page  1  2      prev | next

Beautifully shot...   on June 22, 2005 - 7:32 PM PDT   of Step Into Liquid (2003) 1 out of 2 members found this review helpful   surf flick brought down by appalling music (high school assembly, self-help rock and 3rd generation ripoffs of bands that sucked to begin with) and...well...a lot of surfers talking. Turn down the volume, play some Dick Dale, Beach Boys, or Hawaiian steel guitar and then you've got a movie.

Most any frame...   on June 19, 2005 - 1:56 PM PDT   of Office Killer (1997) 2 out of 2 members found this review helpful   of Office Killer could be printed and hung in one of Sherman's gallery shows. But the visuals and costuming suggest more substance than is really here. The film suffers from continuity problems and confused intentions. The serial killer material owes too much to Alan Ormsby's Deranged and the satire of office life is dated and unsubtle. Ricky Gervais is endlessly more terrifying in The Office and he never resorts to the knife.

Most films...   on June 9, 2005 - 9:19 AM PDT   of Thirty-Two Short Films About Glenn Gould (1994) 2 out of 2 members found this review helpful   that take music or math as their subject are satisfied to flash number and patterns across the screen accompanied by frenetic music and go "There that's math" (Pi) or use over the top portrayals to communicate the rapture of genius (Amadeus) but 32 Shorts Films... structures its narrative to present Gould's quirky, detached life as one of the baroque pieces that he loved. Full of creative visual and auditory trickiness, the film echoes Bach's playful Goldberg Variations. It is also refreshing that the film avoids the Oprah-Bookclubish tendency to present every moment of a childhood as an explanation for an individual's faults and gifts. Yes, children would be cruel to an obsessive, semi-autistic but that isn't what's interesting about Gould's personality, and the film--with Gould's dry dismissal of that aspect of his childhood--is perfectly aware of this.

Will make you very happy....   on January 9, 2005 - 2:56 PM PST   of The Saddest Music in the World (2003) 4 out of 6 members found this review helpful   Probably Guy Maddin's strongest film since Careful. The scope perfectly coincides with the budget and it features a wonderfully sympathetic cast. Mark McKinney is great as the brassy American who will do anything to be tops at being down. Every time a nation?s team is beaten, he buys them out and adds them to his gigantic, suicidal Busby Berkeley routine (cause even sad can have a little pizzazz!). Great songs--I wish there were a soundtrack album?-and there are some really funny and insightful ideas about how grief and mourning are themselves performance.

Historical interest mostly   on January 4, 2005 - 9:21 AM PST   of I Vampiri (1956) 1 out of 1 members found this review helpful   This police procedural/supernatural thriller is one of Mario Bava's earliest directorial efforts...and you can tell. The storytelling is flat and plodding--every time I expected a red herring, it turned out to be the real shock moment leaving me thinking "that's it?"--and there isn't a hint of an attempt to ratchet up the tension. Of course, since this is Bava movie, it is full of beautiful black and white compositions, imaginative set decoration, and seamless trick photography; probably the best in-camera aging effect I have ever seen. This is worth a rental if you enjoy crisp-looking b+w thrillers or are a Euro-horror completist, otherwise give it a pass and watch "The Girl Who Knew Too Much."

Old-fashioned creep out   on December 31, 2004 - 9:34 AM PST   of Jeepers Creepers (2001) 1 out of 2 members found this review helpful   Jeepers Creepers has a very innocent feel to it. If your definition of "innocence" can include an underground chamber decorated with corpses, that is. It's a carnival spook show that resourcefully uses shadow and suggestion to excite the imagination. The monster design is inventive and is carefully revealed a piece at a time (Is that a wing? How many eyes did I just see?) and the strong orange and black color palette make this a great Halloween rental. The protagonists don't make very logical choices (does anyone really want them to?) and the "shock" ending doesn't fly, but these are mostly quibbles.

Big guns and little bullets   on December 31, 2004 - 9:27 AM PST   of Winchester '73 (1950) 3 out of 3 members found this review helpful   Phenomenal Anthony Mann western with Jimmy Stewart on an Ahab-like quest to revenge the death of his mentor. The film is structured around the titular repeating rifle and, as it changes hands, it gives us a window into each character's soul (the male ones anyway) by showing us how they obtain and handle a weapon of such power. The rifle has an aura much like the Ring in Peter Jackson's trilogy and the film--with its emphasis on the arcane and supernatural rites of gunplay--is an early bridge between the Western and the Martial Arts film. This is an engrossing and varied film with some of the best gun fights ever shot. Highly recommended.

Above it all   on December 19, 2004 - 9:21 PM PST   of Out of the Present (1996) 1 out of 1 members found this review helpful   Life on the disintegrating space station MIR during the fall of the Soviet Union is a fascinating subject for a documentary. Unfortunately the only possible documentarians were unskilled filmmakers and (at least on camera) unreflective explorers. The astronauts perform zero-G follies for nearly the entire length of the film while the events back home, and the politics that strand them in space for 6 extra months, are barely touched on. We do see some breathtaking exterior shots of the earth (unfortunately scored with sub-Mind's Eye era techno) and you get a strong sense of soviet-era space technology but the movie is a big disappointment.

The sweat of your brow   on December 19, 2004 - 9:20 PM PST   of Salesman (Criterion Collection) (1969) 7 out of 7 members found this review helpful   Salesmen follows four men who, in order to "live on their own hook," travel the country selling God's word on commission. They have been everywhere but each new town is just another "territory" full of poor people to exploit, and the potential for failure. The salesman Paul is the tragic center of the film. He is clearly slipping into Willy Loman-land, but his friends can't help him because of the competitive (and superstitious) tendencies that are near the heart of everyone who lives by their spiel. Watching Salesmen will make you question every sacrifice and self-destructive choice you have ever made for a paycheck. I hope someone is filming "Telemarketer" or "Walmart Clerk" right now to document our own exile from the land of milk and honey.

Good characters, crap plot.   on October 6, 2004 - 6:33 PM PDT   of Mystery Men (1999) 3 out of 4 members found this review helpful   Being a longtime Flaming Carrot fan, I was excited for this film to hit the theaters but I ended up getting scared off by the reviews. This was a mistake, but it wasn't necessarily mine. The reviews followed the standard dictum not to give away the plot, but they did give away all of the quirky details of the character's super powers and their bizarre origin stories. This was wrong-headed since the details of this film are hilariously funny but the plot is of the "who cares" variety. Still "The Specials" is much better and more true to itself.

Go witches!   on September 29, 2004 - 9:18 PM PDT   of Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs (1937) 0 out of 3 members found this review helpful   After a back to back viewing of The Wizard of Oz and Snow White, I decided that the best part of these early fantasy films is watching the insipid heroines tormented by the colorful evil witch queens. Not sure what this says about me. If Dorothy and Snow White weren't such uncharismatic, blank-slates I might actually be scared for them. As it is though the films are good, sadistic fun.

crap   on September 29, 2004 - 9:14 PM PDT   of The Deep End (2001) 2 out of 4 members found this review helpful   A paint-by-numbers thriller whose characters all behave absurdly (both practically and emotionally) in order to advance the plot. If you try to trace motivations a step beyond what we see on screen, they fall apart completely. The best conceit of the film, setting a thriller on the cusp of a teen's coming out, is barely addressed and just serves to construct a really lame MacGuffin. Not badly acted but Swinton and company were working from poor material. Also, the film is full of distracting and pretentious water metaphors that go nowhere.

An alternate history that is actually a little worse than the one we're living in.   on September 29, 2004 - 9:12 PM PDT   of It Happened Here (1964) 2 out of 2 members found this review helpful   A neo-realist alternate history showing a collaborationist England under the control of the Nazis. The film is best when it shows practical, "stiff-upper lipped" British citizens convincing themselves that order--any order--is better than resistance and anarchy. It is also disturbing to hear National Socialist rhetoric spoken with an English accent. This film had a low budget for its ambition, but I actually think that (with a few exceptions) the cost-cutting methods were good choices. They give the film a solid documentary feel, where a glossier production might have felt like a novelty.

Moody and slow   on September 29, 2004 - 9:10 PM PDT   of Night Tide (1961) 0 out of 2 members found this review helpful   The movie begins atmospherically enough and feels a bit like a Val Lewton picture, but at about the halfway point it just stops moving and becomes a serious chore to get through. The film features an early lead perfomance by Dennis Hopper, which I'm having trouble pinning down as either sincere or one-note. Maybe it's both.

2/3 of the way to a really good movie   on September 29, 2004 - 9:08 PM PDT   of Ginger Snaps (2000) 3 out of 4 members found this review helpful   Ginger Snaps has a strong opening and first half. The sisters are charismatic and they look like they stepped out of an indy comic (or maybe the first season of Buffy). The werewolf/puberty metaphor is clever, if not as original as I kept hearing, but unfortunately the screen writer or director couldn't decide if they wanted to keep it a metaphor or make it into a "jumpy" horror movie. As a result the second half of the film is unbalanced. Check it out if you enjoyed Heathers.

Warm fuzzies for killer goo   on September 28, 2004 - 11:15 PM PDT   of The Blob (Criterion Collection) (1958) 2 out of 3 members found this review helpful   I would happily face an amorphous, all-devouring river of killer goo to live in a town where everyone is this friendly. It's no wonder the 30-year-old "teenagers" haven't struck out on their own. A wonderful film with some very inventive special effects and as much implied menace as onscreen carnage.

Dude. That's, like, a dead girl...   on September 28, 2004 - 11:12 PM PDT   of River's Edge (1986) 2 out of 4 members found this review helpful   If you didn't see this back in the 80s, it will probably play more like an anthropology lesson than a meditative study of teenage inertia. Other films from the period have aged worse though. River's Edge would make a fun double feature with the Twin Peaks pilot. Who makes a better corpse? Danyi Deats or Sheryl Lee?

Beautiful to look at   on September 28, 2004 - 11:09 PM PDT   of The Spiral Staircase (1946) 2 out of 3 members found this review helpful   One of the most stunningly shot thrillers I have ever seen. It is full of detailed, lucid compositions and deep shadows. This film will definitely be germane to fans of Dario Argento and Mario Bava. Unfortunately, like many of the works of those pillars of Italian horror, this film's screenplay and acting aren't nearly as elegant as the cinematography. They are servicable though, with a couple of standout performances (Elsa Lancaster in particular). It is also interesting to hear how the killer's diatribe echoes Hitler's speeches, which in 1947 were still raw in the public mind.

Best Ripley film   on September 28, 2004 - 11:07 PM PDT   of Purple Noon (1960) 2 out of 3 members found this review helpful   This movie is full of loathsome people picking each other apart in some of the most beautiful cities in Europe. Alain Delon is perfect as con-man, anti-hero Tom Ripley. He seems engrossed in the part and performs his own dangerous, though low-key, stunts (like carrying a prone 200+ pound man down a marble staircase). I feel like Philippe Greenleaf deserves his fate in this film more so than in the book, but it's been a while.

Passing years have faded its charm    on September 28, 2004 - 11:05 PM PDT   of Sabrina (1954) 0 out of 2 members found this review helpful   Enjoyable, but Sabrina hasn't aged as well as other films from Wilder or Hepburn. To the modern viewer, the romantic triangle at the heart of the picture, seems driven by lechery and blatant social climbing. Hepburn is fascinating to watch and--like a hard-boiled Ayn Rand--Bogart delivers a hilarious monologue on the altruistic drive of the businessman. He just wants to build factories in out-of-the-way parts of the world so the newly gentrified workers will be able to go to the picture show. Bless his heart.

page  1  2      prev | next