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Reviews
War Story (2014)
It should have been called "Snore Story"
What a waste.
We don't need to see three minutes of the heroine rearranging the furniture in her hotel room. We saw her sleep (or try to sleep). We saw her driving. We don't need to see her watching a couple in the next room having sex. (Settle down, they're on the other side of a frosted glass window.) Lots and lots and lots and lots and lots and lots of wandering around Sicily. Lots and lots of pointless looking at assorted unknown people and things. We got to watch another character wait to use the restroom; yeah, absolutely true. We even had the obligatory "brushing of the teeth" scene. Oh, I can't forget (but I wish I could) the three-minute wide static shot of a conversation with the characters in the distance. We couldn't really see their faces, so we couldn't see their facial gestures to get a sense of their emotions. It was a pretentious one-shot scene that confirmed the director's lack of talent. How artistic! Yeah, yeah, it's all character development, blah, blah, blah. No it isn't.
It ultimately took over half an hour for the story to really begin. The character's incessant pondering led me to ponder, "Is this director Mark Jackson's cinematic love letter to himself?
All the "blank" scenes in which nothing happened are, I would imagine, not just thought of (mistakenly) as "artistic" by the director, but a darn fine way to keep the budget down and an easy way to fill 90 minutes so it could be called a feature film instead of a short film - it looks better on the resume, I guess.
It's apparent that writer Kristin Gore and writer/director Mark Jackson have had no experience in photojournalism. I do (thankfully never in a conflict), and I've worked with people who have been in war zones. Yes, some war photographers suffer PTSD. Yes, some conflict photographers abuse alcohol and drugs. Rather than showing her at work, even in flashbacks, we have a conversation that tells us all about war photographers. (We even get to hear the almost required tired phrase, "It's what we do..") Talking about whatever is the cheap, cheating way out; they're called "motion PICTURES" for a reason. The traumatic experiences that shaped the character should be shown, even in a quick flashback,, not talked about. (And no, I'm not a war movie lovin' kinda' guy. I usually avoid those.)
The cast was good, no complaints there, although sadly everyone's acting skills were wasted. They gave good performances in a bad film. (Kingsly only had about five minutes of screen time; he's a great actor, but his appearance was huge waste of money.)
War Story isn't "artistic." Instead, it shows a lack of understanding about how to tell a compelling story about interesting characters through film. It's truly self-indulgent on a level rarely achieved. It's pretentious. It's a waste of money, a waste of effort, a waste of great actors, and even a waste of my own time. Bravo, Mark Jackson!, you got a free trip to Italy out of the deal.
This should have been a short film, 20 minutes at most. It _might_ have had a shot of being entertaining in that case... but probably not even then.
If you can't keep people interested by giving them a little entertainment, then all the artistry packed into a film means absolutely nothing. (We can be entertained by films with mature subjects and themes, believe it or not.)
I'm a film snob and I love great artistic films, but even that love of film couldn't get me to feel warm and fuzzy about War Story.
I hate this film.
The Phenom (2016)
Not your standard film, and that's a good thing
As others have mentioned, this was more of a character study than a film about baseball. It could have been a film about being an artist, an executive, pretty much anybody who finds themself under unwanted pressure from an outside source.
There were a few odd stylistic choices in the directing, but those odd choices worked for the most part. The director took some gambles, and I'm looking forward to seeing more of his work. It's refreshing to see something surprising (unlike those tired, old super hero movies).
My only real complaint is so minor it's comical - I didn't like Ethan Hawke's flat top hair cut. It just didn't seem to fit. A buzz cut, yes, but not a flat top. This wasn't 1958.
If you're a fan of the same old ordinary movie with no surprises, this isn't for you. But if you love film as entertainment _and_ art, then The Phenom is one to consider.
Hesher (2010)
Horrendously, incredibly stupid
First, the good points. Devin Brochu does a fine job as T. J. Forney, the only realistic major character in the film. Everyone did a fine job; the cast was top notch.
Now the bad points. The characters.
Hesher was way too over-the-top, which could have been acceptable if we'd had even the slightest bit of back story.
Paul Forney, the dad, was way too passive, even for someone in the deepest depression. You don't think he would have at least called the police when he found Hesher in his house?
Natalie Portman was Natalie Portman, what can you say? Slightly nervous, downtrodden. You know, the standard role written for her.
Sorry, but I just can't get over the... well, antics is too soft a word. Okay, I can't get over the anti-social and criminal acts Hesher engages in, with absolutely no push-back from anyone. In the real world, Hesher would have/should have been arrested half a dozen times.
This was truly a rotten film, but it could have been a lot better with even slightly more realistic characters.
Ugh.
Courier X (2016)
Remarkably Mediocre
Well, it started out well, with a bit of "what the heck is he doing" intrigue, but that didn't last long. My impression is that the director was trying too hard to make a good movie, if you can imagine that. I think it would have been a much better film in the hands of a different director.
I'm not the smartest guy in the world (but I'm also not stupid), but I found the story to be VERY hard to follow. I didn't get the connection between the airplane crash, the drug smuggling, or any of the other stuff. (For the record, their discussion of modifying a surface-to-air missile wouldn't have worked for their needs.)
For the most part, the acting was average. There were a few that rose above that, primarily, for me, by delivering lines realistically. This isn't the kind of film that called for emotional acting, which is a good thing because many of the actors seemed a little stilted in their performances.
Some of the editing decisions were a little strange, random very quick cuts away from the speaker with no real motivation for the cut. In some cases, there were weirdly random shots of a character not really doing anything, sort of a bridge between scenes.
There was a problem with the sound editing. When shooting a film, the location sound mixer will record "room tone," basically the sound of the location and nothing else - no dialog, no foot shuffling, nothing. That nearly blank sound is used to fix mismatches in the audio. In the case of this film, you'd see one character in a room lit by fluorescent lights, along with the minor hum the lights give off. But when cutting to the other actor, we'd hear the lights but the humming would be a little louder. The recorded (or possibly never recorded) room tone should have been used to smooth out the sound differences.
The music chosen for the film, playing almost continuously throughout, reminded me of what would have been used in a second-rate TV drama from the 2000s or 2010s. Not bad music, just used too much in the film and way too generic.
So as I started watching the film, I thought to myself, "This could be good." And it quickly went downhill.
MK Ultra (2022)
How to Make a Movie Without Really Trying
It's easy to make a movie when your script is only half the length of a feature film - fill the finished product with lots of shots of people doing interesting things like driving, smoking, contemplating. Don't forget to include shots of things completely unrelated to the film: a rag on a fence, a wet road...
I have patience, I really do, but filmmakers need to honor the patience true film fans give them, and these filmmakers (like so many other unknowns) have abused that trust.
The cinematography and sound design are really good, but all that is thrown away by a story that just about doesn't exist.
Please, movie watching public, don't waste your time with this one.
Mulholland Falls (1996)
All-Star Thud
If you've seen "Once Were Warriors," Tamahori's film right before this one, you'd see that he really knows how to direct a riveting film. "Mulholland Falls" makes me wonder if his earlier film was just a fluke, a lucky strike.
Tamahori clumsily mixed a serious noir film with misplaced bits of humor. It's hard to describe, but it wasn't done well. Aside from that, the person that committed the murder would be someone unlikely to do so. (I don't want to spoil it by mentioning more about this.) The whole airplane fight scene was a bit silly.
Much of the dialog, especially near the beginning of the film, felt false, as if the writer was trying a little too hard to set the time the film takes place.
With such a huge cast of skilled actors, I was really hoping for more.
The Lobster (2015)
It takes a devoted film fan to watch this, and I thought it was worth two hours
There was definitely a lot said in the film, even though the characters - by intent - often had little to say.. What they did say was always in a monotone - by intent.
I kept passing on watching this, then I gave it a shot one time and got maybe a minute or two into it and gave up for some unknown reason. But tonight it seemed like the most intriguing thing I had available to watch so I gave it a try, and I'm glad I did.
As at least one other reviewer has pointed out, this film does seem slow to the point of being painful at times, but that really isn't something that could have been avoided as the story really couldn't have been told any other way.
If you love to be challenged by a film and are patient, then this is one to watch.
There are a couple of things to mention. The electronic music dance scene at about an hour and 21 minutes into it is genius. The other thing is the poster design - it really says everything about the film without giving a single thing away.
Life on the Line (2015)
You'd swear this was paid for by a linemen's union
"We're linemen, boss, it's what we do."
Yeah, that should give you an idea. I lost track of how many times "the little ladies" adoringly said, "He's a lineman." I almost expected to hear angels sing whenever that was said.
Or how about, heard at least twice in a couple of variations: "You heard him, get to work."
So if it took an underling to get people working, what's the problem with the boss?"
Or the eruption of applause in the control room, reminiscent of NASA Mission Control, when the power is restored.
If that's not enough, toss in a few barely-related sub-plots that really don't serve a purpose.
Watching this was like drinking a soda that lost its fizz. It was like patiently licking a lollipop only to find there's no chewy fudge core.
Please pass the disappointing snacks; I have more movies like this to regret watching.
I Think We're Alone Now (2018)
20 minutes of story crammed into a 90 minute movie
Let me start out simply: This could have been a short film. This SHOULD have been a short film.
There seems to be a trend with "artistic" filmmakers to show us lots of pretty, atmospheric scenes at the expense of, well, at the expense of the audience. In this film, aside from the little time spent telling us a story or developing the characters, we see:
People driving (I'd say about 25% of the film was just this)
People looking (10%)
People contemplating (10%)
People waiting to say something (5%)
People walking through barren towns (10%)
People walking down deserted streets (10%)
People brushing their teeth (1%)
People barfing (1%)
People doing ordinary things (15%; I can see myself do that any time)
People looking at pictures we as the audience can't see (5%)
Assorted other wastes of time (8%)
It's getting really, really annoying that filmmakers have forgotten (or never knew) how to tell interesting stories. With this pile of dog steamer, it's gone to an extreme. It got to the point where every time I saw overly-long scenes of someone driving I'd think to myself, "Again?!" I have nothing against cinematographers (the director comes from that background), but the pretty pictures make it pretty obvious she worked in that role. ("Smoke the room! We need shafts of light!" "Hey, look at this cool cut; it's Del driving during the day and then we cut to exactly the same camera angle, but this time he's driving at night!")
Stop wasting our time stroking your egos, filmmakers. WE are the ones buying the tickets and WE are the ones keeping you employed. Craft a tight film, make sure long, idle moments actually SUPPORT the story, and give us entertainment; art should be secondary from the audience's perspective. That doesn't mean throwing artful filmmaking aside and it doesn't mean feeding us mindless dreck. Balance it.
Cowboys & Aliens (2011)
Good popcorn movie if...
Good popcorn movie if you like digging around the bottom of the bag for those tasty half-popped kernels.
The best quote from the movie: "You have to stop thinking."
That pretty much sums up the plot.
The problem with the movie is that it takes a strange mash-up and does nothing new with it. Nothing. Same old aliens that screech like all the others. Same old aliens that have scary openings that spring open like a flower. Same jump scares. Same seemingly unending action sequences. Same dramatic orchestral music. I kept thinking to myself "I hope it's over now... I hope it's over now... I hope it's over now..."
If you don't like surprises you'll love Cowboys & Aliens.
To help the filmmakers out, I've come up with some ideas for sequels:
Truckers & Aliens
Substitute Teachers & Aliens
Podiatrists & Aliens
Tax Accountants & Aliens
And best of all - Kittens & Puppies & Aliens.
Knight of Cups (2015)
This review is a primer for the ignorant masses
See Bale contemplate. Contemplate, Bale, contemplate.
See Bale reminisce. Reminisce, Bale, reminisce.
See Malick write. Write, Malick, write.
See Malick direct. Direct, Malick, direct.
See Malick and the producers lure big name actors working for scale. Lure, Malick and the producers, producers, lure. (I almost wrote manure; my bad.)
Terrence Malick knows how to write and direct; after all, he told us so by directing this. Throw _ALL_ your skills at the wall and see what sticks, eh Terry?
This was a concept thrown out by Jerry Seinfeld - a movie about nothing.
It was beautifully shot, so kudos to cinematographer Emmanuel Lubezki.
I certainly can't criticize - or praise - the cast, because no acting was involved.
I love the Malick films I've seen... until now. I'm sure this is a stunning piece of cinematic art, but it's not a movie, it's the epitome of self-indulgence. Who exactly is the audience? It's certainly not the ignorant bulk of audience members I alluded to in the review title. There's a very, very small set of cinema fans that will appreciate this, and I seriously think most of them are just posers pretending to be film snobs. (I'm a film snob, but I'm not _THAT_ much of a film snob.)
The investors dumped a whole lot of money into a film - a product, after all - with a limited customer base. Corporate leaders in the real world, ie: not Hollywood, would never let this happen. As of 2016, the film earned about $1.1 million _world-wide_. And like other Malick films, the budget for this wasn't released (or at least I couldn't find it) so we really have no idea how many film investors jumped to their deaths in Hollywood's real-world version of the crash of Wall Street.
My bafflement keeps me in good company - many of Malick's big-name cast members were as clueless about their films as I am about this one.
I tried watching this once before a few years ago and gave up after about 20 minutes, and, like with me and Brussels sprouts, I did my best to force this down my gullet. It almost came back up, and I don't mean the Brussels sprouts.
There are no spoilers in this review because there was no plot to be spoiled. Happy, happy!
The Kingdom (2007)
One third great, two-thirds stupid
What can you say about a film that dedicates a half hour or so near the end to a chase/shoot out/RPG/hand grenade/knife battle?
This could have been an 8, no problem, had they stuck with the difficulties of foreigners conducting a criminal investigation in Saudi Arabia. Sadly, the production team decided to amp up the testosterone level of all the GI Joe wannabees.
Token female on the team: CHECK
Token rescued male team member: CHECK
Explosions: CHECK
Car crashes: CHECK
Unlikely friendships forged: CHECK
Machine guns: CHECK
Hand grenades: CHECK
Rocket propelled grenades: CHECK
Five (or six? Hard to tell) people fighting off a veritable army of bad guys: CHECK
American consulate official who's little more than a public relations hack: CHECK
Tender, they're just like us interlude: CHECK
Shaky camera (almost nauseatingly so at times) to lend an air of documentary authenticity in less action-packed scenes: CHECK
High production values but low story sophistication: CHECK
Too bad. If they'd just cut this down to the first 45 minutes it could be a respectable film.
That Championship Season (1999)
This film is great for actors...
...and not so great for film audiences... in my opinion. Here's why...
It's not that difficult to make a good film with the source material being a good play. The problem is that the filmmakers hesitate to stray too far from the original story.
A play is written with oftentimes very obvious "on the nose dialog," with lots of repetition. Live theater audiences rarely are close enough to see the actors clearly, and so they don't have the benefit of reading facial expressions or even, as odd as it sounds, seeing the actors' lips reciting the dialog. So theatrical dialog is obvious, repetitive and oratorical.
However, that's not an issue with film. As film audiences, we're usually right in the middle of things when dialog is being spoken. Movie watchers don't need overt and repetitive dialog. There can be a lot of nuance.
So the failure with most adaptations is that the filmmakers don't make the needed adjustments, and that's where this version (I haven't seen the other) of That Championship Season fails. We're watching a movie with dialog pulled from live theater.
I do have a quarrel with the original play. Without going into details - no spoilers here - I really have to wonder why none of the four guys left the coach's house as they fought amongst themselves. I certainly wouldn't have stuck around if things got as heated as they did in this story. Maybe I'm just not willing to put up with accusations, insults and worse.
Two last things about the movie, minor things only a film geek like me would have noticed.
First, in a few low-angle shots we could see glare from a few of the movie lights placed up above the camera's field of view. The overall color of "practical" (intended to be in the shot) light was the golden color of tungsten bulbs, but the glare was very white and came not from anyplace a practical ceiling lamp would have been placed.
The second thing was the wardrobe choice for the guy who'd set his life aside for others because he wouldn't stand up for himself. He had 1950s-style glasses, a short sleeved shirt with his suit, and white socks. That was a silly, lazy way to make him look like a second class citizen.
True Believer (1989)
Gimme' a C!!!
Gimme' a C!!!
C!!!
Gimme' an R!!!
R!!!
Gimme' an A!!!
A!!!
Gimme' a P!!!
P!!!
What's the spell?!!!
"True Believer!!!
Ugh, where do I start?
First, the characters, except for Woods' character and one other, were one dimensional. The bad guys were bad, the good guys were good. Robert Downey Jr.'s role was completely unnecessary.
The plot was generally predictable. Although details might have been new, this movie was really no different than hundreds that came before it. I knew who was going to win and lose. I knew someone was going to realize the error of their ways and finally right their wrongs. I knew the end was going to be bubbly upbeat with the two main characters (one superfluous as I mentioned) walking off away from the camera, engaging in witty, happy banter (shades of Casablanca). I knew there would be explosive dialog and angry accusations in the courtroom. I could have written this in my sleep.
Last... the music, completely uninspired and unoriginal. Cue the rock guitar solos for fight scenes. Cue the electric piano solos for those parts in the movie when characters are feeling energized by the progress they're making (extra points if the piano accompanies aerial shots of the story's heroes driving to their next stop as they work to crack the case. Cue the subdued piano solos for those times when it seems things might turn to garbage. Now that I think about it, all of the music should have been subdued piano solos, because the film was garbage.
Art School Confidential (2006)
Stunningly mediocre
I see this film has gotten a lot of great reviews, so I'm going to wake the artistic rebel hiding behind my pituitary gland and I'm going to buck the trend.
I didn't hate this movie. I didn't love this movie. I didn't dislike this movie or like it. I just didn't care one way or the other.
The way I see it there was nothing special about Art School Confidential. There was no mastery of the filmmaking medium by the director - it was a standard off-the-shelf movie. It's oatmeal without fruit. It's popcorn without butter. It's sex without an orgasm. In other words, it was watchable but a day later it's completely forgotten. This was a dark John Hughes film without the humanity.
John Malkovich occupies the third spot on the movie poster. His 10 or 15 minutes of screen time, at most, could have been handled by any actor. The producers wasted their money... ah, no, maybe not. Malkovich got third billing on the movie poster even though other supporting cast members had much more screen time and more significant roles, plot-wise, so my guess is that the producers thought the big paycheck for Malkovich would be a dynamite marketing coupe. I think it backfired - I'd never heard of the film until I watched it tonight.
And in keeping with the "wicked smaht" marketing plan, Anjelica Huston, with less than five minutes on-screen, gets fourth billing on the poster.
It seems everyone involved forgot film is a form of art as well as a business.
But there's a bright spot. I can sleep well tonight without having my mind racing to analyze the artistic intent because there was no artistic intent. It said nothing. It made me question nothing.
"More oatmeal?"
"No thanks, I'm full."
Vice (2018)
Outstanding
This confirms it: Adam McKay has moved on from directing schtick movies like Anchorman and has joined the big leagues with Vice, not just because he tackled a difficult topic - political history told (mostly) factually - but because he did it in a very, very creative way.
First, the makeup was amazing; it's no surprise it earned the artists an Academy Award. It was flawless. Most notably, of course was the makeup used to "flesh out," pardon the joke, the character of Dick Cheney. I don't know how accurate it was, but the care taken to make the makeup look realistic suggests that it's also very true-to-life, with age spots and other facial features closely matching those of Cheney.
The casting was incredible. The physical likenesses were top-notch, especially for Cheney and Donald Rumsfeld. The acting was great, especially of course with Christian Bale. This is the kind of role he was born to play, one that requires immersion into a real person's life in order to play the part. Bale could make a very, very successful career just from playing real people.
Now for the core of the film itself - the stylistic choices.
Just like the Bush/Cheney administration, Vice was half comedic and half deadly serious. (Comically the two are different - Vice was satirical at times, while the Bush/Cheney administration was farcical at times.)
Director McKay made some bold and wonderful choices. There were times when the story veered from a linear narrative, and sometimes those diversions "broke the fourth wall" in a sense. It wasn't done by having characters speak directly to the audience, but rather by taking us out of the realm of realism. This was done at times by having a fictional character, sometimes on-screen, as a narrator; sometimes it was done by thrusting major characters into fanciful scenes (the restaurant scene in which the waiter read off the specials could have been a stand-alone short film - it was genius); and sometimes it was done in other unexpected ways.
The attention to detail was amazing, with things most people probably wouldn't notice being made a part of the film - for instance, as Cheney was hatching one of his real-life schemes that cost thousands of lives he was holding a knife used as a letter opener. This level of details even extends into a good part of the end credits - make sure you pay attention to the fishing flies.
One thing I noticed that I'm not sure was intentional was that early in the film, before Cheney had even given up his partying days, a few shots of him or his wife, Lynne, had a fly buzzing around, which once landed on Dick Cheney's face. I'm guessing it was intentional (digital of course) because it would be unlikely that a real fly would cooperate over the course of half a dozen takes from each of at least two camera angles.
If you're a film fan, you MUST watch Vice.
(Note: It was fun to see the stock footage of Bush's arrival on the USS Abraham Lincoln in an S-3 Viking jet to announce, erroneously, "Mission Accomplished" in Iraq. I flew in Vikings as an enlisted member of the crew about six or seven years earlier. And the digital effects people did a pretty good job of inserting Sam Rockwell's face into some of that video.)
Flawless (1999)
Good, but...
Flawless was good, but it wasn't flawless. (Nyuck, nyuck, nyuck.)
Like so many films, this seems like it didn't know what kind of film it wanted to be. Mixing genres is fine, but this was comedy (sometimes bordering on slapstick), drama, and crime film.
However they're to be referred to (and I mean no disrespect), drag queens get little attention in the movies, and when they do it's almost always either in a musical or a comedy - there's little if any attention paid to the lives they live. Flawless attempted that but the effort was diluted by the introduction of "the caper." It just didn't seem cohesive.
Philip Seymour Hoffman was outstanding. Although one of the two primary characters, his (her) story took a back seat to... everything else that was thrown into the cinema salad that Flawless is.
Robert de Niro was Robert de Niro with a speech impediment. What can I say? And of course even his story was given short shrift thanks to the criminal subplot.
Some sub-subplots were even more distracting, like the beauty contest and the meeting with the gay Republicans. The contest was there for the comedic aspect, I guess, and the meeting was there to get a message across. Messages we get through film shouldn't be so obvious that we recognize them as messages - they should slip in unnoticed through the storytelling process.
There was a lot of potential that was squandered. If the film had concentrated on Hoffman and de Nero's characters and the subplots that supported the character arcs this would have been a MUCH better film. I like it but I didn't love it.
The Bone Collector (1999)
Good production values but lacking in logic and full of illogical plot points
I _REALLY_ need to stop watching movies.
Much of my review is actually going to be in the Goofs section since much of it involves character errors and plot holes. Ultimately, my review is best done via a list of inane choices made by the director.
###
1. While trying to track down an antique book publisher's logo, Donaghy just happened to enter the right used book store and she just happened to see right away the same book the killer patterned his crimes on.
2. What the heck is "emergency bed mode?" (Hint: It's mechanized stupidity.)
3. One word: "Enhance." Yes, Rhyme told his computer to perform some vague enhancement process on an image.
###
My two hours would have been better spent picking my nose and then my toes. It would have been more entertaining.
Midway (2019)
Silly garbage
Note to self: I should stop watching movies.
Seriously, there are so many bad films being made these days, and this is one of them. The effects are, pardon the joke, over-blown, very relevant historical facts are ignored (for example, USS Arizona sank upright, but in the film it rolled over), military discipline is sorely missing and aviation procedures are ignored all through the movie.
There are two bright spots, though - the casting of Woody Harrelson as Chester Nimitz* and Dennis Quaid as William Halsey. They're pretty good doppelgängers for the admirals.
Although the film does play straight with a lot of the historical facts, it ignores too many of them to make this a film worth watching if you want anything remotely like a serious account of the battle.
*With the same hairpiece, Woody Harrelson could _easily_ play Spencer Tracy in a biopic.
Exodus: Gods and Kings (2014)
General Scott at it again
Ridley Scott isn't a film director, he's a military general. He rallies armies of craftspeople, technicians and artists to tell the same story over and over again - a non-leader rises up to become a leader (that is, of course, between stints directing various boring iterations of the original Alien). (Watch Kingdom of Heaven to see the same story 2500 years later.
Scott doesn't employ creativity in his work anymore - he's all about spectacle. Even Christopher Nolan, another general, tries to be creative. But Scott seems to be going for big paychecks time after time. It might be time in his old age to revisit his former days as a film artist. I know he can do it, he's done it before. Apparently spectacle is like crack in Ridley Scott's world.
The Quick and the Dead (1995)
It can't decide what it wants to be
Is it a drama? Is it an action film? A thriller? A comedy?
In the hands of a director more talented than Sam Raimi this might have been a decent film. It's possible to mix genres but with this film it didn't work.
And, sad to say, there were no surprises. Person out for revenge gets revenge, period. Definitely a film not worth seeing twice/
8MM (1999)
Forgettable
Change the actors, change the topic and you end up with any of hundreds, no, thousands of other films. There was nothing special this. Snickers satisfies; 8MM doesn't. Even the jump scare... didn't. If you want a good movie about the dark side of adult entertainment, see Hardcore.
There was no real suspense. Will he die in the fights in which he's out-muscled? Of course not.
Nicolas Cage played Nicolas Cage, an under-emoting mumbler. Catherine Keener was wasted in a part too small and one dimensional for her talents. Peter Stormare played the same kind of character he always does - a weirdo. Come on, Hollywood, take a slight chance and put funny actors in dramatic roles and dramatic actors in funny roles.
Pass.
Fair Game (2010)
THIS is what a movie based on real events should be
The acting was great - every role was played just right, not over the top, not under-played. This is a film I'll probably watch again in a few years.
One thing: I think we need to take up a collection to buy Doug Liman a tripod. I get it, there's a stylistic choice of using a handheld camera, but it really got quite ridiculous during some of the conference room scenes, with the camera bouncing manically from one character to another and back.
Freejack (1992)
Anthony Hopkins had the right idea...
...when he called this a terrible film.
I'd always been under the impression Freejack was considered a decent movie. Where that idea came from I have no idea. The concept could have worked, but as with many science fiction movies there was a lot of razzle dazzle and "ooh, look at that" incorporated for no reason that had anything to do with the story. For example, one of the characters had an obviously scarred face... and there was absolutely no reason for it indicated in the film. This truly was a piece of dog squeeze.
The Conspirator (2010)
Remarkably average
I love good biopics and had high hopes for this. Robert Redford, honored with multiple awards for acting and directing, directed this - and I felt it was a bit flat. There were no real surprises, no moments of high tension, and the only character I cared at all about was Mary Surratt, played by Robin Wright.
I'm a bit more visual than most people, so I wasn't too thrilled with the look of the film, specifically the costumes and hair styling. Clothing back then, especially for men, didn't always fit very well and sometimes showed the wear earned by years and years of use. The clothing for the main cast, especially the male actors, was a bit too well-tailored. And as for the hair, well, one doesn't need to do much searching on Google to see that hair styling wasn't yet a thing for men - most of the time it was basic hair cuts, often not done well at all, and often people went for a few days without washing their hair. This is a facet of the film that won't bother most people, and it might not have bothered me if I felt a bit more engaged in it.
It was a nice try by all involved, but it was a bit of a miss for me.