday Night Live skit gone awry. But the worst element, surprisingly enough, is the superhero stuff. It's about as smoothly integrated into the film as President Bush is smoothly integrated into Iraq. Why did Coppola and crew decide to take something so all over the map and just throw it on the screen? How would this seem like a good idea?

The cinematography, however, is another matter. It often easily matches the most faithful translations of the comic book aesthetic to films, such as the recent Sin City (2005). Coppola orders a majority of shots to be from extreme or oblique angles that exaggerate perspective. The production design matches the aesthetic, with supersaturated combinations of colors, interesting, complex textures and architecture and so on. Why this kind of care couldn't have been put into the script escapes me. On the other hand, if you're prone to dislike CGI, the few very rough computer graphic sequences in this film will surely turn you off.

Still, judging from the reviews on IMDb, at least, some people have enjoyed this film. I suppose if you're a big fan of Allred's work, and you're familiar with Grafik Musik, G-Men from Hell is probably worth seeing, and it should make a bit more sense, if it's supposed to make sense. The climax of the film, wherein the case is solved and the mystery explained, was so convoluted and ridiculous that I have no idea who the killer was supposed to be or what anyone's motivation would have been. For that matter, I was still confused about half of the characters in the scene. But it seemed like it was supposed to be intentionally confusing, and that it was supposed to be funny. Unfortunately I can't say I laughed out loud even once during the film, and neither did I care about the story or the characters.

If you decide to give it a shot, you'll at least be entertained visually, and that includes the presence of a couple extremely attractive women.


This parody of the Nazi occupation of Poland has a few moments >of classic Mel Brooks good humor but is by far below the level >of his other works. If you are looking for a good laugh and a >bit of Hitler bashing rent 'History of the World Part I' or >'Blazing Saddles' instead


This movie is such a deception. I've been watching some random Manuelde Oliveira movies to understand how he got so renown. Maybe I should go check just the ones that got the best awards. This is the worst I've seen from him. What a waste of time. He could well have condensed all the story into less than an hour and spare us our time. I don't like fast action movies. A movie can be slow and have much more intensity and thoughtfulness. This one however is just boring ideas from boring people. And Pedro Abrunhosa, who happens to be a famous singer from my city should stick to his music career so we don't have to put up with such bad acting and can choose not to listen to his songs.


I came to that movie with a good feeling : the trailer is good, the actress is great, the picture is not bad, the film-maker has a good reputation, the film had a price in cannes, the novel is a classic of french litterature. I was in a good mood too. But nothing of that helped me : I forced myself to stay watching it. I even hoped something would happen, the director awaking or something, but nothing happened. The "contemporary" adaptation of a 17th century novel is always a good idea, because without the costumes, some details of the old times appear differently and helps us to see what really changed during theese centuries. I liked for this "rastignac ou les ambitieux" (a TV movie from Balzac) or "moments de jean-jacques Rousseau", a cd-rom. But "La lettre" didn't work with me. I must tell I hated the music used, some kind of portuguese large audience crooner songs (portugal has so brilliant musicians... why choosing this one ?) and this makes maybe a lot because the music has a certain importance here.


Scarcely worthy of comment, except to say that "Eyes Wide Shut" would have been much better if Tom Cruise's character had a similar fate to Mr. Cleves (to the tune of the high piano note playing over and over).

Although I was enjoying it at first, I began to suspect that something was awfully awry during the drawing room scene where 'the accident' was revealed in the news.

It was all downhill from there


If you are a maniac who watches movies constantly, you know that you have wasted some hours in your life by movies that have absolutely nothing to say, this debacle is such one....gone are 100 minutes of my life! The story is superthin. A rich girl Madame De Clèves (played by Chiara Mastroianni, and I never could imagine acting could be done in such a boring way) has been destinated by her mother to marry the boring (they definitely found each other!) François De Guise. But of course, our bourgeoisie-lady meets (huuuum) a popstar and falls in love.... Now excuse me and let me point out some critical things. a) the popstar, a certain Pedro Abrunhosa is a macho in Armanisuit who plays the most annoying Portugese rock you can imagine....his crapmusic is about 20 minutes from the movie! b) the popstar seems to be part of the high society of cultural life, so it happens that he plays for a few people who normally only watch pianoconcerts from Chopin. Since when is that cool??????????? c) Since when falls a bourgeoisie-woman for a popstar who is surrounded by groupies? I don't know if director Manoel De Oliviera wanted to be hip by using some popscenes but it only makes his movie ridiculous. And the worst is yet to come! Madame De Clèves cant decide and she asks the help of her friend who happens to be...a nun. The nun tells all philosophicalbullshit that can be told in four words "Do your own thing", but for this intelligent answer you have to see a picture from 100 minutes in where nothing happens. I absolutely don't wanna hear terms like "art cinema", this is just wasted money. God, even Woody Allen wouldn't like to see this garbage.


Answer: Largely disinterested acting from its star, an almost actionless script, a plodding pace, verbose inter-titles, and mostly flat, uninvolving direction.

Despite negative contemporary reviews (including an excellent summation of everything that's wrong with the movie in The New York Times), this vanished version of Holmes with its fantastic cast line-up (including the movie debuts of Powell and Young) has long intrigued both film and Sherlock buffs worldwide. So imagine the joy when about 600 rolls of work print offcuts (amounting in all to about 4,000 feet) were found! These were handed to Kevin Brownlow who, with the aid of Albert Parker himself, painstakingly re-assembled the movie over a period of six months. George Eastman House then came to the rescue when the inter-titles were found in their vaults.

The composite reconstructed movie now runs about 109 minutes. There is still footage missing, but that doesn't matter a great deal as, alas, the photoplay is boring enough as it is.

Admittedly, it has its moments: Von Seyffertitz is a marvelous presence. I also enjoyed Roland Young's Watson and Powell's chat with Barrymore in the taxi. And unlike other viewers, I thought Miss Dempster looked quite charming in this non-Griffith outing. And even below-par Barrymore did provide a great moment at the climax for those hardy viewers like myself who persisted right to the end.

But the movie is full of talk. Talk, talk, talk! That's mostly all the characters do in this tediously paced, almost actionless movie. After 80 minutes or so, I just got so bored reading the inter-titles, I gave up. Some of them were too hard to decipher anyway.

Which brings me to the next problem. Labs take no care in printing up positives which are solely to be employed for negative cutting, so 90% of the movie is far too dark. Sometimes you can hardly see what's going on. True, some if it looks attractive and you say to yourself, "Wow! Film noir lighting in 1922!" But this is not the way it was presented to original movie audiences.


I agree with with another reviewer who thinks this might just be the worst Sherlock Holmes ever--or at least among the worst. It's because this version of the great detective is him in name only--almost nothing about him sees like the Holmes of the Conan Doyle stories. Having read all the original stories, I know what I am talking about here. John Barrymore simply isn't Holmes. This didn't come as that much of a surprise, though, as when the movie began it said that the film was based on the plays of William Gillette--not the Doyle stories. Gillette played fast and loose with the character and added many of his own details and flourishes and over time, his plays became less and less like Doyle's stories. So how could anyone expect this film to be THE Sherlock Holmes? The story is a weird variation on the original Doyle story "A Scandal in Bohemia". Of all the dozens and dozens of original stories, this one happens to be my favorite and it's practically a perfect story. But, oddly, very little of the original story remains (just a few odd bits and pieces)--and lots of unnecessary stuff is added. To Holmes maniacs like myself, this is tantamount to sacrilege! A prince has fallen for a commoner. He isn't particularly worried, as there are others in line for succession well before him. However, when those ahead of him are killed unexpectedly, he calls off his upcoming marriage--such a marriage would not be acceptable to the nation. Despondent, the lady kills herself and her sister has letters that the future king had written to his former lover. The British government want Holmes to find those letters and return them to the man who is about to be crowned.

Okay, aside from completely changing the story into a tale involving Moriarty (who, by the way, was captured pretty easily at the end), the story did some of the most ridiculous things you could do with Holmes--it made him a sentimentalist AND had him fall in love, inexplicably, at first sight. Holmes NEVER showed anything but contempt for most women (save two) in the stories and NEVER was sexually interested in any woman--in fact, he was repulsed by them. In THE SECRET LIFE OF SHERLOCK HOLMES the film went so far as to say that Holmes was gay (and fantasized about Watson!). While the real Holmes in the stories seemed asexual, being gay at least made much more sense than having him fall for a lady and even propose to her at the end of the movie!!! This is just wrong and violated the entirety who Holmes was. Plus, Holmes acted more like an action hero and showed little of the usual methodology he employed in the stories. It was as if no one associated with the film ever read the stories--not even one. If all this is okay, why not make him a Chinese acrobat or a serial killing nudist? There was so much more about the film that was wrong or didn't work but I won't bother going on, as the love interest alone ruins the story.

So what is good about this film? Well, it had lots of footage that was actually filmed in London and the scene in the mountains looked nice. Aside from that....absolutely nothing makes the film worth seeing--even if the great John Barrymore is in the lead. Apparently it took many years to piece this movie back together from various sources in order to restore the film. Too bad it wasn't worthy of such efforts! Yes, you can tell that I do love my Conan Doyle!


This starts out with Sherlock Holmes (John Barrymore) and Dr. Watson (Roland Young) as VERY old looking college students. They help Prince Alexis (Reginald Denny) foil a plot against him by the sinister Dr. Moriarty (Gustav von Seyffertitz). They cut to years later when Holmes is a world famous detective and Watson is married and a successful doctor. Moriarty again comes into Holmes' life when he threatens Prince Alexis with incriminating love letters! That's right--Holmes on a case to get some stupid love letters! Arthur Conan Doyle must have been spinning in his grave when this came out!

There are so many things wrong with this it's unbelievable. First off Barrymore is terrible as Holmes. He walks through the role and shows none of the deductive powers that Basil Rathbone did so effortlessly. Also he was 40 when he did this--and looks it. Watson is barely in this one--he adds almost nothing to the story line. Moriarty looks hysterically evil. He looks like something out of a Charles Dickens' novel! Not even close to the suave Moriarty we all know and hate. The case here is, as stated before, so ridiculous it's insulting. Even worse Holmes is given a love interest!!! That's totally against any of the books or the character! Historically this is important as (I believe) the first full length Holmes picture and I'm glad it's available. Sadly, as is sometimes the case, it doesn't live up to its reputation. If you're a Holmes fan like me stay far FAR away from this one!


I have been viewing the great detective on film as a progression, through the years, since the early part of the 20th century. I'm sure it was fascinating for readers of the stories to watch our hero develop, and there have since been countless literary expositions on Holmes and anything accompanying him. It has likewise been a lot of fun watching different portrayals on the screen.

I have enjoyed the Eille Norwood productions immensely, and of course can strongly recommend Messieurs Rathbone and Brett in the role. Other commendable cinematic or televised Sherlocks include Charlton Heston, Peter Cushing, Christopher Plummer, Nicol Williamson--a lot of good men have played Sherlock Holmes.

But this one is the very worst one I've seen, except for a short burlesque by Douglas Fairbanks Sr. Mr. Barrymore shows zero intellectual processing--that's right, none. He is in a daze. Can you can imagine Sherlock Holmes in a daze? I understand he was intoxicated for most of the production, and it shows. If he was a great actor, he was a pitiful interpretor. I would doubt he ever read a Holmes story.

The film has some good features, as delineated by Mr. Morris in the review above this one. It is of some historical interest. It might even be a fairly good movie of its day. But, when laid beside The Hound of the Baskervilles starring Jeremy Brett, you have a turkey.


This movie was really bad, I think that the title fooled me because I thought that there would be at least more vampire call girls and more of a vampire acting but what I got was a bunch of boring sex scenes including a girl straddling a washing machine while some goof with glasses watches through a peep hole, a lady at a club watching the most horrible band in the world play with a guy playing a guitar with only one note and then she takes him back stage, or vice versa and straddles the guy. Then there's the red neck who gets ripped off by one of the call girls and goes after her at the head call girl's house and asks for his money back and they all seduce him instead. This movie was nothing but a compilation of lame skits, terrible acting and left overs from last years copy of Hustler and thats it.


I hate to be the one to tell you but this film is the sort of crap that Hollywood thinks is a film about "real" people ie the working class. And maybe the book, which I've not read, is about a real working class town but the film they made from it is so predictable, so covered in self-congratulatory ooze about its curmudgeonly hero and so bathed in hero-worship for Paul Newman that it becomes a Hallmark Hall of Fame special. And I like Paul. And his performance is fine but the whimsy is leaden and the "quirkiness" of the characters weighs you down with its lack of invention. For example: Has Pruitt Taylor Vince taken a patent out on his slobby slow sidekick who aches with human feeling. (see Heavy). Don't get me wrong (I'm sure you will anyway)...this is a well-made Hollywood product with good performances by all (I even thought Melanie Griffith was half-way believable) but the whole construct is made by cynical minds who want to neuter the people of this town with a treacly gloss that would have embarrassed Frank Capra. We all want to honor the memory of Paul Newman but this film is a poor memorial. Frankly I find it depressing that so many people thought this was a good film. TV has rotted your brain, people. Now go watch Hud as penance.


I love this book. It was my bible for years from high school on. Notes From Underground (what happened to the *The*? My text versions always included it) was arguably the first truly modern psychological ontological existential novel, the forerunner to, among other things, Catcher in the Rye & many of Woody Allen's better works.

This movie, on the other hand, comes off as nothing more than a very lame imitation of a Steve Martin routine. The lead even looks like Steve Martin but the ancillary characters are barely cardboard in substance. What should have been wryly & universally satirical simply becomes high-school sophomoric.

A dreadful disappointment.


When William Wellman was filming The Public Enemy he originally had James Cagney and Edward Woods in each other's parts. Noting in the daily rushes how Cagney's personality came through even in the supporting part, Wellman made the decision to reshoot and switch the roles. A star was born because of that.

Another star had to wait a bit to be born because no one was as bright on the Three On a Match Set. Three friends from Public School 62 in Manhattan meet as adults. Ann Dvorak is the pretty one who's married a wealthy lawyer in the person of Warren William and she's rich and spoiled. Joan Blondell was the troublemaker back in the day and she's done a stretch in the joint, but she's calmed down and now is starring in a revue. The good girl was Bette Davis who went to business college and is now a secretary. They meet for lunch and light their cigarettes from the same match. The third one to light is Dvorak and the rest of the story is how she blows it all and Blondell picks up the pieces.

But can you imagine if someone had the wit to see what talent Bette Davis had then? Dvorak's part was the kind of role Bette Davis used to go to town with. Three on a Match is at best a passable melodrama. Had Davis played Dvorak's part, she would have made it a classic. She did just that for many a mediocre property in her career.

The four leads in the film are Dvorak, Blondell, William and Lyle Talbot and Talbot probably gives the best performance in the film as a weak and shallow playboy. Down in the cast is not only Bette Davis, but Humphrey Bogart in a brief role as muscle to gambler/racketeer Edward Arnold. Bogey's good in what little he has and Arnold has one brief, but memorable scene confronting Talbot about his debts.

Talbot in a moment of insanity hits upon a desperate attempt to raise money and suffice it to say it costs a whole lot of the cast big time. Ann Dvorak has a great scene in trying to escape from the clutches of the villains, but what Davis would have done with it might have made her a star.

No one had the wit to see this was a Bette Davis picture with Bette Davis ready and available. Pity.


The Haydens and Colbys are two mountain families who've had such a long term feud, everyone's forgotten what it started over. Never mind when Pop Colby (Noah Beery, Sr.) shoots Grandpa down in cold blood, Dad Hayden takes an unorthodox and cowardly approach in some eyes, he calls in the law.

The Haydens move west and Colby when he gets out of the joint takes the family and moves to where the Haydens are to take up where they left off. Along the way he has an ally, Jack LaRue, who has an agenda all his own.

Of course in Romeo&Juliet fashion, the Hayden son (Randolph Scott) and the Colby daughter(Esther Ralston} meet and flip for each other. If anything that throws gasoline on the feud fire.

This is one of the weakest of Randolph Scott's earlier westerns. I'm not sure if I'm seeing the complete film as a budget video company put out a re-release that looks like it was choppily edited. There are a lot of plot gaps and things that don't make sense.

This is also one of the earliest films of Shirley Temple who's big scene is when one of the Colbys shoots the head off of her doll. It wasn't for sadistic purposes but to get the Haydens to chase them. Still it's an earlier weepy for Shirley. She later did two more films with

Randolph Scott, Rebecca of Sunnybrook Farm and Susannah of the Mounties and with her name above his at that point.

Also at the very end, the fadeout is Esther and Randy in what looks like a photograph of later domestic bliss. And the soundtrack was blaring the Bing Crosby hit Please. Kind of out of place, but since Paramount had the rights to it, they figured they had to use it.


This tale of fussin' and a feudin' is showing its age in spades, but at least it benefits from a memorable cast: Randolph Scott, Buster Crabbe, John Carradine, and little Shirley Temple, whose doll gets its head shot off. Jack La Rue plays the villain and is in desperate need of a moustache to twirl.


Okwe, a doctor of medicine, chess master and all-round renaissance man, not to mention a saint, has been forced to migrate to London from his homeland of Nigeria. Predictably, he has to work two jobs on the brink of exhaustion, because of Whitey's horrible oppression.

Okwe lives with Senay, a Turkish woman who also has come to London in the hopes of finding a better life. To everyone's surprise, Senay falls in love with Okwe but the affair doesn't work out because of Whitey's persecution. Instead, Okwe and Senay get involved in illegal organ trade.

Dirty Pretty Things is not entirely without merit, but it is definitely is flawed in many ways. Okwe's character is very superficial, while Senay has no depth at all. Her only attribute (besides being in love with Okwe) is that she's a virgin, and the moment we hear that, we know for certain that before the film is over, she will lose her virginity at the hands of some evil white man.

Dirty Pretty Things works fine as self-flagellatory fodder for self-hating white liberals. Others should approach with caution.


Apart from being shot like a TV drama, the story was ridiculous and all the characters apart from Okwe are flat and 1-dimensional, both in terms of script development and acting.

I live in a part of London where if I walk down the street and hear someone speak English I turn my head in surprised. I have immigrant neighbours from Africa, Turkey and Eastern Europe. None of them act like the characters in this film.

Frears very rarely creates any live atmosphere in this film. And some of the decisions in the story-making process are just plain stupid and wrong.

The mistake is that on the one hand we are given the feeling this is a serious drama dealing with very real and heartbreaking immigration issues. But on the other, the story is so ridiculous, particularly the final twist, that you can't take it seriously.

Typical of British film-making, this movie is caught between being entertaining and delivering some kind of social message. It does neither. I'm not surprised that most of the other reviews are written by Brits. It is obvious that Brits know nothing about movies. No wonder we can't make a decent one.


The screenplay is the worst part of this film, as it lurches from one premise to the next, missing all the important bits that would have made a number of different stories possible. (This film is confusing, because the audience doesn't know what the story is.) I had no problem with the low-production values and the acting wasn't great, but this is telly, so it was fine. I don't mind if some scenes looked like they were done in one take. But having such a non-sensical screenplay is completely unnecessary. Did any executive actually read it before forking out the cash? Avoid this at all costs.

The prologue in particular was so poorly written, it needed a voice-over to fill in all the details that had been left out. The prologue was rushed, it wasn't clear what was happening, ie. The Russian Revolution was reduced to "Some riots are happening in Petersburg", with the next scene being soldiers arresting them. I know the basic history of the Revolution, so I could fill in the details, "those pesky Communists". The prologue is best ignored.

This could have been a thoughtful study of a person who is confused about who she is. It sets up this premise in the asylum. It could then have her struggling to identify herself for the rest of the film. No. Gone. The film assumes she is who she says she is (even though there is still no empirical evidence.) It sets up a melodramatic romance, a love so strong, it'll believe anything she says. Okay, a soppy romance. No, because it makes no sense. The love interest seems like a crazed (and incidentally, sleazy) lunatic, bursting out in wild gestures. This also doesn't work, because the film stupidly decides to tell the truth in the monologue at the end. They never got married and she returned to America. The love story collapses. Despite there being plenty of love scenes, I was never convinced of the reason that they were in love. I find rom-com romances more convincing, despite there only being one or two scenes which establish that they've even spent any time with each other.

It could have been a thriller-type thing where the film assumes she is who she says she is, and she struggles to prove her identity. No, the court case is summed up rather than dealt with. The bizarre voice over comes back, again to fill in the details of a better film.

The funniest thing to consider is what really happened. Anna Anderson was a loony who went to America and married another loony and they did crazy things together. Throughout her life, she had bouts of lunatic behaviour. None of this in the film either. There's a really annoying character in the asylum who crops up from nowhere and announces herself as a 'One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Next/'Twelve Monkeys'-type informant. Thankfully, she vanishes, having brought nothing to the story.


I cannot believe all I'm reading about this movie comes from people who claim it was beautiful and well-done. It was well done, all right, if you ignored the tedious lines, the "absurd theater" construction and the utter lack of imagination which rendered the situations as completely uninspired and made you go "ahhh come on..." I will not even waste my time on explaining all the reasons I thought this movie was purely awful, I just want to know how anybody can think it was beautiful, clever or touching... And I would also like to know how a movie which is as "real" as Liz's life is considered authentic and worth watching. Everything in there is completely unauthentic, situations are poorly constructed, the love story is a sick twisted tale which escapes the rules of common reasonable sense, and that does not make the movie great. When a movie surprises you it just becomes unpredictable and that effect can be easily obtained once you completely turn a situation upside down, this does not mean that if you are taken by surprise you should bow to the imagination of the writer.

God, this was one of the worst ever. EVER


Terrible acting, terrible plot, terrible dialogue, terrible soundtrack, terrible dubbing, and a terrible waste of time. It wasn't offensive, just completely and utterly boring. I'm a BIG fan of lots of low budget or B grade movies, but usually they have a great plot or a good idea behind them. I watched this with a friend who loves B grade horror movies and he actually fell asleep through it. This is something maybe a 5 year old kid would find amusing, but you'd have to find one of those kids who giggles every time somebody says the word 'butt'. He wouldn't be laughing at the movie, just the word 'butt'. To give you an idea of how juvenile this movie is, they use the word 'poop' a lot but never say the S word (that would be rude wouldn't it?) however they occasionally use the F word. It felt like a Disney movie, designed not to offend anybody. It doesn't fit into the 'Comedy' genre and doesn't fit into the 'horror' genre either. The most amusing thing about the movie is the name. I can only assume the movie is so far rating at 7.3/10 after 30 votes is because every single member of the cast voted 10 for it. PLEASE DON'T WASTE YOUR TIME WITH THIS!! I implore you! Stop giving people who make these movies your DVD renting money! Then maybe they will stop making movies like this. I've seen movies in the IMDb Bottom 100 that were far more entertaining than this.


Have you ever flipped around at 3AM looking for a movie? If you reach "recatuma", flip on (it will never be shown at any other time, I'm sure).

I've nothing against gutter humor, e.g., "There's Something about Mary", or the "American Pie" series, but "recatuma" is just not funny. It looks like the product of two 8-year-olds who got their hands on a camera.

It's beyond me how this movie has one of the highest ratings I've seen on IMDb (votes by the director and friends?), but this movie seriously makes me question IMDb ratings.


Rocky meets Canadian Heritage Minutes, so be thankful that it's not absolutely unwatchable. The underdog-friendly class consciousness is pervasive and fitfully amusing, although it's schematic and sentimental as well. Heroic rowing star/bootlegger Nicolas Cage is his usual dopey, wooden, charming self, and he has some lively moments, especially when he comes into conflict with the starched shirt types. Christopher Plummer's villainous manager is nothing to write home about, but even he transcends this material; in all other cases the costumes and hair seem to be doing all the acting. The frantically underlined Careful Research, and the general odor of educational intent, smother the valiant gestures at comedy, and the pricey period detail of the production design is wholly undermined by a dramatic arc that is pure 1980s bootstrap trash.


Unless you like movies about rowing, this movie is a little slow. The only thing this film has in common with Chariots of Fire is the fact that its a period piece. The film is predictable even if you never heard of Ned Hanlan. It's a little "sappy" at times. The acting is a bit over the top and wooden with little chemistry felt between Cage and Dale.

SPOILER The training scene for the race on the Thames looked like it was stolen from one of the "Rocky" films but without the speed bag. If you like to be bored to tears or need a non-narcotic to fall asleep this would be a good film for you.

** out of *****


I saw this in a theatre out of pure curiosity back in 1986. The ads gave no indication what this was about--it just showed Nicolas Cage with his shirt off showing his VERY nice chest. It was a dull true story of Ned Hanlan who was a world class sculler--or something like that. It takes place in the 19th century (the ads didn't mention that either) and I usually hate period pieces--that didn't help me like the movie more. The only good thing about this was Cage--he WAS good and his body looked fantastic. But, unless you're interested in sculling, you'll probably be bored silly.

There was one unintentionally hilarious scene in which Cage tries to rip open a woman's shirt--and it wouldn't rip! He fumbles with it before he finally gets it off. The audience I saw it with was laughing hysterically.


With Randolph Scott in his best outfit riding his best horse (Starlight) and looking and acting his dusty old best, and with Lee Marvin and Ernest Borgnine at their early villainous peaks, this could have been something. With Andre de Toth directing, it really should have been something. But it's not something. It's not anything, except a mess. Horrendous dialogue, terrible editing (the big gunfight in the mountains is unintelligible until the principals gather to rehash what just happened), and some really bad acting (not so much from Scott, Borgnine, or Marvin, but pretty much everybody else. Alfonso Bedoya is a joy to watch, as always, not because of his acting, which is abominable, but because it's so much fun trying to figure out what it is he's doing with his mouth to make him sound that way. George Macready, who belongs in things like "Gilda" rather than oaters like this, kept getting shoved into Randolph Scott Westerns (four of them). He's incredibly out of place in all of them. And Claire Trevor, so wonderful in "Dead End" and "Key Largo," is wasted here and one's heart goes out to the Oscar-winning actress for having to do such pot-boiling dreck as this a scant five years after winning that Oscar. The attempts at 3-D effects are pretty laughable in their earnestness, and for an action movie, an awful lot of the actual action occurs just off-screen -- saving money on stuntmen and stagecoaches, I suppose, but diluting the feel of the down-and-dirty Western this clearly wants to be taken for. I'll watch anything Randolph Scott did in the Fifties and Sixties, but this one was an absolute chore. I'd sure like to know where to get a coat like that, though.


well, since you're reading a review there's bound to be spoilers. but i might as well issue the warning anyways. but its not like i'd be ruining anything. the plot is predictable.

an asteroid hits the ship, oxygen supplies are lost, the entire crew cant survive the trip. one guy decides to go on a rampage. how original.

the effects are awful, the acting is often clunky, the plot is inconsistent.

it is, however, a good time waster. IF you have absolutely nothing else to do. 3/10


What the heck is this!!! this movie is the most worst robin hood ever made bad choice of cast! bad acting bad everything! do not watch this movie! but if you do like comedy and medieval then

watch it if you don't like that just see if you like still i did not like this movie and wish it was never made!!!

this movie is about a man who goes on property and says that his name is Robert hood and stuff so then he ends up becoming a outlaw and is wanted and then changed his name to robin hood. this movie is really weird because every time they fight there is comedy and the music does not go along well with the fight scenes and action!


Another of the many film takes on the legend of Robin Hood, from my point of view, two essential things were missing from this version: proper character development and any real sense of nobility. In regards to the former, I guess many would suggest that the characters are sufficiently well known that they don't really need to be developed at length. Nevertheless, I found their respective introductions to the story - the most important in this version were Little John (David Morrissey) and Friar Tuck (Jeff Nuttall) - rather jarring and sudden, which I thought left the respective actors struggling a little bit with the parts. Robin's rise from simple outlaw to leader of the gang also seemed a little too quick and easy, although I appreciated the background that was offered to his character, which offered a reasonable explanation of how Sir Robert Hode became Robin Hood. In regards to the latter point, I didn't feel that Robin came across as particularly noble in this movie (although he does decide to return the taxes to the common folk) but rather he seemed interested primarily in Marian (Uma Thurman). Thurman I thought was a bit miscast in the part, as was Jurgen Prochnow as Sir Miles Folcanet. I also found Daguerre's jester irritating after a while. The only truly noble scene in the movie (aside perhaps from the decision to return the taxes) was the exchange near the end of the film between Will Scarlett (Owen Teale) and Daguerre (Jeroen Krabbe) about the future of England. There's some good swordplay involved - particularly when Robin and his men crash Marian's wedding - but in the end it all seemed a little too simple. In particular, while Robin's victory over Daguerre and Folcanet was accomplished, I was left wondering what was going to happen when King John (OK - Prince John) returned with his troops to collect the taxes. There was no sense in the movie that the return of Richard the Lion Hearted was imminent, and taking on the King (even an unofficial king acting as regent) would be a pretty daunting task. I can't say I was overly impressed by this telling of the story. There's some original material (particularly about Robin's background) which fills in some holes from the common legend, but not enough to make this a truly good movie. 4/10


Whilst nearly keeping close to the traditional Robin Hood Theme apart from the missing Sheriff of Nottingham (Replaced by a Baron for some reason) this film starts well but is of course sadly lacking in any real acting talent apart from the actor playing Much The Miller and perhaps Ms Thurman.

However for those that like to see really really badly directed movies then there's a treat for you in the last five minutes of the film. The fight scene has to be one of the worst ever seen eg "Are Robin and Marion going to make that balcony whilst swinging on the bell rope or are they going to smash into the wall because the rope is too long ? - no chance, cut scene, phew they made it".

Funniest line ? - (To Uma) "you are the most beautiful bride in England" followed by a cut to Uma looking more like a rejected model for ET.

Certainly the worst ever Robin Hood film EVER made, even the many TV series put this in the shade.


Patrick Bergin displays just the right blend of charisma and intelligence as Robin, but I join many other reviewers in pointing out the woeful miscasting of Uma Thurman, an actress of limited range who's perfectly suited to embody Quentin Tarantino's cartoon characterizations.

The rest of the cast do their best in a vain attempt to had some heat and light in an overly drab period re-creation made worse by its sluggish plot. One almost begins to yearn for the unrealistic Technicolor and bogus Sherwood Forest of the old Flynn/Rathbone version. Even the castle interiors in this film are so dark and misty that they might as well have filmed those scenes in a London pub clogged with tobacco smoke.

The ideal situation, in my view, would have been for Director Kevin Reynolds to have swapped Bergin for Costner, who was as badly miscast in the contemporaneous "Prince of Thieves" as Uma Thurman was in this one.


Funny how people tend to assume that, when two movies on the same subject are released competing with each other, one of them has to be "the good one". It happened in 1998 with 'Armageddon' and 'Deep Impact', it happened in 1992 with 'Christopher Columbus: The Discovery' and '1492: Conquest of Paradise', and it happened in 1991 with 'Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves' and this one. In all the aforementioned cases the second item of each couple is considered "the good one". Well, in my opinion, if the first halves of these couples suck marginally worse, the second halves are also all bad. And this Robin Hood is no exception.

Having been cut from a longer print (which it shows) and adapted for TV, this looks every bit of a TV-movie it ultimately is, with unremarkable cinematography and choppy editing. And where do all the comments about its supposed seriousness and realism come from? This is just as silly and cheesy as 'Prince of Thieves', if only a bit less showy thanks to the lower budget. I have read director John Irvin was offered to remake the Errol Flynn classic and he turned it down unless he was allowed to do a more true to the facts and historically accurate version. If so, why is this one so tributary to Flynn (much more so than the Costner), specially towards the end? Even the look of the main character is quite Flynn-like, complete with (horrible modern-looking) mustache. Nothing that suggests a Middle Ages look.

And the acting? Say what you like about 'Prince of Thieves', which will be all true. But at least that one had Morgan Freeman and Alan Rickman. The actors in this one, with the exception of Jürgen Prochnow (who isn't that great either, just merely adequate) and not counting the great Edward Fox since he's wasted in a pointless cameo, are all horrible. Patrick Bergin is always as dull as it gets, and here's no exception. Uma? This could very well be her worst performance this side of 'Batman + Robin', but to be fair, the script doesn't help her by writing Marian as a woman of the 1990s. But the worst offender is the ever hammy Jeroen Krabbé, who does nothing but kicking and screaming and embarrassing himself.

OK, the writing isn't as horrible here as in the Costner, but it comes fairly close. The only bright spots are clever ideas like the mocking of the relics of saints (showing them as they really were), a disguised Marian discovering the ambush via the story Robin is telling her, and the fact that the boys decide to share with the poor as a way to outdo the reward the villains are offering for Robin's capture. Nice touches in an otherwise garbage script full of plot holes (how to justify Robert Hode's name change to Robin Hood? They don't bother) and very poor in character development, even the basic kind (the chief of the band of thieves appears to be Little John, yet suddenly it's Robin. Why?).

3/10. Stick to Flynn.


This is a pathetic attempt to remake Robin Hood. The acting is feeble and totally unconvincing. This is a low budget movie with little conviction from the characters and little or no plot. It is hardly a swash-buckling tale, it almost put me to sleep and I was overjoyed when it ended.


This bitchy, strident (modern and very nasty) "romantic comedy" is a real disappointment. I was rather surprised that nothing works well in this mess of a movie. The cast is good and the script is by the acclaimed writer Jay Presson Allen (based on her novel), but director Lumet fails to align all the dots. The story deals with the NY upper class, a place that I'm sure Lumet knows well. However, he cannot make up his mind if this was meant to be a social satire, a black comedy, or a serious drama. The tone of the films keeps changing from scene to scene. As I said before, I liked the cast (Alan King is really good in his best movie role), but this is one of those movies with high aspirations and little common sense. Plus all characters are very obnoxious. Not even Oswald Morris' glossy cinematography can save this one.


If truth in advertising laws were applied to motion pictures, London By Night would have been titled Backlot By Day, because this is one of the least convincing London-set features made by any American studio. George Murphy barely makes an effort as Michael Denis, an Irish reporter (with an American accent) mixed up in a murder investigation, and most of the rest of the cast deliver their lines in equally unconvincing fashion. Only George Zucco, as a police inspector, makes much of an impression, and the story itself is minor stuff indeed. At least Corky the dog doesn't embarrass himself too much, delivering a convincing portrayal as Jones, Denis' faithful canine pal.


Beyond the cheap-yet-surprisingly-decent gore, The Final Curtain (sometimes called Acts of Death) is one of the worst pieces of Indie-Crud horror I've seen.

The acting ranges from subpar to downright abysmal, with the script and dialogue becoming progressively worse. In horror movie fashion, the actors play their stock character in caricatured glory. The story dragged on to the point of a crawl, each scene (until the deaths, of course) duller than the last. Throughout the whole film, you'd feel that coprolalic compulsion to encourage each last character to his/her untimely and gristly doom. At the very least, the deaths were interesting. One guy gets split open, and his guts spill out as he whimpers.

The WORST part of the film is the ending.

I'M GONNA SPOIL IT.

It turns out the main character raped his friend's sister and impregnated her. When she went to abort the baby, she died in the process. The film ends with enraged friend murdering richie boy and his Dean Daddy. If this was supposed to be a twist...forget it. Technically, it wouldn't count as a twist, as it is background information that wasn't revealed until the very end.

So there you have it. In all advice, AVOID THIS FILM AT ALL COSTS. Even if you're a gorehound, I wouldn't suggest watching it.


I watch a lot of indie horror films especially the ones that are released by lions gate films and I am disappointed a lot of times too by the low budget and predictable story. This one didn't have a predictable story entirely but it did drag out for the first hour and it failed to have enough excitement to wake me back up towards the final 42 minutes. I have seen much worse from lions gate, but then again I have seen much better. I really wouldn't recommend this to anyone because it really bored me a lot and the ending was really cheesy. I mean I didn't see it coming or anything but it was still stupid and the acting isn't very good in the film either but I don't look at that as much if its a good story but this movie was just a plain old sleeper compared to the awesome horror films I have seen in the past.

So anyways this movie isn't worth your 3 dollars to rent it and surprisingly its not made by Ulli Lommel. In case no one knows him thats reading this, he is a complete idiot that wouldn't know directing if it smacked him in the face. Anyways I give this movie a 3 out of 10.


Let's get straight to the point, this is low budget horror. So at the end, you've probably got what you asked for; below par acting, below par sets, below par directing and below par anything else that you might want to add. Of course you can come across very good low budget movies, and this certainly doesn't rank as one of the worst I've seen by any stretch of the imagination (see scarecrow or the Pumpkin Karver for that accolade for example), but this could have been so much better. The plot is typical slasher horror fair, with young college students trapped in a building, and the first half hour is quite interesting, setting up the situation. But then the film slows right down, and unfortunately it is very clichéd and never really sparks. There are also a number of very odd situations created that are plain annoying, and as with so many recent movies the attempted 'twist' is just pants. Certainly if the director had cut 20 or even 30 minutes out of this film it would have been a far more enjoyable fair. As it stands its a passable way to waste an evening if you have nothing better to do, and aren't expecting great cinema, but there are far better slasher movies out there.


A perfect example of a film with an intriguing sounding plot--very similar to "The Clown at Midnight" and "Stage Fright aka Deliria" that was executed, or at least written, very poorly. Certainly this isn't the first film to do this, but that makes it even more problematic because by now filmmakers should know what to do and what not to do, particularly when you are working with the slasher genre. And one thing you DON'T do is make a boring slasher film, which is exactly what "Acts of Death" is.

The film centers around a group of college theater students who decide to initiate new students by playing a prank on them while they are in the theater. Unfortunately, something goes horribly wrong, and a'la "I Know What You Did Last Summer," some of the students decide to cover up their act. Bad idea. See, the next night, the same group of students get locked in the theater and begin getting picked off one by one by a mysterious killer.

The Bad: Sounds decent enough for a slasher film, right? Well, lets just say that for the first 45 minutes of this film I was BORED OUT OF MY MIND. Nothing happened except talking talking and more talking. By the time the action starts, I really didn't care because (a)I hated the characters and (b)I was half asleep. The plot meanders along with no real purpose, even when the killing starts. The acting is hokey, even for a low-budget horror film--I did not, for a second, believe these were college theater students. The twist comes out of left field and the, the film ends abruptly in a very unsatisfying way. It's a shame because this film could have been a decent slasher film if the director had remembered that is what he was making...not a WB teen drama.

The Good: Um....a cool death scene? Seriously....involving a wire and a pulley-like device. Pretty cool. Other than that....not much. I suppose the film looks OK and the setting is pretty effective, but really, the pacing and bad script sink this film.

Could have been better, but just isn't very good. There are much much better DTV slashers out there if you look. Avoid this unless, of course, you need something to put you to sleep. Trust me, it's not addictive.

My Grade: F


An impressive cast: James Mason, Michael Wilding, Stewart Granger, Karel Stepanek, inter alia. And that's about it for the good parts.

Even the cast can't lift this wartime espionage thriller above the routine. James Mason is a splendid actor but should have stayed away from any role calling for a foreign accent. In "The Desert Rats" he mangled German. Here he does to a French accent what the Luftwaffe did to Stalingrad.

Michael Wilding sounds positively uncomfortable with his working-class London locutions. Karel Stepanek, who made virtually a career out of playing Nazis, at least SOUNDS right but the role seems to have come by way of a cookie cutter. What a stereotype. I can't blame the writers too much, though -- this being written in 1942, a bad year for the Allies.

Let's say this is an historical curiosity. The future held better things for most of the people involved in this low-budget thriller.


James Mason delivers perhaps the worst performance of his career in this incredibly mediocre intriguer directed by Harold French. Mason plays Raoul de Carnot, a Free French soldier who returns to his native land to plot against the Nazi occupiers with the help of his family and three British agents. Mason, who herein resembles a rictus grinning caricature of Frank Sinatra, emotes with one of the worst French accents ever captured on celluloid. Don't get me wrong: this is not a broad, Inspector Clouseau-ish accent, it's just a dreadful, unconvincing stab at Franglais. Mason seems to know it, to: he barely acts in the film and sheepishly mumbles his way from scene to scene. Secret Mission is also cheaply made (watch for the model boat chugging across a miniature set in an early scene) and badly written by future Bond-helmer Terence Young, but it's Mason who is the cerise sur le gateau. The whole thing would be a lot more fun if he'd been costumed in a stripy shirt and told to periodically nibble on a baguette.


What a low level things sometimes fell to during the War! To think that such a worthless exercise as this could even be contemplated, much less filmed! James Mason is supposed to be a Frenchman named Raoul, but his French accent is something a ten year-old in a school play would find embarrassing. Thank goodness he dies before the end, none too soon! Michael Wilding is even more ridiculous. He plays someone who owns a cafe in Normandy, but he speaks with a Cockney accent and acts like a clown. As for Roland Culver, he ambles through this film as if he were on a golfing holiday, occasionally wrinkling his brow in order to suggest he may have thought of something, and once in a while uttering a platitude to remind us that this is a talkie (or perhaps to wake the audience up). What passes for a plot is about some jolly chaps going off to Normandy from Britain, to be beastly to the Germans and find out how to win the war by discovering where some things are which might be blown up, dontcha know. Their idea of hiding from the Germans is to leap behind a false bush and leave their legs showing. The dunderheads in helmets who rush by with fixed bayonets are unable to see legs showing behind false bushes, so that's all right, then. This film would disgrace the word 'travesty', if I were to attempt to use it, so I will use the word 'rubbish' instead.


I'm so offended by the awfulness of this movie that I don't even want to expend the energy necessary to tell you in detail how bad it was, such is my absolute hatred for this movie - BUT, it is my duty as a movie lover and as a human being to do my best to prevent you from having to watch this complete dog turd. You will thank me and be pleased that you are not now doing what I am doing: trying to think of a way to strike myself across the head in such a way that I will forget I ever saw this thing. Though, I may not really wish to do that on the off chance I succeed, happen upon the title once again and decide it might be interesting.

It was not interesting. It was terrible. I feel like weeping. Better still, I feel like kicking David Ayer in the groin.

In short, the flick is about some losers being losers in the most non-interesting and non-compelling way possible, and in the end you wish more people had died, especially Ayer. Suckfest 2006. Worst movie I've seen in years, and I've seen a LOT of movies.

Christian Bale plays the part of a white guy who wishes he was a street-savvy Mexican gangsta. Apparently, he's ex military, and apparently, this is supposed to have had some impact on his present personality.

He is as convincing in this role (both as an ex-mil and as a Mexican) as Vanilla Ice is convincing as a hardcore rapper. Random extras acted better in this movie. I believe there was a Coke machine in the distance that seemed more Mexican/street than Christian Bale. I have begun to wonder if Bale can act without Christopher Nolan, or if it was simply the fault of Ayer, who in all honesty really should be arrested for terroristic activities. I can't think of another description for this flick than 'nuclear bomb'.

Don't see it, or if you do, don't say I didn't warn you.


Christian Bale has been one of my favorite actors since American Psycho, with his battery of fine films including hits like Equilibrium, Batman Begins, and The Prestige. However, no amount or great future movies could ever atone for having to watch him (poorly) attempting to appear "ghetto" in this mess of a terrible action flick. Did he read the script before he agreed to play the down on his luck hero of Harsh Times? Bale cannot act well in this role, and listening to him moan on about wanting to get "****ed up!" made me want to throw up. Harsh Times? You don't understand the meaning of the words until you sit through this travesty. I can't even allow myself to score this trash any higher than a 1/10, and I think that's being generous.


After I had watched Harsh Times and found it to be one of the worst films I'd seen in ages, I thumbed back through my collection of film mags - that normally have a decent hold on what's decent and what's not - expecting it to be slated in the review. I couldn't believe what I was reading '...is Bale the new Deniro?' '...Bales performance akin to Deniro in Taxi Driver'. Erm what?...What?

I rented this film on the grounds that Christian Bale normally makes good role choices. As I watched it I became increasingly embarrassed for him as he spilled the stinking homie dialogue from his mouth. "yeah daaawg" "yo homes"...I wanted everybody in this film to either shut up or die. The dialogue throughout is so bad it made me want to run full belt into a bus.

I was also surprised that so many people rated it highly on this site "Christian Bale's performance is as mesmerising as De Niro's Travis Bickle in Taxi Driver" some mug wrote. 7.1 is a high mark for a film that almost made my dog go bald. I know it's about different opinions and tastes but come on people...


Let me preface this by saying that I am definitely a fan of Bale's previous work- particularly American Psycho, and I thought training day was awesome. I also live in LA if that means anything. I'm aware of the fact that trailers are often deceiving, but judging from this movie's trailer- I truly believed that the film showed promise. Knowing this, you may be asking yourself, "how is it possible for a motion picture to contain so much suck in only 2 hrs?" I honestly don't know how it's possible but, they were able to do it. There's not just one thing that makes this movie unbearable- so let me highlight a few of elements that did so. First of all this movie should have been titled something slightly more relevant, e.g.: "stupid people looking for a job in LA", or maybe the less wordy, "jobhunt". Was I the only one who thought from the trailer that Bale was actually going to become a cop? Secondly, the most common misconception in criticism I'm hearing is that the acting is bad, but the fact of the matter is that all of the actors did a bar-none job of portraying stupid, unlikable people. I don't consider myself a saint, but I could not relate to, or even feel sympathy for any of the characters. These are the kind of people who make the world a sh*tty place to live in: corrupt, lazy, lying, drinking-while-driving, gun-toting, dope-smoking, misogynistic, anti-intellectual, selfish, ignorant pieces of sh*t. These people corrupt the military, the police force, school-systems, essentially everything they touch, and yet I felt that these characters were being glorified throughout the whole film, except for towards the end when Bale goes nuts; however it is at this point that I felt Rodriguez stepped-up to being the hero. The thing that bugs me the most is that Rodriguez's character was able to run home after literally murdering his best-friend in the face, make-out with Eva Longoria, and pretend like everything was going to end up fine. I'm sorry- while I don't doubt the rejuvenating qualities of swapping spit with Ms. Longoria, I think its effect was slightly exaggerated, because I don't really think that it could eliminate the horror of killing your best friend. Most disturbing to me is the fact that people not only enjoyed this movie, they loved it! People are already screaming Oscar-worthy, when the truth of the matter is that at best this movie should have gone straight to DVD, and I'm being generous. In all honesty, this movie should never have seen the light of day. I highly regret not walking out of the film, as did two of my friends who went to the movie with me. Of higher priority than 8 dollars, is time, and if you value either I urge you to avoid this movie at all costs.


There basically wasn't any plot - just two major f-ups riding around in a car doing what major f-ups do. Absolutely no character development - you never understand how these two got to be friends in the first place, let alone stayed friends. Also a complete miscast. Was Bale supposed to be Hispanic or what? It was like watching Richard Burton playing Snoop Dogg. I know English actors are versatile, but there are some roles they should stay away from. Playing a war veteran from south-central LA is one of them. It just didn't work for me.

The only thing the movie had going for it (and I suppose why many people liked it) was a lot of over-the-top violence that left you constantly anticipating what laws they were going to trash next. Which after a while became quite boring, once you realize that's the only point to the movie. And how did they get away with openly breaking countless laws - when most people could never get away with it? It seems that they have friends in the LAPD whose ultimate goal in life is to party down with two unemployed losers. I know - it was an insult to my intelligence too.

Finally, the "he might have been a nice guy if he hadn't been traumatized in Afghanistan" alibi has been done waaaay too many times, and wasn't at all convincing in this instance. I got the feeling that Bale's character would have been an sociopath in any case - though probably not as suicidal. In that sense, I was totally OK with the fact that he got f-up in the war. Otherwise, he might have hurt a lot more people, and they wouldn't have all been scumbags like himself.


I liked Training Day.

I like Christian Bale.

Together, they should be a pretty great combination. And together they were, in David Ayer's directorial debut, Harsh Times. Bale in particular, as always, got the notice of critics when the film hit the festival circuit, and came and went in limited theatrical release late last year. Looking fairly interesting, I gave the movie a watch, and despite the praise, ended up being immensely disappointed.

Jim Davis (Bale) is a war veteran, living in Los Angeles and trying to become a cop. He feels he is destined for it, and despite his heavy drinking and smoking (sometimes cigarettes, sometimes marijuana), feels his training overseas makes him more than qualified to help clean up the scum in LA. He lives this desire each day, along with his dream of marrying his sweetheart Marta (Tammy Trull) from Mexico. So while he goes on hoping for the best, he takes his best friend Mike (Freddy Rodriguez) around town looking for a job. But his heavy psychological trauma may prove to be a problem for Jim and his quest.

Without getting into anything more specific, this is the set-up for Harsh Times, and the pattern the film follows for the majority of its runtime (before taking the two main characters on a rather obscure road trip to Mexico that lasts for the final act of the film). And this is also what works against it.

From an ill-placed and beyond confusing opening in the Middle East, the film runs through scene after scene practically thrusting the viewer right in the middle of the action, and hoping they will completely understand the motivations of all of the characters, or even why we should even care about them in the first place. Right from the start, the viewer gets little backstory on Jim or Mike, and even as the film progresses, do not quite get an adequate understanding of who these men are. As I learned it, they are no good losers who drink and smoke while driving, and just get into general mischief instead of what they should be doing. I have seen tons of childish coming-of-age stories like this, and the only difference with this film is that the main characters are men in their twenties, and are not being played by the children they are acting like.

If this mismatched pair is actually from the streets, and have been through the Harsh Times that the title and the film itself suggest, then how can they act like such children? Should they not be more hardened, or even more psychologically damaged than the film lets on? How can they be so simply characterized, and not even for an instant truly believe they should have so many more advanced traits than they do? This seems to be a problem more in the realm of the writer/director, than it is with the actors. As they are, Bale delivers a very good performance as Jim. I could see the work he put into his portrayal of this evil and conceited individual, and I can see just why he continues to be one of young Hollywood's most talented possessions. Even Rodriguez, who is getting better and better as an actor with each role he takes on, does a very good job here as Jim's sidekick, and voice of reason. But both are clearly held back by the limits placed within the confines of the script. Neither is truly more than merely two-dimensional in any scene (whereas the likes of Bale's brilliant Patrick Bateman in American Psycho is a living, breathing three-dimensionally twisted and perverse monster), and even at their best of times, just do not feel well written or described. The actors look like they are struggling to understand their motivations in every scene, and when they are not giving it their all, they just look confused and horrified at the things that are taking place in front of them.

It is almost as if Ayer (no stranger to the LA streets with a resume including the aforementioned Training Day, as well as Dark Blue, S.W.A.T., and The Fast and The Furious) got ahead of himself in constructing the story, that he forgot to make his protagonists/antagonists actually feel the pain and anguish that the story sets out for them. Jim and Mike are supposed to look like they have failed at life, and show the torment they are facing as a result. And while Jim does show some distress, Mike shows nothing but bewilderment. Ayer clearly wants us to see the chaotic scheme of things on the LA streets, but he does not want to commit to any of the ideas he brings up. And what should have been a great stretching point from the acclaimed Training Day quickly morphs into amateur first time film-making.

And even when this muddled mess comes to its conclusion, there is still a blatant lack of satisfaction with where it has gone. For all it sets itself up for, there should be so much more going on. But like it seemed before, Ayer does not want to commit to anything, so he just lets genuine moments of greatness slide past before any of the characters can use them. None of the supporting cast stands out as being worthwhile in their roles, and all of them are wasted in the grand scheme of things. They can be glorified extras for all the viewer cares, they just do not seem to be needed for anything Ayer does briefly commit to.

If Harsh Times is worth anything, it is for the decent performances from Bale and Rodriguez. These are both top-notch actors who have clearly done much better work in much better films, but if one is to venture into this jumbled mess, they have to have something to look forward to.

3/10.


Although this is my first review, I have watched a lot of movies. I normally am attracted to the anti-hero against the world kind of movie, which is what this movie portrayed itself to be. The actors and writers attracted me to this movie, knowing that most likely, that this high profile combination would put in a worthwhile performance. Which you really can't say they didn't. The reason for such a low rating then is, I just didn't get the point of the movie. A movie doesn't need a great plot to be entertaining or evoke emotions of some sort. And that is the problem in the end. I didn't feel any emotions that the film was trying to pry out of me. I didn't feel sad when the movie wanted me to, I didn't laugh when the movie wanted me to, I didn't feel angry or sympathetic to the characters when the movie wanted me to. Why do I keep saying "when the movie wanted me to" you might ask? Because you do feel these emotions through the movie... mainly because the script is so awful. Awful as in poorly written. The lingo was hard to pick up and go in the way of the characters emotions. I felt myself laughing at scenes when I was supposed to be feeling something else. I felt myself distancing from the movie and creating my own entertainment. The movie doesn't go anywhere. I don't think it's supposed to though. It was supposed to get you inside the head of a person confused as to who he is supposed to be. Trapped in two different worlds. The world he wants to be in, Mexico, filled with beautiful scenery, beautiful people and peaceful settings and the world he longs for, LA, full of violence and anger which deep down he feels he needs. Unfortunately we only get brief glimpses of this deep and meaningful inner turmoil of the main character as the movie feels the need to throw in sub plots that really don't add to this turmoil. Trying to combine it with other peoples turmoils - but only superficially. The side character probably has the most powerful scene!? I don't for the life of me understand why!? But he even has two of them! The movie may have salvaged itself if they didn't try to also make the main character, try to talk like a ghetto person one minute, and then a respectable, sensible person the very next. Even though this was trying to bring out the point of the film, the characters mixed emotions deep down of who he actually was. We find ourselves laughing at this comical person. I didn't want to laugh at him, but just couldn't help myself, which I think speaks volumes about the script of this movie. I didn't take this dark movie out to laugh at its contents, which were trying to be very real and were also very graphic. Maybe that speaks volumes about me, but I didn't watch this movie on my own, and I found myself looking around and seeing people feeling as I did.

Very disappointing movie. Wasn't quite what it should have been. Should have spent more time on the main character, less time trying to build up the minor characters, and also should have taken a closer look at the dialog on this script. "Dude", "Dawg", "Homey" coming out of a person's mouth 3 or 4 times in a sentence every sentence, makes it very tough to see and not laugh, especially when that person is Christian Bale. I laugh just thinking about it. It also makes the scenes seem shallow, and they were supposed to be powerful scenes.

Didn't get it. Could have been so much more. So much better. Pity.


SPOILERS AHEAD:

There are so many loose ends in this movie. If the Ice Man really did come from a much earlier civilization, what happened to all those buildings in that civilization? Why is that man the only proof of the civilization?

And about Andy? At first, Jack is angry about him receiving the experimental treatment. But at the end, he's happy God made him a continuation of a long-forgotten civilization. Jack's not even worried about Andy possibly dying like the Professor did.

I thought the scenes with the angry monkey were funny. But on the whole, this movie was very sloppy. Kinda like if Rain Man was a sci-fi B-movie from the '50s, directed by some orangutan.


It is hard to believe that THE DARWIN CONSPIRACY was made in 1999 as it plays like really bad TV of the 1970's; indeed, the director's earliest work was in 1970's TV ("Barnaby Jones" for example). This made-for-TV movie is totally predictable with a plot and script (which are the real culprits) so weak as to be funny. The pseudo-science is outlandishly foolish, and the whole thing is silly enough to merit viewing once, if you're game.

Best scene: a mentally-enhanced chimpanzee (it received injections of super-human DNA!!) steals a van - the chimp learned by watching how to start the vehicle and can operate the pedals by telepathy - but, alas, it apparently did not pay attention to steering and so plunges at high speed head-on into a tractor-trailer and, to the chagrin of government scientists, is killed.

This poor example of film-making makes NIGHT OF THE LEPUS (1972) seem Oscar-worthy.


Dr. Jason Ward (Jason Brooks) is a highly qualified geneticist. His brother Andy Ward (Robert Floyd) had problems during his birth and is mentally retarded. Dr. Jason is hired by an agency to develop some kind of experience with DNA. What he does not know is that this DNA belongs to the body of a very developed prehistoric man, and his findings are being used by another government laboratory to develop a kind of super-intelligent species. His brother Andy is used as part of this experiment. This movie seems to be a bad pilot of a possible television series. However, the screenplay and the performance of the casting are so foolish that probably the producers gave up with such an investment. However, although deserving a place among the worst 250 films in IMDB, there are movies worst than that. By comparison with other craps, my vote is four.


No other words describes this movie other than it absolutely stinks. The plot seemed interesting with a perfectly frozen man with incredibly advanced DNA, but for some stupid reason, this vital plot point was dropped and a relationship between this scientist and his retarded brother was brought to the forefront. The dialogue was hackneyed and trite. Another reason to know why this movie stinks is that the San Diego Padres were incorporated as an essential part of the "plot". If I could give this movie a negative score; I would!


Paris Lockdown: this one-man army of a wet paper bag of poor excuses of a wannabe gangster film, this is as empty as a crêpe Suzette in a nunnery on a Sunday morning. As rich as poor taste goes, yes there's boobs, bottoms and nodding heads galore but takeaway the sleaze, the flying bullets and the flash cars then all we have done is landed on the square that tells us to "Go Back To GO, do not collect £200...start again".

This is as deep and meaningful as gutters will allow it to rise, while an insight of Parisian lowlife drug smugglers, pimps and killers, there is just nothing to add to the narrative. Nothing. The characters are living the life of a one-dimensional caricature. We are given a so-called gang leader who simply is not memorable, and his pet dogs are just as easily put-down and unmissable as the whole sorry affair.

The entire episode here seems too have been pulled out of any sequence in their life, it is a Soap Opera of blood and thugs. This is a basic rise and fall of a Paris crime boss who lives his life whoring, shooting and, again, shooting. The development of these people is as far as your next bus stop to Plainville, even the Robert De Niro look-alike and his greased-up hair looks too pastiche, tooalready done.

Frédéric Schoendoerffer, director, has placed the action in the seedy side of town, the bars, strip joints and night filled streets of Paris, France, Europe and to be fair, any self respecting Parisian gangster seeing this sad debunkle would be, allegedly, embarrassed.

With just a touch of bewilderment, this crime-caper has no direction apart from up. It is not a poorly made film, it's, forgive the pun, executed well, nice offensive language, great looking girls and mean mothers' doing their job, only too well. Some nice, forgive the pun, once more, location shots and bad attitudes, the odd torture sequence, done very nicely too, ouch. However, it is the putting together of this work that to make any coherent sense a plot, let alone a sub-plot would have been acceptable.

These guys are hard-core but when the spotlight of the good-cop, bad-cop is shining on their sorry backside, it is the whole main feature that will give the game away and get you busted, sent-down and sent to solitary


If you rent this movie, bring a long a peg for your nose, as this is an utter stinker. The main drive of a good gangster film, is the characterisation, the motives behind the violence. This has none of that, all it has is a grumpy Alan Sugar a-like moping round shouting and swearing. You don't care about him or any of the other characters at all, people drift in and out of the story without any sort of motivation. Its flat and dull, even the half decent car-park shoot out is spoiled with fake cgi blood. I will say one thing though, the torture scene with the drill to the knee, is pretty cool, but doesn't go any further than in the trailer. In fact, just watch the trailer, its much better than the movie itself. Proper wafty. If you want to see an intelligent French gangster film, with pathos and a sense of realism get 'The beat that my heart skipped'.


I just don't understand... Where is the story, where are the characters ? Well, this is a strange movie. I'm still wondering whether is was good or not... This could have been a classic but the characters are so flat: They all live for the same things (i.e. drugs, alcohol, money and Hungarian whores) they get doing some "business". None of the characters seems to have something unique or original. The story is really completing this. Whith no-personality-characters you get a no-personality-story or just a no-thing. On the other hand if you really haven't got anything to do today. Just go. There is a lot of dumb mafia guys shootin' and drinking all film long. Really interesting ;-) Fortunately I didn't pay for the cinema so I can't regret it !


Self-indulgent, tiresome and whiny. I saw this with the other films nominated for the 2005 Animated Short Oscar. This one generated the least audience response (no clapping afterward)of the five. There's a second act, so-to-speak, that tells the father's story that is interesting and better than the first and third acts. But it's pretty much a downer of a film. The animation is simple and interspersed with home movies and photographic stills. The animation shifts among visual styles for no apparent reason. Reminded me a lot of a Woody Allen film -- if you like his work, you'll like this. If, like me, you don't, give this a pass. Many other works have examined the tensions of the father-son relationship much better.