From tskirvin at killfile.org  Tue Feb  2 03:08:01 2010
From: tskirvin at killfile.org (Tim Skirvin)
Date: Tue Feb  2 03:08:04 2010
Subject: Review: Edge of Darkness (2010)
Message-ID: <tskirvin.20100202080607$7f3e@vulture.killfile.org>

  Well, I guess I got the bad January Movie I was hoping for.

  Should I have had any hope going into the movie?  Sure, I found him
quite excellent in the first two thirds of the Kill The Brits Trilogy
(_Braveheart_ and _The Patriot_; I'm still kindof sad he never starred in
_Zulu_), and he did a more-than-adequate job as the lead of action
thrillers like _Payback_ and _Conspiracy Theory_.  But the last blockbuster
he starred in was _Signs_, one of my great movie disappointments of the
last decade.  Was this not a hint?

  Well, it should have been.  _Edge of Darkness_ is a convoluted mess
- not as bad as _Signs_, I suppose, but pretty bad.  It started with some
dream sequences, followed by a bunch of slow, atmospheric detective scenes;
every now and then some shadowy political intrigue was tossed in, and all
of it was punctuated with short, sharp scenes of violence.  This would be
fine, if, say, these pieces fit together in some way.  Instead, we were
treated to the shock of seeing a woman suddenly and inexplicably killed,
and finding that this kind of transition was as good as we were going to
get.

  What went wrong here?  Quite simply, the movie was over-complicated;
it was trying to be a Bourne movie, without the underlying sensibility or
well-thought-out source material.  The plot involved too many characters,
split into too many factions, many of which never interacted.  While there
were many geographical settings, all of these locations were in New
England, and didn't offer much of a sense of diversity.  The "gears within
gears within gears" didn't manage to hold up to the slightest scrutiny.  The
supporting cast was, with one small exception ("how does it feel?"), beyond
generic.  And the viewer was never given any reason to care - well, except
that Mel Gibson was the good guy.

  (At least my instincts on Mel Gibson were good - he can still act,
and even offered a fairly convincing Boston accent for most of the movie.) 

  So, what went wrong?  Well, it became pretty obvious once I
discovered one fact: the movie is based on a BBC mini-series.  Aah-hah!  Not
only did the movie suffer from the standard British-to-American conversion
problems, but it was 1/3 the length!  I'm sure that most of those plot
points could have been properly explored and justified with adequate time.
And if the number of twists in the movie felt like a season of 24, well,
that's probably because *that's what they were going for*.  

  In short: this movie tried to cut down a 5 hour mini-series into a
2 hour movie, and did it very badly.  And sight unseen, I recommend renting
that series before watching this movie.

  I should have seen _Legion_.

  * 3/4

  As a side-note - one of the trailers was for _The Losers_.  I want
this movie to be good, if just to encourage the creation of more Vertigo
Comics movies.  The trailer did not fill me with hope.  Oh well.

                           - Tim Skirvin (tskirvin@killfile.org)
-- 
http://wiki.killfile.org/           Skirv's Homepage <FISH>< <*>
http://wiki.killfile.org/reviews/movies    Skirv's Movie Reviews

From Faust668 at msn.com  Wed Feb  3 13:09:04 2010
From: Faust668 at msn.com (Jerry Saravia)
Date: Wed Feb  3 13:09:06 2010
Subject: Retrospective: Timerider: The Adventure of Lyle Swann (1982)
Message-ID: <9c054764-84ce-4dfa-886a-c3af6c2f11d1@b35g2000vbc.googlegroups.com>

TIMERIDER: THE ADVENTURE OF LYLE SWANN (1982)
Reviewed by Jerry Saravia
RATING: One star

The name Timerider refers to a time-travel device in the middle of the
desert. It is put to use but unfortunately, a motorcycle rider from
the Baja 100 race has inadvertently crossed its path and been sent
back to the Old West, circa 1870's. Great idea, horrible execution of
the material.

Fred Ward is Lyle Swann (not the catchiest of names), the motorcycle
rider who has no idea he is in the Old West. Outside of a pack of
cowboys led by the scenery-chewing Peter Coyote (in what may be his
sole villain role), the lack of phones, a buxom Belinda Bauer who
doesn't take too long before she removes her clothes, it all looks the
same as the present. Add to the cast a listless, taciturn L.Q. Jones,
himself a veteran of westerns, and Ed Lauter as a priest and we got
the makings of a cinematic disaster. Fred Ward looks too out of place
as the clueless hero, Bauer is there to show some flesh and look
helpless as she is tied to a bed and little else, and Coyote and most
of the cast overact to the hilt. After Lyle finds himself in the Old
West, we get a love scene and numerous shootouts that are badly staged
and edited - they take over the last three-quarters of the movie and
add nothing to the story outside of reminding us that the Old West was
a stomping ground for wild and crazy trigger-happy cowboys.

There is one good scene where Peter Coyote wants that motorcycle,
referred to as the "machine," and he finally gets a hold of it. Coyote
tries to start it up and rides it, only to fall on his bum. Other than
that, "Timerider" is a snore-inducing and highly indifferent picture
that bears some of the nifty ideas of time travel without realizing
them. There is no fun to be had here and with a less than engaging
hero and cumbersome acting by all involved, no one to root for either.
A twist of fate at the end of the film lends some gravitas but you'll
forget about it the next day.

For more reviews, check out JERRY AT THE MOVIES at:
http://www.geocities.com/faustus_08520/Jerry_at_the_Movies.html

BIO on the author of this page at:
http://www.geocities.com/faustus_08520/index.html

Email me at Faust668@msn.com or at faustus_08520@yahoo.com

From Faust668 at msn.com  Wed Feb  3 13:09:33 2010
From: Faust668 at msn.com (Jerry Saravia)
Date: Wed Feb  3 13:09:35 2010
Subject: Review: Drag Me to Hell (2009)
Message-ID: <8085b4d9-175e-40d1-b0fa-5aad4efc2411@x6g2000vbl.googlegroups.com>

DRAG ME TO HELL (2009)
Reviewed by Jerry Saravia
RATING: Two stars

Drag me out of this movie. Sam Raimi's horror-comedy "Drag Me to Hell"
puts more spin into horror than the comedy, which would be acceptable
had the horror been something more than a vomitous creature and a
bland, real-estate heroine with lots of fire and brimstone special-
effects. And for comedy, well, we have vomit, worms and a mean goat!
These are traditional Raimi touches but they are not very hellishly
funny.

Alison Lohman is Christine Brown, a bank loan officer who denies an
old Gypsy woman an extension on her house (timely topic indeed).
Needless to say, the old Gypsy woman doesn't take this very well after
she tries to bite her and beat her to a pulp in a parking garage!
(Hey, don't shame a Gypsy who begs on her knees.) Unfortunately,
Christine has been cursed by this ravaged, cretinous woman with the
help of a coat button! How apropos yet Christine is not prepared for
the torment and physical pain she will endure. We are talking about
demonic shadows that creep around during the day and at night, violent
dreams that involve the Gypsy woman vomiting ungodly things into
Christine's mouth, flies that try to penetrate her skin, nosebleeds
that lead to spraying people with blood, and an assortment of other
tortures from Raimi's Evil Dead arsenal.

Unfortunately for us, none of this is any bloody fun. Lohman is so
fluffy and blandly inconsequential an actress that she would make
white bread moldy by just looking at it. Some early scenes with her
boyfriend (Justin Long, unconvincing as a professor) show promise,
especially when we learn that her boyfriend's mother disapproves of
her. And there is some compassion developed early on about her
promised job as an assistant manager that feels genuine. Raimi (who
wrote this film) abandon all hope of a strong character study for the
sake of aimless bloody thrills and chills. Lohman emotes a singular
gaping expression every time she is frightened or thrown around like a
rag doll (only her scene at a graveyard seems to elicit more of a
Bruce Campbell wickedness than anything else in the movie). Raimi amps
up the soundtrack with creaky noises and a chorus of screeching
sounds, but to what avail when we could care less about Christine?

"Drag Me to Hell" aims to be an "Evil Dead"-type film but it lacks
thrust and purpose and a better lead. Bruce Campbell in the "Evil
Dead" pictures was in on the joke but he also made us watch and recoil
at everything he encountered - he and Raimi made more inspired,
inventive horror films that became Three-Stooges-like cartoons. Lohman
also makes one recoil but we quickly lose interest in a largely
unsympathetic and witless character (I will not describe what happens
to a certain pet). I am all for a Raimi horror pic that abounds with
bad taste and wicked humor. This is the first time from Raimi that I
was only left with a bad taste.


For more reviews, check out JERRY AT THE MOVIES at:
http://www.geocities.com/faustus_08520/Jerry_at_the_Movies.html

BIO on the author of this page at:
http://www.geocities.com/faustus_08520/index.html

Email me at Faust668@msn.com or at faustus_08520@yahoo.com

From Faust668 at msn.com  Wed Feb  3 13:11:10 2010
From: Faust668 at msn.com (Jerry Saravia)
Date: Wed Feb  3 13:11:13 2010
Subject: Review: Inglourious Basterds (2009)
Message-ID: <91da26e8-7935-41e0-9db3-464386209621@g39g2000vba.googlegroups.com>

INGLOURIOUS BASTERDS (2009)
Reviewed by Jerry Saravia
RATING: Four stars

For the most absurd and powerful revisionist war movie in eons, you
can't get any better than "Inglourious Basterds," the loopiest and
most entertaining Tarantino flick since his "Kill Bill" series. To
call it only riveting and exciting is to underrate it - it is a movie
largely about movies. It is about dazzling the audience and thrilling
them to no end with one galvanizing moment of intensity after another.
It is so damn enthralling and exasperating an experience, so blackly
funny and so blood-chillingly and brazenly violent with such top-notch
performances that I am almost ready to say it rivals "Pulp Fiction."
In fact, it does.

The Basterds are comprised of some Army soldiers during World War II
whose job is to hunt and kill Nazis. The way to prove you killed a
Nazi is to scalp them, and if you find a Nazi and let them go, you
carve their foreheads with the forbidden swastika - a Scarlet Letter
of shame. Tennessee-born Lt. Aldo Raine (Brad Pitt) is the leader of
the pack of Basterds. One member of the Basterds includes a nearly
psychotic baseball bat-wielding Donny Donowitz, known as "The Bear
Jew" (Eli Roth, surprisingly charismatic). The rest are the archetypes
of most 20th century WWII movies including a startlingly beautiful
French Jew, Shosanna Dreyfuss (Melanie Laurent), who owns a Parisian
cinema where she is forced to show German propaganda films; a British
film critic and expert on German cinema no less, Lt. Archie Hicox
(Michael Fassebender), who is also a spy; and a glorious German movie
starlet, Bridget von Hammersmark (Diane Kruger), also a spy.

The plot involves the Basterds' ultimate mission: to kill Hitler,
Goebbels and the whole Third Reich in the very movie theatre owned by
Shosanna by setting fire to a few dozen nitrate movie reels. If this
mission, known as Operation Kino, succeeds then World War II is over.
Yes, I know, we never heard such nonsense when we learned about World
War II in school but Tarantino isn't so much making a historical film
about war - he is brave enough to rewrite it to fit his own universe.
Back to the mission: a certain dashing, charming, suave and cunning
Nazi may serve as an obstruction. He is Hans Landa (the amazing
Christoph Waltz), who has a calm demeanor and is extraordinarily
intelligent in obtaining information. He can find a Jewish family
hiding out in the French countryside, ascertain the proprietor of a
high heeled shoe in the aftermath of a massacre, and can speak
English, German and Italian with ease. He is the most delectably
frightnening villain in all of Tarantino's ouevre - an officer who can
make anyone quiver and spill the truth without the need of a lie
detector test. Can the Basterds stop this nasty Nazi and finish the
war with Jewish-American suicide bombers and dozens of nitrate film
reels?

"Inglourious Basterds" is the work of a master director who combines
and mixes his love of all war movies into a socko and comical epic
punch of a movie. As I stressed before, he is not making a traditional
war movie nor is he making a serious treatise on war - he is making a
war movie about war movies. But even more interestingly, he adds
touches of humanity even in the face of such homage - the movie is in
quotes and full of irony but there is something deeper here that
touches on war in a way that perhaps war movies have not touched upon,
post-"Saving Private Ryan." For example, there is the Sergio Leone
opening (complete with a score that is reminiscent of Leone's
spaghetti westerns) with the dairy farmer harboring Jews underneath
the floorboards of his home. Landa pays a visit and eventually
discovers that there are Jews hidden under the kitchen. When the dairy
farmer tries to fight back tears, knowing that he had to give away
their presence (and Landa knows it too), it becomes unbearably tense
and it is tinged with regret - this war makes everyone quiver and
shake in their boots. Also consider the Bear Jew who beats a Nazi to
death with a baseball bat - the other Nazis have surrended and see
this horrific display of brutality with tears in their eyes. Such
scenes show that Quentin Tarantino may be a demonic hell-raiser of a
filmmaker, but he is also in touch with the humanity in horror from
both the good guys and the bad.

And then there is the French tavern sequence which rivals even
Hitchcock for building suspense and tension. It is so uniquely
unsettling this sequence that I would say it is among the greatest
suspense sequences of all time. I won't give much away except that it
involves a German actress, a few drinks, a name-guessing game and some
spies masquerading as Nazis. It is all in the telling details (like
how a German is supposed to order a drink) that give away the spies'
true identities. "Reservoir Dogs" also dealt with identity but, here,
it is almost phantasmagoric in its unnerving atmosphere and tension.

But there is so much more to enjoy. I would give a laundry list of
fantastic, tantalizing scenes but there is one that is etched in my
memory. The vision of Shosanna Dreyfus in her precious movie theatre
where her projected laugh on the silver screen in the face of Nazi
deaths will linger (not to mention an aural accompaniment preceding
the climax with David Bowie singing the musical theme from "Cat
People") is haunting and poetic, more so than anything else I can
recall from Tarantino. It is as if Tarantino was recalling the imagery
of Fritz Lang's own striking noir tales, or even aping to some degree
the climax of Lang's own "Metropolis."

And there is the cast, which is as wonderful an ensemble as one can
imagine. Brad Pitt does his Southern twang perfectly, and most notable
is the memorable scene where he rounds up the troops and explains what
he expects from them. I would not count this as his best role (that
honor would go to "Fight Club") but it is a colorful, hilarious role
for the Pitt Man (tell me you simultaneously won't laugh and cringe
when he pretends to be an Italian at a German movie premiere). Also
worth mentioning is Eli Roth who is suitably effective and mean enough
as the notorious Bear Jew; the almost unrecognizable Mike Myers as a
British officer; Rod Taylor who came out of retirement to play Winston
Churchill; Daniel Brohl (who really seems to come out of that 40's
era) as Frederick Zoller, a Nazi war hero and movie star who can't
bear to watch his own life story in the film within the film,
"Nation's Pride"; the aforementioned Michael Fassbender as the classy
British spy who also seems to have dropped in from that era as well,
and Diane Kruger as the sophisticated German movie star in undoubtedly
the best role she's played by far (you'll quickly forget she was in
"Troy" and "National Treasure").

But there is the piece of de resistance, the man whose glowering eyes
and piercing charms will resonate long after the movie is over. He is
Christoph Waltz, an actor who makes all other Nazis in the history of
cinema look pale by comparison. This is an actor who epitomizes the
phrase "devilish charm." He is so evil, so cunning, so humorous, so
subtle and so damn charming that I am surprised that the Hitler of
this movie didn't quake in his boots at the mere mention of his name,
Hans Landa. Shudder, shudder, shudder. Waltz should win the Oscar for
playing the most devious Nazi ever, one who so relishes a Nantucket
Bay home after the war is over. Playing one of the great villains of
all time, Waltz waltzes away with this movie, hands down.

Quentin Tarantino's "Inglourious Basterds" is a complete masterpiece
of pop cinema, with Tarantino at his absolute peak and in full control
of his own vision of war as a playful and violent diversion. I don't
think he can top it, but then I didn't think he could top "Pulp
Fiction." Well, he did. After the cartoonish carnival of the "Kill
Bill" volumes, the grindhouse spin of "Death Proof," and the mature
love story of "Jackie Brown," he has delivered his finest achievement
to date. It is more than a movie - it is a reminder of the art of the
cinema in all its lush glory and vivid entertainment.


For more reviews, check out JERRY AT THE MOVIES at:
http://www.geocities.com/faustus_08520/Jerry_at_the_Movies.html

BIO on the author of this page at:
http://www.geocities.com/faustus_08520/index.html

Email me at Faust668@msn.com or at faustus_08520@yahoo.com

From steve.rhodes at internetreviews.com  Wed Feb  3 13:12:58 2010
From: steve.rhodes at internetreviews.com (Steve Rhodes)
Date: Wed Feb  3 13:13:00 2010
Subject: Review: When in Rome (2010)
Message-ID: <0MqdncCPrcrM_v7WnZ2dnUVZ_u2dnZ2d@earthlink.com>

WHEN IN ROME
A film review by Steve Rhodes
Copyright 2010 Steve Rhodes

RATING (0 TO ****):  ***

Sweet, romantic and genuine, WHEN IN ROME is certainly fluff, but it is very 
entertaining and enjoyable nonetheless.  Sure, most critics are warning you 
away from it, but, if you are like the members of our packed audience, 
you'll be laughing often and will leave with a satisfied grin.

But, first let's have a location check.  We aren't talking about a rerelease 
of the Mary Kate and Ashley film of the same name or any of the many other 
versions of the film with the same title, going all the way back to 1932. 
The latest WHEN IN ROME features a consistently charming Kristen Bell as 
Beth, a woman who was so hurt in her last relationship that she has become 
very leery of believing in love's possibilities for her again.

Bell, who has been seen in many TV shows ("Heroes") and films (FORGETTING 
SARAH MARSHALL), is probably best known for her title role in "Veronica 
Mars" and as the title voice in "Gossip Girl." She manages to make this 
lightweight movie rather magical, and there is genuine chemistry between her 
and her co-star Nick (Josh Duhamel).

Set up as something of an adult fairy tale, WHEN IN ROME has Beth accidently 
casting a love spell on five guys by pulling their coins out of a fountain 
in Rome, where she has gone to attend the wedding of her sister Joan (Alexis 
Dziena).  While there she first meets Nick, who is the best man at her 
sister's wedding.  The film's many jokes include Nick's lame Italian 
translations of Beth's reluctant speech at the wedding.  Like most of the 
jokes, you've heard them before, but Bell and Duhamel throw themselves into 
their parts so convincingly that you never care.  Sure, if you go in 
expecting the film to be bad, you can probably groan smugly.  But, if you'll 
just be in the moment, as our audience was, you'll easily fall in love with 
the film and its stars.

Most of the supporting casting is okay, if nothing exceptional.  My personal 
favorite is Dziena ("Invasion"), who is cute as a bug in the small role of 
the sister.  Another good one is Jon Heder (NAPOLEON DYNAMITE) who plays a 
street magician who thinks he is love with Beth because of the coin spell.

At a time when way too many movies have colors that are downright dull, WHEN 
IN ROME features wonderfully lush and inviting colors.  It's a real treat 
for the eyes.

The story ends predictably but satisfyingly.  The ending also contains one 
of the film's funniest sight gags, which involves a tiny car.  Yep, you've 
seen this before too, but, as you're laughing hard, you probably won't mind.

WHEN IN ROME runs a breezy 1:31.  It is rated PG-13 for "some suggestive 
content" and would be acceptable for kids of all ages.

The film opens nationwide in the United States on Friday, January 29, 2010. 
In the Silicon Valley, it will be showing at the AMC theaters, the Cinemark 
theaters and the Camera Cinemas.

Web: http://www.InternetReviews.com
Email: Steve.Rhodes@InternetReviews.com

***********************************************************************

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Just write Steve.Rhodes@InternetReviews.com and put "subscribe" in the 
subject line.

From mleeper at optonline.net  Wed Feb  3 13:13:53 2010
From: mleeper at optonline.net (Mark R. Leeper)
Date: Wed Feb  3 13:13:55 2010
Subject: Review: The Hurt Locker (2009)
Message-ID: <op.u7f1qrv5y83cp7@mail-hub.optonline.net>

                         THE HURT LOCKER
                (a film review by Mark R. Leeper)

     CAPSULE: An American diffuser from a bomb squad
     in 2004 Bagdad goes from one white-knuckle situation
     to the next.  Just 38 days from being released to go
     home, SFC William James takes one risk after another
     because he cannot give up the excitement of the
     hazardous game.  The film is also an education in
     just how the bomb-defusing job is done.  We see two
     robots defusing the bombs and one is Staff Sgt. James.
     We never get to really know any other side of James.
     He is an addict of the game he plays, and we do not
     know if there is much human inside him.  Rating:
     +2 (-4 to +4) or 7/10

This is an almost documentary-like portrait of a man who enjoys his
job and goes into episode after episode with gusto.  It is a job
that most people would assume nobody would like.  The job is
defusing or detonating bombs (technically IEDs or Improvised
explosive devices) in Iraq.  SFC William James (played by Jeremy
Renner) likes living on the very edge.  He is like a chess master
who glories in keeping ten games going at once, knowing he will
beat every single opponent.  What is more, he is willing to play
with very uneven payoff.  If a bomb maker loses, he looses a few
hours work and some explosives.  James is betting his life and the
lives of others.  And he does this over and over and over under the
watchful eyes of people each of whom could be a bystander or could
hold the detonator.  To this point he has always won.  But when he
worked on the first bomb he ever defused he was pushing his luck.
Doing it repeatedly while disobeying orders, exasperating his squad
leader (Anthony Mackie), and trying to do anything in those
cumbersome padded anti-explosion suits goes beyond just pushing his
luck.  He is committing slow motion suicide.  Why does he love this
job?  Is it the beauty of his surroundings, exotic Bagdad in 2004?
That is not very likely.  It appears to be just that he loves the
competition and cannot give up playing the game.  It is an
obsession with him that he continues to play, like a kid with a
video game.  He knows he is good and that makes it impossible for
him to stop.

Kathryn Bigelow, director of action films like STRANGE DAYS and
K-19: THE WIDOWMAKER directs a film written by Boal.  Curiously for
such a tense film, the pacing is really slow.  A lot of the game is
standing still and sizing up your opponent(s) and jockeying for a
better position and maybe waiting out a sniper.  That takes time
and slows the pace.  The film could tell us more about what is
going on inside the characters, but Bigelow passes up that
opportunity.

Almost everything else is done well.  The cinematography by Barry
Ackroyd puts you even a little nearer to the action than you would
choose to be.  The style is very realistic, except for occasional
touches like slow motion to show the dark beauty of a detonation.
Other times James in his padded suit looks like he is walking on
the moon.  There are not even opening titles so that from the first
frame the viewer is pulled into the action.  One thing pulls us out
a little.  I did not recognize Renner, but several all-to-familiar
actors show up in small roles and pull us out of the action with
the game of "Is that...  No.  Oh wait, yes it is."  If you think
you see Guy Pearce, Ralph Fiennes, or David Morse, yes, that is
him.  Go back to the movie.  If you think you have seen George
Clooney, he is not there.

The film opens with a quote from Chris Hedges saying that war is a
drug.  The drug is adrenaline and its rush does seem to be
addictive for people like SFC William James.  The film makes that
quite clear, but I am not sure it says a whole lot more than that.
The film is quite a ride, it could have said so much more.  I rate
THE HURT LOCKER a +2 on the -4 to +4 scale or 7/10.  I missed where
the title comes from unless it suggests that James keeps all pain
locked up inside him.

Film Credits: <http://us.imdb.com/title/tt0887912/>

What others are saying:
<http://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/hurt_locker/>

					Mark R. Leeper
					mleeper@optonline.net
					Copyright 2010 Mark R. Leeper

From themoviereport at gmail.com  Wed Feb  3 13:15:12 2010
From: themoviereport at gmail.com (Michael Dequina)
Date: Wed Feb  3 13:15:14 2010
Subject: Review: Preacher's Kid (2010)
Message-ID: <4b66cbda.0f0bca0a.2fec.ffffe61a@mx.google.com>

_Preacher's_Kid_ (PG-13) *** (out of ****)

         With a title like _Preacher's_Kid_, it's 
not entirely unfair to walk into the film 
expecting a "standard" faith-centered/gospel 
play-style drama.  A plot summary makes 
expectations fall further in that line: sheltered 
20-something choir girl Angie King (LeToya 
Luckett) leaves the home of her strict bishop 
father (GregAlan Williams) to join charming R&B 
star Devlin Mitchell (Durrell "Tank" Babbs) on a 
touring gospel play company.  The story is 
another variation on the prodigal son tale, used 
many times over in entertainments both religious and secular.

         But the film's writer-director is Stan 
Foster, whose most recent screen credit was for 
the screenplay for one of the best, most 
affecting entries in the genre, 2004's Michael 
Schultz-directed, Independent Spirit 
Award-nominated adaptation of his play 
_Woman_Thou_Art_Loosed_ (based on the novel by 
Bishop T.D. Jakes), and accordingly there's a bit 
more edge and heft than just the expected 
faith-affirming messages and lessons.  Most 
striking of all Foster's self-referential, 
meta-commentary approach with the film's 
play-within-a-film conceit.  While this angle 
allows Foster to poke some good-natured fun at 
the well-worn tropes of genre, both in on-stage 
action (e.g. broad character types in both old 
age and Madea-style cross-gender drag; the 
obligatory moment of gratuitous beefcake by the 
heartthrob lead) and more inside issues (such as 
the types of stars generally cast in such 
productions and the general day-to-day working 
conditions of such touring plays), it also 
reinforces how he employs those familiar genre 
conventions far more effectively than the 
norm.  Indeed, at the core of the film is a 
well-meaning female lead caught between a Very 
Bad Guy in Devlin and a Very Good Guy (choir 
director Wynton, a bit of a thin role played by 
Sharif Atkins), but there's a fair amount of grey 
shading that makes the proceedings all the more 
believable.  While his behavior comes to 
explicitly live up to his similarly-sounding 
namesake, Devlin's effortlessly charismatic 
manner is convincingly, understandably 
alluring--and hence all the more insidious as he 
preys upon Angie's naivete and attendant 
insecurities.  Those qualities in Angie are 
nicely drawn from the start, and as such her more 
questionable decisions are understandable, coming 
from that place of honest unworldliness and a 
pure need to be accepted and belong in the "real" 
world outside of her father's orbit; accordingly, 
she is also is shown to not be beyond displaying 
some unpleasant behavior herself.  The added 
complexity is also present in the smaller parts, 
from the play's pragmatic director Ike (Clifton 
Powell), who does his part in advising caution 
but knows better than to not say or do anything 
to upset the rather delicate production in any 
way; to Angie's father, who may be wise to warn 
about the evils of the world but must also learn 
himself--not only to let go but also, in an 
effective (if somewhat underserviced, due to run 
time constraints) secondary plot, to start living life for himself a bit.

         That sense of balance and subverting 
expectations extends to the casting.  While 
veterans such as Powell, Williams, and Ella Joyce 
(as an old friend of the bishop's) reliably do 
the job in their supporting parts, carrying the 
film--as is often the case in many of its 
stage-based ilk--are two familiar figures in the 
R&B world who are relative newcomers to acting, 
Luckett and Babbs.  Luckett proves to a natural 
beyond her established vocal abilities, 
comfortably navigating the emotional demands of 
the role and holding the screen with effortless, 
relatable likability.  Any outward signs of 
Luckett's screen inexperience actually serve the 
part well, for Angie would be a bit ill at ease 
in many of the situations in which she suddenly 
finds herself and especially when confronted with 
as overwhelming a presence as Babbs's 
Devlin.  Babbs doesn't seem to be stretching much 
at all in the early stages, clearly having fun 
riffing off of his well-known loverman music 
persona, but what really makes Devlin's eventual 
manipulations and abuses all the more startling 
is just how convincing Babbs proves to be in 
depicting the dark side.  Likely to be underrated 
in a less showy but no less important part is 
Tammy Townsend, who shines both vocally and 
dramatically as Desiree, Angie's rival for 
Devlin's leading lady position both on and off 
the stage.  She, like the rest of the cast, 
benefits from Foster's generosity in his script, 
taking what in another film could be a cardboard 
adversary into a character that develops 
unexpected layers as the film progresses.

         While that sense of added dimension 
strengthens _Preacher's_Kid_ throughout, the 
ultimate reason for its success lies in something 
simpler, which is actually addressed in one 
rather observant line from the film: "Our 
audience may not be the most sophisticated, but 
they can spot a lie."  In terms of broad 
narrative and thematic strokes, the film may not 
venture too far past what is plainly obvious from 
the outset.  So it all comes down to how the 
formula is executed and how the message is 
expressed during its two hours, and Foster's film 
confirms the unique, undeniable power this genre 
can achieve on both stage and film--best 
exemplified by a scene climactic to both the 
movie and the play-within-a-movie, where Angie's 
song soars with such sincere, soul-baring passion 
that the audience, religious or otherwise, is 
uplifted beyond the screen and to a place that is genuinely transcendent.



(c)2010 Michael Dequina



Michael Dequina
mrbrown@iname.com
The Movie Report/Mr. Brown's Movie Site: www.themoviereport.com
www.quickstopentertainment.com | www.cinemareview.com | www.aalbc.com
www.johnsingletonfilms.com | on ICQ: #25289934 | on AOL/Y! IM: mrbrown23


Michael Dequina
A-Frame Studios
twotrey@gmail.com | michael@aframestudios.com | mrbrown@themoviereport.com
The Movie Report/Mr. Brown's Movie Site: www.themoviereport.com
www.cinemareview.com | twitter.com/twotrey23 | AIM/Y!IM: mrbrown23

From mleeper at optonline.net  Wed Feb  3 13:19:45 2010
From: mleeper at optonline.net (Mark R. Leeper)
Date: Wed Feb  3 13:19:46 2010
Subject: Review: The Lovely Bones (2009)
Message-ID: <op.u6z1mtc9y83cp7@mail-hub.optonline.net>

                        THE LOVELY BONES
                (a film review by Mark R. Leeper)

     CAPSULE: Peter Jackson visually overpowers what should
     have been a small personal story.  A murdered fourteen-
     year-old girl is in a limbo between heaven and earth
     from which she tries to bring her grieving family peace
     and at the same time get the murderer found out.  The
     overpowering glories of the afterlife are really a
     distraction from the real story that is taking place in
     our world.  More effort was needed in telling the
     earthbound story that seems superficial even in a
     135-minute movie.  Rating: low +1 (-4 to +4) or 5/10

Fourteen-year-old Susie Salmon (played by Saoirse Ronan of
ATONEMENT) is murdered by neighbor George Harvey (the great Stanley
Tucci).  Susie does not go directly to heaven but to a sort of
limbo-world called the In-between.  She is not entirely in heaven,
and she is not entirely in the real world.  Instead she can see her
family and try to protect them.  She also tries to reveal who her
murderer is so that her family can find some closure.  Susie's
parents, played by Mark Wahlberg and Rachel Weisz, are absolutely
crushed by the tragedy.  Wahlberg seems to work overtime in being
the bereaved parent and Weisz seems not to have nearly enough to
do.  Susan Sarandon is along as the bad-girl grandmother who tried
to be as bad an influence as possible on Susie.

Traditionally a story like THE LOVELY BONES would have been treated
as a small personal film with just a few visual images to show the
metaphysical taking form in our world.  Just subtly hinting at the
world beyond worked for films like Jerry Zucker's GHOST and THE
UNINVITED.  That might have worked for this film, but Peter Jackson
was the wrong director to do that.  Jackson is known for his
flamboyant visual style.  He created huge spectacular vistas for
THE LORD OF THE RINGS and for KING KONG.  There was a place in this
film that it must have been irresistible for Jackson to put in
visuals.  After Susie is murdered in this film she goes to "The In-
between."  And apparently for Jackson the enticement was just too
great to spend a lot of money and make The In-between about as
glorious a place as his imagination could muster up.  It is full of
New Zealand splendor and special effects skies and landscape that
changes shape.  The problem is that is not where the important part
of the story takes place.  Most of the story takes pace in our
world.  The splendor of the In-between is not the point of the
story.  It is really a distraction.  Jackson spends too much time
trying to convince us it is a wonderful place for much too bizarre
a definition of wonderful.  It is out of place, like wearing a
diamond tiara with shorts and a t-shirt.

THE LOVELY BONES is reminiscent of WHAT DREAMS MAY COME, which did
not have nearly so good a story, but which gives us much more
creative images of heaven and hell.  The In-between seems to have
lots of wide-open space, but for some reason Jackson keeps
returning us to images of confined space.  We see a penguin in a
snow globe, we see ships in bottles, and the most claustrophobic
space of all is a small bunker built by the Tucci character as a
place where he can kill.  That bunker may be a detail from the
book, but it makes very little logic.  It is awfully well built and
nicely furnished.  It is hard to believe he could get all the
materials to built and furnish this underground room with nobody
noticing.  He would have had to do all this work in the middle of a
very flat and open field where he could be seen from a fair
distance away.  The idea that he could do all this construction and
not leave in it any clue for the police stretches the imagination
almost as much as the concept of the In-between does.

It is hard to know what Jackson was intending to do with this film.
Instead of telling the earth-story he seems to have wanted to give
us some indelible images of heaven--or a place very much like
heaven.  He misjudged the images and made them seem banal.  I rate
THE LOVELY BONES a low +1 on the -4 to +4 scale or 5/10.  Jackson
can create the images of Middle Earth in beautiful detail, but he
seems to be unable to show a piece of paper carried by the wind
that does not look like it is being pulled by a string.

Film Credits: <http://us.imdb.com/title/tt0380510/>

What others are saying:
<http://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/1189344-lovely_bones/>


					Mark R. Leeper
					mleeper@optonline.net
					Copyright 2010 Mark R. Leeper

From mleeper at optonline.net  Wed Feb  3 13:22:29 2010
From: mleeper at optonline.net (Mark R. Leeper)
Date: Wed Feb  3 13:22:31 2010
Subject: Review: A Single Man (2009)
Message-ID: <op.u60k93c3y83cp7@mail-hub.optonline.net>

                          A SINGLE MAN
                (a film review by Mark R. Leeper)

     CAPSULE: A day in the life of a man in deep depression.
     Directed by first-timer Tom Ford and based on a short
     novel by Christopher Isherwood, A SINGLE MAN gives us an
     up-close and very personal look at a college professor
     who recently has lost the meaning of his life when he
     lost his gay lover.  We follow him through a single day
     as he looks just once more for love and for life or the
     strength to end it all.  There are good performances by
     both Julianne Moore and Colin Firth.  Rating: +1 (-4 to
     +4) or 6/10

A spoiler follows the main body of the review.

For George Falconer (played by Colin Firth) each new day is an
ordeal--living in agony and in L.A.  He starts the day putting on
the right fashionable clothing that he uses like a mask to hide the
pain going on inside him.  He looks longingly at a gun and the
escape that it could bring.  George was deeply and profoundly in
love for many years with the handsome and callow Jim (Matthew
Goode), but Jim died in a car crash on an icy road and George's
life just crumbled.  Now he is going through the motions of his
day.  He teaches his class in literature and almost by habit
notices the good-looking men he sees around him.  He goes to a
liquor store and sees another hunk there.  On the other hand the
women around him seem just collections of pieces to him.  The
camera suggests that he cannot even look at women as whole people.
When he sees them he sees their hair or their mouths or their
eyes--especially their eyes.  He is out of touch with people and
living within his mind.  The camera captures his mind fog with slow
motion close-ups of people he does not really care about.  In other
films this same camera technique has been used to show people who
are drugged.  And it is showing him almost in the same state.

There is no love left in George.  The last living person whom
George cares about was his long-time friend, Charley (Julianne
Moore with a fairly convincing British accent).  If George could
have loved a woman it would have been Charley.  He even gave it a
try once, but when it failed it really ruined both lives.  Charley
is now always either mostly drunk or fully drunk.  She still sees
George for friendship or dinner, but she is only teasing herself.

Colin Firth seems to have made his reputation mostly playing solid,
prosperous "Mr. Right" types like the two Darcys in PRIDE AND
PREJUDICE and BRIDGET JONES'S DIARY.  Tom Ford co-authored the
screenplay as well as directed the film, his first.  His real
business is as a fashion designer.  His visual sense can be seen in
George's unrealistically fabulous house.  Just where George gets to
wherewithal for a house like this on a college professor's salary
is open to conjecture.  The film has technical problems.  We are
told that it is taking place on November 30, 1962, but the
television tells us that Cuban Missile Crisis is occurring.
Actually the crisis ended October 27th.  We are told that George
and Jim had been together for something like fifteen years, but
they appear not to have aged at all since they first met, as we see
in flashback.

This film is based on a short novel by Christopher Isherwood whose
book I AM A CAMERA was made into a film and then remade as a play
and a film as CABERET.  Curiously, he also wrote the screenplay for
the TV miniseries "Frankenstein: The True Story."

This is a film of gay angst.  There are some directors who might
have tried to make a statement that George's pain is at root caused
by intolerance.  Tom Ford does not do that.  Instead we just seem
to have two people, George and Charley, who are just plainly
dysfunctional.  They are free to make their own mistakes, and they
really do make them.  I would rate this film a +1 on the -4 to +4
scale or 6/10.

Spoiler... Spoiler... Spoiler... Spoiler... Spoiler... Spoiler...
The ending of the film is telegraphed.  Early in the film we see
George has a physical problem that seems independent of all his
other problems.  That then is dropped until the very end.
Curiously enough it makes the whole film a variation on a familiar
O Henry story.

Film Credits: <http://us.imdb.com/title/tt1315981/>

What others are saying:
<http://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/1218217-single_man/>


					Mark R. Leeper
					mleeper@optonline.net
					Copyright 2010 Mark R. Leeper

From Faust668 at msn.com  Thu Feb 11 17:43:46 2010
From: Faust668 at msn.com (Jerry Saravia)
Date: Thu Feb 11 17:43:50 2010
Subject: Retrospective: Troll 2 (1990)
Message-ID: <b8f37cb9-e263-49d9-88cb-4757a16f6e25@s12g2000yqj.googlegroups.com>

TROLL 2 (1990)
Reviewed by Jerry Saravia
RATING: Three stars (!)

"Troll 2" can be summed in one phrase: best good bad movie you might
ever see. I've seen my share of good bad films that manage to
entertain in spite of everything else that goes wrong ("Plan 9" is
infamous, of course, but there is also "The Third Society," less well-
known but worth watching because it is not boring). But "Troll 2" is
something more unique, a fifth-rate B movie that is so woefully
misguided and executed that, somehow, it actually works because it is
so damn entertaining. If the filmmakers admitted they made a parody of
"Village of the Damned" or something of its ilk, I would've said this
was exceptionally hilarious. The fact that the filmmakers intended to
make a serious horror movie makes this a special good/bad movie with
its own special place in the annals of idiotic cinema.

"Troll 2" has no relation to the original and very dull "Troll" from
1986, which starred Michael Moriarty, Sonny Bono and I think one angry
troll. At least it had a higher pedigree than this movie, which may be
the only sequel where "in-name only" feels like a cheap
understatement. This movie was supposed to be called "Goblins," just
as other notable films by the Italian director Claudio Fragasso like
"Terminator II" and "Evil Dead V" had alternate, original titles with
no relation to their popular U.S. titles. Moving on, a family goes on
a vacation trip to the town of Nilbog (anyone that can't guess what
that means...) where it is so sparsely populated that there doesn't
seem to be a functioning grocery store (they offer unrefrigerated milk
for free and it ain't Parlamat!). Lo and behold, Nilbog's residents
are all goblins (hate to spoil that for anyone) and there is a
resident witch living in a church with a crimson red bed in its lobby,
a portal to Stonehenge, and lots of plants! The family have a son
(Michael Stephenson, the best actor of the bunch) who has visions of
goblins eating the chlorophyll remains of dead people with green ooze
in their mouths! He figures out what the town of Nilbog is up to,
thanks to the spirit of his beloved grandfather. By the way, the house
the family actually trade for their own has handwritten signs of the
occupants's names taped on their doors.

For laughs, we get little Stephenson urinating on green-iced cookies
and cake (we know he will do it when he opens his fly); the
grandfather's spirit getting lost in the house; the witch seducing a
young teenage boy with corn on the cob that turns into popcorn; a
sheriff offering a teenager a cheeseburger with green ooze (now who
would willingly eat that?); a silly jamboree; another hapless teen
turned into a plant, holding a flower pot; an 80's dance scene, and
there is so much more that I can't keep typing this nonsense. This is
the kind of movie where any description of any scene must be followed
by an exclamation mark.

What is "Troll 2" about? I can't say except that the town of Nilbog
and its hungry goblins care about the environment and are vegetarian.
However, they like to eat people but only after they pollute their
victims' blood with chlorophyll mixed with cheeseburgers (from some 24
hour burger joint in town) or with vanilla cake and cookies. So, to
destroy the goblins, it might help if you are armed with a double
decker bologna sandwich that has no trace of chlorophyll. This begs
the question: if the goblins are strict vegetarians, where do they get
the unrefrigerated cow milk? (Unless it is Parmalat). Also, they are
surrounded by the forest, so why don't they feast on plants and leaves
instead of feasting on people and turning them into plants? Yeah,
there is irony here but it is so slapdash and so absurdly presented
that I classify it as unironic and unintended irony. That last
statement makes about as much sense as the movie.

Apparently, the English-speaking actors in this ultra low-grade horror
(shot in Utah) were not able to communicate with Fragasso(using the
alias Drake Floyd) or the crew because they all spoke Italian. That
explains a lot, but I can't say I was bored by this movie. It is so
entertaining and so unintentionally comedic and so inanely acted and
directed, it is hard to resist. It is a new high in the lower margins
of fringe filmmaking. Suffice to say, once you have seen "Troll 2,"
you can't unsee it.

For more reviews, check out JERRY AT THE MOVIES at:
http://www.geocities.com/faustus_08520/Jerry_at_the_Movies.html

BIO on the author at:
http://www.geocities.com/faustus_08520/index.html

Email me at Faust668@msn.com or at faustus_08520@yahoo.com

From Faust668 at msn.com  Thu Feb 11 17:44:59 2010
From: Faust668 at msn.com (Jerry Saravia)
Date: Thu Feb 11 17:45:03 2010
Subject: Review: Twilight (2008)
Message-ID: <9a2959f3-e18f-4da4-9678-7befbe49ca28@z26g2000yqm.googlegroups.com>

TWILIGHT (2008)
Reviewed by Jerry Saravia
RATING: Three stars

Vampires are fascinating creatures because they represent the undead
and seem unconnected to humans and their proclivities. Not so with the
vampires in "Twilight" - they play baseball and attend the prom! There
are a couple of new twists on vampires in "Twilight," an absorbing
love story that has a rushed third act but it still manages to
maintain interest.

Kristen Stewart is Bella Swan, the quiet teenage girl from Phoenix who
has moved to the town of Forks, Washington, to live with her father.
This town is almost always cloudy and drenched in rain. Her new
classmates seem like a joyful bunch, but there is also a group of
emaciated teens with dark brown eyes. One of them is a brooding James
Dean lookalike named Edward Cullen (Robert Pattinson), who is even
more quiet than she is. Bella sees something in Edward, something
either otherworldly or she has met the sulkiest, most distancing
teenager in history. But when she is rescued by Edward, either during
a potential rape attack or getting smashed by an out-of-control truck,
she grows smitten and eventually discovers his secret: he is a
vampire. I think the ice-cold skin might have been the tip-off.

Legions have read Stephenie Myers' novel so they know what to expect.
I suppose a teen-friendly vampire soap opera is a might close to my
initial expectations, but I was pleasantly surprised by the film's
central key relationship. What elevates it I think is Kristen Stewart
and Robert Pattison who have undeniable chemistry, and keep the
romance believable and honest. In fact, had Edward not been a vampire,
it wouldn't have mattered. She wants to kiss him, make love to him,
but all Edward wants to do is climb up trees. He makes her long for
him, and I can imagine that many teenage girls find this idea
arresting, forlorn and tragic all at the same time. Yeah, he is a
vampire and she is human so sex could be a problem. The key word is
abstinence but I must say it is refreshing to see a movie where the
teenagers can love each other first before the sexual shenanigans
begin. Director Catherine Hardwicke (who helmed the potent "Thirteen")
knows and understands Bella and Edward enough to give them weight and
some measure of complexity.

"Twilight" does suffer a bit when it focuses on Edward Cullen's
family, who all live in a glass house in the middle of the woods. They
welcome Bella with Italian food that they obviously cannot eat
themselves. The Cullen clan also play baseball but only when
lightining strikes (!) and they only drink the blood of animals. And
when we are introduced to another group of vampires who kill humans, I
felt my heart sinking a bit. A better subplot given less screen time
is to the Native American family who might be werewolves. Granted that
many of these subplots are in the book and perhaps figure in later
installments, but I grew weary of the evil vampire clan and their
determination to go after Bella. Perhaps due to Stewart and Pattison's
love story, I felt these other elements distracted a bit.

Still, "Twilight" is a serene and strangely beautiful film with two
charismatic leads. The love story blooms and stays with you, nicely
amplified by Stewart and Pattinson who give this film an ethereal
humanity you don't see much of in movies anymore. Hardly a great movie
nor a stunning new saga in vampire lore, "Twilight" is still
captivating and makes you swoon. It is just a sweet love story that
happens to revolve around vampires.


For more reviews, check out JERRY AT THE MOVIES at:
http://www.geocities.com/faustus_08520/Jerry_at_the_Movies.html

BIO on the author of this page at:
http://www.geocities.com/faustus_08520/index.html

Email me at Faust668@msn.com or at faustus_08520@yahoo.com

From steve.rhodes at internetreviews.com  Thu Feb 11 17:52:27 2010
From: steve.rhodes at internetreviews.com (Steve Rhodes)
Date: Thu Feb 11 17:52:30 2010
Subject: Review: The Last Station (2010)
Message-ID: <xKKdnQmf19fVK_DWnZ2dnUVZ_qudnZ2d@earthlink.com>

THE LAST STATION
A film review by Steve Rhodes
Copyright 2010 Steve Rhodes

RATING (0 TO ****):  ***

While THE LAST STATION's two major Oscar nominations, Christopher Plummer 
for Best Actor and Helen Mirren for Best Actress, may cause you to 
needlessly raise your expectations for the film, the movie is basically an 
entertaining piece of fluff with a little drama thrown in every now and 
then.

The last film I saw by writer and director Michael Hoffman was 2002's THE 
EMPEROR'S CLUB, which is a very traditional and completely satisfying film 
that is something of a combination of DEAD POETS SOCIETY and MR. HOLLAND'S 
OPUS.  His latest movie, THE LAST STATION is equally successful.  Basically 
a love story, it tells a story centered on the end of Leo Tolstoy's life, a 
time in which he had abandoned his books to his new endeavors, which could 
be seen as a movement that was a precursor to communism.

Called Tolstoyian, the new movement is shown as being advanced more by 
Vladimir Chertkov (Paul Giamatti) than by Leo (Plummer) himself.  Pacifism 
and a renunciation of private property appear to be the two main tenets of 
this philosophy.

Leo, a gregarious guy who is said to have been the most famous author in the 
world in 1910 when the story is set, lives on a large country estate with 
his wife Sofya (Mirren) and some of their thirteen children.  They have a 
loving but very volatile marriage.  Sofya worries about Vladimir stealing 
all of her husband's money for Vladimir's causes.  While living a very 
aristocratic lifestyle, Leo talks endlessly about the plight of the 
peasants.  Meanwhile, outside their front door is a permanent encampment of 
a host of journalists acting just like today's pesky paparazzi.

Sofya, a melodramatic hypochondriac, and Leo squabble and bicker when they 
are not engaging in sweet talk and playful kidding.  After 48 years of 
marriage, they still love each other very much, but forces are conspiring to 
drive them apart, as the couple's goals increasingly diverge.

In a satisfying but ultimately disposable subplot, James McAvoy plays 
Valentin Bulgakov, the new secretary sent by Chertkov to spy on Leo, and 
Kerry Condon plays Masha, a free spirit Valentin meets at the Tolstoy 
estate.  In no time, Valentin abandons his belief in a celibate life and 
throws himself headlong into a sweet little romance.

With superb acting throughout, THE LAST STATION may not be a great film, but 
it certainly is an easy one to enjoy and savor.

THE LAST STATION runs 1:52.  It is rated R for "a scene of sexuality/nudity" 
and would be acceptable for teenagers.

The film opens nationwide in the United States on February 5, 2010.  In the 
Silicon Valley, it will be showing at the Camera Cinemas.

Web: http://www.InternetReviews.com
Email: Steve.Rhodes@InternetReviews.com

***********************************************************************

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Just write Steve.Rhodes@InternetReviews.com and put "subscribe" in the 
subject line.

From mleeper at optonline.net  Thu Feb 11 17:56:12 2010
From: mleeper at optonline.net (Mark R. Leeper)
Date: Thu Feb 11 17:56:14 2010
Subject: Review: Phyllis and Harold (2010)
Message-ID: <op.u7u9vy1ky83cp7@mail-hub.optonline.net>

                        PHYLLIS AND HAROLD
                (a film review by Mark R. Leeper)

     CAPSULE: Cindy Kline is a filmmaker fascinated by
     her parents' dysfunctional marriage.  In a previous
     film, TIL DEATH DO US PART (1998, a 20-minute
     short), she interviewed her parents trying to get
     to the core of what made their relationship so rocky.
     Later following the death of her father she could
     get more from her mother about their problems.  Now
     she can tell a more complete story in PHYLLIS AND
     HAROLD.  Ironically, what she tells us of her parents
     and what we can see are diametrically opposed.
     Cindy's conclusions are directly at odds with the
     evidence on the screen, and the entire story is
     surprisingly compelling for such a modest effort.
     Rating: +1 (-4 to +4) or 6/10

Over the years when she was growing up, Cindy Kline and her sister
Ricky were caught in the battles between her parents.  Outwardly
they seemed at one time an attractive couple.  Harold's profession
as a dentist allowed them to live very comfortably and to travel
extensively throughout the world.  They should have been an ideal
pairing.  But secretly and not so secretly they were in a constant
state of conflict.  Cindy interviews the two of them and tries to
put some meaning onto the discord.  The two seem opposites.  Harold
is quiet and at least in front of the camera is easy going.
Phyllis is talkative and acerbic.  From early in the film a pattern
becomes clear.  Phyllis's descriptions are punctuated with sharp
verbal jabs at Harold.  Harold stoically takes the abuse and gives
none back.

For example, Phyllis will say Harold would send "what he considered
love letters."  Apparently they did not meet her high standards for
what constitutes "love letters."  Through the years she benefitted
 from being married to Harold, but usually escaped from any
responsibilities as part of the relationship.  In the early days
when Harold was struggling financially, Phyllis spent weeks looking
for a job and then quit the job she found after only one day.  She
has children by Harold, but then does not want to raise them
herself and hires a nanny.  For ten years Cindy was closer to the
nanny than she was to Phyllis.

In the interviews Phyllis complains about Harold's supposed bad
behavior and his faults.  Harold says nothing about Phyllis that is
not sympathetic.  He is proud of his accomplishments, his
investments, and how he can provide for his family.  He is a simple
man and something of a romantic, supporting his wife and ignoring
the digs.

The film takes some twists.  Apparently Phyllis had an affair with
a married man with whom she is still in love.  The daughters tell
her she should have followed her love without much consideration to
what it would have done to their family, especially their father.
Little incidents boil up from the past.  Cindy as a young girl sees
a baby and her mother has to tell her that babies do not stay cute
for long and they grow into ugly teenagers.  Phyllis throughout is
domineering and self-obsessed.  Even as Cindy makes the film she
seems unable to see how destructive Phyllis was.  If Harold has a
similar negative side, we see little of it in the film.  He may be
clumsy, but he is a romantic.

The film has the uneven style that might be expected of an
inexperience filmmaker.  We get some makeshift animation that may
be intended to lighten the tone.  It is mostly of the photographic
style that Terry Gilliam would use for the early Monty Python
episodes.  Somehow it seems like it belongs in another, perhaps
lighter, film.  Some of the sound recording is crudely done and a
little hard to understand.  Some of the scenes go on too long
without giving us new information.  The use of home movies intercut
with the scenes of the present are a familiar touch and the home
movies could have been better chosen, but they give a feel for the
time period of the narrative.

Cindy Klein give us a picture of herself as a woman who grew up in
a household that had the assumption that it is the husband's
responsibility to make the wife happy, but not the reverse.  She
seems unaware that she maintains that prejudice throughout the
film, and it may reflect badly on her, but it gives the film its
interest.  I rate PHYLLIS AND HAROLD a +1 on the -4 to +4 scale or
6/10.

Film Credits: <http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1382323/>


					Mark R. Leeper
					mleeper@optonline.net
					Copyright 2010 Mark R. Leeper

From lifefeed at gmail.com  Thu Feb 11 17:57:18 2010
From: lifefeed at gmail.com (Justin M)
Date: Thu Feb 11 17:57:20 2010
Subject: Retrospective: Visioneers (2008)
Message-ID: <0678ea4b-9b29-45e4-b6f4-a5823a1544e7@m16g2000yqc.googlegroups.com>

Visioneers

review by Justin M
rating: 5/5

I came home from work to my small one-bedroom apartment and cooked a
mid-priced porterhouse steak.  I coupled it with a handful of
Mediterranean salad from a large Tupperware in my fridge, and topped
it off with large glass of water.   I took my meal into my uncluttered
living room and then sat down to watch a movie about people who
spontaneously combust due to their humdrum lives.

Visioneers is a dark indy comedy.  It stars Zach Galifianakis as
George Washington Winsterhammerman, a man who has dreams where he is
namesake and is battling the British.  In reality George is a level
three worker in the Jefferies Corporation, a national conglomerate
that appears to run America.  He sits in a gray office and  with
paperwork that comes from a retro-futuristic pneumatic tube.  He lives
in a mini-mansion with his wife and son, the former of whom
religiously follows a happiness talk-show, and the latter we never
see.  He is supposedly happy.

Galifianakis is fantastic as George.  All of his acting comes from how
fully he inhabits this character, from the expressiveness of his
silent emoting, and he has to be expressive since this is a very quiet
character, and entire scenes pass by without him saying a word.  The
few times he bursts with emotion it's not with the wild recklessness
we've come to expect from actors, but of a man whose still struggling
to free himself.  Galifianakis's job here is even more impressive when
you consider that this is the same actor from The Hangover.

Visioneers takes place in a dystopian world where dreams have almost
entirely disappeared, literally and figuratively.  The Jefferies
Corporation manages people from birth to death, allowing them to live
idle suburban lives filled with nine-to-five jobs and minivans.  The
pervasive banality of the Jefferies Corporation has started to cause a
peculiar problem: people have started to spontaneously combust.  We
eventually learn the reason why: these are people who dream, and they
can't reconcile their dreams with reality. George the dreamer is
worried.

Jared and Brandon Drake are the director and writer, respectively, and
this is their first movie outing.  The movie is well-made, although it
does show it's low price tag at times.  With a larger budget we
could've seen a more coherent world, one in which we see the full
insidious reach of a company capable of producing an office as Brazil-
like as the one George works in.

The writing is top-notch, the story takes us to a place that dystopian
fantasies rarely bring us.  In these kinds of stories the corporation/
government is typical too entrenched to be toppled, it has become
permanent.  In Visioneers, the Jefferies Corporation is truly
threatened by this outbreak of spontaneous combustion.  They react to
the growing number of exploded dissatisfied citizens as if it were a
plague or a war, and their counter-measures grow in urgency and
desperation.  George accidentally harbors a possible revolution,
really a group of bliss-seeking men and women who are as drone-like as
the corporate workers, a plot branch that openly mocks the hippies of
the sixties.  Instead of a hopeless cog, George becomes important.

Visioneers is an excellent movie for anyone who likes their indy
dark.  It marries a high-concept dystopian world with a suburban-
family-in-crisis story.  The movie takes pieces from Brazil, American
Beauty, and More, and comes out greater than the sum of its parts.

Half-way through the movie I opened up my yogurt cup with fruit on the
bottom, and discovered that the fruit was missing from the bottom.
Concerning the poor dreamers in Visioneers, a bare moment before they
explode they have a sudden knowledge of what is about to happen.  I
don't know if that's a boon or a curse.

5/5

(For more reviews, check out http://www.albanyboston.com/, where I
write from Boston.)

From tskirvin at killfile.org  Sat Feb 13 12:33:26 2010
From: tskirvin at killfile.org (Tim Skirvin)
Date: Sat Feb 13 12:33:29 2010
Subject: Review: Valentine's Day (2010)
Message-ID: <tskirvin.20100213173132$0f0f@vulture.killfile.org>

  There were few bright spots as I was forced to sit through
_Valentine's Day_ last night.  The best I came up with was finding ways to
make the movie better - perhaps an impossible task, but hey, I was really
stretching.  I came up with two reasonable ideas:

  1.  We have both McDreamy and McSteamy (from Grey's Anatomy - no, I
don't know their real names [yes, I watched that show for too long]) in
this movie; why don't we hook them up?  That'd be awesome!

  2.  When Julia Roberts is returning to her seat on the plane to
L.A., there's a significant amount of unexplained turbulence.  Can we please
crash the plane into the city and kill everybody involved?  A mix of _Escape
from LA_ and _Magnolia_ would be significant step up...

  But no.  This was a movie of romantic comedy clichÃ(c)s, not
subversion slash or disaster movies.  The most subversive element was an
Indian Shotgun Wedding; the most disastrous element was the waste of good
talent.  And so I was left with one of the most painful pieces of film I've
seen in years.

  _Valentine's Day_'s premise - "how many A- and B-list actors can we
fit in a romantic comedy?" - clearly overrode any other considerations that
the creators might have come up with.  The movie of a dozen or so
five-minute romantic comedies stuffed together and loosely connected by a
ten-minute romantic comedy.  Each of these plots wastes two or more talented
and/or popular actors, who only have their looks and/or reputation to rely
upon to display a character.  Only one of the plots involves anything even
vaguely unpredictable; none of the characters go through anything
resembling character growth, most don't even show much personality in the
first place, a few "plots" never even have a plot introduced, and a couple
(Kathy Bates, Queen Latifah) don't even have an associated love interest.
It was almost as if they came into the game too late, and just needed to be
stuffed in somehow.

  The movie's implementation was nearly as bad.  The movie jumped
frenetically from plotline to plotline, introducing secondary characters
from time to time that were more interesting than the main plots.  Romantic
comedy clichÃ(c)s were generally elided to save time; given that there *was*
no other plot, this was especially egregious.  Thematic integration points
between the sub-plots were ignored.  Any visual themes that might have been
interesting in a longer movie were lost by being caught up in the sheer
mess that was playing elsewhere.  And the writing...  dear Gods, the
writing...

  Interestingly, it was the fact checking that I found the most
egregiously bad.  Perhaps a minor point for most people, it bothered me that
nobody looked at a calendar and spotted the fact that Valentine's Day falls
on a Sunday this year.  This movie clearly takes place in 2010, and more
clearly takes place on a weekday (there are kids in school, work is in
session, etc).  Perhaps it's just that I know that things would have had to
*change* if the movie had been in a different year, but...  

  Romance?  Oddly, I'd argue there wasn't any.  There were break-ups;
there was the occasional realization that two characters "had always been
in love"; and there were Grand Revelations.  Past that, we merely had the
time to glimpse people that were, purported, already in love.  

  Comedy?  I could swear that some of the audience (made up of 70%
teenage girls) laughed a couple of times, but I honestly couldn't tell you
when that happened.  I certainly didn't laugh, or gasp, or respond with some
low kind of pity.  

  Was there anything worthwhile?  Well, I saw it with a dear friend;
that was nice.  And while she didn't hate the movie as much as I did, she
also didn't get upset when I ranted about it on the way back.  Score one for
Eva.

  Yeah, that's about it.  Avoid this movie.

  * - or, more accurately, BOMB

  Postscript 1: I suppose that it's fair to point out that I am not a
fan of romantic comedies, and that my score probably reflects this.  In my
defense, there are definitely romantic comedies that I respect and,
shockingly, even like - _Love, Actually_ comes to mind.  This movie,
however, was an embarrassment.  

  Postscript 2: when the trailers come on, I highly recommend closing
your eyes and ears for _Date Night_, the vehicle for Tina Fey and Steve
Carell.  The movie's only chance might be surprise as to the premise; and
the trailer ruined that for me.

                           - Tim Skirvin (tskirvin@killfile.org)
-- 
http://wiki.killfile.org/           Skirv's Homepage <FISH>< <*>
http://wiki.killfile.org/reviews/movies    Skirv's Movie Reviews

From Faust668 at msn.com  Fri Feb 19 17:15:13 2010
From: Faust668 at msn.com (Jerry Saravia)
Date: Fri Feb 19 17:15:16 2010
Subject: Review: Monsters, Marriage and Murder in Manchvegas (2009)
Message-ID: <c8fc09c8-03ea-4899-b5e9-4cac3fa24055@c5g2000vbh.googlegroups.com>

MONSTERS, MARRIAGE AND MURDER IN MANCHVEGAS (2009)
Reviewed by Jerry Saravia
RATING: Three stars

A title like "Monsters, Marriage and Murder in Manchvegas" will remind
some of the gloriously long titles of B-movies of the 1950's. After
all, it is no different than a title like "I Married a Monster from
Outer Space." Movies like "Manchvegas" don't seem to exist anymore and
coming from writers Matt Farley and Charles Roxburgh (who also
directed), they aim to make a charming, inoffensive picture that is
seemingly exploitative (with a title like that, you can't expect less)
but delivers a certain sweetness that can only emanate from its small-
town setting.

The small town in this film is Manchvegas, or more appropriately to
the rest of you, Manchester, New Hampshire. Three members of an
entrepreneurial group known as M.O.S. (Manchvegas Outlaw Society)
deliver newspapers, hot dogs, books, lemonade and poppy Beach-Boys-
sounding CD's from their own band around town. They also solve some
petty crimes such as finding the kids who are stealing the delivered
newspapers. Of course, M.O.S. mostly spend time at a nearby lake
engaging in lots of tomfoolery and "summertime fun," including
throwing water balloons at each other. The leader of M.O.S. is
Marshall (Matt Farley), who pines for the affections of Jenny (Marie
Dellicker), another member of the group (would a blonde adult really
hang out with such a group?). There is also All-Star Pete (Thomas
Scalzo) and he mostly plays basketball and sets up surveillance on
Jenny's dates so that Marshall can scare them off. Can't really blame
Jenny for seeking other men since Marshall suffers from maximum
arrested development.

A murdered bride-to-be is found and M.O.S. decides to solve the murder
(their credentials don't extend beyond stolen newspapers). Another
bride-to-be, a product of finishing school known as Melinda (Sharon
Scalzo), is missing after she was last seen skinny-dipping but who is
the killer? Is it the local grocer who became her fiance? And what are
those strange, mythical forest beasts, known as Gospercaps, who speak
in an undiscernable language? Are they harmless or are they murderous?

I will say that "Monsters, Marriage and Murder in Manchvegas" is an
original treat for anyone who loves cheesy, low-budget  B-movies,
especially those that are still shot on film. Though some of the
actors, such as police chief Delvecchio (James McHugh, who is clearly
reading his lines rather than speaking them) or Melinda's dad (Kevin
McGee, whom Farley has described as their Bela Lugosi), don't give
spellbinding performances, Matt Farley, however, gives it his all - he
has presence in those arched eyebrows and slight squeaky voice (he was
genuinely creepy in his last outing, "Freaky Farley"). He inarguably
gives the best performance in the film and the sweet little love story
with Jenny adds a layer of true innocence to the proceedings. You can
tell these guys had fun making a cheerful, unpretentious film that
nearly everyone might have a hard time disliking. But it is also that
small-town innocence that gives the movie an added touch of
nostalgia.

Farley and Roxburgh have to work on ironing out their repertory of
actors, but they have ideas and combine humor, nostalgia and a good
sense of time and place, not to mention a witty, engaging script with
three solid lead actors (will someone please give these guys a bigger
budget?). I cannot wait to see what they cook up next.


For more reviews, check out JERRY AT THE MOVIES at:
http://www.geocities.com/faustus_08520/Jerry_at_the_Movies.html

BIO on the author of this page at:
http://www.geocities.com/faustus_08520/index.html

Email me at Faust668@msn.com or at faustus_08520@yahoo.com

From mleeper at optonline.net  Fri Feb 19 17:16:47 2010
From: mleeper at optonline.net (Mark R. Leeper)
Date: Fri Feb 19 17:16:49 2010
Subject: Review: The Wolfman (2010)
Message-ID: <op.u744m8xxy83cp7@mail-hub.optonline.net>

                            THE WOLFMAN
                (a film review by Mark R. Leeper)

     CAPSULE: Joe Johnston directs an expansion and
     sophistication of the 1941 THE WOLF MAN.  In
     story and in style this is a cold, dark film.
     The script has some very nice touches but goes
     over the top in the final act.  In many ways it
     is much more a work of art than the original film,
     but the original will be remembered when this film
     is forgotten.  Rating: high +1 (-4 to +4) or 6/10

Lawrence Talbot (played by Benicio Del Toro) left palatial Talbot
Manor when his mother died and he was only six.  He went to the
United States and eventually became a famous actor.  Playing in
London in 1891, he gets a letter from his brother's fianc<UTF16-201A> Gwen
(Emily Blunt) that his brother has disappeared.  He returns to the
brooding now-cobweb-laden manor house of his early youth, ruled
over by his father, Sir John (Anthony Hopkins).  It is not clear if
the manor or Sir John is deteriorating faster.  He finds his
brother is dead, apparently by either a very powerful animal
or--don't laugh, the locals certainly don't--a werewolf.  He soon
discovers that there is something very powerful, very fast, and
very mean in the forest; it is indeed a werewolf, and it bites
Lawrence.  Anyone who knows the original film knows somewhat where
this story is going.  The screenplay is by Andrew Kevin Walker and
David Self re-telling a story suggested by the 1941 script by
prolific Curt Siodmak.  [I am not kidding about prolific.  Horror
fans should look at Siodmak's filmography.]

But knowing the original film does not prepare the viewer for the
dark, morbid atmosphere of director Joe Johnston's sumptuous
production.  Nothing in the film is ever in brighter than half-
light.  Where the low B-film budget of the first film did not allow
for very much visual style, Johnston goes overboard on the
production design.  Scenes showing a normal-speed foreground
against a time-lapse sky border on the pretentious.  The same moon
is gibbous and full in the same night.  Gore and organs aplenty
fall from people slashed open by werewolves and only the dark
photography restrains their impact.  Johnson was well aware that
the usual man in hairy makeup would not cut it.  Rick Baker does
the werewolf effects including transformation so it is not
surprising that transformation scenes would stress stretchiness of
limbs, much like Baker's effects in AN AMERICAN WEREWOLF IN LONDON.
This is a werewolf who can run on two legs but for speed drops on
all fours, an interesting concept.  And these werewolves are fast
and powerful, thus providing a credible threat.  Even if they were
not supernatural they would be hard to kill.

The original THE WOLF MAN had a weak third act.  This version of
the story bends over in the other direction having a really
melodramatic ending featuring two super-werewolves fighting in a
burning house.  That is just the sort of film this is.  It is
peculiar coming from Johnston who directed excellent films like THE
ROCKETEER and OCTOBER SKY.  He may be excessive here, but he is a
good enough director to keep his tongue out of his cheek.  This is
material that would be easily destroyed by turning it into a joke.

Speaking of the supernatural and werewolf lore, there runs through
the film a believable confusion as to how to kill a werewolf.  Some
try silver bullets, and they by themselves are not enough.  For one
werewolf the film borrows folklore from HOUSE OF FRANKENSTEIN.  The
other werewolf in killed in a way not generally endorsed in
werewolf films, and that seems to be cheating just a bit.

Casting for this film sounded odd from the beginning.  Having
Benicio Del Toro as Lawrence Talbot is a little strange for people
used to seeing Lon Chaney, Jr., in the role.  But then to cast
Anthony Hopkins as his father is bizarre.  They neither look nor
sound alike.  Geraldine Chaplin as Maleva the Gypsy woman is a
peculiar choice.  Hugo Weaving as a police inspector is a familiar
face from the "Matrix" movies and the rest of him is familiar from
the title role of V FOR VENDETTA.

Universal Studios never showed the proper respect for their
tradition of monster films.  To give so many tie-in films to
Stephen Sommers demonstrates that.  Sommers has never shown any
real appreciation for the original material.  Joe Johnston was a
better choice for THE WOLFMAN.  He is much closer to the mark.  I
rate THE WOLFMAN a high +1 on the -4 to +4 scale or 6/10.

Film Credits: <http://us.imdb.com/title/tt0780653/>

What others are saying:
<http://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/1194949-wolfman/>

					Mark R. Leeper
					mleeper@optonline.net
					Copyright 2010 Mark R. Leeper

From tskirvin at killfile.org  Sun Feb 21 02:08:28 2010
From: tskirvin at killfile.org (Tim Skirvin)
Date: Sun Feb 21 02:08:31 2010
Subject: Review: Shutter Island (2010)
Message-ID: <tskirvin.20100221070632$7de8@vulture.killfile.org>

  What else can I really say about _Shutter Island_ without spoiling
the movie for somebody?  This is a Twist Movie, and there are two
fundamental problems with reviewing Twist Movies:

  * The reviews are for two different groups of people: those that
are trying to figure out the twist, and those that want to know how the
movie hangs together when the twist is known.  These groups are
irreconcilable.

  * Even talking about the movie's premise can stray into spoiler
territory pretty easily.

  So perhaps I should start small.

  First of all, this is not a horror movie, unlike what the trailers
suggested.  Instead, it is a psychological thriller, set in the 1950s on an
island in Boston Harbor.  In fact, the only part that the trailer got
unambiguously right is the people involved; it does indeed star Leonardo
DiCaprio, it includes a pretty impressive supporting cast, and it is
clearly directed by Martin Scorsese.  The marketing team probably would have
been better to focus only on that.

  While the movie is clearly a Twist Movie, it's actually a fairly
straightforward one.  This isn't a movie where you're going to come out and
say "I see how he tricked me!" - indeed, you may see where it's going a
mile away - but this turns out to be a perfectly reasonable way to handle
things.  The movie is methodical and consistently paced, and it benefits
from this quite nicely.

  The setting and time period turned out to be more interesting than
I expected it to be.  The characters, living on an island with little
contact with the mainland, seemed to be connected to the world at large in
much the same way as the viewing audience was; that is to say, indirectly
and with only a basic understanding of what was really important at the
time.  Only the racial issues were truly jarring; the rest just seemed a
little bit unreal, but so did life on the island itself.

  And...  well, that's about all of the gross details that I can
offer.  That, and "I liked it"...

  ...well, okay, a couple of details.  

  * The opening of the movie takes place on a ferry, taking Federal
Marshall Ted Daniels to the titular island.  The main thing I noticed in the
opening scene, besides the ominous soundtrack and general character
introductions, was some second-rate green-screen work.  This bothered me at
the time, but as it turned out, it helped set the tone for the movie as a
whole.  Who knew that a little bit of poor special effects work could
benefit the movie as a whole?

  * The most jarring part of the movie was Ted Levine playing the
institute's Warden.  Having seen him over the last few years primarily as
Captain Leland Stottlemeyer in _Monk_, it was hard to even recognize him
without a moustache.  He did a fine job, but it was shocking.  

  * I don't know how much of a mental connection I had made between
the 1950s and World War II before this movie.  That's changed now.

  Anyway - it was worth seeing.  It's not Scorsese's best work, but
I'm not complaining.  He certainly did a better job with this than, say, M
Night Shyamalan would have done.

  ***

                           - Tim Skirvin (tskirvin@killfile.org)
-- 
http://wiki.killfile.org/           Skirv's Homepage <FISH>< <*>
http://wiki.killfile.org/reviews/movies    Skirv's Movie Reviews

From mleeper at optonline.net  Tue Feb 23 17:56:58 2010
From: mleeper at optonline.net (Mark R. Leeper)
Date: Tue Feb 23 17:57:01 2010
Subject: Review: Shutter Island (2010)
Message-ID: <op.u8f62elzy83cp7@mail-hub.optonline.net>

                        SHUTTER ISLAND
                (a film review by Mark R. Leeper)

     CAPSULE: Martin Scorsese turns his hand to directing
     a psychological horror film.  Two United States
     Marshals travel to an island off Massachusetts that
     is a cross between Alcatraz and an asylum for the
     criminally insane.  The film is very moody and the
     plot is twisty and supremely melodramatic, though
     few of the twists seem like new ideas.  Fans of
     psychological horror may have seen the material
     before, but rarely so much of it and rarely is the
     tone so perfectly presented.  Laeta Kalogridis wrote
     the screenplay based on a novel by Dennis Lehane.
     I suspect this film is Scorsese's tribute to German
     Expressionism.  Rating: low +2 (-4 to +4) or 7/10

Shutter Island is a dismal piece of rock off the Massachusetts
coast.  It still houses a Civil War fort, but now, in 1954, the
fort and two more wards make up Ashecliffe Hospital for the
Criminally Insane, part asylum and part fortified prison.  Leonardo
DiCaprio plays Teddy Daniels and Mark Ruffalo is Chuck Aule, two
United States Marshals who are sent to Shutter Island to help look
for Rachel Solando. Solando is an inmate who killed her own
children and has somehow impossibly escaped from a locked cell.
She is either dead or still on the island some place in hiding.
The two marshals will need all the help they can get, but from the
first moments on the island the marshals clearly are not going to
get much cooperation from the staff.

 From early on, this seems to be a plot suffering from a case of
extreme over-stuffedness.  Dr. Cawley (Ben Kingsley) and
Dr. Naehring (Max von Sydow) may be doing fiendish medical
experiments on the inmates.  But nobody will believe the inmates
when they tell because they are considered insane.  Also one of the
inmates may be the man responsible for the death of Daniels's wife.
Meanwhile, Daniels seems to be drifting into schizophrenia and sees
his dead wife visit him.  And when he dreams, his nightmares are
terrible.  Daniels is troubled by memories of an atrocity he took
part in during the liberation of Dachau.  Besides the creepy fort
that is now a ward for the worst patients, there is also a creepy
old lighthouse that can be reached only at low tide and which may
house horrible experiments performed by the staff of the asylum.  A
category 5 hurricane is about to hit the island and may level the
prison and/or drown the inmates chained to the floor.  In the dark
of the moon a beast from 20,000 fathoms wades ashore and topples
the lighthouse.  (Okay, I admit I made the last one up.  The rest
are real.)  This is a longish 138 minutes of story, but it takes a
director of genius to pack all of that into even a film of that
length.

Most horror films have retread plots and if the plot-pieces of
SHUTTER ISLAND are not so original, at least their profusion in a
single story is.  What is refreshing is the stylistic return to
some of the conventions of German Expressionism of the 1920s and
1930s.  In few films since the early Universal horror films (which
liberally borrowed German Expressionism) have we seen such
evocative visuals.  This film seems to hark back to the German
horror of NOSFERATU and THE CABINET OF DR. CALIGARI, and to even
greater German horrors at places like Dachau.

It is a surprise to see Martin Scorsese making a horror film when
his most successful films have been crime stories.  In fact, he
seems to be a lover of all kinds of films and this film is in some
ways a tribute both to the 1930s horror film and the 1950s crime
film.  DiCaprio and Ruffalo look pretty good in slouchy 1950s hats
and coats.  Scorsese even has a little nod to 1958's THE FLY when
he borrows the line "I said catch them, not kill them."  The film
is just a little too long and the logic needs some rationalizations
by the viewer, but logic problems are a hallmark of the old horror
films.

Scorsese has made a horror film for film lovers.  I rate SHUTTER
ISLAND a low +2 on the -4 to +4 scale or 7/10.

Film Credits: <http://us.imdb.com/title/tt1130884/>

What others are saying:
<http://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/1198124-shutter_island/>


					Mark R. Leeper
					mleeper@optonline.net
					Copyright 2010 Mark R. Leeper

From mleeper at optonline.net  Thu Feb 25 22:08:22 2010
From: mleeper at optonline.net (Mark R. Leeper)
Date: Thu Feb 25 22:08:25 2010
Subject: Review: Percy Jackson & The Olympians: The Lightning Thief (2010)
Message-ID: <op.u8m53qmyy83cp7@mail-hub.optonline.net>

         PERCY JACKSON & THE OLYMPIANS: THE LIGHTNING THIEF
                (a film review by Mark R. Leeper)

     CAPSULE: This film with the cumbersome title is a young
     adult movie from a young adult novel that reminds us of
     precursors like JASON AND THE ARGONAUTS and CLASH OF THE
     TITANS, but is set in a contemporary setting.  A high
     school boy finds out that the root of his problems is
     that he is a demigod in the sense of Greek mythology.
     In this world that mythology was not only true, the
     battles of the Greek gods continue today.  Percy Jackson
     is suspect number one in the theft of Zeus's lightning
     bolt so goes from being an underachiever to battling the
     great monsters and gods of the Greek myths.  This is a
     surprisingly satisfying fantasy adventure.  Director
     Chris Columbus adapts a screenplay by Craig Titley based
     on the popular novel by Rick Riordan.  Rating: +2
     (-4 to +4) or 7/10

The trailer for JASON AND THE ARGONAUTS talked of a story set in a
time of "men like gods and gods like men."  The makers had me right
there.  The film offered special effects genius Ray Harryhausen's
mythical monsters, gods that towered eighteen feet high, and the
story of an epic quest of heroes.  Few films have had films with so
much imagination to grab me.  I was reminded of that first viewing
of JASON when I saw PERCY JACKSON & THE OLYMPIANS: THE LIGHTNING
THIEF.  This is a film that will introduce another generation of
kids to new worlds of gods and monsters.

Percy Jackson (played by Logan Lerman) somehow never fit in at his
high school in New York City.  In fact he does not quite fit in to
our world in general.  Then one day on a school trip to the
Metropolitan Museum of Art a particularly harsh teacher turns into
a harpy.  Literally, she is a harpy with wings and fangs.  His
handicapped best friend Grover (Brandon T. Jackson) turns out
actually to be a satyr.  His teacher Mr. Brunner is actually the
centaur Chiron (Pierce Brosnan from the waist up; digital horse
 from the waist down).  It seems that in the tradition of Greek
myths, Percy does not know his lineage.  His mother is a
downtrodden housewife (Catherine Keener) and the father he never
met was Poseidon (Kevin McKidd).  It seems there is chaos in
heaven.  Someone stole Zeus's lightning bolt.  Chief suspect is
Percy.  This bolt is the key to all political power on Olympus
(moved to hover just next to the Empire State Building).  A rogue's
gallery of gods and monsters want to get their hands on the
lightning bolt.  Nearly everyone thinks Percy has it.  The confused
teen has to learn to fight like a demigod and then go to Hades to
look for the bolt.  But he needs a way to escape Hades.  Percy
forms a team with Grover, and Annabeth (Alexandra Daddario), a new
friend who happens to be the daughter of Athena--enemy of Poseidon.
The three must go across country and collect three blue pearls, the
key to escaping Hades.  Each pearl is in a different American city
and each is guarded by a peril from ancient Greek myth.

Most people seem to be comparing this film, the first in a series
as the title implies, to the "Harry Potter" films.  Well, Chris
Columbus (who directed two "Potter" films) directs it.  And it is
based on a young adult series and it does involve a teenager with
the supernatural.  Both involve boys with an unknown heritage.
There certainly are parallels, but this film is set in a different
sort of world and one with a little more gravitas since it is not
entirely made up.  The atmosphere is quite different.

Will this film be remembered as fondly as JASON AND THE ARGONAUTS?
Probably not.  In the 21st century it has too much competition from
other CGI films.  And the effects are not as much fun as those of
JASON.  On the other hand they are far more sumptuous.  While Jason
might have an animated monster in a scene, LIGHTNING fills the
frame with visual effects, albeit digital effects.  What surprised
me is that I had some affection for an action adventure film the
way I would have in the days of the Ray Harryhausen's best films.
I rate PERCY JACKSON & THE OLYMPIANS: THE LIGHTNING THIEF a +2 on
the -4 to +4 scale or 7/10.

One more comment on the Percy Jackson books: a friend in high
school was very enthusiastic about the series and the Greek
mythology he had learned from it.  I discussed mythology with him
and was surprised how much he knew.  I gave him a gift of a book on
classical mythology and later heard he wrote a report based on the
book.  He came away with a better understanding of the roots of
Western culture.  Had he been interested instead in Wolverine, what
would he have learned of any comparable value?

Film Credits: <http://us.imdb.com/title/tt0814255/>

What others are saying: <http://tinyurl.com/perc-jack-lightning>

					Mark R. Leeper
					mleeper@optonline.net
					Copyright 2010 Mark R. Leeper