Treacherous "Safe Water"

Typically emotional and reverential Ken Burns biography, featuring the usual display of wonderful vintage pictures and discreet music and sound accompaniment, as well as professional line-readings and commentaries.

Twain's interesting life alone and all the anecdotal plentifulness of Burns's script guarantee three-and-a-half entertaining hours, but as a documentary about such a witty and sagacious writer, this feels too conventional and tame in style and presentation, hammering home some of its notions about Twain's inner conflicts too repetitively.

It's still quality work, though.

7 out of 10 failed business schemes

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The Poetics of Comedy

Tati's later work grew more and more cleverly elaborate and, thus, less and less warmheartedly funny (though still ingenious) over the years, but with this early masterpiece he just hit the right vibe.

The tender shifts from slow, almost meditative build-up to subtle gags of sight and sound are a marvel, as well as the whole lovingly detailed, gently mocking ambiance of faux impressionist "savoir vivre", full of closely observed character vignettes and the ironies of life mirrored in the seemingly slightest incidents.

Tati managed to create something Chaplin had never been able of despite all his talents: He directed a deeply humane comedic poem, without resorting to ostensible sentimentality.

A true classic!

10 out of 10 folded canoes

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Ink and Paint Turned into Flesh and Blood

This one's outstanding!!!

The sheer wealth of artistic and technical on- and off-screen talents involved in all, I mean ALL production departments is awe-inspiring. But what's truly astonishing is the love and care that went into filming this. A Big Studio(s) entertainment movie with a heart! It's as if all those cynical producers, screenplay supervisors etc. were enchanted by the whole charming enterprise themselves.

Seldom has a fantasy world been created more vividly. And the nostalgic impact seeing all your beloved old cartoon characters (and some amiable new ones) naturally interacting with each other and their human neighbours is simply mesmerizing. Watch the pic a second time to get all the funny one-liners and sight gags... and an umpteenth time for sheer pleasure.

Every movie-loving person will be hooked immediately, but cartoon buffs and film noir freaks should keep tranquilizers ready.

Were it not for the interminable and mildly dull showdown, which is a misstep, this would be a perfect masterpiece of light entertainment. But an imperfect masterpiece is more than enough.

9 out of 10 cigar-chomping Baby Hermans

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Life's a Swamp

This good, if not great early Kurosawa is still rough around the edges and not free of obvious symbolism and narrative weaknesses. It all feels somewhat forced and not quite as fluent and natural as later works.

But, needless to say, there are always pleasures to be had from a movie made by this wonderful artist: Kurosawa favourites Shimura and Mifune (in his first teaming with Kurosawa) give their usual multi-layered performances, the mise-en-scène is superb, and a sound gimmick featuring guitar-playing is brilliantly used to enhance atmosphere.

In this instance, though, one cannot fully swallow the director's "life's a swamp but use your willpower and watch out for the silver lining"-attitude. He jumbled it this time. But glorious things would follow...

7 out of 10 buckets of immaculately white paint

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A Flat Charade

Mamet's back again with his deceptive sleights of hand, rushing poor Val Kilmer from one precarious situation to the next as if trying to outdo "24".

But breathless pace, self-indulgently clever (or rather not so clever) dialogue and plenty of mechanical twists and turns can't hide the fact that this flat and unconvincing charade never generates a shred of emotional or intellectual resonance.

Watch those great 70s conspiracy thrillers instead. They were gripping and smart without being sophomoric.

3 out of 10 mean Al Bundys

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Double Vision? No Vision at All!

This trashy Taiwanese-American cooperation tries to mix all stereotypes of U.S. police buddy-movies/serial-killer thrillers and Asian supernatural horror films into one brew... unfortunately, its taste is revolting.

Mind me, the technical aspects and even some of the otherwise typically hammy acting is okay, but the convoluted plot kills it all, particularly after confusing Taoist prophecies, silly modern killer monks and, most annoyingly, lofty melodramatics are introduced. And I won't even speak about the ridiculous finale.

I seldom cared less about a thriller's outcome.

2 out of 10 lethal air conditioners

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Passion and Duty

So much could have gone wrong with this follow-up to Visconti's deeply flawed "Morte a Venezia": the treatment of Ludwig II's (dream-)life could have resulted in hokey mystification; Helmut Berger's impersonation could have been badly influenced by the actor's frequently mannered performances; re-casting Romy Schneider as Sissi could have been a mere folly; and stretching the running-time to four hours could have been the nail in the coffin.

But miraculously, it all works: Visconti's elegant and empathic direction finds the right biographical tone; Berger has never been better; Romy is simply dazzlingly charming and witty in her second, much more mature approach to the Sissi character; and (except for the bumpy last hour) there's not a single unwanted scene.

Plus, Trevor Howard's Richard Wagner is a real treat; the other supporting actors are uniformly excellent; Ludwig's dormant homosexuality is subtly handled; the soundtrack is a marvel and visually, it's Visconti's most impressive work.

9 out of 10 moonlit horse rides

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"He's the Boatman. He Stays in the Boat!"

With this ultra-violent fourth entry in the Rambo canon you're in for a small surprise: While this is by no means a good movie in itself, it's still slightly better than expected (and better than its two predecessors.)

Of course, the pretty all-American girl is not harmed by the evil Burmese military while the villagers are slaughtered. Of course, the titular hero saves the day. Of course, it's all terribly two-faced and reactionary, building up a discrepancy between Hollywood action movie tropes and the terror on real killing fields (just as it was the case in the earlier installments, except for the first part, maybe.)

But in times of bland and forgettable Hollywood action entertainment with its pseudo-clever lines and outrageous situations, this (literally) visceral down-to-earth approach earns some extra points. It really gets to you in a smutty kind of way.

3 out of 10 sonorously mumbled laconic statements

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Desperate Screenplay

Predictably entertaining and simple-minded Warner Bros. war heroics with Flynn and his comrades crossing hostile Nazi Germany, behaving like a bunch of boy scouts on a scavenger hunt, while striking down lots and lots of stupid German soldiers.

Way too much half-baked comedy relief and anthemic background music, not to mention the weak plot, prevent this from being one of the more watchable Flynn adventures. In fact, from here on Flynn's movies started to decline in quality.

It's still a fun ride in its silly way.

4 out of 10 spit pepper corns

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Blind Puzzling

While not quite as monstrously preposterous as later works, this slow-moving, repetitive giallo offers some nice touches in the first half, but grows more and more lethargic and silly as it stumbles to its lame denouement.

To be sure, the actors are above average - considering this is an Argento movie - and some moments show the director's visual skills, but whole sequences should've been cut and, basically, it's just the same exploitative trash as ever, wallowing in fake science and abnormal sexual depravity.

3 out of 10 genetic disorders

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Call Me "The Sphinx", "The Hunchback", "The Black Pope" or Just "Il Divo"

This ultra-slick, highly stylized account of Giulio Andreotti's Machiavellian schemes during his premiership(s) goes down like butter, but in the final analysis, the pic's a tad too flashy and trivial in its depictions of dirty politics. There's a certain lack of insight, professionally covered up by lots of technical shenanigans and eye-catching performances, above all Toni Servillo's chameleon-like turn in the title role.

It's still worthwhile Italian film-making with the right amount of humour, violence and tragedy to warrant two enjoyable hours.

7 out of 10 sardonic aphorisms

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Find Inner Peace with Schubert

Just when you hoped to escape heavy-handed German pretentiousness it sneaks up on you, hidden in highly metaphorical intonations of Schubert's great song cycle "Winterreise", which accompanies Josef Bierbichler's (inner) journey from wintry Bavaria to arid Kenya, from captivating mental depression to liberation.

But for most of the time, despite Kekilli's wooden turn and some other positively eccentric acting in the supporting roles, it's a decent enough pic because Bierbichler stems it on his broad shoulders. He offers a real tour-de-force performance, aided by the accentuated direction and camera-work.

It could've been so much better without the arty touches of the later stages.

6 out of 10 phantom suns

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Alice Darkly Twisted

Stop-motion animation is such a laborious task, particularly when presented in feature-length, that those few examples that are finally distributed are almost exclusively works of high quality both in form and content.

That's especially true for Henry Selick's meticulously crafted Gothic tales with their wicked sense of humour and their intuition for the magic of the bizarre. His latest work - a clever twist on "Alice in Wonderland" with subliminally menacing picture-perfect happiness replacing Carroll's liberating nonsense - succeeds in all the right departments, from the gorgeous vistas, the haunting score, the great character design and voice-work, the countless sight-gags, the well-paced narrative up to the balanced mixture of heart and brains.

The story is a tad too episodic and the showdown slightly disappoints, though. But it's a wonderful pic, anyway.

8 out of 10 button eyes

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0327597/usercomments-138

More Than Just a Pet

Most film-makers who deal with a story featuring a boy/girl and his/her pet go for the heartstrings by underlining both the kid's and the animal's cuteness. The narrative structure holding this picturesque idyll together mainly consists of predictable melodramatic incidents that endanger this relationship.

One of Loach's best pics undermines this soapy approach by intensifying the unaffectedly portrayed boy-pet relationship through the unflinchingly bleak description of the boy's surroundings. Kes is not just a beloved falcon, he represents a way to endure social hardships.

This earnest, heartfelt drama is a true gem of British working-class cinema.

8 out of 10 funny football matches

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0064541/usercomments-63

Make My Day! It Could Be My Last...

Don't get me wrong! I like Eastwood, I really do. He's a fine if limited actor and he's a solid handyman director whose movies often touch on interesting topics. There's just one teenie-weenie problem: many of his movies, both as actor and director, simply aren't very good. I think there's one main reason for his directorial failures: Most issues Eastwood chooses to build his films around need a director with a more intellectual, a more imaginative approach than he is able to achieve. He's a mainstream-thinker trying to do art-house cinema. Sometimes, he gets away with it through pure craftsmanship. But not in this instance.

This basically old-hat plot of the old curmudgeon mellowed by his adolescent Hmong neighbours into grandfatherly feelings and, of course(!), revenge and vigilantism is stock-full of amateurish acting, hoary plot machinations, lame culture-clash jokes and cardboard characters. Not to mention that solemn showdown.

Technically, the pic's well accomplished, but who cares after two long hours.

3 out of 10 geriatric action moves

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Never Fall into a Room Full of Barbwire! It Hurts!

What's considered as Argento's ultimate masterpiece by his admirers turns out to be just what all of his pubescent and exploitative schlock movies are: a succession of more or less well-handled gruesome killings with only the barest necessities of storytelling to link them. Acting, dialogue, narrative: it's all quite intolerable.

But this time, even Argento's few strengths have mostly deserted him: the whodunit puzzling of his giallo plots - as stupid as they are - is sorely missed, the murders are boring (except for one doggy moment) and the finale is a howler.

On the plus side, there's great location atmosphere, some nice shots, lots of Technicolor window-dressing and another effective Goblin soundtrack.

3 out of 10 experts on witchcraft who bear a striking resemblance to Pepe Nietnagel's Dr. Knörz

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0076786/usercomments-433

Schlemmer!!!!!

If you like to witness Jimmy Cagney being constantly on the brink of a heart-seizure AND a nervous breakdown for almost two hours, this is the right place. To cast an ageing actor best known for playing gangster-types in the role of a Coca-Cola exec is a good joke in itself. But it's surely not the only scoring off of Western capitalism (and of Eastern communism) in this hectic Cold War farce.

Some, one is inclined to say: too much of the (still funny) one-liners are downright silly, which deprives Wilder's movie of any possible satirical leanings, and the whole affair comes across as rather strident, but the ensemble cast is first-rate and the whole manic enterprise is over before you can even start grasping at what you didn't like about it.

7 out of 10 Pepsi vending machines

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A Beauty and a Beast

Sixties and seventies Polanski is always worth a look, and this unsettling piece of internalized Grand Guignol is certainly one of his best works.

Deneuve's doll-like beauty is just as effectively used as in "Belle de jour", but Polanski doesn't go for Bunuel's bitingly satirical, but for a thoroughly menacing kind of surrealism. The few outbursts of violence are real heart-stoppers and the whole atmosphere is built up masterfully.

In the end, though, Polanski's manipulative puppeteering emerges as slightly too self-sufficient to allow this to be an utterly embraceable masterpiece.

8 out of 10 razor-sharp encounters

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The Talented Mr. Ridley

There were times when Ridley Scott made first-class genre pics, well, eh, two pics to be concise: "Blade Runner" and this spine-chilling space horror movie, which is still his best effort.

It's basically an old-fashioned monster movie, complete with cats hiding in the dark and false attacks, but the accoutrements are ingenious: the Alien's design, right down to its parasitic ways of spawning and breeding, is - one might say - lovingly detailed; the expressionistic set-pieces feel just right; Weaver's heroine lends a touch of intelligence and vulnerability to the proceedings that avoids the usual genre movie machismo; the low-key characterizations of the crew members don't resort to clichés; and some nerve-wrecking shock and suspense scenes, interrupting an otherwise effectively unharried story-line, are masterly handled by Scott and his expert team.

9 out of 10 gut-bursting baby Aliens

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No Hollywood Ending in Sight

Woody's always good at mocking showbiz attitudes, and the first third of this movie-making farce features his funniest pure comedy writing since 1998's "Celebrity". Unfortunately, as soon as the silly one-joke premise about psychosomatic blindness gets started, the audience is in for a steady decline in quality.

Woody stumbling across chairs and falling down stages (not to mention him mistaking female breasts for cushions) wears thin after a while, more so as some scenes drag on for too long (no wonder considering the two hour running time) and a lame father-son-subplot is introduced far too late in the game. But some chuckles here and there help one to get through to the final punchline... or shall I say "pointe"?

Watch Allen's "Broadway Danny Rose" and "Bullets Over Broadway" instead.

5 out of 10 Chinese translators

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Journalism Meets Artistry

Most people don't understand what Godard's aiming at. That's sad, but not surprising. They're so caught up in conventional storytelling techniques (of which a great non-mainstream auteur like Woody Allen is also part of) that Godard's intellectual Brechtian devices appear to be sickeningly pretentious. In truth, all his jarring visual and tonal interruptions and blanks left for the audience to ponder on serve as a means to scrutinize media manipulation.

And his interview with Woody is one of the finest examples of this method. While Godard's questions and - to a lesser degree - Allen's answers are highly interesting and profound in themselves, particularly those revolving around the issues of television influencing habits of perception, it's really Godard's handling of the material itself that provides ample food for thought. (But, of course, only for those willing to do so.) By the way, Godard's style of film-making should not be mistaken as a lack of respect towards Allen. On the contrary...

8 out of 10 apparently nervous Woody Allens

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What Would've Jim Henson Said?

Hollywood executives must have lobotomized Peter Jackson when he started the "Lord of the Rings" franchise, because his earlier New Zealand productions were so much better.

Just look at this sickly cracking showbiz satire, complete with an array of mostly disgusting Muppets from hell, acting as a walking compendium of the seven deadly sins (and some more). The sheer audaciousness of this nightmare folly is to be applauded, but the astounding fact remains that behind all the cold misanthropic viewpoints on display there's still a beating heart pumping warm blood into this creatures.

Certainly not to everyone's taste and riddled with too many drawn-out plot excesses, this one-of-a-kind pic still deserves a huge cult following.

7 out of 10 panty-sniffing anteaters

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Burn the Candle at Both Ends

Not a single second of this wonderful 1932 movie is dated! Along with the following year's "Duck Soup" this is Marx Brothers lunacy at its peak! The college backdrop suits their brand of anti-establishment anarchy perfectly, the one-liners are impeccable and delivered with lightning speed, even the musical interludes are brilliantly integrated.

No boring schmaltz Muzak, no bland pair of lovers, no toning-down of the brothers' wild nonsense and relegating them to the side-tracks as amiable pals. In short: no MGM restrictions to satire and goofiness... not yet.

The pic's just pure unadulterated fun from start to finish. And it's more modern and livelier than most contemporary comedies put together.

9 out of 10 swordfish passwords

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0023027/usercomments-74

Soft-Boiled Neo Noir

This curious pic doesn't know if it wants to keep a straight face or make bizarre faces. It opts for both ways which results in a highly uneven genre bastard that leaves one unsatisfied despite some choice moments such as the sad coda, which works better than it should.

Oldman's desperate loser, Olin's over-the-top femme fatale, Scheider's old-school Mafia don... they all are individually convincing, but not when thrown together in a mishmash of soft-boiled philosophical voice-over ramblings, heavy-handed cop flick and film noir genre tropes and, eh, sexually connotated arm amputations.

So the pic's quite a mess, particularly in the story department, but it's still worth a look. At least, it's not by the numbers.

4 out of 10 tell-tale photo albums

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Say Yes to Dr. No

It's all Sean Connery's show. His Bond still stands head and shoulders above all the following incarnations. He's charmingly menacing and menacingly charming, just as believable as both killer and love-maker, while imbuing every on-screen moment with subtle ironic detachment. Lazenby's short intervention lacked zing, Moore was too jokey and ill-fitted for action scenes, Dalton didn't even bother, Brosnan was too superficially handsome and slick, and contemporary 007 Craig is just a boring robot going through the motions.

The first Bond outing may not be the best - it looks quite cheap in instances, clever set-pieces as well as later trademarks are sorely missing and the plot feels restricted -, but it's an okay spy adventure anyway.

6 out of 10 prosthetic hands

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Screwball Comedy Goes Noir

Once in a while you see a movie that's so jaw-droppingly perfect in all departments that just reminiscing about it drives tears of happiness to your eyes. Howard Hawks's black comedy "His Girl Friday" is part of that pantheon.

Never again was a Hollywood mainstream comedy bleaker and more cynical in its characterizations (without resorting to condescension and moralizing), never again was (party overlapping) comedy dialogue so brilliantly written and delivered with such speed, never again was a comedy plot (with tragic overtones) told with such economy and perfect timing, never again were Rosalind Russell and Cary Grant (and the whole bunch of great supporting actors and actresses) funnier and wittier. Never ever will a timeless masterpiece such as this be outclassed.

Sorry, I have to go and watch it again while drying my eyes.

10 out of 10 unscrupulous headlines

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Bright Rabbit Eyes

Water-colour backgrounds and Art Garfunkel's high-pitched voice singing "Bright Eyes" versus doom's day metaphors and a general air of desolation. Welcome to Martin Rosen's ambitious if flawed adaptation of Richard Adams' best-seller. We're talking anti-Disney rabbits here. No Thumper in sight!

Feature-length cartoons with adult-oriented themes are always welcome, but the allegorical impact gets somewhat diminished by the whole stylistic indecisiveness of the pic. (Commercial interests may have played into it.) And the animation could've been more experimental.

Still, it's mostly a stimulating piece of work and the voice-cast is excellent.

7 out of 10 Great Friths

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Bittersweet Symphony

Fellini's first masterpiece may not be as well-known as later classics, but it's just as wonderful, fortunately lacking the maestro's later (sometimes overbearing) tendencies to turn to caricature and the grotesque.

The director's humanity and the resulting poetic images in beautiful black-and-white photography enrich a basically neo-realist plot and turn it into something magical. We not only care for these five young men, we become them, parts of them, at least.

This is deeply emotive film-making.

9 out of 10 sad days at the seaside

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Feeding Frenzy

This big white shark not only killed his hapless on-screen victims, but - more disastrously - an era of intelligent and thought-provoking American cinema called New Hollywood. Spielberg introduced a new dimension of immensely successful pulp storytelling. No place for adult themes and honest emotions any more... at least in box-office terms.

But fortunately, "Jaws" is pre-bumptious Spielberg, when he still worked as an effective craftsman, not a self-important mainstream "artist".

So the movie's thankfully devoid of the cuties and cheap symbolism and bathos, that would soon ruin most of Spielberg's work. Instead, what we get are solid thrills, a splendidly cast trio of shark-hunters, some funny lines and quite a shoddy-looking man-eating shark named Bruce.

7 out of 10 crushed plastic cups

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0073195/usercomments-839

Where's Pierre Brice When You Need Him?

There are mostly two kinds of German comedies: broad and broader. This stupefyingly successful Schnitzel western parody is of the childishly broad variety, heavily influenced by the comparatively witty Zucker/Abrahams/Zucker approach to movie genre bashing. (I said "comparatively"!)

All in all, there are two or three decent gags, but the whole pubescent affair drags on interminably (despite its average running time), while the grimacing actors are hampered by a lame screenplay that's put to shame even by the mediocre German Karl-May-adaptations it's based on.

3 out of 10 Winnetouches

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Kitsch as Kitsch Can

I hate to love Disney, but this orgy of sugary spoon-feeding is (almost) irresistible. It's episodic, i.e. undramatic, it's overlong, it's simple-minded... and absolutely marvelous! The tunes are catchy as hell, Julie Andrews is a real Dame with charm to boot (and strangely attractive in her nanny outfit), van Dyke's lamentable Cockney-turn gets funnier with each viewing and the animated sequences add a nice touch of day-dreaming.

There's good kitsch and bad kitsch. This is one of the greatest good kitsch movies. Watch another Julie Andrews performance in one of the worst bad kitsch movies: The Sound of Music.

8 out of 10 Supercalifragilisticexpialidocious!es

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0058331/usercomments-197

Phallocentric Action Mayhem

 

Whoever thought of a skyscraper as a perfect location for a modern-day one-man-army action-flick, seemingly stripped off of the nauseating excesses of Stallone/Schwarzenegger comic machismo, was damn right! Let's kill those lousy German high-tech terrorists like a real man inside a huge phallic glass-tower! Make my day, Hans!

Okay, okay, most of the supporting characters are still annoying after all these years and some lines and situations are laughable, but McTiernan handles the claustrophobic setting surprisingly well and Willis's down-to-earth approach to heroism was refreshing. (Nowadays, he's certainly not a refreshing sight anymore.)

And remember: "He's in the elevator schacht."

7 out of 10 blood-soaked shirts

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0095016/usercomments-627

Beware of the Child

This has to be seen to be believed! Malle seems just as well to be the victim of Zazie's dark whirlwind surrealism as the audience themselves. Never again achieved an adolescent movie character such an anarchic quality. Despite all the displays of technical outrageousness and pure buffoonery, the pic never feels as superficially sketch-like as many of Dick Lester's works. And the complete lack of warmheartedness is a relief in a picture featuring a young girl!

Now that's a truly original way to declass French bourgeoisie and throw an anti-Fascist pie in their faces! And it's one of the few hommages to silent comedy (amongst sundry allusions to cinema and social topics) that really work. And it's one of Malle's best.

9 out of 10 polar bears

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0054494/usercomments-18

Norman Birds

Anyone ever notice Perkins' bird-like performance? Look at the stuffed birds in the motel room. And the way he's eating like a nervous sparrow. In a movie (and a directorial career) full of impish inside jokes, Hitch turns Norman Bates into a frightened fledgling unable to escape momma's nest.

All in all, a gigantic and immensely well-made trick on the audience's expectations and the "über"-mother of all the inferior slasher flicks that followed.

(Were it not for the silly final speech to explain Norman's behaviour away with psychological mumbo-jumbo, this would be a minor classic.)

8 out of 10 healthy showers

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0054215/usercomments-761

A Wasted Opportunity

After half an hour of almost meditative atmospheric silent comedy build-up, complete with perfect use of sound effects, the plot kicks in and we're left with one of PIXARs least captivating story lines this side of "Cars".

The computer-generated images are crystal-clear and marvelous to behold, but, compared to, say, "Ratatouille" somewhat distancing, while the sledgehammer delivery of the eco-friendly message with all the obese robot-controlled ex-earthlings tends to overstay its welcome. Especially the second half with all the chasing and hiding suffers from lazy script-writing.

Still, as with all PIXAR works, an enjoyable movie.

6 out of 10 "Hello, Dolly!" songs

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Too Much Talk of the Town

A likable cast and an unusual story promise entertainment with enough food for thought, but the whole static affair proves a disappointment.

An excellent Colman shines in an otherwise extremely contrived plot with naive (pseudo-)intellectual pretensions. In the second half the timing is all off, Arthur's flightiness and Grants lordliness grow tiresome while a discriminating audience certainly loses interest as a freshly shaved reborn sunny boy Colman saves the day by confronting a laughably Hollywoodesque lynch mob in the worst Capra-fashion.

All in all, a rather heavy-handed attempt at seriousness, typical for "Shane" director Stevens, with only some amusing lines and moments to guarantee average viewing pleasure.

(One of the writers was Irvin Shaw. Give me his namesake George Bernard any time instead!)

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0035417/usercomments-42

Chat and Dead

There are a lot of terrible thrillers out there, but this lifeless mess is particularly awful.

I'm not sure if the filmmakers' contempt towards their audience is bigger than towards their characters or the other way around, but both are surely treated as if they were idiots of the highest order. The protagonists' behaviour is more than a bit idiotic and the supposed suspense scenes are just as sleep-inducing as the lame attempts to generate erotic tension between an enervating Berry and a disinterested Willis.

The actors either go through the motions or overact badly while the plot succeeds miraculously in being both too predictable and too far-fetched at once with half-hearted red herrings that are fishy indeed.

The twist ending is silly instead of shocking and leaves one wondering what all the fuss was about and why anyone should care about the outcome of this lethargic turkey.

2 out of 10 burnt eye pupils


http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0457433/usercomments-164

Social Drama American Style

Everyone seems to have fallen into the trap of regarding this vicariously condescending freak show as some sort of soberingly honest social drama whereas it's just a series of strokes of fate, told in an apparently un-Hollywood like frankness and ugliness, but with the obvious Hollywood like slickness.

Despite all the human cruelty on display and some powerful individual scenes and performances, the characters remain just as superficial as Precious's colorful day-dream fantasies.

Yes, the movie's not as manipulative as others of its ilk, but its calculated do-good mentality leaves a distinct aftertaste in some of the more discriminating viewers's mouths.

Something about this pic just doesn't feel right.

5 out of 10 saintly teachers

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0929632/usercomments-226

Bone-Headed

If there needs to be one last proof of Peter Jackson having been artistically spoilt by his Lord of the Rings megalomania, this interesting companion piece to Jackson's wonderful "Heavenly Creatures" is that very evidence.

Whereas the earlier pic was subtle and reserved in its use of special effects to lead the viewer into the girls's fantasy world, here it's all bombast and sledgehammer symbolism, with our raped and killed teen angel wandering through corny CGI landscapes that would even the makers of the Robin Williams bomb "What Dreams May Come" blush of shame.

But what's even worse: the dark thriller subplot, the tragicomic family drama and the above-mentioned afterlife scenes don't gel at all and remain strictly superficial and listless, one might even add tasteless and vulgar.

The first half hour is acceptable, the rest is rubbish.

3 out of 10 stupid police investigations

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0380510/usercomments-480

Blown Away

Unfortunately, this partially gripping pic isn't quite the sum of its parts. While individual scenes are well-crafted and the difficult situation that American G.I.'s are confronted with in Iraq is made perceptible, the attempts at character drama are rather irresolute, despite Renner's strong performance.

The omittance of stereotypical narrative tropes and cheap combat splatter sequences is to be applauded as well as the expert direction. But something's missing while one effective set-piece after another is served up on a bloody plate. Maybe a political/social contextualization or a deeper look at the Iraqi people.

What we're left with is a well-made war-actioner with half-realized efforts towards more serious issues.

6 out of 10 human bombs

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Shrek the Last?

The first two Shrek movies were not as brilliant as most critics said and this fourth installment (after the weak third part) is not quite as bad as they say.

Yes, there's a certain slackness to all the calculated proceedings, but the basic premise is quite intriguing, though hardly original. At least, the pic moves reasonably well, some jokes are great and despite a rather lame showdown, which is a weakness of all the Shrek movies, the story (with its dark undercurrents of existential crises) is told effectively, with Rumpelstiltskin being a first-class villain.

The many, many pop songs on the soundtrack grow tiresome after a short while.

6 out of 10 hissing geese

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Forget about "Twilight"!

This one's the real thing in adolescent bloodsucking.

Both effectively eerie and emotionally honest, this breath of fresh air to the dusty vampire genre is exceptionally well-made, from the beautiful photography and intelligent direction up to the flawless acting and the screenplay's ingenious re-imagining of vampire movie conventions.

Nothing's telegraphed for the lowest common denominator, everything's subtly and tastefully handled, even the outbursts of violence.

So much could've gone wrong with this sort of story, but the makers carefully avoided all missteps and offer us one of the best genre movies in ages, culminating in a perfect final scene.

8 out of 10 blood-brothers

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1139797/usercomments-420

Runaway Train

With no real villain in sight and with its blue collar down-to-earth approach, this unusually (though just relatively) subdued Tony Scott railway actioner proves to be surprisingly watchable.

This pic's lean clean disaster fodder without much of the usual clichéd stereotyping, thereby providing an uncommon focus on plain technical aspects, avoiding the pitfalls of unbelievable melodramatics, though some trivial rudimentary emotional background on the protagonists is still at hand.

That said, the pic doesn't leave much of a lasting impression, despite its immediate impact.

5 out of 10 dangerous curves

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A Not So Happy Finish

After the demented roller-coaster ride in part two, this boring and literally unwatchable appendix is quite a let-down compared to the earlier installments.

Despite the far-fetched ending, which is so absurd as to be actually funny, we've got more of the same, but with diminishing returns (and badly lit at that.) The newly introduced characters aren't that much of a big deal, either, and the blissfully short running time reflects the uninspired nature of the whole schlock parade.

It was time to end this carnage.

3 out of 10 (h)armless karate kids

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Not Sloppy At All

If you couldn't stomach the first part, please forget about watching this phenomenally crass and tasteless follow-up with its no-holds-barred approach on how to improve upon disgusting your audience.

Don't get me wrong, this is no complete scorcher. Actually, I kinda liked the pic's almost subversively unconcerned attitude towards the worst forms of physical damage one can (or better cannot) imagine. The constant stream of bizarrely over-the-top violence paired with a demented sense of humour results in a state of hypnotic stupor. You know you shouldn't like what your witnessing, but you just can't skip it.

An overkill movie if there ever was one.

5 out of 10 raped cats

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1104835/usercomments-64

Feeding Frenzy

The Alien wannabe monsters in this feeding frenzy splatterfest look quite preposterous, which cannot be disguised by Gulager's jittery staging. And the knowing winks at the audience while genre conventions are joyfully turned upside down are as far removed from intelligent parody as the generally hammy performances are from award-worthy acting.

Still, despite all its shortcomings, the pic is fun in a demented sort of way, and highly preferable to the grim and glossy torture porn that "Saw" and its ilk revel in. This is just "innocent" tasteless guts'n'gore.

What distinguishes it from the few really good examples of its kind - like Peter Jackson's "Brain Dead" - is its unfortunate lack of wit.

Loved the shagging, sex-craving monster attitude, though.

4 out of 10 killed heroes

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0426459/usercomments-242

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