Anglik Reviews

Digital (2005)

A fantastic image montage of modern-day alienation

[10/10 · 10 January 2008]

I came across this film accidentally, as it was broadcast as a "filler shortie" in between longer features on French PLANETE TV channel, and was glad to have seen it a couple more times since. It's a chillingly accurate, even if a bit depressing, montage of shots of a generic modern city, presented as an environment devoid of human emotion and preventing any individualism. The film's apparent objectivity, driven by a matter-of-fact narration (which resembles a lecture of a future-day historian or a guide for an alien race) underlines how the concept of "digital" has been created to change the meaning of eating and loving habits, of everyday life and reality, of humans inhabiting the planet Earth. Reminiscent a bit of "Matrix", but only in its focus on alienation and desolation of the soul, it is scarily more relevant to our real lives today (especially with the recent advent of virtual reality worlds such as Second Life, etc.)

In what I presume to be a mockumentary fashion, the shortie is presented as "Key Concepts of the Modern World Series - Chapter 3", with another chapter mentioned as coming up. This only works to strengthen the chroniclary mood of the observation (as does the mentioning of Encyclopaedia Britannica at the start of the narration).

Strongly recommended. Don't miss it if you have a chance to see it.

Deadly Isolation (2005 TV Movie)

Sadly, a waste of everyone's time

[3/10 · 23 August 2007]

I have been a fan of Sherilyn Fenn since David Lynch's "Twin Peaks" (who hasn't?) and I've had a great deal of respect for Nicholas Lea because of his very decent work in "The X Files". Unfortunately, looks like time has not been merciful to either of the actors, and they are now being forced to pick up whatever lousy piece of script so-called screenwriters throw at them, not to mention directors who couldn't direct a tree to save their lives. It's a shame, really, because they do deserve better than this run-of-the-mill, "B" or "C" class made-for-TV pulp. The storyline is so thick you could cut it with a chainsaw. The dialogs are so pretentious that I seriously pity the actors who had to actually deliver them. The characters are puppets being jerked around on strings by some unknown force, their motivations having little to do with emotions, the laws of logic or the common sense.

It's hardly a good endorsement for a movie to say that I cared more about peeling dead skin off my heels than about how the film ended. Unfortunately, this happens to be the case with "Deadly Isolation". Use your time more wisely: go for a walk, or to sleep. At least you'll do something positive for your mind.

This film gets a star for each of my favorite actors, the third being a dog. (I thought of adding one for a gun, too, but that would be overgenerous.)

Mondo (1995)

The best adaptation ever... that isn't one

[10/10 · 20 August 2007]

Throughout this movie experience - which moved me to tears several times - I had an extraordinary feeling that I was watching an adaptation of "Le Petit Prince" ("The Little Prince") by Antoine de Saint-Exupéry. Even though the film is set in a different time and place, and its main characters and plot line are not really in sync with the story of a boy from another world, there is, at the same time, a strange affinity here with de Saint-Exupéry's timeless classic. As we watch the peculiar odyssey of a little Mondo - a boy with no home, no family, no past, no memory almost, and no real skill apart from smiling wide joyful grins and opening his heart to strangers - we have no other choice but to fall in love with this little homeless adventurer, this modern Gavroche, who seems almost mythical in the way he turns up in the midst of people's lives to touch them, move them, perhaps change them - for a couple of days, or forever.

Heartily recommended to all those who embrace cinema as a way of channeling emotions, rather than notions and philosophical ideas, through images. "Toujours beaucoup".

Timeline (2003)

Avoid at all cost

[1/10 · 1 July 2006]

I cannot believe this sorry excuse of a movie comes from the same director who gave us the Lethal Weapon series. The story is so ridiculous that it can only be rivaled by some of the most horrible acting I've seen, at the level of a high school panto. All other aspects considered, I think this is a serious contender for the worst film ever. Really, Mr Donner, have you seen ONE movie about time travel? Marty McFly would just roll his eyes at this. I can't for the life of me figure out what a couple of fair actors, like O'Connor, Connolly, Thewlis and Friel, are doing in this pile of crap.

Make room, Ed Wood, here comes Richard Donner. Anyone else: run for your lives!

Poison Ivy: The New Seduction (1997 Video)

Unbelievably Bad

[1/10 · 13 September 2002]

Incredible. One has to see this to believe it. It's amazing a thing of such low quality has made it past the editing room. What's even more incredible is the presence of a major star and sex goddess of nowadays, Jamie Pressly ("Jack & Jill" et al.) The redeeming factor: it was her first flick ever. Fortunately someone saw in her the potential this film does no justice to.

Blood and Wine (1996)

Depressed to the point of discomfort

[4/10 · 15 May 2000]

After watching "Blood and Wine" I had an almost physical urge to immediately put on something much more cheerful (like a new "Friends" episode). Hardly do I stumble upon a film so brutal and tasteless, in which the main characters come across only as people in various stages of moral disintegration, with whom the viewer is compelled to feel no attachment whatsoever. The "good guys" seem appealing only by virtue of committing the least disgusting wrongdoings. The characters' motivation is not to become better, but not to become worse than they already are, and redemption is nowhere in sight. One depressing, bleak piece of a movie, with little - if any - value. Nicholson presents a disappointing lack of class, Lopez puts off by her strong Cuban accent, and only Michael Caine seems to tower above the rest of the cast, in a role which is nevertheless a bad waste of his talents. In short: avoid if you can. (And for a really good caper flick - go see "The Thomas Crown Affair", any of the two versions, although I recommend the newer one.) (4/10)

My Best Fiend (1999)

Herzog and Kinski: a love-hate relationship

[10/10 · 4 October 1999]

This is probably one of the best documentaries I have ever seen about any actor - not because it is in-depth or complex (it isn't) but because it focuses on very strong personal feelings that Klaus Kinski evoked in his friend and sometime enemy, Werner Herzog, as well as in co-actors and crew he used to work with. Related from a director's point of view, this is as much a film about Kinski as it is about Herzog, and the peculiar love-hate relationship between these two major characters of modern German cinema is presented with a great deal of both nostalgia and (sometimes self-ironic) humour. Anyone who is captured by the charismatic presence of Kinski in Herzog's films will be thrilled to hear (and sometimes see) some first-hand accounts of what was happening off screen during the creation of such great pictures as "Fitzcarraldo", "Aguirre: The Wrath of God", "Woyzeck" or "Cobra Verde", including some absolutely incredible footage shot during Kinski's raving fits (possibly without his knowledge). Herzog, however, avoids cheap thrills of tabloid quality by concentrating on the technical aspects of working on the same set with one of the greatest megalomaniacs ever to grace the big screen, and manages to balance that rough director's treatment with several quite tender and fond memories - by himself as well as others. What emerges is a portrait of a man as psychologically complex as the characters he portrayed in Herzog's films. Overall, a must for any Herzog/Kinski fan, and a 10 out of 10, if only for the pieces of footage that seem to have emerged from that storage room seen at the end of "Raiders of the Lost Arc". Great stuff.