IN: Review: "The big goodbye" introduces us to the first holodeck adventure, in this case Captain Picard posing as private investigator Dixon Hill. This episodes creates some sort of standard pattern, repeated several times on TNG as well as DS 9 and Voyager. After entering the holodeck something goes wrong and the characters have to deal with the program under different circumstances beyond playing a game (represented by the failure of the holodeck's safety program).

This concept is used to expand Star Trek's possibility and enabling a kind of genre-mix. Picard's Dixon Hill stories are examples of 1940s crime fiction and their representation on the screen are referred to as Film Noir often having the stereotype antihero in the lead (see for example Chandler's Marlowe stories or Polanski's all time classic "Chinatown"). Star Trek never focuses on the story (mostly it's a simple "how-do-we-get-out-of-here" scenario) but enables the actors to take a different approach to their characters. Those Holodeck "games" are commonly used for recreation and reflect the private interests of the crew members. Therefore the technical aspect is always neglected and from that point of view the stories are never sound (but did Star Trek ever had a technical, scientific point to it, I mean besides some utopic concepts?).

"The big goodbye" shows a relaxed Patrick Stewart, a McFadden that hardly ever looked better in a Star Trek episode (at least the early ones) and Data has some great scenes, too (although I find it hard to believe that pulling the lamp's plug out of the wall would have really surprised him, for the fact that he'd done research on that period and its customs). Wesley continues turning peaceful Trekkies into potential murderers (why didn't they take him to the holodeck and let the gangsters finish him off?) but all in all this one's fun...
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OUT: positive

IN: Review: I saw this film a while back and it's still at the top of my 'favorite movies' list. It is amazingly put together and what really makes the film are the detailed tid bits (such as the 'Cafe Bustelo' coffee crate being reused as a cup to wash her grandsons hair) that people aren't seeing because YOU WILL NOT UNDERSTAND THIS MOVIE UNLESS YOU ARE HISPANIC. This is just one of those films that is very culturally specific and particular. Please do not bash this film if you have no prior knowledge of what foundation it's being built upon. I completely see what the writer/director was going for, and he hit the target perfectly! This film is highly deserving of a better rating.
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IN: Review: At the point in time that The Lady from Shanghai was being made, the marriage of Orson Welles and Rita Hayworth was disintegrating. The film was as much an effort by Welles to rekindle the old flames as it was to make a classic noir. Not received well at the time, The Lady from Shanghai has gotten more and more critical acclaim as years pass. Gotten better with age so to speak.

Welles is Irish seaman Michael O'Hara who on a fateful night rescues the beautiful Rita Hayworth from three muggers in Central Park. Sparks do fly, but then comes the rub, turns out the lady is married to crippled, but brilliant criminal attorney Everett Sloane. Nevertheless Sloane takes an apparent liking to Welles and hires him to skipper his yacht.

So far this film is starting to sound a lot like Gilda. If Orson had seen Gilda and was not at this point thinking with his male member, he would have skedaddled back to the seaman's hiring hall in Lower Manhattan. Instead he gets himself involved in a lovely web or intrigue and finds himself pegged for two murders and Sloane as his eminent counsel.

Welles for whatever reason decided that his wife would be a blond in this film. Supposedly Harry Cohn hit the roof as Rita was internationally known for her coppery red hair. This may have soured him on the picture as he joined the legion of studio bosses who saw Welles's vision of independent film making a threat to their power.

Stage actor Glenn Anders plays Sloane's partner Grisby who is one slimy dude, he winds up a corpse. The other corpse to be here is Ted DeCorsia, a bottom feeding private detective who tries to go in business for himself.

It's a good noir thriller, showing Rita at her glamorous best even if she was a blond here. The final shoot out in the hall of mirrors is beautifully staged, but I wouldn't recommend seeing it if one is on any controlled substance.
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IN: Review: So I'm looking to rent a DVD and I come across this movie called 'End Game'. It stars James Woods and Cuba Gooding JR and has the synopsis of a taught political thriller. Well worth a look then. Or so I thought.

Boy, was I wrong.

End Game has just about the most ridiculous plot I have ever had the displeasure of enduring. Now being something of a whodunnit, I can't really tear into it as I would like without 'ruining' it for those who have yet to experience this monstrosity. But questions such as 'Why has he/she/they done this?', and 'Where on earth did they get the resources to pull this off?' are all too abundant following the film's unintentionally hilarious conclusion.

As for the acting - you know those films where you can almost feel that an actor's realised that they've made a terrible mistake in signing on for a movie, and this then shows in their performance? This is one of those. Accompany this with a laughable script and seriously flawed, irritating direction and you have the recipe for cinematic poison.

Of course, this didn't make it to the cinema, and for the same reason you should not allow it into your living room; it is appalling.
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negative