Reviews

The movie is worth seeing simply for the music. Tchaikovsky composed some of the most beautiful pieces I've ever heard. The use of the music in this animated film is gloriously woven into the storyline. The story is captivating with delightful characters. A great film to introduce children to joys of Tchaikovsky's music.

Spiderman is a superb comic book adaptation. Tobey Maguire is perfectly cast as Peter Parker and Willem Dafoe is brilliant as the Green Goblin. While some have criticized it's cartoonish fight sequences, I feel that they were wonderfully done in such a way that makes them slightly inconceivable. After all, this is a film based on a comic book that has a premise which is a little bit out there. Another great casting choice was that of James Franco as Harry. He and Willem Dafoe look so much like father and son it's astounding. Kirsten Dunst gives another great performance to her resume, I'm a big fan of hers. She plays her roles beautifully with great charm. She really is the girl next door, having looks that aren't spectacularily drop-dead gorgeous and a smile that will melt your heart. The plot is delightful, my favorite line of the film being "We'll meet again, Spiderman!" It's so deliciously cheesy and yet it works so well. All in all, I had fun at this film and that's exactly what it should be, an exciting night out that leaves you with a smile on your face.

The Mangler 2 is the epitome of the direct-to-video teen slasher movie. Let us begin with the paint-by-numbers characters. To start off, there is the "troubled teen"/"poor little rich girl" Jo Newton(Chelse Swain) who rebels against her father for not being home for dinner. Then we have the sexy Emily(Daniella Evangelista) who struts around in her half-top, later replaced by her bikini top. We'll throw in the hot chick's stoner/surfer boyfriend Cory Banks(Miles Meadows) and then his "token black guy" buddy, used mainly for comic relief, William(Dexter Ball). And, for good measure, why not the jock? Dan Channa(Will Sanderson) is naturally Emily's ex-boyfriend and, of course, he's interested in the rebellious "computer geek" Jo! This is just the teenagers. For the adult portion of the cast we have Headmaster Badian(Lance Henriksen) who is naturally a hard-ass prick there to fuel the teenagers' pissy moods. Next we have the Frech chef Lecours(Philippe Bergeron (I)) who hangs a Toronto flag in his room in a lame attempt at spelling out where he's from. To put the lid on the adult cast, we'll throw in the Pierce Brosnan look-alike bodyguard to Jo. Seems they have every stereotype covered in there, now all that needs to be done is a script. While the premise is interesting, the writer didn't pull off what he could have. This could have been a decent movie if they read up on computers, laid off a bit on the stereotypes and aimed a little bit higher. Most of the plot is utterly laughable and some events in the film shouldn't even be graced with a laugh. It is clearly set up for yet another sequel and I can only hope they watch this film a little more closely and take notes so as to not make the same mistakes again. All in all, it is a paint-by-numbers that has just been mangled a tad too far.

The Lord of the Rings is an amazing journey. It's characters, plot, scenery, emotion and power enthralled me. It is a life-changing epic that should be cherished by millions. It is rich and deep and wondrous. Words cannot describe the emotions felt within me regarding this movie. I had to recover at the end of the film as I felt it had entered into my bloodstream and taken over me.

Every character was perfectly cast. Viggo Mortensen's Aragorn was exactly as one should expect. Orlando Bloom's Legolas was astounding. Perhaps my favorite was Sean Astin as Samwise Gamgee. His determination and loving admiration of Elijah Wood's Frodo was touching and real. Though honestly, it is far too difficult to hone down on one single performance. Each actor exceeded my expectations by far.

The cinematography of a film has always been extremely important to me. I felt the cinematography was as close to perfection as it could get. The score was gorgeous. Costumes and make-up were wonderful. Every single piece of the movie seperate and together equalled one thing: Perfection.

This movie won't change your life. And if you're going to watch it, I suggest bad humor be your type of humor. It was funny. In a sick way. And you'll have to be able to accept that when going to see it. I can't stand it when people freak out over movies like that. Why go see it if it's so obviously NOT your type of movie? It's bad, sick humor, but it works. And if you can put up with that and still enjoy it, go see this. If you can't deal with it, DON'T. It's really that simple.