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Kshalene
Reviews
90° South
A Cold Journey into the Birth of Documentary Film
I can imagine that this film would have been quite remarkable in 1933 when the first incarnation appeared. It still serves as a fantastic tale of humanities quest for the unknown and his perseverance in the face of the worst conditions that the earth can produce. Yet, as a viewer of the film in the 21st century, I found the film to be somewhat dull. The development of the characters, even the stalwart Captain, are not very well explained. The amount of drive and obsession that the people that would be willing to take such a journey is simply explained away as British Nationalism,and to a calloused modern viewer such as myself, this simply was not sufficient explanation. Yet, as a historical document, this film is well worth the hour and ten minutes of viewing time, and some of the early footage of the Antartic is truly amazing.
Fat Albert (2004)
Floater
Fat Albert is well enough intentioned... I do not think that the film makers set out to destroy one of the Saturday Morning Gods in such an atrocious manner. While this genre, like the more successful comic book genre, can be done somewhat successfully (i.e. Scooby Doo), there is a fine line to walk without making the characters look empty and embarrassing. Fat Albert unfortunately does this. It takes the two dimensionality of the original characters and focuses on it until they loose whatever vibrancy they had previously. The story is contrived and supremely predictable. Grandberry is his usual chewing-on-the-scenery self. Thompson is passable as Fat Albert, but should stay far far far away from rap music for the remainder of his days. The only really enjoyable scenes in the movie were the ones with Bill Cosby. All in all, this movie is a total floater. Don't look at it, just flush.
Cidade de Deus (2002)
Citt of God is Fabulous
Easily one of the best movies of the year, perhaps the decade. I have not seen a gangster movie with the level of nuance and attitude as City of God. All the of the characters are wonderfully developed and all have their own identity to add to the message of the film. The locations in which the film was shot are almost a character unto themselves and I left wanting to see more of this slum of Rio de Janiero. There is nothing that I can say about this movie other than it is a masterpiece of storytelling and setting... This is the movie that will put Latin American cinema back to it levels of a couple of years ago. Yet City of God moves beyond what Perros Del Amor and Y Tu Mama Tambien ever dreamed of achieving. Go watch this movie!
The Manchurian Candidate (2004)
Bland-churian Candidate
If you have never seen the Sinatra version of this film, you will have a mediocre experience in this new version with Denzel Washington. The essential story is the same, albeit updated with the appropriate wars, misguided patriotism and politics suitable for the Bush 2 administration. If you have seen the Sinatra movie, do not bother, for this cultural road-bump is definitely not worth soiling the memories of the original classic. Streep is wonderful, of course, but not on screen enough. Denzel is asleep. And the rest of the cast is just okay. The cine-photography and editing are ordinary. Nothing to get excited about here, except for the hints at incest between Shaw and his mother, which, while oddly inappropriate and generally gross, does cast a new shadow on the characters, one that I found to be very interesting albeit a tad over-reaching. Yet this odd addition to the original script does not lift you out of the blasé monotony of the rest of the film.
Septem8er Tapes (2004)
A great little war film.
I couldn't help to be blown away from this little movie. I see the obvious comparisons to Blair Witch, but films that choose to tell their story through the device of fabricated documentary have few options in which to work. I think that the characters were original and the acting was so good that I kept forgetting that I wasn't watching a documentary. Towards the end of the film I could really feel the actors' terror. I think that the film dealt with some touchy political issues and did it without being too prescriptive or heavy-handed. The main character was a little foolhardy at times, but he needed to be for the film to work... I would strongly recommend this movie, and I often do at the video store I manage.