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fruchtman
Reviews
Spider-Man (2002)
Wait for it to come out on video.
First the good: Great effects, good fight scenes, fantastic acting, direction, and cinematography.
Now the bad: Formula, formula, formula. This movie was as designed and engineered as N-SYNC. The producers didn't even try to disguise their quest for money with an interesting plot.
And the ugly: The smarmy love-story. It made me want to wretch. How the actors kept straight faces while reciting some of the corniest and sappiest lines I've ever heard is worthy of an Academy Award. I haven't seen anything so maudlin since the Sammy Maudlin show.
The Groove Tube (1974)
Remember that it's almost 30 years old when you watch.
This movie predates SNL by a year. Does being first make you the best? No, obviously not. However, give credit where credit is due. Groove Tube was radical, obnoxious, annoying and hilarious in the 70s. If you're under 30, don't waste your time with this one. ***
American Beauty (1999)
I love this movie!
This movie is possibly the best movie of the 90s. I loved everything about it. The acting was spectacular, the cinematography was breath-taking, the plot was flawless. Testatment to the fact that you don't need to spend 100 million dollars on special effects to produce a great movie.
Renaissance Man (1994)
Poorly written disappointment of teacher vs.student & civilian vs. military angst.
Prior to this, I was unaware that two heavy hitters like Danny DeVito and Penny Marshall were capable of work of such a mediocre calibre. I am embarrassed for the both of them, and cannot help but wonder what went wrong here.
This movie tries to take the viewer in eight different directions, all at the same time, and ends up going absolutely nowhere. The only redeeming tidbit is the portrayal of the underused Gregory Hines as the Drill Sgt. whose only purpose is that of the screaming voice of discouragement, although Hines admirably rises beyond the poor writing and comes across as easier to like than the supposed hero (DeVito's Bill Rago).
I found it impossible to root for DeVito's character, even though he has my sympathies at the start as an unemployed but persistent former advertising executive who gets a temp job working as a teacher of a surly group of underachievers in the U.S. Army. But DeVito's portrayal
lost my sympathy when he arrogantly undermines the authority of Hines' Drill Sgt. by casually strolling along the parade deck in the middle of a reprimand on tardiness, and shouts out that Hines should "go easy on 'em" and "lighten up". Even someone with the IQ of an old Army boot and zero military background knows better than to mouth off while the Drill Sgt. is Drilling!
Among many, the biggest mystery about this film is why the (softer, gentler) U.S. Army suddenly decides to give a crap about 7 or 8 trainees who aren't achieving in their physical fitness/training efforts. But beyond this, what made them think that academic enlightenment from the unlikely source of DeVito's "Look-none-of-us-wants-to-be-here-so-let's-just-make-the-best-of-it-teacher" will cause the trainees to successfully negotiate the obstacle course!
They never explain why, in God's name, the Army figures that a civilian unemployment candidate whose only teaching credential is the fact that he has a Masters Degree from Princeton, is capable of educating these trainees, yet the Commanding Officer, in a scene where DeVito is sent to the military equivalent of the Principal's Office, insists that he will let nothing get in the way of this "program" -- but he doesn't say what the program is!
Since there is no curriculum, DeVito, who just happens to be reading Hamlet at the time, decides "Why not that?" For some weird reason, this former ad exec happens to be more insightful about Shakespeare than most English Literature scholars and in the ultimate "pearls before swine" effort, attempts to force-feed Hamlet to these supposedly hip, mostly minority, urban attitude, problem recruits.
We are then subjected to the standard fare of a recycled and somewhat modernized version of "Hamlet" which could be renamed, "Hamlet -- the Rap Musical" smacking of a poorly executed Gilligan's Island-esque variation except that when Gilligan's Island did it, it was mildly amusing and cleverly done (as part of a talent show, the castaways took "Hamlet" and musically adapted it to the music from the opera "Carmen"). For some weird reason, this former ad exec happens to be more insightful about Shakespeare
than most English Literature scholars and in the ultimate "pearls before swine" effort, attempts to force feed it Hamlet to these supposedly hip, mostly minority, urban attitude, problem recruits.
They allow only 1000 words here, or else I could cite a dozen such examples of bad writing, and enough plot holes that this movie makes swiss cheese seem water tight by comparison.