zhombu Reviews

Wonka (2023)

What makes a movie bad?

[3/10 · 1 April 2024]

Bad acting. Bad story. Bad effects. Bad music. Bad casting. Bad direction. Bad costumes. Bad ideas.

Chalamet is simply too weedy. He has zero physical presence. He delivered all of his lines as if it was a first-time table reading and then the one and only take on film is what was used. He's charmless. Has no voice. Inflects no emotion. Holds no intrigue. Utterly uninspiring.

The rest of the cast could have been anybody. Olivia Colman does a fine job, if a bit over-the-top at times, but, overall, the mix of accents makes the ensemble seem like they used whomever showed up first for the audition.

The musical numbers are rote and flat. Hookless and banal. Pointless, they add nothing to the story.

Things happen often that suggest that Wonka should have the ability to solve any problems that come his way...but he doesn't use them.

The industry must have been short on green screen while this was filmed because it's painfully obvious in all instances that characters aren't always in the same space.

Why was this movie even made? Why?

The Gilded Age (2022– )

Somebody please wake me up!

[5/10 · 20 November 2023]

Formula 1 race car chassis are made from full, carbon fiber tubs. The stiffness is extraordinary, and few things on Earth could possibly be stiffer.

Except...

The contrived, non-conversational dialogue must be the reason for the stilted, ice-cold feeling that emanates from every character. Too many plot lines crammed into too short a time don't help. Key characters have atomic clock predictability about how they'll respond to every action, Baranski will be crabby, Nixon will be wimpy, Coons will be aggressive, Spector will be Mr Freeze, Nathan Lane will be....oh dear, that's supposed to be serious? There very little latitude or time for characters to develop. Secondary characters in Downton Abbey had solid backstories. Here, the staff are nearly furniture.

Would using British actors faking American accents imbue a Western with authenticity? No. And a world that is essentially unknown to Americans that looks for all the world like English society gentry just doesn't fly with American accents. Too flat. But I suppose its accurate.

And as others have mentioned, the sets, conveyances, costumes...everything looks brand-new, just built, just made. Sterile. Fake.

Eh.

The Greatest Beer Run Ever (2022)

This movie made me want to start drinking

[5/10 · 3 October 2022]

Honestly, what is wrong with everyone? The script is bad. The acting is worse. The accents are comical. The direction is terrible. Farrelly clearly doesn't understand how to force a film into the genre into which it wants to operate.

This is not a comedy in any way. It's not written like one, nothing is funny, and very little should be funny. But Farelly can only see films in that light, so the timing is awkward throughout, as if he was waiting for the laughter to calm down before the next line is given. Everyone delivers his lines woodenly and in isolation form other conversation, like a play given by middle-schoolers who are doing it for extra credit.

Visually, the film is more successful but it's really old territory we've seen an awful lot over the years.

The embedded soundtrack is clearly reaching hard to create that mid-to-late 60's psychedelic sound. It achieves that flavor but except for bits of two songs from The Association, one from Jefferson Airplane, and perhaps another, they are are third-rate or unknown things you'd find on a Time-Life, "Man, Dig the 60's" CD collection because...they're cheap to use.

It's based on a book by the main protagonist in the film but...what a stupid thing to do. So dumb it was distracting. There was no shortage of beer in Vietnam. An acquaintance who was infantry there told me that all they drank was American beer because the water would kill you faster than the V. C.

I was very glad when it ended, both the Vietnam war and this torturous movie.

The Center Seat: 55 Years of Star Trek (2021–2022)

Close to unwatchable

[5/10 · 24 November 2021]

I can't say that I'm happy with my assessment and I'm sure most others won't be as well, but the pace and editing of this first episode are so bad that I'm having trouble finishing it and may not watch the other three I've recorded.

In Philadelphia, there is the Franklin Institute, a center for science, scientific history, science demonstrations, and industrial scientific testing. It's quite a place and I've gone there since I was very young. It's been a while since I visited, but the last time I was there, drinking in the exhibits around me, I watched as schoolchildren too immature to understand what they were seeing absolutely raced from exhibit to exhibit trying to find the button to push to make the display do something. They would rush up to it, frantically hammer away at whatever initiated the demo, and hunted to see what would happen. If it moved, lit up, make a sound or whatever, they watched for five seconds. If pushing the button didn't result in an INSTANT payoff...two seconds, then on to the next exhibit. Nobody stopped to look, wonder, read, or try to understand what was happening.

I am sure that the editor of this series was one of those kids.

Hyper-fast cuts, contributors flashed on the screen for so short a time that you can see what they look like, what their name is, or what they are saying, pick any two, cut-ins of scenes from shows that might well be funny but go by so quickly that they are blips...this bears all the hallmarks of someone too young to know how to edit for an audience who is seeing the material for the first time, not someone who has been spending hours with each scene. It's an absolute mess. No attention span whatsoever. No depth of examination. No desire to discover, just to get to the next bullet point.

I'm going to boldly go back to the TV now. I think there may be 15 painful minutes left of the fist episode. There are other "history of Star Trek" films and videos that are not frenetic and juvenile that tell the same story.

Harlan Ellison; story of how unhappy he was with the rewrite of, "City on the Edge of Forever" is mentioned. I can only imagine how irate he' d be if he was around to see this mess.

Mission: Impossible - Ghost Protocol (2011)

Ten lines

[1/10 · 29 December 2011]

Ten lines is what IMDb requires for a review. So here goes... 1: Stupid. 2: Stupid. 3: Stupid. 4: Stupid. 5: Stupid. 6: Stupid. 7: Stupid. 8: Stupid. There, that should do it.

OK, when did the world begin to accept filmed folderol such as this movie as valid entertainment? You think the ancient Romans were cruel? At least they tortured the few people participating in the action, not the thousands in the seats. Stupid actions, stupid plots, stupid lines delivered over and over with out-of-the-box steely eyes, cars explode, buildings explode, computers explode, sandwiches explode...

There are so many science fiction stories and movies that tell of a time where the dazed hoi polloi are driven sheep, told what to do, what to eat, say, think...and these are meant to be stories of horror, a warning of what society could become if we don't all use our giant brains and actually think.

No thinking in Mission: Impossible. Just things blowin' up. The cinematic equivalent of a Saturday night demolition derby in some clusterfark Southern town made of mud. Duh. BOOM. Duh. BOOM. Duh...

Brad Bird must have a pod in a basement somewhere. This can't be his work.

Rango (2011)

Magnificent

[10/10 · 19 December 2011]

It is with immense sadness that I eject "Rango" from my Blu-Ray player to send it back from whence it came. And in hindsight, I regret not making it to the theater when this was released. I spent nearly a year ignorant of the magic of this film, a time when something untoward might have happened to me and I could have left this world without having a chance to have seen it.

Get the picture? Often, one can get a better idea of what is great about a film by reading the negative reviews, most of which, for Rango, consist of terrified parents who didn't pay attention to what movie ratings mean. "PG" means that, "some scenes are not suitable for children". What that actually means is, SOME SCENES ARE NOT SUITABLE FOR CHILDREN!!!!!! The movie is gritty where it needs to be gritty, coarse where it needs to be coarse, and terrifying when it intends to be terrifying...and all the more brilliant for it.

Pixar does make fabulous animated films. I was overjoyed by "Monsters, Inc", touched by, "Nemo", and thrilled with, "The Incredibles" but Nickoldeon has financed what is surely the finest animated film of all time. All work in it is spectacular, from the tiniest details to the phenomenal voice-acting. Bill Nighy's briefly seen but essential character rates, to me, as one of the most frightening villains ever put to the screen, such was his performance. The detailing in all of the characters regarding movement, idiosyncrasies, and texture are astounding. In extreme close-up one character, speaking in great fear, has his eyes blinking appropriately to convey his feelings. But one eye, one time skips a tiny, tiny bit and executes a partial double-blink. It's barely perceptible but it conveys the effort this character is having relating his tale. It's something an actor might understand but surely not an animator? But no computer made the decision to animate it that way. That is an example of the depth to which Rango has been produced.

The backgrounds, the texture and feel, the music, the classical Greek convention with a inspired Southwestern twist (you'll see) gives sharper viewers a decent idea of how deep this story will go beyond the obvious.

Rarely, RARELY have I watched any film I liked a second time IMMEDIATELY after finishing it the first time but I began the second, stop-and-go-back viewing the next morning, seeing a thousand things I had missed while watching wide-eyed in the moment on the first go-round. I can imagine that the same Puritan-type parents who whisked their kids straight from the theater and hurried post-haste to post a "don't waste..." on IMDb about this movie are the children of those equally horrified parents who did the same (minus IMDb) when they ran screaming from "Fritz the Cat" in 1972 wondering what the "X" rating was for having probably assumed it meant "Xtra nice for kids".

For you parents who don't know your ABC's well enough to have bothered to understand what "PG" means, for you, there's a big, purple, stupid dinosaur waiting to hug you. For the rest of us who bothered to pay attention, there are amazing films like Rango. Watch it once, watch it again, and marvel at the true mastery of the state-of-the-art

The Princess Bride (1987)

Read the "haters reviews"

[3 November 2011]

I'm sick and decided to take a few films from the local library to kill some daytime. "Why not see 'The Princess Bride' again?", I thought. I was surprised to see how old it is already. The movie is fun and funny. But reading the reviews from those who hated it seals, for me, why it is so good. This is a film from a book, and a pretty good book at that. The screenplay was, refreshingly, written by the book's author, William Goldman, so what was filmed was OK by him. The Haters make several common errors in their misunderstanding of the film.

1: Who ever said this is a children's film? It's a contemporary fairytale peppered with irony, and only one person who didn't like the film said he had read the book. You need more sophistication to understand irony. The satisfaction depends on knowing how things normally go, how they could go, and why opposite outcomes are funny, not visual punch lines to obvious jokes. If you don't read and don't listen well, you'll not enjoy this movie.

2: Plenty of people complained about the scenery, acting, and costumes. They entirely miss that what we see on screen is the story as imagined by a young child as he hears the book read to him. That concept allows for certain inconsistencies and stylized actions, such as scenes where others complain about a certain creature looking "obviously fake" It's intentional.

3: Most people complained about Wallace Shawn being annoying. That is absolutely so, he is so damn irritating that I usually go elsewhere when his face and voice appear in anything. He's like ketchup on pancakes, just doesn't belong and ruins the whole thing. He is not at all what the book character was supposed to be and I can only assume that Rob Reiner owed him a big favor. I remember being hugely disappointed when he showed up and it took me several minutes to regain my attention to watching the movie.

But, golly, the rest of the movie is so fun and freewheeling that you'll be left behind if your imagination needs to be spoon-fed every morsel. We who love it, love it, and we understand why. For the rest of you, there's reality TV.

Cedar Rapids (2011)

Is this funny for church goers in the mid-west?

[3/10 · 14 March 2011]

Seriously, someone read this script and decided to fund it? For what reason? The laughs simply aren't. Ed Helms may have been perfect for the Daily Show but he is not leading man material. His face isn't funny. His voice isn't funny. His mannerisms aren't funny. He just can't carry a movie, there's really nothing there.

We're supposed to believe that a 35+ year old insurance salesman is so non-worldly, he can't figure out what a prostitute is, yet he's busy in the opening scene with his elementary school teacher, Sigourney Weaver, who sleepwalks through her lines in obvious boredom. John C. Reilly unimaginatively plays the most obvious over-the-top crass salesman who checks all the boxes of this type of over worn character. The other actors fill their respective spaces, with Ann Heche being especially creepy.

Everything that happens is as predictable as sundown, no surprises at all. Oh my, Ed Helms doesn't do drugs, but here, he's going to...and we have to sit through that 15 minutes section of the movie. Golly, the head of the seminar is crooked...and we have to wait while that plays out letter-by-letter. Heavens, there's cursing and shock value lines as out of place as Stephen Hawking at a quinceañera. It seems as if it was written by a hayseed as clueless as the main character. Honestly, he reacts to a "black man" in his hotel room as if it was an outtake of "Guess Who's Coming to Dinner" that they scrapped because it was too stupid...in 1967.

Like a bad car wreck covered by yellow sheets, "move along people, there's nothing to see here!" I'd almost rather see a Matt Damon film.

When in Rome (2010)

Water would be more nutritious

[1/10 · 22 January 2010]

Hollywood brings yet another pointless re-assemblage of stale ideas, preposterous events, plot loopholes, and ridiculous conveniences though which one could drive a galaxy, and I don't mean the Ford version. Nothing worth mentioning, really, but for one brief restaurant scene that was truly funny for its concept, though not its execution.

Girlfriend insisted so we went to the screening. Saw it for free and I was still annoyed. Will rue the lost ninety minutes on my deathbed. Being stuck in traffic with a full bladder would have been preferable. I suffered so you don't have to.

Avoid.

War of the Worlds (2005)

Exactly what I expected from Speilbore

[4/10 · 3 July 2005]

On my deathbed, I will have many regrets. One prominent in my mind is the $15 Speiberg still owes me that I spent to see A.I. Now, adding to the tab is "War of the Worlds", a perfectly good book and seminal 50's classic film blasted to smithereens by Spielberg's Death Ray of Boredom. Let's admit that, with a decent movies such as "Schindler's List" and "Amistad", it's hard to go wrong, unless a little song-and-dance or comedy were included as people were killed. Even Spielberg isn't that stupid, but he simply has no sense of what causes suspense in a film. Aside from the endless plot and logic holes that destroy the story faster than any invading aliens could, (no one on Earth ever noticed hundreds or thousands of fifteen-story metal machines buried in the ground?) and the vending-machine acting performances I find the main problem here is that the important conflict (for conflict is what drives characters to move through the plot) is between the aliens and the people of Earth. Instead of spending film time developing the "us-versus-them" convention that is demanded by this story, Spielberg wastes the energy on developing conflict between father and son, husband and ex wife, main protagonist and stranger, etc. He gets so distracted with those relationships that it's possible the aliens could have gotten bored and gone home, and we wouldn't know about it because we're forced to watch Sentispeilbergmental plot-diluting scenes. The end of the movie, which should be based on the the relief that everyone on Earth still alive is now safe, is passed over in favor of a smarmy father/son reconciliation of a schism that should never have happened. Spielberg's greatest clue of how to handle this story is right in the title, "War of the Worlds", not "Jimmy and Jenny learn to like Daddy again." I have generally found that this is the main problem with all of his films. Think of the Velociaptors-in-the-kitchen scene from "Jurrassic Park." How stupid would it have been to have the two kids arguing over something mundane instead of trying not to be eaten? It would have robbed that whole scene of any direness crucial to its effect. Spielberg does exactly that with much of this movie.

Lastly, a plot hole that made us laughing in our seats. Everyone is hungry. Robbie has brought only bread, peanut butter, and condiments as sustenance. Rachel is allergic to peanut butter. Ray is furious. He throws the slathered bread onto the window resulting in a lucky once-in-a-lifetime adhesion. Hunger! What will they eat! Where will they find food? This all takes place in the kitchen of an obviously well-stocked home. Personally, I would have looked in the refrigerator, duh.

The Day After Tomorrow (2004)

The shizzle be all frizzle!

[31 May 2004]

SPOILERS - Another dumb movie. Director Roland Emmerich claims that he knows about all of the implausabilites which provided the story line, but that they were necessary for dramatic effect. Anybody can write a script like that. It takes talent to tell a story within the confines of reality, even if it's to take place in outer space with Imperial Storm Troopers. It's OK if Imperial Storm Troopers can shoot hand-held laser weapons, but we'd all cry "foul" if they were able to take a direct hit without injury. Here's a movie where 10,000+ years of climate change occurs in weeks without justifiable cause. Silly, silly, silly. Buildings freeze solid in seconds, yet Dennis Quaid can WALK 200 miles because he has a really good parka. People are freezing their butts off in the street while only two stand around the barrel fire keeping warm. The vice-president and government cannot be convinced that anything serious is happening in the world because they apparently have no access to CNN. And on and on. Rant follows.

I was dragged to see this by the girlfriend. On September 11, I watched 3000 real people die by a horrible terrorist event. Why do we need to have disaster movies made at all? Do we all feel better seeing films where people deal with terrible problems just so we can say, "Whew, glad that wasn't us!" I said that when the towers collapsed, when the Pentagon was hit, and when the plane crashed in PA. Go see comedies and laugh. There is no glory in dramatized disaster. There is no glory in death. There is no glory in war. It is juvenile to think that death, disaster, disease, or any pain and suffering is anything but horrible. Ask anyone who's been in the infantry in the army how fun it is to be in a firefight. Reality is far more tangible than dramatized terror. Try watching the news or read some articles on real science, instead of paying for the ignorant gruel served up by Hollywood, as I did today.

Rant over, for now.

Troy (2004)

AWESOME!

[15 May 2004]

As in, "Aw, some movies are good, but this surely isn't one of them."

Brad Pitt is good, but here he's met his match. This part is well beyond his abilities.

Why the English accents? Why English actors? A thick German accent would have made just as much sense and been much funnier. Or Japanese.

The Greeks addressed royalty as, "My Lord?"

Orlando's ear points were missing.

Geez, imagine the footage they didn't include!

Needed a car chase.

Snnnorrrrrrrrrrrrreee!

Deadwood (2004–2006)

Well, they got the "dead" part right. Dead awful.

[22 March 2004]

Dirt, grime, violence, death, drugs, murder, booze, sex, gambling, swearing swindling, treachery, capital punishment, and crime; that pretty much sums up the first five minutes of "Deadwood." So where to go from there? I dunno, repeat the first five minutes until the hour is up?

"Deadwood" tries so very hard to be one of our beloved HBO series but misses the target by a mile. From the opening music which is a disguised Western-style version of the opening music from "Six Feet Under" (it is, listen closely) to the highly dubious contemporary cursing lifted from "Oz", to the endless violence of "The Sopranos" (and "Oz"), Deadwood forgets to build characters with more than one personality trait. Even by the end of the first half-hour, it's pretty easy to figure out what any given character will do next. The result is a procession of mono-dimensional entries and exits as the story requires. No one is likable, therefore we don't care what happens from scene to scene.

Not likely to be around for long, I reckon'. Time for "Deadwood" to git outta town.

Elf (2003)

Lackluster writing, mediocre acting, and simply not funny.

[16 November 2003]

I'm pretty sure I'm simply too old now for anything but a decently written and executed film; neither quality is in abundant evidence in "Elf". I really don't mean to insult all of you who've found this movie to be entertaining, but; you are all really easily amused. This is simply not a funny movie. Anything which could be counted as a joke can be seen coming as if it was a flaming asteroid about to hit Earth. Will Ferrell is just not funny (not in this movie, anyway). James Caan walks through his lines, Mary Steenburgen really has no lines worth saying, and Bob Newhart's portrayal of an Elf who doesn't show too much emotion only drags things down even more. (MINOR SPOILERS) The story is inconsistent: Buddy's character has a particular reputation regarding his performance as a toymaker in the North Pole, but in Manhatten he displays the opposite qualities. James Caan wants Buddy out of his life forever, yet completely changes his mind moments later for some feeble reason given by his son: "Buddy was right" or some such nonsense.

There are a couple of laughs but out a whole professionally produced movie, they are not nearly enough to carry the day. Director Favereau has done far better work. What happened here isn't clear. One high point, though, is Zooey's lovely singing voice, especially during the credits with Leon Redbone.

Geez, I must sound like quite a Grinch, but if you've 12 or under and you've never seen anything else, perhaps this is a funny movie. "Elf" is is one Christmas present which needs to be returned for store credit.

The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring (2001)

Haven't I seen this movie before?

[22 December 2001]

You know, the movie where the story chops from action scene to action scene with little in between? Where there's lots of dark lighting and really quick camera moves to cover up inadequate scenery or costumes? Remember, the movie where bad things pop out from behind walls, and if you didn't already know the story you're completely lost after the first 15 minutes?

Look, I've read the book three times. The detail and rich textures that Tolkien describes are what make the story so interesting. To leave out so much information and film mostly orc-action because it sells well has turned the story to nothing we haven't seen before. All of the names for people, places, and things that Tolkien invented that convey a sense of completeness to Middle Earth are mostly missing here. Perhaps it's not possible to include them, you'd end up with a five hour movie instead of three. If that's the case, then I say, don't make the movie! When I learned that the whole two chapters that deal with Tom Bombidil were deleted, I wondered how the screenwriter would extricate the Hobbits from the Old Forest and the Barrow Wights. Easy, they're not there either. The beauty of Lothlorien is passed through within minutes, Bilbo's party looks to be one fourth as big as it should have been, and way too short. The movie speeds so quickly from scene to scene that there is no buildup of character for any aspect of the film.

Was anything good? The casting turned out better than I thought it would, though Frodo is supposed to be in his early fifties, not half that. The Elves are pretty good, John Rhys-Davies turns into a squat Dwarf through some movie magic, and Gandalf and Saruman suffice. Let's not even discuss the appearance of Arwen, who is mentioned in the book, has no lines, and only exists in the appendix, yet obviously will be a presence throughout the production. The Orcs look more like some guys who played a very muddy rugby game. They are far too humanized.

Hey, what happened to the good stuff? I got off track, which is what Lord of the Rings does quite nicely, it gets way off track from being a romantic story good versus evil and the reasoning behind it, and shows us mostly cowboys and injuns. I swear I saw an Imperial Stormtrooper flash by.

A.I. Artificial Intelligence (2001)

Dear, Steven S, if you see this message...

[8 July 2001]

Please forward $16.50 to my PayPal address. I have been ripped off less at at carnival. Read everyone else's negative reviews and believe them, they're all accurate.

A robot so sophisticated that no one can tell he's not real? Oh yeah, he doesn't blink. You just knew that would be the hard part of building such a being, didn't you? Gigolo Joe can change his hair color and style just by willing it to do so, but his internal music needs to be switched on and off manually? Humans can not only be cloned from hair, but the cloned being will have all of the memories needed at just the right time in that person's life? Oh yeah, that's right, the "aliens" (I believe they were supposed to be high-end robots left over from advanced humankind) explained that all memories were conveniently found to be floating around the universe but we really needed a lock of someone's hair to make it work. For a day.

Hey, let's go robot hunting with the biggest, brightest balloon we can find. They won't see us then, (sure hope the moon's not out that night!)

Teddy repairs himself with a needle and thread. He has no fingers.

Though we have the technology today to keep sensitive electronic instruments clean and dry from such perils as, oh...spinach...the future seems to have lost that ability. Maybe creamed spinach was outlawed and so no one considered the possibility that it would be around to hurt anything ever again.

Near the end, David's mother is heard to say, "I'm having trouble keeping my eyes open."

She must have been watching the dailies.

Evolution (2001)

Watching this is better than having your teeth crushed by pliers

[21 June 2001]

Probably, anyway. I actually laughed weakly two or three times as I watched this supremely poor film, but it was only to try and convince myself that I was enjoying it. I wasn't

It is easily possible to watch this movie without laughing at all, but that's only because nothing funny ever occurs. Not one aspect is done well, the writing, dialogue, acting, or direction. David Duchovny, who's ability to act and emote contain more wood than a lumberyard, mumbles his way through each line as if it's the first time he's read it. Orlando Jones, who may have talent, waits the whole movie for The Funny Line By The Black Guy So White People Will Laugh, never really gets to it, Julianna Moore is the luckiest person who gets paid vast sums to be in movies, because she has zero ability to deliver a line of dialogue. I'd be surprised if she could deliver a pizza. She, Senator Quayle, is no actress. Seann Scott attempts a few "awesome, dude" type lines but they never come close to working, mostly because of the feeble dialogue but partly because he can't act either. Even the aliens are too brightly colored to look real, but countless films have had fake-looking creatures and have been able to make things work.

I might have been better off seeing this summer's blockbuster (literally, 'bomb') Pearl Harbor, which I steadfastly refused to do insisting that "Evolution" would be funny.Now I have had to give my pledge to see Ben Affect's movie to make up for this one.

What a lousy summer movie season, so far!

T-Rex: Back to the Cretaceous (1998)

The finest IMAX film I've ever seen...

[1 March 2001]

...would never be this one. Read the other user comments, they are dead accurate. What I find fascinating is that a few people actually saw something of value in this tremendous turkey. It is so bad in every aspect it's indescribable. The acting, story, dialogue, and direction are awful beyond words. The Big Draw, which would have been dinosaur effects, are stilted, lame, and dated. The producers evidently have been too busy to have seen Jurassic Park or it's sequel to realize that they have been outgunned with dinosaur effects by an order of magnitude. I will be on my deathbed and still be annoyed that I paid $18 for two tickets to see this amateur level film.

A word about IMAX. While the initial films were certainly novel, everything I've seen in the last 6 years or so has been pretty much pointless. It's like the long standing predictions from the 1950's and 1960's of two-way visiphones. No one forsaw the advent of personal computers, with which the promise of two-way visuals is now actually quite cheap and obtainable, except that almost nobody cares. It turns out that we really don't need to see the other person talking. IMAX is like that. OK, I can see a huge screen and what would have been smaller is now...bigger. So what? The 3D aspect just makes the film much harder to watch. We humans are so good at interpreting a two-dimensional film as having depth, that adding 3D really just gets in the way.

Red Planet (2000)

Being stranded on Mars would be better than seeing this film

[13 November 2000]

Golly, Val Kilmer is talentless. What better place to dump him than into a movie that wouldn't challenge his acting ability anymore than it challenges science, plot development, character development, or logic. There's no need to go through the details as so many others have done, just know that where the usual conventions of this genre pop up, such as scary monsters, brutal serial deaths, barely plausible love interest, failing machinery, and the usual slasher/chaser c**p hardly show up at all. That could have been a good thing except that they weren't replaced with much else. The movie ends up with very little on which to feed. It's so boring that we were the last to leave the theater, not for reading the credits as usual but because I had to regain enough consciousness to stand up.

Save your money, go clean your room instead. Or take out the trash. Either will be far more fufilling than suffering through Red Planet.

Anna and the King (1999)

Possibly not a good movie

[19 December 1999]

With your first impression, this movie seems to have some solid footing on which to base itself. I guess I liked it, overall, but let's dissect it a bit. There's the old story which most of us think we know, until you read the excellent comments by other well informed IMDB users, notably William Murphy's. Apparently this film was rather inaccurate historically, with lots of confusion between what happened, to whom, and when. If you are aware of the truth, then maybe this movie will disappoint you.

The costumes must have been accurate, nobody seems to have a problem with them but how about the location? It's all filmed in Malaysia presumably because Thailand is still smarting over some past portrayals and some aspects of this new version. I guess they haven't progressed politically as far as the movie suggests.

The acting is more than adequate but something bothered me. While her accent was pretty believable Jodie Foster seemed to display one of two or three expressions at all times. The same applies to Mr. Chow. What I found bothersome was that, in a movie with really only two principal players, nearly every scene of this not short movie had either Jodie Foster, Chow Yun-Fat, or Jodie Foster and Chow Yun-Fat, and their chosen expression.

Two last items: Sometimes in life, things blow up. Pipelines burst, fuel tanks are breached, airliners run into mountains. Wouldn't you think that, in a movie before airplanes, automobiles, and home delivery of natural gas, we could see a movie without a huge explosion? Apparently not.

Next to finally, after setting the story in the mid-1800's and leaving the viewer with that sense, why tack on a "theme song" so inappropriate? It really was a terrible song, too, common and pointless, and straight out the late 1980's in style.

Finally, is it my imagination or was the movie's title never seen on screen during the credits?

Being John Malkovich (1999)

This is not a plot you've seen before

[27 November 1999]

One of the most fascinating aspects of the IMDB are the users' comments. With some thought, we could all name some titles that, with the exception of the schizophrenic and evangelical religious, we could agree to categorize as "good", "bad", "boring" or "great". The fascination comes in the reading of reviews that describe completely competent films, "such as "Being John Malkovich" and the mix of praise or condemnation they offer. See the "numan-2" review for example. I agree with the bulk of the reviews I've read about this film. This movie has a fresh plot, one you've never seen before. Think about that for a moment. Even my cats turn up their noses to their favorite food at some point. If I could give them a can of flaked Jonze w/Malkovich bits, their world would be turned on it's side. That's what this movie does, it twists everything you know about the world and how you thought things would turn out. That's from what great science fiction stories are made. As usual, don't let anyone try to "tell" you what this movie is about. Go in ignorant. Let the director do the job for which he was hired. Stop thinking you know how the world works, in this movie, it's very different.

Sleepy Hollow (1999)

Maybe I'd enjoy shuffleboard better

[22 November 1999]

Hey, perhaps I'm just too jaded from watching films but I always thought that the story and acting were important parts of a "good" movie. Johnny Depp, who has certainly demonstrated competent acting abilities elsewhere, has clearly never watched any British television. His accent is so poor and inconsistent that it became a blaring beacon of the mediocre talents of Tim Burton and what he accepts as adequate. That's right folks, Tim is no master. He has colorful disparate visions that he translates into film but couldn't tell a story properly if his career depended on it. Obviously it doesn't. People are satisfied now with eye candy scenes thrown together without a clearheaded arrow of cause and effect. Burton knows what he wants things to look like, he know how he intends to end his films. All of the stuff in the middle is filler. He doesn't understand how to generate suspense, he fails to catch the lack of chemistry between Depp and Ricci (why is she in this movie?), and relies on a awkward and complicated soliloquy from a key character to bring us all up to speed before ending this film since he's unable to weave it into the progress of the story.

So bring on the shuffleboard, at least I can see where one action logically leads to the next, and see this movie at a matinee to increase it's meager value.

Superstar (1999)

So when does the funny stuff happen?

[5 November 1999]

OK, I'll give Molly Shannon credit for coming up with a character that might have been funny when we all first saw it on SNL. Possibly it was funny the second time we saw it (the next week, I'm sure) just for verification. But that was a few years ago and thumbs in armpits only goes so far. It certainly doesn't go far enough to carry this movie. I expected the basics of the Mary Katherine Gallagher character such as thumb-smelling, pratfalls, and cheerleading poses, to be repeated ad infinitum in this film. Strangely, they were kept pretty much in check the whole time, which means that not much happens, funny or not. Will Ferrill, who has some potential, is always present but plays a rather subdued dude. Usually in plot-thin movies, effects or action will attempt to fill the bill. Neither really happens here. The movie starts, some stuff occurs in the middle, and then it's over. Just like SNL every week, it seems as if the writer and director just shrugged their shoulders and said, "well, there's always next week."

Two points noteworthy: Mary's grandmother is played by Glynis Johns, best known to me anyway from "Mary Poppins" where she was the suffragette Mrs. Baxter. She does a nice job and has a voice that is underused in the industry, in my opinion. Also, there seems to be a running joke about automobiles in this picture. Keep your eyes peeled and take note of every car you see. Pretty funny, huh?

Bowfinger (1999)

Steve Martin proves himself once again

[28 August 1999]

Uh, that is that he proves he can't seem to make a funny film. Remember (all of you old people) when you first saw Steve on the Tonight Show in '74ish? "Hey, that guy was funny!", you said. Have you noticed that you're still waiting for him to be funny again? Here's another Steve Martin film that plays like a phantom bowel movement. You keep waiting for it to really happen but...it never does. I'm going to put a movie review on a softkey to save me time. It would say this: If you've seen the trailers then you've already seen the film. The rest of the movie is just an attempt to set up the funny bits. Where is the writing skill that movies used to have? Where is the craft of the set up and the powerful punch line? Well, it's not in this film. You already know the basic plot, no need for me to parrot it. Expect to laugh occasionally. Pay only a matinee admission. Try to get someone else to pay for it. It will reduce the pain.

Mickey Blue Eyes (1999)

Another 103 minutes of Hollywood junk

[25 August 1999]

Hollywood seems to mostly make films the way Detroit made cars for so long, throw some parts together that look like what you imagined and see if if it's any good. It's not.

While there are a few funny moments they are sparse and, like so many films, if you've seen the trailer, you've seen the funny bits. Really, to say that there are a few funny moments is nothing of which to be proud, it's supposed to be a comedy. Detroit made funnier product.

Hugh Grant may well be a very nice guy. He might also realize that, while he has very little acting range, people keep paying him lots of money to play and replay the weak-kneed Englishman trying to make the best of some dull situation.

The rest of the cast dutifully reads their lines to move this sad collection of cliches to an unsurprising end. Last week I saw "The Sixth Sense" and came out of that movie stunned at it's level of craftsmanship. It was a film definitely not produced from parts bin scenes. Today, a week later I left "Mickey Blue Eyes" saying to myself, "Boy, that 6th Sense was a good movie!"