If there was a 0 stars rating i would gladly hand it out to this absolutely horrid pile of waste. The fact that the actual summary is perfectly fine and that if it had been made different it could have been brilliant only makes it worse. The basic task of locking up a group of people in an experiment chamber is fine, but WHERES THE EXPERIMENT? All i see is a bunch of unintelligent surfers and blondes chatting about music and culture i don't know or want to know about... The challenges are pathetic and silly. The whole point of reality TV is to show REALITY. If you set a 'challenge' don't make them play with exaggerated props of food and stereotypical cultural elements in 'friday night games'. make them do an actual challenge. And as for 'earning' prize money, thats fine, if they actually earnt it! These people are nuts. If only they would make the show better, the actual idea would be glorious. But that ain't gonna happen!


This rubbish excuse for television is the single most god-awful piece of trash ever to hit Australian television. The house-mates are dull, uninteresting, ridiculously unintelligent and are picked on the basis that you would be likely to attempt to murder them if you had to live with them. As far as I am concerned Big Brother is the decline of western society, showing how us as a society are on a steep slope to becoming brain-dead morons. Whatever happened to television that didn't target the lowest common denominator of society as an audience? This cannot be classified as entertainment. I think that it true that Channel Ten can remove your soul. It happened to Rove McManus who was once a respectable comedian and, once moving to Channel 10, become horribly unfunny. With the exception of The Simpsons which is highly intelligently made.


Besides being dragged out and a little convoluted, this movie has inconsistencies that give away the ending early into the film.

Mrs. Savage is simply too *nice* given all the trouble that's hit that fan. When you first see husband and wife together you assume she's clueless about the affair, just from their chemistry.

It's bad enough her husband had an affair with a sexy young blonde , now he's in all kinds of legal dodo. No wife would respond as compassionately as her, without some occasional flare- up of anger and sarcasm from buried hostility.

The ending is a mess with a way too drawn out confession. It made me regret sitting thought the film, as much as I like Harrison Ford playing a bad boy now and then. Maybe this role helped land him a much better character in "What Lies Beneath."

The film should have simply ended with him finding the blood hammer and then let the audience's imagination fill in the rest. (which by the way is the LAST thing a killer would leave laying around without washing it off - duh)

It's also unusually sad to leave the cute little son an orphan because of his dad's bad behavior. The movie's a bummer.


I don't care for Harrison Ford, and I didn't care for this movie. The best thing about it is that the viewer is kept in the dark as to Ford's guilt or innocence of the murder of his former lover. Another plus is Raul Julia's fine performance as Ford's defense attorney.

But these two elements cannot save this film. It lacks cohesiveness and lacks anything for us to really care about.

4/10


In "Presumed Innocent",Harrison Ford plays deputy prosecutor Rusty Sabich,who has been assigned to investigate the murder of a colleague.the hitch is,he had been sleeping with.he digs a bit deeper into the case than someone wants him to and finds himself charged with her murder.i had had the chance to watch this movie several times over the years and never got around to it.finally,i sat down to watch it.i was not impressed.the movie plods along much too slowly.it is not riveting or even compelling but i suck with it.i will give points for the ending though.it is something i did not expect and would have been pretty decent except they dragged it out long.Harrison Ford was convincing in a dramatic role.Bonnie Bedelia was good as the wife,and Raul Julia was very good as Sabich's defence attorney.as for the movie on a whole,it was disappointing. i wish i could give this movie a better rating,but the best i can do is 4/10


First of all, the title is kind of misleading: yes, there are blondes in this movie, but they use guns approximately 1% of the running time (at the most). Unless the title refers to their others "assets", in which case it makes more sense. Anyway, this spoof of "Basic Instinct" (with such side targets as "Indecent Proposal", "Body Of Evidence" and "9 & 1/2 Weeks") is certainly not lazy - there's a visual or verbal gag every 10 seconds or so - but, unfortunately, only a small portion of these gags score; the first 10 minutes are the best, the last 10 minutes, in particular, degenerate into sloppy idiocy. For most of the people involved, this was their first and last film; one that I would have liked to see in more is former Miss California (or so the Troma DVD cover claims) Elizabeth Key, who is not only beautiful (though the nudity is provided by the other leading lady, Gloria Lusiak), but a pretty funny comedienne as well. *1/2 out of 4.


Okay, this flick has a lot against it. Bad acting, bad script, bad directing, low, very low budget and more junk than I can name. But there are a few things going for this movie, that make it not totally painful to watch. Some of the jokes are funny. And the lead isn't played to badly by Michael McGaham. And unlike some low budget features, it doesn't try to be what it isn't. And that's good. This movies sucks, and they all know it. They're not trying to make anything of any substance of any kind. But it's still hard over look many of the mistakes here, so I can't give it a rating higher than a 2. But that's a big deal, since I've never even thought about giving a Troma film anything higher than a 1. So if you're in the mood for stupid, dumb (dumber than "Dumb & Dumber) comedy, than check this little flick out.


(SPOILERS!!)

This film is boringggg and baaaddddd.....Bad acting,bad camera,BAD JOKES!!!!!!!!!!!Bad music,bad script,bad everything!!!!! One of the Troma's worst films(not has bad then "Rabbid Grannies"). The dude is a very sheep clone of Bruce Campell, and the blonde chick is look like a street whore... This film is really bad, and the jokes are...well AWFUL!!! The Director should be in prison for life, just for doing such a bad movie... I like Troma films,like "Tromeo and Julliet", "Terror Firmer" and "Toxic Avenger", but "Blonde have more guns" is a terrible stupid comedy with no sense at all....


This is the very worst film I have ever seen in my life on all accounts. It is a series of continuous and abysmally stupid jokes. If it had a plot, I don't know what it was. It appeared that the guy who was writing it was trying to write an "Airplane" style film but tried too hard and with hackneyed lines. The cheesy "Under Sir Veillance" bit was about the highlight of the entire film. Then, on top of this inanity, add lots of gratuitous nudity which contributes nothing to the story except that the person making the film was probably getting off (it appeared the camera froze in a few chosen spots...like we have never seen those before!) The only funny thing aspect of this film is that it was even listed on here! I was shocked to find it. Okay,it is memorable but so is food poisoning. I was trying to think of the worst film I have ever seen and then looked it up! Haha! There it was! Think of the most boring home movie you have ever seen...then, divide the entertainment value in half. That is this film.


Do not go to this movie if you haven't read the book by the Flemish writer Willem Elschot. This movie is very boring and lacks all interest because you cannot identify with the characters. Does Grünewald (Shaun Dingwall) love Louise Créteur (Jules Delpy) or not? Does he become a deserter at the end or is he killed in the war? Why does the German commit suicide? What happens with the old woman Gendron (Dora van der Groen)? Grünewald must be something of a German superman that an American widow falls in love with him at first sight. This movie is slow and dark, is it always raining in Paris? Behalf of that you don't feel the Parisian atmosphere. It could be London at the end of the 19th century or even a German town at the same period. The lawyer (he was a lawyer), who is the real "chief" of the pension has no personality at all, he could as well be the postman ringing at the door. The end of the movie is the best: then at last you see that Louise Créteur has feelings and that she can cry. Every time that Grünewald wants to declare his love, somebody intervenes very artificially to interrupt their tentative to some conversation. Is Grünewald the "man with black hair" who is going to ruin the life of Louise as a fortune-speller predicts? The abortion seems to be done so that Grünewald never knows it, which is impossible. And how does Grünewald react to this remains also a mystery. The war scenes are superfluous and without interest. Everybody plays on the piano in this hotel which is also without interest. The friendship with the other servant is uncomprehensible, why is she so honest? Is she really her friend? She has nothing to win by being her friend. This movie is full of riddles and at the end you say: "Let this soon be over, please".


Boring. Boring. Boring. Sure, some of the shots looked sort of pretty, but not unlike all the other films you've seen dealing with this period. Nothing new or interesting happens, so you can't even call the film daring or interesting. Some people will call the film well made (even the ones that don't like it), but what does that mean? If nothing interesting is shown and you care about none of the characters, is a film well made because it looks like it costs a lot? No, this film was badly written and directed, let's face it.


While the animation and style of the movie aren't half bad, in fact (besides of background stuff and vegetation not exactly moving much and the characters seeming lifeless every now and then) it seems better than a lot other animated movies (except anything by Pixar or Dreamworks of course).

That said the writing is horrible, mainly because the story doesn't seem to make any sense WHATSOEVER. From what I gathered it seems to play a few years after Don Quixote's fight against the windmills and all of his adventures and the movie is to about 50% about Sancho's Donkey (thus called Donkey Xote). The actions and traits of the characters deviate from one scene to another and the story even gets into the bizarre at times.

For example we got a "bad guy", that isn't really evil... more conflicted or confused cause he wants to get famous. And he seems to be the kind of guy that believes the best way to make you leave a city would be to make everyone else disappear so you feel unwelcome, then block all the rivers and burn all the food so you'll have to leave after a while instead of say throwing you out directly... and while that might have some sort of style it's illogical and this movie is riddled with similar stuff. Also there's some of his minions that want to kill some of the protagonists at one point and after the heroes managed to save themselves, there doesn't seem to be any grudge and both parties just walk away.

With a decent script this could've been a nice animated movie similar to say Shrek but as it stands right now it's somewhere between a 3-4 for me.


Another reviewer wonders whether this is just drinking up EU subsidies, and I have to admit that a rare Spanish venture in animation ended up in a disaster.

One - animation is decent, although animals look like old Pixar and Dreamworks, or clones of them * especially the donkey, who is 99% Shrek's Donkey, and the hen, very much like in 'for the birds'.

Two - a very complex storyline, based on a very long book with a difficult plot and many subplots... that wasn't a good idea for a cartoon, which gets lost Three - some good second level jokes and some good first level jokes.

Overall... too hard for kids, too long, too convoluted. Pity they hired decent animators but poor editors and script writers.


Over the Christmas period we've taken our sons to see quite a few movies. I thought we reached the bottom of the barrel last October when we went to see 'space chimps' but that was long before Donkey Xote (DX). Let's start with the positives. The animation isn't bad whatever some reviewers here may have written. It's not cutting edge and is a little on the simple side maybe but it's easy on the eye. That's it. Everything else is simply awful. I don't know if the original Spanish version makes more sense but the plot is is over complicated, the dialogue impossibly convoluted and the acting voice overs appalling. Watching it is a little like reading obscure eastern European poetry. It seems to be as much an exercise in proving what an intellectually clever chap the director is but in trying so hard to do so shows actually that he's completely clueless. There are characters cropping up in the film that are utterly pointless, don't add to the story and serve to confuse the audience. The script is largely read as if your listening to the kind of live translation service that you hear at news conferences or during UN addresses. some of the voices are so irritating you could easily feel like screaming. The voice over for Don Quixote's horse is, possibly, the most excruciating that I've ever heard. It pains me to say that my boys (aged 3 and 7) enjoyed it. That said they didn't really have a clue what was going on and they will happily sit in front of any cartoon in any language without any complaint. If you're a sentient adult please, please, please give this movie a miss.


Please forgive my ignorance, but I've never even heard of Don Quixote. (sorry!) Unfortunately, this movie failed to ignite my curiosity or enthusiasm for the legend. The English dubbed version is very weak and I found ALL the voices rather annoying.

But I can see how this story has become a Spanish favourite. The ideas of chivalry and adventure are always popular and this story reminds me of a crap Spanish version of say.. robin hood, king Arthur or the french three musketeers story.

Anyway, this film is dismal and fails to capture the imagination or produce any laughs from it's lame comical moments. The soundtrack is also poor but the animation is 'ok'. If you decide to watch this film then I will not be held responsible for your inevitable regret.


I was confused reading one after another so laudatory reviews; I began thinking that I really wasn't paying attention when they aired the show. But then, I found a review from Canadian blogger Geno Sajko, who resumes EXACTLY the outstanding feature I most remember about the show: "... they have kids doing stupid things getting them into trouble (taking the show to a attempted comedic level), and characters who acted so stupidly - not believably. Too many episodes around some dumb tw*t doing something stupid after being asked not to, thus costing time, food, supplies etc, then rescuing them."

In a hostile or at least unknown environment, people acted like they were strolling through a Kentucky prairie. The Martin couple behaved like Lost in Space's Dr. Smith, always furthering their own agenda and finally creating problems for all, themselves included.

My vague -and perhaps mistaken- recollections also include an absence of visual attractions: In my mind, people are walking all the time on dirt; all around looked like brown dust, and that's all there was.

Actors were excellent (and often gorgeous), but the characters were unable to gain my sympathy.


I think I have a love/hate- relation ship with this series.

The show began so very promising! There was mythological mystery of the new world, a conspiracy hailing back from Earth 1, quite likable characters, a goal for the characters to reach (and thus a chance for the show (and the characters) to grow).

I think I watched every single episode of it and whenever an episode was over I thought "this show sucks", yet, I always came back. What went wrong? IMHO they focused on the wrong characters (the kids and the overprotective mother were just plain annoying) and the plot just dragged on and on(which can be said about pretty much every episode, but also on the series as a whole), without reaching satisfying peaks, without noticeable progress on the characters mission to reach "new pacifica" and without a closure that suits the promises made by the set-up of the series.

I think in this regard it's pretty comparable to ST-Voayager- While there was a "Mission" for the series and they spoke about it all the time, it never felt like they made any measurable progress.

(OK, Voyager had a crappy "wrapping up" episode and a very few amusing episodes but this didn't made it than Earth2.)


This review is just about 1 episode in general. I saw some eps of earth 2 a long time ago (i don't recall them as being anywhere above a 5 star rating), but when i saw this episode today i felt animated to write a review. The first 30 minutes weren't really interesting, just some:"oh there's a time rift, black-hole whatever thing in this cave". The fun actually started when they "got a theory" about how this time-rift whatever works. There were spiders at each side of the rift and after a spider bit one of the actors and he suddenly started to be in love with one of the other actors they got to set up a theory. Some time ago in this ep a spider bit one of those Grendel's(at least they are called so in the German translation) and it got angry as hell. So... 2 different types of spiders. One makes you feel positive and the other negative. Think logical and you might think of a positive and a negative magnetic pole. a positive on the one side of the rift and the negative on the other side of the rift. Sure... 2 magnetic spider webs equals 2 poles = magic rift of instant teleportation. When the rift broke down they came to the conclusion that they might have brought a spider from one side to the other and by removing the "wrong" spider by placing it in a plastic tube, TAdaaaah the magic rift appears again.

Someone talked about brain in this series.... i think this is the hardest anti-brain ep i ever saw in sci-fi for a long time..(OK except for Andromeda maybe).

My final words: go watch battle-star galactica or the "new" enterprise for some serious sci-fi. earth 2 has some serious problems explaining things(and sci-fi is mostly about stuff you can somehow explain... as its called SCIENCE-fiction) and the story wont keep you longing for the next ep. This last paragraph is my personal thought only so pls don't flame me about that.

Best regards Dobs


A pseudo religious story of salvation and redemption with wood carved characters that you would never choose for a mission like that. Egomaniacs, corrupt bureaucrats, a wise black man, a mother as a second in command who is totally obsessed with her sick kid, a riffle guy as a commander, a lonely girl without a mom raised by here tech dad with secrets to be kept.... The actors are also mostly to be rated B, the series wasn't very challenging anyway. Scientifically absolute nonsense. When will there be a sci-fi show where you don't have to think in every scene "oh G what a crud!" If you like Lost, this might be something for you. If you like fantasy, join the club. If you like sci-fi, don't waste your time.


I almost want to give it a ten for being so perfectly horrible but the fact that he takes this so seriously makes it so bad. I can't help but watch it. It's great! I'll be waiting for the next 2000 chapters, but he calls it "hip-hopera". There is no movement to the music after a chapter ends, he rhymes the same word several times in a row. It's plain awful from a musical standpoint but the fact that it's a farcical, unintentional laugh riot, makes it totally awesome! My favorite line is when the midget (and i love that he's referred to as "the midget") says "oh god, I think I just shitted on myself. How could he sing that line with a straight face?


this has got to be one of the funniest things i possibly have ever seen in my life, and i have seen funny. R. Kelly gives voice to each character, all characters having the exact same voice but one, who he gives a southern-fried voice to (keep in mind, once again, in this "opera" he is singing all voices).

did he even think to take a fiction 101 class? nope, the answer is obvious, he is writing for himself and not an audience. the funniest part of the entire "opera" is the fact that it wasn't written to be funny. R. Kelly takes himself so seriously that watching the overwrought emotion, along with whatever actually rhymes with, yes i am not lying, the word is "baffroom", is too much to handle. the guy actually sings an entire commentary about walking across a room, looking in drawers for jilted lovers, looking behind refrigerators, (nope, no one back there), all the while waving a gun around. who is cheating on whom? who cares. this is freaking hilarious for all the reasons it wasn't meant to be funny, because HE thinks it is marvelous. give it a try- just be prepared to not be able to catch your breath because you'll be laughing so hard. i'm giving it a "1" for awful because the writer's intent was serious, now if it was a spoof of an opera, that would be a different story. honestly, i don't think dave chappelle could spoof it any funnier.

did i mention the midget in a cabinet?


At the beginning this threatens to be more than an R&B opera. R Kelly is immediately the closeted narrator and the bewildered protagonist in the bed outside. The episode - as its successors in this first series - battles the intent of doing something remarkable in lyric storytelling with the dramatic dead ends of posturing, homophobia and brandishing firearms.

I came across this series after having read an article by Alex Petridis, a pop critic for The Guardian, a UK paper. What he had to say is worth repeating: "These days, record companies have entire departments dedicated to preventing artists like R Kelly from perpetrating acts of grand folly such as Trapped in the Closet. Whatever you think of the end product... you have to be glad he has circumvented them. The increasingly beige world of rock and pop could use the occasional grand folly, however crass, idiotic, baffling and unintentionally hilarious it may be." Jim Swaffield's rather perfunctory committal of R Kelly's plan to video must rank, in both senses, alongside. 3/10


Don't get me wrong, I found this WILDLY entertaining - as a comedy. Me and everyone that watched it with me laughed hysterically at this thing. The rhymes and lyrics are 3rd grade level and simplistic.

At first, I thought R. Kelly deliberately made this as a joke, but it seems apparent that he's taking himself pretty seriously. It's great for a good laugh.

That other comment above this one, I contend is written by someone involved in the sales of the video or a lobotomy patient. No sane human could possibly consider this a serious work with any redeeming value. Darn funny stuff though!!


Trapped in the Closet 'Trapped in the Closet' contains a single chord progression. I am reliably informed that this is an "Am chord with C as pedal bass to an E-Major chord with B as a pedal bass". For a film that is sung throughout, this is no mean feat, and the predictability of Robert Kelly's vocals cements the plot's position as main attraction. This, perhaps, is the great failing of the project, jeopardising its status as the first true "hip-hopera".

Hip-hop has, in recent years, become a major player (excuse the reviewer being down wit' the flo') in the televised media, and the prevalence of urban-styled videos on music channels surely made such an attempt inevitable. Many people will immediately observe similarities with the surprisingly underused rock-opera, and perhaps The Who's attempts will spring to mind. The immediate, advantage of 'Tommy' over 'Trapped' is that of variation. Whilst maintaining sufficient momentum within its story, 'Tommy' goes one step further, managing to produce not only a stream of interesting and distinct sounds, but indeed a few memorable classics. In his blatant refusal to omit describing any detail on the screen, to explore a situation on an emotional, digressional level, or even to throw in a new beat once an hour, Kelly destroys the film's potential as a musical device. It would seem fair to rebut this using the basic principles of rap. With its highly illustrative nature and foundations in slow, unimposing beats, a "hip-hopera" would likely be a methodical affair. As much as these tendencies stay true to the genre, anyone recalling The Streets' concept album 'A Grand Don't Come For Free' will appreciate the greater capacity of rap, utilising a myriad of interesting and, wait for it, relevant backing tracks to highlight the private thoughts and emotions of the narrator. It is a very delicate point to make, but I must highlight that R's picture is not suitable for those expecting to see developments in rhyme. Many verses end with identical expletives, and the reliance on the gangsta image makes the censored version solely suitable for those who can appreciate the inherent humour in missing every second word.

So much (or perhaps so little) for the music. To its credit, the opening twelve chapters are remarkably fast-paced, each chapter consisting of 4 minutes of intense conflict with an assured cliff-hanger ending. This reflects more on the serialised nature of Trapped's release than an underlying theory, but it is undoubtedly a useful device in its desperate battle for your attention. However, depending on the viewer's mindset, the shock-tactics might appear to be a little old-hat, particularly in a society where many of the incidents detailed are rife. To spoil, slightly, the start of a very early plot line: Kelly is threatening to shoot an innocent clergyman whose wife he has been sleeping with, until, after much suspense, said clergyman is discovered to be GAY. For no apparent reason, the sexual tendencies of this as-yet irrelevant character cause Kelly great mental anguish, displaying (as do so many characters in a tale where everybody is cheating on their respective spouses) an all too clear sense of homophobia. The movie relies heavily on strange stereotypes, and one can readily imagine R and his crew (film, of course) sitting down with a list of 10 names to devise novel links between each. A could sleep with B, who is married to C, who had an affair with stripper D, whose physically challenged son E went to jail for stealing Mary-Jane of F, and so on ad infinitum. The end-result is a mess of interweaving actors, all being voiced by Kelly, and by the end of chapter 22, the landmark attained at the time of this review, you are left upset, confused and slightly irritated. Put simply, the viewer is not fully rewarded for his efforts.

Chapter 22 revolves solely around an unexplained secret, and the vast number of characters that it remarkably affects. However, there are no clues as to what the promised continuation will centre around, or when it will actually be made. If you are the kind of person who could not live with watching the first two of the Godfather movies, steer well clear of 'Trapped'. The same message applies to anyone without a basic understanding of hip-hop, or one whose knowledge and selectiveness on the subject will be disappointed by the barrenness of the rap. The target audience is those whose lives share enough similarities with the characters that their issues appear real and critical. If you carry a gun/knife, or have experience cheating on a partner who turned out to be in similar shenanigans with a masochistic rabbi, then perhaps this film will ring true. Of course, those of you fully immersed in popular culture, who can view the disconsolate rapper with a cynical and condescending air; well, students, you know who you are...


I really don't see R. Kelly making this 'series' out of seriousness, actually I think he made it on a dare or something to prove to his friends that his fans will eat up anything he puts out. So R. Kelly drank a bottle of laxatives and squeezed out 42 minutes of a musical. This thing covered EVERYTHING in way to much detail and seems based on a collage of Springer guests.

The reason I say all this is because I couldn't take it seriously and I can't imagine anyone else doing the same, each sequence just goes on & on, really, why does it take 10 verses to describe a man opening a closet door? And that's just an example; this sort of things goes on through out the whole series.

The best and worst part of it all, the 12 segment ends with a sort of cliffhanger, letting you think that R. Kelly just bought another bottle of laxatives and is stewing up another 6 or 12 segments to this all.


The fact that people are calling him a 'musical genius' for this is absurd.

He uses the SAME MUSIC IN EVERY chapter and just randomly talks over it, with what has to be the most completely retarded thing to ever be recorded.

And to the people who are claiming this is R. Kelly 'purposely' knowing that he was making a comedy?

NO....he was downright serious and thought he was on the same level as Mozart, Puccini and other opera greats, when he wrote this meandering sack of crap known as "Trapped in the closet"

He sat back and thought he wrote the 'Magnum Opus' of RB songs.

R. Kelly is full of himself....and we all know what R. Kelly is full of.

R. Kelly should be in prison for being a pedophile.

I know that if the average Joe got caught doing what he did, he'd be in prison for a long time.


This film is truly an insight to the mind of R.Kelly. The only thing I will give it is the singing ability of the cast; other than that...nothing. While watching this "artful" piece of ..., I was distressed to think that people could actually relate to this plot. Not only did the script completely lack any true depth, but also R.Kelly's performance as the singing narrator was accidentally comedic relief, as the whole film was, though not intended to be. When I realized that this was a serious movie and not intended to be as bad as it was, I analyzed a little more in depth the "intricate relationships, complex characters and general truths of life" as R.Kelly explains in the director commentary remix, or lack there of. This movie is entertaining for a few minutes, but for those of you who enjoy this movie and feel it tells about your own life; I am sorry, you are a deprived, uncultured, individual who lacks the ability for much thought at all. If you don't believe my statements take a look at the director commentary. As you will see, the mastermind behind this project avidly discusses what is written on the back of the DVD box which, though already unintelligent blather about cliffhangers, sounds dumber coming out of R.Kelly's mouth. If you disagree with me, or...you are R.Kelly, please attempt to deviate this post.


My friend showed me this video, and I must say it is among the weirdest things I have recently seen. I seriously don't know what the heck happened. It is kind of like a modern day opera, but the music is really bad, and the acting is very weak. I'm really not a fan of R Kelly or rap music in general, but the lyrics in this were really poorly written, and the whole thing had one repetitious beat in it. I honestly don't know why anyone would want to put the effort into making this - did someone down the line actually read the script and think it was good??? I also thought it might have been made as a joke or something.

I'm giving it a generous 3 out of 10, just because I feel people should see it for themselves just to see how weird it is.


When I first heard the idea behind this "urban operetta" or whatever it's supposed to be, I accepted it. I figured R. Kelly was going to try to basically create a sort of R&B "Tommy". But no such luck. Instead, we get a production so ridiculous it would have Ed Wood rolling on the floor laughing.

The beat never changes, and it's a pretty lousy beat to start with. It's full of awful forced rhymes that make you long for the Seussian. The story begins coherently, but falls into complete nonsense before then end. Laughably bad, but then again, it does make you laugh.

The only thing redeeming about this steaming pile is to use it as a drinking game. Every time someone pulls out a gun...


R. Kelly is a disgrace to all black people. Not only that, but he is also a disgrace to the entire human race. Go away, R. Kelly. You were 'THIS CLOSE' to being cool. But you just had ta pee on the b*tch, didn't ya? DIDN'T YA!? i hate you R. Kelly. I really, really hate you. I think you are this generation's Hitler. You suck. In case you don't get the idea, i'll give you some director's commentary: I hate you. I seriously do not like this movie. And the IMDb comment rules. And also, i hope the so called 'stars' of this 'feature' understand that they will never get an 'acting' job again. See you in porn, folks. I also feel bad about the people who worked with him on this 'project' did they, like, know he was a joke? I don't understand how this even exists.


This has to be the worst idea ever, a story being told with a bad beat that seems so improbable, unbelievable and pointless that it makes no cents after chapter 3. It also sets a stereotype that everyone who cheats on their husband or wife their husband or wife is cheating on them. Almost every time a group of 3 or more people are talking someone has to pointlessly pull out a gun. It just goes to show that these people try to make their guns talk for them and shoot someone for no reason. Most of the chapters you don't know whats going on unless you listen to all the chapters before it so you cant even listen to one part of it without getting lost. Unless you have like 45 minutes to waste don't watch or listen to this garbage. If you are waiting for the next chapters to come out then you must find watching paint dry and grass grow exciting.

Question for bbadger187: What do you find awesome about this?


I saw this with a friend of mine over the weekend in a press screening and I really did not enjoy it. The special effects are fine but the story is rather hammy and the performances are not very good. The main character looks like a deer in head lights most of the time and the villains acts like cartoon stereotypes more than real characters. Most of the characters here seem like rejects from other films and it shows by how unoriginal they were. The only performance in the film that has any credibility what so ever is the dragon Saphira and that's mainly because she is voiced by Oscar winning actress Rachel Weisz, who has more talent in her vocal cords than all the actors working in this film combined.

My suggestion, wait for DVD.


Crude, unimaginative adaptation of Christopher Paolini first novel is a bad joke from top to bottom. The screenplay is a joke, with major characters missing from the original novel and the acting from almost everybody in the film is down right horrible and that's really because most of the roles are miscast to begin with. Jeremy Irons makes an grant effort with what he has to work with but he's let down by the script and the bad performances of his co-stars and the only solid piece of real acting comes from the voice over work of Rachel Weisz, who gives the dragon Saphira enough charm, charisma, and strong will to make her the only believable and likable character in the entire film. That's in itself a great accomplishment considering the fact that script really does not even try to do that with itself.


Paolini's novel should have been left alone. It was unnecessarily tampered with to make it into a lack-luster movie losing all magic, motivation, and meaning. The writers, director, and producers missed a real opportunity to make this into a great trilogy experience...perhaps they should have read the books first because they were much better than this. Get better actors and get a better director and you will have something. My advice...produce the movie again . We will forget the first attempt and bring back Rachel Weisz who made the dragon the best part of the film and it will be a better film. If you do that, it will succeed.


When I first heard that a movie is going to be made by the book "Eragon" by Christopher Paolini, I must say I was very delighted, and I was even more delighted when I heard that Stefen Fangmeier will be the director. I have read the book, and thaught:"What a great movie this is going to be". Unfortunately, I was wrong. First of all, I would dare to say that half of the events that happened in the book weren't shown in the movie at all(reason: Lord of the Rings has less then 400 pages and the movie lasts around 3 hours; Eragon has around 500 pages and it lasts around hour and a half). As a result, instead of complexed, unpredictable fantasy plot you get simple, one-way heading fairy tale. Characters that play very significent role in book(like Murtagh, Ajihad and Angela) are hardly even mentioned in the movie, so that it becomes centered on pretty much only 3 characters-Eragon, Saphira and Brom. Villains and locations lack imagination, so they look cheap and ordinary. Choice of actors is, in my opinion, good, except Edward Speleers. There are way too much "memorable quotes" in the movie, so that movie becomes kind of too much theatrical.Everybody, from director to actors failed, but still, I personally bealive that the biggest failure is Peter Buchman, screenwriter. Although he had a fantastic material to work on, he managed to ruin it, and make a pathetic screenplay from a fantastic bestseller. Only bright side of the movie is always top-of-the-class John Malkovich(King Galbatorix), pretty solid performance by Jeremy Irons (Brom), but most of all dragon Saphira (voice by Rachel Weisz, whose vocal abilities are on very desirable level)


Really Bad. If you read the books, do yourself a favor and don't put yourself through the agony of sitting through this travesty. The story line (which skips about 70% of the original story line) wanders miles from the novel. Except for Rachel Weisz's great voice over work for the dragon (which is the best acting this film has) the acting from the rest of the actors is just above high school play level. What were Jeremy and John thinking in taking these roles? The special effects are decent but that's it and the sets are cheesy Save your cash and wait for the third novel.

Let's hope they will not be a sequel.


For a film with potentially more scope and grandeur than even Lord of the Rings, Eragon falls entirely flat due to lack luster acting, a terrible script and a total lack of pace. Only Rachel Weisz voice acting for the dragon Saphira manages to give the movie its only good performance while Jeremy Irons sincere performance is let down by the hammyness of its lackluster script. The special effects are fine and the cinematography is great, the pace is way off and the movie is way too short for its own good. I have not read the books that gave life to this film but I hope it was much better than this because the movie was a letdown.


Horrible and very funny adaptation of the popular children's book that plays like a bad SNL skit that is trying to parody "The Lord of the Rings" than the book that it's based on. The screenplay is a major mess with dialog that even little kids would find stupid and the performances are almost all laughably bad. Jeremy Irons and John Malkovich should be ashamed of themselves for even agreeing to be in this film and Djimon Hounsou should start reading his scripts a little more carefully. The only redeeming thing about this crappy film is the great voice over work of Rachel Weisz, who manages to give the dragon Saphira more talent and range in terms of solid acting than all the human actors working in the film. The C.G.I work done for Saphira was also well done, making her more lifelike than her human co-stars as well.

Outside of Rachel Weisz's great voice acting and the great special effects for the Dragon Saphira, this movie is more and less a bad comedy that did not deserve nether of them.


The movie was an absolute crap imitation of the book. so be warned if you have read the book do not go through the pain of watching this absolute horrific and badly made movie.

The producers changed the whole plot and facts including: 1 the egg that Eragon finds looks more like a pill than an egg and when he touches it, it gives him a fat spiral on his hand instead of the shining palm. 2Eragon and Brom go on a journey to track the Razac but in the movie they go straight to the Varden. 3 Eragon doesn't meet Solebum. 4 Angelina doesn't read the correct prophecy. 5 Brom gets killed by Durza instead of the Razac. 6 Katrina doesn't even get shown. 7the dwarfs are not short and whatever happened to Orik. 8 Eragon just happens to know the ancient language. 9 Eragon rescues Arya and she is healthy and doesn't have pointed ears!! 10 the twins don't appear. 11 Durza doesn't give Eragon a scar. 12 Eragon doesn't bless Elva. 13 Farthen Dur is not even shown as it is described in book and there is not star rose that Saphira breaks. 14 Murtagh and Eragon don't spar together. 15 Saphira has feathers on her wings(she a dragon not a bird!!) 16 Eragon doesn't go on flight with Saphira were he gets scars on his knees. 17 Durza conjures up a strange creature instead of just fighting Eragon with a sword.

I could keep going forever but i don't have space so i'll just say this; they should make the movie again!!!


I liked the book. I really did. I thought it was a great fantasy story with dynamic, entertaining, and complex characters. The plot was great; it was an intricate and well-done book. When I heard a movie was being made, I was excited. I had hoped they would take this great book and make it the next big fantasy series. I was sorely mistaken.

First of all, how can you possibly expect to take such a long book and cram it into 1hr and 40min? IMO, any fantasy movie such as this should be at least 2 hours, preferably more. Because what does fantasy appeal to? Intelligent people. Next, the acting was terrible. Even Jeremy Irons and John Malkovich (who there is more of in the trailers than the actual movie) were laughable. Saphira as Rachel Weisz wasn't particularly well cast; she sounds a bit young and not very wise, as Saphira is supposed to be. Ed Speleers, ouch. There was no expression in his voice AT ALL. Every line sounded the same: so monotonic. Sienna Guilliory as Arya was depressing. Acts more like a teenager than the wise elf she is supposed to be. The only pretty decent characters were Durza (Robert Carlyle) and Murtagh (Garrett Hedlund).

Whoever wrote this should be fired. This is the most clichéd movie I have ever heard. One line is said about 5 times. It's utterly disgusting. You know right what's gonna come out of a character's mouth even before he or she says it. Oh, and this: "Time to fly, do or die!" I bust out laughing during one of the "tensest" parts of the movie.

To top it off, this movie is BORING. All the action is over in about 6-10 minutes. The rest is just dialogue that serves to advance a poorly cut plot that the audience isn't interested in. The whole thing seems very pieced together. Scenes continually cut to one another, giving an episodic feel and messing up the movies flow. The whole thing is just cheesy.

Overall, read the book. Skip the movie. You will be SO disappointed.


My friend and I went to go see this movie and it was so bad it was funny. The effects are good and the baby dragon was cute but beside that, everything stunk! The outline of this movie was really bad. Good for a book but bad for a movie. I really hope the makers of this movie do not make a squeal. I was kind of looking forward to this movie because the book was pretty good but the movie just killed it. It was like a Harry Potter movie but worse. I don't really recommend this movie but if you're really into movies that have to do with fantasy then you might like it. But the effects were good I have to admit that. It was bad and the actors were scary. Sorry.


I love the Inheritance series, but the movie didn't come close. It was done badly. To many key parts were cut out,the "Razack" look like something out of a horror movie, the "urgals" just look like large men, i didn't even know there were dwarfs until someone told me; the twins, Solembum, and Katrina weren't even mentioned. It just wasn't done to it's full potential. I think it was lame and corny. ex: "I'm a princess", "When will i see you again?" And the ending was all wrong. It was just bad in my opinion. My suggestion is to just stick with the books, they are so much, well, more. More complex and the characters are more developed, and the story is fuller. There is more to it than the movie shows. I hope the Eragon is redone in the near future and is done better, and it would be great if the characters look how the are described in the book.For example Aray's looks don't fit her personality, which was also changed.


Proves that making a visual-effects maker a director of a movie is a mistake.

Not one single scene contained any of the components the book actually used to make a good story. The story-line suffered immensely from it.

If you take the book, and flip thru it, take a sentence on each 3rd or 4th page, and visualize that. Then you take each of the parallel stories, the hidden hints and associations, and you boil it down to one sentence and reveal them in each scene, and then you have this movie.

Not one of the stories have survived, not one of the twists is revealed in a proper manner in the movie.

It's OK to cut parts of a story out to make a visual presentation, but this movie cuts out the plot it self.

How they can make a followup of this piece of *beep* (something than usually smell really really bad) is beyond me, they removed all the plot-twists that allowed Eragon to make room for the "Eldest".

I will NOT ruin the "Eldest" by seeing the movie (if ever one is made), unless off-course, they manage to get some promising director to direct it... And then, I doubt I will pay money to see it in the theaters.

Shame on the script-writers! I have NEVER seen a book be so awfully ruined in a movie.


With a stellar cast and some very good special effects, one might assume that the film Eragon, following in the wake of lotr might achieve a modicum of success. Not so. the acting is adequate, but the uter failure in the script, directorial lead, and perhaps most importantly book adaptation and editing makes this movie a truly awful experience. while i've read the two books in the series and had been looking forward to this film, i forgot i'd seen it later that same day, perhaps i'd blocked it out. irons, malkovitch and honsou should fire their agents. spellers, good luck in life, because after this movie, i'd be surprised if you were in a hallmark commercial.


What can I say, that was the longest one and a half hours of my life and its safe to say there will definitely not be a sequel and if there is, I shall set pickets outside major cinemas campaigning for a national boycott....

the dialogue was so bad, the story even worse, i cringed for the likes of Robert Carlyle and john Malkovich, this movie was far beneath them, in fact it was far beneath my 98 year old Romanian Gran who has no teeth and cant even act old....

The plot was dry and would have made excellent burning wood....

Please I beg all out there, do not watch this pile of dragon Pooh


I want to ask Christopher Paolini :

" How dare you ? How could you let such a disaster happen ? This movie, if you will call it that, contains absolutely nothing, not even a hush, of the world and lovely history and so on from your well told and thought, mysterious feelings......only the Names !!!!!!

It should be a part of you and your soul. I am so down !!! Shame on you !!!"

Did not Peter Jackson give the world an example how you should have to get such a stuff into an epic movie.

Now it's only very fast and much too early produced and filmed only for MONEY !!!! And then...it isn't even good. I mean, there is nothing......nothing from the actors...nothing from the special effects.. and what do i care about the landscape if I don't find and feel any sign of the original story which i love ???

If you compare for example, Saphira and Gollum. Saphira, as a character in the movie, has nothing to say what's good about.it's very bad animated.....horrible !!!!!!!!

So on, I'm German, and therefore i can't any more describe with words what anger i feel and how much I'm disappointed.

!!!! It's A CRIME !!!!

Thank you for reading and i cant't imagine, even in my darkest dreams, that anyone, any damn person who read the books, could not be angry and disappointed about how such a great story is ruined, only for the money.


3/10 To put it simply, Eragon lacks. The story is rushed unexplained and poorly thought out, the acting is below par, and the cinematography is annoying with its tilted angles and range so close to the action so that you can't see what is going on.

The writing of the movie is by far its weakest aspect. The story is rushed quickly jumping from one thing to the next without any plot development so the viewer is left constantly wondering what is going on, one second our main character is a naive farmer, the next he is suddenly a fully experienced warrior with absolutely no evidence showing exactly where he gained this experience from. Entire scenes of the movie plod along with absolutely no meaning or relevance to the story, scenes which should have been cut out of the movie to make the narrative flow better. Characters come and go as they please with no relevance to the story, such as the archer who just suddenly appears out of nowhere and then just aimlessly follows the main characters without actually adding anything to the story. It almost seems as if the movie was written by a 9th grade high school student for his English class.

The acting of the movie is far below par, as it seems that nobody in this movie seems to have emotions as if all the characters were cyborgs from the Terminator series or Steven Segal. For example there is the scene where the main character discovers that the stone he has found isn't a rock but actually a dragon egg as the egg hatches. Now normally people seeing a small monster burst out of a rock would express quite some level of surprise or shock, but all our star does is raise his eyebrows slightly and give a pathetic tiny gasp. Every character in the entire movie is like this, if someone is crying over a slain comrade all they do is frown and have a look of "dang it" on their face, if someone is cheering over victory, all they do is leer and go "woooo". The emotion is non existent.

Eragon is a poor movie at best that fails to be entertaining, especially when compared to the other movies it is copying they style of such as "Lord of the Rings" and "Harry Potter". It seems that the makers of this movie thought, "This movie has swords, magic, old English style speech, horses and dragons, it therefore must be good". They were wrong. The belief that just because your movie looks a bit like "Lord of the Rings" it must be good like it, is incorrect.


The the writers even read the book?!?!? I believe that Eragon and Eldest are two of the best books i've read and the movie was disgraceful. It seamed more like they read the summary on the back of the book and made a movie of what they thought it was about. So what happened to the dwarfs? the scar he gets from Durza? and a million other things they left out? They killed the Ra' Zac easily when the Ra' Zac are still in the third book. The Urgals instead of being a different race they are just barbaric men with tattoos. Arya leaves to Ellesméra without Eragon?? how can they even make a second movie based on the second book. My personal opinion is the director didn't really care for the book and only made the movie as a job. A director shouldn't make a film unless he really likes the idea and desires to make it come to life. I was impressed on how well movies like The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe (2005) and the Lord of the Rings Trilogy did in making the movies as real and as close to the books as they can. I know that they can't fit an entire book in but they could have at least given the book the respect it deserves. The Harry Potter series aren't the best at being accurate but they're close enough to give them credit. I should not feel like a did Hollywood a disfavor by supporting a movie, which is how i felt after seeing it tonight. If i were them i would destroy any evidence of this new film and start over from scratch, and put people in charge who actually have a love for the book. Why did Christopher Paolini give the permission to disgrace and destroy his story. I am currently a film student and i would have volunteered all my time to help them make the movie because apparently they needed all the help they could get.


I think this is one of the worst movies I have ever seen. I am a huge fan of the book and I can't believe that I waited for THREE YEARS to see this load of crap. The best part of the movie was the end. It barely followed the plot of the book, cut out more than half of the major events, and was cut way too short. I wouldn't see this movie again if someone threatened to force feed me nails. It was very cheesy, especially the two minute period in which Saphira magically grows up; also, periods that spanned two months in the book spanned several hours in the movie. The ONLY reason I gave the movie a three out of ten, was because of the good animation on Saphira. This movie is an insult to all loyal Eragon fans. To summarize: if you have read the book, don't see the movie. After seeing the movie, me and my Eragon loving friends had a conversation on how stupid and idiotic the movie was. After seeing how crappy Eragon was, we are scared to see Eldest.

~Kristina (A VERY angry fan)


Being a fan of John Malkovich, I expected his performance to be no less than excellent. But unfortunately, his performance is really disappointing. On the other hand, Jeremy Irons, another great actor, did a great role. I have not read the book, but I've been told that a lot of the main plot is not in the movie. Did the movie makers try to keep the movie short to go against other popular fantasy movies (The Lord of the Rings, Harry Potter, etc)? There were scenes that did not make any sense and did not provide useful information. This is a movie that one would watch on a Sunday evening when there is nothing else to do.


I liked some parts of this film mostly because of its Chicago location shots, But I thought the film's production values were very low budget for a Hollywood film. It really looks reminiscent of a made-for-TV movie. The overlaid 80's Casio keyboard soundtrack for example, made this film seem (well what it is) very very 80's cheese. Watching it i couldn't help think immediately of "About Last Night" a GREAT film! How can two films both shot in Chicago, the same year (1986), and both films a Tri-Star production look so completely different!?! In a nutshell my favorite actor in this film was Eva Marie Saint who indeed gave a saint of a performance - The scene of her talking to her husband (Gleason) in the hospital, spilling her guts "What Happened to us Max? I cared, I know I cared" and Max's reply was a self-centered cold, "Bullshit". God I felt her pain. It ripped my heart out. Don't rent this film but if it comes on TV on a Sunday afternoon you may get thru it but then go out immediately and rent "About Last Night" to cheer you up. This one is a BIG DOWNER.


...and I don't think that I needed to. What I saw went nowhere. If "Nothing in Common" was supposed to be a jab at the corporate world, then it didn't work. If it was supposed to be a look at relationships, then it didn't work. If I had seen this when it first came out, then I would have thought it unfathomable that Tom Hanks would ever win even one Oscar, much less back-to-back Oscars. How could Garry Marshall, having created something so great with "Happy Days", create something so idiotic with "Nothing in Common"? As for Jackie Gleason, I heard that "The Honeymooners" was actually a rather cruel show, so it's not really any surprise that his role here is a piece of drudgery. And how could a magnificent actress like Eva Marie Saint get herself mixed up in this crap? The only reason that I stopped short of giving this movie just one star was the presence of Tom Hanks and Eva Marie Saint (plus Hector Elizondo), who can make almost any movie seem really good. But even here they have trouble doing that.

Oh, and in case Eva Marie Saint is reading this: Happy Birthday, Eva! You were one of my grandfather's favorite customers in Superdrugs down in Los Angeles!


This movie had every reason in the world to be a major hit. I, for one, was extremely disappointed. The main problem is that is was difficult for me to like either character. Max (Gleason) was just a mean, nasty old goat, and David (Hanks) was so obnoxious and self-absorbed it was unreal. And this business of him being such a major stud, (First he beds down a stewardess he meets, then later while he's working on the airline account, he manages to nail the owner's daughter, played by Sela Ward.) I'm sorry, I just ain't buyin' it. The only likable one in the film is the mother (Eva Marie Saint), but she appears only sporadically, and she isn't the focus of the plot. I eventually became a Tom Hanks fan after films like "Philadelphia" and "Forrest Gump," but for several years I was leery of anything with him in it, because of this film.


I was in this movie. Nothing big, just ran out of a van and up some steps and that's it. A friend of mine was in a few scenes too (trips up the main character during class I think). I remember being pulled out of class and sent down to an area where many kids were lined up to see if they'd get a part. They filmed, what I guess was the city public school scenes, at my school; Alexandria Primary School in Sydney.

I can't remember much of the movie. I think a number of us went to see a screening of it over in North Sydney. We had an introduction from the cast & crew but that's about all I remember. Oh, and the "food & drink" they put on for us consisted of a paper cup of candy popcorn & a cup of lemonade. Ritzy! Still, it got me out of quite of bit of school that day, earned me $50 and each take of my scene (and there were a few) I had to eat an éclair. Not bad.


Rented it because I'm a Sophia Loren fan. It's obvious that she got the illustrious cast to sign on so her son would have something to do. He is a bad writer and even worse director. No energy at all in the film, lots of dead space, trite camera angles; the women in the film are colorless, downtrodden, and hopeless. This portrayal of women is surprising since Eduoardo Ponti's mother is the vivacious Sophia Loren. The camera angles are especially unflattering to her. What's up with that? This film is a complete waste of talent considering the big stars in the film. Even after the women make life-altering changes, they still look weepy and pathetic. The script has every cliché in the book.


Over the top drama. A very boring movie, where every one has way too much grief and sorrow. Keep it small and do not overdo it man. This film is way too far-fetched and unbelievable. Speaking of incredibility: consider the implausible coincidences. Olivia is dreaming of images of which she makes drawings that look exactly like her lost daughter's sculptures. By accident, she then sees this daughter in a very staged television interview. The woman who just made a photo shoot for Time magazine in Angola happens to stumble upon an Angolan woman at the local market. Yeah right. Just to make the story-telling easier I guess.

None of the actors really outshines here. Famous names, low profiles. The fact that half of the cast is not native English-speaking adds to the very slow-paced, troubled effort in natural acting.

No irony, no humour, this movie takes itself far too serious. If you're still not sure, just watch the very stupid ending and all that I've said becomes clear. If you would like to watch an intelligent, well-acted parallel lives women's drama, check out 'Things you can tell just by looking at her'.


Despite a meaningless title and a lead (Samson Burke!) who gives new meaning to the word "wooden", this is not too bad for what is essentially a formulaic muscleman effort. The plot is typically chockful of court intrigues within Ursus' camp  by way of the King's deceitful rotund consultant who contrives to have his own master killed, Ursus convicted of the crime and appointing bald-headed Livio Lorenzon (an above-average village who keeps a leopard for a pet) as his people's new ruler; a couple of attractive ladies: one good (Ursus' fiancée', of course) and one evil (who, clad in an iron mask, even disguises herself as the latter at the King's wedding ceremony!); and, to up the suspense factor somewhat, an independent-minded kid brother for the hero (from whom he tries to keep his superhuman past by posing as an indefatigable farmer)! For what it is worth, at one point the action once again requires Ursus to engage in a tug-of-war with a number of elephantsalthough here he needs their impending threat to his little sibling for him to eventually manage in suppressing them!


I really wanted to like VENGEANCE OF URSUS but it's basically a kids film. There's nothing wrong with films aimed at kids as long as it still treats its audience with a certain amount of intelligence. Because this film is aimed strictly at kids here, the writers wrote a script that's full of easy and illogical contrivances. The movie suffered irremediably from it, no matter how much it tried.

Scenes like the old man being stabbed on the wooden barge, while everyone on shore watches on and yet no one notices what just happened. This sets up the whole scene with the bad guys are trying to kill Princess Sira when she's on the barge with unsuccessful results because Ursus is there. The whole scene is an obvious set-up for facile heroics. One wonders why they even bothered to kill her when Ursus was there, visible for all, including the dumb villains, ready to save anyone in peril. And one wonders why they even bothered to kill Sira in the first place when the rest of the movie is about the villain, King Zagro, trying to force her to marry him?

At one point, King Zagro actually marries Sira in a fake ceremony, with the Zagro's mistress standing in for the Princess. The Princess and mistress do not look a like so how does Zagro get away with it? The mistress (and bridesmaids) wears a mask during the marriage ceremony. Since when do women, certainly royalty, wear masks on their so-called happiest day of their lives? Everyone thinks that was the real Princess and they all rejoice in the new union of two Kingdoms. How easily duped. If marrying into a royal family was as easy as this, there would be hundreds of Kings out there.

Ursus warns the Princess' father about Zagro's evil plot to marry her daughter and usurp his thrown. So what does the King do about this? He sends Ursus to the dungeon! When Ursus escapes from prison, the King is assassinated and Ursus is found with the knife that killed the King. How many times have we already seen this in other films?

Evil King Zagro becomes King of Lecca overnight. When Zagro arrives at the new Kingdom, he's alone. No Princess. The Princess is not even there next to him, even if her father was just killed. You'd think the populace would be a bit suspicious about Zagro's intentions. Their king has been assassinated and Zagro is already there to take over, without the King's daughter to mourn the passing of her father? I mean, come on.

At one point, Ursus has to prove he's innocent, that he's not the one who killed the King. So how do they go about this? By Divine judgment, or in other words, forcing Ursus to go through a series of feats of strength, like pulling against an elephant. Huh? That's a way to prove his innocence? But then after surviving those feats of endurance Ursus suddenly tells the ministers of the Kingdom about Zagro's army waiting in the forest nearby. When Ursus makes this announcement about the army, King Zabro literally appears in the room and the whole Kingdom is suddenly besieged by Zabro's soldiers.

This begs the question: why didn't Ursus just tell the King about Zabro's army waiting in the forest before being sent to the dungeon? This would have prevented the King's death and Ursus' imprisonment and those feats of strength that could have killed him.

This is my first film starring Samson Burke and I have to say that, physically speaking, he fits the bill for a S&S hero but the guy is kinda stiff! He stands in one arched position throughout the movie. He also looks a bit ridiculous swinging that Fred Flintstone papier mache club. No Peplum star, including Steve Reeves, looked serious with one of those silly props. The score is recycled music from other S&S films. The cast is the usual S&S actors, like Livio Lorenzon (seen in GOLIATH & THE SINS OF BABYLON and CHALLENGE OF THE GLADIATOR) and Gianni Rizzo (the TEN GLADIATORS films). There's also a kid, who's annoying but he's in one of the film's best scene: the kid hides in a vase and the leopard sniffs him there. The other memorable scene in VENGEANCE OF URSUS is the feats of strength. What's a Peplum without them?

Like I said before, the whole script is riddled with such silly contrivances that it was almost impossible for me to enjoy it but being a fan of S&S films, it's watchable for sure, but then I would watch the cheesiest of them all and still be entertained. It's just not the best of the bunch.

BTW, the title doesn't make any sense at all. There's no vengeance in this story.


Very poorly written & directed, I laughed a few times, fast forwarded it a few times and mainly kept watching it because Vincent Gallo kept popping up. There's more chemistry between him and David Tennant than there is between Tennant and Ms. Shaw. It would have been more interesting as a buddy movie with Tennant and Gallo getting into mischief than a poorly played out romantic comedy. Julie Delpy has the worst fake American accent I've heard in a long time. Tennant in his boxers isn't too bad.

For fans wanting to check out Tennant in something other than Doctor Who, I'd recommend Blackpool or Learners. Einstein and Eddington was pretty good, but Tennant was sort of... cardboard in it & Casanova was extremely silly. For people wanting to check out a movie like this, but done much better I'd recommend True Romance (1993- Christian Slater & Patricia Arquette) or the cult classic Valley Girl (1983- Nicolas Cage in his first lead role and Deborah Foreman).


Aki Karusmaki or his equally brilliant brother Mika directed and wrote this stunning piece of Europeana. Or Finneana. I love it when these European amateurs poke fun at Hollywood while they themselves aren't capable of making one good movie per decade. Besides, Hollywood is such an obvious and all-too-easy target, and this sort of thing has been done a zillion times before, and mostly much better. The gags are primitive, unfunny, badly directed or written, and the movie has to be endured instead of enjoyed. So trite, the way they yet again use the unfunny, stone-faced Leningrad Cowboys as some kind of sorry comic relief. Many familiar faces in small roles (Saskia Reeves - with about three seconds of screen time, Delpy - as a ridiculously overplayed dumb blonde, Gallo - ridiculously overplaying an L.A. "dude", Depp - "re-doing" his "Dead Man" character as an obvious tribute to Karusmaki's infinitely more talented pal Jarmusch, etc.); these actors probably appeared for nothing, thereby pretentiously supporting Le Europeanne Cinematique Arte-te-te that way. If the Karusmakis are one of the current leaders in Europe's Filmlandschaft then Continental Europe must be in the worst shape than it's ever been. Politically and morally anyway.


There's a mystery at the heart of this abberation...why on earth did somebody of Johnny Depp's talent chose to cameo in this debacle? Unsympathetic characters, dodgy editing, bland caricatures and a plot line you'd have trouble filling a matchbook with. Our 'hero', Tennant is about as interesting to watch as a lobotomy on a gnat. To say he's uninspiring is a gross injustice to flat performers the world over. So here it is: Bradford undertaker decides to follow LA chick back to her homeland...and?...motivation?...development? That would be asking too much. Question: Vincent Gallo, Julie Delpy, what on earth were you thinking of? This insipid piece of self indulgent flatulence should have been strangled in the editing room, I say editing room loosely. It feels like the producers shipped the editing duties out to a first term film student...there are plenty of bad films out there, thankfully this one has been hidden in amongst the other dross on cable pay TV. The likes of Gallo, Delpy and Depp must cringe whenever this one is half remembered.


Um... Duh... Ah... Who needs ten lines when one will do? Now let's see... One... Two... Three... Almost there. Now here it comes! Hang on to your seats because it's a real spoiler. At the core of this film lies the profoundly disturbing revelation that can be best expressed by the following: I looked into it, and after a few minutes I realized that it was too deep for me. There! Nothing new. Been there, done that, and you and I and the endearing people of Minnesota do not need to be reminded by some artsy-fartsy indie film-maker that we are all just a bunch of dumbass fools.

Still not enough lines for submission?! I give up. What does one have to do to have one's opinions heard? Beat a pithy insight to death with a redundancy of words? Redundant? Now that's this film in a word.


OK. This seems to be a documentary about a film crew going to MN to film a "mysterious" hole in the ice. But the hole is closed so the crew does some soul-searching as they explore the hole, its meaning, its possible causes, ....

It's an Indie film so it's not superficial cr*p. No, it's heavy and serious and meaningful and fresh and vibrant and significant.

And it's really a mocumentary. Wow. So many layers.

What really really happens is New Journalism || New Film-making: It's not about the subject - the hole in the ice - it's about the director's feelings about himself as he confronts the not-hole.

Wow. You know, like Maureen Dowd's articles are not about the subject but about how she feels about the subject.

Since this is about Karpovsky we see that he's got some problems with his woman at home, with his camera crew, with friends. He talks to the camera from a bathroom; he talks on his mobile. He begins to question his existence; the meaning of life; god. Wow. It's really heavy.

Then he checks into a mental hospital and we go through that with him.

So it could have been an interesting story. But Karpovsky's real and/ or imagined problems aren't interesting.

Wow. You just don't know what's real and what's not. Wow.

There is nothing in this film: no creativity, no humor, no insight, nothing nada. See it if you want to hear a whining & uninteresting guy crying and talking about himself.

But, hey, it's an Indie. Wow.


Tasha Yar is kidnapped by a race who resemble tribal Africans. The leader of this race wants her as his wife and subsequently she is forced to fight it out with his old wife. Quite a bizarre episode,which has far more in common with the original series than Next Gen, a move probably entirely deliberate given that this only the third episode. I have to say as a Star Trek fan, I can put up with a lot of shoddy acting, but something about Tasha Yar always made me grind my teeth. Perhaps it was the haircut, or the tone of voice but I never liked her much and this is a perfect example of why. To be honest I was pleased when she left the series and actually enjoyed her performances in her subsequent and inevitable comebacks. Not essential.


Roddy Doyle's Barrytown trilogy was an affectionate, humorous but unsentimental look at life in the poor suburbs of Dublin; all three books have now been turned into films. 'The Commitments', directed by Alan Parker, was virtually a musical; in the original, Doyle hilariously peppered his text with fragments of the lyrics of the songs his protagonists (a soul band) were singing; in the film, the songs were played straight, and pretty much in their entirety, and some of the subtleties of the plot were also lost. Stephen Frears did better in making a low key film of book two, and is also at the directorial helm for this film of the final book. 'The Van' represented a slight change of direction for Doyle, a weighter piece of fiction than his earlier efforts; but it's still fun, and a sensitive portrait of male friendship. However, I don't like the film very much, even though it is quite faithful to the book in both content and tone; for in spite of this, it has lost the spark, and the vision, that the writing possessed, and appears coarse and clumsy in comparison. An Eric Clapton score is used insensitively, underscoring dialogue with unnecessary frequency; the acting (especially from Colm Meaney) renders the characters close to parody; the camera work is needlessly jumpy; while the plot is reduced to a series of set-piece encounters. This is supposedly a naturalistic movie, but never manages to convey the rhythms of ordinary life. While judged as against other films that tell tales of working class survival, it has not the political anger of the works of Ken Loach, the emotional impact of 'Brassed Off' or the jauntiness of 'The Full Monty'. Perhaps the most cruel cinematic comparison, however, brought to obvious attention by the prominent presence of a decrepit snack van, is with Mike Leigh's 'Life is Sweet', a film whose originality and desperate humour make a stark contrast with the dull clichéd Oirishisms on display here. Conclusion: read the book instead.


Like all American soaps, 'Dynasty' is nothing but a mish-mash of ropey acting, inane plots and one-dimensional characters. Many loved it, though. If this heap of misery entitled 'Dynasty' has made so many people happy then that is fine by me. What I objected to was the fact that most days in the mid to late '90's, 'Dynasty' somehow managed to bribe U.K-Gold into giving it constant re-runs (what did we do to deserve this?), as was the case with 'Knots Landing' and 'Dallas'.

The best known cast member from this show, as most will know, is Joan Collins, who many men used to fancy. I, myself, could never understand why. I wonder what men would think if they actually saw her face without the 10,000 layers of make-up.

Some people reckon that hanging is suitable punishment for murderers. No, that's just a smack on the wrist. Make them suffer. Make them beg for forgiveness. Make them watch endless repeats of 'Dynasty'.


Gerd Oswalk made a "pretty" picture, but it certainly wasn't a "thriller", to me. So predictable ! If the story had been good, I'd have overlooked that.

The "brilliant" comments before mine makes me wonder if we all saw the same movie. BUT, Robert Wagner ("Bud Corliss") DEFINITELY was not the "noir"-type actor, nor was Jeffrey Hunter ("Prof Grant") anything near the role he was assigned. Both of those guys were TOO pretty for their roles....guess that's why Hunter was wearing glasses most of the time. I thought Joanne Woodward ("Dory") was ridiculous and not nearly pretty enough; Virginia Leith ("Ellen") was lovely, but an actress?? Guess that's why we didn't see her again.......

....someone compared this film as a companion-piece to "The Talented Mr. Ripley" WHAT ?? I have no idea how this film ended, but I guess Wagner got caught, huh? The scene in the "supply"-room was a hoot - and those rubber-gloves he ALWAYS had with him. AND, he even typed "Dory's" suicide-note on his own typewriter !! That was it for me. WOULD THAT STRONG, YOUNG MAN JUST SIT AT HIS DESK WAITING FOR WAGNER TO PULL THE TRIGGER ??? ...I left this film half-way....it looked beautiful, with all the stylish clothes the main character-guys wore (everyone else wore shirts) and the lovely autos, etc...

ANYONE who compares this film to "Ripley" should be doomed to watch "Kiss" a jillion times. Double Boo !!


There's very little, if anything, memorable about "Manhatta." Besides being one of the original "city symphony" films, paving the way for better works like "Berlin: die sinfonie der Grobstadt" (which I think translates into "Berlin: Symphony of a City)" and Pennebaker's "Daybreak Express," to name two, all it really offers to modern audiences is a reason to fall asleep. Manhatta is mainly made up of static, or at best, phlegmatic shots, and has inter-titles quoting Walt Whitman. The camera has a strange obsession with smoke billowing from chimneys of boats and factories. It's a pioneer of a new land that was soon in the hands of more skillful developers.


Final Cut (aka Death Games for us Yanks) is a different type of psychological thriller, and one that, unfortunately, offered so much clever chit-chat and trickery to arouse your suspicions of the characters on the screen, but that had ended with much nonsense and relatively little bang.

This is the story of a young, idealistic filmmaker and his journalist sidekick beauty. The filmmaker is finally given approval to make a film on popular record producer, and promises to deliver to the network a production full of juicy details. His career depends on it. But, his subject never seems to cooperate and instead, enjoys toying with the couple one evening aboard a yacht when a bloodied woman appears to have fallen overboard (film which conveniently goes missing) and then later, during a weekend in the producer's penthouse high rise. There is relatively little action going on to grab your attention, aside from copious amounts of gratuitous nudity and lesbian seduction among the characters, but much of the film is purely dialog. The producer, sure to annoy the filmmaker by letting him very few details of his personal life for the picture despite expectations otherwise, just goes on and on with little suggestions of ill will and demise. But, nothing ever really happens. And in the end, if you haven't fallen asleep or otherwise, tuned out the movie, you might otherwise be confused, or dissatisfied entirely which, only artificially so, looks like a clever ending.

Deathgames had plenty of potential, although some of it being falling prey to the standards of the cat-and-mouse chase thriller, with some Hitchockian elements. But this film doesn't even offer that much. And the flaws weren't inherent in its obviously low-budget atmosphere or the acting ability of its stars (even that didn't get in the way). But rather, you're always careful to hold on the words of the character, sure that you're able to put the mystery together, but there really is no mystery.


I saw the VidAmerica VHS of this as Deathgames (video box title)/Death Games (video title).

A dreadfully boring movie that doesn't make much sense anyway.

A newsreel cameraman for some reason decides he is going to make a film on a wealthy entrepreneur who generally doesn't grant interviews. He films a woman surfing topless while he waits to board the entrepreneur's yacht along with his girlfriend.

On board the yacht, there is a big party. The cameraman films a woman dancing topless. The entrepreneur grants an interview, but he seems very sleepy and drunk and says something about killing, and rambles on about various things that seem unimportant. Later, the cameraman is on the beach, apparently drunk and/or stoned, filming the moon. He sees the topless dancer running topless with blood on her. He passes out, and someone takes the tape/film out of his camera. He later looks at the footage (apparently replaced), but it lacks the scene of the woman running and some of the things the entrepreneur said.

Nevertheless, he and his girlfriend get invited to the man's penthouse. They get hit on by the entrepreneur and his mistress. They get drunk and their drinks get drugged. The girl is seduced by the mistress, and the entrepreneur plays various "games" which involve his guests apparently killing each other. Whether anybody is really getting killed or not is unclear; it may be an act for his own amusement, to watch on tapes recorded via his security system.

The slow pacing of the movie, the way relatively nothing happens, and what does happen doesn't necessarily happen was pretty tiresome. The ending is not very satisfying at all, and does not clear up what the "games" were.


An early big screen effort for Landon(along with the unforgettable "I was a Teenage Werewolf") this is a pedestrian effort at best. Obviously put out to capitalize on the popularity of the Kingston Trio hit, in this incarnation, Dooley, who is being un-justly pursued by the law, accidentally kills his true love. In short-good song-bad movie!


I've seen this movie once, and only once! its a far cry from Bonanza, story line reminds me of a bad late 60s Elvis movie only worse! far worse! I noticed that the town looks oddly like the Gunsmoke set! and there's absolutely no background music, thats in a movie, it was so annoying, I don't recognize anybody here except Michael Landon in this very very very bad movie, its a wonder they didn't run Michael Landon out of town for this slop, Michael Landon is a very good actor, but he definitely could have done better, don't get me wrong, I think this movie should have been made, just not like this, makes me wonder if Sam Katzman directed this flick! sign slapstck2000


I guess using the Kingston Trio song as a script instead of writing one from scratch was a lot cheaper. Why bother trying to use any imagination.

This b/w thing could almost pass for an episode right out of GUNSMOKE, without the good graces of Festus and Miss Kitty. It has all the same Columbia ranch and Newhall locations that have appeared in hundreds of B movie oaters, so you can almost identify every tree or stump that comes into view, a thousand times over.

Another standard Columbia quickie made before Michael Landon landed as Little Joe on the Prairie, this one must have been filmed in less than 7 days and really doesn't have much going for it. They should've saved money on the film stock that they wasted.

Three Confederate soldiers ambush a Union stagecoach not knowing that the war is over. The townsfolk come gunning after them without any belief that they didn't know that the war had ended. No excuses, they have to be hung, plain & simple.

The townsfolk come across as a bunch of bloodthirsty dummies and the rebs (including Landon) aren't much smarter, making them all look unreal. I guess the folks over at Columbia weren't that much smarter, either...

3 out of 10 for being a bunch of dummies.


As a huge fan of the book and the musical, I have made it one of my priorities to see all of the movie versions of Les Miserables that I can. I can officially say now that this version is probably the furthest from the book, except perhaps the 1998 version. I cannot blame the actors, but I do blame the screenwriter and director for this slaughter of a classic.

The movie was okay up until the judge sentenced Valjean to ten years in the galleys. Valjean doesn't go to the galleys, he goes to TOULON, a PRISON CAMP where he does HARD LABOR. I could forgive this however, except that the movie only went downhill from there. The incident with the bishop is fairly similar...save that the dialogue seems to have been taken almost word for word from the 1935 version and that Mme. Magloire appears about twenty. Valjean is somehow able to buy a pottery plant after his "brilliant" idea to have everyone work on what they are best at. So much for glass beads. At this point he meets the entirely nonexistent Robert, who becomes a close friend that lives with Valjean for the rest of the movie. Why did they decide to make up characters, WHY? It was wholly unnecessary! Well...it would have been if they had stuck to the book. The way this script was going it was probably necessary.

Fantine, of course, does not sell her hair. Or her teeth. Because apparently audiences of the 1950s do not want to hear about such things. In fact, she looks quite good for a woman living on the streets. Fantine is not a prostitute either, because it's bad to promote prostitution as a way to survive when you cannot support your starving child any other way. And, because everyone has to believe that good things happen to dying people, Valjean goes and fetches a not-so-young-looking Cosette, who is reunited with her not-so-sick-looking mother. Bear in mind that this sequence is not shown, eliminating the Thenardiers entirely, as well as images of a malnourished Cosette. Apparently everyone is well aware Fantine is going to die, yet they go about their day ever-so-happily.

They end up at "The Convent of the Child Mary" because Petit Picpus is too hard to say. The sequence of meeting Marius in the convent is rather random, as is Marius' later accusation of Valjean being in love with Cosette. This IS NOT TRUE. Why? Why do so many directors and screenwriters think he's in love with Cosette? It's not TRUE. Anyway, Marius, not seeming overwhelmingly disheartened when Valjean won't let him marry Cosette (and also says they're leaving for England), ends up at the barricades. It's not really ever explained why there's a barricade in the first place. There just is. It's just a bunch of random people (and by that I mean, about five times as many in the book. It's 40, not 200) So Valjean intercepts Marius' letter to Cosette...which says something to the effect of "Your father is a jealous, horrible person. If I live, you should run away and elope with me." Totally opposite, of course, from the "I'm going to die, and I love you" letter that should be sent. Valjean seems to go to the barricade more to convince himself he's unselfish than to save Marius.

Then comes the sewer chase. The sewer chase upset me for one reason, and one alone. There was a skull on the sewer ledge. Just a skull. Not even a skeleton. Because so many people go down into the sewers and some how decapitate themselves such that their head remains on the ledge and their body floats away. It was so CORNY! I laughed very hard when I saw that skull. It also appears to be a flashback to the 1935 movie, where there was one present in those sewers as well.

Thanks to bad character development and a bad script in general, Javert's suicide seems entirely uncalled for. And Valjean watches. And the movie ends. And I start to cry and laugh simultaneously.

I am very upset at the plot changes, as well as the cuttings of Enjolras, Eponine, and the Thenardiers. I am upset that Valjean was a brute with few redeeming qualities throughout the movie, and that they did not show his confession to Marius nor his death. I am upset at the horrid characterization of Javert, who was among other things short, rotund, and non-menacing. I am upset that Fantine looked perfectly fine and got to see a thirteen-year-old Cosette again. I am upset that Marius was an unattractive, 35-year-old man without a background story to help you understand his character. I am upset at the addition of "Robert" into the story. I am upset that absolutely no one in a movie about the poor and miserable was poor and miserable except the galley slaves. In fact, Gavroche may have been the only character whose original attitude and appearance remained the same, though many of his scenes were cut entirely and he served more as a messanger than anything.

Some other unexpected defects in this wretched movie were the costumes. The costumes did not look at all like the clothes of 19th century Parisians, except for the National Guard uniforms. The hats, in particular, were very wrong for the time. It was saddening that no one did any research on this kind of thing.

The trailer advertised it as "A movie as great as the book!" The people who created this trailer must have never read it.


Hollywood strikes again...

Michael Rennie starts an Jean Valjean a convict who escapes captivity and then sets about redeeming his life. Once he thinks he has his life in order he is found by Javert a policeman who will stop at nothing to uphold the law.

Miscast (I think only the supporting roles seem right) and horribly abbreviated this film plays like a greatest hits version of the story with everything geared to getting to the next key bit. The result is all of the characters seem like cardboard cut outs rather than real people. Its not bad but there are so many other better, versions of the story I think its a waste of time and effort to see this one.

Watching the the film on Turner Classic Movies tonight I was struck by the horrible thought that once I got through the film I would never have to see it again. Personally I would rather watch the version by Raymond Bernard again or almost any of the other version of the story.


It's been awhile since I last posted one of these user comments - and what a winner I've returned with. Wizards of the Demon Sword was made during a period rife with extremely bad sword and sorcerer movies, yet it has the dubious distinction of being about the worst I've thus far run across. It didn't take long for me to realize just how much I was going to dislike the movie. As soon as the film's supposed hero appeared on-screen, I found myself instantly and negatively comparing him to the hero of another putrid sword and sorcerer movie, Deathstalker II. And any comparison with that jackass is definitely not a good thing. Antoher big problem is the plot. Wizard of the Demon Sword's plot isn't worth devoting a minute of time or an ounce of effort to. It's a mish-mash of recycled ideas that any fan of this genre will have seen dozens of times - and usually done much better. In fact, nothing in the movie is worth devoting much time and effort to. So I'll wrap this up with by saying that the tired plot, the poor acting, the non-existent special effects, the dull screenplay, and the lousy direction make Wizards of the Demon Sword a poor excuse of a movie that offers nothing in the way of entertainment. A 1/10 is almost overstating it. In the end, I was left asking myself what in the world Russ Tamblyn, Lawrence Tierney, and even Michael Berryman were doing in a stinker like this.


I don't know what it is about Fred Olen Ray. I hate his movies, but I always buy them thinking the next one will be a winner. He is notorious for the most annoying giant monster encounters ever. Hmmm, let me see if I can explain this... Man says "hey look at that monster over there!" camera cuts to giant monster then back to man "I wouldn't want to mess with him!". Giant monster in his movies never interact with normal sized men. I hate that! Why even put them in the movie?! If you must see a Fred Olen Ray picture, watch Phantom Empire.


...as one of those films you go to see, knowing nothing about it, except that you like the stars: i.e., Jeff Goldblum and Michelle Pfeiffer.

I was also wanting to get together with a friend I hadn't seen in a while.

Does the fault lie in my expectations or in the impression that the ads led me to believe the film would be about.

If it is a spoiler to expect to see a madcap comedy with two actors who are really good at madcap comedy, and get a very bleak, Brechtian story, then I am guilty.


This is the shortest Chaplin short I have ever watched. As a result, there is absolutely no time for the development of a story--something SUPER-important to good Chaplin films. In addition, this film is almost pure slapstick--with tons of pratfalls, slapping, hitting, etc. Because of this, the film has absolutely no depth or quality about it. It's just people getting hurt with little reason for this other than cheap laughs. So, I would NOT recommend this film to those who are not very familiar with Chaplin's work--they will get the wrong idea about him. They would incorrectly assume he wasn't that funny and his films were quickly slapped together. While this might be true of the very earliest films he made in 1914, by 1915 he was, aside from this film, doing better and more well-crafted work.


Being a longtime mystery lover, but never having read Robert B. Parker or seen a Jesse Stone movie, I really looked forward to watching Sea Change. But it was almost a complete disappointment. First, the principal characters have been given colorful histories or eccentricities seemingly only to keep them from being completely uninteresting otherwise or to fill time (for example, Luthor's post-coma extrasensory power). Why does anyone have his or her peculiarities? And how do they add to the plot? Why is Sean Young's character even introduced? Nothing is ever developed or explained. Second, no problem is ever too great for Jesse to wrap up neatly with almost no effort, including the rape charge, the problem with Fish, and even the central mystery. Even William Devane, who is always worth watching, is unlikely as an ex-cop-turned-psychiatrist. And the glacial pace of this drama makes it almost painful to sit through. I know there are a lot of Robert B. Parker fans out there, but I can't see how this movie could possibly justify their devotion.


I approached this film with an open mind and was looking forward to it. As the film progressed and passed the one-hour mark, I honestly have to say that this is one of the most boring, uninteresting and slow moving films I've ever seen. For the last 20 minutes I was just praying for it to end.

Tom Selleck is bland and completely uninteresting, and his character speaks entirely in "clever quips", ALL the time, which really grinds after a while. Although Selleck is bad, he still delivers the best performance in this film, because the other actors are so incredibly bad -- perhaps with the exception of Nigel Bennet who plays Harrison Pendelton who's good, but unfortunately only on screen for about a minute throughout the whole film.

The story is not exactly predictable, but written to a safe recipe of "crime mysteries" which stirs up no real interest - in me, anyway. Overall I found this an exceptionally drab experience and I wish I had spent the hour and a half doing something else.


I don't mind that the movie has no plot or that it's so noisy my 90-year old grandmother complained or that Charles Laughton thinks he's the one who should supply the laughs and not the menace. What I do mind is that A&C have so little to do. They manage a few bits, but these are crowded out by the chaotic knock-about. It's like someone said we don't have a script or any routines, so let's just run around, make noise, and maybe no one will notice. Maybe the best thing is the really great special effects. The masted ships and sea battle look like they come from an A-production, which they may have. But even the explosions on the sea-shore sets are well done. Too bad the rest of the movie doesn't rise to that level. And pity the poor regally composed Hillary Brooke who looks like she's missing all the mayhem, at the same time Laughton manages more mugs per minute than a race car generates RPM's. In my little book, this is one of the least of the 5 or 6 entries in the A&C Meets... series.


This is a curious film. Abbott and Costello were only a bit beyond their prime, ready to do the first year of their still beloved television series. Someone, apparently at Warner Brothers, suggested this movie, a low-budget musical comedy filmed in a wretched color process that all but killed the project in itself. Hiring Charles Laughton to do slapstick and Hillary Brooke, quite a talent in herself, must have taken more of the budget than anticipated. The toy ships, the cheap sets, the dreadful choreography, and the forgettable music do little to enhance the low comedy. What an interesting choice for the singing lead: big band singer Fran Warren. She couldn't act worth a lick, but oh those pipes! The song "Speak to me of the Tall Pines" is actually not bad. Her romantic relationship in the film with the totally forgettable tenor is awkward at best. Still, three cheers for Laughton. He steals every scene he's in. But in this crummy film, that isn't saying much.


Egad, this is an awful and dull film. Considering that Abbott and Costello had a whole lot of films behind them and some clout, I always have wondered why they agreed to do some seriously bad films--particularly in the latter part of their careers. Were they THAT in need of money or narcissistic that they'd agree to be in films even if they are just plain awful? I know that after WWII, Bud and Lou had some serious tax problems and lost their fortunes, but I would have assumed by 1952 and with a lot of films behind them they still didn't need money THIS badly! What's so bad about this film? Well, the first and most obvious are the wretched songs. Not only are they totally inappropriate for a pirate film, they are even more distracting than the songs in their other movies. The other obvious problem was Charles Laughton. While an exceptional actor, he had a reputation for over-acting if the director didn't keep a firm hand. In this film, you'd assume there is no director at all, as any sane director would have told Laughton to shut up...or at least stop screaming!! It seems that Laughton's interpretation of Captain Kidd is a man who talks at the top of his voice all the time! It's actually amazing to think that Laughton was NOT in his first film but an accomplished actor--his acting was THAT bad.

Speaking of the real Kidd, almost nothing about this film is like real pirates or the real Kidd. It's like one cliché after another. Pirates (with the exception of Blackbeard) were not bully-boys, as their crew would have killed them and the real life Kidd was completely dominated by his crew. Heck, he apparently only turned to piracy because his crew gave him the choice of this or death! There are also only two cases of female pirates (a common Hollywood cliché) and neither were captains--just crew members on the same small and insignificant ship. Also, if real pirates had met these jolly singing idiot pirates, they probably would have killed them--as well as marveled at how clean and well-dressed the all were! Why, oh why couldn't they just shut up and quit with the singing?! As for Bud and Lou, they seemed to have less screen time than usual in this film. They are like bystanders throughout much of the film. When they are involved, it usually consists of scenes where Laughton screams at Lou. Wow, that's funny...not! Among the team's least funny and enjoyable films. The only one that might be as bad or worse is JACK AND THE BEANSTALK--even IT AIN'T HAY, LOST IN ALASKA and Africa SCREAMS are much better than this film.

You know, I had considered doing this review like Laughton emoted in the film, but I don't think IMDb allow reviews that are in all capital letters!!

For information on the real Kidd, try www.thepiratesrealm.com/Captain%20Kidd.html .