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The Audrey Hepburn Story (2000)
Boring but hard work JLH and Rossum makes it worth watching
Not knowing very much about Audrey Hepburn, this film isn't a good place to start finding out. That feeling stuck during the entire film. And mind you, not because of Jennifer Love Hewitt. I think the film is badly written. Picking moments of Hepburns life and taping them together is not going to create a good story. Hewitt makes the best of it though. I understand she is a fan of Hepburns work, and I congratualate her on a job well done. Her hard work is showing, and it makes the film worth watching. And who can resist that smile. Great performance by Emmy Rossum, who plays Hepburn when she was 12 to 16 years of age. Just too bad that the film is boring story-wise and that the cinematography isn't helping either. And didn't the Hepburn story get much more interesting in her final stages of her life? Her work for UNICEF, her sickness?
The Karate Kid Part II (1986)
Karate Kid II: An action movie whick takes it time...
I'm a fan of Japanese culture. That's why I like this film. It's an action movie, but it takes it's time to show a lot of Japanese culture. Those scenes add much to the overall story. It's an integral part of the story. And that's why I like to recommend this film. It's not afraid to take it slow and focus on the story, it makes the action much more fun to watch.
Dracula (1931)
Philip Glass kills Dracula!
Finally, I bought Dracula on video. I remember looking on the cover of the video, saying restored version and new musical score by Philip Glass on the cover. But I was so crazed by my find that I didn't stop to think if that was the video I wanted. If I buy a video, it must be as original as the movie.
A very important part of the Universal pictures in the '30, is the music. The music is very much a character in those movies. The music adds a special mood. The new score by Philip Glass didn't add that feeling. It was irritating. For instance, when Renfield visits Count Dracula in Transsylvania. These scenes are very important because they introduce us to Dracula. When Dracula and Renfield have conversation, I had trouble concentrating because of the ridicilous score! The score wasn't a character to the film, as the original was.
Sombre (1998)
Sombre: morality not included
Tonight 'Sombre' premiered in the Netherlands. Present in the audience was the director of Sombre, mr. Philippe Grandrieux. He is known mostly as a maker of documentaries and videos, and it shows in Sombre, his first movie. Shaking camera's (he told the audience he shot most of the footage with a 35mm camera (about 24 kilo's heavy, that's gotta hurt at the end of the day), extreme close-ups and experiments with dark and light. It absolutely complements the story.
About the story. It tells the story of Jean (Marc Barbé), a man that has many sexual encounters with women, but ends up killing them. Why, we do not know. I think he tries to love women, but at the end his lust takes over and controls him. After a couple encounters he meets a woman played by Elina Lowensohn. Apparantly she's something else. She also has a history she's not completely happy with (why we don't know) and she joins Jean with her sister. It doesn't take long before Jean tries to rape and kill the sisters. They escape. But apparently she is somehow touched by Jean, a touch she can't forget (a romantic vision about love, says Grandrieux). She goes back to him. They have sex but at the end Jean drives her away. He can't be with her, because for the first (in the movie) time he experiences love, but he still can't control his lust and she can't be with him because she might end up being dead. Oh bitter irony...The movie ends with spectators of the Tour de France, a metaphor for reality watching this morbid fairy tale. And it is a bit of a fairy tale. Jean is a puppet player. He does a show in front of crowd of children (one of the best scenes in the film). He plays the wolf, the Beast! Eline plays the Beauty ( at the end of the film, I have my doubts about that, but anyway...).
It's a difficult movie! Grandrieux tells us that one of his main influences is the silent movie. Silent movies have spots on the film, the cuts are clearly visible, it's rough, 'it stays in the ears, even when you can't hear the sound'. And Sombre is rough and dirty. In some scenes you can almost touch objects, for example hair or a woman's thy. Other scenes are very serene and still, but you still feel the objects. Grandrieux tells us that he want to make the audience edit the movie realtime. And that was exactly what I did. You need some imagination with this picture, you have to fill in the blanks, because not much information and dialogue is given to you. What Grandriex achieves with this, is a connection between the audience and the film. 'Edit the movie the same time you are watching it'. Man, you gotta love that one.
Still, I would liked to have some more info on the characters and their history. I liked to know what makes them do the things they do. Now they are just doing them. And with almost no moral in it. There are some scenes where the theme hope is explored, but you got to dig deep. That results in dividing the audience in two teams. You either like it or you hate it. One more thing, the music. The music by Alan Vega is excellent.
See this movie, make your own story of it and make your own conclusions. Sombre is good material for the eyes and ears and the mind. Phillipe Grandrieux is a kind man who tought that the only way he could express his feelings with this theme, was by film. I rate it 7 out of 10.
Apache Woman (1955)
Just another western, too bad...
The movie starts with a street fight between a cowboy and Anne LeBeau (Joan Taylor) who is half Apache, half white. The fight is about the white town people blaming the Apache for the various crimes in the area. By watching this scene, I know why I'm watching a Roger Corman movie. I'm not an expert on Roger Corman movies, but I think he is always trying to make his movies different from other movies by doing scenes that no other director would do.
The theme of the film is what makes this western somewhat different from other westerns. Corman is trying to deal with prejudice between the Indians and the white people. Anne LeBeau who is a 'halfbreed' lives with her brother some miles out of the Apache reservation. Her brother, Armand LeBeau (Lance Fuller), is leader of a band of outlaws who are committing the crimes the Apache are blamed for. The town people want military troops from the government, but they send Rex Muffett (Lloyd Bridges). He starts an investigation, and he starts with Anne. Anne, who thinks she belongs to the Apache refuses to help him, but somehow the fall in love anyway. Rex suspects Armand, and questions Anne some more, who is now troubled by the fact that Rex might be right. What is she going to do? Betray the Apache by turning her brother in? Or be responsible for a war between the Apache and the white men, by protecting her brother. This is an interesting notion, but I think it's poorly played out in the film. At the end Rex and his men are trying to ambush Armand and his men. It ends in a plain ol' shooting festival with Rex and Armand in a fist fight, with Armand falling off a cliff. I think Corman could do a lot more with the theme in his film. By showing more of the tension between the Indians and the townspeople, there would be a lot more tension in the film, and then we could understand better why Anne has such problems. I think the story is OK, the acting is OK (Lance Fuller does a great job at playing Armand LeBeau), the casting is OK, everything is OK. That makes it a very dull movie. It had potential, but in the end it turns out to be just another Hollywood western.
The Wrong Man (1956)
Why does he takes the beating?
The Wrong Man, a movie about a man wrongly accused for a crime he didn't commit. But he gets arrested anyway. How do you prove your innocence when the law is working against you? How do you prove your innocence when your wife can't handle the pressure?
Henry Fonda does a wonderful job here. In the first half of the film his character is degraded from a normal guy, with a job, house, wife, kids, debts to a low life criminal. Fonda plays this well, the unbelieve radiates from his face. He can't belief what's happening to him, he doesn't understand it. Frustration, anger is what I would expected, but the fact that it didn't does great justice to the character. It's his wife (Vera Miles)who can't handle the pressure. The scene in the bedroom where his wife hits him on the head, the broken mirror, the great acting of Vera Miles is the best scene in the film. It's a turning point in the story. Suddenly you it becomes evident how the events have effected the characters.
In the last 30 minutes the story becomes kind of dull. The courtroom-scenes and the discovery of the real suspect are not as strong as the rest of the movie.
What I liked most about this movie is the effect the story has on the characters. During the movie I was constantly thinking how the events effected the characters. And for me that's what makes a great movie: if it makes you think it is a good film.