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Reviews
La véritable histoire du Chat Botté (2009)
I want my dollar back.
"It's a trap!" -Admiral Ackbar- The same could be spoken of this film. Whenever a great film is released, or even just anticipated, anyone with the ability to churn our their own knockoff is going to release their dumbed-down version so as to capitalize on the success or hype of the original. The True Story of Puss in Boots is one such film.
While I'm quite the plot, if you wish to call it that, differs quite widely from Dreamworks upcoming film, the cover was way to much like the Dreamworks cover to make me think that this film being released about the same time was mere coincidence. The film makers knew you would get this by accident, thinking you were getting the American made film staring Antonio Banderas...and so did Redbox. Hence, why I want my dollar back.
The characters in this film are just awful, and the American dubbed voice acting does them no justice (Shatner sounds like Herbert the Pervert from Family Guy) there is your pop-obsessed princess, an obese king, a drunk queen, your demon-clown chamberlain (who I am convinced was supposed to be the court jester in the French version) and for some reason an ogre who seems to be more along the lines of Cthulhu.
The plot makes no sense, and I will not even attempt to walk you through it. I got bored after 15 minutes and just completely lost track of what was going on.
I don't fault the French for trying to trick us into getting this film. What I do fault them for is deliberately messing up a story that originated in their country far worse than any American hack could. The blame for tricking us lies with Redbox for trying to pass this abomination off as the Dreamworks film we actually wanted to see. If you're reading this review, it is likely because you fell for the trap as I did. In that case, I can only offer my condolences. In the off-chance someone reads this before renting this film, do not get it!
The Fourth Kind (2009)
Unscarry...Unconvincing...Sloppy
I write this review with the forward that I am used to be disappointed by horror and suspense flicks...which this was not. This was more along the lines of a psychological drama. There is little emphasis on the abduction phenomena, and a lot on the turmoil that a psychiatrist and he family are facing. Think of it as a poorly rendered version of Signs that tries to play itself as a true story...which it is not.
The visual effects do a lot more to hurt the film than help it. Often throughout the move you will see the reenactment portrayed alongside the "actual footage" but slightly out of sync with it. I see no reason for this other than to try and distract the audience from how crappy the whole thing looks. There is a lot of camera distortion in critical places (deliberate I am sure) to try to avoid the use of any actual special effects. Sound is terrible throughout. I had to re-watch it with subtitles on just to catch what was going on.
The poor visuals an audio aside, there is very little of documented abduction phenomena actually portrayed. The scenes where the aliens were "speaking" through there hosts looked more like demonic possession than a human being used as a radio transmitter. More emphasis is placed on the fact that these beings are either gods or want us to believe so.
The director and producers wanted very much for us to believe that what we are seeing is real. The "evidence" given by the actors at the end, of all the FBI trips to Nome, is taken completely out of context. None of this actually happened and it would be nice if the film makers could have pointed that out.
Marley & Me (2008)
For all those who have ever loved and lost a faithful friend...
...bring a box of tissues, because those who have loved and eventually had to make the painful decision of letting our best friends go this movie will touch a nerve, and remind us all why we love our pets.
The plot of the movie is actually a very basic one. Journalist John Grogan gets his wife a puppy to take his wife's mind off kids, and their lives are never the same for it. We watch Marley grow into a ninety pound, underwear stealing, jewelry eating, drywall chewing wrecking ball, but we also see his unconditional love for his family, through the good times and the bad. And in we end, we see the inevitable end of Marley's long life and his family's loss at having to let him go.
There are many funny moments in this movie, but this is by no means a Beethoven knockoff canine-comedy. This is a story of life, and a story of love in spite of difficulty, and this is the story that many people have shared as they have watched a beloved pet grow old and die.
This movie was not just about Marley; this movie was about my neighbors lab Rex who died of cancer, my grandparent's dog Sooner who my last memories were of him struggling up the stairs with arthritis in both hips, and of my best childhood friend Skipper who tragically lost his life to an automobile.
The insensitive will see this as a cute movie but nothing more. The rest of us will need some time to regain our composure before we attempt to drive home. Once you get home, take your dog for a walk, throw a few balls, and tell them what good dogs they are. You'll definitely regret it if you don't.
Alvin and the Chipmunks (2007)
Are singing hamsters a bad example for children?
After seeing Alvin and the Chipmunks I can't help but shake my head, sigh, and ask "What's the deal with putting so much adult innuendo and bathroom humor into supposed children's movies?" because, along with a trio of tone-deaf squeaky rats that's what you are going to get
adult innuendo and bathroom humor.
This could have been a cute children's movie. This could have resurrected a novelty group that stopped being cute and funny fifty years ago. But what this movie did is pander to adolescent bathroom jokes. There are fart jokes, butt jokes, poop jokes, and general crude behavior from three weasels that would cause most parents to have a cardiac arrest if their kids acted like that.
I'll admit there is still a good moral
even if it was just the parents who caught it. It was the message about family that was a consistent theme throughout the movie. There was also the strong message about the danger of child actors. This does not however make up for setting a very bad example for the younger audience.
This can still be a kid's movie, but with adult supervision. Parents, be prepared to nip problem behavior in the bud if your children begin acting like the chipmunks. This may not have been the worst movie I've ever seen, but it could have been a lot better.
Cloverfield (2008)
The way monster movies were meant to be.
I had been looking forward to this movie for months. I knew that it was being told from the perspective of a movie camera found after the fact, so I was prepared for a lot of crappy angles and jumpiness ala Blair Witch Project...but I was not expecting to be taken to the edge of my seat and held there for the remainder of the movie.
The plot is fairly basic: some friends are gathered at a farewell party for one of their buds who has been offered a high paying job in Japan. The guy gets into an argument with a girl he slept with a month ago and she leaves in a huff. All of a sudden there is a tremor and the power flickers off and on. What then follows is terror and insanity beyond anything that Hollywould has thrown at me for the last 5 years. These people are trying to escape from the city when the central character gets a call from his friend who was injured and he decides to go rescue her.
I will not make any attempt to describe what this creature looks like except this: if a mountain could be said to walk or stumble. It follows no body pattern that I can say belongs to one particular type of organism. Cthulhu of the Lovecraft mythos could not have been as huge, intense, or as insane as this beast. Absolutely NOTHING the army does to it seems to affect it in the slightest.
This film does not tie up any loose ends, and to me that is a good thing. As with the Blair Witch Project its what you Don't see that makes this film. Most (if not all) of the loose ends are not tied up. If you absolutely must know what this creature was or if it was finally stopped, sorry but you will be disappointed.
All in all this was an excellent film for what it is: a fast paced odyssey of pure destruction and chaos that, while it may not have great acting or much of a plot, will grab you and hold you in your seat...until it shakes the life out of you and swallows you whole that is.
300 (2006)
An epic story of exceptional courage
I was deeply interested in the Battle of Thermopylae long before this movie came out. History itself lends for one of the greatest stories of human courage in the face of overwhelming odds that I know of. 300 Spartans along with 700 Helots held the massive Persian army at the pass of Thermopylae for three days while the rest of Greece was able to master their forces. They could have possibly held the pass indefinitely if it were not for a local named Ephialtes who thought he could gain a profit by leading the Persians behind the Spartan lines.
Despite being outnumbered by more than a hundred to one by even the most conservative accounts the Spartans refused to back down and fought to the last man, taking a rather disproportionate number of Persian soldiers with them.
That is the Battle of Thermopylae in a nutshell. For the most part this story transfers to the big screen in what I now regard to be the best epic battle sequences in cinema. However well the fights are choreographed though, there are some historical inaccuracies that are sure to annoy the history buffs;
1. I am pretty sure that the Spartan hoplites fought in more than just their helmets, bracers, groves and Speedos. No soldier fighting in a battle where stabbing and slashing weapons were used would have been so dressed.
2. One scene showed the Persians using makeshift pottery grenades when gunpowder would not have been discovered for almost another thousand years.
3. No nation in history used rhinos as beasts of war.
4. The many bizarre ogre like Persian elite soldiers almost put this movie into the realm of fantasy. Yes, I know that's how they looked in the comics but come on!
One of the subplots that I particularly dislike, and one that is actually central to the movie, is that of Leonidas's wife Gorgo (unnamed in the movie) trying to rally support for her husband while a traitorous politician tries to thwart her. That made sense from a dramatic standpoint but was the single greatest event in the movie that never actually happened.
A particularly enjoyable part of the movie is having events narrated by David Wenhem. He has a way of theatric narration that catches your attention and the final narration he gives at the end is one of the greatest speeches ever given in cinema.
My one final lasting puzzlement is all the arguing over the directors portrayal of history as well as undertones of racism. It's a movie for *obscenity* sake! While this movie was clearly not meant to be a history lesson it was meant to be entertaining and does so quite well. And as for the bizarre conspiracies of inciting Americans against the middle east I'll believe that when I see it. While this move was not meant to inspire racism in its viewers it certainly does inspire a sense of valiance, patriotism, courage and honor that was a trademark of the Spartan culture but severely lacking today.
I gave this move a seven out of ten. I loved the styling and artistic look of the movie. It looked excellent and was solidly entertaining. I also didn't like some of the major historical inaccuracies as well as the unnecessary nudity. This movie would have gotten a nine if not for that.
Catwoman (2004)
A bad idea gone horribly wrong
I think I know how this movie got into production. Somewhere in one of those Hollywood think tanks somebody must have suggested "Hey, lets put Halle Berry in tight shredded leather and make her crack a whip around like a dominatrix!" Gee, how could THAT idea have possibly backfired? This movie could be summed up in one phrase, worthless flesh fest. Everything from the acting, the story, the special effects, to some of the plot devices were so bad that they were just painful. Guess how Sharon Stone's character gets her super powers. Yup, anti-wrinkle cream that turns her into stone (pun intended).
This movie was Catwoman in name only. There is absolutely no ties to its batman comics roots. You would think that X-Men gave us us fair warning not to cast Halle Berry in comic book based movies, but noooo!
Spider-Man 3 (2007)
It just rolled over and died at the end
I am at a loss for words after seeing this mess. I was expecting a dramatic ending to the spider man trilogy, not this inexcusably flawed piece of crap! For the first quarter of the movie it was fairly decent. We got plenty of action and it looked quite pretty. But then the movie decided "I don't wanna be an action movie any more. I'm gonna be a drama!" The movie then tries to take two very different plots and twine them together. The first is Peter finding out that it was actually the Sandman who killed Uncle Ben and becomes obsessed with revenge. This is in stark contrast to the Sandman's back story in which he is just trying to provide a decent life for his little girl who is stuck living in the projects.
The other sub-par sub-plot is Peter Parker being twisted by the alien symbiot that has bonded itself to him. In the comics that was actually a pretty good story run as it steadily made spider man meaner and more aggressive. On the big screen it just turns Peter Parker into a creepy pervert who has no problem using his landlord's daughter who has a major crush on him, hitting on random girls on the street (they looked as creeped at as I was by this behavior), and shamelessly flirting with another mans girlfriend in front of M.J. just to make her jealous.
Probably the biggest let down of this movie was Venom. I found nothing wrong with the character himself. He still looked good (sans rolling tongue) and Topher Grace actually did a pretty good job of pulling the character off. But why give such a highly anticipated character less than fifteen minutes of screen time?! Why?! Soon, (but not soon enough it felt like) the movie came to its end in which Peter reconciles with the man who killed his uncle as well as Harry Osborne who repents of his vengeful ways. It was this so-sugary-your-pancreas-will-go-into-shock ending that irritated me the most. It was not just anticlimactic, it was the end of a great movie franchise rolling over and dying without so much as a whimper.
All in all this movie tanked. Toby McGuire still gives a rather wooden performance as our favorite web-slinging wall-crawler (I am still convinced Topher Grace should have been cast from the beginning as our main hero). And what little action there is is badly overshadowed by what are quite possibly the most poorly written script and story line for an action movie ever.
Erufen rîto (2004)
Oh lily of purity!
It took me some time to decide what I wanted to write about this anime. Having seen it I doubt I will ever forget it. This was one of the most hauntingly beautiful (and yet profoundly disturbing) works I have been blessed to see in a while and that is saying something.
There is a shortage of films nowadays that make you think. Elfen Lied does just that with its grim and often rather brutal portrayal of humanity, or the lack thereof. This movie challenged what we see in ourselves and gave a rather strong message of tolerance and kindness.
I hate to reveal any plot elements for fear of spoiling the experience. To describe this movie one could say it is a combination of the girlie cuteness of Chobits and Sailor Moon, the social issues of X-Men, the romantic drama of Titanic and the violence of 300. The movie revolves around a diclonius (a mutated race that is going to replace humanity as the dominant species) named Lucy as she escapes from a testing facility and is found by a boy whose family she murdered years before the anime. Lucy has severe amnesia (the result of being shot in the head with an anti-tank round) and is left with the mind of an infant. Her Lucy side emerges as the anime progresses and she comes to grips with the young man she hurt so long ago.
That is the plot in a nutshell but there is so much more, too much to put in a review so do yourself a favor and see this anime.
One thing about this anime is the fact that it is not always easy to tell the good guys from the bad guys. Case in point the main protagonist Lucy is, when in her right mind (I use the term loosely) best described as cold, cruel, sadistic, and psychotic. Throughout the series we also see the characters pasts and how the abuse of the world has affected them. Most of the characters have some psychological scars in one form or another.
Keep in mind that this is not one for the children. There are many graphic depictions of abuse, torment, animal cruelty, child molestation and murder. If you are offended by violence, nudity, or having your basic identity as a human being challenged this may not be an anime for you.
All in all this was the best anime I have had the pleasure to experience. The cruelty and uncaring of this world aside, there is also a sublime message of love, friendship, compassion and forgiveness. The main musical score, Lilium, is often played throughout adding to an atmosphere of beautiful melancholy that is sure to stick with you for a long time. You will either love this series or be vehemently opposed to it. Not for the faint of heart or weak of stomach.
Eight out of Ten.
The Messengers (2007)
Suspense Thrillers Take Another Shot in the Pills
To understand what is happening to suspense and horror movies these days you must first understand what a puppy mill is. In a puppy mill the mama dog is bred as fast and as frequently as she is physically able. The pups often suffer from the my-uncle-is-my-daddy problems of inbreeding and are rarely checked for hereditary diseases. Now that you understand what a puppy mill is, you understand what horror movies have been going through for the past two years.
The Messengers is just another pointless off-the-assembly-line horror film. We've already seen jerky pale little boys who crawl on the ceilings and we have already seen solid objects turn liquid. Come on Hollywood, find something new to scare me with.
What really puts this movie below some of the other bakers dozen flicks is the sub-par plot. The movie starts out with a mother and little boy hiding in their farm house from an unseen terror that kills them both. My first though was "Ok, some sort of malevolent entity lurks in this house and the family is going to realize this only when it is too late." How wrong I was. Turns out, it was the father who went nuts and killed his family and now the ghosts are trying to warn the new family that the psycho is still around. The house comes alive during the last fight and somehow the ghosts are able to turn the basement floor into quicksand and bury the psychotic former home owner alive. They were just trying to warn the new owners, they were just being helpful. Fair enough. But if the ghosts are trying to merely warn the family why are they injuring the teenage daughter (but NOT her toddler brother for some weird reason). It makes no sense to hurt the occupant when the ghost are trying to protect them.
All in all there is nothing original about this movie. Dake a dash of The Grudge and add a sprinkling of The Haunting (the new one, not the good one) and mix it all together with a bunch of run-of-the-mill scare tricks and you have The Messengers. Don't expect too much if you rent this movie. You will only be let down.
The Hunchback of Notre Dame (1996)
Take with a grain of salt: and not because of the plot deviation
The deviation from the actual plot aside (the worst trashing of a classic story yet.) there are a number of reasons I did not like this film as well as why I would recommend that parents not let their kids watch it, at least not until they can better handle some of the more mature themes.
This was a rather dark movie for children. The stark ugliness of the world that Quasimodo wants to be a part of is way to sharp a contrast to the bright sunny world of the bell tower. However Disney feels the world may be, it is rarely so black and white in its differences.
There are a number of rather mature scenes that may be age inappropriate for the target audience: 1. When Quasimodo is trying to loose himself in the crowd he accidentally bursts in on Esmerelda dressing for her performance. Not the worst DIRECT scene but you do a get a brief glimpse of an uncovered breast
2. Ah, the once scene that takes the cake as having too lustful an overtone. Esmerelda is dancing, using way too sexy of moves in front of Frollo, and uses a spear to pole dance. I'm sorry, but that just not appropriate in a children's movie.
3. And last but not least, the numerous scenes where Frollo expresses his lust for Esmerelda.
This movie was everything I have come to expect from Disney in recent years. By all means if you find yourself bored pop it in and shut down the thinker for a while. Just make sure to fast forward through a few points if toddlers are present.
The 13th Warrior (1999)
The best adaptation of Beowulf to date
Many years ago, when Michael Chrichton was in an English literature class, his professor briefly covered Beowulf and commented on how almost no one read the epic poem any more. Well that got Michael and his friends talking and one of them dared him to write his own telling of Beowulf. Michael Chrichton did so and produced a book called "The Eaters of the Dead" and as a result we have The Thirteenth Warrior, possibly the most accurate Beowulf depiction despite the fact that the names of characters and places only sound like the ones from the poem.
I like this movie for a number of reasons. Firstly, the Vikings are depicted rather accurately and the depiction of their religious beliefs is actually pretty spot on. I like this movie because it is almost 90% accurate to the original book. It has a much more "real" feel to it than many other movies set in medieval times.
I would also be so bold as to suggest that this is Antonio Banderas' best performance. As Ibn-Fadlan he gives a rather good portrayal as an Arabian poet who finds himself dropped into the middle of a culture that he cannot understand but eventually comes to respect.
"Lo there do I see my father! Lo there do I see my mother and my brothers and my sisters! Lo there do I see the line of my ancestors, back to the beginning. Lo they bid me enter with them into the halls of Valhalla, where the brave may live forever!"
The Lost World: Jurassic Park (1997)
My least favorite of the three - which still makes it a decent flick
I am a huge fan of Jurassic Park. If anything I enjoy the books more than I do the movies. And that it precisely what bothers me about this film.
The first point I would like to make against this film is that it starts out by getting preachy really fast. I'm sorry but I am with Peter Ludlow when he says (and it was actually Lew Dodgson who said the same line verbatim in the book) "an extinct animal that is brought back to life has no rights. It exists because we made it; we patented it, we own it.
My other beef is with two of the main characters Sarah Harding and Kelly. I could not think of two more inaccurate transitions from book to big-screen. Sarah Harding comes off as a bit of a hypocrite when, after she has just finished petting a baby stegosaurus, she insists that they are here to observe and document, not interact. That made no sense. And how does a gawky geeky white girl become a black gymnast? The absolute dumbest scene has to be when she uses her skills as a gymnast to knock a velociraptor through a window where it is impaled on a piece of re-bar. The slow swaggering strut that she uses just before she launches herself onto some conveniently placed bars is just revolting. Honestly, would a person act like that when facing down a three-hundred pound predator ready to eat them? Idiotic and poorly done human characters aside, the rest of the movie is excellent. The dinosaurs look even better than they did in the first film. And I don't care how campy the T-Rex attack in San Deigo is, or how much this deviates from the book, it is still one of my favorite Dino vs. Human sequences in cinema.
I would still recommend this movie as a dinosaur flick. It looks pretty and is still quite fun. You just have to close your eyes and stuff cotton into your ears whenever things get preachy or the characters open their mouths and stupid comes out.
They (2002)
This movie scared the hell out of me
I made the mistake of watching this movie for the first time, by myself, with all the lights off. Needless to say, I hadn't needed a night light in 17 years and yet I needed one after that.
What I really like about this movie is that it does not go for gross-out over actual suspense. I see horror films where people are getting impaled, disemboweled and beheaded and I yawn. Thank you Hollywood for desensitizing me to entrails. But this movie is legitimately creepy, and it does wonders to awaken a fear of the dark that we thought we lost with childhood.
The only real disappointment with this film is the ending; both of them. The first ending is our young hot protagonist being captured by these night-terrors and taken away forever. I found myself yelling "that's not fair!" because it wasn't. You found yourself drawn into this young woman's horror and she loses in the end. Why!? The alternate ending, the one where she is a patient in a mental home and the whole movie is one of her delusions, really ticked me off. Such a worthless plot device.
This is a great horror movie for those of you tired of cheap mutilations. By all means watch this movie. Just don't watch it by yourself after dark.
Happy Feet (2006)
Offensive on all levels
I rarely am offended by movies but this one managed to do just that. Happy feet could have been a great kid's film. A story about a young oddball penguin that has to overcome a social difficulty that is no fault of his own could make for a wonderful story of growing up and being yourself. But then we get the stereotypes.
It should be pointed out that EVERY character Robin Williams voices pokes fun at some group or another; a rock-hopper penguin that rips on black Baptist preachers, an Adele penguin that stereotypes Mexicans, and of course his religious leader emperor penguin that is all that is bad in anyone who holds to religion.
There are also a number of things that make this movie inappropriate for young children. There is way too much sexual innuendo. And the sequences with the leopard seal and killer whale may be too scary for the target audience.
My last gripe is the fact that once again, humans are the villains. I am sick and tired of being portrayed as a monster just because of my species.
So, except for the offensive stereotypes, the sexual references and the political demagoguery this was a semi-decent film.
Beowulf (2007)
Robert Zemeckis takes a sh-t on classic literature.
I went in to see this movie with high expectations. Boy was I let down. First off, I would like to start off with a question; why was this film not given a R rating. There were scenes in this movie that made Austin Powers look tame by comparison. The only real comparison I can give to this move is an episode of King of the Hill where Bobbie's drama teacher does a reenactment of The Alamo where the heroes who fought and died there were drunk, cross-dressing, surrender-monkeys. Yes, the deviation is that bad. My biggest beef is that Beowulf is depicted as a skirt-chasing fraud who has trouble keeping it in his pants where supernatural women and other men's wives are concerned. But that is not the only serious deviation. In the epic poem Grendel was the son of Cain, not Hrothgar, and his mother was also one of Cain's kin. Beowulf did NOT have sex with Grendel's mother (who, to my understanding, was not a succubus) and did NOT father the dragon which would eventually kill him. Throw in the fact that that towards the end of the movie Beowulf is not even attempting to hide the fact that he is cheating on his wife with a girl young enough to be his granddaughter and you have ruined quite possibly the greatest hero in literature. My other point was some of the CGI characters. They look like they were ripped out of Shrek. So, to make a long story short I left the theater not just feeling disappointed but also quite angry. This sort of "my own interpretation" is the sort of thing I would have expected from Oliver Stone. My biggest worry is that those who have never read the poem and are unfamiliar with the story will think this is an accurate depiction of it.