Change Your Image
larryy
Reviews
Played (2017)
Interesting idea, poor execution
The basic premise, that through drugs and video games it might be possible to control someone's perception of reality and "radicalize" them, is actually kind of interesting. But the characterizations, the dialog, the storyline, and the direction were terrible. It's like no one in the production staff has ever interacted with real human beings before. The characters stare into space, ask dumb questions, make non-sequitur proclamations, yell at each other pointlessly, and generally behave as the scriptwriter told them to behave, completely ignoring the fact that none of these characterizations and character interactions were realistic or remotely believable. Key elements of the plot were equally unrealistic.
I *think* the acting was also pretty terrible, but it's hard to say because if Meryl Streep and Robert De Niro spoke this dialog, followed this script, and honored the requests of this director I suspect they'd look awful too.
Don't waste your time. Imagine what you'd dream up for this premise. Trust me, it's better than this. Two stars because the premise was interesting and the production values were halfway decent.
I Am Mortal (2021)
Religious doggerel
The message: Atheists will damn you forever by forcing you to live forever and controlling your mind. Christians will save you by making sure you live and die like you're supposed to.
I should acknowledge that I only watched about 32 minutes of this movie. But when the good-guy rebels started explaining how everything went wrong because an atheist took control and mind-wiped a Christian, I couldn't take it anymore.
The film equates immortality to never having truly lived and confuses even that pithy little gem by conflating immortality with mind control. Yes, the dialog is pathetic, the acting mediocre, the production values low, but it's the wild illogic and rabid proselytizing that are truly unbearable.
Mondo Hollywoodland (2019)
Pointless drivel
Sorry to be so harsh, but, well, it goes on and on saying nothing of interest and meaning nothing at all, so "pointless drivel" it is.
When it first started I had some modest hopes for it. I genuinely like experimental video and weird films. My favorite film is probably "Forbidden Zone" (1980). I love "Eraserhead" (1977), "Zachariah" (1971), "Death Race 2000" (1975), "Being John Malkovich" (1999), "Inception" (2010), and on and on. So, okay a visitor from the 5th dimension trying to find out what Hollywood really is, combined with lots of fast edits and some known and unknown film clips actually caught my interest. I thought cool, it's going to be a big budget experimental film with a hint of sci-fi. But then it devolved into these completely lame disjointed scenes with dialogue that was either largely unscripted or written by a ten year old (or a Waring blender). Everybody takes drugs; whoop-di-do. The "acting" is laughable. I stuck with it for about 40 minutes, to my chagrin. But I found myself unable to pay attention anymore after that it was so inane and boring.
I kind of suspect somebody wanted to do a film about modern day Hollywood or Hollywood in the '80s, perhaps after having seen "Mondo Hollywood" (1967)--hence the name. But having written the lamest script ever, somebody else, or maybe that same person given the feedback they would have received on the script, decided to take the same script, break it up into three parts, and thread an incredibly thin alien-from-the-5th-dimension theme through it to spice it up. (It didn't work. Nothing could.) That's pure speculation, but gives the flavor of the experience of trying to watch this turkey.
Two stars instead of one because some of the editing was impressive, and some of the clips chosen were pretty cool.
Don't waste your time.
Death Squad (2019)
Like the worst movie you've seen
Wow. I can kind of understand how a total stinker of a movie gets made... Not that fun B movie, the total schlock waste of time... An enthusiastic but talentless amateur either fronts their own money or coaxes mom and dad and a few friends to front the money, and you get one of those Written-Directed-Produced (and sometimes even Acted) by one poor schmo, and everybody loses their shirt, and we all either run screaming or have a good laugh at its expense. But how does an entire TV series get made with this level of lameness in writing, direction, acting, everything? This show has absolutely nothing to recommend it. I watched the entire first episode, to see if it ever had a special moment. It didn't. Won't waste time on anymore episodes.
About the only thing that was so bad it was funny (enough to evoke actual laughter) was the music. Or perhaps it was really the direction and editing. I wonder if the music might have been okay if the dramatic moments in the music were actually matched by dramatic moments in the show, but inevitably the director and/or editor would queue up these dramatic flourishes in the music with utterly banal moments in the show. The meeting is over, cut to wide shot of the group... BOMMMM. The group of bad actors, excuse me, mercenaries turn a corner... DUNN, DUNN, DUNN. These unintentionally funny musical moments became the highlight of the show for me.
If they'd played it for intentional laughs, they might have had something. But that would have a taken a level of intelligence that was sorely lacking in the production of this series. Yow, this was bad.
Dispatches from Elsewhere (2020)
Smart, quirky, sweet, and kind. A joy.
Okay, unabashed, I love this show. I was hooked on the quirkiness right away, but wasn't sure how much it really had to offer in the beginning. But it just got better and better throughout the series. It suggested it was going to have fun with us, and us with it, and it delivered.
I'd love to talk about specifics, but am going to avoid spoilers. But I will say that in addition to being unlike anything else on television, it offers some truly brilliant performances. Jason Segel does the best ever professional imitation of an amateur singer, accentuating each line with the cleverest, most insightful little facial tics. That one song tells a huge and intricate story, and deserves a Golden Globe award all by itself. Richard E. Grant delivers the most refined and ambiguously condescending narration ever. Sally Fields is brilliant and her character is the most brilliant observer of the group. Andre (3000) Benjamin is delightfully over the top. And Eve Lindley is sweet, smart, and heartbreaking.
The finale is a surprise and a joy. After you've seen it, look up the relationships between these revelations and real life, and see "Forgetting Sarah Marshall" (2008) if you haven't already. There are some delightful references and resonances with Dispatches.
This is not a normal TV show, so I can kind of understand why it seems to polarize opinions. It's not for everybody. It completely smashes the fourth wall, but then it was already playing with the creation of a fictionalized version of real life events that overlaid a surreal fiction on the real world. It was meta right from the start. If you like a combination of weird, sweet, funny, smart, and kind, you should give this a try.
Alien Reign of Man (2017)
Unredeemably bad
Worst writing and direction I've seen in a film in quite a while. Some of the acting was dreadful too, but if the actors had been given a coherent script, with actual dialogue, and something to do besides stare off into space, apparently enraptured by the special effects, some of them might have risen to the occasion.
The FX were decent in places. That's the best thing I can say about the film.
Rather than engage in anything resembling actual conversation the actors were forced to spew plot points. And what little plot there was was disjoint and banal. There were exchanges like... A: "The Order has known of this for some time." B: "The order stole my childhood." A: "The atmospheric parameters are bad." B: "I'm not sure what to do." A: "We'll torture you unless you comply." Really. The "dialogue" just jumps around randomly, while the actors stand almost perfectly still. Astonishingly bad. Oh yeah, one of the actors actually said "You could have got us caught, captured, or killed!" Care to explain the difference between "caught" and "captured" for me? Sheesh. There was also one attempt at poetic speech that came out something like "Floating rock blood." (That's not an actual quote, but the actual line was at least as nonsensical.)
I almost always watch movies to the end, no matter how bad, but I only made it through about 1/3 of this and just had to turn it off. It made my brain hurt and was wasting too much of my life.
Vibes (1988)
One of the most underrated comedies of all time.
I'm really glad to see other reviewers talking about how much fun this film is. It's so good, sweet, and funny that I can't believe it's so poorly rated in some places. Roger Ebert must have eaten something bad before watching it, because 1 star is just ridiculous. And Rotten Tomatoes, that usually picks up on the more quirky films gives it just 6%? Really? Dark Star, which I also love, but is much more reliant on sheer quirkiness and offers much lower quality plotting and acting, gets 79%? Vibes is a film that, like Dark Star, should really be appreciated by anyone who loves film and appreciates smart-but-silly humor. It has higher quality production values and much better acting than Dark Star, but is lighter and less dark.
Others have talked about the great comedic timing and lots else to enjoy in this film, so I'll skip all that, and just give a word of advice.... Don't even look at the trailer. It is absolutely abysmal. I'm grateful I never saw the trailer or I'd probably never have seen the film. Really. It's that bad. And given the huge disparity between critics' ratings and the great joy this film brings, just skip bad reviews as well. That person didn't get it, and it's their loss. Just relax and enjoy this great little hidden gem.
Pod (2015)
dumb and boring
Most of the film is like a loud, bad soap opera with characters you couldn't possibly care about yelling at each other for reasons you couldn't possibly care about. Bad script, bad acting, bad direction. Don't waste your time.
There was some oddly nice cinematography, suitable for a nature documentary. And the score was surprisingly good. It's a shame some genuinely eerie, dramatic music was wasted on people knocking on doors and windows, wandering aimlessly around, staring intensely into space, driving, walking, doing absolutely nothing of interest, ever.
Written, produced, and directed by the same guy. It had to be, because if anyone with taste, talent, or even a light touch of sanity had been involved they'd've prevented this schlock from being made.
The Quatermass Experiment (2005)
completely dreadful
I really liked the old Quatermass films and even though I discovered them belatedly, being from the US, I got some enjoyment out of the TV series. But this remake was simply dreadful. The writing and direction were horrendous. Most of the time it was simply dull, but occasionally the poor actors had to deliver lines that made no sense, or go from quiet discussion to drastic scenery chewing in a heartbeat. I'm a huge science fiction fan and will watch (and enjoy) almost anything with a hint of science fiction to it. I can find great pleasure in a good B film and put up with almost anything to enjoy a bit of space travel, alien contact, or futuristic speculation of any kind. But I had to give up after about 36 minutes of this. I skipped forward, dropping in once in a while if anything looked remotely interesting. It never was. Partly because it was live, partly because it was cheap, and partly because the people who created this were completely lacking in intelligence or imagination, it was utterly without even a pretense of supporting special effects (e.g., monitors with important data the actors are all discussing are tilted away from the camera so you only see the back of the monitor), the sets were plain and very few, the audio was terrible, the whole show was dark and dreary looking, and the ending was as uneventful and lame as any movie or television program I've ever seen. Do not waste your time. It's not even interesting as a curiosity. There is absolutely nothing to recommend it.