Problem: This review is like what?

Review:I can hardly believe that this inert, turgid and badly staged film is by a filmmaker whose other works I've quite enjoyed. The experience of enduring THE LADY AND THE DUKE (and no other word but "enduring" will do), left me in a vile mood, a condition relieved only by reading the IMDb user comment by ali-112. For not only has Rohmer attempted (with success) to make us see the world through the genre art of 18th century France but, as ali has pointed out, has shown (at the cost of alienating his audience) the effects of both class consciousness and the revolution it inspired through the eyes of a dislikably elitist woman of her times. The director has accomplished something undeniably difficult, but I question whether it was worth the effort it took for him to do so -- or for us to watch the dull results of his labor.
+++++++++
A: negative

Problem: This review is like what?

Review:I'm watching the series again now that it's out on DVD (yay!) It's striking me as fresh, as relevant and as intriguing as when it first aired.

The central performances are gripping, the scripts are layered.

I'll stick my neck out and put it up there with The Prisoner as a show that'll be winning new fans and still be watched come 2035.

I've been asked to write some more line (it seems IMDb is as user unfriendly and anally retentively coded as ever! Pithy and to the point is clearly not the IMDb way.)

Well, unlike IMDb's submissions editors, American Gothic understands that simplicity is everything.

In 22 episodes, the show covers more character development than many shows do in seven seasons. On top of which it questions personal ethics and strength of character in a way which challenges the viewer at every turn to ask themselves what they would choose and what they would think in a given situation.

When the show first aired, I was still grieving for Twin Peaks and thought it would be a cheap knock off. Personally I'm starting to rate it more highly and suspect it will stand up better over the years. Reckon it don't get more controversial than that!
+++++++++
A: positive

Problem: This review is like what?

Review:Now I recently had the viewing pleasure to watch the hilarious comedy Bachelor Party, one of my new favorite comedies, laughed until it just hurt type of movies. So I naturally wanted to see the sequel, hoping it would have the same laughs, but instead Bachelor Party 2: The Last Temptation is made by the American Pie generation where it's tasteless and defeats the hole purpose of the first film. Yeah, the first film has nudity, but it doesn't show in every single scene. Also the plot is exactly the same from the first, it's not always a complaint with me, but this could have been a little more original. The only thing is that I'm glad that at least no old actors from the original appear in this movie, because it would have been cheesy or really silly looking.

Ron and Melinda are engaged, after only 2 months of dating, everyone is against it. Melinda has a rich family, but they're pretty happy with Ron, and Melinda's brother, Todd is scared that Ron will take his job. So they go out on a weekend to Miami for a bachelor party and Todd is going to make sure that he'll trap Ron into a picture that will make Melinda change her mind about the marriage.

Bachelor Party 2: The Last Temptation has a couple laughs here and there, but over all fails to deliver what the first film accomplished. These guys, Ron's friends, were more obnoxious than likable, except for Seth, he was kinda funny. The only likable characters other than Seth is Ron and Melinda, everyone else just more or less gets on your nerves. You wanna watch this film? Just watch Girls Gone Wild, it's the same thing only it doesn't try to pretend that it's a film. Stick to the original Bachelor Party, that's the movie that's going to get you in tears of laughter.

3/10
+++++++++
A: negative

Problem: This review is like what?

Review:I'd read about FLAVIA THE HERETIC for many years, but I only got to see it early last year, when I went on an insane movie-buying binge, and, for whatever reason, it has been on my mind lately, though it's been some months since I watched it.

It's a striking film, set in Italy somewhere around the 15th century. Definitely Medieval-era (though I don't think any specific year is ever given). This being the time of Christian ascendancy, the age is a time of utter madness, and the movie captures this very well.

Flavia, our protagonist, is a young lady who encounters a fallen Muslim on a battlefield. He seems a warm and intriguing fellow, and she's immediately taken with him. Her father, a soldier of a a family of some standing, comes along, almost immediately, and murders the wounded man right before her eyes. But she'll continue to see him in her dreams.

Her father ships her off to a convent that seems more like an open-air insane asylum--the residents, so harshly repressed by unyielding Medieval Christianity, slowly go mad. Flavia comes under the influence of one of the nuttier nuns. But in a mad world, only the sane are truly mad, and this sociopathic sister clearly recognizes the insanity around her. Her take on the times in which they live strikes a chord with Flavia, who, being young and apparently sheltered, is beginning to question everything about this world in which she finds herself trapped.

The movie is unflinching in its portrayal of that world, showcasing a lot of unpleasantness. We see a horse gelded, a lord rape one of the women of his lands in a pig-sty, the pious torture of a young nun. Through it all, Flavia observes and questions, rejecting, eventually, the Christian dogma that creates such a parade of horrors in terms that would gain the movie some criticism over the years for seeming anachronistic. I disagree with that criticism. Flavia's views, though sometimes expressed in ways that vaguely mirror, for example, then-contemporary feminist commentary (the movie was made in 1974), revolve around what are really pretty obvious questions. It is, perhaps, difficult to believe she could be so much of a fish out of water in her own time, but that's the sort of minor point it doesn't do to belabor. Flavia is written in such a way to allow those of our era, or of any era, to empathize with her plight. Getting bogged down on such a matter would be missing the forest for the trees.

Flavia is heartened when the Muslims arrive, invading the countryside, and she finds, in their leader, a new version of the handsome Islamist who still visits her dreams. Smitten with her almost immediately, he allows her to virtually lead his army, becoming a Joan of Arc figure in full battle-gear, and directing the invaders to pull down Christian society, and wreak vengeance upon all those she's seen commit evil.

Is she the herald of a new and better world? She may think so, but Muslims of that era weren't big on feminism, either, as she soon learns the hard way. As they say, meet the new boss...

This is really just a thumbnail of some of the things that happen in FLAVIA THE HERETIC. The movie is quite grim, and with a very downbeat, rather depressing ending. Not a mass-audience movie at all, to be sure. It's quite good, though, and doesn't belong on the "nunsploitation" pile on which it is often carelessly thrown. I think there's much value in the final film, and I'm glad I saw it.
+++++++++
A:
positive