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Reviews
Dying to Tell the Story (1998)
"The Journey is the Destination"
A well done documentary that examines the motivation behind journalists in war zones. The film was made by Amy Eldon, who was the younger sister of Dan Eldon, a Reuters photographer killed during a Somalia riot in 1993 when he was 22 years old. In her attempt to understand what had happened to him and why he and countless other journalists take such risks, she travels back to Somalia to the place where her brother died.
A number of notable war journalists are interviewed, including Christine Amanpour, Corrine Dufka (who has twice been assigned to replace dead colleagues), and Peter Magubane (who was jailed and tortured for taking pictures during the height of the apartheid). From these interviews, one begins to understand the importance for such people in war zones, and why they continue to take the risks. The pictures they take and the stories they tell in this film are very sobering. When the movie was finished I sat breathless for a moment, and had to shake my head a bit to get myself focused. This is a very intense film that shows the reality of war and those who capture it on film.
I was drawn to this documentary after buying Dan Eldon's incredible book "The Journey is the Destination." After he was killed, a number of journals were found that he had kept ever since he was a child. I strongly recommend buying this book- its full of emotional and visually stunning collages. Its definitely one of my favorite books that is well worth the price. You can flip through it a million times and always get something new from it.
"Dying To Tell The Story" is certainly a worthwhile film. I'm not sure where its available (I think it was aired on t.v. a few years back or so) but I ordered mine from Amazon.com. If you can find it, its definitely worth watching.
The Insider (1999)
Unfortunate
This could have been a really terrific movie. The acting was amazing and the story was well written. Unfortunately Michael Mann's direction was awful. I'm not quite sure what happened, since he did such a good job with "Heat." In "The Insider" he constantly uses awkward focusing techniques and hand-held cameras- it's like watching "The Blair Witch Project" but worse because you're trying to follow a complex plot, but people's heads keep shifting in and out of focus, and the camera keeps zooming around in blurry close-ups, that I got dizzy every scene. The movie was too long at almost 3 hours, it could have easily had 30 minutes or so cut. The problem is I really liked this movie. I was looking forward to it, Mann's awkward direction and often out-of-place music cues detracted a lot from this film- I can only honestly give it ** out of **** stars. Its a real shame, this could have been an incredible movie. Pacino, Crowe, and especially Christopher Plummer were fantastic. Really unfortunate.
The Devil's Advocate (1997)
Thank God For Pacino
Alright, lets be reasonable here. The movie's not that bad, it's entertaining and fun to watch, but it's not a >great< film. As far as suspense and thrillers go nowadays, "Devil's Advocate" is pretty run-of-the-mill. While I think it's a great concept, the movie's hindered by a flashy script, overdone special fx, and too many stale cliches to keep me intrigued. However, it's probably worth watching just for Pacino's incredible monologue at the climax. . He saved this movie from being just another basic cookiecutter thriller that Hollywood is cranking out one after another. Thank God for Al, where would we be without him?