cannonclubonline Reviews

Insidious (I) (2010)

Slighty Above Par with Most People, But Hard to categorize!

[18 September 2011]

What we have is a story of a normal family suddenly thrust into a disturbing situation in which their son, Dalton (Ty Simpkins), falls into a mysterious coma the doctors have know way of explaining.

********* W A R N I N G ******** This review contains spoilers (explanations that could spoil it for you, so if you are thinking about seeing this film, please don't get mad at me for spilling the details).

Little do they know that there is much more to this endless sleep than meets the eye as they, seeking outside assistance, explore the spiritual and paranormal implications, of Astral Projection, and out of body experience few films have delved in to.

I'm seriously wondering whether to recommend this film to ghost/horror film buffs or not! One good thing about this film is that it took you way out there in the weeds as as far as a new form of weirdness. In most reviews, though most would point out that the first part of the film should have just been erased and trashed in lieu of the fact that that's about when it started to pick up.

Unfortunately, that's about the time where someone falls asleep in or out of the theater. There are a few campy/cheesy things in the onset of the film that just aren't too awfully scary for the average horror movie goer, however, James Wan succeeded to chill in the theater to give the creepy suspense going with the music in Dolby surround sound, but didn't work at home as much.

Around the time that first lady showed up, the mother-in-law Lorraine (Barbara Hershey) that's when it got pretty stupid. Like, we are supposed to know that this person was the mother-in-law? NOT! That didn't make much sense, just as it didn't when the mother-in-law started saying, "I've seen visions and dreams". Now, if you drop that part & pick up with the kid in a coma with the parents freaked out about the so-called psychic/paranormal bug patrol led by Elise Ranier (Lin Shaye), then we got something.

Apart from a few inconsistencies/goofs like the screen door on the house door vanishes/reappears, & Dalton moving his hand lying on floor in a coma, this film could possibly be ranked as up there with Tobe Hooper's 1982 film Poltergeist, which was produced by Steven Spielberg and starred Craig T. Nelson, Jo Beth Williams, & 6 year old Heather O'Rourke who played the child name Carol Anne who got somehow physically abducted by apparitions from another dimensional plane. Of course, there really couldn't be anything more spooky about the Poltergeist films since Carol Anne, who was played by Heather O'Rourke actually died during the filming of Poltergeist III in 1988, she suffered flu-like symptoms. The symptoms were a result of intestinal blockage, which ultimately claimed her life. The whiny screaming of Carol Anne's name, which is either spoken or screamed in Poltergeist III 121 times would truthfully unnerve anybody.

In the case of Insidious, we soon find a few things that we can sink our teeth into, such as the creepy guy that constantly wants to play an old vinyl recording of Tiny Tim's "Tip-Toe through the tulips" & the fact that the father somehow has the same power of leaving his body while asleep. I forgot to mention the scariness of the infrared view-master machine along with séance that goes bananas. What's not really explained in this film is to why there are actually physical beings that are able to totally appear from this so-called "Further" area & cause audible issues as well as trashing up the place.

Brainstorm (1983)

Absolutely Mind Boggling! A Must See for Film Buffs.

[9/10 · 2 August 2011]

Without a doubt, Brainstorm is one of the best science fiction films of the 80s, together with spectacular imagery and a wonderful story, make this film as unforgettable as Blade Runner, Close Encounters and Star Trek with which the director, Douglas Trumbull, of this film helped master with his experience in jaw-dropping special effects. Although this film never returned it's investment at the box office, we have to remember that, because of the dedication to his film, Douglas Trumbull didn't give up and give in to the insurance companies, who were trying to kill the film, due to the untimely death of Natalie Wood during the shooting of this film. Supposedly Natalie met her untimely demise in a boating accident at sea, which makes the film even more mysterious, since we soon discover that the whole plot begins to revolve around the recorded heart attack, death, and passing of the main researcher Lillian Reynolds played by Louise Fletcher.

Long before you may have thought the story might go nowhere, we are slowly pulled into a story of broken dreams due to a failed relationship between the Christopher Walken's and Natalie Wood's characters who play a divorced couple still working on amicable terms for a high tech company on the verge of a major breakthrough.

The story begins in the lab as two brilliant researchers Lillian Reynolds (Louise Fletcher) and Michael Brace (Christopher Walken) develop a system of recording and playing back actual experiences of people. Once the capability of tapping into higher brain functions such as thought is added in, one can literally jump into someone else's head and play back recordings of what he/she was thinking, feeling, seeing, in a Memorex fashion. Of course the impractical and practical applications are limitless. We soon find out the company owner Alex Terson (Cliff Robertson) has greater aspirations for his inventions and tries to convince Lillian to work with the FEDs in order to make the invention part of a defensive weapon for later use perhaps during war and espionage. As we follow this story, the applications for the project quickly spiral out of control. Without spoiling the film's final moments, we must give full attention to the detail of the ideals of this extraordinary technology as it changes the character's lives as they once knew, due to misunderstand and mis-communication. Each element of this film makes the previous seem important, sustainable, and impossible, however, when all the elements are finally presented, we feel complete in our understanding of our characters motives and unattainable humanity put into perspective with phenomenal beauty and eloquence.

In closing, this film still holds its own after 30 years!

Suspect Zero (2004)

Absolutely Mind Boggling! A Must See for Film Buffs.

[8/10 · 28 March 2011]

This film was absolutely a wonderful treat to watch. Ben Kingsley was definitely at the top of this game. Ben plays this quasi serial killer named Benjamin O'Ryan. We are perfectly forced to remain within the constraints of the way this story is told that makes it so difficult to stop watching. We soon find ourselves opening up to the other characters in this film such a our FBI investigator Thomas Mackelway (Aaron Eckhart). Thomas seems to have his own little hidden secret in which were are soon exposed to. What's so creepy about this film is this Benjamin's uncanny gift of remote viewing, which is a highly unlikely situation with most people. The federal government was to have supposedly started this remote viewing project from a spin-off of a Russian program considered to do the same things.

During the development of the story we soon are introduced to another investigator named Fran Kulog (Carrie-Anne Moss) who had supposedly earlier been involved with Thomas Mackelway in a relationship. However, we soon find out that this relationship had somehow gone sour because Thomas was tortured by his incessant desire to track down one of the scummiest serial killers out there. We discover that Thomas actually had gone across the border into Mexico without prior approval to do so and kidnapped this rapist Raymond Starkey (Keith Campbell). Thomas was suspended for doing this and was told to get some psychological help. At every step of the way, Benjamin taunts Thomas by purposefully leaving clues designated to perpetuate his game-like killing of these people. Thomas Mackelway arrives in Albuquerque, and his first case is the murder of a traveling salesman, Harold Speck (Kevin Chamberlin), who had a zero mark on his body. The FBI was called to the scene since the body was found in a car located just across the state line. Thomas grows increasingly estranged by the case & his insanity grows all encompassing as he tries to find the link between the victims that will lead him to their killer.

The film's intensity is only too well topped off by explicit details of newspaper clippings and hundreds of well-composed charcoal drawings, many of which help drive the plot along. There is a dark, demonic imagery involved with this film which I think should be present since we are dealing with a gruesome subject. We find both men torturing themselves within their own minds, thusly, we find caught up in a reverie of overlapping and sometimes mis-shapen images that are supposedly mimicking blurring thoughts of a remote or E.S.P. type origin.

The visual style reminded me of "Seven" (1995) which seemed to be perfectly captured by Director David Fincher. However no director has yet come as close to match Fincher's unique visual composition and cinematography. All of the shots in Seven are carefully composed and never falter in its editing & pace.

We also have a very strong performance from Harry Lennix who played Rich Carlton, Thomas Mackelway's superior who always seems to have some kind of sarcastic comment to throw out to get Thomas's head out of the clouds.

Ultimately in the end, the film achieves great power during the confrontation between Thomas, Benjamin, and Fran. The showdown with undiscovered serial finally comes to a head. We finally discover how disturbed Benjamin really is when he begs Thomas to go ahead and kill him just as he has seen in his visions since he has and will continue to be tortured by these paranormal occurrences.

Predators (2010)

Could have been 100 times better but failed to impress.

[6/10 · 19 March 2011]

Without further ado, I'll have to say that I was quite disappointed with this film. I'm so glad that I didn't actually spend money on this in the theater. I would have probably walked out after the first 45 minutes. My major complaint about this film was the ridiculous dialog and the careless handling of the development of the characters in the film. The dialog was so simple and choppy, it didn't make much sense. Not to mention the fowl language and vulgarity from the character labeled as the death row inmate who said that he couldn't wait to get "coked up and rape some women".

Leading the team is Adrien Brody, who as soldier of fortune, decides early on to be a loner, so he's not going to forge any emotional bonds with anyone, being quite dogged and determined to leave the gaming planet alive on his own.

This of course irks Isabelle (Alice Braga), the female soldier from Israel who holds a few secrets of her own, and others from the likes of the Chechnyan soldier Nicolai (Oleg Taktarov) to the odd Dr. Edwin (Topher Grace), given the rest have tasted real life action in the killing fields, now brought by alien abduction to a planet whose atmosphere is almost identical to Earth, for a game of cat and mouse to test their survival skills.

The most disappointing thing about the film was that the trailer leads you into thinking that their were perhaps more alien hunters by showing Adrian Brody being targeted by a large number of 3 point laser cannons when, in the film it only shows about two.

The highlight of the film was when Laurence Fishburne materialized in an Alien invisibility suit. I thought, wow, this film is getting ready to go somewhere, but he just decided to take a nap and then slipped out the back and started a fire around the party to steal their weapons. What a poor way to use someone with such talent in a first rate film for ten minutes.

If that's not enough to convince you to skip ahead to the action scene, then find the spot where they spend two minutes watching the entire cast climb though a door one by one. What's really confusing and disappointing is when they suddenly start talking about the fact that "They see our traps." What? What traps? Did you see them make any traps? No, but I did spend 2 minutes watching the entire cast climb through a door. If you start watching the movie and you start getting that feeling like 'Hmmm, now wait a minute. This is just terrible, it's like the feeling when you get when you buy a lemon at the car dealership. They call that cognitive dissonance. You keep saying to yourself "Nah, I'm sure it will get better." I suggest you trust your instincts on this one, and if you have to see it for yourself, make sure that you have an exit strategy. This was an Epic failure for me.

I'm extremely happy for Adrian Brody, who actually looked pretty buff in this film, probably thanks to working out in a weight lifting facility. I was constantly reminded how stupid it was to have this Doctor Edwin character played by Topher Grace tagging along with no gun and being the off planet expert botanist. So what did I miss when he decided to turn evil and slice Isabelle (Alice Braga) with a poisonous pocket knife? Were we supposed to believe that this little twerp was in cahoots with the predator creatures? Another unanswered question was why was the predator chained to the stone? Why did he blow up his own space ship? If the film was supposed to be different from the first, then why did they steal lines from 1987?

The New Daughter (2009)

Creepy At Times. Falls a bit short with Action, However Great Ending.

[6/10 · 13 November 2010]

The competition in the arena of good cross-over films is quite heavy when it comes to making a film with multiple elements. What's really good about this film is the spooky cinematography elements intermingled throughout the story-line and dialog. What's totally implausible is the calmness of John James (Kevin Costner). I must say that he was actually playing a normal guy who was walking through life with this reserved numbness. Yes, it's great that you can actually feel the anguish, however, it seemed like it would have been nicer if Costner would have played his character with a bit more zest, zeal, and caring. It would have been twice the film if there was much more Exorcist style interaction; someone that would tackle this demonic thing head on and go to war with it much sooner than 2 minutes until the end of the film. To me the disappointment of the whole film was that it had so much potential. If they had just trashed most of the pity party scenes, and gone straight to the creatures, it would have been a masterpiece. I'd really like them to get maybe a Mayan theme with space ships involved and then it would have hit the home run. Each little bit of smallness by the story-teller let us down as time continued marching on. The small scene that was deleted when it shows John looking out of the loft window at claw marks should have been left in directly before the scene where a creature was filmed walking up the dark roof.

Poor and sloppy story telling caused me to become extremely disenfranchised very early. Buy chapter 7, I couldn't really even stay in the room long enough to keep my interest, I probably rewound the film 20 times before I got through the final 12th Chapter. I'd just say if you skipped every other chapter, you would probably be better off. I'm really ashamed to have to say this as a film reviewer, however, that appears to be quite indicative of the repetitive story line. The daughter was just not really possessed enough. Costner's character goes to visit this old stranger who he became curious enough to visit named Roger Wayne (James Gammon). Wayne screams at him at the end of that scene and that was about as exciting as the film gets up until that point. He starts screaming while Costner's character is running out the door and says "She's not ever going to be the same, don't you get it?", doesn't really convince me that she's going to get much more disturbing.

The title really causes you to believe that the daughter was supposed to turn into something terrifying. Of course, you automatically know by the tone of the film that it's not going to be "Hellraiser" or "Mid-Night Meat Train" or something from that genre, but it just appears to me that it's really quite close in slowness to Costner's other film "Dragonfly" or M. Night Shyamalan's "Signs". Some have mentioned a few other films that we could say it was a cross between, such as The Ring mixed with The Grudge. Some have even mentioned Blair Witch, but this was too slow to be Blair Witch.

I'll have to say that Ivana Bequero played her part well as did Gattlin Griffith. The story was supposedly trying the tell the story much from the perspective of the struggling family unit. I'd really have thought it would have been nicer to see Costner wind up with the teacher, however, I guess that wasn't part of the script anywhere. Oh well! Just wanted to mention that this was the last film that John Gammon did before passing at the ripe old age of 70.

Legion (2010)

Clearly Hollywood Has Run Out of Good Material

[5/10 · 26 October 2010]

Upon viewing this film the first time around, I'm sorry I fell asleep. It just didn't spark my inner interests even though it supposedly had angelic origins.

In mulling over in my mind about this film, I really almost didn't get it, although, after a while, I finally got what the director and co-screen-writer was trying to do. It goes something like this. We are soon introduced to a bunch of normal average everyday losers from all walks of life who somehow become totally stranded in the middle of nowhere during the coming of GOD's final judgment. We soon learn that all the common annoyances we normally go through in this world are just as boring and typical as our worst Thanksgiving dinner with our dysfunctional families (analogous to, no pun intended, devils in hell want ice-water). The Paradise Diner is almost like a microcosm of pond scum we all love to try & get out of, mainly speaking. It almost reminds me of where old actors go after they have a couple of decades of wonderful roles and then get caught in a down turn, much like what happened to Michael Gross's popularity when he went from "Family Matters" all the way down to a 2nd or 3rd billed actor in Tremors (1990 with Kevin Bacon). As a matter of fact, if you could just subtract the Angels and add the alligator worm creatures, I'd think this film would have done a bit better.

I think what really went wrong with this was when they made the story-line centered around GOD's wrath and Angels. Actually I checked out the ratings on IMDb.COM (Internet Movie Database), and with only 3,100 votes Tremors 4 (2004) actually beat out this film receiving only a 5 out of 10 by 0.3 of a point. The actual voting for Legion was 9 times the number, so that's almost the curse of death for a movie to receive that low of a ranking with so many votes. That also says a lot about Michael Gross's acting. Great job Michael, although, I got tired of the Tremor films at about number 2.

What chokes this film is only a couple of really noticeable mistakes: 1) After Percy gets bathed in acid, there is a shot where you can clearly see that his back is intact, but after that he falls revealing his shirtless back completely acid burnt with flesh eaten away to the spine.

2) Why would we really care at all if the characters were really ragging themselves at all (Jeep) about freezing up & not shooting the old lady? 3) After spending hours of planning with over 20 major stunt drivers, the direction failed to take full advantage of the 18-wheeler with pipes on the back. In my opinion, by not getting the pipes to dump was a budgetary constraint that caused the action in the film to be a tiny bit stale and ineffective.

4) The audio was extremely low in places, thus ruining much of the important lines that would have been much more effective had they not been trying to play on any kind of emotional tear-jerking reactions.

There were one or two good lines that gave the film much needed value, and it came mostly from Percy Walker coming from Charles S. Dutton. The first was when he told about what his father used to tell him before he went to bed at night. He said, "If it's your last day on this planet, would you be proud of what you've done in this life?" The other line is only from memory, however it was something about that he didn't know were Michael was getting his information, but that it definitely was not from the same book he knew. I'll have to applaud those lines. The rest were way too "Barbie".

Seven Pounds (2008)

A Whole Lot Of Tragedy In Too Short A Time

[8/10 · 15 August 2010]

Most would agree that a tragic film such as this will somehow carry it's own weight, yet Seven Pounds seemed to leave me profoundly depressed and wishing that the story would somehow leave me uplifted. The film somehow fell short in delivering a redemptive message it set out to do.

******** A real Spoiler ********** Will Smith proved himself as a solid force to be reckoned with in the industry and has impressed me in many other wonderful films. His character, Ben, is a very lovable guy that seems to have entered into a period of enigmatic crossroads in life. Given his desire to be helpful, it doesn't seem fit that he would pose as an IRS agent to deliver up some kind of blind love for redemption. When a freak accident killed seven people including his wife, he really did search, but found no answers.

Although you might think it was a flashback to some other point in time, Ben was a very successful engineer with a high paying job. When his trouble began, his brother, who was with the IRS, allowed him to use his identity and pose as an IRS agent long enough to track down potential beneficiaries of his live organs after his preplanned suicide. I'll be the 1st to say damn!

In Shakespeare's The Merchant of Venice, Shilok the Jew, wanted a pound of flesh in payment for nonpayment. This leads us somehow to the thought within the play where we get the speech about "the quality of mercy is not strained, but droppeth like the gentle dew from heaven upon the place beneath". Therefore, we get the old adage, "An Ounce Of Prevention Is Worth a Pound of Cure."

The anger & frustration that Ben feels when he finds that his empathy and compassion towards someone in uncertain health circumstances is betrayed is very believable, although, if he feels any compassion towards those people at all, he should soon become aware that all of us are not going live a perfect life and that desperate times can lead people to desperate measures. His pact with his friend and his quest to end his life and somehow prolong others is a noble challenge to take on, however, he should leave this kind of work to Almighty GOD. Even so, Science seems to deliver many blessings to those in need, however, the real tragedy is that man created science in order to compensate for his fall from grace(sinfulness).

The tragedies in this film are quite intense and make us aware that we are not immortal, yet we somehow are made to feel that Ben is trying to discern the reasons why good things happen to bad people while bad things happen to good people.

There were nice touches left here and there within the main body of the film that pushed you to love this guy regardless of his inner drive to be some kind of angel or GOD's supersaint. We knew he was disturbed from the start of the film, but didn't really know why. In my opinion, it would have been a much better film if the director had left off the first scene. That way we would not have had any idea where his character was going.

The jelly fish death leaves us thinking, "How could you die and still be fresh". Well "Not because he was the Fresh Prince", but this has to do with just the neurotoxins of the brain.

Many of the supporting actors compliment this film, such as Woody Harrelson playing the part of a physically challenged individual who has lost his sight.

August (2008)

Best Yet From Josh Harnett With This Near Perfect Script

[7/10 · 20 July 2010]

Many find life like a boat with a sail billowing in the wind. Sometimes, the wind is not there, but for a few, those that can will sail away into fortune. Josh Hartnett's character epitomizes those optimists. We catch up to this wheeler dealer just a few months before the actual huge part of the bubble finally burst starting in March 2001. There was no indication from watching this film that it had anything to do with the times other than the film was supposedly taking place and ended soon before the fateful day of 9/11. This apparently was not mentioned in the film, however, some reviewers tend to connect this film to a procession of unraveling events that seem to showcase the end of our way of thinking (the dawn of a new era).

There are many wonderful things that I could say about this film. Some would argue that it's just a meandering waste of time. After watching other films such as Purpose (2003), Boiler-room, and Wall-Street, this film seemed to fit a different kind of niche in my memory. More or less that niche centered around the extreme confidence and undying drive that Hartnett portrayed playing Tom.

Whereas the message pretty much comes off the same in the end; a person or company hitting a so-called brick wall or the end of the track right before the train falls off into the ravine. In Promise, the main theme seemed to be centered around John, a software developer who becomes a billionaire overnight when he takes his company public. John unfortunately gets caught up in the fame, greed and power and all the vein distractions that go along with living the new high life. Inevitably, our Dot-com guy must learn what's really important in order to save his invention and company from a hostile takeover. Fundamentally, John learns that love and a sense of purpose are more powerful and more valuable than money.

With Tom in "August", you already know that this guy has a sense of purpose but can't really believe that failure is in the picture. Thus, for all intents and purposes, we are taken on a journey into the daily life of Tom to see how he really ticks and what he really thinks. We finally see who Tom really is and how he blames the other leeches for his unforeseen failure. Some animosity comes out when Rip Torn, who plays his father, pushes Tom to the limit of his own inner ego bubble, when he insinuates that LandSharks (the company) is a company of Oreo eating lazy teenagers who do absolutely nothing. Tom views his brother's and his father's ideology foreign and corrupt from his own. That's when the partying pansy pretty passively provokes pity pugnaciously putting punches on his own face by pissing someone he knows off just for the fun of it. This behavior soon carries him to the final seen where David Bowie tells him how the cow is getting ready to eat the cabbage. Bravo performance goes to everyone including Ron Insana who plays himself, Robin Tunney who plays Melanie Hanson, Naomie Harris who plays the on again failed relationship Sarrah, and Adam Scott who plays the brilliant, yet not so business-minded brother Joshua who delivers his down to earth perspective on what's really going on. In conclusion, John Hartnett makes this film totally believable and, hands down, should have put him in the running for an Oscar for his role except that somehow his pervasively pensive prose put people off. Too bad he could never do this again with his own brother was the last thought felt by him but that was alright!

Horsemen (2009)

Disturbing Thriller that Tries, But Somehow Leaves You Hanging On Too Few Hooks.

[6/10 · 18 July 2010]

There are films that have tried to capture the haunting nature of humanity and murder such as "Seven" and "Saw" and "Silence of the Lambs". Directed by Jonas Akerland (Swedish born) and produced by Michael Bay and others, this film, also known as Horsemen of the Apocalypse, was set to thrill Hollywood with another major line-up of great actors. I find it quite odd that, up until this film, the Platinum Dunes releases all seemed to have been made up of existing horror property such as The Amytiville Horror, The Hitcher, and the Texas Chainsaw Massacre. This film may have been the one that would have done it, except it didn't have the "teeth" (so to speak) to bring it into the same category.

The Revelations 6 thing in the Bible was pretty spooky, however, how in the world can we believe that the four horsemen are supposed to come back re-incarnated as 4 spoiled and disgruntled teenagers? Putting all that aside, what's with the Forensic Orthoedontical twist here? What's the deal with the pulled human teeth found out in a snowdrift in a serving tray surrounded by 4 trees that have "Come and See" written in blood on them? Did they ever really point anything back to the fact that these teeth were missing from anybody victimized in the film? I don't think so, otherwise it might have been brought up and discussed.

I reacted to both Dennis Quaid's and Zhang Ziyi's characters as there were able to draw me in as a viewer interested in their stories. They completed the task of convincing me that their characters were real. Especially Ziyi who was capable of playing polar opposites, like a switch being flicked on. Ziyi's character gave me the creeps and still I felt its erotic side too, just as it was intended. Quaid looked extremely tired and depressed, just as intended, and his son looked like a messed up smarty-pants teen, just as intended. The baby fetus thing was very unclear. I couldn't immediately identify the bloody ziploc bag to the step-mother. Ziyi's room was about as spooky as you can get in a film, along with many other death scenes.

The underlying message about the inadvertent "gay bashing" was probably missed, it's intent was to show the other side of the world how bad it really is not to accept someone for who they really are and how ridiculous it is to discriminate, and to what sorts of sadness and tragedy it can all lead to.

The pseudo-religious aspects of the film were quite weak, although the film-maker made a very good running stab at keeping true to the words of the bible. Father Whiteleather (Paul Dooley) made for a very passable Catholic priest, although a grave biblical error stuck out like a sore thumb. When Det. Breslin (Quaid) visits a catholic priest to ask him about the book "Revelations", the priest says that John (the writer of the book) is one of the Apostles. The writer of Revelations is actually John of Patmos. The name Whiteleather for his character was somewhat of an oxymoron since the movie was intended to be about the evils of torture.

Barry Shabaka Henley as Lead Investigator Tuck seemed to be quick on the trail of solving these crimes and lent his experience in acting to the big screen. I thought it quite strange that Breslin seemed to be acting alone many times when he should have been with another law enforcement officer.

Overall, this film finished with much emotion coming from Det. Breslin directed at his dying soon, yet the film really left me hanging on too few hooks for comfort.

Little Children (2006)

Strikes a Powerful Cord In The Downtrodden Hearts & Souls

[10/10 · 11 July 2010]

An unusually powerful narrative about normal feelings living in the heartland makes this film stand out as the ultimate winner of real life. There is nothing fake about this. The director Todd field captures the novel, written by Tom Perrotta with a zeal for true emotions. Although many could say that this film may have seemed overblown, most would agree that the film captures the psychotic nature of humanity through the lens of actual events that seem to always happen when social norms are questioned by self-righteous or self absorbed groups who band together to fight the so-called evils of western society. Although most would not blame themselves for being a certain way, this film highlights many hypocritical viewpoints about making the best of what they have. Living with the pain & agony of a miserable relationship or bad experiences (or even unacceptable behavior of people who made remorseful mistakes in the past) make this film stand above many others attempting to pinpoint the true essence of individuals realizing themselves. This is not a feel-good film as some might assert. To realize our failures as humans and try to correct them is the key to understanding this film. I would not even say this film was a satire to which is eroding at humanity's morals. I would happen to agree more with many who comment about this film that it teaches us not to judge since we most often don't understand the experience of walking alone with one pair of shoes into the desert. We couldn't possibly explain the loneliness of those that have been chastised & singled out because of being different.

Perrota makes this perfectly clear by being an actor in his own screenplay by simply identifying himself in the credits as simply a small man. Maybe, no more or less than his persecuted character Ronnie J. McGorvey (Jackie Earle Haley) who is labeled in his community as a perverted sex offender. This film makes you think about others feelings and the ties of life & influence you have as a consequence of your actions. Our lives are fundamentally flawed at birth as we live and interact with others. It's too sad that most of our hopes & wishes are washed down the stream when we become trapped in our history.

Whether the banality or sheer fear of life running its course, we seldom, if ever know what train wreck is around the corner. Perrota's narration lulls us into accepting that this may just be a boring children's story that will endlessly continue innocently, yet we most often see glimpses of 21st century life creeping in on us.

Our despondent Ronnie reaches out to us with love and hate to expose our own attitudes. May (Phyllis Somerville), Ronnie's mother, gives a life time performance worthy of an Oscar. This representation of cancer (evil) within our midst is what makes us all become monsters. Understanding Ronnie drives us to feel love, sympathy, and hatred all in one. What makes it even more putrid is Larry Hedge's (Noah Emmerich) despicable behavior in light of all that we know is right. Will it be Ronnie or the two adulterers, Sarah (Kate Winslet) or Brad (Patrick Wilson) that we should make our object of blame? It's not really us to judge. In doing so, we become our own enemy. When do you draw the line? Fields puts us in the driver's seat whether we know it or not.

Jennifer Connelly fits her role perfectly as well as all the other cast members. A must see for all conscientious adults who are wanting to make sense in their own time.

Kabluey (2007)

Prendergast Strike Gold In This Hilarious Indie Comedy

[10/10 · 10 July 2010]

Not many things in life are worth watching that will inspire you to laugh at other people's crazy situations more than this film. Filmed in and around Austin, TX, this 86 minute film wins you heart by captivating you with a surrealistic story-line that depicts the players lives as pure chaos.

Our hilariously funny young man Scott Prendergast makes his feature film debut as the lead role, director, and writer. Prendergast strikes pay dirt on this one, making it fun to be quirky and strange. This sort of life imitating art is perfectly balance off as Salman (Prendergast) is suddenly thrust into the middle of his sister-in-law Leslie's (Lisa Kudrow) miserable situation as a wife with two small bratty kids trying to make ends meet while her husband serves another tour in Irag.

It's quite hard to pick up on but Suze (Teri Garr) is supposedly the mother of Leslie (Lisa Kudrow). This actually happened once before on Friends (1994) with Phoebe's character.

The most disturbing things about this film, is that Salman has no way of controlling his two nephews, Lincoln (Landon Henninger) and Cameron (Cameron Wofford). It's amazing that the uncle didn't hurt this one kid who poured something like comet in his mouth while he was sleeping. Ironically, when Salman finally wears his blue dot suit to the birthday party. The children completely change when they discover that Salman is inside the suit. They win a new respect for Salman since they think he's some kind of super hero.

Leslie finds Salman a job at her defunct DotCom company BlueNexion. We find that Salman has no idea what he has gotten himself into. Kathleen (Conchata Ferrell) steals the show as Salman's stressed out employer who recruits him to go out into the middle of the country wearing the company mascot suite and pass out fliers. Ferrell small fits of rage with cursing, and the tantrums she has while hiring Salmans is completely unexpected. Every moment she's on screen is absolutely hysterical. Even though she's supposedly playing this seriously, the comedic nature of it all was way too funny. Too bad she doesn't have a show like Carol Burnett did.

Kudrow plays this role with dignity and believability. It's not what I'm certainly used to with her roles, however, it is played so well she should have gotten an award for it. You could almost, for a few moments feel the pain in her life and the trouble she faces as an abandoned and troubled mother. The strong supporting cast also includes Angela Sarafyan as the weird grocery-store clerk named Ramona. Teri Garr plays a believable deranged woman who lost her savings with BlueNexion and takes it out on the company's big blue mascot. Christine Taylor has a very small part as Betty yet she gets a higher billing than Teri Garr. Jeffrey Dean Morgan is pretty good as Brad, one of the corporate bosses who seems to have a few tricks up his sleeve with his office secretary, Leslie.

Roddy Bottum's makes all that you see much better with his charming and unconventional score that keeps the movie rolling right along. Their seems to have a lot of time put into the closing credit by introducing 4 or 5 really short, but interest sets of animation using the BlueDot guy. Perhaps one of the funniest scenes of the film was one where the blue kabluey guy ganged up with cheese-girl taking Polaroids of Brad at the Motel with his other girlfriend.

Don't miss this film if you can help it. There are many things enjoyable in life & this is one.

The Lovely Bones (2009)

Seems to Have a Perfect Balance of Elements For Virtue Under Extreme Distress!

[9/10 · 4 July 2010]

We see here in this film a culmination of many pathways of different experiences coming together for a truly superb film. This journey may only be compared to a cross between "Stir of Echoes" & "What Dreams May Come". Although the first person narrative may have been somewhat overdone at times, it was there to tell a story through the eyes & mind of a child who still had an innocence. It might be hard after years of living in this cruel world to all of a sudden start writing a screenplay with such innocence. We all to often want to start saying that it is unimaginable or way to sappy for anyone to have that sort of innocence at 14 years old. I find it even hard to believe knowing realistically how adolescents now actually think. Maybe Susie Salmon (Saoirse Ronan) lives a really sheltered life with no internet or much television back in 1973. Child molesters and serial killers weren't actually in the mainstream news back then.

Irish born Saoirse Ronan makes the film work for everyone involved. Without her, the film would never have made such an impact. I wouldn't dare say that her acting skills were any more or less than any other performer, but being gifted at such a young age surely will make it much easier for her to land herself in other powerful and meaningful rolls in the future. Unfortunately she didn't land on the list for an Oscar.

All the main players in this film delivered outstanding & believable performances. Taking special notice to Mark Wahlberg who plays the estranged father Jack Salmon. His acting skills have improved immensely since some of his other important films. Rachel Weisz was extremely convincing as a concerned & loving mother. Grandma Lynn (Susan Sarandon) was a bit distracting at times, but delivers a brake in tension with comedy, lending itself to a good release when things are sad. George Harvey (Stanley Tucci) was as creepy as they come. No one can say that Tucci can't act. He's probably the most versatile actors I've seen.

What many have said about the film is that the computer graphics displaced the overall 1973 feel of the story-line. Most could argue that, to be a really memorable film, it has to be down to earth, and leave out all the complicated elements. Director Jackson may have alienated many people with the technology because that probably saw the polished glimmer of fantasy middle-life (Limbo) and began losing interest in the power of the story. The story is truly unforgettable, but might miss a mark or 2 with core elements by electroplating everything over with too much far-out visuals.

Critics of film can be quite cruel and unforgiving when it comes to telling why certain things might have been responsible for ruining a film for them. I didn't really imagine what the film would have been like without the bells & whistles, since I connected the visual allusions to explanation (by Susie's narrative) to what I was viewing on the screen. I still felt as any protective father would; grieving, joyful, tense, thrilled, angry, heartbroken, vigilant, and blameful.

The scene of Linsey Salmon (Rose McIver) breaking in Harvey's home was extremely suspenseful. Conflict resolution stages dealing with the discovery & the ending didn't quite work out for me, however, I can see why the surprise about what Susie's unfinished business really meant more to her than helping expose her killer.

If you really make the effort to delve into this film, you will come out with a few tears rolling down you face.

Crazy Heart (2009)

Bridges Lives a Dream as Bad Blake, A Semi-Celeb on the Mend!

[10/10 · 4 July 2010]

When Thomas Cobb wrote this novel around 1988, he probably wasn't thinking to the future of how true it is when we hear others say how life imitates art. Well, get this! Ryan Bingham, who plays Tony (the musician Bad talks to at the bowling alley) is a real-life 30 year old rising country-rock star from Hobbs, New Mexico. Bingham co-wrote "The Weary Kind" with T-Bone Burnett. Bingham's recording of "The Weary Kind" won a Golden Globe & an Oscar for Best Original Song. The real Ryan Bingham won an Oscar while a fictional Ryan Bingham, played by George Clooney in "Up in the Air" 2009, who was nominated the same year, did not. That's really freaky.

When Bad Blake (Jeff Bridges) gets on stage, the world stands still to watch & listen as this veteran country music legend departs the wise old words of life in his songs. Actually Jeff Bridges had a long time appreciation for T-Bone Burnett, who worked on the music score on the "The Big Lebowski 1998). Jeff only agreed to play the role if T-Bone Burnett agreed to contribute a track for him to play on screen.

Married 4 times with a son to boot, Bad can't remember a time when he performed without getting lit. Once on the wagon, he made this comment to Wayne after performing his first sober performance. Alcohol changes the way you saw things. A more colorful person comes out of long term contemplation of sorrow behind a bottle, sitting on a barstool, regretting everything you did & said wrong. Actually, the best line in the film was said by Bad, "Whole worlds have been tamed by men who ate biscuits." There's not enough dark matter in the universe to fill over all the guilt you have for messing up things.

Scott Cooper, who originally wrote the screenplay as well as directed & shot this film in 24 days, does a wonderful job bringing this character to life. Although there were a few goofs in the film (nothing outstanding), the film would have been much better in my opinion if they had they kept the long scene labeled Bad relapses in the film and off the editing floor. This scenes includes a hilariously tipsy woman named Donna (Annie Dorley) who happens to be drinking in a local bar. Since the entire scene was removed, it only appears under the deleted scenes area where Dorley does get mentioned. We soon find Bad and her asleep in the back seat of his truck awaking in a drunken stupor and discover his truck will not start. Bad gets out to go for help and winds up falling down on his but in the muddy ground in the middle of a rainstorm. Typically watching a squalling man lying in the mud would only make people angry, but knowing how talented this guy is, you really start feeling sorry for him.

Bad's relationship with Jean Craddock (Maggie Gyllenhaal) starts out quite nice, but somehow, Bad has trouble keeping women for very long. Although he's trying real hard, she wants a perfect man and can't put with his miserable self destructive qualities. I can't really say whether Bad deserved her rejection the way it turned out, but hey, that the movies. I don't have any idea why Bad didn't wind up dead in a broken down sleazy motel dead of alcohol poisoning.

The best thing in Bad's life happens to be an old bar owner named Wayne (Robert Duvall). Duvall's role in "Tender Mercies" happens to happens to parallel "Crazy Heart" in a lot of ways and won Duvall and Academy Award as well. Thanks to Toby Keith for allowing Bridges & Colin Farrell to perform at the Journal Pavilion in Albequerque.

Up in the Air (I) (2009)

Probably The Best Clooney Can Ever Get! Superb

[10/10 · 3 July 2010]

There is no way that I could pass up the opportunity to review this film. This one superbly traps us up in the underpinnings of real life situational irony that only gives us few clues about who this guy, Jet-set Ryan Bingham (George Clooney) really is. The writing is always witty, drastically depressing (yet satirically hilarious) in places and always manages to deliver up an heir of living with purpose by the book and on the clock. Produced by Ivan & Jason Reitman, Jason gets totally behind this project by directing/co-writing this story along with Sheldon Turner pitching in on the screenplay.

This Ryan "guy" initially comes across as way too simple minded for me; the outward facade of a study in timing and efficiency. Everybody knows one of these "guys". It soon becomes evident that our guy is comfortable convincing himself & others of his total belief that he indeed has the perfect life. His only goal in life seems to become 1 of only 7 who hold the elite distinction of having flown 10 million miles with American Airlines. Don't get me wrong about this. My traveling days peeked with 12 take offs & landings in one week on commercial airlines across the U.S. in the late 80s & early 90s. I also had a severely depressing job selling computer software directly to funeral homes. Of course, people are still dying to get into the computer (pun intended)! Clooney reminds me of myself here. He's proud of the fact that he, of all the people in the world, is a "total professional" at firing people. He's proud of his corporate raider downsizing technique. Traveling lightly is not just an art, it's a necessity. Clooney gives us certain glimpses of this guy's soul (what makes him tick) to the tune of "I started out as a diamond, so don't rub coal on me" as opposed to "I'm just a lump of coal but I'm going to be a diamond someday." Jumping in bed with just anyone couldn't really happen with this guy. He totally falls for the gal that's his female counterpart he meets during connections at an airport bar watering hole.

Reitman & Turner create this world of words that is hard to duplicate with boring people. The quick witted banter is totally heady & shoots straight from the hip. The counterpart role of Alex Goran (Vera Farmiga) is comfortably romantic & played attractively & honestly. Little do we know whats really around the bend.

Fascinating things happen when Natalie Keener (Anna Kendrick) come into the picture. The down time, disappointment, & anxiety all build us up to the eventual meltdown/refreeze. Our "guy" Ryan really is a fascinating & caring person, yet somehow doesn't have the family roots to bring him back home much. Only his sister Julie (Melanie Lynskey) getting married (whom he isn't close with) will bring him back home to northern Minnesota. Sometimes he is comically depressing; other times, it's just plain common sense.

Just when you think he's headed for the pasture, things head "back east" for him & you somehow feel that same ole' familiar "guy" slipping back into his comfort zone, up in the air.

The cast is balanced off with funny people such as the groom Jim Miller (Danny McBride), the boss in Omaha, Craig Gregory (Jason Bateman), depressing people like Bob (JK Simmons) & Samuels (Steve Eastin), and last (but not least) Maynard Finch (Sam Elliot-Ghost Rider 2007). Funny that after 67 years, Elliot is still churning the butter. He & Kate Capshaw really where the hot tamales in The Quick & The Dead 1987.

Breach (2007)

Hanssen Caught in 2001, A True Story, And A Must See

[9/10 · 29 June 2010]

This film by Billy Ray (Shattered Glass) tells this remarkable story of how Hanssen was eventually exposed and how the F.B.I. worked over the final two months of his employment at the agency to try and infiltrate his circle and make a case using all their available resources at the highest level of the bureau.

On February 20, 2001, FBI agent Robert Hanssen was arrested by an agency task force and charged with selling the highest and most classified of the government's secrets to the Soviet Union. His case would later identify him as the biggest spy in American history who's sharing of sensitive documents and information lead to the death of at least three operatives while exposing some of the nation's highest confidential secrets and operations.

Chris Cooper (Adaptation) plays Hanssen. He is a church going family man that at first hardly mirrors the monster that the agency is determined to expose. Ryan Phillippe (Crash) plays Eric O'Neill, an agent wannabe that is assigned to work as Henssen's clerk in an attempt to follow, document & spy on his move in an attempt to help the F.B.I. build their case. Their relationship for two months will lead to the downfall of Hanssen's operations and would leave a black mark on the government agencies in a year that presented its own problems by 9/11.

The film is less concerned with big action scenes than with examining the relationship between these 2 very different men set in unwitting opposition to one another. Hanssen himself was a mass of immense hypocrisies & contradictions. As a devout Catholic, he attends Mass religiously, recites the rosary everyday, and looks with disdain upon homosexuals, women who wear pants & anybody seemingly to the left politically of extreme conservatism. Yet, despite his outward display of moral rectitude, Hanssen secretly distributes porn videos of his wife (she is unaware of their existence) and betrays his country by turning over classified information to the enemy. O'Neill finds himself simultaneously drawn to & repulsed by the man, who manages to be both prig and libertine at one and the same time. O'Neill knows that what Hanssen is doing is terribly wrong, yet he can't help falling under the spell of a man he knows that, under other circumstances, might well come to value as a friend & a mentor.

In July of the same year, Hanssen was tried and convicted for 15 counts of espionage. Followers of the Robert Hanssen case believe that Hanssen's primary motive was to show his own importance (as a information security planner) by revealing holes in the system that he would have plugged. I wish this film would have worked with that a bit, because this notion of helping the system by hurting is system is both what the story could have been about and the means used to tell the story.

A news documentary which ran on Dateline on 3/5/2001 outlined the way Robert Hanssen communicated his information to re-establish new protocol to pass information over 6000 pages of documents/data that was worth hundreds of millions of dollars.

Great roles were delivered as well by Laura Linney, Gary Cole, Dennis Haysbert, Kathleen Quinlan, & Tom Barnett to name a few.

Interesting trivia: In the opening, code quickly flashes & is reduced to the movie title. The scrolling code is a Linux procedure that mounts (connects to) networked data sources such as Unix, Windows and Novell file systems. The real Hanssen commonly used a quote about purple pissin' Japanese which led to his capture.

Streets of Blood (2009 Video)

A Straight to Video Film With No Eddie Murphy? Why?

[5/10 · 28 June 2010]

Set on the backdrop of devastated New Orleans after the Katrina, the partner of Detective Andy Devereaux (Val Kilmer) is found dead. Devereauz soon teams up with Stan Green (50 Cent) as new partner. During the investigations, an undercover DEA agent is murdered by two dirty police officers who are corrupt and power hungry. I can't forget the segment where the drug dealers are hanging at the house listening to loud music and having sex with the women.

The precinct's psychologist Nina Ferraro (Sharon Stone) has successive interviews with Andy, Stan and the two perpetrators of the shooting. Meanwhile, the FBI also investigate the corruption in the police force leaded by Agent Brown (Michael Biehn).

Kilmer's and 50 Cent's chemistry is crucial for this film to work out. Unfortunately, it's just too disappointing that they don't deliver in that aspect because the script is fairly engaging at times. The viewer has to be witness to this vile & grim view of crime & how it affects the characters who are being watched as they are supposed to just protect & serve our interest but obviously are not. The shaky digital camera works in this instance because nothing about this bleak world we are entering should be represented with the opposite of beauty which is filth & grime. The camera is all over the place, barely ever still. There seems to be only a few long shots that turn out any longer than maybe five or so seconds before switching angles. Even though the plot gets messy & is a bit hard to follow, we must always remember that life in the projects gets quite blurry sometime, not sure if we understand who the heroes or the villains really are, yet this paradox only adds realism to the film. All the players in this film are corrupt in some fashion. We assume they all are worldly guys that are not always saints that do special things, yet this street-wise quality makes the characters look really believable. Val Kilmer is playing cop who never took bribes but constantly brakes laws, makes illegal searches & plants evidences to get drug dealers or simply kills them. But despite of this, he is a man of strong principles. His own principles. 50 Cent is playing his partner who, torn by Kilmer's methods, always covered his back & secretly steals money from busts when he had the opportunity.

I'm going to point my finger at Kilmer's disconnection here since I thought that 50 CENT tried to show emotions half of the time, but Kilmer never really engaged his guilt. Yet still, Kilmer seems to be barely mumbling, making it hard to understand him at times. Maybe that's the way the director wanted him to come over as a cursing bad guy or something, but it didn't hardly work for me mostly. Sharon Stone was not really a good pick for this piece since it was much harder for me to believe in her Cajun accent.

Overall the plot is just a bit too confusing and the story seems to roam. I still do not understand the end in that it didn't seem to be set up well in the earlier stages of the film. There was a scene when one of the guys got shot up against some food trailer and he smeared blood all over the side of the trailer where it said something about roasted rooster balls. I guess that was an ironic end to his vengeful demise? As I stated the script could have been a great deal stronger and the the acting by 50 cent could have be a great deal better, however, I'm sure, for him as a rapper, it's probably hard for him to feel comfortable playing a street cop.

Knocked Up (2007)

Apatow Takes Realism To The Limits & Brings It Back

[7/10 · 28 June 2010]

Let's just say for all intents and practical purposes you are totally bored with real stupid comedy and you've watched up all your soap operas. Where do you soon turn? Of course, where else will most agreeably turn when everything else fails? The DVD Comedy Section! Judd Apatow takes his views on life, love, and comedy very seriously. So seriously that he continues to pour out film after film of hilarious uncharted territory we all can not seem to get enough of.

Like most films Apatow produces, we learn to expect a different kind of experience. Apatow normally, if not mostly, likes to push the envelope as far as possible on what the audience perceives as either plain stupid, ignorant, gross, profane, incoherent, embarrassing, in your face, or unacceptable when it comes to embracing the current common societal views on decency. Apatow somehow is able to walk this thin line in his films without totally alienating most people. The common thread in most all of his films seems to revolve around characters that we somehow would love to hate, however, can't seem to ever get to that point. We always conditionally forgive these people regardless of how they act. Most of the characters tend to always redeem themselves with us before the film ends.

The common fallacy we might make when trying to explain a film to someone who hasn't seen it before is saying something like, "Hey man! Have you seen that film called Knocked Up? That was totally awesome!". Of course when the person, that doesn't really understand that you are a film expert film buff, goes home and watches it, then they might never listen to another one of your opinions again. Mostly, the film as with any film, either has a shelf life (i.e. A life of its own or it doesn't).

My opinion is meaningless when it comes to judging a comedy. We just have to see if it's going to be a long-term forgettable film like "Flashdance", or something else. I'm certainly not knocking the directing talent of Adrian Lyne or Don Simpson as a producer, but there is so far a film can carry you after 30 years. For instance, I can only remember the gal (Jennifer Beals), I thought I would never see again in another film, and the Michael Simbelo "Maniac" song. I'm certainly glad the Jennifer Beals didn't just disappear from the scene, but she has hardly starred in another major role in her acting career. Jennifer is definitely still holding her own and looking better than ever, which is a miracle. She is only about 6 months younger than me, and my body looks like it's been trampled by a herd of hippos. I'm just saying, in trying to pinpoint a single formula that makes Apatow's films so very memorable, you'll just have to go back and watch it 20 years later. That's the most important litmus test for the next generation of comedy analyzers.

Some say that the inner sanctum of loving a film is loving the main character. Seth Rogen is definitely fun and delivers us the most astonishing silliness one could ever imagine. Ben Stone is a likable guy who could just as well be your best friend or cousin. Bad behavior is expected along the way and Rogen as Stone delivers it up as best he knows how. Simply put, you actually feel sorrow for this green and pitiful idiot who has no clue how he has screwed his life up. Instead of taking us down an even more pitiful story-line, Apatow shows us that even this guy can make good decisions and turn his life around. Cheers to everyone who made Knocked Up!!!

Sexy Beast (2000)

Interesting British Gangster Film With Several Surprising Twists

[7/10 · 28 June 2010]

First-time feature director Jonathan Glazer (who earned his stripes shooting videos for Massive Attack and Radiohead) does an amazing job of keeping everything in perspective while giving the film his own personal imprint.

What makes this film so rewarding is that it constantly ups the ante, never once settling for the conventional. It never misses an opportunity to surprise or excite the viewer.

The film originally premiered in September of 2000 at the Toronto International Film Festival, then opened in January 2001 in the UK and worked its way to the US in June. Superior writing, acting, and direction almost always define a great film & this one has it all. Screenwriters Louis Mellis and David Scinto create a battle of wills and words that gives the likes of David Mamet & Steven Berkoff a run for their money. The film veers from comedy to drama & back again without skipping a beat.

The film picks up with the sunning by the pool of Gary 'Gal' Dove (Ray Winstone), a noticeably British bloke who happens to be a so-called fat-cat UK mobster who has obviously hit his retirement with a perfect zest and zeal for the good life. Our slightly overweight ex-villain has a thick working-class accent who seems to be passing his time away lounging on his bright white Costa del Sol sun-deck in his skimpy yellow Euro Speedos talking to himself about how "bloody 'ot" it is. The nuance of his relaxation is heightened by the playing of the song "Peaches" by the punk band called The Stranglers.

Suddenly a huge boulder careens down the Spanish hillside above Gal's opulent stucco villa and crashes into the pool, missing Gal by inches.

Gal is married to Deedee (Amanda Redman), who he dearly loves, but somehow has gotten past all the sordid past of her being a former porn-queen whose nickname turns out to be "dirty Deedee". — are sitting around in a restaurant waiting for their friends Aitch (Cavan Kendall) and Jackie (Julianne White) to join them. You can barely understand a word out of Aitch's mouth but Jackie looks worried. Very worried, in fact. Within minutes, the fear on her dining companions' faces is palpable.

Don Logan wants Gal to do a job. He's picking a team and he wants the very best. This Friday, at the Grosvenor Hotel. London. Gal wants none of it. He's retired, remember? "I'm retired," he tells Jackie.

"Well, you can tell him yourself," says Jackie. "He's on his way over." Don doesn't take no for an answer. Cutting to a shot of bald-headed Don (Sir Ben Kingsley) striding ardently through a crowded airport & you already know there's going to be some kind of trouble.

Certainly Kingsley is formidable (in a role the Gandhi man appears to relish), but Winstone is equal to him in a less flamboyant performance. Amanda Redman (Deedee) also deserves recognition; she reacts a lot with her eyes, especially in the presence of Don threatening thug, but her performance is beautifully subtle, yet extremely effective. Ian McShane provides additional malevolence in the brooding black-attired form of arch-villain Teddy Bass.

The film has its violent moments, of course, a lot of them verbal (Don Logan is a walking, talking Molotov cocktail of viciousness and slurs), but the film is more likely to be remembered for its humor and Gal's undying love for his wife.

Cavan Kendall, who plays Aitch (Gal's best friend), soon passed at the age of 57 shortly after the making of this film. Julianne White, who is Australian plays her character quite well also.

The Life Before Her Eyes (2007)

A film achievement for Ukranian Born Vadim Perelman

[10/10 · 22 June 2010]

This film shows us some of the best cinematography I've seen in years & is a masterpiece. Ukranian born Vadim Perelman comes back with sheer & utter blinding talent on this film after his debut as a screenwriter and director for House of Sand & Fog (2003) starring Ben Kingsley & Jennifer Connelly. Cinema is much more interesting when new directors try new exciting ways of telling a story. I can't wait to see Perelman's third film Poltergeist hopefully to be out in 2013.

Creating the sequences in The Life Before Her Eyes must have been nerve-racking; trying to decipher life into tiny moments by editing various time frames together to make an extremely intelligent and complex interplay of images. We seldom if ever find a film that captures the fleetingness of life in such a philosophical and allegorical way. The use of a superb mixture of images, motif, sound, timing, smart dialogue, use of replay for traumatic overture & cascading suspense, mystery, casting, direction, editing, & acting all give this film every ingredient for top notch rating and life-long impact.

The sound conflict-resolution theme allows the viewer to expect more from this film, promising us to deliver the right message at the right time, often bring us just a step away from the precipice, but always jerking us back in the nick of time to prepare us for the next series of revealing sequences. The film quickly establishes the main characters, who play a very important role in the telling. Diana is doubly played as young (Evan Rachel Wood) and the 15 years older (Uma Thurman). Both roles are played with believability. Wood holds her own against the backdrop of a much more mature Thurman since Wood's eyes look to tell everything about her in seconds. A picture can do that, yet not many actors are interesting enough to have that Hollywood starlet allure, yet both Wood & Thurman seem to capture the essence of the role and play it convincingly well.

Funny that the working title of this film was changed from "In Bloom" back to The Life Before Her Eyes". It would almost seem a better name for the film as to not give away the experience of watching the film unfold without any clues or cues as to what may transpire. The Turkish title Bir nefeste hayat translates out to "The Life in a breath".

Certain lines in this films tend to set you on either euphoria or the precipice. The lines most interestingly positioned in the film for maximum effect are "Conscience is the voice of GOD, the nature and heart of man." "The heart is the body's strongest organ." A fact "72% of the body is composed of water. Also, when Michael says "If I don't kill you, who should I kill?" Symbolism is used throughout this film. The master of symbols used in this film has to be the symbolic nature of water to represent life & death. We see this death metaphor played out in humanity with the phrases "River of Life", "Crossing Over Jordan", & the piercing of Jesus's side & the mixing of blood with water. The secondary motif often used is flowing blood. A third motif is blinding fog.

James Horner, who also worked with the director of this film on House of Sand and Fog, delivers a haunting music score, which adds to the David Lynchian style of sensory overload. The overall haunting effect of this film on your senses makes this 2002 novel written by Laura Kasischke a perfect career debut film choice for screenplay writer Emil Stern III wrote the screenplay for Tenderness (2009 Russell Crow).

Come Early Morning (2006)

A great film - But my review contain SPOILERS

[7/10 · 13 June 2010]

Amazingly enough, I knew segments of this film were being shot right down the street from my house here in North Little Rock in 2003, yet never got to see the film when it was released. I finally watched it here at the house this past June weekend.

Although Joey Lauren Adams originally wrote the role of Lucy to play herself, she soon found it harder than she had imagined and got Ashley Judd to play the lead role instead. That was probably a wonderful idea although Ms. Adams is quite a talented actor.

It took me a while to figure out the underlying message in this film, because it is presented in an almost silent and subtle way. One wanting happiness, but never really finding it. "One wanting something good in life, but nothing is worth having" type of message. We find out quite quickly that Lucy (Judd) has a taste for beer and pool halls. She shows us how miserable she really is in life, although she is trying extremely hard to come to grips with her family's skeletons.

We never really get a feel for what the matter was between her and her Papa played by Pat Corley. All that we are able to gather, Lucy's father has moved back from somewhere and we know that Nana (Diane Ladd) has had previous conversations with him without prior knowledge. Diane Ladd is a wonderful actor who has been around in television and film for 52 years and I hope she gets to act as long as she can. We are made to feel a sense of almost desperation in Lucy as she tries to remain impervious to love. When she meets Cal Percell (Jeffrey Donovan) for the first time, we see the sparks fly in both directions, but we somehow know that Lucy can't decide to make anything good stick long enough to her ribs to make a difference.

****************************** SPOILERS ******************************* Lucy struggles to find answers to her tremendous incessant remorse with her punishing habits of getting drunk and tying one on with any man that happens to catch her eye. Cal makes a comment that typically says it all. Cal asks Lucy "When was the last time that you kissed someone sober?" Lucy attends a local church with her father and soon has a meltdown while seeking answers to one of life's most difficult decisions one has to eventually make.

Proper counsel with the very colorful pastor of the Holy Roller Church as it is referred to in the film does Lucy much good. She realizes that she has to forgive, not only others, but herself. The film takes a few disappointing turns toward the end, but still delivers to wrap up the story by easily making us aware that Lucy was about to leave her old ways behind and finally break free from her past so that she can really know what love is. The old adage is so true; before you fall in love, you need to love yourself.

Director Joey Lauren Adams won the Women in Film Crystal Awards Dorothy Arzner Directors Award in 2006 for this film. Additional notice should be mentioned for the role of Uncle Tim (Tim Blake Nelson) and the roommate Kim (Laura Prepon) who both played memorable roles. Laura Prepon grew up in the north, so it was a pleasure to see her play such a wonderfully simple southern beauty.

Thanks to the church and band members, the pastor, and Lyle's Starstudded Honky-Tonk Band. Don't let me forget two biggest guys Lucy loved dearly, Owen Allen (Stacy Keach), and Bob (Ritchie Montgomery).

Joey, I hope you make more films in Arkansas because it's such a wonderful state to be from. Let's not for Grandmother "Doll" (Candyce Hinkle) who had a very small role but did great. Great Job!