theericconrad Reviews

The Last King of Scotland (2006)

Fantastic except for the visuals

[8/10 · 26 March 2007]

Long story short: good movie, great performances, great writing, mediocre direction. So many of the visual choices in this film seemed designed to eschew the incredible beauty of the setting, opting rather for a TV-like amalgam of close-ups, quick-cuts and occasional moments of camera self-consciousness.

Basically every actor in this film did a terrific job - with the lovely Kerry Washington turning in a surprisingly good and (wow wow wow) hot performance. The movie was well-paced and the production quality high, but I left the theater feeling cheated out of what could've been such a visually stunning and artistic picture, but wasn't.

Little Children (2006)

Very Good, could've been great

[7/10 · 26 March 2007]

Kate Winslet (unsurprisingly) shines, as always, in this one, capturing beautifully the stale boredom of the overeducated young mother/housewife.

At times Field's direction drifts uncomfortably close to Alexander Payne-ian (to coin a phrase), but while Payne and Jim Taylor were able to render Perotta's oft-diffuse novel Election in an airtight and fantastic film, the Field-Perotta collab on Little Children fell a bit short. With some lazy decision-making as far as character focus goes, the movie starts to take on a rambling and directionless quality at times, and begins to feel looooonnnnggggg.

That said, there are moments of genuine tension and relative horror - all of which can be credited to the perversely creepy Jackie Earle Haley (made all the creepier by his child-star past). Never again will I see a foil swan or hear the phrase "don't you tell on me" without a shiver go up and down and up my spine again.

All in all, a good movie that could've been great in some different hands.

Color Me Kubrick (2005)

Who knew 82 minutes could last this long

[3/10 · 26 March 2007]

I went to this picture with the hope that -- if nothing else -- watching John Malkovich play a highly troubled delusional queen with a genius for manipulation and an obscene fashion sense would be enough to keep me entertained for an hour and change. It wasn't.

The flick's barely worth analyzing; it's simply a mess, handled so poorly that Malkovich's moments of comic mastery are lost in a sea of poorly executed photography, tepid writing and haphazard form. While director/prod Brian Cook was one of Kubrick's assistant directors we see that little to no talent ever rubbed off - things get so bad that one clings to the often forced and clumsy musical/visual homage's to the genius' work to at least quell that nagging voice that won't stop whispering "you spent eleven dollars on this...you spend eleven dollars on this..."

To say nothing about the quality of acting, photography, writing, form, pace, etc., one can credit Color Me Kubrick as a charming premise, but one gone sodden and awry with mediocre film-making.