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tax_man
Reviews
Across the Universe (2007)
Ham-handed and vapid.
I'm tempted to spill my credentials when it comes to Beatles music, but it's not exactly material in reviewing this movie purely on its own merits, so I'll resist.
There's good and there's bad, but if my score is any indication, the bad greatly outweighs the good.
The good: Some decent song renditions, and a misplaced Joe Cocker. If this movie wasn't attempting to have a consistent plot, it'd be a fun collection of mediocre music videos, and I'd be less strict about judging it, but alas...
The bad: ...there is an attempt to portray a story. It's vapid to say the least, and inexistent if you're truly critical. As a result, the characters are two-dimensional and uninteresting. The movie flows along at an astoundingly disjointed pace, creating any and every excuse to have a musical segment possible - usually falling flat on its face in the process - with the most literal interpretations of the songs possible and some truly poor imagery and symbolism.
As if the audience didn't have enough of being slapped in the face with giant Uncle Sam poster singing "I want you," the movie depicts just about every 60's cliché you can imagine. There's a clone for Janis and a clone for Jimi, a naked, scant Vietnam War subplot, Timothy Leary and Ken Kesey (Bono is just a giant turd after all) references, Greenwich Village; it's as if they just stuck as many 60's events as they could into a bowl, randomly arranged them in a line, and decided to order the movie as such. The whole affair is a mess, but in the end the events just resolve themselves with no real actions taken by the characters.
The worst part about this movie is that there will be people that absolutely love it. They'll call it "sweet," or "pretty," or "fun." It's safe to say that, if they do, you can go ahead and null their opinion on movies from here on out, because this overlong, self-righteous, 60's-for-the-cell-phone-generation trash heap is none of the above.
Pauly Shore Is Dead (2003)
Making my attempt to remain objective.
You know, I don't even hate Pauly Shore nearly as much as many other people seem to, and it's still hard to remain objective during the course of this movie and actually judge it for what it's worth. Well, let me get to what I thought it was going to be.
My girlfriend and I were cruising the rental place having just returned Team America and Party Monster. I saw it on the shelf and had looked at it before, but never had the guts to rent it. So we did. We returned home, threw it in, and I started it expecting some sort of funny, dark prank where Shore went around getting interviews from famous actors and comedians about their opinions of the 'late' Pauly Shore. That would have been funny. But I can't judge the movie on my own disappointment from that aspect. This is what you actually get.
Pauly. Shore. Writing.
Yeah, that's it, let it sink in. Absorb it. It's just about as painful as it sounds. There are some decent parts, I'll give him credit for what he wrote that actually did turn out funny, but it's funny for all the wrong reasons. Your reactions might sound like, "holy hell, he actually got Tom Siezmore/Micheal Madsen/Ben Stiller/Carrot Top to do this for him?" Those parts are funny enough, but the parts with the maddened redneck and Shore undercover get just plain embarrassing. Too much of the movie is written and the acting contrasts by being half-assed by everybody but Pauly and his mother Mitzi on the phone.
The writing isn't the only bad part, though, the whole thing is done on digital film because (educated guess) it's cheaper. It just looks bad when it's not done right, and he didn't do it right. Most of the movie looks rather like a bunch of giddy little high school girls doing a project for the lit. class. Just bad choices, bad direction, really rough editing, so many things that chop away at the score.
Pauly Shore claims to have worked on this for over four years. The man needs to get a life. Buuuuuuuuuuuddy.
Gacy (2003)
Worst movie since Plan 9
So, possibly not the worst, but damned near to it. Here's the thing; I'm a psychology major with a specialization in criminal psychology. I've been working in a prison with small-time serial murderers for the past 3 years north of Atlanta, Georgia for my internship and occupation. I've extensively studied all the famous ones, Fish, Sutcliffe, Gacy, Dahmer, Gein, etc. so that I could make headway on treatment and understanding in the prison I've been working in. For all of you out there interested in the subject, the best book on the subject for those not doing, well, graduate study or anything, is My Life Among the Serial Killers by Dr. Helen Morrison. Excellent book with a large section on Gacy, her studies with him, and even his trial and execution. Not even talking from a standpoint of how it incorrectly portrays Gacy the man, but plainly from the standpoint of movies, it's terrible. It's an absolute bore; the whole movie drags and chops its way through a largely fabricated story with terrible editing, directing, and acting. Much worse, Gacy is portrayed as if his murders are driven by revenge at points, unconscious drives at others (closer to, but still not getting to the most likely causes). There is one thing that the movie did decently, and still it was nothing more than hinting at the truth. Jeff Rignall, one of his few surviving victims, was depicted as that male prostitute. He suffered severely from Gacy's treatment, including permanent and nearly fatal liver damage from the chloroform, brain damage from the near-death suffocation, and several other major medical issues along with severe developmental and psychological issues. The other victim that survived and came forward, Robert Donnelly reported almost identical occurrences as far as abduction and torture. Even then, his life did not need extra, fictitious events to dramatize it. He was an interesting enough person even when the truth is told. Come to think of it, some of the most interesting things he did were during his imprisonment up until his sentence was carried out in March of '94. Either way, if you think this movie gave you any insight into the veiled monster that Gacy really was, you're deeply mistaken. The biggest thing this movie was lacking was recognition of his inability to view other people as separate sentient human beings. That is what makes a serial killer. This movie did not portray that in any reasonable way, and it did not bring to the public any sort of idea of what Gacy was.