bikerc Reviews

Men in Black: International (2019)

Bland

[5/10 · 15 June 2019]

This move is afraid of its own shadow. It oozes fear. Fear of not upsetting a certain crowd easily offended by "toxic" masculinity. One of the main characters cannot be very manly, it has to brought down a few notches by assigning him characteristics that rendered him unreliable. They should have thrown in the belly as well.

As for SF imagination I give it 1/10 (to offer a banana for scale I consider Guardians of the Galaxy and Dr. Strange an 8 or more). There is nothing new that you haven't already seen. Ok, maybe one thing that has to do with a beard.

Overall, the movie is as bland as porridge. It doesn't have soul. It reminded me of Aquaman but I think Aquaman was better, and you get the idea.

Don Jon (2013)

Save your money...

[1/10 · 11 October 2013]

... unless you like to get bombarded with meaningless porn clips.

Before I went to the movie I checked rotten tomatoes. Critics 82%, audience 71%. It must be good, right, perhaps something like the 40 years old virgin... Wrong! It was awful. Whatever message it had it was lost between between the porn bits. The characters didn't have any depth, they were just stereotypical. The men were libidinous and disgusting, and they didn't have any preoccupation other than scoring women. OK, one guy liked to watch NFL in addition to being libidinous. The women were stereotypical as well, a mother that had to put up for decades with her lewd husband (whose house uniform was a wife-beater), Scarlet's character uneven and controlling (in her world her man becomes a puppet in exchange for being provided with an object of desire or love, and sex services), the sister who texted the whole movie, and, well, Juliane's character, artificial, ready to give advice and live sessions about the art of sex and love making to a stranger (yeah, like that happens a lot to other guys - I know, I am just envious).

A recurring theme was to take a poke at the catholic church. These days it seems fashionable to do it over the different channels, but for the life of me I am not too sure why the guy bothered to go to church. Or perhaps, they were making fun of the people going to church, being hypocrite and all. Well, it kind of got as tiring as the porn clips, the scenes with the guy making his bed or throwing napkins in the garbage bin after masturbation sessions.

If I were a woman, I would probably feel uncomfortable watching this movie, if I were a feminist I would probably bring my boom box to the theater.

Drive (I) (2011)

If I could travel back in time I would advise me not to see it

[1/10 · 1 October 2011]

Once again critics let me down. I went to this movie after checking out the rottentomatoes reviews, and at around 90+% I thought it's a must see. Well, I was wrong.

Pace - kind of slow, it picks up occasionally

Ryan - cool, intense (he's always playing intense characters or he's rather playing himself), doesn't speak much, but we can guess there something going on in his head and if he didn't care for Carey's character he could have easily been a psychopath in the league with the bad guys. Good driver though. And once again he loves the girl with same obstinacy that we've seen in the other of his movies.

Carey - here I am lost because I am not too sure what was her role besides being cute as a pie (or button) and the object of Ryan's character's affection. Pretty much she didn't have a clue of what's going on. But her face must trigger some deep need to protect feelings in the men around her.

Bad guys - One thing that struck me are Ron Perlman's teeth. They are very long! OK, it's irrelevant. Other than that, the usual, nothing new, they are unnecessarily violent (or belligerent how a character put it) , they don't listen to logic, they like to slash people with objects they care about (which they clean and keep in nice boxes).

Naked girls - yes, there is a scene full of breast enhanced girls that didn't seem to care a guy was about to get his head smashed with a hammer. But hey, we would expect too much from them. Right?

Music - I liked the music, I would give it a 9 or 10

Image - pretty nice in some cases.

To summarize - I didn't see anything new and unforgettable. I would save my money if I were you.

Chloe (2009)

Done watching movies made by Atom Egoyan

[1/10 · 20 June 2010]

There is something implausible and artificial about the main characters, with their sexual promiscuity and lack of any trace of moral backbone.

I am not saying that every one in the movie should be a saint, but the movie feels as if Atom has two bags.

First bag, contains the following concepts/ideas/patterns: sexual promiscuity, sexual craving, deep hidden lesbian tendencies, insecurity, desperate need to be loved, no financial worries, loyalty, nice house, lot of time time to kill, can bang any woman in sight, can bang any man in sight, be good at both, have or have not feelings when you do it, capable of love.

Second bag: woman gynecologist who spends most of her time inspecting other women's vaginas, university teacher, horny young guy, escort girl.

Atom probably closed his eyes and combined randomly items from the first bag with items from the second bag. And the result is this movie which feels like a soup made from the content of a pig's stomach.

As much as I wanted I could not identify with any of these characters. I found them and the universe in which they operated artificial and contrived.

Midsomer Murders: Last Year's Model (2006) Season 9, Episode 8

highly recommended!

[10/10 · 23 February 2008]

I consider this to be the best of Midsomer Murders, due to the psychological depth of the characters and to the excellent acting. The story was great, and there's only one murder!(unusual for Midsomer Murders). Consequently, there was no need for those preposterous explanations as to why a lovely old lady had to kill 3 or 4 times in order to protect her son or some such nonsense. Lately, I've been watching MM for the love of beautiful images only. But this episode is believable and dramatic - the way Midsomer Murders used to be.

Also, I enjoyed the great chemistry (and relationship of trust) between John Nettles and Siobhan Redmond(Dr. Plunkett), and the intimation of something that "might have been". Great insight into Barnaby's soul.A devoted husband, a doting father...but not only.

Ellie Parker (2005)

don't rent it, save your money

[1/10 · 27 April 2006]

As much as I like Naomi, I found extremely hard to follow this movie. It seemed to be filmed with a video camera you buy from your favorite electronics store and it followed Naomi's character relentlessly, with jerky movements, from all her endeavors to become an actress to more private moments such as being in the bathroom. I am not too sure if the director tried to give the movie an air of reality show, but the camera didn't give any space and the screen seemed to be suffocating. This movie looks like a movie made by a kid who just got his camera as a birthday present, takes the camera, strolls in the city and films anything that moves with the pretentious claim that it is worth. Well, after half an hour I couldn't stand it anymore.

So, save your money...

Occident (2002)

A realistic, bitter sweet rendition of what life in Romania is for young people without money and/or connections.

[10/10 · 6 October 2003]

A beautiful story about time, coincidences and happenstance. Three stories intertwine and characters influence one another's life without ever knowing it. Excellent and convincing performances from both veteran actors and newcomers. Even though it made me laugh a lot, after I finished watching it didn't taste like a comedy, but more like a sad love story. And even though love doesn't conquer all (love between man and woman, love between friends, love for one's country), the story doesn't feel hopeless and bleak, not even once. A must-see for anyone interested in Eastern European productions.

PS: The version I saw had English subtitles, but they were sometimes incomplete and a couple of times rather badly translated. I felt they didn't do their best to do justice to the lines.

She's the One (1996)

Enjoyable movie but it has a couple of flimsy situations

[6/10 · 8 August 2002]

*** Possible SPOILERS ***

Overall, I thought the movie was pretty good, I liked the acting, they all seem very natural with one exception, Ed Burns. I've seem him in "Sidewalks of New York" as well, and I can say the guy is the same in both movies (slightly better in this one though), the same bored expression ("I am the director, so what the heck, I can put this face all the time"), the same monotone voice (as if he's speaking all the time into a tape recorder), not a bit of "joie de vivre", very little or no passion, primitive development of emotions (his character's main problem was he couldn't get over seeing the hairy ass of his fiancee's lover, and from here all the afferent pain). I've always asked myself what would have happened if he dropped the TV he was carrying, or, if a brick hit him in the head. I am glad he didn't get sick though. Other than the fact that he's the director, I didn't see any reasons why, in both movies, the female characters fell for his character. He seemed to be good only at one thing... There is one scene when Cameron's characters says: "You're are the only English-speaking white guy driving a cab in New York". She's got a point here.

I liked Maxine's character. She seemed to be more real than the Ed's emotionally log like character. I liked when she says: "I would rather live in the back of this cab than let something like rent get in the way of our romance".

Also Jennifer Aniston and Cameron Diaz were great. So were the other actors.

One thing that seemed to me (very) implausible was Fran's condition. His abstinence towards his wife (Jennifer Aniston!!), plus the lame excuse served every night for months didn't convince me much. If the characters were normal the whole thing should have exploded after one week...

6/10

Committed (I) (2000)

funny and sincere

[10/10 · 21 May 2001]

Heather Graham is not just a pretty face,she is also an extremely talented actress. She adds a unique flavour to the movie. Overall,it's an intelligent and yet compassionate look at love,marriage and relationships.I thoroughly enjoyed it!

Asterix and Obelix vs. Caesar (1999)

excellent adaptation

[10/10 · 29 December 2000]

My only regret was that there were not more episodes!The characters and plot were exactly what I would have imagined them to be,and if you like juicy French humor and Roman bashing you will definitely enjoy the movie.Excellent comic acting from Roberto Benigni! I watched the DVD,and my only reserve would be that it did not offer closed-caption.