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Adamjammer
Reviews
Me and You and Everyone We Know (2005)
Potentially good, but misses on the delivery
My friend and I (both film "enthusiasts" for lack of a better term) decided to go see this movie on a whim. It was the rare case where I went in knowing absolutely nothing about the film, which doesn't often happen in our over-advertised world, which allowed me to be fairly objective when I saw it.
I wanted to like the movie, but to me it seemed nothing more than a loose collection of interesting ideas that never really gelled or came together. The best comparison I can give is that of "Dazed and Confused", or any number of other Linklater films, where things happen to the characters but there is no active driving plot persay, just stories within the overall story.
Unfortunately while Linklater is a master of his craft, Miranda July doesn't quite pull it off. I'm willing to chalk it up to the fact that this is her first feature film, but I think equally telling is the fact that her background is as a performance artist which, while not meaning to detract or belittle such people, I've never really understood or cared much for. Indeed her "day job" is evident in that some of the situations the characters get themselves into are a little bit disturbing and just a tad creepy, without giving too much away. Perhaps I'm just too uptight and prudish for it (which I doubt any of my close friends would say) but it seems like she almost took a perverse joy in trying to push the audience and the "acceptable limits" of what she could discuss rather than focusing on the characters. And here perhaps is where she falters while Linklater succeeds; he examines characters and their interplay as events happen to them, while July seems more interested in the situations while paying little mind to some of the characters.
I do feel I'd be remiss if I didn't highlight the good points of the movie. While some of the situations and "conflicts" in the film didn't sit too well with me, there were some other very interesting and well-done scenes that I thoroughly enjoyed. Additionally there is some decent acting going on, particularly John Hawkes who, while he doesn't deliver a knockout performance, is entertaining to watch as the harangued and awkward shoe salesman/father. The rest of the actors seemed to range from mediocre to just about average in their performances (particularly Ms. July whom just seemed to be a little too frantic and off-kilter, as if she was trying to act like a crazy person rather than just becoming the role.)
Overall I feel like I'm being a little harsh, but in the end I just didn't really care for this movie. On the other hand, my friend whom I saw it with loved it. So take it as you will.
The Guardian (2006)
Not as bad as I expected
To begin with, I had fairly low expectations, so I was surprised when The Guardian wasn't as bad as I expected. Granted, it really wasn't great, but it could've been worse. I suppose I should be more specific, right?
First off the length is one of its biggest flaws, you could easily chop off a good 45 minutes, make it closer to 1 1/2 hours and it wouldn't have suffered greatly. Secondly, I hardly exaggerate when I say they trot out nearly every single action movie cliché in the book, and I do mean nearly all of them. The fact that Costner plays an "unconventional" teacher who "won't give up" on Kutcher's character, and that they have more in common and learn to overcome their dislike of each other and in the end have a mutual respect, the way the events unfold and even the lines that are used to unfold them, it's one tired cliché after another. I know that it's hard to be original when most everything has been done, but unlike other action movies The Guardian doesn't bring anything new to the scene in presenting these clichés. Thirdly, maybe the most astounding fact is that despite its tedious length, the movie focuses nearly entirely on Costner and Kutcher. Of course this is the point of the movie, but its a shame to let the supporting cast go to such waste. Most of the other characters are kept out of the picture, popping up now and then to remind us that they exist and offer a one-liner or two, and the few we do meet (the girlfriend, the ex-wife, etc) are retreaded characters we've met in a thousand other action movies. I mean, I personally love Dule Hill and was psyched (no pun intended to those of you who catch it) when he surprisingly turns up as another student in the Coast Guard Academy. I was needless to say supremely disappointed when he had a grand total of 3 lines. But I digress, the point is that the movie takes so long and yet focuses on so little besides Costner and Kutcher. For the 219 minute price, I personally would expect a little supporting cast action. Alas, little was to be had.
So, why wasn't it as bad as I thought it would be? Well for starters despite the fairly vapid characters nearly all the actors do a credible job with the little substance they have. Some are better than others, I've always liked Costner and he does a good job here, seeming to have the most fun with a rather flat character. Kutcher continues to underwhelm me but he shows some flashes of some decent acting chops. In addition, while they do use clichés up the whazoo, they're pulled off pretty well, even the final big scene (which I saw coming a mile away) was done surprisingly decently in my opinion, and it helped save the film. Visually it's a satisfying enough film, and there're even a few good one-liners stuck in the mediocre script.
Overall, I'd say wait for a rental. It isn't great but as far as fairly mindless action flicks go, it's done well enough.
Little Nicky (2000)
Not too good, not too bad
I rented this on a whim with a friend (mainly to relieve the stress of watching Saw and Saw II back to back) and I gotta say it wasn't half bad. I wasn't expecting Scorsese, but I was expecting a pretty bad movie, and I was pleasantly surprised when it actually delivered some laughs. Technically the movie's put together fairly shoddily, the plot is far from cohesive, the dialogue's mediocre at best, and yet somehow I got a good handful of laughs despite this. The sheer randomness and ridiculousness of it all keeps you off-balance enough that the occasional good one-liner comes through and can make you chuckle. It ain't Shakespeare, hell it ain't even Ogden Nash, but it's not as bad as I thought.
Monk (2002)
Subtle small-time crime-comedy, pure genius
I had been a fan of Monk for some time, but it really won me over in that it managed to win a good number of my friends over. On a late Friday night a group of us had gathered in someone's basement just to hang out and catch-up, ranging in age from mid-highschool to mid-college levels. Obviously not the easiest crowd to impress, especially when it comes to entertainment and t.v. Anyhoo it was getting late and we were getting tired and flipping around the t.v and being in control of the remote, I came to rest on the new episode of Monk (I believe it was the Monk gets Drunk one, where they visit a winery.) A few of my friends had heard of it, but none had seen it. Yet a mere 5 minutes into the episode and everyone was hooked, and those who'd planned on leaving wound up staying till the hour was up to see how it ended. That is the power of Monk, to somehow be engaging, funny, and yes, even "hip" for a group of teenagers.
There're two things that stand out in my mind as to why Monk succeeds so brilliantly. One of course is the genius of Tony Shaloub in the title role. I've been a fan of his quirky characters on the big screen and his role as an OCD detective seems fit only for him. He's believable, funny, quirky, and yet pulls it all off while still managing to bring something new to the performance.
The other reason I believe Monk works so well is the scope which it tackles, which is a relatively small one, especially considering the "bigger is better" mentality of most t.v shows and movies today (i.e Alias, 24, etc.) The crimes are still important but are relatively small and almost quaint, given what else is on t.v these days. Don't get me wrong, I am a huge fan of Law and Order and SVU. But sometimes you just need to watch a good mystery without having the darkness and the gravity shoved in your face, and in this respect Monk is beyond refreshing. The show is every bit as clever and mysterious as any Law and Order episode (I might argue it is even more clever most of the time) but it does so unpretentiously. The crime never gets bigger than the immediate cast of characters, it is not a be all and end all scenario ever, the bad guy is of course bad but not some slimy vile creature that you wish would just curl up back in whatever sewage pipe he came from (as frequently happens on L&O.) It's just nice, plain and simple, a good mystery sans the dark.
The Brothers Grimm (2005)
Stop blaming Gilliam, blame writing a third grader could've produced
To be candid, I'm a big Gilliam fan since his Python days, so this review may be a bit biased. However I fully stand by my claim that Gilliam shares the smallest of blame for this movie while %99.999 lies on the idiot who wrote the "story" (and I use the term loosely.) It's pretty clear when the parts that Gilliam devised appear on screen, as they have his distinct and slightly manic touch to them. These in and of themselves are good, not overwhelming like in some of his movies, but distinct, funny (in a dark manner mostly) and again, very good. Where Gilliam's personality shines, so does the movie in my opinion.
The rest, is cookie-cutter garbage, and not very intelligible garbage either. I try to give movies the benefit of the doubt these days, as it seems to be getting harder and harder to be creative and imaginative, but that's no excuse to go in the opposite direction. The writer fulfills every cliché with only one or two having a slightly creative twist, and the rest of the story is forgettable and even confusing. You have to constantly remind yourself where you are, why this person is doing what and most of the time the motives behind the actions are a complete mystery. Another tip is that having the characters go into the woods, out of the woods, into the woods, out of the woods and basically all over half of europe does not make for an understandable (not to mention creative) story. The lines are made passeable by Damon and Ledger, but only a few moments are laugh out loud funny, and these are mostly due to the actors and not the actual words. Anything exciting/funny/suspenseful/dramatic comes either from Gilliam or Damon and Ledger.
Maybe it should have been a tip-off that the writer of this script also wrote Scream 3. Pairing him with Gilliam is a match made in hell, specifically for Gilliam himself.
The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy (2005)
A bit underwhelmed
I first discovered the books during summer camp one year when our counselor read them aloud to us as we fell asleep each night. From there I checked the books out of the library, eventually bought them, and in all devoured every bit of Douglas Adams' writing I could. It was with a mixture of anticipation and trepidation that I then went to see the movie. Here's the low-down.
In all, I must admit, I was a bit underwhelmed. I know, the human imagination is far superior to nearly any movie out there, but I was still surprised at just how disappointed I was with some aspects of the movie. The props first and foremost come to my mind. I suspect the director was simply trying to capture the zaniness and whacky feel of Adams' books in that some of the props and costumes seem a bit clunky and farcical. But at the same time, it just didn't work for me. That in one movie you can have absolutely breathtaking scenes of Marvin the robot on the ice planet as well as shots from inside the factory (people who've seen the movie will know what I'm talking about, to those of you who don't I can't give it away), and yet have some fairly subpar costumes and depictions of certain creatures and elements of the book, I just personally found it to be a bit of a letdown.
But let's go down the list. I've already talked about the props, special effects, costumes, etc.
Plot: It stayed fairly faithful to the series for the most part. There were some liberties taken I felt, but since Douglas Adams was a consultant on the script (he might even have been a writer, I'm not sure) before he passed away, I can't quibble too much. The first 45 minutes or so of the movie (after you get past the dreadfully ridiculous credits, at least that's how I saw them as I feel they again tried to capture the off-beat humor of Adams and failed) are very well-paced and well-scripted. Dialogue is tight, action is tight, and the laughs are fairly continuous and smooth. It's as good a first 45 minutes as you'll find in most movies. Alas, around the 45 mark it falters and slips into a dragging tone. The movie tries to be a bit too tense and dramatic (which is odd since they tried in the first place to capture Adams humor and failed in some spots) and the added emotions over some of Arthur Dent's (the main character) decisions and his love with Trillium and whatnot are unnecessary. It becomes too much a story of "one man's journey to find himself" which is I feel, not in the spirit of the books. Just get along with the funny and the action and the good stuff! It manages to stagger across the finish line and end well enough.
Actors: Trillium was passable, Zaphod was like a puppy, cute and likable at the start but pretty soon you wanted him to just shut-up and go away. A bit to Jim Carey-ish for me. Arthur was good enough too, no great find but he passed as the bewildered average joe caught in it all. It's Mos Def's turn as Ford that won me over. I'd only ever seen Mos Def on Chappelle's Show before this movie, and he was great in the sketches, albeit his time was a bit short. But in this movie he did a great job in not only delivering the lines humorously but in living the character as a whole. The runner-up for best actor would be Alan Rickman's voice over as Marvin, a robot so depressed he would make Eyeore look like Richard Simmons. I honestly could never hear in my head how Marvin "should" sound, but now it's hard to imagine anyone other than Rickman voicing him.
Overall, it was good, but not great. The movie's worth a rental if you're a fan of the book (but be forewarned it's no match) and if you're not then you can probably pick it up and still enjoy it, although I can't highly recommend it on its merits alone without the books to prop it up. So I guess you should go out and read the books. Then you can see it
Fantastic Four (2005)
Not as bad as you'd think
Honestly, I gotta say it wasn't as bad as I thought it'd be. Even before it got universally panned across the board by critics I was still thinking "My God this is going to be the worst movie ever" just from seeing the previews. Thus it was with some trepidation that I allowed myself to be dragged to the theatre by my friend who wanted to see it. And I gotta say, it's not as bad as I thought it'd be.
Don't get me wrong, it ain't no gem. But it's some mindless entertainment that was actually fairly entertaining. Don't feel like thinking but want to be entertained? See this movie. I stress the "don't feel like thinking" part, because I can't say this was even a remotely clever movie. I am a huge fan of the intriguing mysterious thinking film-noir movie for entertainment (i.e Usual Suspects, Memento, Se7en, etc etc etc) but every once in a while you gotta let yourself just go. Hence this movie.
Alright, I in turn have been panning it nonstop. So what did I like? I'm not quite sure exactly, I have a hard time putting my finger on it. I guess it's that the script, while it won't win any awards, was adequate, especially since it didn't force any cheese-ball lines on any of the actors. The actors themselves are probably what did it for me the most. Von Doom is suitably evil though with just a touch of campiness so that it doesn't try to be strictly serious which would've ruined it. Johnny Storm is done well as the comic relief hotshot (har har, I made a funny), Reed Rivers is good as the genius but clueless head scientist, I actually felt pretty sympathetic towards The Thing during most of the movie, and I gotta say Jessica Alba for me was just okay as Sue Storm. Not great, but really she was there for her looks and not much else as it seemed. The dynamics between the actors and their characters worked out well enough to be believable, if barely.
Special effects were alright, plot was alright, dialogue was decent, actors were good, my biggest complaint would be the action scenes, especially the big end fight. I think the director's a little too gung-ho there and it all just kinda mashes together and isn't really remarkable or even very well done. But in the interest of campiness, hey it works.
Overall, if you got some money to burn you could rent it. Better yet borrow it from a friend. But it's not that bad.
Alexander (2004)
Points for effort mister Stone
I give Oliver Stone points for effort. Having just studied Alexander a few months before in school, I remember sitting through the movie and thinking "Wow, for a Hollywood movie this is pretty accurate." Unfortunately I also remember thinking along the lines of "This is ungodly long and not really worth it all." In fact I suspect that the reason it was so long and a little underwhelming was that it was too accurate. Some people criticize Hollywood for having to distort every story it gets its hands on, but here is a case where the story was as accurate as could be, and it didn't play out well at all. Guess it's just hard to have it both ways.
Anyhoo, my major complaints: I felt the pacing was incredibly off. It suffered from being narrated the whole way by Hopkins as Ptolemy, recounting the story to his scribe. While again, this allowed for the movie to take in a vast picture of all of Alexander's life in good detail, it sucked the life from the story. Using a narrator as a bridge between scenes can work. But at times it seemed Hopkins would never stop quoting and recounting dozens of names, battles, cities and who knows what else that are never shown and are quickly forgotten. Too accurate, too slow, just not a good idea on Stone's part.
The script likewise was subpar. For any other director, it would've passed, but from an Oliver Stone film I guess I would expect the dialogue to be just a bit more memorable. It wasn't laughable per se, but there were some eye-rolling moments for me.
The actors were hit or miss (mostly miss.) Hopkins, even though his long-winded speeches could've put some modern day politicians to shame (and sleep), was good (not that his part was that demanding.) Val Kilmer...just didn't work for me at all. He did not work in the least as the father figure, not sure why, maybe I'll have to see it again to decide (if I can bring myself to do that) but he did not. Angelina Jolie did the best with what she had. I think her character was just a teensy over the top, but she stuck to it to the bitter end. Colin Farell did not do it for me, much in the same way Val Kilmer failed me. Again, I think part of it was that the material he was given to work with was well below standard, but he certainly didn't help it any. A dark-haired hard-drinking irishmen as the fair-haired wunderboy of ancient Europe? Too much of a stretch. And the sex scene in the movie is I think one of the few times where I have been in a theatre and the audience has audibly laughed at a moment not intended for laughter at all, it was a complete miss and frankly a pathetic attempt at drama. I'm sorry, but it was.
The things I liked: Jared Leto was alright, Jolie tried valiantly, the setting and props and costumes were sumptuously brilliant, and the cinematography (particularly at the end) was very well done. In fact the camera work I'd say is the saving grace for this movie. It makes it interesting enough to watch at some points, but cannot save it overall.
Personally, I can understand if you hated this movie. I try and cut directors some slack or else I prolly woulda ripped it apart much more. I can also see if you were able to overlook its inadequacies and didn't find it to be too bad. But to say you actually really honestly liked or even loved it? Well...I guess you're certainly entitled to your opinion...
Points for effort mister Stone. Next time though, let sex just be sex, please.