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train_8400

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6813498c-adc9-4568-97c7-aa0bf464611d

This piece of crap, since I can't call it a movie, can be summed up by the following.<br /><br />-Stereotypical black criminal with black midget partner get in trouble -Black Midget pretends to be a baby with a fully developed adult face, body hair and genitalia -Black midget is mistaken(somehow) by man and woman who happen to want a baby -Black midget than goes on to commit acts of physical and sexual violence, demean white people wherever he sees them, and commit more crimes -Happy Ending<br /><br />Honestly, it could have been a good satire if it hadn't been directed so shallowly and had such talentless bastards star in it.

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train_8401

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6735dd4c-f424-4848-9a0b-ebb29e0a4d8e

'SherryBaby' is quite a painful and sordid melodrama set in Jersey, the story of a young mother who is out of jail on probe after a drugs-related conviction and fights to stay clean, to find a place for herself in life and especially to win back the love of her kid daughter who is being taken care by her brother's family. The only reason the film is to be watched is Maggie Gyllenhaal, an actress at the top of her career, who fits very well in the role and carries the whole film on her shoulders. This is not enough however, as the story line is too simplistic and expected, and the emotional emphasis is put on the wrong place - I kept asking myself all over the picture whether I am supposed to be sorry about the ex and maybe future drug addicted mother as the director and script-writer wanted, or about the innocent kid who is in the middle. Even Maggie Gyllenhaal's acting could not convince me that I should not care more about the kid.

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b99f9863-48a9-49eb-9fde-bf7e7f31ea72

This is a simple tale but it feels very manipulative. It lacks pathos for it does not leave a room for imagination or a personal thought or time for reflection.<br /><br />The animation is well done but I feel like it is too presentational. I would have preferred more images from behind, more space in the background and maybe then this would not feel so kitsch to me.<br /><br />But for a Hollywood style film it works OK but it is very derivative of Aardman films and this is bothering to me. Perhaps a longer film will test if this maker can do without the voice-over.<br /><br />I think the voice over is too glib.

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396a5ce1-8bed-47a7-8791-edd7cd60be96

I can see the guys doing the budget preparation for this flick. "Well lets see now, we spend 50% getting Dirk Benidict, cause Battle Star Galactic and the A-Team were cool. The we spend 40% making a Demon Costume, never mind that the Demon is supposed to be incorporeal in the script. And we spend the rest making the movie." This was pretty bad and VERY cliche.... Have a loved one present when watching (or bring a good book)

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db56eea1-6a05-4db5-956e-b8b47bf776cc

I gave it a 2 instead of a 1 because I think "The Wild Women of Wongo" is worse. This is an exercise in patience. It's like having your teeth cleaned by a bad dental hygienist. There's no plot. There's no logic. There is certainly no acting (although the shark has some quality dialogue). We don't wonder about anything. We don't know how people got where they got. It's always amazing to me how things like this even get released. I agree with the previous writer that it isn't even funny bad. I know. It's about 90 minutes long and that will fill up about that much space on a DVD collection. It's like a paperweight. Or a bad painting you bought at a starving artists' sale. It covers the crack in the wall.

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02de7976-fbcb-43ca-80b4-fe57234d39ee

This is one really bad movie. I've racked my brain and I cannot come up with one positive comment to make. The acting is atrocious. I've seen more believable performances on cable access. The plot is ridiculous. Stolen diamonds, secret recordings of the President, and a shark that attacks anything that gets near it should have made for cheesy fun at the worst. Night of the Sharks isn't even so bad it's good. The dialogue sounds and is delivered as if it were written seconds before it's filmed. And to top it off, Night of the Sharks has the worst soundtrack I've ever heard. I'm surprised my ears didn't start bleeding from the 80s techno synthesized sounds that someone actually bothered to record.<br /><br />From everything I've read, the Italian film industry was dead by 1987. Night of the Sharks is like a final nail in the coffin.

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6d3e8067-a871-426c-8b50-642e1039f3b4

-SPOILES- Lame south of the border adventure movie that has something to do with the blackmail of a big cooperate executive Rosenlski the president of Unasco Inc. by on the lamb beachcomber David Ziegler who's living the life of Reilly, or Ziegler, in his beach house in Cancun Mexico.Having this CD, that he gave to his brother James, that has three years of phone conversations between Rosenlski and the President of the United States involved in criminal deals. This CD has given David an edge over the international mobsters who are after him. <br /><br />The fact that James get's a little greedy by trying to shake down Rosenlski for 2 million in diamonds not only cost him his life but put David in danger of losing his as well. Ropsenlski want's to negotiate with David for the CD by getting his ex-wife Liz to talk to him about giving it up, Rosnelski made a deal to pay off her debts if she comes through. David is later killed by Rosenliski's Mexican hit-man Tony, with the help of a great white shark, who just doesn't go for all this peaceful dealings on his boss' part. <br /><br />Tony had taken the CD that Liz left for his boss at a local hotel safe and now want's to murder James, like he did David, and at the same time keep the CD to have something over Rosenlski.<br /><br />David who had secretly hidden the diamonds that James had on him at the time of his murder is now the target of Tony and his men to shut him up for good. David also wants to take the diamonds and at the same time give his boss Rosenlski the impression that the CD that David had is lost but use it later, without Rosenlski knowing who's behind it,to blackmail him. <br /><br />The movie "Night of the Sharks" has a number of shark attacks in it with this huge one-eyed white shark who ends up taking out about a half dozen of the cast members including Tony. David who's a firm believer in gun-control uses knives high explosives and Molotov cocktails, as well as his fists, to take out the entire Tony crew. Even the killer shark is finished off by Tony but with a hunting knife, not a gun. When it came to using firearms to save his friend and sidekick Paco a girlfriend Juanita and his priest Father Mattia lives from Tony and his gang guns were a no-no with David; he was more of a knife and spear man then anything else. <br /><br />The ending of the movie was about as predictable as you can make it with David thought to be killed by the one-eyed shark later pops up out of the crowd,after Rosenlski was convinced that he's dead and leaves the village. David continues his life as a free living and loving beachcomber with no one looking to kill him and about two million dollars richer. to David's credit he had his friend Paco give Rosenski back his CD but under the conditions that if anything happened to him his cousin, who Rosenlski doesn't know who and where he is, will shoot his big mouth off and let the whole world know about his dirty and criminal dealings.

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9ab6dfcf-3c15-479a-92e9-6de7c46150c0

What's to like about this movie???<br /><br />It is in colour! <br /><br />It has some impressive underwater photography! <br /><br />It has a rhythmic musical score in the background that works well at times! <br /><br />So 3 out of 10! <br /><br />Sometimes the music is speeded up! Especially when the shark or the baddies are about to move in! <br /><br />Sometimes it is slowed! As if to convey to the audience it's about to be time for sympathy! <br /><br />As another one bites the dust! As if in a "spagetti Western" this has much similarity to! <br /><br />It's not that the Italians can't produce quality productions! There was a series of TV movies with a heading like "Octopus" numbered about 1 to 7, screened on SBS TV in Australia in the 1990s about mafia-type conflicts! And they were excellent! But alas, you won't find it here!!!<br /><br />I assumed it was made about 1960s! Sadly it was 20 years out of date, as evidenced by a funeral scene near the end! <br /><br />Then there was the razor-sharp bite of the speedy shark that makes for a red dust repeatedly emerging in the bluish waters! <br /><br />Amidst it all, either in bar-room brawl or in observing the latest sea-side bloody demolition by the relentlessly hungry shark, the mate of the hero looks on through his glasses of little concern, as if he too was bored in his relentless role amidst a lack of much evidence of plot or anyone's character development! <br /><br />At least the hero indicates a fleeting concern belatedly, for his ex-wife! <br /><br />But of course, even if the music fails to awaken our realisation, we have the sinister sound in the baddies' voices, as if to nudge us that another dark deed is about to emerge! <br /><br />And near the end, someone thought of a twist! Just when we thought it was all totally predictable! But stay tuned, folks, for you may find another twist! If you are watching closely! To, more or less, warm your heart! <br /><br />Follow the advice of the hero, and have a few beers along the way! It'll make your viewing of "Night of the Sharks" more enjoyable! <br /><br />Then you'll be ready for something like a "007" movie to ease your way back into reality when this is over!!!

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Despite some moments in heavy rain, an encounter with a drunk as well as an organ grinder with a gypsy and a monkey, and a stay in a sanitarium, this Roscoe "Fatty" Arbuckle silent comedy short with support from Buster Keaton and Al St. John is only fitfully amusing though there is a quite funny sequence of Arbuckle in drag flirting with Buster that's the ultimate in "meet cute" scenes especially since it's one of the few times we see The Great Stone Face smile and laugh in the movies! Also, many scenes seem to have been jump cut edited possibly because of overuse of the film stock. Still, if you're an Arbuckle or Keaton completist, Good Night, Nurse! is certainly worth a look.

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bdf0bc3d-a595-4950-a2ad-e0f4f0a56475

This isn't one of Arbuckle's or Keaton's better films, that's for sure. Fatty's wife is tired of all his heavy drinking, so she takes him to a sanitarium where a psychiatrist (Keaton) claims to have a guaranteed cure! Well, once there, Arbuckle accidentally eats a thermometer and is taken to surgery. Then, he escapes and is chased about the place where he meets a cute girl who also wants to escape. Finally, despite staff chasing them about, they escape at which point it becomes apparent that the girl is crazy and Arbuckle is soon recaptured. However, he awakens and everything AFTER the surgery has all been a dream--there was no sexy crazy girl and Dr. Keaton isn't as big an incompetent as he seemed in the dream.<br /><br />A lack of humor is the biggest problem with the film. Sure, making fun of mentally ill people is pretty low, but in its day it was guaranteed laughs. I'd laugh, too, if there was just something funny to respond to! A lot of energy and that's all.<br /><br />FYI--during one of the chase sequences, Fatty wonders into a race for men over 200 pounds (wow, what are the odds of that?). And, shortly after this, he backs into a post on which the number 5 was just freshly painted. As a result, the five is now on the back of Fatty's shirt and he looks like a regular participant. HOWEVER, the number SHOULD have appeared backwards on Fatty's shirt but came out front-ways--a mistake, as they should have realized the mirror image would have been a backwards 5.

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38656ba7-ec92-4865-870d-a26965735597

Man oh man! What a piece of crummy film-making! But this is a guilty pleasure from my childhood even though I hate to admit it. They showed this movie on my basic cable system all the time. Where I grew up in San Jose, California (right on the border of Cupertino) we had this thing called The G Channel on our cable system. And they basically showed the same one movie over and over and over again. Wanda Nevada was one of those movies. I fell in lust and love with the young Brooke Shields and loved her dopey adventures in the Grand Canyon in the 1940s. The script makes almost no sense, the direction is poor, the few highlights are that Henry Fonda makes an appearance, a lot of dialog that's so bad it's good and a nice Carole King song played over the end credits. Maybe you have to be stoned to truly enjoy this flick. And hey, everybody knows there ain't no gold in the Grand Canyon!

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cc7564b9-07f5-45c9-93d1-83cbcad83f62

Peter Fonda is so intentionally enervated as an actor that his lachrymose line-readings cancel out any irony or humor in the dialogue. He trades sassy barbs and non-witty repartee with Brooke Shields as if he were a wooden block with receding hair; even his smaller touches (like fingering a non-existent mustache on his grizzled face) don't reveal a character so much as an unsure actor being directed by himself, an unsure filmmaker. In the Southwest circa 1950, a poor gambler (not above a little cheating) wins an orphaned, would-be teen Lolita in a botched poker game; after getting hold of a treasure map promising gold in the Grand Canyon, the bickering twosome become prospectors. Some lovely vistas, and an odd but interesting cameo by Henry Fonda as a grizzled canyon man, are the sole compensations in fatigued comedy-drama, with the two leads being trailed by cartoonish killers who will stop at nothing until they get their hands on that map. Shields is very pretty, but--although the camera loves her pouty, glossy beauty--she has no screen presence (and her tinny voice has no range whatsoever); every time she opens her mouth, one is inclined to either cringe or duck. *1/2 from ****

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c0529c87-3a91-4f1e-b2bd-54d047e7b81e

Wanda Nevada is a pubescent fantasy movie using circa 1979 ideas of what constitutes illicit romance for 13 year old girls. Script, pacing, and direction are uniformly awful. Action sequences defy belief. Characters speak with the simplified diction one usually finds in films aimed at the under 10 set, but also includes multiple sexual references involving Shields' character as well as graphic deaths. <br /><br />The movie wants to be a comedy on some level but is never funny, an adventure picture but plot and action are insipid, and a children's movie but introduces pedophilia and child rape as real possibilities. It also wants to be a buddy picture, a coming of age picture, a ghost movie, an Indian spiritual movie, a travelogue, and a western. The overall affect is of massive stupidity with a nasty twist. Wanda Nevada is a complete waste of time unless you want to see a good many terrific shots of the Grand Canyon. That it manages to do just fine.

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1ffd098c-d802-4bb2-8ec2-ad288ea38299

Any movie in which Brooke Shields out-acts a Fonda is going to be both an anomaly and a horror. Shields actually is only bad because she's youthful, inexperienced, and clearly not well directed by her co-star. Peter Fonda is bad because, well, because he's bad. I liked him in Ulee's Gold, years later, but Lord above, he's awful here. Not that anyone else is good. There's not a single performance (outside Henry Fonda's delightful cameo) that is even passable. I've never seen a movie with this many bad performances. In the case of Luke Askew, the chief villain, it's clear this is because of poor dialogue and direction, as he's done good work in the past. But his partner, played by Ted Markland, is an embarrassing ham. The writing is just bloody awful, and the actors cannot be faulted for the terrible things they have to say. But they say them so badly! The editing and direction are worse than pedestrian. Shots are held way too long for no dramatic reason, or cut off before the impact of the scene can be realized. This picture was far worse than I'd imagined and would have been utterly forgotten (and probably never even made) without the participation of a couple of famous names. One bright spot: the cinematography in the Grand Canyon is exquisite, capturing the beauty of that area in a way even big-screen Imax productions have not quite done so well. And finally: either this is a bad version of Paper Moon, with a lovable pair of father-daughter types, or it's a bad version of Pretty Baby, with a considerably more icky romantic relationship between a forty-something and a 13-year-old. It suggests more of the latter than the former, and thus is pretty disturbing.

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d3a7664c-054e-4a17-be4e-420ff19e883d

Beaudray Demerille(a weak Peter Fonda, who also directed), an aging gambler, wins young teen Wanda "Nevada"(pretty, but not talented Brooke Shields) in a poker game. Together the unlikely pair(of course)embark on a search for Indian gold in the Grand Canyon.<br /><br />That's the story and there really is no need to search for a deeper meaning in it. It just isn't there. The acting is very weak too, which was quite a surprise given the fact that Peter Fonda was in the lead.<br /><br />If you're looking for something interesting in this film, take a look at the nice scenery and some good looks of a young Brooke Shields. Her character however is so irritating(especially at the beginning)and dumb, that she never quite comes off as sexy or appealing. Too bad, but, given the story, I doubt anything more could be made of this. I wonder why Peter Fonda directed and starred in this film. He must have even talked his father(Henry Fonda)into a (useless) cameo in this ridiculous mess. Unfortunately, this was their only film together. Couldn't Henry be in EASY RIDER for example? 3/10

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e2f75a35-6ac6-4dd2-95bf-a7722cc156aa

I rented this movie because it falls under the genres of "romance" and "western" with some Grand Canyon scenery thrown in. But if you're expecting a typical wholesome romantic western, forget it. This movie is pure trash! The romance is between a YOUNG GIRL who has not even gone through puberty and a MIDDLE-AGED MAN! The child is also lusted after by other leering men. It's sickening.<br /><br />Peter Fonda is portrayed as being virtuous by trying to resist his attraction to Brooke Shields, and her character is mostly the one that pursues the relationship. He tries to shoo her off at first but eventually he gives in and they drive off as a happy, loving couple. It's revolting.<br /><br />I don't see how this movie could appeal to anyone except pedophiles.

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f4a686e6-dd28-4c20-ae8f-6cf7b662861d

Quite average even by Monogram standards, this mystery (a remake of The Sphinx) has an oddball plot which is not unraveled to much effect -- you'll see through it after about ten minutes. The two leads have some nice breezy dialog at the outset, but John Hamilton is hopelessly dull as the villain (perfectly cast Lionel Atwill originated the role) and Warren Hymer's nitwit shtick is pretty annoying. However, it's worth sitting through for a five-minute appearance by the incomparable Mantan Moreland as Nicodemus the janitor, who gets the better of the defense attorney during a hilarious courtroom appearance. You've got to hand it to Bill "One-Take" Beaudine; he wasn't much of a director, but he would always punch up a routine programmer with some goofy vaudeville.

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63e8454a-6ab5-4c87-ac7a-513b7138b178

I just came back from "El Otro" playing here in Buenos Aires and I have to say I was very disappointed. The film is very slow moving (don't get me wrong, I enjoy slow moving films!), slow to the point of driving you crazy. All you hear is Julio Chavez breathing heavily throughout the whole film. This is a poorly made film, but more importantly, it is a film without a lick of inspiration, I felt nothing for the story or its characters.<br /><br />"El Otro" was made only for the sake of making a film... making it forgetful. I would advise you to pass on this one, if you want to see good Argentinian films, look for films by Sorin.

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792f9741-5bf0-43d8-a863-e0740afa2088

Guy walking around without motive... I will never get those two hours of my life back. The guy kept on assuming identities and cheating on his pregnant wife. What was I thinking? How did this win a price anywhere? I understood he loved his father but other than that the movie was completely senseless to me. What was the purpose of walking so much and going to the funeral of a stranger for no apparent reason. How did this enrich his life??? Why did we have to see the dying old lady on her underwear????!!! Why???!!!!<br /><br />I though it would be deep or about something more interesting. I do not recommend the movie even to leave on while sleeping...

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1ae2154d-c37b-4c0c-be27-6b3d720d8da9

I just finished watching "El Otro". I have always taken my hat off to Julio Chavez's performances, as he is a great actor, but this movie is really depressing and slow. I guess that it would have been even worse if it wasn't for Julio. Anyways, this is definitely a film that you will never understand if you are not from Argentina, and even if you are, I would advise you not to rent this movie in order to have a nice time with your girlfriend, boyfriend, family or friends... it is really depressing and incredibly slow, and the plot does not make a lot of sense neither. Probably the director wanted to show the fragility of the human life, but what he does is bore and impress the audience with scenes that shock you a little bit. It gives you something to think about, but not in a good way. Overall, I definitely didn't like this movie.

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8276995e-5045-4bf4-95a4-428237f936b6

The title should have been "The walker". That was only he did walk.<br /><br />There was nothing on the movie that was good. The description of the movie doesn't really comply with the plot.<br /><br />The only thing that I can get from the movie is that he was a good son, but a low life terrible person.<br /><br />I'm sorry that I expend my money and time, on this movie. I saw people leaving the theater in the middle of the movie. I stayed hoping that it will better....what a mistake. I got worse.<br /><br />If there is a suggestion that I can make to he producer is to re-direct his life to another field, because making movies is definitely no his cup of tea

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409f51cd-dffa-4833-b750-9b841a5b9589

The title should have been the walker. The guy expend 90% of the movie walking. He doesn't know what he wants, or what he is. Go through life stealing peoples identity for nothing. He gets no benefit, no money, nothing pretending to be another person.<br /><br />No body was able to understand why he was pretending to be somebody else.<br /><br />The only thing that was clear in this movie is that he love his father and was a good son. But the rest was crap.<br /><br />May be director is a looser that would like to be somebody else. But what he really should do is to get a real job, because after his movie, I don't think he has a chance to make as a movie producer.

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7ccce876-9b6a-4bb6-ad93-d78be8d640f7

This movie could have been so much better, especially considering the talent. Larenz Tate's portrayal of Frankie Lymon was not good, especially in musical performances. He doesn't lip sync well and his stage mannerisms are Larenz Tate, when he should have been Frankie Lymon. The portrayal of the women as a bunch of gold diggers has Hollywood written all over it. The powers that be obviously pushed it, but it only made the characters more unrealistic. The positives of the movie were Miguel Nunez's portrayal of Little Richard, and the cameo of Little Richard himself. Lela Rochon is eye candy, as usual, even in a conservative role. It's too bad that the talents of Halle Berry and Vivica A. Fox were wasted. The whole Frankie Lymon saga was fascinating in real life. Too bad this film was a wasted opportunity.

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26ee9b47-8d71-4d87-9f00-408a8d3f6da1

After reading all of the rave reviews about this film and a few that give it a so-so. I finally decided to throw in my no cents worth. I agree with most on the point that if it hadn't been for Lauren Lewis and Chris Ferry it would have been a disaster. Filmed in Mariette OH. just north of Dogpatch where all the real talent fled south down I-77 years ago, at least as far as a tank of gas would allow. I did get a chuckle from reviewers who subtly claim that they cerebrate a little better than most by claiming they followed the plot without an inkling of confusion. This wee tale by the Brothers Crook is like an old record with a skip in it. As an American I understand the difficulties Ind film artists have to face. A trip to Romania would have wiped out the budget for sure. Lets face it this whole film was a loop de loop of Claire in the gas station, Claire on the side of the road, Claire under the bleachers, Claire in the house, Claire in the cornfield, Claire at school. Claire here and Claire there. It almost became monotonous and would have if she had not been the best actor in the cast. Josh and Jeff have to make a living but don't write a two page script and turn it into an hour,twenty flick. Before writing another screenplay about dreaming ghosts watch an episode or two of Ghost Whisperer or something and get a little background. All of the cast except the above mentioned and a couple of others were engaged in their first and last film. Also, there is an appearance by co-director Jeff as he is in all his films. Just like Alfred Hitchcock, eh? One thing the film had going for it is that the cameraman seemed to have a fixation on Lauren Lewis' derrière. Well, with all sarcasm now satisfied I still recommend the film for the horror buff just to see this young actress in the formative time of her career (I hope)and that Chris Ferry has established himself as a villain worth watching.

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d2151bdf-9721-4b20-9bc2-d69f41c9cf7f

Salvage is the worst so called horror film I've ever seen. There is nothing remotely horrific about it. It doesn't deserve to be in a genre so fine. First of all i don't see how so many people can think this piece of crap such a great movie. If I wrote something as boring and utterly ridiculous as this i would be laughed at and too embarrassed to subject others to the stupidity of it. Second: the acting is terrible and the lead actress is excruciatingly ugly. Third: the story sucks, its been used before, and the excuse that its a cheap movie is no excuse. Read the summery on the back of the case, it reveals the whole story. I do not recommend that you watch this movie unless you have 80 minutes to waste on something that will leave you regretting that you watched it. I feel really bad for those Crooks and the irony of their name. All hail Anthony Perkins!!!!!!!!!

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31b96286-bbfd-4c46-9024-c4a322dd3574

Salvage: 4 out of 10. Groundhog Day meets a Christian Coalition horror film. Okay maybe it's not that bad. But it is close.<br /><br />Claire (played by Alicia Silverstonesque Lauren Currie Lewis) is stalked and possibly killed by a serial killer (Chris Ferry who is quite menacing and brutal). I say possibly because she wakes up and it was all a dream….. Or was it? (Cue music)<br /><br />The basic problem with the film is that these fifteen minutes of plot (Done quite well the first time) is repeated over and over again. And since Claire wakes up every time and every scene is clearly a dream or alternate reality I just stopped caring what happened to Claire and started wondering what lame twist at the end was going to pull this together.<br /><br />I was rooting for a séance (which honestly would have made more sense) but instead got one of those too obvious by half surprise endings (Think the Village or Below) Yup the film collapses faster than Donnie Darko's directors cut. All the great twist endings in horror movies The Sixth Sense, the original Invasion of the Body Snatchers, Happy Birthday to Me worked because the audience wasn't expecting a left field explanation. (Heck even the canoe ending in the original Friday the 13th was worth a jolt)<br /><br />Salvage on the other hand screams twist ending with every scene change. Other nagging faults is the one note piano soundtrack (Though the featured songs were decent) the obvious time padding (Claire doing the dishes, Claire's mother's subplots), the way Claire says "hello is anyone there" every time she thinks there is a serial killer around.<br /><br />Also some of the secondary acting roles (In particular Claire's mother played by Maureen Olander who resembles a Mary Kay zombie) shows the first time actor low budget roots.<br /><br />Both too clever by half and not nearly clever enough Salvage keeps your interest if only to see how they are going to fix this mess. Problem is they really don't.

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d5849e72-09c3-43fb-b9f4-fb154f57cb83

I love horror movies. I can even appreciate most cheese (face it, 9 out of 10 horror films these days ARE cheese), but this was just ridiculous. Terrible acting, terrible writing, completely hollow and unbelievable characters (no Meisner actors here!) and a total lack of sufficient body count. I wish I could SALVAGE the 79 minutes of my life I just wasted. At least the Crook brothers are aptly named. The only good thing about the whole film was watching the Alicia Silverstone wanna-be get punched in the face. How this EVER made it to Sundance is completely baffling to me. Most of the plot was absolutely unrealistic, even by slasher film standards. I mean, COME ON! Who would rush out to get a cheap earring 10 seconds after a creepy stalker guy just left their doorstep? Lame.

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1be6f197-fca5-457d-9889-b9c51620b1ba

One of the worst films I have ever seen. Got so bored that I switched it off midway through to watch the news. When I switched it back on, I fell asleep. The film starts with a dream, continues with a dream, and ends with a dream. Then there are a few more dreams in between. Come on, what is supposed to keep me interested in that? A film needs to have a reason to be interesting. The minute you felt the film was only a dream is when any sensible film-goer switches off. Ever had someone insist on telling you their dreams and what it means to them? This is it!!!<br /><br />Absolutely awful.

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4bb94357-dd36-4faf-9857-31f4eca68e5f

This film just goes around in circles, and the viewer does not know where they are. At first I thought..mmmmm, could be kinda cool movie this, but it just drags on and on, and eventually you don't know what's going on. The lead female is a good actress and played her role well, and the psycho fella, is creepy, but after a bit you don't really care what happens, because this film just drags on. Shame really, this could have turned out a lot better.<br /><br />Would say though that the lead female and psycho fella, will have a good career ahead of them , but will they remember this film, for making them known, or for being the film they regret they ever made.

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4cd02758-2f8e-49a6-9644-672a413fd56e

This movie is very important because suggested me this consideration: sometimes you can wish to be sick ... sometimes you can wish to have a syndrome ... sometimes, for example, you can wish have Goldfield Syndrome... that way you'd not remember this boring movie ... and above all you'd not remember Adam "superfluos" Sandler... sometimes, simply, you can wish... have rented another movie...<br /><br />My vote? 3 out of 10. My suggestion? If you are neither a fan of boring romantic comedies or Adam Sandler (...it's a joke don't exist Adam Sandler's fan...I want to hope it), save yourself... Someone to save? Drew Barrymore. ... perhaps.

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train_8430

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4aa09bf9-edb6-4a7a-a7e4-e1f361b35efe

Millie is a sap. She marries a rich guy named Maitland and they have a child. She then catches him cheating on her and divorces him...but lets him keep the kid she claims to love. Back then in the early 1930s, she would have been entitled to hefty spousal and child support but lets the guy off amazingly easy...with no support...what a sap! Later, when she has a boyfriend and life seems pretty good, he turns out to ALSO be a cheat! Wow, does she have a hard time picking men.<br /><br />As a result of these bad relationships, Millie changes. Now she's a wild party girl--doing everything she can to distract herself from her hard luck. Suddenly, many years pass. Millie's daughter who she left early on in the film is now 17 and oddly fashions haven't changed one bit. An old friend of Millie's (yes, it's another evil man!) is now pretending to be the daughter's friend, but he has lecherous designs on her. Millie promises him that if he touches the girl, she'll kill him. Take a wild guess what happens next! <br /><br />Overall, the film is a confusing and often bizarre mess--a bit like "Madam X" but much, much less focused. So often Millie's motivations and actions seem to make little sense. And, the film seems to have a little of everything tossed into it--so long as it substantiates the notion that all men are pigs. Unusual but not particularly good.

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train_8431

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87a62ade-3ba3-420a-af0d-c455d8095143

How the hell did they get this made?! Presenting itself as a caper comedy, the misbegotten "$" is essentially two hours of people mumbling sentence fragments. The usually dependable Warren Beatty looks drunk, and the usually hilarious Goldie Hawn acts like she's on depressants. As for Gert Frobe, his most famous role - Goldfinger - was infinitely more admirable than his character here. Not even the guy with the champagne bottle of LSD can save this litany of worthlessness.<br /><br />Am I comparing this movie to "Plan 9 from Outer Space"? I wouldn't do such a thing even if someone paid me. "P9FOS" was idiotically made but ended up hilarious; this was idiotically made and causes you to feel like your brain just melted out of your ears. Warren Beatty and Goldie Hawn made up for this when they co-starred in "Shampoo", but then they co-starred in the dreadful "Town & Country". Maybe they just shouldn't co-star in movies. All in all, I would rather have my skin torn off than have to watch this again. Awful.<br /><br />Maybe they should remake it with Jackie Chan. Then I would pay to see it.

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train_8432

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0c754d38-240b-4fc3-af57-18ce975c05d5

The pakage implies that Warren Beatty and Goldie Hawn are pulling off a huge bank robbery, but that's not what I got out of it! I didn't get anything! In the first half there's a new character (without introduction) in every other scene. The first half-hour is completely incomprehensible, the rest is just one long, annoying, underlit chase scene. There's always an irritating sound in the background whether it's a loud watch ticking, a blaring siren, a train whistling, or even the horrible score by Quincy Jones. There are a lot of parts that are laughably bad, too. Like, the bad guys chasing Beatty on thin ice with a CAR! Or, the police arriving at the scene roughly fifteen times. I really hated this movie!

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train_8433

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52d72338-4e99-4020-9e16-7988e478e57f

This has the absolute worst performance from Robert Duval who sounds just like William Buckley throughout the entire film. His hammy melodramatic acting takes away from any dramatic interest. I'm not sure if this was deliberate scene stealing or inadvertent but it's the only thing I can recall from a truly forgettable film. This picture should be shown in every amateur acting class of an example of what not to do. Thank God, Duvall went on to bigger and better things and stopped trying to effect a cultured accent. He is a good character actor but that's about it. Klaus is so much better. His performance is muted and noteworthy.

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train_8434

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7d79c2fe-378f-47c3-a8ae-1183a1b6ccc0

This is by far the worst film I have seen in my entire life. The acting is poor and the storyline is almost incomprehensible. Whether or not you like lightships or any ships for that matter is irrelevant. As for special effects the film has none. The whole film crew were probably on the boat out in rough seas rather than in a studio and when some of the men are "stabbed" (if you can even call it that) their reactions are totally unreal. The guns are more quiet than a mute. How this film could have one two awards puts serious questions to the state of the human mind. Well thats about it. This review is probably more fun to read than the film is to watch. If anyone is considering watching it or buying it I would seriously advise you against it for obvious reasons. I have said that it includes a spoiler. If the fact that some people get stabbed and a gun gets fired is a plot giveaway. I suppose it is because they are the only good parts of the film.

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train_8435

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8eaa4ce8-19ea-4029-ae4f-0ab9e3bfab53

Shiner, directed by Christian Calson, centers around three "couples" and their relationships with obsession and violence. Pretty good start as far as I'm concerned. Interesting. The couples break down into a heterosexual couple, two heterosexual male friends and a straight guy being "harmlessly" stalked by a gay man.<br /><br />The "het" couple really don't have much of a role in the film. There are some scenes that show how they like to be aggressive when having sex or playing around with each other, but seem to have no real purpose since the are so marginalized. My assumption is that they represent a more day to day illustration of how sex/violence are integrated in a couples life. The couple aren't very aggressive and it's not even shot in any kind of erotic way. As characters, they don't add much to the theme or plot.<br /><br />The two male friends make up the bulk of the plot. They engage in some gay bashing of sorts by convincing a homosexual man to have sex with them in an alley. This escalates into violence. And the violence changes them. It becomes a means of sexual gratification. And their need for violence t release grows as the film progresses. The main problem I had is the violence is not convincing. Never once does it seem that any of the characters is in any real danger. It just doesn't work. Given that the whole theme of the film is about the characters' relationships with violence, this is a major problem. Unfortunately, the make-up doesn't help either. Sometimes, it's okay, other times it is very bad. In one scene, I really wondered why one of the characters had rouge smeared on his face. Confusing.<br /><br />The more interesting pair of the characters is the "stalker couple." Here Calson seemed to have more to say and was able to develop a more coherent storyline. Perhaps it is because the characters seem to develop more and have resolution at the end. Shiner may well have been much better if it had stuck with these two.<br /><br />I appreciate that Calson wanted to achieve a lot with this film. It is admirable. Most low budget flicks don't aspire to much. I don't think Calson achieved want he was aiming for. Myself, I found nothing particularly controversial or unsettling. Shiner was unconvincing. This doesn't mean, however, that the director can't achieve something with his next film.<br /><br />He seems to have something to say.

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train_8436

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9ff8c87d-852d-493a-95f3-2d23aac2aa4c

What an unfortunate mess is "Shiner." I wanted to like this over-the-top, anti-film aspirant, and in fact found a number of moments with powerful resonance. Sadly, those moments are few and far between. While I appreciate some of what Calson was attempting, any advantage aspired to by bare bones, no budget cinematography was destroyed with some truly atrocious editing that benefited the movie not at all.<br /><br />While bad acting abounds in low budget (and big budget) cinema, Shiner has some remarkably bad performances that are nearly painful to watch. In particular the "straight" couple Linda and Young Guy. These are the two most poorly written characters offering almost nothing to the story. The acting is so abysmal and neither actor seems capable of resisting smirking or cracking up as they drearily drop their lines with an appalling lack of skill. The choppy editing almost lends the feeling that these roles were entirely gratuitous and dropped in to avoid the films being stereotypically cast as an oddball gay film. It would have been better off as such.<br /><br />With all that is going wrong for it, there are several performances that seem to capture what Calson was hoping to get. In particular the story centering on Bob and Tim. These are the two most richly drawn characters and offer the most rewards with genuinely captivating performances by Nicholas T. King (Bob) and David Zelinas (Tim). Tim is a boxer with some serious issues. Remarkably low self esteem is disguised by an almost cartoon like arrogance that he wears like armour plating. Obsessed with Tim, the seemingly harmless yet ultimately creepy Bob, stalks the boxer in classic cat-and-mouse fashion. When the tables are turned and hunter becomes the hunted, the resulting in the film's only genuine emotional catharsis. In a film so artificially hard-edged (that's a compliment) one character MUST have that revelatory break through (or breakdown, as the case proves here) and the final confrontation between Bob and Tim provide Zelinas and King opportunity to display some real acting chops.<br /><br />As played by Scott Stepp and Derris Nile, Tony and Danny seem to be the focus of the movie, and despite some bravado moments of their own (including one truly disturbing scene revealing the sex/violence obsession), but they can't seem to escape a cartoon-like artifice and it's difficult to look at - or beyond their seeming one note symphony and find anything other than the obvious.<br /><br />Ultimately this same raw material could (and should) be used to tell this story in better fashion. Alas, there really isn't much to recommend this yet, the performances by Messrs. King and Zelinas, really do offer something special and a glimpse of what might have been and are ultimately worth seeing.

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train_8437

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2e8d2d86-e44b-4338-9204-fcaa4243c0d7

I saw "Shiner" on DVD. While I was watching it, I thought, "This is a really bad porn flick without the porn." I also thought, "Whoever wrote this has some real issues." Then I watched the director/writer Carlson explain his process as a special feature. Yeah, it was real special.<br /><br />The emphasis of the film is placed on two alcoholic losers who hit each other to get off. They are marginally attractive. There is frontal and full nudity. These factors probably account for the film being seen at all.<br /><br />The most upsetting element of the film is the gay bashing and the subsequent further gay bashing of the same victim who tries ineptly to exact revenge from his assailants, the two drunken losers. Not only is the subject handled absurdly and badly from a technical point of view, but the acting is horrendously bad.<br /><br />Then there's the boxer-stalker theme. This is really insane, not just absurd. This hunky boxer is somehow traumatized by the persistent attentions of a fleshy momma's boy who works at his gym's parking lot. This is in LA, mind you. The boxer is so traumatized that he turns up at the stalker's house, strips in front of him and gets excited in the process.<br /><br />Well, all I can say is, why would a boxer who is at heart an exhibitionist be so traumatized by the attention of a stalker? It simply makes no sense. And, I'm afraid, some psycho-dynamics actually do make sense, if you take the time to read about them. However, bad scripts seldom make sense at all.<br /><br />The director/writer seems to have thought that this film represents a considerable minority within the gay community. Well, he may be correct, I suppose. We may never know, since that minority would be so dysfunctional they would hardly be able to get organized enough to ever get to an obscure gay film festival or DVD store, the only two places they could possibly find this turkey. Thank goodness for that.

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train_8438

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c516f2fa-96f2-410e-b148-92c977c175a0

I question its importance to Queer Cinema as it seems to be more about having a homosexual encounter via violent behavior than making any clear statements regarding homosexuality and violence.<br /><br />Three tales are tangled together in a rather sloppy manner. I found myself trying to untangle the messy narrative in the first 15 minutes, that alone didn't sit well with me. Weak plot points were endlessly repeated as though we might not have gotten it the first 10 times.<br /><br />There was a feeling of padded dialog throughout the film. More like a 45 minute Boy's Brief short rather than a fleshed out full-length film. It had a certain erotic flair, male nudity and sex appeal but overall the sum did not equal its parts.<br /><br />The 1st part: Boxer/Stalker storyline was the strongest and yet it too felt like it had been pulled thin. Bob has been following Tim for four years and only now is he confronting him? I felt as though their cat-mouse game was not developed enough to merit its conclusion. We needed more information about them and less Parking Lot/Locker scenes with Tim relentlessly saying "What do you want?" <br /><br />The 2nd part: Danny wants his buddy, Tony, to beat him up while he jacks-off. Tony doesn't seem to mind, but he doesn't even appear interested in exploring the implications of his homo erotic hobby -- not even after they do it in the nude. This tale lacks the all-important transition from "I'm a straight boy smacking my guy friend around for fun" to "I think I might be gay and hitting him because I'd like to spread his ass and do him S/M style." A very important thing to leave out.<br /><br />Clearly these stories each could have conveyed their points in half the time. The 3rd part with the man and woman slapping each other around adds to that thought. Furthermore, it was unnecessary and added nothing to the film. Yes, the actors did a fine job under the circumstances and the four male leads were very sexy. The make-up (bruises and cuts) however was on par with a grammar school talent show.<br /><br />There wasn't enough meat to this story to have any impact on the gay politic. The film made no statement, squandered time, and is not engaging or worthy enough for thoughtful investment. Its fatal flaw is its amateurish approach, that makes it ultimately impossible to take seriously.

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train_8439

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1615e92d-2322-417f-ab3e-fa60666e0709

If you want to watch a film that is oddly shot, oddly lit, weird stories of these men (and one woman) who enjoy beating the crap out of each other, if you want to enjoy a story that goes nowhere of these two guys, one a boxer and the other a gay man, then you should watch this film.<br /><br />After watching this film, I almost felt as badly bruised up and cut up, like the director (of the film) himself beat the hell out of me.<br /><br />This is a movie where one is not meant to watch for plot or for great acting, this is a film to gawk at in horror and wonder. A lot like watching an airplane crash or a train wreck.<br /><br />If you want to watch a great movie, a good movie, a "B" movie, or even a mediocre movie, this movie is not it.<br /><br />A warning to all who watch this film, please don't eat beforehand. You might want to puke by the end of the film.

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train_8440

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fc84b770-d8cd-489e-b59b-9c8c479645a4

OK. So it's a low-budget "film" (I used the quotes because it was shot in Hi-8 video). The acting is universally horrid, the makeup is laughable (the blood looks like it came from Sherwin-Williams and I've seen more convincing bruises made from halloween ghoul kits), and the lighting generally looks like they used someone's borrowed Toyota pickup to shine headlights on the actors.<br /><br />I might be able to forgive these low-budget traits if there were some actual content, if a movie made an attempt to tell a story. But this collection of video footage can boast of no plot, no real characters, and no momentum. It's a self-indulgent mess.<br /><br />And don't worry -- no spoilers here, 'cause there's absolutely nothing to spoil.

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train_8441

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d0eb8d3f-6f08-4c97-9287-b8915189b1a0

This is the most ludicrous and laughable thriller I've ever seen. Oh....where to start....<br /><br />Plot (what little there is): Clayton Beresford Jr. (Hayden Christensen), a young billionaire, with a bad heart is desperately in need of a transplant. Clay has been secretly engaged to his mother's PA, Samantha, played by Jessica Alba. On the night that these two secretly get married, it just so happens that a heart donor with the same rare blood type is found. Go and figure the odds of that one! Once on the operating table, Clay finds out the anesthesia isn't working, and he can feel everything and hear everything.<br /><br />Fortunately Clay seems to be able to filter out the pain of a razor sharp scalpel cutting open his chest by simply concentrating on his memories of Samantha, which we are told he's doing through an annoying voice-over which never seems to stop.<br /><br />If you didn't burst out in laughter yet, you will surely start to when you see the surgical scenes. <br /><br />How could a young billionaire agree to have a heart transplant performed by one surgeon, one nurse, an attending physician and an drunk anesthesiologist? There were more people in the room when my wisdom tooth was getting pulled. Not to mention the medical behavior, which is too preposterous to be taken seriously...the operating room isn't even kept sterile...people are practically able to just walk in and out of the room without even having washed up... During the operation the viewer gets to hear Clay's thoughts, none of which are too fascinating. Ah...but here's what it's all about ...the doctors are trying to kill him in order to take his money. Believing him to be unconscious, the villains speak freely. Gosh! What will happen? <br /><br />Well... at least there's no interference from anyone else in the hospital, while an incompetent doctor who's got four malpractice lawsuits running against him is performing major heart surgery. Not even Clay's overprotective mother seems to be able to check on his status. The only one interested in keeping updated is Samantha...but oh no...could sweet Sam be in on it....You'll quickly find out through some Scooby Doo dialog...<br /><br />In the end, it wouldn't even matter whether or not Clay underwent anesthesia awareness, because the end would have turned out the same way in both cases.<br /><br />If you can ignore the feeling that the director/writer is trying to make fun of the patients who fell victim to anesthesia awareness, maybe there's some dumb fun to be had...<br /><br />Enjoy...

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train_8442

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9d4cc825-6c38-4ac7-b532-e31b4f2ead74

I just saw this movie last night and, being someone who had very low expectations to begin with, was still disappointed. The most glaring error in this abomination of a movie is that the main plot point (the guy being awake during the surgery), had NOTHING to do with the outcome. It would have ended the same way regardless. So, what was the point of this? Who knows. Also, this surgeon had 4 malpractice suits against him and he didn't think people would ask questions if a patient died on his table? Give me a break. Jessica Alba is completely talentless and Christiansen is almost as bad. The whole thing was just laughable from start to finish. I'm fairly certain that if you could feel someone cutting through your chest with a scalpel, you would be in more pain than that.

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train_8443

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f2dc743c-5666-434d-8120-551291f7e629

First of all, the big named actors must need the money... The surgical scenes were laughable.... and surely they must know that people who have a little knowledge of medicine would find this utterly absurd......Anesthesiologists do not leave the room during a heart transplant....nor do they do the surgery in a tiny room devoid of instruments, heart lung equipment and sterile techniques... just a joke... couldn't concentrate on the story line because of all the stupid surgery scenes... no blood, no personnel and then the hero doc coming in and taking over... it is not a film for thinking adults....Also the budget must have been limited... the street scenes were OK but who was the technical adviser....Seems like it was directed by a total idiot.. Save your money and wait until it comes out on DVD and Don't rent it..

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train_8444

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1cccc9ad-1c44-4845-bbe1-393e27ac4983

From the beginning this movie did have a few flaws. The main character played by Hayden Christensen is a the rich young mogul who has inherited his father's considerable wealth and power, and he is struggling to both fill his father's shoes and cut the apron strings mother (and co-executive) keeps too tight. He also has the problem of having a heart condition and waiting in the limbo that is the organ donor registry. There are also minor back stories which your first instinct is to mostly ignore that become important later, such as his friendship with his surgeon (Terrence Howard) and his romance with a middle class girl (Jessica Alba). Uncreative story lines, but not bad enough to ruin the movie. The only real "oy vey!" moment was the name of Lena Olin's character. Overbearing woman named Lilith...subtle!<br /><br />The surgical scenes are not at all censored. I appreciated that, people who find surgery scenes scary might not. The horror of being awake during anesthesia was done well at first. You watch in emotional agony as Christensen screams inwardly through the chest incision and the rib spreader. The moment of irony from the trailers then comes where while he is one of the unlucky few to be awake during anesthesia, he is also luck in that it helps him learn that his surgical team is planning to murder him.<br /><br />The big twist, however, is very predictable and sends the film delving into the conspiracy and his memories of the little signs which were there but he, like us, initially missed. <br /><br />There are two more twists at the end involving his relationship with his mother. One is an impressive gesture by Olin, which comes of as unimpressive due to poor writing. The other is a secret about the family's past which seemed very tacked on and pointless.<br /><br />The initially well done anesthesia awareness drama gets lost in the poorly written conspiracy drama. There is a one final attempt to bring it back which falls flat, taking the entire movie with it.

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train_8445

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bca4d088-272b-4e7d-b4b4-ba1b50223225

I was very surprised to see that this movie had such a good rating, when i checked it on IMDb after seeing it. This really is one of the worst movies i have ever seen and i have seen many bad movies. It looks like a good movie in the beginning, but when he comes into surgery i couldn't believe how bad it got. This voice-over destroys EVERYTHING! Just imagine you are being cut open like that and then listen to what he says. I saw the movie in German so i don't really know what he said in English, but ironic stuff like "Yeah right, it doesn't hurt.."?...what is this? Telling yourself "think about something else" and then forgetting your pain by just thinking about your girlfriend is just...stupid. And his mother...how the hell does she figure something like that out? Someone comes to tell her, her son died in surgery (what she kind of had to expect). Plus she found some letters in Jessica Albas bag. plus that "she knows the hospital" stuff... and then it takes her "one second" to figure it out? What the hell?^^ And the ending...why does the police bust them? The patient died in surgery, thats all that happened. That drunk doctor doesn't know anything else either...and then they bust them all, even the girlfriend??? Why??? Despite all that i think Christensen did a bad job, but that doesn't really count for me...those mistakes and stupid things i wrote about above are the problem. I watched this movie with some friends and we all were VERY disappointed... As i said, one of the worst movies i have ever seen... Just don't watch it ;)

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train_8446

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86329cc5-c342-4cf9-9d20-3f2b2090f9ff

Hayden Christianson and Jessica Alba two of my least favourite actors of this century team up in what is quite possibly the flattest attempt at remake the already dire The Butterfly Effect. Awake is so dull and so utterly uninteresting that you'd be better off asleep. Terrance Howard still recovering from the diabolical August Rush puts up a decent fight as the sadistic doctor who seems hell bent on killing Christianson and after viewing his performance I would gladly assists.<br /><br />Alba, still recovering after Fantastic Four Rise of the Silver surfer. Is naturally disastrous and equally unwatchable as she always was. Only once has she ever been rather brilliant at that was in the safe hands of master director Robert Rodriguez in Sin City. Could it possibly be that Jessica alba isn't as poor of an actress as most give her credit for and is is possibly that her acting abilities are being weight down by a poor script. If so then that would explain Awake. What with a script that would shame that of Plan 9 from Outer Space.<br /><br />Jessica Alba, Hayden Christenson, and Terrence Howard star in first-time director/screenwriter Joby Harold's nerve-jangling psychological thriller about a man who experiences the frighteningly common surgical phenomenon known as "aesthetic awareness," in which those laid out on the operating table remain acutely aware of what is going on around them despite remaining completely paralyzed and unable to cry out for help. When a successful young young man (Christenson) goes under the knife and realizes that the anaesthesia hasn't quite done its job, the horror quickly sets in as his worried wife (Alba) waits anxiously and a terrifying drama unfolds in the operating room.<br /><br />Hoping to do for operating tables what Final Destination did for planes, this first effort from director Joby Harold pivots on a blood-frosting conceit. The pre-credits sequence tells us one in 700 people suffers from a phenomenon known as 'anaesthetic awareness', where the patient remains conscious but paralysed during surgery. One such unfortunate individual is Clayton Beresford Jr (Hayden Christensen), who finds himself wide awake during a heart transplant... and he can feel every single slice.<br /><br />Intermittently inventive as it probes away at his tortured psyche, Awake fails to inject true terror into its novel premise. Spiralling from chilling simplicity into absurd conspiracy, it's hindered by stilted turns from Christensen and Jessica Alba. You'll wish you'd popped a sedative before watching… <br /><br />VERDICT: Awake is at very best extremely undemanding. A pull no punches film that undoubtedly looked better on paper. As a film though its awfully generic and extremely derived. Awake fails to inject terror into its novel premise. The end result is really quite lousy. Alba and Christian are the very least of your worries as the films main flaw lies in its inability to scare its audience. Awake is a film you'll most likely sleep through.

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train_8447

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8729cf46-f58c-4385-beab-52250bcda516

After watching Awake,I led to a conclusion:director and screenwriter Joby Harold made Awake with the intention of laughing at the spectator,for the simple fact the movie is full of ridiculous elements.Awake has a lot of plot holes and it is full of absurd and ridiculous elements(for example,the hospital uniform the spirit of the main character uses...did the ghost of a doctor leave it in the floor ?).The concept behind this movie is slightly ingenious but all the plot holes and the absurd things make of this a stupid and crappy film.With the exception of the great Lena Olin,all the actors bring bad performances.Hayden Christensen has zero expressions and the same applies for Jessica Alba.The extraordinary actor Terrence Howard is enormously wasted on his role.Awake makes a laugh of the spectator.It's so ridiculous and full of absurd things that it's impossible to take it seriously.My recommendation is:skip this crappy movie.

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train_8448

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daf807ad-b043-4562-b79f-52b167b56b47

******SPOILERS******<br /><br />The unfunny radio quiz show host Kyser and his mediocre band are the excuse for Lugosi, Karloff, and Lorre to pick up a paycheck in this bland, sporatically watchable haunted house spoof. Lugosi is a mystic whose seances are exposed as a fraudulent attempt to bilk an heiress' fortune; Karloff is the butler and Lorre is a professor who exposes fake mediums, but it turns out that they're both in conspiracy with Lugosi. <br /><br />Of course, Kay Kyser and his band of 30-something year old "kids" uncover the truth with the minimum of possible humor along the way. Not recommended to any but the absolute horror completist.

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There is something in most of us, especially guys, that admires some really working class small town "real men" populist fare. And Sean Penn serves it up for us with a cherry on top. Hey, A lot of people use Penn as a political whipping boy, but I don't rate movies or actor/directors based on politics or personality. That is what right wing commentators like excretable faux movie reviewer Debbie Schlussel does. While acknowledging he is one of our best actors and a good director, I think this picture was a simplistic piece of aimless dreck that he has atoned for since. <br /><br />Okay, you have the gist of this there is this good cop, a small town trooper, Joe, played against type by David Morse, who in the opening scene chases some guy on a country farm road in big sixties cars. The bad guy stops, gets out, shoots at him so Joe has to blast him dead. There was no explanation what drove this man to do such a desperate violent thing and the dead man's parents do some redneck freak out at the police station while Joe feels real sad and guilty that he had to kill someone. So we know that Joe, the farmer forced off his land into a cop job, is a good basic sort of guy. Then his brother Frank shows up, he is a sadistic, amoral bully, fresh out of the Army and Nam where the war got his blood lust up. Some people here and in other reviews called him just an irresponsible hell raising younger brother and Sean was trying to make some point about what our John Wayne tough guy culture and war does to otherwise good people but what I saw was an amoral, sadistic bully who enjoys hurting and ripping people off. Then there is mom and dad, Marsha Mason and Charles Bronson, who do the requisite turn as old fashioned country couple, then die off; she by illness and he by shotgun suicide, to advance the story for us. Both times Frank the bad guy is away being a miserable SOB. But good Joe brings him back to Podunksville from jail so Frank can straighten his life out by welding bridges and living with his utterly stupid screaming trashy pregnant wife. But Joe has a nice wife, played by Italian actress Valeria Golina, who is Mexican and Sean uses this as an exercise in some affirmative action embellishment of goody Joe and his real soulfulness underneath his uniform and crew cut. For me, that was an utterly pointless affirmative action subplot that Sean uses to burnish his tough guy creds by sucking up to Mexicans because Mexicans are so tough and cool.<br /><br />But Frank is bad and we get the requisite events like stealing friend's car, robbing gas station by beating the clerk over the head then torching the car and all those cool things that hell raisers do. Then there are the mandatory 8mm film childhood flashbacks of young Joey dutifully moving the lawn and cowboy dressed Franky jumping on his back and wrestling him and yadda yadda so we all know what deep bond there is between the two of them.<br /><br />So the film meanders around with a lot of small town schlock to warm the heart of any red stater. Accompanying the film was a great soundtrack of good sixties songs like Jefferson Airplane and Janis Joplin which were totally inappropriate, except for the 60's era effect, to win the hearts of old hippies. The worst offense is that, since the movie was inspired by a Springsteen song, "The Highway Patrolman", that song was not included. <br /><br />So Joe's brain dead wife goes into labor and Joe runs off to the bar to get loaded and spout some populists drunken victim's spiel about how tough things are while good Joey comes to drag him back to his wife. The bartender is good Ole Ceasar, played by Dennis Hopper. So Viggo - Frank whigs out for no particular reason and beats his pal Ceasar to death after good Joe the Cop leaves.<br /><br />So Joe has chase his bad brother down and I was so hoping that he would do the right thing and blow that menace to society away. Instead we get a scene where his brother stops ahead of him in some old 50's junker on some lonely road at night, and little Franky in his cowboy suit and cap guns gets out of the car to face good Joe, the kid from the 8mm flashback home movie sequence. Oy, such dreck! Then to top off this drecky sap fest, there is some Zen crap about the Indian runner, who is a messenger, becomes the message, ala Marshall MacLuhen? See what I mean, Sean has done much better than this so don't be afraid to miss this one.

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I don't like Sean Penn's directing very much, and this early work, The Indian Runner, is no exception. The movie has no core, it's colored with a kind of redneck, anti-authoritarian tweeness that in all honesty taints most of Penn's work, his latest work even more so than the earlier. Frank Miller, Robert Rodriguez, Clint Eastwood, Sean Penn, the whole lot seem to produce such fundamentally banal product, ostensibly in some allegiance to honesty, but ending up being, for the most part, glorified pro wrestling matches, and moralistic, almost as if Hallmark cards had developed a line of Hell's Angels greetings, and make me long for the days of Deliverance, which is a fine movie. Viggo Mortensen's acting is much, much more believable here than that ridiculous Eastern Promises thing he did with Cronenberg, and that's about it. The movie is dead meaningless, and seems to be an exercise, a series of techniques, more than a story. Kudos for Charles Bronson, however, who proves he can act. And I wanted more of Sandy Dennis' character. A lousy 3 out of 10 for this The Indian Runner crap.

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Thin story concerns two small town brothers and their struggles over family honor. David Morse is the responsible, straight-laced cop and 'good' brother; Viggo Mortensen, the 'bad' boy, is a former soldier and ex-convict. As an actor (particularly in his earliest years), Sean Penn seems to have modulated his performances under the Method. Turning first-time writer and director for this arty, obtuse drama, he works his script and characters out through the same methodical process, slowing the pacing down to a crawl (ostensibly so we can catch every nuance and inflection). This approach might be fascinating if there were three-dimensional characters to care about, but photogenic Morse and Mortensen aren't really convincing as siblings. Worse, we expect more from prominently-billed veterans Charles Bronson and Sandy Dennis, who hardly get a chance to come through with anything interesting. The picture is balky with turgid sequences, a wobbly narrative and confusing editing (always slanted to point up the artistic excesses). Penn's tricks with the camera show off a talented eye, yet they are mostly an irritation. *1/2 from ****

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Penn takes the time to develop his characters, and we almost care about them. However there are some real problems with the story here, we see no real motivation for the evil brother's behavior, and the time line is screwed up. Supposedly set in 1963, the music is late 60s/early 70s. The references and dialogue is 70s/80s. The potential for a powerful climax presents itself, and Penn allows it to slip away. But even with all these difficulties it is worth the watch, but not great.

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There is only one thing essential to thorough appreciation of The Indian Runner. Unzip your trousers. Peek inside. Is there evidence of a Y chromosome? Okay, you'll do.<br /><br />This film has all the male requisites: blood, guns, car chases, fond women, death, multiple tattoos, cigarettes, liquor, violence, pyrotechnics -- what have I left out? -- oh, yeah, blowtorches.<br /><br />As a woman, I seriously hope Sean Penn regards this as a `when I was a child...' kind of effort. Since he both wrote and directed the thing, he's nearly solely responsible. An uneven cast (Viggo Mortensen as usual demonstrating brilliantly how the job's supposed to be done) tries to save Penn. Too late. The lines and action are there. Even devoted, skilled acting can't change those.<br /><br />I found this movie puerile and silly, as well as predictable. The dialogue staggers along -- Sandy Dennis has my respect for trying to breathe life into a woodenly maternal monologue without motherly authenticity. Then she dies. After a bit, so does the protagonists' father, played by Charles Bronson. Their absence is hardly noticeable.<br /><br />At intervals, the pyrotechnics, etc., noted above appear to liven things up and scare the audience into thinking something significant is occurring.<br /><br />If you're male and under 25, you may adore this film. Plan to return to it at 35. Think you'll still like it?<br /><br />I don't think so.

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you can be fooled by your first impressions. as in, initial reactions to a movie, for example. as in, the first time i saw this movie i was bedazzled by the idea of it (first of all, i love black comedies). could even - despite being male, myself - empathise with the feisty girls' fervor to see their husbands deceased without delay. was tripped up by my own face-value (and, i do mean "face-value") response to nicolette sheridan and a couple of the other delicious dames in the picture. it just goes to show you that you've gotta step back from a situation sometimes and see that it's bad (and not "bad good," either): the reason i'm giving this movie a "4" rating is because of ms sheridan and her gams (the rest of 'er is pretty good, too); but this movie has all the hallmark TV movie characteristics - which means you'll be disappointed if your a lover of movies made for the big screen. the story contains plot holes you could run a tunnel through - and i'll generally overlook holes in a plot if the overall thing does it for me; and i just experienced an incredible letdown the second time i saw it. i don't think it's a total waste of time, but....

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DEAD HUSBANDS is a somewhat silly comedy about a bunch of wives conspiring to bump off each others husbands`. It`s by no means embarrassingly bad like some comedies I could mention but it never fufils its potential . Imagine how good this could have been if we had the Farrelly brothers directing Ben Stiller in the role of Carter Elson .<br /><br />Oh is Carter based on Jerry Springer ? Just curious because the catch phrase on Dr Elson`s show is " look after each other and keep talking "

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When I rented this movie, I had very low expectations......but when I saw it, I realized that the movie was less (a lot less) than what I expected. The actors were bad (the doctor's wife was one of the worst), the story was so stupid...it could work for a Disney movie (except for the murders), but this one is not a comedy, it is a laughable masterpiece of stupidity. The title is well chosen except for one thing: they could add stupid movie after Dead Husbands! I give it 0 and a half out of 5.

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So, this movie has been hailed, glorified, and carried to incredible heights. But in the end what is it really? Many of the ways in which it has been made to work for a hearing audience on the screen do not work. The fairly academic camera work keeps the signing obfuscated, and scenes that are in ASL are hard to follow as a result even for someone who is relatively fluent. The voice interpretation of Matlin's dialogue, under the excuse that Hurt's character "likes the sound of his voice", turns her more and more into a weird distant object as the film goes on. Matlin does shine in the few scenes where her signing is not partially hidden from view. But nonetheless, most of the movie, when this is a love story, is only showed from a single point of view, that of the man. As Ebert said, "If a story is about the battle of two people over the common ground on which they will communicate, it's not fair to make the whole movie on the terms of only one of them."<br /><br />The idea that an oralist teacher who uses methods that have been imposed in many deaf schools for decades would be presented as "revolutionary" is fairly insulting in itself. His character becomes weakened as a credible teacher as the movie goes on. Drawing comedy from a deaf accent is, quite honestly, rather low. And his attitude towards the male students of his class is pretty symptomatic of how he seems to act with women: as an entitled man. A party scene involving a number of deaf people including a few academics meeting together leaves him seemingly isolated, in a way that's fairly inconsistent with his credentials: I have seen interpreters spontaneously switch to asl between each other even when they weren't aware of a deaf person being in the area, and yet somehow he feels like a fish out of the water in an environment his education should have made him perfectly used to. As a lover, he seems like a typical dogged nice guy, including his tendency to act possessively afterwards. And yet the movie is, indeed, only really seen through him, as everything his lover says is filtered through his voice. <br /><br />The scenes involving the other deaf kids are, in general, wallbangers. The broken symbolism fails, the dance scene, the pool scene, even the initial sleep scene which is supposed to carry some of it - all these scenes that try to hint at the isolation of the deaf main character are broken metaphors, at best: many hearing people I know do dance on the bass beats that deaf people feel (instead of squirming like copulating chihuahuas), and going to take an evening dive for a hearing person is rarely an excuse to make a deep statement on the isolation of deafness (no, seriously, when I go swim, I go swim)...<br /><br />It also fails at carrying the end of the play, instead making it a story of a deaf woman who submits to a strong man. Even though the original play ended with a more equal ground, where both have to accept each other as they are, and where he has to finally recognize her real voice is the movement of her hands, not the vibrations in her throat.<br /><br />And for all the breakthrough that it may have seemed to be, Marlee Matlin remains Hollywood's token deaf woman to this day.

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Sorry. Someone has to say it. This really is/was a dull movie. Worthy perhaps, but dull nonetheless. I nearly cried with boredom when watching it. The acting is pretty dire, the story drawn out and predictable, the score and camera-work totally standard and unexciting. It's one of those movies you are not allowed to hate (becase it is about disabled people) but hate it I suspect nearly everyone does. It is interesting that critics have been so kind to this movie. I suppose they too are not allowed to be objective. This was made to win awards - which I remember it duly did. But it was neither interesting nor entertaining. I haven't seen the play so cannot compare.

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The movie itself is so pathetic. It portrayed deaf people as cynical toward hearing people. True, some deaf people are wary of dating hearing people, but they are not necessarily angry like of Marlee Matlin's character was throughout the story. Deaf people do not go to the bar and dance the way Matlin did. All in all, the movie itself is more boring than pathetic. It is so boring that I'd like to believe that it is an insomnia-cured movie. If I have a problem sleeping, I can simply pop in Children of a Lesser God and watch. It will put me to sleep.<br /><br />Keep in mind, this is a deaf guy talking.

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It is like what the title of this thread say. Only impression I got from that movie is that Marlee Matlin's character was always angry, so cynical, and so pathetic. Her character's first date with William Hurt's character where they were dancing were dumb. All in all, I've tried to finish watching the movie four times, and of all four times I fell asleep. I would keep watching that movie with one intention... to beat my problem with insomnia, because all it do is to put me to sleep. Sweet dream.

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CAMILLE 2000 <br /><br />Aspect ratio: 2.35:1 (Panavision)<br /><br />Sound format: Mono<br /><br />Whilst visiting Rome, an amorous nobleman (Nino Castelnuovo) falls in love with a beautiful young libertine (Daniele Gaubert), but their unlikely romance is opposed by Castelnuovo's wealthy father (Massimo Serato), and Fate deals a tragic blow...<br /><br />A sexed-up love story for the swinging Sixties, adapted from a literary source (Alexandre Dumas' 'La Dame aux Camelias') by screenwriter Michael DeForrest, and directed with freewheeling flair by Radley Metzger who, along with the likes of Russ Meyer and Joe Sarno, is credited with redefining the parameters of 'Adult' cinema throughout the 1960's and 70's. Using the scope format for the last time in his career, Metzger's exploration of 'la dolce vita' is rich in visual excess (note the emphasis on reflective surfaces, for example), though the film's sexual candor seems alarmingly coy by modern standards. Production values are handsome throughout, and the performances are engaging and humane (Castelnuovo and Gaubert are particularly memorable), despite weak post-sync dubbing. Though set in an unspecified future, Enrico Sabbatini's wacked-out set designs locate the movie firmly within its period, and Piero Piccioni's 'wah-wah' music score has become something of a cult item amongst exploitation devotees. Ultimately, CAMILLE 2000 is an acquired taste, but fans of this director's elegant softcore erotica won't be disappointed. Next up for Metzger was THE LICKERISH QUARTET (1970), which many consider his best film.

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The Cowboys could leave you a little sore in the saddle. Definitely not one of Johns best movies. Don't get me wrong, with any John Wayne move there is always some good spots. And this one has it's fair share. But over all the picture moves slow and just doesn't live up to the aspirations it could have been. Bruce Dern again does an outstanding job as the villain. Roscoe Lee Brown is another bright spot in the movie. The kids in the movie were average but could have been cast better. This would be a good movie for the eight to fifteen year old movie goers.<br /><br />This would be a good family move to watch with your children. Just be aware, there is a couple of scenes that you may want to take a look at before you let the young ones see it. But most kids that I know who have seen the movie like it. Maybe it's because they get to see kids their age do all the grown up work.

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What a time we live in when someone like this Joe Swan-whatever the hell is considered a good filmmaker...or even a filmmaker at all! Where are the new crop of filmmakers with brains AND talent??? We need them bad, and to hell with mumblecore!<br /><br />This movie is about nothing, just as the characters in the film stand for nothing. It's this horrible, so-called Gen Y, that is full of bored idiots, some of which declare themselves filmmakers with out bothering to learn anything about the craft before shooting. Well, Orson Welles was a filmmaker. John Huston was a filmmaker. Fellini was a filmmaker. Dreyer was a filmmaker, etc. Current films like these show just how stupid young, so-called "filmmakers" can be when they believe going out with no script, no direction, no thought, no legit "camerawork" (everything shot horribly on DV), no craft of editing, no nothing, stands for "rebellious" or "advanced" film-making. Nope, it's called ignorance and laziness or just pure masturbation of cinema (and there actually is an in-your-face "jack-off shot," so be ready). <br /><br />Look at the early films of any accomplished "indie" filmmaker: Linklatter, Morris, Allen, Lynch, Hartley, Jarmusch, Jost, Lee, or Herzog...none made anything as tedious and aimless as this, yet Swan-whatever the hell, is still going to SXSW every year and hailed as some kind of gutsy, new talent. It's crap! I can't imagine anyone liking this, and everything else this so-called filmmaker has done (all seen by me) is just as bad (the newer stuff clearly made to appeal to a more mainstream audience, one of the sitcom calling). Steer clear, unless you're a friend or family member of those involved...on second thought, if you're a family member or friend you'd probably be embarrassed to see a family member or friend in such compromising situations...<br /><br />Utter garbage. This isn't art. This is the ultimate opposite of it.

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"It's like hard to like describe just how like exciting it is like to make a relationship like drama like with all the like pornographic scenes thrown like in for like good measure like, and to stir up like contro- like -versy and make us more like money and like stuff." - Ellen, the lost quote.<br /><br />"Kissing, Like, On the, Like, Mouth And Stuff" is like the best like artistic endeavor like ever made. Watching like Ellen's hairy arms and like Chris masturbating was like the height of my years-long movie-viewing experience and stuff. But before I like begin like breaking new U.S.-20-something-airhead records with the my "likes", let me like just briefly list like the high- like -lights of this visual like feast: <br /><br />1. Chris doing the deed with his genitals. And not just that: the way the camera (guided so elegantly by Ellen and Patrick) rewards the viewer with a full-screen shot of Chris's fat white-trash stomach after he finishes the un-Catholic deed - that was truly thrilling. I can in all honesty say that I've never seen such grace. Chris, you should do more such scenes in your next movies, because that is exactly what we needed as a continuation of what that brilliant, brilliant man, Lars von Trier and his "Idiots 95", started. A quick w*** and then a hairy, fat, white belly: what more can any movie-goer ask for?! Needless to say, I can sit all day and watch Chris ejaculate (in spite of the fact that I'm straight)... Such poetry in motion. Such elegance, such style. No less than total, divine inspiration went into filming that sequence - plus a solid amount of Zen philosophy. Even Barbra Streisand could not get any more spiritual than this.<br /><br />2. Ellen's hairy, thick arms. The wobbly-camera close-ups, so skillfully photographed by our two directors of photography (I can't emphasize this enough), Ellen and Patrick, often caused confusion regarding the proper identification of the sex in question. There were several scenes when we would see a part of a body (a leg, arm or foot), yet it was often a guessing game: does that body-part belong to a man or a woman? Naturally, Chris and his fellow artists, Ellen, Patrick and whatsername, cast themselves on purpose, because their bodies were ideal for creating this gender-based confusion. It was at times hard to guess whether one is seeing a female or male leg. Patrick is so very thin and effeminate in his movements, so hairless and pristine, whereas Ellen and the other girl are so very butch, what with their thick legs and arms. Brilliant. <br /><br />3. Brilliant - especially the way that neatly ties in with the theme of role reversal between the sexes: so utterly original and mind-blowing. Ellen behaves like a man, wants sex all the time, while her ex Patrick wants to talk - like a girl. Spiffing.<br /><br />4. Ellen's search for a Leftist mate. "He must love 'The Simpsons', which is quite Leftist." I am glad that the makers of this movie decided to break the long tradition of offering us intelligent Leftists. Ellen is such a refreshing - and realistic - change. The number of "likes" that she and her liberal friends manage to utter in less than 80 minutes is truly phenomenal (3,849, to be exact). They have managed to realistically transfer their real-life ineptness onto the big screen with a minimum of effort, and I applaud them for that.<br /><br />5. The close-ups of toes. Plenty of stuff here for foot-fetishists, which I think is a very liberal, highly commendable way of reaching out to sexual minorities. After all, shoe- and foot- fetishists are offered so little in modern cinema, so it's nice to see that someone out there CARES.<br /><br />KOTM, or rather, KLOTLMAS, offers more than meets the eye. It is not just a modest little film about shallow people engaging in hollow relationships while indulging in meaningless conversations. No, it's much more than that. It's about the light that guides all silly creatures; the guiding light that dominates the futile lives of various pseudo-artistic wannabes who just dropped out of film school, and plan to assault our senses with dim-witted drivel that will hopefully play well at pretentious festivals like Sundance and Cannes, enabling them to gain the necessary exposure hence some real cash for a change, with which they will later hire the likes of Sean Penn and George Clooney in promoting the saving of this planet and the resolving of ALL political problems this world faces. What better way to do that than by making porn at the very start? <br /><br />If Chris and Ellen did the camera here, as is clearly stated in the end-credits, then who held the camera while the two of them were in front of it? They probably hired some passers-by and shoved the camera into their hands...<br /><br />Go to http://rateyourmusic.com/~Fedor8, and check out my "TV & Cinema: 150 Worst Cases Of Nepotism" list.

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This film was absolutely awful, I even feel uncomfortable calling it a film. Its the typical "mumblecore" movie, with zero plot and a bunch of aimless whiny twenty somethings stumbling around trying to "figure stuff out". I have tried to give mumblecore a chance, but lets be honest its just horrible.<br /><br />I am not out of sync with cinema, I appreciate Dogme95 films, Idioterne is one of my all time favorite films. So I do not mind if a film is cheaply made so long as there is some (ANY) substance.<br /><br />Everything in this film is horrid, the acting, the writing (or was it all improvised?), the direction, but MOST of all, above everything else, the camera work was just plain and simple nonsense. The camera was never anywhere logical, there was no consistency. I got to admit being a guy I had heard there was nudity in this film so I thought to myself well even if its horrible at least there's nudity (yea I know, I'm a jerk). Well thanks to the uber crappy camera-work you never really get to see anything, and the things you do see, TRUST ME - YOU DO NOT WANT TO SEE. This film made me want to vomit on numerous levels.<br /><br />The dialogue made me want to vomit, the camera-work made me want to vomit, but mostly the idea that this film was praised by some legit critics, well now that more than anything makes me want to vomit.

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I admire 'Kissing on the Mouth' for its frankness – pubic hair cutting and masturbation, especially from the lead/director Joe Swanberg. They weren't afraid to show trueness to everyday "private" occurrences. Unfortunately, the film falls under the 'The Brown Bunny' realm, though with a slightly more developed plot of jealousy. Yes, it mirrors 'Bunny' with a whole lot of nothing going on, or too many cinematography shots focused (or sincerely unfocused) on absolutely nothing – feet, hands or genitals. Again, unfortunately, I can see why this film was released, and why people are renting: true life sex scenes and full frontal (equally, both male and female) nudity. Other than that, it was a complete waste of time. We quickly learn of a post-college male/female roommate pair in which the male has obvious feelings for the female that sees him as just a friend while continuously having sex with her ex-boyfriend. Other than that, we are subjected to the every-day events of their boring lives: she works for her parents; he works on an extremely uninteresting sexual awareness project on his computer. For this all to work, the dialogue has to be interesting and the acting real. Neither work and it's as boring as watching someone drive for an hour, i.e. 'The Brown Bunny.' The only actor that stands out is Kate Winterich, and even she does some questionable acting. (The DVD extra with her in front of a mike is actually worth watching/listening to.) Again, I admire the filmmakers, especially Swanberg, for baring it all and not being afraid to expose themselves or shower-habits, but overall the film falls flat. It has narrations that doesn't fit the scenes, too many boring everyday events and unconvincing acting that you wonder, other than the soft-porn factor, why you rented this.

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OK, I kinda like the idea of this movie. I'm in the age demographic, and I kinda identify with some of the stories. Even the sometimes tacky and meaningless dialogue seems semi-realistic, and in a different movie would have been forgivable.<br /><br />I'm trying as hard as possible not to trash this movie like the others did, but it's not that easy when the filmmakers weren't trying at all.<br /><br />The editing in this movie is terrible! Possibly the worst editing I've ever seen in a movie! There are things that you don't have to go to film school to learn, leaning good editing is not one of them, but identifying a bad one is.<br /><br />Also, the shot... Oh my God the shots, just awful! I can't even go into the details, but we sometimes just see random things popping up, and that, in conjunction with the editing will give you the most painful film viewing experience.<br /><br />This movie being made on low or no budget with 4 cast and crew is not an excuse also. I've seen short films on youtube with a lot more artistic integrity! Joe, Greta, I don't know what the heck you were thinking, but this movie is nothing but a masturbation of both your egos. You should be ashamed of yourselves! In conclusion, this movie is like what a really lazy amateur porn movie will be if it was filled with 3 or 4 lousy sex scenes separated by long boring conversations and one disgusting masturbation scene. If that's not your kind of thing, avoid this at all cost!

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This is a very old and cheaply made film--a typical low-budget B-Western in so many ways. Gary Cooper was not yet a star and this film is highly reminiscent of the early films of John Wayne that were done for "poverty row" studios. With both actors, their familiar style and persona were still not completely formed. This incarnation of Gary Cooper doesn't seem exactly like the Cooper of just a few years later (he talks faster in this early film, among other things).<br /><br />However, unlike the average B-movie of the era, there are at least a few interesting elements that make the film unique (if not good). If you ever want to see the woman that was married to Errol Flynn for seven years, this is your chance. Lili Damita stars as the female love interest and this is a very, very odd casting choice, as she has a heavy accent (she was French) and wasn't even close to being "movie star pretty". Incidentally, she was also married to director Michael Curtiz. <br /><br />But for me, the most memorable and weird aspect of the film is the seemingly gay subplot--sort of like a BROKEBACK MOUNTAIN from the 1930s (and we thought this was a NEW idea). Gary Cooper's character was raised by two men who hate women and do everything they can through much of the film to keep Cooper clear of females. This misogyny alone doesn't necessarily mean much, but there are so many clues throughout the film that indicate the makers of the film really were trying to portray them as a gay couple. In particular, towards the end, when one of them is killed, the other is shot by an arrow and holds off dying long enough to crawl over to the body of his fallen friend and then falls--with his arms cradled around him! This was pretty edgy stuff for the time and I think this makes this dull film really fascinating today! As far as Cooper and the plot go, the film is a bit of a disappointment and very skip-able. Unless you are curious about Damita or the homosexual undertones, do yourself a favor and find a better Western.

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The motion picture was, in all likelihood, made in the year 1930 and released in 1931. I would surmise that talking motion pictures had great difficulty in making the transition from the silent era. Nevertheless, this particular Zane Grey plot appears to be very weak. Also, Gary Cooper was probably just learning to act. The result is something that would not be acceptable by today's standards. For 1931, maybe. For 2004, not acceptable. Some of the actors performed well. Sadly, the Indians always get the short end in these early westerns. They were living on the land long before the white man came, but according to twisted history, they had no right to defend themselves.

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4f2fc329-9e60-477c-af27-58751c367d40

This is actually a pretty bad film. The ideology is not as perverse as in those films Collins made later. However, my main misgivings about the film are that it is implausible and quite frankly boring for a long time. The whole concept of an ex-SAS man joining terrorists for no particular reason isn't very convincing and you can't help wondering why a group of highly organized terrorists (who later become pretty clueless) fall for it. The film starts with a pretty powerful scene but then meanders for quite a long time building up towards the great finale. Overall, I think Who dares wins could have been an interesting 45 minutes episode of The Professionals but the story doesn't carry a feature film. Although reasonably successful at the time this film initiated the demise of Collins' career who in the eighties mainly made cheap and dubious soldier-of-fortune or army films. Pity, because he actually is quite a versatile actor but at the end of the day Martin Shaw chose his roles more carefully and has a career that's still successful.

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615e6ee2-b43b-479b-82e7-217343a244e6

... just look at the poor Robert Webber character (great performance, once again!) who tries to wrestle a sub machine gun from one of the terrorists. Everything in this movie seems to be a little wrong. The biggest mistake in my opinion is the effort to give the action a firm footing in the actuality of the early 1980ies (the fundamental difference between this flick and the far more fantastic, ironic and therefore timeless Die Hard). The story comes through as a failed attempt to glorify the SAS commandos. Ideas like when a commando shouts „heads down" all good guys do it and all bad guys don't so that they can blast away ad lib (with a good conscience), that the main character does not get mown down by the gas masked commandos although he wears the same clothes and carries a weapon from their arsenal just seem to be unlikely and make it hard to take the movie seriously. And it just happens that it tries to be more than just fun. Don't talk about the toilet-mirror-signal episode ...<br /><br />I don't mind the criticism of the Pacifist movement as a shield for evildoers and the arguments between the peace fanatics and the settled, even headed representatives of power in this movie. But the political comment is rather lame and uninspired. This is insofar regrettable as the movie features an early performance of Judy Davies. She plays the main fanatic and seems to have done extensive studies on the „subject". Anyway, her performance is a notch above that of the others and somehow I feel the movie let her down.

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a9d321f2-6d32-4bc8-8689-a90fbefcdd03

It's 1982, Two years after the Iranian Embassy Siege which involved the dramatic SAS Rescue from the Balconys, and with a War with Argentina over the Falkland Islands currently taking place, what better film to make than a Gung-Ho "SAS" Film that re-creates the Iranian Hostage siege, whilst using Britains Number one action hero of the day, Lewis Collins. throw in Edward Woodward and a few other Well known actors and you've got a winner on your hands?...Well maybe not! The film itself doesn't make the situation serious enough, whilst the acting is quite second rate. it's like a Movie long episode of "The Professionals", but without the formula. This film goes nowhere fast and is quite predictable. Maybe Cubby Brocoli watched this film and decided to ditch Lewis Collins as a Touted James Bond Replacement for Roger Moore. Watch it if your a fan of Lewis Collins or SAS stuff in General, if not, save your time.

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6797b07d-4524-4eb0-8c8c-fd84204e469f

In Europe, it's known as Who Dares Wins; in America, it's known as The Final Option, but under any title this ludicrous SAS action flick asks the audience to put their disbelief to one side for around two hours. I find it incredibly hard to comprehend how Lewis Collins (the hero here) was almost chosen as Roger Moore's successor in the Bond films.... this guy is so expressionless he'd struggle to get a job in a waxwork museum (as a waxwork!!!) Luckily, Judy Davis is on hand to partially redeem the affair with a meaty performance as a hard-line lady terrorist, and there's a climactic ten minute action sequence that is quite competently orchestrated by director Ian Sharp. Let it be added that it's a very, very, very long wait for these closing excitements to come around, and I can't honestly say that a near two hour wait for a bit of decent action was worth the effort.<br /><br />SAS hard man Peter Skellen (Lewis Collins) goes undercover among a group of peace protesters who would like to see the end of nuclear weapons stock-piling. He meets their leader Frankie (Judy Davis), a strong-talking and opinionated woman who might just be capable of taking extraordinary measures to achieve her goals. Frankie's dedicated bunch violently lay siege to the American Embassy in London, demanding that a nuclear missile be fired at a naval base in Scotland (she believes that when the world witnesses a nuclear blast for real, everyone will be so appalled that they will join her campaign for disarmament). Unfortunately for Frankie, she makes the mistake of taking Skellen on her little embassy raid, and he plans to thwart their plan from inside with a little well-timed outside help from his SAS comrades.<br /><br />The film is inspired - quite obviously - by the awesome SAS assault on the Iranian Embassy in 1981. Someone who saw that event on the news apparently thought it would be good to devise a film along similar lines. Unfortunately, the film is rather banal, with too much stupid dialogue and a heck of a lot of embarrassingly bad scenes (the arch-bishop's debate which descends into a riot, anyone?) Frankie's idea to bring about peace by instigating a nuclear blast is ridiculous anyway, so she becomes a laughable figure just when the audience is on the verge of viewing her as an interesting villain. Who Dares Wins tries to be a celebration of the military legend that is the SAS, but at the same time it dips into clumsy action clichés and ill-thought-out plotting. The result is a well-intentioned but wholly ineffective slice of Boy's Own absurdity.

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329286d6-35b8-4ddb-86d6-68559b2f12d8

Okay, what the hell kind of TRASH have I been watching now? "The Witches' Mountain" has got to be one of the most incoherent and insane Spanish exploitation flicks ever and yet, at the same time, it's also strangely compelling. There's absolutely nothing that makes sense here and I even doubt there ever was a script to work with, but somehow I couldn't turn it off. The scratching your head with confusion starts right away, with an opening sequence about an angry little girl that killed her mother's cat. So you think this film revolves on children possessed by evil forces? Heck no, because after this intro, the girl and her wickedness simply aren't mentioned anymore. Then cut to a guy, with the most impressively trimmed mustache you'll ever see, who breaks up with his girlfriend in a rather unsubtle way. When she asks him to spend his vacation with her, he promptly phones his employer requesting him any type of assignment! Great move. The movie finally starts now, as he travels to an isolated mountain area to photograph some peaks. Though not before he picks up a new girl (Patty Shepard) and photographs her topless! Throughout their journey, all kind of strange events occur that – you guessed it – are never explained. The girl wakes up in the middle of the forest, loud petrifying music plays everywhere and someone even steals the jeep! Really, car jacking witches? Apparently a coven of silent witches owns the mountains and they practice voodoo on trespassers. That's as close as I get describing the plot, but there's a good chance I'm way off… More important here is the atmosphere! "The Witches' Mountain" is occasionally very creepy, with its spooky music and interesting cinematography. The supportive characters all look uncanny and the ravishing Patty Shepard plays a good heroine. This is the type of European horror film that could have been legendary, if only someone had bothered to write a structured screenplay.

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6b1033da-8158-4aa3-b5d6-923e2551a646

Saying this movie is extremely hard to follow and just as frustrating to sit through is putting it very mildly. Also saying that the current available print is dark, dreary, scratchy, abysmally edited, painfully dubbed, seemingly censored and in almost unwatchable shape is also correct. This film is in dire need of a good remastering from the full, uncut, original negative and seeing how it's reasonably atmospheric (and won the director an award at the Catalonia Film Festival), it might actually be worth the trouble. Then again, maybe not... It's just impossible to tell in its current condition what kind of movie it actually is. It starts fairly interesting, if you can discount the completely senseless pre-credits opening sequence, which involves a deranged cat-killing, snake-loving little girl named Gerda. The girls mom, Carla (Mónica Randall, who should have laid off the eyeliner a little bit), splashes some gasoline around in the garage and torches the brat. Seemingly about as crazy as young Gerda, she goes to visit her estranged photographer (ex?) boyfriend Mario ("John"/Cihangir Caffari). He's on vacation from work, but so desperate to get away from Carla that he begs his employers to set him up on an assignment... any assignment. She scowls "You'll be sorry!" as he heads out the door. Well, Mario is assigned to photograph "Witches Mountain" (somewhere in the Pyrenees, I believe). Before he gets to his destination, he gets sight of a hottie on the beach named Delia (Patty Shepard) and snaps a few pictures of her taking off her bikini top. Only slightly peeved, she claims to be a single writer, the two flirt and then decide it would be a swell idea if they went on the trip up the mountain together. When they stop by her place so she can pack her bags, Mario suddenly hears loud, sinister music. Delia claims he's just hearing things.<br /><br />So the two begin their trip up the mountain, taking a stop at a local inn to spend the night. There they encounter a weird, partially-deaf, crazy-eyed innkeeper (Victor Israel) and Delia claims someone was spying on here through her window. The next day, under some trance, she wanders off up the mountain and is eventually located by Mario, who hops out of his jeep and runs after her. While he's finding out what's up, someone steals their wheels and they're forced to walk a piece, eventually finding the jeep undamaged at the foot of a small, ancient, seeming abandoned village... almost like someone was trying to intentionally lure them there. Well as we will see, that's exactly what has happened. In the village they encounter a friendly old woman named Zanta (Ana Farra) who claims she's the only person still living there and lets them stay in her home. Mario takes some pictures of the "abandoned" city and when he develops them they are eerily full of people. Slightly creeped out, he and Delia begin to leave and get stuck in "treacherous" fog and have to pull over and camp out for the night. The rest of the movie has to do with voodoo dolls, black cats transforming into sexy women, Satanic rituals performed by ladies in their bras and a deadly fall off a cliff. And yeah, coincidentally Carla the estranged wife turns out to be one of the witches, too. It all takes place in semi-darkness and to be quite honest, I didn't know what the hell was going on most of the time. The inconclusive "open" ending is just an additional slap in the face to anyone having to suffer through the rest of this senseless mess.<br /><br />Honestly, there are just a few things that stand out to me as being really good. The first is actress Shepard, who has that great Barbara Steele kind of dark, mysterious beauty. There's also an excellent music score (credited to Fernando Garcia Morcillo) and chanting songs, which aided immensely in making this film as atmospheric as it is. The location work is fairly decent, but as I said, the print is ugly as can be and it doesn't make a lick of sense, so proceed with caution on this one.

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eb02e8ca-9fc4-40fc-95e7-24346eeec97c

This was a fairly creepy movie; I found the music to be effective for this. The photographs Mario took of the village were also unnerving. However, I had three problems with this film. One is that the lighting was very dark so some of the time it was hard to tell what was going on, but this may have just been my copy. The second is that the very beginning is not explained very well and I'm still not sure what was going on there. The third problem is that I didn't understand the ending, but apparently some people do. Of course there are also the usual problems of people doing stupid things, and the male lead is very 70s. All in all, watchable but not even close to being a favorite.

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d2370c1e-43c0-475b-9836-c83a8eadeaea

Highly implausible, unbelievable, and incoherent Spanish production about...well, let me see just how close I can get to it. The film opens with a woman having one of her cat's killed by a young girl. She then begs her lover to take her somewhere on his vacation. He calls work and demands that he loses his vacation time and she says he will pay for this. What relevance this plays out to is anybody's guess at the film's end, because the guy, a swarthy photographer, spies a beautiful Patty Shepard, queen of Spanish horror films it seems, taking her bikini top off momentarily so he can snap a picture, ask her out to lunch, and then to his assignment to Witches Mountain - for reasons again we are never privy to. Before they go, Patty must stop by the house and loud, "eerie" chanting echoes in our hero's ears. Again, this is never explained. The film goes on with these two stopping at an inn, going on to the mountain, and finally realizing why the mountain is called Witches Mountain. You know, there are several aspects to this film which make it better than a bad film. It has some atmosphere, some of the character actors are really quite good(especially the deaf innkeeper and the old woman), the leads are at least adequate, and the climax - though it makes absolutely no sense at all - is well-choreographed(literally) with the witches in white brassieres and long black hair. It just doesn't make any sense though, and that is a huge detractor to me. I could watch the film another ten times and still not know more now than I did after the first viewing. That is a major problem. The Witches Mountain is a curious film from the long line of cheap, atmospheric European horror films that blanketed that decade. If you can get more out of it than me, better power to you.

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b47473f7-f2e0-40b1-a8f7-5ed534276e58

I couldn't make sense of this film much of the time, and neither could anyone else, based on other reviews. The opening scene of this film has virtually nothing to do with the rest of the story. In it, a photojournalist with a big mustache cancels his vacation to get away from his girlfriend. He is assigned to photograph a mountain range. It's rumored to be haunted, but I couldn't tell whether he heard that from his boss or later in the film. On his way, he meets a beautiful writer (Patty Shepard) and convinces her to join him on his working trip. Throughout the film, there is this terrible music score, mostly consisting of noisy singing that makes you want to scream "SHUT UP ALREADY!!!" What really will gall a person is that the film always seems like it's about to become good, though it never does. There is beautiful mountain scenery and some genuinely creepy atmosphere. The inn and the silent, abandoned old buildings scattered on the mountain are rather ominous. The foggy nights look real, not like someone put an artificial fog machine on the set. And the idea, while not original, had potential. But it never does improve, at least not enough to be worthwhile. Here's how it goes, more or less. They stop at this inn run by a weird innkeeper (you expect him to be named Igor) with a hearing problem. There is a scene where the writer thinks a peeping tom is in her window, but the scene is so dark, I had no idea what was going on. Whether this was poor lighting or a poor film transfer is unknown to me. In any event, we never find out know what happened. There is a scene where she wanders off during the night. Whether she is sleepwalking or mesmerized by the witches of the title is never explained. Another scene which is never explained is when their car is stolen, then found again, with nothing stolen. They wind up in this apparently abandoned mountain village whose sole inhabitant is this seemingly kindly old woman. There are other things, including a chained wild man in a cave who is never explained, an attempt to sacrifice the writer in some way (will they kill her or brainwash her into joining them?), the witches themselves, a bunch of brunette women in white robes who don't show up until the last 15 minutes of the film and whose practices and beliefs are never explained. Even the closing scene doesn't make any sense. When all is said and done, most people will be saying, "Huh?"

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2e52b9b9-7cc0-42c7-9371-ab5198dbad9a

I was never quite sure where this thing was going. These people seem interested in what is going on on some mountain. They investigate, have narrow escapes, leave, come back, leave, put each other in danger, sleepwalk, get attacked by witches who have consistent wardrobes, etc., etc. The guy seems to like the girl, but leaves her unprotected numerous times. She gets taken off, he gets her back, leaves her again. You get the point. The whole thing seems to get around to some sort of sacrifice, I think, but I'm not sure, or turning people into witches, but I'm not sure. It's just dull and endless and not worth the time. There are some atmospheric scenes, but the print is so bad that there times when twenty seconds of blackness is not unusual. Is this caused by age or the overuse of night filters.

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6bfa3e3c-41c0-42e5-89f1-aca4498df113

I admit, I had to fast forward through this poorly transferred DVD after about 30 minutes -- NOTHING was happening, and everyone has already described the "plot." But has anyone mentioned the opening scene -- a butcher knife is stabbed through a wig and it's impaled on the grass in the front yard! I'm guessing the bratty kid did it, put it's never explained. Really trippy opening.<br /><br />I wish this had been a better written or thought out film, because what we're left with if pretty daft and a movie that makes no sense isn't a "clever" movie, it's just a poorly executed film.<br /><br />I would like to see a cleaned up version and if there was any missing footage, I would like to see if it would help. Otherwise, this is an odd little film that is best if fast-forwarded through!

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bc4b6934-d33a-4ce6-9e00-fbbd41e12cc9

I am working my way through the Chilling Classics 50 Movie Pack Collection and THE WITCHES' MOUNTAIN (El Monte de las brujas)is something like the 17th movie in the set.<br /><br />The movie had nothing to it to hold my attention at all. The plot was incoherent. The dialog seemed improvised. The acting was poor. The characters were unsympathetic.<br /><br />The best scene is the beginning, with an exasperated woman that is driven to burning her seemingly bratty daughter. However, the only connection this scene has to the rest of the movie, is the lead character, Mario, who has the most stupendous mustache ever. But, that's it.<br /><br />The film was not effective on any level. The music was too intrusive. The lighting was very dark, so that some scenes are almost completely black. It really is barely watchable -- what more can I say?

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fb555c7d-4bb9-4d6e-a5ca-d48c49c0b26f

Welcome to movie 17 on the chilling classics 50 pack. Where we'll see, That's right. Another movie that makes absolutely no sense. Seriously, this movie had me so confused at the end, i thought i was rewatching "At Dawn they Sleep." The plot seems simple enough....well that is until 3 seconds into the movie where a girl supposedly killed a cat and then...um.. explodes? i have no idea what happened. and that was BEFORE THE TITLE SCREEN. That's really sad when i can't even tell what happened in the first 3 minutes.<br /><br />Anyway it stars a photographer with a big mustache who finds this girl after dumping his other girlfriend on the way to take pictures of something somewhere. so we get there but not before somebody steals their jeep to drive it 200 feet out of the way towards a town. suspicious? nah. so they decide to stay at this deserted village with one old lady. and then blah blah stuff happens and blah blah talking. The guy with the mustache goes out in the fog for some reason even though the old lady tells him not to. He gets lost and then finds his way back.<br /><br />Oh, i forgot to mention this is all after an incredibly pointless 20 minutes of them staying in the house of a guy who looks like that buggy eyed guy from casablanca. Then they leave. There's really no point to this scene. It's really just padding. if you cut it out no one would have noticed or cared.<br /><br />But sadly, that was actually the best part of the movie. wait. let me rephrase that. REALLY sadly that was the best part of the movie. because the rest is so confusing that i had to look on IMDb to find out what happened. But of course no one else knows so i'm SOL. <br /><br />Seriously, the last 30 minutes of the movie were some of the most mindscrewing moments i've ever seen on film. They dressed her up in a dress, he gets kidnapped, then released, he runs back to the house, then at the end the witches are in the house and it ends? seriously. i have hardly ever been so confused in a movie. i mean, as bad as movies such as "War of the Robots" are, at least they MAKE SENSE. this movie doesn't even make the ATTEMPT to be coherent. the ending was as confusing as the end of "At dawn they sleep" and the plot was much more boring. This movie gets a 1 just for its sheer "i have no idea what happened in this movie"ness. "Witches mountain" gets 1 confused movie watcher out of 10.

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035d1629-aab3-4bae-8151-3f35af1327ce

As someone else mentioned, it begins with a bizarre prologue about a little blond girl killing a cat. Then the main story: a photographer (Gaffari) and a writer (Shepard) meet by chance and take a trip into the mountains. First they spend the night at an inn where the slightly deaf landlord gets hollered at, with increasing irritation to the audience, by Gaffari. Once in the mountains they seek shelter again and are invited in by a kindly old lady who seems overly hospitable to strangers (Hansel and Gretel, anyone?) What happens next I will leave for the bold viewer to sort out because I most assuredly couldn't. Now, I like Eurohorror, and this woulda been better if only Artigot (writer AND director) had made some attempt at logical story telling. The backdrop (Pyrenees?) makes an excellent and intriguing location for mysterious and occult occurrences. The verdant peaks could easily obscure supernatural forces and those who command them. The photography is nice. Just wish the whole thing made sense. You can view this film at archive.org.

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9c7ed45d-ed8d-4df1-a51f-ef15a17d5fc4

This engaging (which it shouldn't be) low-grade Spanish exploitation (quite tame I might add) looks good, but huh? Let me phrase that again 'huh?'. Actually the word 'huh?' would be going through your mind quite a lot. Nothing makes sense, nor does it try too. I just don't know if its complicatedly cryptic or just a convoluted muddle, but there's no denying how laconically uneventful, strange and wordy it feels.<br /><br />Unrelated sequences tied (like that nasty opening involving a little girl, dead cat and fire) in to a sparse story involving photographer Mario (played by a chest-puffing John Caffari, who's mustache is a dead ringer for Nintendo's iconic Mario. What's the odds?) that ditches his girlfriend at home and encounters a young lady (a gorgeously fixating Patty Shepard) who he asks to come with him on an photography assignment, where at this remote mountain retreat they come across some hooded witches.<br /><br />Look past the unhinged plot structure and wallow in what is simply a moody piece of atmospheric mechanisms and growing unease. Raul Artigot directs few jarringly unusual visuals and creepy passages, but for most part seems sporadically non-existent and unfocused just like his writing. Ramon Sempere's striking cinematography lenses the gracefully rich scenery as we take in the scenic views and let the time leisurely grind away. However there are certain areas where it was too dark to see what was going on. Fernando Garcia Morcillo's hauntingly bombastic and overwrought score blends terrifically with compulsively dense atmosphere created. The leads are capable, but there's also a sturdy bunch (the pick being Víctor Israel) of secondary performances.<br /><br />Slow with little in the way of interest, but this dreamy set-up (that seems to go on and on) manages to keep you watching until its closing.

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890ba784-e7e2-44dd-8578-37593f1352c4

This movie got off to an interesting start. Down the road however, the story gets convoluted with a poor illustration of ancient black magic rituals. The male lead was very good , even though he gets the worst end of the stick in the climax. In comparison, this is "Boomerang" meets "Extremities".<br /><br />

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01e17b6f-c082-495f-837a-710fe2cb6b8d

This movie got off to an interesting start. Down the road however, the story gets convoluted with a poor illustration of ancient black magic rituals. The male lead was very good , even though he gets the worst end of the stick in the climax. In comparison, this is "Boomerang" meets "Extremities".

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eafdad27-cd20-4d1e-ac66-de8ba30843a1

This is a typical Steele novel production in that two people who have undergone some sort of tragedy manage to get together despite the odds. I wouldn't call this a spoiler because anyone who has read a Steele novel knows how they ALL end. If you don't want to know much about the plot, don't keep reading.<br /><br />Gilbert's character, Ophelia, is a woman of French decent who has lost her husband and son in an accident. Gilbert needs to stop doing films where she is required to have an accent because she, otherwise a good actress, cannot realistically pull off any kind of accent. Brad Johnson, also an excellent actor, is Matt, who is recovering from a rather nasty divorce. He is gentle, convincing and compelling in this role.<br /><br />The two meet on the beach through her daughter, Pip, and initially, Ophelia accuses Matt of being a child molester just because he talked art with the kid. All of them become friends after this episode and then the couple falls in love.<br /><br />The chemistry between the two leads is not great, even though the talent of these two people is not, in my opinion, a question. They did the best they could with a predictable plot and a script that borders on stereotypical. Two people meet, tragedy, bigger tragedy, a secret is revealed, another tragedy, and then they get together. I wish there was more to it than that, but there it is in a nutshell.<br /><br />I wanted mindless entertainment, and I got it with this. In regard to the genre of romantic films, this one fails to be memorable. "A Secret Affair" with Janine Turner is far superior (not a Steele book), as are some of Steele's earlier books turned into film.

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As I said, the book was pretty good and this might have been a good movie if Melissa Gilbert hadn't been so horrible and unbelievable in the lead roll. What kind of accent was that suppose to be anyway? It sounded the same as her horrible Russian accent in another movie that I have seen her in. Every time she opened her mouth I cringed. It took 3 tries before I was able to watch the entire movie. Brad Johnson was good as the other lead. <br /><br />I really liked the beach location scenes. They added some much needed brightness to take your mind off of Melissa Gilberts depressing portrayal. I think they could have used San Francisco views more to their advantage though. It looked like the night scenes were actually SF, but I could be wrong. I don't recall the character in the book being this depressing. <br /><br />Please keep Melissa Gilbert out of any future movies that require an accent!

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2fcf64b4-4eab-4b83-970a-de0098055664

Like all the Taviani Brothers films, this one looks great, but it is rotten to the core with false romanticism, and coincidences heap upon each other in some facsimile of a "story". In actuality, this is really just a sentimentally cheap tear jerker posing as an intellectually distinguished art film.

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10ea60b5-36ae-47bd-a942-b58d9d258efa

Even by 1942 standards of movie-making the setup which HER CARDBOARD LOVER presents was dated to the extreme. The machinations of one half of a pair (of husband/wife, ex-husband/ex-wife) to get the other back at the threat of marriage to another, divorce, or an eventual separation by means of jealousy, humiliation, or other schemes had been done much better in classics such as HIS GIRL Friday and THE PHILADELPHIA STORY. Both of these movies features women with a strong, indomitable screen presence and who played independent, proto-feminist characters. In both movies, both women were estranged/divorced from their (witty) first husbands and set to marry colorless men who were their exact opposite, and both would be bamboozled into rejecting their soon-to-be husbands and re-igniting their passion for each other.<br /><br />The plot in HER CARDBOARD LOVER switches the gender: here, it's Norma Shearer in the Cary Grant role out, this time, to ward off an ex-boyfriend (George Sanders) by means of hiring Robert Taylor to pose as her gigolo. The problem is, Shearer is much too old to be playing a role more suited to an actress in her mid-to-late twenties; Sanders is about as involved as a piece of furniture for the most -- any man who would be in love with his fiancée, on seeing a strange man come out of her bathroom as happens here, would knock the lights out of him and cause a huge scene. Not here. And Robert Taylor plays his part as if he were trying to channel Cary Grant half the time, not in speech inflections but in overall essence.<br /><br />But the worst part of it is Shearer herself. For an actress used to parts which gave her a sense of intellectual sexiness and dramatic presence, playing Consuelo Craydon seems to put her into throes of complete over-acting, over-emoting, and over-gesturing which, while still a part of her style of acting and more appropriate ten years earlier, makes her look like an extremely mannered performer wrenching the joke out of a situation like water from a fairly dry sponge. It only fuels the fires that tell the theory which gives Irving Thalberg the maker of her career and chooser of (most of her) roles; why she passed on roles such as Charlotte Vale and Mrs. Miniver on mega-hits NOW VOYAGER and MRS. MINIVER is a mystery, but then again, most accounts also state that by this time she had just burnt out from acting, that she'd had lost interest in the whole thing altogether and it's no secret that anyone who has experienced this sort of thing has essentially lost focus and can't wait until retirement or the end of a contract is near to leave as soon as possible. Such could be the case here. She seems lost, she seems tired, she seems ill at ease, going through autopilot instead of living the part. After this film she would make no more, but would be responsible of discovering Janet Leigh who would come into her own as a screen star during the late 40s and into the 60s.

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Songwriter Robert Taylor (as Terry) is "dizzy, slap-happy" and can't see straight over otherworldly Norma Shearer (as Consuelo). "She makes the sun shine, even when it's raining," Mr. Taylor explains. But, Mr. Taylor gets a lump in his throat whenever he gets near Ms. Shearer. Finally, at the Palm Beach casino Shearer frequents, Taylor proclaims "I love you!" Shearer brushes him off, as she is engaged to George Sanders (as Tony). However, to settle a gambling debt, Shearer hires Taylor to pose as "Her Cardboard Lover", to make Mr. Sanders jealous.<br /><br />This film's title invites the obvious and appropriate three-word review: "Her Cardboard Movie". It is most notable as the last film appearance for Shearer, one of the biggest stars in the world from "He Who Gets Slapped" (1924, playing another Consuelo) to "The Women" (1939). To be fair, this was likely the kind of Shearer film MGM believed audiences wanted to see. However, the part is unflattering.<br /><br />Plucked and powered, Taylor and Shearer were better off in "The Escape" (1940). If Shearer had continued, she might have become a better actress than "leading lady"; apparently, she was no longer interested, and certainly didn't need the money. Taylor has a great scene, reciting Christina Rossetti's "When I am Dead, My Dearest" while threatening to jump from Shearer's balcony, as directed by George Cukor.<br /><br />**** Her Cardboard Lover (6/42) George Cukor ~ Norma Shearer, Robert Taylor, George Sanders

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3335ae89-bf93-4d33-b58e-1d9ff3761b06

In this forgettable trifle, the 40-ish Norma Shearer plays a fluttery, girlish socialite in Monte Carlo, caught in a tussle between George Sanders and Robert Taylor. It would be tempting to blame this movie's failure on the dull, talky script, or director George Cukor, who never seems interested in livening up the film's generally comatose state. Mostly, though, it's the fault of Shearer herself, who desperately wanted to keep playing "young" parts as long as she could get away with it. Inadvertently, this makes "Her Cardboard Lover" a bizarre monument to an aging woman's vanity.

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"Her Cardboard Lover" is Norma Shearer's last movie. She quit the movies and, I think, joined the Board of Directors at MGM. That was a good move on her part. "Her Cardboard Lover" was talky and boring in parts. It was obvious there were only a handful of actors with speaking parts so they had a lot of dialogue to speak to keep this turkey afloat. <br /><br />The story was a good idea about a wealthy woman (Norma Shearer) hiring a man (Robert Taylor) to make her playboy fiancee (George Sanders)jealous. I am surprised that the director, George Cukor, did not cut many of the talky scenes between Ms. Shearer and Mr. Taylor. Mr. Cukor served Ms. Shearer well in "The Women" but not in this movie. <br /><br />The best performance in the movie was given by Robert Taylor. During Mr. Taylor's career, he was given his best comedy roles in this movie and "When Ladies Meet" in 1941. In 1942, he gave his best comedy performance in "Her Cardboard Lover" and, up to then, his best dramatic performance in "Johnny Eager." He had a busy year. I think of all the actors at MGM, Mr. Taylor worked with all the major and minor actresses on the lot. Also, MGM gave Mr. Taylor all types of movies to make - most of them were successful. That is why MGM kept him for 25 years. <br /><br />Mr. George Sanders was very good as a socialite heel. He played a similar role eight years later in "All About Eve" for which he won an Oscar for a supporting role. As for Ms. Shearer, this was one of her worst performances, she was not funny and too dramatic for this comedy. It is strange that she made a great comedy in 1939, "The Women", and gave her best performance. It was obvious that she was too old looking for her younger leading men in "Her Cardboard Lover." Also, it didn't help that some of her clothes were awful.<br /><br />Too bad she and Mr. Taylor did not make another dramatic movie like their last movie together, the superb "Escape". The same comments about this movie can be said of another movie, "Personal Property" that Mr. Taylor made in 1937 with Jean Harlow. It was too talky, boring, and the actress looked old. Ms. Harlow looked ill throughout the movie and nobody in Hollywood noticed to tell her to see a doctor, so in 1937, she died at age 26. What a waste! She was becoming a good actress and getting better roles.

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What boob at MGM thought it would be a good idea to place the studly Clark Gable in the role of a Salvation Army worker?? Ironically enough, another handsome future star, Cary Grant, also played a Salvation Army guy just two years later in the highly overrated SHE DONE HIM WRONG. I guess in hindsight it's pretty easy to see the folly of these roles, but I still wonder WHO thought that Salvation Army guys are "HOT" and who could look at these dashing men and see them as realistic representations of the parts they played. A long time ago, I used to work for a sister organization of the Salvation Army (the Volunteers of America) and I NEVER saw any studly guys working there (and that includes me, unfortunately). Maybe I should have gotten a job with the Salvation Army instead!<br /><br />So, for the extremely curious, this is a good film to look out for, but for everyone else, it's poor writing, sloppy dialog and annoying moralizing make for a very slow film.

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6356d10e-c07f-430b-865d-6411c9ad0b67

What's written on the poster is: "At birth he was given 6 years to live... At 34 he takes the journey of a lifetime." Ami is an American-born Israeli who was diagnosed with Muscular Dystrophy disease at the age of one. At age of 34, after the love toward his 22 years old care-giver didn't go well, he decided to come to the US to face the doctor who said that he would have only 6 years to live. He wanted to show the doctor that he is still alive, and weights 39 pounds. Why? Your guess is as good as mine, even I have seen this film.<br /><br />Obviously it's courageous to live when all he can move is his left index finger, but why does he have so much anger toward the doctor who diagnosed his disease 34 years ago? His doctor just told his mom that based on the medical history, people with his disease won't live long. What's the point of him showing up at old doctor's door for? Why is tracking down this old doctor in the US is a journey of his lifetime? There are so many things we might be interested in Ami's life: how can he make those animations with the movement of only one finger? How can he go through daily lives while totally depending on others? How did he out lived his doctor's prediction? How does he deal emotionally when other people look at him like looking at a strange creature? The movie told us none of that. Instead, the filmmaker got a van and set up a trip to let Ami to show up at his old doctor's door in order to show him that he is still alive. I thought it was a joke.

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There are three movies with this animation style that I fondly remember from my youth. This movie, "The Last Unicorn," "Flight of Dragons" and "The Hobbit." I own copies of both "Dragons" and "The Hobbit" (both excellent) and I hadn't seen "The Last Unicorn" in more than a decade. That was until today and now I wish I hadn't. What bothered me the most was the script. It was incredibly choppy and often inane. Things would happen for no reason and other things would happen without explanation. We're not just talking about little things here either; we're talking about key plot points! The story itself isn't that great to begin with, but it could have worked had the script been decent. Not even close. On top of that the music was awful! I know that music in movies such as these rarely have what one would call classic pieces, but the music in this movie made me want to knock myself unconscious with a bowling ball. This was one of those films that I was going to show to my kids some day, but it just got cut. I don't think I could ever sit through that crap fest again. Disappointed is putting it mildly.

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I loved "The Curse of Frankenstein" so much that I rushed out to get "Frankenstein Must Be Destroyed" to see Cushing at it again...even if it was without Chistopher Lee this time. To my great disappointment, this movie not only does without Lee, but it does without Frankenstein's Monster altogether! Was it a case of "If we can't get Lee, we won't have a monster at all"? Why would they do that? The monster is half the fun of the whole thing!! This film is dedicated solely to the study of Baron Frankenstein and his quest to finish experiments he had begun in brain transplants before ending up in an asylum. I found the script extremely weak, with the need to suspend disbelief forced upon the audience a little too much. I'm willing to suspend a fair amount, but this movie got fairly ridiculous, which took me out of the film rather than immersing me in it.<br /><br />Peter Cushing, though, is absolutely brilliant playing pure evil in this film. For being one of the most beloved actors and notoriously sweet men, he sure could play menacing and malevolent extremely well. The supporting cast is competent, but has little to do, even the young doctor and his fiancée blackmailed into helping Frankenstein. A bumbling police chief is introduced, along with his put-upon sidekick, to generate some comic relief, then they are completely dropped from the movie! Why? We are led to believe that the police chief will be the main nemesis of the Baron, then we are led to believe it will be the young doctor, and then it ends up being the victim of Frankenstein's brain transplant experiment. There was no tension, we weren't invested in the "creature", and the ending was left so ambiguous as to leave one unsatisfied because it is so clear they are setting up another sequel.<br /><br />Also, there are virtually no "horror" elements. Yes, there is a beheading in the beginning (off-camera), and we are treated to the sounds of Cushing cutting the tops of two men's skulls off (again, off camera), and there is the most unsettling and thoroughly unnecessary rape scene (90% of which is, again, off-camera). I understand that there is a love of "letting the audience imagine it all, for their imaginations are far worse than what we can show", but come on, if you're not going to give us a Monster, then at least let us SEE the few "horrific" elements you do choose to include. Showing us a skeleton in the lab lit with a green light is just not scary.<br /><br />On top of a weak script, I thought the directing was mostly flat. There were a couple of nice shots, but otherwise no excitement, atmosphere, or suspense was generated. The same director did "Curse" back in 1958 and I thought it was brilliantly directed...guess he was as uninspired by this film as I was.<br /><br />The movie gets a 4 out of 10 from me strictly for Peter Cushing's powerful, nuanced performance...beyond that, I found little in this movie worth recommending. Instead, my suggestion is to watch "The Curse of Frankenstein" and see a truly great Hammer horror film.

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Oh, man! This thing scared the heck out of me when I first watched it... and I was SIXTEEN!!!<br /><br />That creepy animated Barbie is scary as hell! I want to stop talking about her now.

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aad73ad4-1e03-41e1-99cf-c7bfa4eeb228

It is a Frank Zappa axiom that "music journalism is people who can't write interviewing people who can't talk for people who can't read." If you ever needed proof that musicians can't talk, this is the film for you. Repeated attempts at profundity stumble over themselves to end up in monosyllabic comments delivered in awestruck voices: "Wow." (Thank you, Idris Muhammed.) This film is pretentious but, while much of the pontificating from Youssou N'Dour and his gang of merry men (and one token woman) grates, the music saves the day.<br /><br />The main idea behind the film (what I take to be the main idea, dredged out of the inarticulate commentary) is interesting. To gather a group of musicians from America and Europe and take them on a journey through the different styles of music that grew up in and out of slavery, back to their roots in the music of West Africa, and a concert in the old slave fort of Gorée off the coast of Senegal. We are treated to gospel, blues, jazz and variations of these, including some fantastic drumming both in New Orleans and Senegal. There's also a good deal of N'Dour's own compositions.<br /><br />Sadly, that's another weakness. It's never entirely clear what N'Dour himself wants to achieve. To some degree, the film appears to be an exercise in self-promotion on N'Dour's part. He wants to play his own music, jazzed up to some degree and performed in the company of a bunch of musicians he admires. He's clearly a little embarrassed by this and early in the film obtains the blessings of the Curator of the Gorée museum.<br /><br />The clash between the different agendas shows through in several other places. For example, somebody obviously felt that it was not possible to tell the story of black music without involving a gospel choir, but N'Dour and most of his mates are Moslems (a point made repeatedly throughout the film). The whole early sequence involving the black Christians is uncomfortable and then they disappear from the story until the close harmony group (the only black Christians who can hold a tone?) turn up in Dakar at the end of the film. (To be fair, they turn up triumphantly and perform the best piece in the film.) If the story of black music needs to nod in the direction of gospel, why not also in the direction of Latin America? Where are the black musical influences from the Caribbean and Brazil? Samba? Reggae? Then there's Europe. Here the black diaspora doesn't seem to have produced any musicians of calibre, since N'Dour chooses to draft in Austrian guitarist and a trumpet player from Luxemburg. Are they in the team just because N'Dour has played with him before? What I personally found most irritating, though, was the long sequence which tried to recreate a kind of 60s beatnik/black power/Nation of Islam cultural happening in the New York home of Amir Baraka (a.k.a. Leroi Jones). Hearing people talk about the importance of "knowing your history", and then in the next breath perpetuating ignorance. Why do so many African-Americans believe that taking an Arabic name is an assertion of their African roots? And why do they think Arabic Islam is so much more admirable than European Christianity? Who do they think established the trade in African slaves in the first place? The film doesn't have much to say about the situation in West Africa today beyond the platitude that "present conditions" are a consequence of all the brightest and best having been shipped away for 300 years. The Senegalese appear to be a poor but happy, musical gifted folk, friendly and welcoming, respectful of their elders (and not above fleecing the visiting Americans in the fish market). Is this ethnic stereotyping or just my imagination? There is no comment on the armed guard that N'Dour and the camera crew seem to need in the opening sequence as they walk through the streets of Dakar.<br /><br />There is also a strong implication in the film that the slaves who were taken from Dakar came from Dakar. The similarity between the folk drumming style of New Orleans and the folk drumming style of Senegal is cited in evidence. The last thing the slaves heard before they were shipped away was the drumming of their homeland, bidding them farewell. Except, of course, that by and large, the slaves shipped from Dakar did not come from Dakar. They were captured or traded from the interior by the coastal Senegalese and sold to merchants of whichever European power currently held the Gorée slave fort. The people of Dakar are not the descendents of Africans who escaped the slave trade, they are just as likely – more likely – to be descendents of the people who sold their black brethren into slavery and exile.<br /><br />The two agenda's clash again in the final part of the film. There are two separate endings. On the one hand, the concert which N'Dour and Co have been rehearsing and preparing along the way and which they deliver in the courtyard of the Gorée slave fort. The other end comes when the Harmony Harmoneers sing the spiritual "Return to Glory", in the seaward doorway of the slave fort. This is deeply moving, even if it is hard to believe the performance is quite as spontaneous as it appears.<br /><br />This is a film that is flawed. Unclear of the story it is trying to tell and tugged in different directions. Irritating, confusing, beautiful and emotional by turns. Watch it (listen to it) for the music and the feeling, but don't expect enlightenment or intellectual rigour.

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