mattrett Reviews

Where's My Roy Cohn? (2019)

This Is How We Got Trump

[10/10 · 22 September 2019]

Don't miss this exhaustively comprehensive look at the odious Roy Cohn, who in spite of living only 59 years did decades' worth of damage to the U.S.

Tyrnauer's finest film.

The Black Dahlia (2006)

There is no way...

[1/10 · 12 September 2006]

...that this laughable, camp, offensive (considering it willfully ignores the facts of a REAL-LIFE, unsolved murder) is getting 7 or 7.5 out of 10 from actual viewers. It's absurd. The performances (except for a wonderful Swank, who should've been in the far superior HOLLYWOODLAND instead) are amateurish or way, way over the top, the sex is unnecessarily lurid, the violence is sexualized. It's like an unwelcome glimpse into DePalma's wet dreams. I love some of his movies for the same reason (BODY DOUBLE springs to mind), but don't do your messed-up shtick with history, DePalma. Yuck. There is also a very weird homophobic vein running briefly throughout a few scenes, which is underscored by the fact that DePalma seems to believe "lez" clubs in the '40s were gigantic and out in the open. Avoid this at all costs.

Boy Culture (2006)

They did good

[10/10 · 30 April 2006]

As the author of the original novel, I think Q. Allan Brocka did a good job with the film. I have blogged about it extensively at boyculture.typepad.com and I think that my comments there capture my feelings on the subject. The director and writers kept the essence of my novel even while making some intelligent and creative changes. I can't imagine this film not being picked up by a distributor. All that said, it's very hard judging a film adapted from your own work. But I hope people like it and I'm confident that many will. There are a lot of gay movies out there that are not among my favorite films, that's for sure. But while I had feared something ridiculous might come of this adaptation, I can't stress enough that I feel the filmmakers did an excellent job.

Parting Glances (1986)

A hypnotic slice of life with pure heart

[10/10 · 18 May 2003]

Despite its scruffy edges (or maybe because of them), this little

movie has so much personal vision and heart and insight---it truly

brings characters alive who stay with you over the years. It's very

heart-tugging without being mawkish. Steve Buscemi is absolutely

brilliant in it---he's so good ti sometimes dwarfs the scenes in

which he is not present, and yet when he does scenes with

another actor, that actor is always much better alongside him. The

film is not a polished Hollywood production, so don't expect it to

look like a million bucks. But what it lacks in that area it more than

makes up for with honesty, wit and humor. I absolutely love this

movie and recommend it.

The Deep End (2001)

Interesting Tilda, well-crafted, overrated 6/10

[6/10 · 12 August 2001]

I was really looking forward to this film, but I was very let down. Tilda Swinton is amazing--I wish she'd get an Oscar nomination. With her beguiling screen presence, she managed to drag me through the film. It wasn't a chore to watch because it's beautifully, coldly photographed and intricately put together. I really respected the technical art of this film, its consistency. The care of the director and the care of the mother and son's performances carry the endeavor a long way. The problem is that the script (maybe the source material?) is FULL of ridiculous leaps of logic and a pervasively dated approach to the plot. The mother's actions are totally silly, which stands in contrast to her cerebral aura. The gay aspects are especially weirdly handled. I kept thinking it would work so much better if the story were taking place in a time when being outed as gay would make the blackmail even MORE threatening (as opposed to being outed as gay when you're a 17yo band-sie). And I didn't buy Tilda and Visnjic's romantic tension. Overall, this was a smart film.

All Over the Guy (2001)

All About the Girls

[5/10 · 12 August 2001]

This movie has gotten a lot of praise for its wit, but I'm lost on that--I found it to be full of very writerly dialogue (everyone has the same sense of 'gay diva' humor, people give long-winded speeches a la Dixie Carter and everyone seems to be doing one-liners all the time) and cookie-cutter situations. The lead is miscast (I know, I know, he wrote it...) and unappealing, the hunk has charm to burn but can't convince as a teacher let alone as a drunk. What's interesting about this very by-the-numbers gay romantic comedy (a genre that is now glutted) are the supporting performances. Adam Goldberg is a lot of fun and brings a palpable sense of professional experience to the film, but what ROCKS are the girls. The fag hag sticks out like Megan Mulally on WILL & GRACE and Andrea Martin is HUH-LAR-I-OUS. The film got a "5" out of "10" from me, but I'd still say to go see it just for her precious few scenes. The funniest thing out there is her performance as a bizarre psycho(logist) mother. But to get that, you have to put up with a weird chronology (where the gay story seems to crawl and the straights are getting married), lame jokes about "Lifetime: Television for Women & Gays" and a lot of watchable and harmless but familiar fluff.

Wet Hot American Summer (2001)

Hit and Miss, Mostly Miss...

[4/10 · 12 August 2001]

I was dying to see this once I saw the ridiculous MEATBALLS poster and divined that it had to be the best satire ever. What a brilliant idea for a satire--the genre is rife. Unfortunately, the finished product (as I think all involved probably realize) is a catalogue of missed opportunities, not-quite-there performances and (thankfully!) a few extremely hilarious, inspired bits. Janeane Garafolo, who is very striking, looks really bad here, probably because she is uncomfortably struggling to make her flat role funny. David Hyde Pierce is just sad to watch, trying to hard to be funny and looking like a Castro nerd. Molly Shannon is so funny just SEEING her makes you laugh, but somehow her segment fails to snowball into something hysterical. Paul Rudd had great teen mannerisms and was sexy as hell, the other guys are also really funny (the nerdier ones). I think the problem is the director just doesn't move things along at the right pace. He starts out very deadpan, and that sets the monotone. But when he lets things get really outrageous (the drug sequence is the second funniest moment I've had all year in movies, the first also coming in a lame movie: Andrea Martin in ALL OVER THE GUY complaining about the movie IN & OUT), it's just plain funny. I wanted this movie to work so badly, but it just didn't. The clothes and styling for 1981 are 99.9% PERFECT, and the very few songs used are also perfect. This ends up as a medium-bad MAD TV episode, complete with frustratingly overlong sketches.

The Others (2001)

Like Goobers for your brain: A treat

[8/10 · 12 August 2001]

I went into this movie hoping for a nice, old-fashioned suspenseful horror movie. I was rewarded with that PLUS some brilliant performances, nervous chuckles and emotional pay-off to boot. I am not a Nicole Kidman fan (especially after MOULIN ROUGE, ugh), but I thought she was sensational in this, or as Tom says, "Nic is pitch perfect." She really is, capturing her control-freak, jittery, yet deeply maternal character to a "T." With another, less mesmerizing lead performance, the kids would have totally stolen the show. Instead, they just add on to the fun--the little girl is like a BAD SEED aspirant and the boy is adorable. You feel for his terror as he's tortured by his big sis, his controlling mom and the house he lives in. To milk so much psychologically from such a basic premise, the writer/director gets a LOT of credit.

Hollow Man (2000)

Almost completely worthless

[12 August 2000]

Verhoeven is good at over-the-top, personal flicks a la Brian DePalma, but is often just a terrible director. This must be one of his worst (one of since SHOWGIRLS and BASIC INSTINCT are pretty hard to top). The script is laughably bad, with cheesy dialogue and bone-chillingly inaccurate characters (no women I know say, "I gotta take a leak," no workplace in the year 2000 that is populated by brainy types would allow porn and dated sex jokes about Superman banging Wonder Woman's p****). The acting is atrocious--Elisabeth Shue (pinch me, but did she actually get top billing here?) looks dreadful, displays the real-life limp she acquired during filming with no attempt to hide it, and routinely offers a blank, Farrah Fawcett-like expression, perhaps to hide her shame at submitting to such drivel. Kevin Bacon is blandly superevil and goes out of his way to display his fine form, though his highly taut face and badly browned hair kinda mute that thrill. The supporting characters are FRIDAY THE 13TH types, waiting for destruction. Not a spoiler, I don't think, to warn you about the preposterously protracted ending.

The Next Best Thing (2000)

Very sweet and funny

[10/10 · 4 March 2000]

I was pleasantly surprised by this movie. It is sweet, funny and open-hearted and obviously made with a lot of heart. It isn't perfect-it has some cookie-cutter moments and some glossing over, but Madonna is very credible and expressive and Rupert is wonderful. The supporting cast was mostly wasted, though they were all good (except the miscast Michael Vartan) whenever they were allowed a second on-screen. I would give it a three stars out of four, and I think that despite the WOW-BAD negative reviews, most filmgoers will come away from this satisfied