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zsk
Reviews
Art Heist (2004)
Ariel views of Barcelona are the best part...
OK - the helicopter shots are fantastic, and the director made good use of some of Barcelona's top sights. Otherwise...production value was blown in the first few minutes and the rest of the film felt like a movie of the week. Ellen Pompeo was charming and fun to watch, Abel Folk had the most depth and was very effective, and William Baldwin was...well, William Baldwin. He got to put his martial art training to good use and be a running-jumping-earnest action figure. The rest of the cast was wooden at best, but mostly paper. So - if you're nostalgic about Spain - it's a picture postcard with an action twist, and a healthy dose of El Greco. If not, skip it.
Sin City (2005)
Uhh - Wow! Never heard reactions like that...
I'm giving this film a nine because it did what a good film should do - take the viewer into another world in a believable manner. You ARE in Sin City for the length of the film. What was amazing afterward was listening to people's strong reactions to the film as they left the theater and reentered "reality." If you go see this film in the theater (and you should, it's visually stunning), try this afterward - high-tail it to the exit and listen to people as they leave. I have never heard a film get this kind of reaction. I actually heard a couple BREAKING UP over it as they were walking out. Nobody left the theater acting nonchalantly. Take my word - you will feel exhilarated or disgusted or something after seeing this film, but you will definitely FEEL. If you don't, you must already be dead.
What the #$*! Do We (K)now!? (2004)
Excellent Movie for those nagging questions...
Hmm, pretty trippy to walk out into the very theater lobby where major parts of the film were staged...I suppose that's one good reason to see it at the Baghdad in Portland while it still plays there. While that particular experience makes it feel homegrown for us Portlanders, this is actually a very universal film with refreshingly deep implications - I am curious to see where it goes from here. Matlin was excellent at illustrating the emerging concepts as the movie unrolled. The script and visuals bravely attempted and mostly succeeded in presenting ideas most of us have never considered. The interviewees were heavy hitters in their own right - impressive! Don't let the title mislead you!
Anger Management (2003)
Amazing Actors, Plausible Plot - but SOMEBODY should have laid off the artificial stimulants...
Wow. A great ensemble cast does not a good movie make. Even the idea behind it was workable. Let's put it this way - viewing this movie with fans of Jack Nicholson, Adam Sandler, Marisa Tomei, etc., we kept waiting for SOMETHING to happen or make sense to no avail. Instead we tried to figure out how this movie got made - huge amounts of alcohol, cocaine, shrooms on the table while everyone came up with ideas that seemed more hilarious as mass quantities were consumed? It has a moment or two. That's it. Leaving it on the shelf on the video store so no additional profits are pocketed is my advice. Otherwise, you will spend the entire hour and 40 minutes waiting for the cleverness to happen.
Gangs of New York (2002)
Whew! Scorsese loves New York
I'm a history buff, and I am all for accurate recreations. Scorsese has always had the eye for detail - his Age of Innocence is amazing. To be honest, though, I'm not too familiar with his other films. I read the original book in preparation, and wondered how they could get this all into a film. Well, he did it. The written word was mind-boggling, but what Scorsese put on screen was some of the best time-travel (albeit shocking) I have ever experienced. Bravo, Scorsese! Thank you for this fabulous gift!
American Beauty (1999)
Kevin Spacey deserved it, the movie did not..
That's it, I don't understand the Academy and its decision making processes. Did anyone see Fight Club? A similar film in its examination of our shallow wants & needs hitting hard reality - maybe the violence was too much or its message too anti-media to get similar attention. I learned nothing new in American Beauty - middle-aged men's issues with homophobia, guns or teenage nymphets? Please...
Kevin Spacey was great, Annette Benning was good if a bit shrill - and I liked the presentation of discontented teens looking for a real life. It didn't make me think or feel much, though. Fight Club did. Isn't that the point?
Fight Club (1999)
American Beauty, Fight Club wanna-be
If anyone has been paying attention to American media culture in the last 5 years or so, Fight Club is an amazing wake-up call. I have not looked at the world in the same way since seeing this film. I cannot watch certain commercials on TV anymore without flashing back to the film's messages. No wonder none of the major award franchises even gave this film a nod - it is much too radical, much too reality-based (ironically), much too confronting. In other words, everything they don't want to deal with. The acting was great (ok, Norton is a demi-god at least), the script tight, the cinematography a wild sensuous ride.
For a film dealing with similar concepts, American Beauty is milk toast in comparison.
Virus (1999)
Another sci-fi/slasher - formulaic & gory
I think video stores should create a new genre - the sci-fi/slasher flick. This one begins with a sci-fi premise (which sucks people like me in), that moves quickly to six to ten people isolated on some craft (ship, spaceship, etc.), while some alien life form attempts to kill them all. The Alien series is the classic of this genre - very good. This follows Event Horizon down the ho-hum-ness of the whole thing, just throw some extra gore in and people will see it. By the end of the movie I didn't even react to the characters' fear, I just awaited the inevitable. And there were some good actors in it. Oh well, I was hoping to get more out of the "virus" concept, but was robbed of that as the movie swung rapidly out of sci-fi and into slasher - I should have known. Skip it and rent Alien again, or rent it, if you collect the genre. I gave it a 2 out of respect for Donald Sutherland and Jamie Lee Curtis (what were they thinking?) - zsk