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QATARIAN_QUALE
Reviews
The Stupids (1996)
People take this movie more seriously than the producers did; consequently, this movie is misunderstood.
No, this movie is not artistic in any way whatsoever. No, the humor isn't all that clever. This movie is just silly, but that was what it was supposed to be in the first place.
The basic value of a movie with characters that are completely clueless as to how the world works is that they can create unrealistic situations that are hilarious. Nobody would see a huge red switch, think it was a light switch, realize it doesn't turn on the lights, and keep trying it over and over again, accidentally turning on the "applause" light at a TV studio, but it's very funny to see the reaction of the stereotypical blond actress and the talk show host when the audience claps at inopportune moments. Furthermore, the imagined scene with Christopher Lee as Sender is simply brilliant. To see such a great villainous actor, star from the old Hammer films all the way up to Lord of the Rings, act so seriously as the sinister man plotting to steal the world's garbage is simply hilarious.
Yes, very many of the scenes are weak, but they aren't so bad if you remember not to take this film seriously at all.
The Secret (2006)
This movie has a valuable point, but it is almost lost.
If times are bad for you, you will accomplish nothing by brooding over your misfortune and bottling in anger and resentment towards other, more fortunate, people.
If they had made this movie about how your attitude affects everything you do, it could have been very good. Positive thoughts foster positive actions.
But a positive imagination causes the universe to adjust itself to fit your thoughts? I'd love to show this film to an economist. Some scenes in this movie were nothing short of sickening. A man sits in his living room, imagining that he has the new car that he wants, and so he gets it. A boy spends all night thinking about a bicycle that he wants, and after a long time, he receives it as a present.
Instead of "Here's how you can sort out your priorities so that you can improve your life by changing the way you look at it," the movie almost lists its moral as "Here's how you can get everything you want and be happy because you have things." I do believe that some ideas this movie expressed were important, (the Genie, for instance, that tells you "Your wish is my command," when you think about how unfair life is, is an effective symbol for the fact that if you don't better your own situation, nobody is going to do it for you,) but at times it seems the film-maker is advocating rampant materialism. I consider myself a very happy person, but that's because I put my effort into appreciating what I already have.
The film-making of this movie is fairly effective; however, parts of this movie almost seem thrown together. I don't remember who, but someone mentions that industrial leaders of the late 19th century wanted to hide the secret from the common man. And then this comment on history is never touched upon again. The statement seems like it's arbitrarily inserted into the middle of something completely unrelated to it.
So to conclude, this movie nearly kills its own valid point by making it look like an infomercial.
The World at War (1973)
Underrated
I'm afraid I must say that 9.7 is too low a rating of this series.
It is the very definition of what a documentary should be. It tells the facts, plain and cold, and it demonstrates those facts flawlessly. I start tearing up just typing about it, thinking of Laurence Olivier dully and bluntly telling us that more than twenty million Russians died as a result of the war. The real war footage combined with the interviews of people who experienced the utter horror leave us with the old and simple question: "Why?" If you are thinking of buying this on DVD, you have already waited too long. Anybody that advocates war anywhere absolutely MUST see this movie.
If I gained access to a time machine, the very first thing I would do is take this movie with a DVD player and show it to Hitler, and he would never have started this war.
JFK (1991)
A Dangerous Film, to be Viewed with Caution
Oliver Stone is a brilliant film maker. There's no doubt about that. But if you'll notice, this movie is not a documentary. It's a dramatic story, and it's a lot farther from the truth than you'd think. I'm not talking about the theory being wrong, because it's never been disproven; I mean that some of the "facts" that it presents are simply false. I'll give some examples: 1. Lee Harvey Oswald wasn't a very good shot.
This is just wrong. Oswald was a sniper in the Marines, and I saw a documentary where someone read off of his training log. Shooting at a target of similar size to Kennedy's body and at twice the distance, he hit 48/50. On another day, he hit 49/50 under the same circumstances.
2. Garrison's moving speech.
This never happened. In real life, Garrison had absolutely no evidence against Shaw and therefore had no case.
3. A large amount of the "actual" footage of the assassination.
Stone, being a brilliant film maker, combined reenactments with real footage to create his own images.
Now I'm not saying this was a bad movie; it was excellent, but this movie is the last place you should look in deciding who you think shot the president.
The Man with the Golden Gun (1974)
This was a different form of suspense
This movie provided suspense of a separate kind developed from the similarities of James Bond and Francisco Scaramanga. The scales of the plot tilt one way and then the other until the end. The important idea of massive solar power is expressed. This movie has, this being a very large rarity, a mixture of many different genres all blended perfectly.