umi-3 Reviews

Yparhei Kai Filotimo (1965)

Great performances and great direction

[10/10 · 22 December 1999]

It's always a pleasure to watch this movie... Everything is so well done! The acting is superb by everyone, especially by Konstadaras and Papayannopoulos... I've looked so hard to find mistakes, hints that those people are actually acting and not talking to each other as they would in real life, but I haven't found anything... It's really amazing, and at the same time a little depressing that such movies don't get made nowadays... The plot is very clever, it makes you laugh and at the same time it makes you think about politics, politicians and corruption... Such a delicate subject "served" in such a clever way...

Amazing is all that comes to mind when I think of this film... Too bad that Greek films are not so popular abroad...

Sleepers (1996)

Very humane and well made film...

[10/10 · 22 December 1999]

I believe this film was a great achievement for Barry Levinson... I haven't read the book so I don't really know if I would expect something better, but everything was so well done in the movie I watched... The performances, especially by Robert De Niro and Kevin Bacon, the direction, the flash backs, the long takes... It's one of these movies that capture you and to some extent you feel that you live in the movie, you get angry with the "bad" people... You sympathize with the kids and their grownups...

I've read some other comments that criticized it by saying that it dragged too long... I don't understand this... For me, it was this "dragging" that made it work, among other things... Others said that it can't be great because it can't be real... Again I don't see such a connection... I don't really know if it's a true story and to be honest I don't really think it is the issue here... What I do know and is important, is that it CAN happen, that child molesting occurs (does it matter if it is inside correction facilities or not?), and it can scar in the worst possible way the life of the person who endures it... The mere fact that the movie handles such a subject, and in such taken-care-of and humane way, makes it really great...

To those who haven't seen it, I'm suggesting that it is a great film, one you shouldn't miss...