Change Your Image
kandotom
Ratings
Most Recently Rated
Reviews
Spectre (2015)
This film offers a trip down memory lane, with a cameo appearance( a video) by Judy Dench, a return of the old Aston Martin, and it is a great travelogue.
We recently saw the latest James Bond - SPECTRE, with Daniel Craig. It's a fine movie. It is the usual combination of extreme violence, sex, intrigue and travelogue. The scenery includes Rome, London, the Moroccan desert and the Austrian Alps. I won't reveal the plot because I don't want to be a spoiler, and because I don't think I can figure out the plot. It doesn't matter, because most of the pleasure is visual, including spectacular fights on trains, boats, helicopters and buildings, and gorgeous women such as the Italian Monica Bellucci and the French Léa Seydoux, whose relationships to Bond are complex, to say the least.
Much of the plot is nonsensical, and requires suspension of judgment, but this has always been so with Bond movies, and it hasn't been detrimental to their enjoyment.
What made this one particularly fun was also the fact that it provided a trip down memory lane, something that is meaningful to those of us who are old enough to remember many of the past editions. There was a cameo appearance (a video) by Judy Dench. She had been the previous impersonation of M, the head of SIS (M16), the British equivalent of the CIA, and Bond's perennial employer. Dench had appeared in four previous James Bonds between 1995 (Golden Eye) and 2012 (Skyfall), at which point she was killed and therefore written out of the script. In Spectre, she is replaced by Ralph Fiennes. (who previously, in Skyfall, was a high government official hostile to Judy Dench as M.).
We also got to see Bond drive the classic (but upgraded) Aston Martin first introduced in Goldfinger (1964), with the familiar gadgets (tire slashers, smoke screen, ejector seat, etc.) plus a new one: a reverse flamethrower.
Alas, I missed the old Q (= quartermaster): This is the head of the research and development division of SIS, responsible for all of Bond's gizmo's. This part had been played in seventeen (!) Previous Bond movies by the inimitable Desmond Llewelyn, starting with From Russia with Love (1963) through The World is not Enough (1999). I'm sure many of you can remember the aging, cranky, impatient technological genius who was always so dismissive, almost contemptuous, of Bond and his playboy ways. In Spectre, Q's new incarnation is a youngster.
Another fixture is Miss Moneypenny. This role has also been played by one memorable person during the bulk of the Bond franchise: Every one of the first fourteen (!) Bond movies featured Lois Maxwell in this role - starting with Dr. No in 1962 and ending with A View to a Kill in 1985. Moneypenny always had a crush on Bond, be he played by Sean Connery, George Lazenby or Roger Moore. Maxwell has had several successors. Since Skyfall (2012), the part has been played by the beautiful and young black actress Naomi Harris.
The very title of this latest edition elicited nostalgia: SPECTRE has been the perennial enemy since the very first James Bond movie - Dr.No (1962), even though the nefarious organization is sometimes confused with another organization, for example the Russian "Smersh" in Thunderball (1965).
And speaking of Russia, it has to be emphasized that without "evil Russia," there could not have been a James Bond: The relationship between "us," (the good guys, the West, protected and defended by James Bond ) and the commie Russkies is always one of ambivalence. There are actually three parties, namely us and the Russians, the two cold-war protagonists, PLUS a third much more nefarious party, namely free- lance terrorists such as Spectre. In many Bond movies, the cold war almost turns into World War Three (You Only Live Twice, 1967; For Your Eyes Only, 1981; Octopussy, 1983, The Living Daylights, 1987), but just as often, the West and the Soviet Union end up working together to defeat the gigantic private terrorist organization (usually Spectre) that is bent on conquering or destroying the world.
Once the cold war ended and there was no Soviet Union any more, the James Bond franchise had to find some other protagonist(s). This happened during the Pierce Brosnan era: In Tomorrow never dies (1997),China is the enemy. In Die Another Day (2002), it's North Korea. One can speculate about the future, as the West's relationship with Putin's Russia is once again souring.
Also persistent and amusing throughout all twenty four Bond pictures is his love-hate relationship with his employer, be it Judy Dench or Ralph Fiennes in the role of M, Desmond Llewelyn in the role of Q, or anyone else. Bond is always in trouble, always getting fired and getting rehired. He always goes rogue, but he is always forgiven after he saves the world. My wife and I were happy to see that the theater was almost full, and that people seemed to enjoy this longest ever James Bond picture (two and a half hours).
The twenty four James Bonds over the past fifty three years have got to be the most successful movie franchise in history. Six actors have had the privilege of playing the part. How would you rank them? There can be no doubt that Sean Connery (six Bond films) towers above all others. After that, I personally like Daniel Craig (four Bonds so far), and also Timothy Dalton (only two movies). I found Pierce Brosnan (four Bond movies) less impressive, and Roger Moore (seven Bond pictures) even less so. As to George Lazenby (one Bond movie, 1969), I can't remember him.
Deadwood (2004)
This review describes the miniseries Deadwood without revealing the story line, while mimicking the linguistic style of the era, employed by the show's script writers.
DEADWOOD: A CURIOUSLY CAPTIVATING NARRATIVE
Deadwood was a weekly Western on HBO from 2004 to 2006. Its thirty-six episodes are still available on demand at this time. I now offer a belated exposition of this amazing show, all the while trying to mimic its linguistic style:
One of the production's highly entertaining facets is the scribes' efforts to render the actors' locutions and axioms as veritable as possible to the prevailing linguistic discourse of the epoch and the locale in question - namely the Wild West of the 1870s. The consequence is a consummate admixture of disproportionate profanity blended with esoteric and convoluted speechifaction such as what you, dear reader, are experiencing whilst reading the present phrase.
I cannot gauge whether the featured linguistic style veritably reflects reality and the prevailing nomenclature of that era, as I was not present, but it is most engaging. As to the ubiquitous use of obscenities by the protagonists, I shall revisit this affair in a moment.
The reviews of Deadwood were unanimously rave. Consult for example IMDb and Rotten Tomatoes. It garnered multiple Emmy and Golden Globe awards. It has been designated "the greatest TV show ever."
I do not acquiesce in such hyperbole, but I do assign Deadwood a high rating. Each installment's conclusion is poignant, as is the music.
The series portrays the savage, venal, lawless, anarchic, perilous and chaotic existence in the no-man's land which South Dakota was during the 1870s, in the aftermath of Colonel Custer's undoing at the battle of Little Bighorn.
Speaking concisely, Deadwood is a hell hole. It is a lawless camp to which malfeasants and renegades flock in search of gold and riches, driven by cupidity and rapacity. Women are vilely oppressed. The value of a prostitute's life is less than that of a horse. The underclass finds repose in opiates and other narcotics. Murder and butchery are quotidian. There are many villains and few heroes. Most people's domiciles, vestments and repasts are rudimentary. Reading and ciphering skills are sparse. Many toil under deadly maladies.
The premier personage in this captivating narration is a Swearengen, most capably enacted by the Irelander Ian McShane. This personage is the camp's "boss." Other preeminent figures from the firmament of history include the august Wild Bill Hickok ( one of the few virtuous personas) and Calamity Jane - a peregrinating and yet endearing alcoholic. We also encounter George Hearst, the progenitor of newspaper tycoon William Randolph. George is a nefarious individual who commissions a multitude of murders. To appeal him is to summon trouble.
The composition of the camp's populace is worthy of remark: Naturally, the juncture being 1876, most people are of European vintage. For example, there are numerous "Cornish" mine workers. Equally well represented is the Chinese race. A sprinkling of Negroes and a Jew ensure that the diversity of Deadwood is well explicated on the whole.
There is, however, a perplexing lacuna: No autochthonous Amerindians appear anywhere in the narrative. This absence is puzzling, in light of the epoch and the locale which are portrayed.
Now let me revisit the concern of profanities: The frequency of uttered obscenities by the protagonists seems incalculable. Two locutions are used with abandon: "fuck" (and its derivatives) and "cocksucker." It has been deemed that the word "fuck" arises about three thousand times in this production, which is tantamount to 1.56 times per minute lapsed. The rationale for this, so the miniseries' scribes aver, was to replicate for the audience the stridulent ambiance of the epoch. However, it is my assessment that the hyperbolic usage of blasphemous language depreciates the narrative and diverts us from it.
Not everyone in Deadwood is a miscreant. For example, Sheriff Seth Bullock, ably staged by Tim Olyphant, valiantly endeavors to uphold the rule of law, through valor and sagacity.
Yet one poses in vain any parallel between this miniseries and the classic The Man who Shot Liberty Valance,(1962). That picture's maxim was the transformation of the lawless frontier into civilized society. The difference reflects two contrasting Zeitgeists: half a century ago, optimism reigned, as did our faith in the ultimate triumph of civilization. Today, we are ruled by trepidation about the future and about our ability to root out evil.
Fury (2014)
some of the reviews of this film are too harsh
Actually, not a bad movie. I am surprised by the large number of scathing user reviews. There are also some very positive reviews, but fewer of them. I suppose the picture is polarizing. I won't say much about the story, so as not to spoil. Just that it's about a small, lonely American tank unit battling its way across Germany during the last few months of World War Two. Lots of violence, but not gratuitous violence. Perhaps the last shoot-out is somewhat over the top. But there is an excellent scene where the invading Americans mix it up with German civilians (women). A good treatment of the good and bad impulses that are both present in the hearts of these brave soldiers. A good treatment of the "uncivilizing" process undergone by a rookie soldier (part well played by Logan Lerman). As I said, not a bad movie. It seems to me that many of the overly critical reviewers are confusing their own political feelings with their assessment of the movie's merits (or lack thereof). I am as much against war as the next person; I am close to being a pacifist (and by the way, I grew up in central Europe during World War Two). Yet, I feel that "Fury" deserves credit for its nuanced portrayal of these "warriors."
The Newsroom: Contempt (2014)
In one word: dynamite! The best episode since the very first one, two years ago. Bravo
This is an Edward Snowden situation. While fully sympathetic with Will and the rest of the ACN crew, any intelligent viewer has got to feel ambivalent as well. This is about the clash of conflicting principles and moral imperatives, the conflict between the First amendment and national security.
I wont spoil things, and just say: "Contempt" is superb. It is by far the best episode since the first season premiere (where Will explodes in a fiery diatribe after a naive student asks him why "America is the greatest country in the world").
"Contempt" is arguable even better. The music, the acting, the plot line, the repartees, everything.
Also: In the second season, things became almost too convoluted at times. There were so many subplots and the dialogs were so rapid and witty that it sometimes became difficult to follow all of it. So far this year, this is no longer a problem.
And one more thing: what a treat, whenever Jane Fonda/Leona appears.
The Newsroom (2012)
The most brilliant and intelligent political show I have ever seen
I agree with the dozens of other reviewers that "The Newsroom" is absolutely brilliant. It's not just ONE of the best series I have ever seen, it is THE most intelligent political drama ever.
Let me make a couple of minor points: The main character, anchor Will McAvoy, proclaims to be a Republican, but this is unrealistic. Such reasonable Republicans did exist at one time (President Eisenhower, Senator Brooke, Everett Dirksen, Bob Dole, etc.) But they have almost totally vanished (Colin Powell is an exception).
Equally unrealistic is the age of most of the staff in the newsroom: They are all kids. In real life, we would see many more aging men with graying temples.
But not to quibble. The main question is how long this show will survive. To call it liberal does it injustice, because that would imply that it is biased. The epithet "liberal" would only apply if you equated it with "factual," truthful," "intelligent," "honest" and "progressive." And that's the problem. I am afraid that in today's massively right-wing environment, those characteristics are likely to make a show unpopular. Truth and honesty hurt too much. I hope that I am wrong.
Looper (2012)
a boring and mediocre movie.
What a terrible movie! Boring to the max. Nothing but bang, bang, bang.
My wife and I ( experienced movie buffs, not novices) decided to see this film on the basis of the professional reviewers' scores in the newspaper, which gave this movie excellent marks. We were deeply disappointed. We did not see any of the profundity noted by the reviewers.
When is Hollywood going to move beyond the banality of gratuitous violence, move beyond showing nothing but bang, bang, bang pistol shots, things which I outgrew by the time I was 7 and done playing cowboys and Indians.
It is incomprehensible that this movie gets a score of 8.3 and ranks among IMDb's 250 all-time best movies.
P.S. This demonstrates once again that Bruce Willis is incapable of playing in a good movie.
The Hunger Games (2012)
The movie is gripping, but it is also disappointing, in that it lacks the Orwellian social analysis found in such classics as Soylent Green and the Omega Man.
My wife and I went to see The Hunger Games. The movie is both gripping and disappointing.
First, what is this new blockbuster about? Well, it describes the dystopia which our society has become in the not-too-distant future. North America now consists of a dozen districts and a Capitol. The inequities and the contrast between the opulent plutocracy at the center and the decrepit, squalid and starving outlying districts are stark. In its Roman-like games-and-circuses policy aimed at anesthetizing the masses (think Aldous Huxley's Brave New World, here), the government randomly selects each year two young representatives from each district to participate in The Hunger Games. These games, televised throughout the nation, are a survival contest to the death, like gladiatorial combat. Only one of the 24 teenage combatants is allowed to survive. The other 23 must all be murdered by each other and by the sole victor. The story's heroine is Katniss Everdeen, played by the stunningly beautiful Jennifer Lawrence.
I haven't read Suzanne Collins' book(s) upon which the movie is based, but in view of the hoopla, I am going to review the movie anyway, and tell you why I am both impressed and somewhat disappointed.
What bothers me is not the enormous violence, although my wife makes a good point when she notes that we already have horrendous youth violence in real life, and that its glorification in popular culture is wrong.
My complaint is that, unlike many of its predecessors in this genre, The Hunger Games is sociologically shallow.
Hollywood has a rich tradition of post-apocalyptic scenarios which extrapolate today's worst tendencies and show us a future which is more cruel, more unjust and uglier than society is today.
During the first half hour or so, it seemed that The Hunger Games would follow in the tradition of such classics as The Omega Man (1971), Silent Running (1972) and Soylent Green (1973). As in those films, this movie locates the seeds of future decay and collapse in today's dysfunctional world, be it AIDS-like plague (The Omega Man), the destruction of the environment (Silent Running), overpopulation (Soylent Green), or nuclear war (The Day After, The Book of Eli).
Such movies are the counterpoint to the naive optimism of the Star Trek- and Star Wars- like faith in never-ending progress through science and technology.
The first part of The Hunger Games does something similar. To show the brutality and dehumanization of mass culture, and the grotesque commercialization and perversion of the mass media, is a good thing. The thinly veiled analogy with ancient Rome is apt. The children who are about to die - called "Tributes," which sounds like "Tribunes" - are first paraded in horse-drawn chariots in front of admiring crowds, then pampered and fed lavishly in the Capitol's opulent quarters, as were gladiators 2000 years ago.
Today, we also have instant stardom and its adulation, in a myriad shows such as American Idol. Survival of the fittest, too, in the even more numerous Reality TV shows. Such programs range from benign elimination contests like Dancing with the Stars to actual elimination to the death as in the 1987 Arnold Schwartzenegger movie The Running Man (whose plot could arguably be said to have been plagiarized by Suzanne Collins!) Deteriorating social conditions, growing poverty and concentration of wealth, are also very much under way at the present time. Extrapolating these into the future is a valuable exercise. Let's also not forget that the vast majority of the 10,000 Americans who have died in our dual Iraq-Afghanistan war consists of youngsters.
In sum, the movie's first 45 minutes contained inklings of such brilliant prognosticators as George Orwell, and I was hopeful.
But alas, it was not to be. For the rest of The Hunger Games, the only remaining question was, who will be last one standing? The movie degenerated into one of those predictable survival contests, similar to so many other films, (including some where the elimination process is natural, as in the recent The Grey).
I am hoping that the sequel will have better sociology, but I am already bracing myself for a disappointment. It seems that the plot will now move to a love story. I guess Sociology is not America's cup of tea.
Red River (1948)
Tom Dunson as Captain Bligh and Matt Garth as Fletcher Christian
A great saga about a Texas cattle baron, a 1000-mile cattle drive in the aftermath of the Civil War, and a climactic end. Epic American history, and sophisticated psychological development. Great acting, and humor, too.
One of my favorite Westerns, long before Lonesome Dove.
Only flaw, maybe, is the slightly irritating Joanne Dru, the leading woman.
I just want to point out one aspect of this marvelous story, one which I am sure others have also noted: The uncanny resemblance with Mutiny on the Bounty: John Wayne/Tom Dunson is Captain Bligh, and Montgomery Clift/Matt Garth is Fletcher Christian. The conflict between them simmers and builds up, until it explodes, with young Matt Garth reluctantly leading the mutiny against a captain who has gone rogue and sadistic. Of course, there are many differences, including the conclusion.
Slumdog Millionaire (2008)
a social commentary on the conditions depicted in this movie
The movie is admittedly excellent, and real. What gets us, though, is the nearly unanimous use by reviewers and commentators of happy words like "uplifting" and "exhilarating" to describe this movie. Instead, I would use words such as "scary" and "nightmarish." The conditions depicted in this film are like Dante's inferno. The poverty and squalor of vast tracts of Mumbai, a typical Indian mega-city. Shanty cardboard towns as far as the eye can see. What we are shown is the Armageddon to which the world may be coming, due to over-population and a globalized growth economy. People living on giant waste disposal dumps the size of mid-size American towns, like scavenging vultures. Human anthills. The horror of garbage-infested streams in which people bathe, a child escaping through feces. The terror of murderous tribal strife, in which people torch each other to death. Child kidnappers who burn out their victims' eyes to make them more effective beggars. Then the grotesque contrast with billion-dollar luxury skyscrapers inhabited by millionaire gangsters. This is uplifting? The movie deserves Oscar nominations, and even an Oscar or two. But uplifting? No. Frightening and horrific, yes. Tom and Anita Kando, Sacramento.
Femme Fatale (2002)
deconstructing "femme fatale"
Deconstructing Brian De Palma's Femme Fatale, 2002
1995: International con artist/thief Laure Ash helps pull off a diamond robbery in Cannes during the annual film festival. She double-crosses her partners-in-crime (the evil black guy and his accomplices) and makes off with the diamonds to Paris where she accidentally assumes the identity of a distraught woman who commits suicide, and then she leaves the country. On the airplane to America, Laure meets millionaire and future US ambassador to Paris Peter Coyote, whom she marries. And then, the mystery begins:
Scenario One, 1995: shown early in the movie: the beautiful blonde Laure is taking a bath in her apartment. A despondent brunette enters the apartment and starts committing suicide. Laure lets the brunette kill herself. That's how she is able to assume the girl's identity, go to America, meet and marry Peter Coyote and do all the bad things which follow, namely:
2002: Seven years later, Laure (now called Lily Watts) returns Paris as the wife of the new American ambassador to France (Peter Coyote) where a certain Nicolas Barto (Antonio Banderas), a Spanish photographer, takes her picture. This is bad, because as a result her former partners-in-crime, still looking for her, will find her. Therefore, she decides to entrap Barto, staging that he kidnaps her for a $10 million ransom from her millionaire-ambassador husband. In reality, she aims to kill Barto, collect the $10 million and skip out on her husband whom she cannot stand, because she is still very evil. But things go haywire, her former partners-in-crime show up, there is a shootout and she is dumped into the Seine to drown.
What's confusing is that (1) the despondent girl whom Laure allows to commit suicide in her apartment in 1995 is another Laure - i.e. she is also played by Rebecca Romijn. And (2) there is another French brunette in the plot, who might or might not be this same girl. This (second?) brunette seems to be another diamond thief and crime partner of Laure's. She helped Laura double-cross the other crime-partners (the ones who are really bad) Early on in the film, these guys come after this brunette, and she dies.
Scenario Two, 1995: shown at the end of the movie: blonde Laure prevents the brunette from killing herself, telling her that she is her "guardian angel," and instead, she sends her off to America to clean up her life. Laure herself stays in Paris. We now learn that all the bad things in scenario One are only things which Laure dreamed while in the bathtub. They all would have happened if Laure had allowed the despondent brunette to kill herself. However, she talked her out of it and gave the girl her air ticket to America.
2002: Laure has been in Paris all along, as has her female accomplice. Their double-crossed partners-in-crime finally catch up with them, but this time Laura's accomplice does not die. The two girls get to keep the stolen $4 million diamond bra, plus Laure meets Barto for the first time, and they like each other right away, and they will probably be happily in love...