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John-465
Reviews
Pantheon (2022)
Best science fiction I've seen in years.
Pantheon's animation is not of Pixar quality but is much better than the average animated TV show, it also has very good voice acting, a brilliant script, and pitch perfect music. It is the most intelligent depiction of mind uploading that I have seen in fiction, although I think Artificial Intelligence will get there first. I give it a 10 out of 10.
I was very disappointed to learn that AMC+ has canceled the second season even though production had already begun on it, they even stopped streaming the first season of it for some unknown reason. My hope is that this wonderful series will find a new home at Netflix or Amazon Prime and they finish the second season.
John K Clark.
The Green Inferno (2013)
Two big problems
Anybody deciding to watch this movie probably knowns what they're getting into, but even besides the extreme violence I have two problems with it. First of all I think it insults primitive hunter gatherer cultures, I don't believe any existing tribe or any tribe that ever existed behaved in the way depicted in this film. The second problem is it accomplishes something I would not have thought possible, it makes bulldozers in the Amazon look sympathetic. Even if we assume for the sake of argument that such a evil brutal tribe did exist and I had narrowly escaped their clutches after watching my friends being slowly tortured to death I certainly wouldn't lie about what happened in order to protect those monsters, I'd want their culture of pain and murder exterminated. Yes yes I know, the tribe had a legitimate grievance against western civilization and I have a legitimate grievance against Adolf Hitler, but if he were standing in front of me right now I wouldn't rip him apart with my teeth and eat him alive.
Anybody deciding to watch this movie probably knowns what they're getting into, but even besides the extreme violence I have two problems with it. First of all I think it insults primitive hunter gatherer cultures, I don't believe any existing tribe or any tribe that ever existed behaved in the way depicted in this film. The second problem is it accomplishes something I would not have thought possible, it makes bulldozers in the Amazon look sympathetic. Even if we assume for the sake of argument that such a evil brutal tribe did exist and I had narrowly escaped their clutches after watching my friends being slowly tortured to death I certainly wouldn't lie about what happened in order to protect those monsters, I'd want their culture of pain and murder exterminated. Yes yes I know, the tribe had a legitimate grievance against western civilization and I have a legitimate grievance against Adolf Hitler, but if he were standing in front of me right now I wouldn't rip him apart with my teeth and eat him alive.
John K Clark
Melancholia (2011)
Pretentious amateurish ridiculous and dull
Melancholia is easily the worst movie I have ever spent money to see, or at least the first hour is, I can't comment on the remainder because I did something I have not done in over 25 years, I walked out of the theater before the movie was over. This turkey gives us a "plot" that is pretentious amateurish ridiculous and dull, characters with vapid dialog who emote with LONG vacant stares at the camera and try to convince us (unsuccessfully) that their melancholia means they are deep and not just self indulgent or have a chemical imbalance, and those aren't even the worst things about this movie.
If Mr. von Trier can't give us something interesting to think about he could have at least presented something for us to look at without making one seasick, but apparently Mr.von Trier got a new zoom lens for his birthday and he was eager to try it out, so he zooms in, and then he zooms out, and then he zooms in, and then he zooms out again, and then he zooms way way way in and figures that would be the perfect time for a swish pan, and all the time he's playing with the zoom he's holding the camera as if fire ants were crawling up his pant legs and he was trying to shake them off. And I'm not just talking about one bad scene I'm talking about the entire first hour, perhaps the entire movie but I wouldn't know about that. Even Ed Wood knew more about how to move a camera than Mr.von Trier, I'm serious, Plan Nine from Outer Space showed more technical skill than Melancholia; so I would humbly suggest that before Mr.von Trier makes another home movie he sell his zoom lens and use the money to buy a tripod.
Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix (2007)
By far it has the best acting of any Potter movie
I loved the movie (I gave it a 10) by far it has the best acting of any Potter movie, but nothing is perfect so I do have 2 complaints.
1) The Snape's worst memory scene is WAY too short and Lilly isn't even in it, nor do they make clear just how bad Harry felt about seeing his father act this un-nobly toward a Snape that was just minding his own business. This PROFOUNDLY effected Harry, but the movie doesn't seem to say that.
2) The didn't have the single best scene in the entire book, the scene when Harry becomes non linear and wrecks Dumbledore's office.
I confess I just don't get it, directors go on and on how they don't want to make their movie too long, and yet the have 10 or 12 minutes of closing credits. I humbly suggest they all should flash by in 10 seconds. True, at that speed nobody could read them, but that is a minor point, nobody reads them anyway; and if you have a burning desire to know if the first aid paramedic for the second unit was John Smith or Jack Smyth you can always look it up on the internet, or freeze frame it when you get the DVD.
I've mentioned this to people before and I always get comments saying that they just love closing credits, but just how much do you really love them? Do you love them more than an entire subplot (probably two) that was in the book but not the movie? And look at some great classic movies, in many of them the closing credits last no more than 10 seconds, this modern trend of endless credits stinks.
Grindhouse (2007)
Tarantino is better than Rodrigue'
Without a doubt the best part of Grindhouse is the last 20 minutes. I've heard someone say it is the best car chase ever put on film, and that may not be an exaggeration; it certainly deserves to be in the top two spot. The only competition is the car chase in Matrix 2, but unlike Matrix Tarantino only used his guts and that of his star not CGI, or at least he appeared to not use CGI. Tarantino's car chase was not quiet as visually spectacular as the one in Matrix but it had more emotional depth. It's hard to decide which is the superior.
I'd rate the last 20 minutes as a 10, but the movie lasted over 3 hours, so I'm generous giving it an 8.
Colossus: The Forbin Project (1970)
The most underrated movie ever made
The Forbin Project has just come out on DVD, anybody who has not already seen it has 24 hours to do so before they must hang their head in shame. The movie is 35 years old now but it is still the most intelligent and accurate portrayal of Artificial Intelligence ever put on film. In my opinion this is one of the best movies ever made, without a doubt it is the most underrated movie ever made. Be warned however this film will scare you; there is no blood or gore and the special effects are primitive by modern standards, but if The Forbin Project does not scare your brain then you have not understood it.
This is one of the very rare occasions when the movie is better, much much better, than the book. When I read the book years ago I remember thinking the premise was great and with a few changes it could be really great, but as it is the book is mediocre at best. With genius you wouldn't expect B grade moviemakers to have they kept all the brilliant parts and eliminated all the stupid parts. This movie has stood the test of time extraordinarily well.
Forbidden Planet (1956)
A flawed masterpiece
Forbidden Planet was the first movie I ever saw in my life and is still one of my all time favorites; effects that were incredible for it's day, wonderful music for any day with the world's first all electronic score, and a basic plot premise that is brilliant and bleeding edge even today.
That said it must be admitted the movie is not without flaw, the most serious being the ending. Like all films of its day we must have a happy ending and to have that the thing of wonder, in this case an entire planet, must blow up. Why? Because of course there are some things man was not meant to know. There are also some lines of dialogue that can only make you groan " I'll bet any quantum mechanic in the army would give his eye teeth to work on this stuff". I also think the comic relief cook should have been the first causality, like in the opening credits.
And there is one scene that is just a few frames too long. This didn't bother me at all the first time I saw it but for some reason it bugs the hell out of me now. Alteria is swimming in a lake and we're told she's nude. Fine. But then we get a brief glimpse of her getting out of the lake and it's clear as day that she's not nude at all. Bummer!
If they can remake Planet Of The Apes they can damn well remake Forbidden Planet.
Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone (2001)
Wonderful movie but read the book
Is the movie as good as the book, no of course not, but it's a wonderful movie nevertheless. I think only a professional sourpuss would fail to find magic in this film, however I'm willing to forgive professional movie critics for panning it, they're more or less obligated to give a negative review to anything that universally popular. As I said a movie can never be as good as a great book but a great movie can be made from a mediocre book, just look at "The Godfather" or "Gone With The Wind", that gives me hope that it might just be possible that "Lord Of The Rings" will turn out to be a great film.
A.I. Artificial Intelligence (2001)
AI is a masterpiece!
I just got home from watching AI and all I can say is it's the best movie I've seen in years, many years. It's visually beautiful, the kid is one incredible actor, and most important of all it worked as a drama. As for the science,well a movie, even a science fiction movie, is not a science treatise but still it shouldn't have anything that would make an educated man groan; I didn't groan, not once. Well, ok, there was something at the very end that might be a bit doggy, but by then you're dealing with something so advanced, so unfathomable, it didn't bother me much. Also a big corporation that's smart enough to make a robot as sophisticated as David is unlikely to do a few things depicted in the film that were sort of dumb, but I confess these objections didn't occur to me until the movie was over and they did advance the plot so I'll cut the movie people a little slack.
I'm certain time will be kind to this movie, I think this is the sort of film that will improve each time you see it. I am also certain that the professional movie reviewers who panned it in the year 2001 will be very embarrassed by their negative articles 10 years from now.