Q: I guess you have to give some points for the sheer courage of writing a musical around a history lesson but how about some decent music?

Is the cartoonish acting of Howard DeSilva meant to pique the interest of otherwise jaded children?

Is William Daniels' campy contemporary (for the time) acting style meant to appeal to a 1960s/70s demographic?

Do we need all the "in-jokes" about NY & NJ? (I can hear the blue-haired Broadway audience guffawing on cue.)

Sorry, I find the whole piece dated, boring & the acting far too strident for the screen
A: negative
Q: In the periphery of Sao Paulo, the very low middle-class dysfunctional and hypocrite family of Teodoro (Giulio Lopes), Claudia (Leona Cavalli) and the teenager Soninha (Silvia Lourenco) have deep secrets. The religious Teodoro is indeed a hit-man, hired to kill people in the neighborhood with his friend Waldomiro (Ailton Graca). He has a lover, the very devout woman Terezinha (Martha Meola), and he wants to regenerate, going to the country with her. Claudia has a young lover, Julio (Ismael de Araujo), who delivers meats for his father's butcher shop. Soninha is a common sixteen years old teenager of the periphery, having active sexual life, smoking grass and loving heavy metal. When Julio is killed and castrated in their neighborhood, the lives of the members of the family change.

"Contra Todos" is a great low budget Brazilian movie that pictures the life in the periphery of a big Brazilian city. The story is very real, uses the usual elements of the poor area of the big Brazilian cities (drug dealers, hit men, fanatic religious evangelic people, hopeless teenagers etc.), has many plot points and a surprising end, and the characters have excellent performances, acting very natural and making the story totally believable. The camera follows the characters, giving a great dynamics to the film. In the Extras of the DVD, the director Roberto Moreira explains that his screenplay had no lines, only the description of the situations, and was partially disclosed only one week before the beginning of the shootings. The actors have trainings in workshops and they used lots of improvisation, being the reason for such natural acting. My vote is eight.

Title (Brazil): "Contra Todos" ("Against Everybody")
A: positive
Q: The problem I find with this title is that I am not sure if the director is trying to produce a documentary or movie. A blend of the two genres just doesn't work and that leaves the whole thing hung in the middle of nowhere. This is more so as the director has picked the most extremes of what is supposed to be happening around our everyday life making it an unconvincing documentary. If it is meant to be a thriller/drama this is too dull and monotonous. In either case, what is the moral or the message which the director is trying to convey to the audience? That around us there are people who ill-treat others who are willing to be ill-treated? That there are many crazy lunatics around us? So..........so what?
A: negative
Q: The Wicker Man. I am so angry that I cannot write a proper comment about this movie.

The plot was ridiculous, thinly tied together, and altogether-just lame. Nicolas Cage...shame on you! I assumed that since you were in it, that it would be at least decent. It was not.

I felt like huge parts of the movie had been left on the cutting room floor, and even if it's complete-the movie was just outlandish and silly.

At the end you're left mouth agape, mind befuddled and good taste offended. I have never heard so many people leave a theater on opening day with so much hatred. People were complaining about it in small groups in the mall, four floors down from the theater near the entrance. It's that bad.

I heard it compared to : Glitter, American Werewolf in Paris and Gigli. My boyfriend was so mad he wouldn't even talk about it.

Grrrr!
A: negative