01.13.03 M O V I E S < < lists < the_board Best and worst of the flicks I've seen.
If I find myself thinking about a film long enough to want to write a short bit about it, then it makes it to the list. Sometimes that means the movie was particularly good. Sometimes that means I was just really bored and awake late at night watching movies.
That, in my mind, is a wonderful indulgence. I remember my dad staying up late to see M*A*S*H or some old cowboy movie on late night, and I've always loved to sit in a quiet house in a darkened room and fall into another world for a couple of hours. I'm a particular fan of horror and sci-fi, so I'm sure you'll find some of that listed here.
On the flip side, however, some movies are so awful that they just bear warning others away from. For that reason, I've also noted a few of the bad.
And then one day I got bored and added the names of the other movies I could remember seeing that simply didn't impress me. I guess they should go on the bad list, but I didn't want to hurt their feelings. So call them mediocre.
Platoon
Oliver Stone (dir.), Willem Dafoe, Tom Berenger, Charlie Sheen. This is the film that I believe to be Oliver Stone's masterpiece, the best of his Vietnam-era trilogy (another being the adaptation Heaven & Earth; the third -- unfortunately very nearly ruined by the casting of Tom Cruise in the lead role -- Born on the Fourth of July). Stone is overall my favorite director, and this my favorite film. Include the fact that I believe Dafoe to be the finest actor of our time, and it's no wonder it sits at the top of my 'best of' list.
Fellowship of the Ring, Two Towers, Return of the King
Peter Jackson (dir.), Orlando Bloom, Viggo Mortensen, Elijah Wood, Sir Ian McKellan, Liv Tyler. Someone who is a bigger Tolkien fanboy than I made these films, with every bit of respect and adoration one could hope for. And a metric shitload of money. It's beautiful. And amazing. And the cast was basically made into the characters for the purposes of filming (isolation, placed under physical stress, given a quest, put together in ways that fostered certain friendships, 'tried' and tested...). And the *cast*. Mortensen is a force to be reckoned with. Bloom is as ethereally beautiful as elves. Tyler. Hugo Weaving. With such impressive results moviemaking may be forever changed. Truly legendary, even in its own time.
Thir13en Ghosts
Matthew Lillard. Tony Shaloub. Doesn't matter who the stars are, which is probably why I can't remember all of their names. This horror flick (a genre I'm particularly fond of) makes the list on the strength of its story, plus a really fantastic set, art, and costume design team. The concept is typical -- mysteriously inherited haunted house -- but the execution is beautiful. The creatures the SFX monster shop creates are truly horrifying, so much so that they totally steal the movie. Of especially terrible beauty is the Jackal, and the Angry Princess. And the Juggernaut.
And, like far too few DVDs, this one actually comes with some nifty extras. Seeing how the house was built was really nifty, what with all the glassetched glass, no less. I want one of the panels as art. And the makeup was really amazing. I'm pretty sure I saw one of the character stills over on rotten once, they're so damn real-looking.
It should be noted, too, that this film is a remake. The original is one of the first 3-D (with the glasses, yo) movies to be produced. It's fairly short, possibly was shown as a matinee flick with another half-hour movie, and really kind of campy. But it's amusing.
Steel Magnolias
A classic Southern coming-of-age DramTragicomedy. Contains several of my long-time favorite actors (and quite a few stars in their own right), in parts dripping with deep South sweetness and acidity. Dolly Parton, Olympia Dukakis, and Shirley MacLaine are the southern "belle" I'd hope to be, the gray-haired triumvirate of small-town backwoods influential living. Sally Field (as always) holds up the shirkless martyr torch -- though for once her pathos is used perfectly. In the funeral scene, her usual animated hysterics actually work, since the wailing down-home grief fit the time and place. I never fail to at least sniffle as she carries on. And then I giggle painfully as the matrons cool her heels with black humour. Laughter through tears, indeed.
A young Julia Roberts has the main role, but other supporters still outshine. Tom Skerrit as the doting dad, Dylan McDermott (before LA Law) the dutiful husband. Daryl Hannah (where has she been since Splash and JFK?) pulls a small part as well. But it's very much about the South and about the ties between girlfriends. Not recommended for men, unless they grew up in a place where Mother was known as 'Momma'.
Nightmare Before Christmas
Tim Burton (dir.). The holiday animated classic. Beautiful, amazing, lovingly hand-crafted Halloween town. This is my favorite holiday film, and often my favorite animated piece ever. The New Orleans, LA fractured architecture shows up in nearly everything I do, and noone does twisted fun like Burton ('cept maybe Roman Dirge, but he's harder to get a hold of, no feature length film yet as I know).
Pirates of the Caribbean: Curse of the Black Pearl
Johnny Depp, Orlando Bloom, Kiera Knightly. I wasn't expecting to particularly enjoy this Disney film, even though friends had totally raved about it. Sure, Johnny Depp. Sure, Orlando Bloom. But Disney has fucked up better casts. But not this one. Depp totally makes the moviehis salacious and saucy Jack Sparrow steals every scene he's in. Though he didn't really have to steal anything, as he is the headliner. He earns it. Sparrow is hilarious. Bloom, the male ingenue, is foppish and adorable, as he should be. Knightly plays the Natalie Portman role admirably. I particularly enjoy the CGit's lighthearted and fun, not overly amazing ala The Matrix, but well-done and befitting its role in the plot. Also, swordfights. Cool. Way cool.
Death to Smootchy
Robin Williams, Edward Norton, Danny DeVito, Rhea Pearlman, Jon Stewart. Dark comedy about children's television. If you have any warm and fuzzies for Sesame Street or a certain purple dinosaur, you might want to skip this one. Bawdy and sometimes belittling (nature-lovin' hippies, prepare to be skewered) humour, Robin Williams doing crazy like noone else, and Edward Norton getting a rare chance to show his impeccable comedic timing. Bonus in the amusing character played by Jon Stewart, who gets some great lines of his own. As with any Robin Williams film, it's best to get the DVD of this, so you have the blooper reel. William's front seat diatribe as a shrew wife is hilarious.
The Ring / Ringu
A very concept-driven horror movie -- not realistic, but fantastic and horribly eerie at the same time. This is a horror movie that actually scares people. It doesn't make a lot of sense the first time through, but by the end it all clicks and you wonder how you possibly could have missed it. This flick benefits from a truly creepy premise -- namely it casts a pall of fear of a normal, everyday activity -- and those are one of the more frightening varieties of the genre.
Baraka
This is a film that is very difficult to explain -- you say art film and you immediately turn off a lot of people, say environmental film and I'm not sure it's any better. Baraka is a little both of neither and both... it's just beautiful and terrible and fascinating.
Cube, Cube 2: Hypercube
Not a movie for the faint-of-heart, and not a movie for the squeamish... but nonetheless a fantastic flick. Once again, a slightly non-traditional horror movie. Very arty, and very concept driven. Like 13 Ghosts, it centers on a place -- a Cube -- that has become a trap. Mad science, human nature a la Lord of the Flies, and a very interesting math-driven plot twist.
And, those wacky Lions Gate folks have come up with a second installment which Sci-Fi (love that channel) sees fit to occasionally run. It was released in 2002, though I don't recall seeing it in the theaters. Doesn't mean much, as I don't always know what's playing. I saw the plot and wasn't too interested in it, then realized that the lead is Geraint Wyn Davies, an 80s vamp show star (Forever Knight, see the TiVo page). He is joined by Matthew Ferguson from La Femme Nikita. That piqued my interest.
I watched it twice and will probably buy it, as not only is it interestingly different from the first, but also quite similar in all the ways that are good. It is astute enough as to be able to poke fun at itself, with little comments about 'the other Cube' being both the movie and the construct. It also touches on tesseract theory, which is interesting of itself, especially to anyone else who is a Madeline L'Engle fan.
The Princess Bride
Cary Elwes, Robin Wright (Penn), Andre the Giant, Wallace Shawn, Mandy Patinkin, Chris Sarandon, Carol Kane, Billy Crystal, Fred Savage, Peter Falk. A true classic fairytale. Nice attention to detail, sticks closely to the book's fanciful dialogue. Not to mention the amazing cast -- and I didn't even include Mel Brooks or the guy who plays Count Rugen (whose name I can't remember).
I'be watched this movie more than any other, with the exception of Rocky Horror.
Identity
This was a random rental from NetFlix -- I knew I'd seen the preview at some point, but couldn't at all recall the premise... even though I did remember that I'd wanted to see it. So I sat down with no preconceptions whatsoever, and was pleasantly horrified, shocked, and surprised from title to credits.
It's difficult to say much about the plot -- I'm loathe to give anything away, as it has several delicious turns that I didn't see coming. Admittedly, it's a bit gory (in a very real way, not schlock-horror sort of way), but it's important to the plot and fairly tastefully done.
I wouldn't say the SFK were outstanding -- there's one big explosion that I think is supposed to give it some action movie cred, but really doesn't. The SFX makeup is good, and the set pretty cool (except for some of the obviously computer-rendered exterior shots).
Speaking of outdoors... I imagine the cast and crew had one hell of a time filming, as nearly every outdoor scene in the film involved pouring rain (a major influence on the plot, admittedly, but still -- they were always soaked.). I give Cusack full marks here -- he is at once creepy and heroic -- while dripping wet -- which is very hard to pull off.
I enjoyed the interior hotel -- the yellowed sepia tone to everything, like the whole movie reel was left in a smoky bar for years. It was grungy and dark -- definately a horror film, from when horror films were taken seriously.
Once Upon a Time in Mexico
Antonio Banderas, Johnny Depp, Willem Dafoe, Selma Hayek, Danny Trejo, Julio Iglesias. dir. Robert Rodriguez (also Desperado, El Mariachi, prequels). I saw Desperado long, long ago and managed to catch it on television before picking up the last in the trilogy, just so I'd remember who was who. Had a choice between this and Welcome to Sarajevo and decided to go with the lighter of the two films. Funny, thatMexico is considered the less disturbing movie, even though it is a great deal more violent.
Not that I mind violence in movies, particularly. Especially when done with either humor (exaggeration, ala Underworld) or emotional value. (I seem to think violence is a part of literature, like, uh... Hamlet? Or anything else Shakespeare wrote?)
And it definately fits here. These tales about the old-style gunfighters... well, they're gunfighters for one. Violence... kinda necessary. And it's not really about violence anyway, it's mostly about sex. Guns, penises... what's the difference really? Also guns and the opposite sex, wives and daughters. Oaths. Faith. and the Mariachi.
I'm not sure if the aesthetic here is the artist or the subject or both. Banderas isn't a particularly favored actor, but as he is here (and in Interview with the Vampire (long-haired silent bad-ass type)) I enjoy him. Dafoe is my favorite actor, hands down, and I love it when he's the bad guy. Even if he does spend an inordinate amount of time behind bandages (What's up with that? Both this and Spiderman obscure his rakish features!). Johnny Depp, in the past and of late, always does something... fucked up... that just works. I was so ready for his hipster to go gangster, though parts of it gave me Crow flashbacks.
Selma Hayek, enh, but Danny Trejo has always been someone I like to see in a good movie. He and John Malkovitch (maybe some Steve Buschemi on the side, pity he didn't make it into this movie from the second) can come be bad guys in my movies any day. Way scary. Especially when he picks his very very large teeth. His teeth are scary.
Don't know if Julio has a career in acting, though he did fine being himself. The slim-cut suede pants get an assist on the role. Perhaps this movie can do for Mickey Rourke what Pulp Fiction did for Travolta. The director's commentary informs me that the Trejo part was intended for Quentin Tarentino. After seeing Dusk till Dawn, thank gods for the Injun.
All in all, an excellent western confection. Enjoy.
Donnie Darko
Jake Gyllenhaal, Patrick Swayze, Drew Barrymore, Noah Wylie. Really wacky. Awfully twisted. Majorly fucked up. It would be better if Jake G. didn't sorta creep me out a bit. But I suppose since he's supposed to be acting the part of a paranoid schitzophrenic, 'creepy' is just good casting.
Yes, yes, this movie (somewhat reminding me of Fear and Loathing or Natural Born Killers) is told through the eyes of a raving lunatic. Not surprising, then, that the freakish twists and turns can throw you off and by the end you're kind of in a vapid trance, unsure if anything that happened was real.
Faraway, So Close
Otto Sander, Nastassja Kinski, Peter Falk, Willem Dafoe. German sequal (I haven't seen the first, 'Wings of Desire,' as I only barely made it through this one -- it's that heavy). I wanted to see this movie for two reasons: (1) Dafoe is my favorite actor and (2) I had heard it was the inspiration for the Meg Ryan/Nic Cage 'City of Angels' ...but without the insipid love story part. I tried to watch it the first time while doing something else -- paying bills, working on a program, whatever. I quickly realized that since it's a foreign film, indeed primarily in German (though some in English, French and Italian), there was no room to multi-task. So I put it away, watched something more familiar. A few weeks later, I sat down againthis time without additional activitiesand tried to play it through. I fell asleep less than a half-hour in. Several more weeks went by and it gathered dust on my shelf. (Luckily, it was NetFlix. NetFlix rocks.) I thought about watching it a couple of times, but always managed to talk myself out of it. Finally, over Holiday Break I found myself one night wishing for something more... juicy... than the typical TV fare, so I dropped the DVD back in the player and let it run. Mmm. Meaty. Yes.
I won't pretend that I understand the entirity of it. Though the subtitles were in English, I found myself often captivated by the stark black and white scenery and, as a result, relying on the remaining rudimentary German I recall from college and high school courses. It served me fairly well, and a lot of the more flowery bits were particularly simple. Or pidgen.
The tale follows a un-Walken-like Engel, Cassiel, as he falls from Grace intentionally to save the life of a young girl. It winds through his new mortal life, with Cassielnow known as Karl Englermaking contact and, he hopes, change for the delicately connected family of menschen that he had watched over in his former heavenly occupation. Willem Dafoe is cast here as Time Itself, perhaps an evil-doer, perhaps just an agent of chaos. That part I didn't quite grasp.
But for whatever inaccessibility there is due to East/West mindset, it is happily unencumbering to what is really at heart a truly beautiful film. The transitions from black and white to full color are well-used and the long wide shots or the spires are achingly breathtaking. This is an aspect that certainly made it into the American production, as I well recall the opening church-bells. It is unfortunate that the rest of the talethe side plot about a family of circus performers and a mobsterisn't also explored in the US version, as it would have been far more interesting a film.
Welcome to Sarajevo
Steven Dillane, Woody Harrelson, Marisa Tomei, Goran Visnjic. This movie is fictional, but just barely. Gripping news footage is interspersed with a fleshed out storyline about a foreign correspondant who becomes involved in the plight of a front-lines orphanage in the once-Olympic Yugoslavia. The footage is brutal, scary, unflinching. They talk about bombings that kill babies and then show you dead infants on the slab. The inclination to blink, to call it exploitative, is there, but given the plot that wraps around it, I think this film is asking for a little more than that.
Dillane is the impassioned reporter; Harrelson plays to type with the gonzo accomplice. I love him in those sorts of roles. Visnjic plays their native driver, a sensitive, quiet man who hopes for better times. The fact that neither henor the emigree childrenfind this happiness, makes for interesting questions about the rightness of excursive versus incursive protections. Do you save a person or do you have to save people? Or else do you merely become another agent of genocide?
Thought-provoking. Sad. Definately sad, and not for those with weak stomachs. Or hearts. It breaks mine, just a little, to think I was blithely throwing my graduation cap in the air and celebrating in excess as this was really happening, a world away. A place forgotten. And it was only the 13th worst place in the world. Like Risto, I'm afraid to see the first.
Beyond Borders
Angelina Jolie, Clive Owen. In the same vein as Welcome to Sarajevo, another film about refugees and social service, and the reality of the violence of the world. Though this time there is a love story set against all the bloodshed. Again, I've seen reviews of that label it self-serving, insultingan affront to the people who do risk their lives as crisis aid workers. But I don't think anyone who sat through the end really walked out with that impression... it left me with the deep appreciation for these reckless saviors and their very humanity, their desire to do normal things at the same time as miracles. I've always been in awe of programs like Doctors Without Borders, I've always known how incredibly easy it is to live where I do and in the style I have grown accustomed to... and to relegate to occasional guilty donations any concern for fellow man. I like the story here, the tragic love story, and I find the landscapes every bit as gorgeous (Canada for Russia, a desert for Ethopia, Thailand for Cambodia). And even if the movie was selfless schmaltz, Angelina Jolie has more than made up for it with the money and time she's turned around and invested into the cause she exploits on the screen. So there.
Bringing Down the House
Queen Latifah, Steve Martin, Eugene Levy, Betty White. The movie toes the line (of good taste), but I really like the four primary stars of the film. Steve Martin is funny as hell. Betty White cracks me up (and good gods, she's been in everything!). Eugene Levy is just hilariousI don't want to, but I find myself giggling till it hurts at those abomidable American Pie/Wedding films. As previously mentioned, Queen Latifah is just so fucking cool. And apparently she taught Steve Martin to dance passably... which in and of itself was some sort of rhythmic miracle.
I wasn't sure who Joan Plowright was until I watched some of the DVD extrasturns out she's apparently a very famous British actress, which makes her scene in the bar even more amusing. Not Eugene Levy amusing, but still.
League of Extraordinary Gentlemen (LXG)
Sean Connery, Shane West, Peta Wilson. When I saw the trailer for this movie, I deemed it 'must see', but the critical reviews chilled my enthusiasm quite a bit and I ended up waiting until it was out on DVD. I think in many ways critical and budgetary expectations (this was a big-budget film) are what sank LXG. I, having very low ones, found it easily more enjoyable then I believed it would be. I wouldn't say it was Oscar materialthe dialogue was heavy, and with a few exceptions, the acting hammy. But it wasn't bad.
Like the Matrix, the concept was an incredibly good one. Alan Moore's graphic novel is excellent, very wittily erudite, and like Neil Gaiman, full of buried references. The movieobviously made by a US film companytraded the intellectual jokes for SFX and eye-popping puppetry. (The 'Making of' featurette, a benefit of DVD-viewing, is actually quite good, speaking of puppetry.)
Of the actors, Peta Wilson pleased me most, though this is not surprising given my appreciation for USA's La Femme Nikita, for vampires, and for Ms.Wilson in general. But her gruff pantomime of "Mr. Q", as she calls him (a cockney'ed Connery) is really spot-on and quite funny.
The patsy Dorien Grey, nattily dressed in his pinstriped gray suit (of course) and skull-headed cane (which really should have registered as an indicator of his standing in all this business) is also really kinda cool.
A lot of the SFX was unnecessary... I would have preferred greater exposition about the individual characters, to see more (the deleted scene plus some) about Jeckyl and Hyde's relationship, ditto for Harker and Grey's. And I think fewer SFX would have also helped the quality a bit, as even in the bonus materials, when the techies talk, you can tell they're a bit frustrated by the clock. Though I give props for the Jacksonian mini-sets. (Both Venice and Helm's Deep were filmed largely using miniatures.)
Bring it On
Fluffy adolescent-book drama about competitive cheerleading, but with a biting sarcastic edge and some decent comedic writing. Best moments are when it skewers popular icons (like Buffy) or the teen-flick genre. The spirit routines are also quite fun to watch, as is the weighty cast, including Eliza Dushku and Clare Kramer (of Buffy), Mira Sorvino, Kirstin Dunst, and a host of other young actors I'm sure will pop out a career eventually.
Screamers
Peter Weller, Roy Dupuis. Another apocalyptic sci-fi flick I discovered in my endless fascination with the genre. (I'm so bad I'll occasionally really get into the "Sci-Fi Originals".) This one has some crazy people, a gritty planet, and the dangers of artificial intelligence -- all interesting topics to explore. Dupuis plays a crazy person, and he seems to enjoy it, let loose... a far cry from the carefully controlled mechanics of his Nikita operative. The movie takes quite a few hairpin twists and turns, and managed to hold out some secrets till the very last minute, but still tidy them up before the credits rolled.
Bleeders (alt. titles: The Descendant, Hemoglobin)
Roy Dupuis, Rutger Hauer. Ok, so let's be honest -- this movie really should probably be somewhere in the 'WORST' list because... well... it's bad. It's not just bad, it's horrible. It's an awfully written, awfully shot, awfully acted B-horror flick. There are plot holes one could drive a semi-truck through, and the ghoulish bad guys are an amalgamation of every fright night cliche there ever was. They are (and I am SO not kidding) grave-robbing amputee zombie photo-sensitive hemophiliac vampire inbred hermaphrodites who feed on human flesh (and possibly formaldehyde?), living in the tunnels under a nondescript northeastcoast island. The only redeeming value to this movie is the 10-minute porno in the middle, starring Roy Dupuis' firmly muscled ass. This is tempered, mind you, by the fact that you just saw this same man consuming a preserved fetus. He is smootching his wife with dead-baby-breath. Two of my friends were terribly squicked by this. You have been warned. But I *loved* it. It's so bad, it's good.
X-Men, X2
Patrick Stewart, Halle Berry, Hugh Jackman, Sir Ian McKellan, James Marsden, Rebecca Romijn-Stamos. Delighful comic-book confection. This movie particularly pleases me as years before it was made, a friend and I sat down and wrote down our 'ultimate cast' X-Men movie. Patrick Stewart was our choice as well. I can't think of anyone else who could be Xavier. And Gandalf-as-Magneto? Heh. Heh. Heh.
W O R S T
Gigli
Jennifer Lopez, Ben Affleck, Christopher Walken, Al Pacino. My roommate and I decided that we needed to see this movie in order to determine whether or not it sucked worse than Bats. It did. Oh, but it did.
It was hard to believe the critical reviewsthat a movie could really be this poorly written and acted, especially with at least one or two fairly reputable actors in it (Walken, Pacino, even Affleck, if you're willing to stretch). But it is. One wonders just how in the HELL Pacino and Walken (or their agents who they pay to not put them in the shitter like this) could have possibly looked at the pile of stinking crap that was this script and said 'Yeah, sounds goodwe're in.'. But they did.
The scene where Lopez breathily extols the virtues of her twat while pointing it lustily at the Broody-Foreheaded One is without a doubt the single most ridiculous moment in modern cinema. It is equalled only moments later when she famously instructs him to make like a turkey. I felt myself being literally struck DUMB in that instant. Because her character is supposed to be a LESBIAN. Lesbians sleep with WOMEN, not men and certainly not Ben Affleck, who looks like a Neanderthal frat boy. Lesbians and frat boys do NOT go great together.
And not only is J.Lo's casting as a dyke completely unfathomable, I didn't even mention the lackadasical 'hood accent that Affleck attempts. The fact that they're supposed to be hitmen and the thought of a severed digit makes them both queasy. The fact that they're supposed to be hitmen with reputations and yet they've never killed anyone.
It's just ludicrous that this movie even made it off the cutting room floor. Had I been the director watching the dailies I would have strangled myself with the celluloid. Bashed my head in with a keyboard. Slit my wrists on a rusty paperclip.
Bats
I can't name a part of this movie that didn't suck. The directing, the acting, the lighting, the SFX. The plot. Wait, there really wasn't a plot. Oh.
The Blues Brothers
I don't really know why I hate this film. Dan Akroyd and John Belushi are pretty funny on SNL. But, for some reason (perhaps it's overuse?), the cliche that is this movie completely fails to impress me. Come to think of it, I really haven't liked a single SNL-spinoff movie. Well, maybe except for Austin Powers, but that's only begrudgingly and mostly because of Seth Green. But this movie is just stupid.
Braveheart
This movie was made for people who watch WWF wrestling and the Real Man Fighting Tournament. I found it gross, overbearing, poorly written, poorly acted (Mel Gibson's accent was neither believeable or amusing), and just... flying right past the squick meter at every turn. Don't think, mind you, that I'm some total wuss with a weak stomach -- I don't mind flesh-ripping violence, as long as it is (a) necessary to the plotline (b) never derivative and (c) tastefully done. Not only did the majority of the uber-bloodletting fail to meet a single condition, but I noticed that several gorey scenes were looped and re-used. (The biggest and most obvious example is the horse that gets gored -- three times!) I mean, c'mon. That's just too much.
Dumb & Dumber, Surf Ninja, etc. (Any movie showcasing Chris Farley)
I hate to say it, as it's a pretty awful thing to say, but I'm glad Farley -- that truly mentally deficient lump of a cokehead FREAK -- is dead. At least that means there are no more movies being made with him in them. Nothing he's in is worth watching anywhere, at any time.
FearDotCom
I had nothing whatsoever to do with the selection of this movie at the video store. And I'm still hoping that the friend who did choose it was
trying to be funny. Unfortunately, it wasn't even that. Funny, I mean. It sort of hovered between pathetic and vaguely macabre. Sure, the visuals were nice. Sure, Stephen Dorff is hot (but he was a LOT hotter in Blade). But that still wasn't enough to rescue the flimsy premise here, and certainly
not enough to make me want to sit through 2 hours of mangled biz-speak. Even with the nice sfx dolls (though for better work of the same ilk, see 13 Ghosts), the very fact that the film is something-dot-com kinda makes it... frightening. But not in the good way.
Groundhog Day
I wanted to shoot myself in the head while watching this movie. Ever after seeing this Bill Murray vehicle, I refuse to watch any movie that might possibly be about Deja Vu. Or might contain Bill Murray.
Rip It Off (also Beyond the City Limits)
Alexis Denisoff, Alyson Hannigan. My god, this was bad. I at least had hope for it as an indie, what with Buffy and Angel veterans Alyson (normally hilarious) and Alexis Denisoff (somewhat handsome, as long as he's not playing pretentious) in the cast. But boy, was this 2 hours full of suck. For one, the movie's voice keeps changing -- sometimes you're omniscient 3rd person, sometimes you get this weird narrator (one of the really minor characters whose voice is so simplistic it's not useful and his churlishness is distracting). And even once you've managed to i.d. the voice, that still leaves the little matter of plot, which is difficult to grasp, being spread between too many unremarkable (and often indistinguishable) characters. And I suppose I can't let it go unnoted (even though I'd rather not, since his performance the last season on Angel has been truly wonderful!) that Denisof isn't just a little off in this vehicle -- he truly bites. His posturing as a communist muscle-head is ridiculous -- and his incredibly fake accent (think of the worst Rocky and Bullwinkle lisp you can imagine) is so bad I actually had to cover my ears lest it cause my head to actually implode.
Spawn
There is a giant, fat, farting, rotting clown in this movie. That alone should be enough to have it banned world-wide. If pressed, I can only describe the first 15 minutes or so of this particular film. It was so bad that my friend LeAnn and I got up and left the theater. We preferred to pay $7 to sit on the sidewalk and smoke cigarettes. Anything to avoid having our eyes and brains exposed to what was going on in there. We're pretty sure our friends who stayed were stupider for having seen it.
Weekend at Bernie's
Stupid, stupid, stupid movie. Completely impractical premise that isn't even at ALL funny. And they somehow managed to make a sequal?!? I'll never understand why.
M E D I O C R E
The Hours
This has got to be one of the most depressing movies I've ever seen in my entire life. Granted, it's about Virginia Woolf, and it was touted as a 'serious' movie AND it won Oscars and stuff, so I should have known it was going to be either depressing or at the least really really maudlin... but wow. I could have made an Emiliy Dickinson, no.. a Tess Eliot... no a *Plath* movie that was less depressing. Oh, wait... I think Gweneth was in that one. Anyway...
Was it any good? Yes. It really shouldn't be here in 'mediocre' because it was quite good, but I'm mad at it for being so damned dulling. The story (from Michael Cunningham's novel of the same title) is excellentor rather the stories, as there are three of them, entwined on several counts. There is the part about Woolf herself who is writing Mrs.Dalloway; the part about a young WW2 wife and mother who is reading it; and a modern bisexual woman who embodies the protagonist. None of their stories end particularly happily.
What their stories say is, I suppose, another matter. The moral is about choosing life, not death. Woolf chooses life in London, real life, though it means madness and an early death... over a certain, immediate end due to boredom. The young wife chooses exile, her son's contempt (he writes her fictional suicide), over death. And the modern Dalloway... her Richard chooses death to set her freeto give her life.
I've read a little Woolf (will probably read more now), enough to know that she explored the greatness in the mundane -- Dalloway is, after all, a muddled society broad, whose emotional collapse over the wrong canape is supposed to seem somehow understandable, by virtue of the artiface of everyday life. Everyone understands their place, and their duty; hers was to create the best, most lavish parties, Woolf's was the novel, the wife's the cake. Why do we care more about one than the other? We don't, what we think doesn't matter. Life is what we choose, and if we choose wrong, then we have to choose again or face exile. Or death. But there is always that choice that has to be made, consciously.
The other thing this movie makes me wonder is... where are we going to get the great works of the next centuries now that there is Prozac? I suppose there will always be a certain class of artist that will refuse to remain medicated (or, alternately, refuse to remain UNmedicated (ala Courtney Love)), but really now that medical science knows all about depression and seasonal disorders and brain chemistry... who's going to write the next Bell Jar? "The Raven"? Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas?
Star Wars, Ep. I and II
I wanted so much more. I guess those of our generation did hope that Lucas would let the series grow with us, and ignore the greedy little scrabblers of today (and their Happy Meal tie-ins), but I guess he wasn't our age back then, either, and it is his movie. But the addition of Jar-Jar was truly disturbing, and though there were some things that really almost made up for it, there were still some moments (especially in the first film) that made me wonder if it didn't indeed belong on the 'bad' list. Without the redemption in some parts of the second movie (I'm a sucker for the impulsive romanticism), the first film would probably be there.
I don't, mind you, at all fault the actors -- the younger ones, anyway. Natalie Portman is as wonderful as she has always been (see The Professional if you don't understand what I mean), and the young skywalkers are passable. Hayden Christensen is the best of the lot, as foppish little Jake Lloyd is occasionally cloyingly obnoxious. I don't like the new Yoda, even if he can flip around in the air. Samuel L Jackson is one bad motherfucking Jedi, and I mean that in the good way. But others (and they know who they are) seemed like they were stoned fanboys who didn't bother to learn their lines. And I wish they'd get somebody good, like Patrick Stewart or James Earl Jones (oh, wait...).
The SFX, too, weren't spectacular -- and for this film to be rated highly, they had to be. It's a legacy, and you don't come out with a ho-hum visual experience. This, however, wasn't due to technology, but direction. Things just seemed... repetitive. The underwater world was dumb (it was the fucking Snorks, for gods' sake); the genetics lab planet was worth seeing, but still very similar to the old trilogy worlds. That, in a sentence, describes the lot of these two films -- spotty. I've still got high hopes for the third -- I mean, wicked shit just HAS to happen, he's wee Vader! Right? Please? Pretty please?
Hidalgo
Viggo Mortensen, Omar Sharif. I wanted to love this movie, coming on the heels of seeing Mortensen as King Aragorn, hoping his headlining movie career would be some sort of salve to the Journey Ending. Unfortunately... it wasn't really. The story was good, possibly even great, but too many threads got started and only ended up dangling, unfinished, even though there was no lack of filmstrip (Hidalgo weighs in at 136 minutes). The horse work was by all means fantastic, the scenery was gorgeous. Mortensen was definately the dirty cowboy, though we could all do with a few fewer 'pardners.' If you like a horse movie (which one of my viewing companions did not), you might enjoy this. If you like Westerns, you might find it amusing. If you have missed Omar Sharif in cimema, have at it. But if you're going for an action and romance blockbuster, you've already seen most of this movie and it was called 'The Mummy.' Mortensen is hotter than Brenden Frasier... or at least he was in ROTK. Here I think it's neck and neck, though Hidalgo (the actual horse) probably puts Hidalgo (the movie) ahead by a nose.
And another thing about the horse: this movie gets dinged to mediocre largely because of the horse. Not only did my friend hate it, but the film contains my least-favorite suspense-building plot point: animal mutilation. I hate Braveheart (and Mel Gibson) for the multiple steed-gorings on the battlefield. The 13th Warrior got a thumbs-down for a violent pike vs. equine. So too Hidalgo, which gets a black mark for the brutal and scary sand pit that impales the painted pony. I was really enjoying the movie up until that point... it wasn't great cinema, but it was lighthearted and fun, and the clowny cowboy and spunky pony were pleasing to watch. After that moment, though, it felt somehow dirtier. Manipulative. Untruthful. And it was awful to watch, even if the weird-ass Indian spirits could come and save the day.
Chicago
I don't want to give Chicago a ho-hum, as so many of my friends seem to like it so much... but truly, I was rather unimpressed. I give Catherine Zeta-Jones and Richard Gere full marks for stepping up in the vocals department, and of course Queen Latifah is truly royalty and all... but other than the novelty of actors singing and Latifah's one number (the other was cut and is probably available on the DVD, but I didn't bother with the extras after being bored by the film itself)... the movie simply loses me. I think I'm supposed to care what happens to the protagonist (whose name I can't even recall), but Zellweger's scrawny, dumber-than-dumb portrayal totally turned me off, and I found myself sketching through most of it, tuning in only when I heard the band start to play. Perhaps I've been spoilt by Baz Luhrman's rapid-fire hypnotic overdrive, but this just left me wanting... something else.
The Matrix / Matrix Reloaded / Matrix Revolutions
Wachowski Brothers (dir.), Keanu Reeves, Carrie-Ann Moss, Lawrence Fishburn, Gloria Ruben, (Elrond). If I split these films out separately, the first installation would go in good, the second in ho-hum, and the third in bad. This is an uncomfortable categorization for me, because really none of the movies are bad per se, but the first movie set the bar very, very high indeed. While the second showed some amount of promise, the third simply failed to deliver the complex sort of resolution 'Revolution' implies. I left the theater wanting more... much more... and am kinda pissed off that they baited-and-switched me that way.
Without a doubt, the Matrix movies are technically brilliant. The adage that imitation is the highest form of flattery holds true, and the imitators of the Wachowski style are many and varied. From MTV spoofs to the now-omnipresent 360-degree freeze-frame fight scene, everyone borrows from this trilogy.
The set-up: the world, the concept, the industrial, tinted surroundings, even the costuming and character conceptsgorgeous. Neo and Trinity, Link, the gruff Morpheus and their thread-bare sweaters are rugged and loveable action heroes. We genuinely want to understand them, figure out their puzzling world. The Oracle is cool as an iceberg, though the recasting of the role in the third because of the original actress's death is both sad and unfortunate. (The original Oracle was far cooler, the second a pale but fairly accurate mimicry.)
But everything that got set up never got knocked down. In fact, nothing got knocked down, it's sort of just all... sitting... there. Waiting for something to be done. Sure, Neo managed to stave off this one attack at the hands of the machines, the Programs... but, uh, what happens now? In a trilogy, an epic (look that word up, Wachowskis) there's supposed to be some sort of epochal journey. Not just a bunch of pretty firefights. Really.
Bones
Snoop Dogg. This should probably be on the bad list, but in truth I was shocked to realize thatfor its genreit really wasn't half-bad. I expected much much worse. The plot was actually fairly clear and even believeable (logical). The characters weren't stereotypical... in fact, I'd have a hard time giving any real ethic category for any member of the main cast. The sets were interesting and creepy, though it did fall prey to two classic gore-flick blunders: (1) bad fake blood and gore (read: tempera paint and dyed ricotta cheese) (2) Jerry Garcia wavvy cg blurs.
But those things are pretty minor compared to the usual egregious departure from anything vaguely sensical in a teen horror flick. Though the main cast are all handsome-faced adolescents, none of them end up naked during the crucial action scenes. None of women jiggle. And there's very little girlish screaming. There'd be points off for overuse of a gore fountain, but the bright opaque red paint just makes it kind of whacked out and funny. And Snoop makes a great undead hero. The man should be a cartoon. I'm not sure that he isn't.