ifrancetic Reviews

Red Rocket (2021)

Refreshing

[9/10 · 30 November 2023]

After watching the movie I went throug the cast, and just as I thought most of the characters were played by the non professional actors. This only shows a bit weak in the last few scenes, but its also charming, as is the movie.

Movie is a light, satirical take on hard life of lower and even marginal people. As the main character is carelessly cruising on a beat up bike throughout most of the film, you can sense the the desparation arround him, and the viewer is constantly on the edge expecting an abrupt cut. Nice job by the director tricking us in this fake suspense.

I initially had a problem with the last 15min of the movie, where the acting of non-actors is a bit shakey, and ending is not what u might expect, bit that is one last surprise pulled of by the director.

Bad Blood (2017–2018)

solid TV series, but only 1st season

[6/10 · 18 August 2021]

Not a masterpiece, but a solid crime series depicting mafia family in Toronto, raise and fall.

Season 2 however, really turns into a B production, with main character running the entire city on his own, going solo against the world. No bodyguards, associates, soldiers, etc. Script looks scraped together without any afterthought.

Funny enough, season 2 episodes have significantly higher score on IMDM.

Koyaanisqatsi (1982)

Never gets old

[10/10 · 5 May 2021]

My favourite documentary, just amazing. The connnection between the music and camera is simply mesmerising, I watched it numerous times in last 15 years since I discovered this gem.

If anything it gets better with time, since the footage becomes even more "retro", while the theme is more and more current.

The Two Popes (2019)

Only for true believers

[6/10 · 29 April 2020]

First the positive; two actors are very good, Hopkins is spot on, incredible. As mentioned in my title, you would realy have to have strong faith (catholic) to believe that any of the ineraction/conversations between two popes ever took place, and that the german pope heard the voice of the argentinian cardinal when God spoke to him, or something like that. As oposed to that, I believe that the more likely scenario was that Vatican politics made those decesions (this was not mentioned in the movie). In any case, as a fictional movie this is a solid 6 in large part due to acting, as the story is nothing groundbraking. As a marketing for a new CC strategic turn, this deservs a higher grade, but only for those who buy into that.

The Gentlemen (2019)

Couldn't wait for the end

[6/10 · 28 March 2020]

Seen the movie and the reviews (all ranging from 8-10). Obviously this resonates well with the taste of the audiences, but I find it sad in comparison to Snatch, and Lock, stock. Those movies had better humor, suspense and acting than The Gentelman (with few honourable exemptions), and after 20 years all Guy did was a bleek copy. The plot is un-inspired, childishly inconvincing, and Mathew's character simply can't make it foat. Even the sterotypes in the old movies were exploited in a funny way, bit in this one they are simply worn out or straight out racist. 6 stars is still border line watchable but I am disapointed that it gets all that praise from the viewers.

The Irishman (2019)

Why the same actor for the 60 year span?

[7/10 · 27 November 2019]

First of all, why is Robert de Niro first choice for role of Frank "thr Irishman"? Maybe some resemblence wouldn't hurt, and real Frank was supposed to be a "mountain of a man".

Also 77 y.o. de Niro is playing this character since he was in II WW (20 year old soldier)? The scenes like him beating a guy on the street are simply not convincing. Why not have two actors to cover this time span 1944-2000. This was a deal breaker for me.

Burning (2018)

Unconvincing and overrated

[6/10 · 7 November 2019]

The "unconvincing" title refers mostly to the unconvincing acting of the main character. I guess he was ment to look like a simple country boy, but for some reason the actor went for the mentally chalanged "look". The movie is not bad apart from that, although the class strugle has already been adressed before, and in a better way, in a number of Korean movies. I did like the ambiguous ending, however it was both expected and seen before. Overall I wouldn't be disapointed with this one, if there wasn't for the inflated ratings (in my opinion).

Black Sun (2017–2020)

Serbian version of Babilon Berlin

[7/10 · 3 November 2019]

Decent historical series depicting the period in ex-Yugoslavia between two wars. Hard not to draw a line between this and Babilon Berlin, although not quite as great. Worth watching this Balkan version for the history buffs, however a lot will be lost in translation, and understanding the politics/names of the era.

El Camino: A Breaking Bad Movie (2019)

Not as good as ratings suggest

[6/10 · 27 October 2019]

I was a fan of BB, but still can't bring myself ro give this any more than 6. As someone wrote it's like 2 more average episodes. Thare is nothing wrong with that, but I was expecting Vince will bring something more to the table after a few years since the last episode. This way I feel it was just quick cash cow.

The Mule (2018)

Not quite the "Unforgiven"

[6/10 · 15 May 2019]

Not a bad movie, but in my opinion it was dragged out for at least 20min, without particular reason. The message was quite simple and clear from the start, nothing unexpected was delivered in general. The old Clint took the entire spotlight, which is too bad since there were quite a few good actors, and age definitely takes toll on everyone, but I guess he isn't critical enough to recognize that.

Icarus (2017)

more propaganda, less documentary

[3/10 · 21 November 2018]

The "documentary" starts off as a kind of experiment ("Supersize me" style), where an amateur cyclist wants to see how much he can improve his performance by using doping. As an ex Olympian and recreational cyclist i found this topic to be very interesting. The reason i gave this 3 stars instead of 0 is because of first 15 min of this film when it was still promising to deliver on the topic. 15 min into it, the main character (cyclists) is given a contact of his designated "evil doctor" who will oversee his doping, and this is none other than the chief of Russian anti-doping lab. This guy more than willing to give doping advice during their first Skype chat, not bothered by the filming crew of course. After that the theme of the film slips away, with a vague conclusion that the cyclist did improve his performance on stationary bike (drugs do work) but fail to improve on the race course (which is not surprising due to external elements during bike race (team, equipment, weather etc).

The remaining 1 h is unveiling of dirty Russian state-sponsored doping orchestrated by the KGB and overseen by non other than Putin. This disclosure is done solo by the above mentioned chief of lab, who turned into whistle blower during the course of this project for no particular reason or motive. We are to assume he did it because of a doping scandal when he was asked to resign, however he started giving away inside secrets of his own lab doping system, so the time line is not convincing. Of course no one gives any explanation who is paying for his escape from the evil empire (russia), lawyer fees, shelter, etc.

For me this case of whistle blower is packed into documentary only for marketing purposes (part of media war against Russia), and obviously so many (if not all) parts of the documentary were staged, and written in a scenario way before the first scene was made, making it everything BUT the documentary. Too bad, because this doping testimony would be more convincing and credible without wrapping it ton of acting, and staged scenes. But than it wouldn't be Oscar material.

American Sniper (2014)

not worth the wait

[5/10 · 26 January 2015]

The movie starts with character development of a typical mid-west American "patriot" who has no doubts what to do when his country is under attack. Well actually he joins the army before 9/11, supposedly motivated by US embassy bombing some time during 90s, but the main trigger and motivation for this character is 9.11. Anyway, I am thinking along the line; now at some point this character will develop, and realize things aren't black and white, and start questioning the himself, the war, whatever, after all the movie was nominated for 6 Oscars. That moment never happens. There is a 30 second duologue with his comrade who has a moment of doubt, and Kyle gives him American football style answer about the meaning of war and life ("go get them, we're right and they're wrong"). The only scene worth mentioning is the one where main character watches turned off TV and hears shots and screams, showing signs of post traumatic stress syndrome. Is that all it takes for movie to be nominated? This reminds me of army propaganda movie/documentary for Vietnam era helicopter gunners; you sign up, go through some fun/hard training, meet the incredibly hot girls while on vacation on Hawaii, and shoot Charlie. And that was 50 years ago. And as many mentioned some great (American) movies about that war were made, and not this kind of one sided baby food for brain washed masses. Clint Eastwood....what can I say, not even old age can be excause for this... The reason for 5 stars instead of 1 or 2 is the fact the movie has technical qualities, and the acting isn't bad...

Only Lovers Left Alive (2013)

not a masterpiece but interesting

[7/10 · 20 January 2014]

The movie is slow, ambiental, and the moral of it is missed by other comments, at least so far, so this is my take on it, before someone else does it better - my first review. I must agree with some of the other comments about the unmotivated name-dropping throughout the movie (listing historical figures main characters interacted with, inspired, or have been inspired by). That could have been done more casual, since Jim Jamrusch audience doesn't need to be baby fed. I didn't have a problem with the fact that the movie develops slowly, perhaps it suited me fine on a rainy Sunday evening I went to see it. Anyhow the cast for this is great, I expected nothing less from Tilda in this role, however Tom Hiddlestom, whom I see for the first time was also great, but I could not decide if the fact he reminds me to Adrien Brody in this role is good or not. Picking Detroit for the shooting site of better part of the film is also a great idea. As for the chemistry between the two lovers, I didn't really buy into it, even though it wasn't completely unconvincing, maybe that's just me, or maybe that wasn't the main idea despite the title. And finally the end of the movie brings a change in pace, where we see that once they run out of blood supply all the morality, tranquility, and intellect are stripped off the main characters (much like the human behavior they criticize more than once), and they become what they are hungry vampires (humans).