Reviews

Let me preface this with the fact that I'm a Sci-Fi horror sort of guy. I'm about the last person that would ever go to see a musical, although I like both Cher and Christina's music. It's not exactly what I would consider a movie I'm interested in.

I had a free Saturday morning and picked this up at a matinée with some friends who talked me into it. I was floored by this. I've seen a few musicals in my many years that I enjoyed. This one knocked it out of the ballpark, largely due to Christina. Her acting was actually acceptable and believable, but it was her singling that stole the show, and that is nothing to be ashamed of in a musical after all all.

When Christina first starts wailing once a little mischief pulls the power to the sound system, I was riveted to the screen. She has an amazing voice with a raw power behind it that's hard to describe. Sheer magnetism. It's one of those scenes that literally reaches out and grabs you. It made my heart skip a beat from the charge it gave. I can only describe it as powerful both in impact and visually.

Cher plays the owner of the Burlesque club. She's a bit like a tough and street wise matronly type but doesn't take too much crap. She's a good choice for the role. For those expecting a lot of Cher air time, you'll be somewhat disappointed as she spends relatively little time on screen, and I think that was the right decision. She wasn't great in this role, but she certainly isn't bad. She pulls out emotion in the right spots and a few grins to your face. Excellent chemistry between her and Christina Aguilera as well as Stanley Tucci.

Stanley Tucci also brings a strong role to the film. As always, he plays a role that is executed to perfection. Stanley plays a companion to Cher (in the friend sense as Stanley is gay) and he pretty much manages the talent, gets the girls on stage and keeps things running with the minute of backstage details.

Last but not least, we have Cam Gigandet who plays Jack the bartender. He's an engaged man who offers his apartment to Ali (Christina) until she can get her own. Innocent enough at first, but Cam's fiancé is thousands of miles away working on another job and sparks start to fly between them once they settle in together. The ladies will appreciate Cam in this role. He's certainly easy on the eyes and also played his part well. I was a bit worried that he couldn't pull this type of role off as it gets a bit intimate, but he does well enough without getting to sticky sweet. Ali and Jack as a couple falling in love come off as sweet without being too gushy. A solid performance.

The storyline itself is, as expected, a little cliché but well executed. Just because a story has been done before doesn't mean you've seen it all or that someone can't come along and do it well, and that was my experience with Burlesque. Well worth he price of admission.

Take this from a Horror/Sci-Fi fan who was surprised as well. You won't be disappointed.

I really enjoyed this one. Although it's a short hour and 20 minutes, it's a fun ride. You'll feel like the party last forever before the action gets started, but it goes at a fairly good pace after that. The acting isn't academy worthy, but it is certainly good. I can't really fault any of the actors as they all did a great job considering they are all unknowns (you wouldn't know that from the quality job). The CGI is screen worthy. Very fast glimpses for the most part. The smaller budget shows a bit there. Action scenes are good and some of them have a good tension to them letting your mind try to figure out whats coming. I liked it for those points.

All in all, a fun movie. I should warn you that if you had problems with Blair Witch, you may want to skip this one. The vomit cam can be a bit much. One of the people in my group actually had to get up and go to the bathroom because it made him nauseous. It's can get pretty extreme in scenes.

Definitely worth a watch!

***Minor Spoilers Follow*** ' ' ' ' ' ' For those that are moaning about the magical battery in the camera and such..Hello, there is only 1 hour and 20 minutes on the camera, meaning it filmed for that long. It wasn't running all night. For those complaining that the subways were empty, don't forget that they had already evacuated most of the city by that point. These people were running towards the monster, not away from it. The area they were in was already deserted. I will agree that this camera with it's night vision was a bit much to believe. That's more of a military type hardware, not some Best Buy video camera ;) Last but not least, did anyone catch the quick shot of this monster falling into the water at the very end of the movie? I'm talking about the very end of the movie when it flashes the scene at Coney Island and if you look out at the water there's a ferry. Watch to the left of it and you'll see something fall from the sky and hit the water. It is not flaming like a meteor. It looks gray and round. I'm guessing this is how the monster actually makes it's appearance? No one else seemed to notice in the theater.

What can I say. I loved this flick. It was a nice ride. The movie starts off with a good teaser, and escalates into action within about 15 minutes after a brief character introduction to the main players. After the initial shock of violence, the move escalates into a tense cat and mouse (literally). I found myself squirming in my seat more than once with a tight grip on my arm rests.

The plot is a unique idea for vampire flicks, which seems pretty rare these days. Vampires decide to visit a town in far north Alaska that gets 30 days of night in the dead of winter.

Buffet anyone? Josh Hartnett and Melissa George play well together, and the supporting actors do a good job of getting you emotionally involved. They did a great job of making you feel the hopelessness of the situation.

If your a vampire fan, this is a MUST see. If your just a horror fan, or even a gore fan, that is also a must see.

Great tension, great plot, great acting. Fun for the whole family (as long as they are old enough to vote anyway)

I so wanted to like this movie. The previews were very eye catching, and the premise was also very good. A thousand year epic. Unfortunately it didn't live up to my expectations. It's more like 15 minutes from a Spanards point of view, and another 40 or so from 'current day'. The rest is all fluff with no filler.

I came across as not much more than a screen saver with a very small plot. The entire movie had maybe 30 to 40 minutes of actual character discourse. The rest was pretty scenery.

Don't get me wrong. Hugh had a great performance here, although with so little to work with it was difficult to get emotionally involved in any of the characters. The film simply tries to be a bit TOO artsy, without the meat of the story to back it up. It's somewhat disjointed and wispy. I would guess that a better editing job might have helped, but not enough to bring this one out of it's own daydream.

The film starts up by just dropping you into a scene, completely lost. At first I thought this might be intentional except for the fact that the character himself (hugh) is not the slightest bit confused as to where he is. It doesn't do much to help with that fact, even after 10 minutes. I kept waiting for some sort of narrative, hint of a time line, starting place, stopping place, etc. They took far to long to appear. Once you finally start to get your bearings, it simply drops the story for another 10 minutes of very pretty scenery. This sequence is repeated throughout the entire film. It is a shame, because the movie has great potential, both with the current day story line, and the Spanish conquistador storyline. The acting that we do get to see if quite good, but with litterly no story behind it, it simply isn't enough. Many on here may claims some lofty hidden meaning in the film, or strive to give it acclaim for being a new vision in movie making. I simply think they are still a bit dazzled by the effects/visuals, which I must agree are quite nice.

Even the ending is rather abrupt and unfulfilling. Someone must have jiggled the mouse ;)

I recently re-watched this gem of a movie. This is, by far, one of my favorite films to date. This initially appears to be a somewhat light film about 2 modern day characters ( Tobey Maguire and Reese Witherspoon) that have a run-in with Don Knotts as a T.V. repairmen. The outcome of which ends them both in the T.V. show of Pleasantville. A place where the temperature is always 72 degrees, the sun always shines, and everything is in black and white, and ...pleasant.

After the initial shock wears off, both characters discover how 2-dimensional the characters in Pleasantville are. They find themselves as the main characters in a 50's T.V. show as children of George and Betty Parker. The actors in this film do a phenomenal job portraying a life devoid of passion. They find that all of the characters go about life in a mechanical fashion, without any knowledge of lust, hope, grief, or anger.

Reese's character (Jennifer) quickly turns to her old ways, and promptly takes her 'boyfriend' (Paul Walker of The Fast and the Furious fame) to lovers lane. She shows him the joys of sex, at which point, the exodus from Eden begins. Shortly after Paul drops Reese off at home, he sees a single red rose. By red, I mean this is the only non black and white thing in Pleasantville. From here on the movie reaches out and grabs you. It turns into a cascading affect of self discovery, both good and bad for the citizens of Smallville. Initially all of the high school kids enter onto this path, as glimpses here and there of pink bubble gum, neon signs at the local hang out/diner, rose red lips, and curiosity about the previously unknown world outside of Pleasantville. The Diner and Lovers lane become a place of color in a black and white world with many allegories to The Garden of Eden.

They discover things like love, lust, wonder about the world around them. This is where I disagree with many of the reviews here. This is a movie about passion. You have to look beyond the first and most obvious things that curious teenagers do. The changes in the children begin to happen with the parents. Suddenly dinner isn't cooked and ready at 6. A wife burns her husband's shirt with a iron because she was daydreaming. They see rain and rainbows in Technicolor for the first time, and a tree in front of the Parkers' household bursts into flame as the mother (Joan Allen) pleasures herself in the bathroom (with a little instruction from Reese Witherspoon on the facts of life). These scenes are all tastefully done.

From here the film takes a turn into the darker side of human emotion. Soon, the 'coloreds' are drawing attention to the fact that things are changing in Pleasantville. Signs stating that no coloreds are allowed start appearing on Main Street while the coloreds continue to explore themselves and the world around them. Angry mobs begin to form, trying to stamp out any sign of change. As each person discovers passion in some form (whether hate, love, lust, bigotry, grief, regret), they turn into coloreds who then initially hide in the local soda shop, desperate to escape the angry mobs outside. A new city ordinance is passed declaring what music is acceptable, and what colors are safe (as long as they are a shade of gray).

Jeff Daniels also shines here as the local Diner owner. He finds himself attracted to Miss Parker, who in turn finds herself drawn to him even though her character is 'happily' married. Daniels also finds he has a passion for art. He goes from a mechanical shop keeper to a person in love, who also stands defiant with Tobey Maguire in painting a naked mural showing Miss Parker. This sets off a riot, and ends with the Diner being trashed and a bonfire culminating in a book burning. Some of these moments have you sitting with a lump in our throat from the raw emotion the visuals and the music evoke from this film.

Suffice it to say; this is one of the finest and most original films I've ever seen, and certainly not to be missed. For those that think this is an attack on moral values, you have missed the point. This is not about lust, or promiscuity. It simply shows that were are all human. We make mistakes. We love. We live. As a result, we have passions of which sometimes you cannot control.