Reviews

The artistry and tightly crafted script are amazingly executed in this episode. I love it when IM starts talking about "controversy," and there's a lot of things that are just so illuminating--for those who care and have the eyes to see it.

Yes, it requires a bit of a refined pallette to appreciate it. That's the way it is folks. Sometimes that's life.

Look, it's like such an ornate, beautiful, layered episode like a matroyshka doll. It just keeps giving and giving. I APPRECIATE this episode in the way that I might appreciate a 15 minute walk through a baroque era house, admiring the finely crafted wood, the ornate decorations, the furniture, the stairs--but it's not home.

It's just kind of not entertaining I guess (which is weird for IM, can't think of any other films of his I wasn't interested in, and I've seen Gods and Monsters). At least not the way I normally like Family Guy. Pointedly no cutaways--like, conspicuously. I like cutaways, they make me laugh. I didn't turn on family guy to see an arts and entertainment level theater production. I do however believe this could be a part of art history and theater classes 500 years from now.

This is a video DIY story about 4 (5 at a few points--the 5th dude comes & goes) gamers sitting around and alternates to the fantasy scenario they are role playing. This was done on a shoestring budget by hobbyists, and I have adjusted my critical-o-meter accordingly.

It's pretty funny, and that's the point, so overall it's successful. They seem to have the whole role playing satire thing down-pat. I can't believe how true to life it is with the horrid, wretched abuse the players try to get away with... though I think this was beside the point.

It starts off a bit slow and then picks up. The whole thing is only 45 minutes long. I really liked the way what happened at the table bled into the fantasy setting. I won't give away any of the funny parts, of which there are plenty, in case anyone wants to see it.

The gamer stereotypes, par for the course I suppose, could easily be construed as tired and cliché if you were the type to get hung up on this sort of thing. I think that if you were pathetic enough to actually fit any of these molds, you deserve to be offended by this movie anyway.

One other downfall: you won't get it at all if you're not a gamer, or at least have a working knowledge of the whole concept.

Billed as a horror movie, this film really fails to instill any sense of dread whatsoever. It's characters are unlikable and dopey, it's villains are unhateable and nondescript. The plot is questionable, linear, and leaves me feeling unsatisfied and bored.

The story is very basic, which could work given the right director, but evidently Alexandre Aja is not the man for this job. First of all, the film starts with stock/public domain footage. Many of you might not care, but this is a HUGE no-no in my book. He did a neat tie-in later, but it was still a clear case of inept filmmaking in need of burning up some screen time.

The formula is all too familiar. Some stupid white tourists are out lost on the desert, and upon finding a guy running a gas station whom they trust implicitly, are given instructions to "take a shortcut" that will get them to their destination faster. It's almost not worth bothering to type it out, but they are in fact being led to their doom.

The characters are total douchebags. I think we're supposed to like the women a bit more, but after all, they did choose these men for their S.O.'s. I did like the young teenage brother, but other than that, I think they all sucked. Dad dies first, but sadly the other main douchebag never dies. At some point, in fact, we are supposed to believe that he becomes a hero, but the transition never happens. He's just a piece of garbage, then suddenly he's being a hero. It's clear what motivated him to this 180 degree personality shift, but it's presentation is clunky and the audience is expected to accept it without question.

So about that neat tie-in. It earned the film a few dubious points w/me. The final showdown, which I was anxious to get to as it meant the film's end, took place in a cool re-creation of those nuclear test towns, complete with mannequins and 1950's TV broadcasts. While not earning the film the right to include public domain footage downloaded from prelinger, it at least (FINALLY) created some sense of creepiness. Unfortunately it was too little too late.

The 1974 Francis Ford Coppela drama/mystery thriller "The Conversation" was lacking in several respects, which I think you'll agree are all inexcusable and, should you decide to watch this movie, will leave you feeling alone and soulless.

First off, it's clearly a rip-off of 1998's Enemy of the State. Yes, I know it came roughly 25 years earlier, but I am convinced they perfected time travel technology and actually stole the idea from Tony Scott. I mean he came up with Final Destination, Gladiator, and Spy Game. How cool is that! Jack Black warned Tony Scott when he made Enemy of the State that the creation of the movie would cause a rift in time, and all of existence in the universe would be micturated down the drain. Case in point: Soul Plane.

Speaking of which, The Conversation is conspicuously Jack Black-less. I think any sane person's review of any movie should have the category of "Jack Black presence to screen ratio", which should factor heavily into the final score for any movie, including those which were made before his birth. Take for instance The Jackal, which was no Shallow Hal, mind you, but made big gains for the best and most pornographic Jack Black death scene ever.

FFC's The Conversation is rife with problems and errors. Firstly, long, cumbersome periods of character development. You'll notice that Enemy of the State solved this problem by leaving the third dimension out of the characters--this helped save time and budget money for explosions. Which brings me to my next gripe: no explosions in The Conversation. Enemy of the State weighs in with a lofty dozen or so explosion, "BLOWING" The Conversation away in this category. Pun intended! Finally, there is no murdering in the Conversation until a mind-numbing two hours into the movie. Enemy of the State also wins in this category, getting to the murder straightaway.

I think that Francis Ford Coppela could really learn a lot from Tony Scott about how a good movie should be made. His lack of modern technology has made his movie look sooo 70's, man. As far as The Conversation is concerned, I would say watch it only if you are not interested in seeing a movie riding on a hollow wave of special effects and Hollywood hype. Of course it goes without saying that everyone is only interested in that.

;-)

After reading many reviews, I've come to the conclusion that this film has very few if any objective reviews. I'm surprised at the number of reviewers that absolutely hated this movie, I suspect that at least some of them were expecting a sci-fi movie and not a horror movie, or were overly affected by the faux gore and edited the rest of the film out of their minds.

I first watched this film in 1998 on pay-per-view shortly after its theatrical run. It's a mostly solid psychological terror flick with a great cast, but at the end it really falls flat.

The buildup of dread is exquisitely crafted for a while, as the trapped characters begin seeing illusions of their worst fears come to life. One entranced character almost dies during these opening sequences, though it seems as if the Hellish presence of the ship is just toying with them at first.

These sequences all work great. I've not felt such film-induced dread in a while, since most slasher/startle flicks fail in every way to truly scare me. However, when they find out that the old crew slaughtered one another it starts to get really shlockey.

Act 3 of this movie unfortunately is really a let-down. They drop the whole psychological terror/illusions of the mind motif in favor of a Doom 2 style showdown. Sam Neil becomes Satan, and Lawrence Fishburn beats him up with a CO2 scrubber. Satan seems more upset about the ship blowing up then I would have expected, but what do I know.

If the dread buildup would have continued, I could easily give this film 10 stars, but the last 20 minutes are just shlock.

I bought this film completely by accident thinking it was an educational piece on how to tell stories. Turns out it was a film called "storytelling." As it turns out, it was an educational piece on how to tell stories.

The movie is divided into two completely different and (more or less) unrelated stories. This is the only thing that kept me from giving it 10 stars, and in most cases, this faux pas (in my humble opinion) kills a film. But Todd Solondz pulls it off! This film uses characterful exaggerations to make its point throughout. The characters' emotional development in both stories is meaningful and their relationships are complex. This is particularly true of the second story, which takes its time and is at once candid and ridiculous. If you are on the fence about this movie, I think the one thing I can say that might change your mind about checking it out would have to be that it faces the truth and faces American issues as they are.

Oh, and John Goodman is the man.

The Player is a 1992 satire on the indifference and uncaring attitude of Hollywood Bigwigs, and a blackmail mystery, or something--nobody knows for sure. This movie's plot is like Bigfoot. Vague, sketchy information of possible plot sightings have been reported by fringe groups and kooks.

The story goes something like this: Anyway, all I can say about this movie is that I want my two hours and four minutes back. I think I'd rather be sitting in an ancient art history class looking at slides of overweight stone cave goddess sculptures with giant mammaries.

The producers' mission statement on this movie was an obvious formula for an enduring, ingenious, classic film: Under no circumstances will the cinematographer point their camera at a person who is acting! Eye contact? Overrated! Why build sets when we can just make the movie hanging around the office! Tension? Story? Why bother! My Hollywood friends are here! There was, what, about eight or nine minutes, tops, of movie here. The remaining hour and fifty four minutes were just camera people running around Hollywood flailing about madly screaming in high-pitched voices, "look at me! Look at me! I've got a camera and I'm shooting celebs!" And yes, they were definitely flailing about madly and screaming in high-pitched voices. It's the only logical explanation.

This movie wasn't a "who's who" so much as a "so what." Among the diarrhea of cameos: Whoopi Goldberg plays a tampon-flinging cop on the loose, with Lyle Lovett as her canny but streetwise poster child for hairstyles gone bad. Cher showed up--I figure they must have paid her in drugs and plastic surgery. And what parade of Hollywood garbage is complete without Burt Reynolds slamming his fat ugly face onto the screen? Even the nudity managed to suck. Every nude woman on the screen was no bigger than a couple half-aspirins on a cutting board. Worst of all, this movie casts Tim Robbins, an actor I used to like, in a whole new light for me.

And here's what I'm told is so delightful about this movie: it's chock-full of Hollywood insider references and jokes. I caught the ones that I caught, and then this movie's advocates tried plaintively to convince me that I was being let in on some really privileged information when I was told the rest. It almost goes without saying, but it just comes off as grossly pretentious.

And, as a sure sign that the apocalypse draws nigh, as this movie points out, there were about 4,166 other story ideas that got thrown out so that this movie could be made.

I personally would rather have watched Habeus Corpus.

This film hasn't aged a minute.

It's an incredible exploration of the human psyche and spirit, to be sure, but it's also a love story. The love story is between Truman Burbank and his true self. In his trueness to himself, he cannot accept this reality as presented by Christof. When he starts trying to escape it, things and people start to look more transparent, and he begins to see illusions everywhere.

It all starts with a stage light dropping out of the sky onto the street. Whoops! As he is given more and more clues, he starts trying new unpredictable things and observing the towns response. This escalates and it becomes truly fascinating.

His obsession with Lauren, or Sylvia as it were, -is- just a little creepy, yes, but just how anyone would respond to being put in this situation is completely up for debate. Just what is the "correct" way to respond to this situation anyway? Remember he was born into it. This is his whole life.

Christof's response to his escape attempt is indicative of his mindset: Truman is a Christof production--that is, Christof owns him. There was never any doubt that Truman's spirit would overcome everything that'd been programmed into him, because this is the story of a man who refuses to be a product. To be owned. To be a slave. "You don't have cameras in my mind!"

I saw this for the first time when it came out, and it has remained one of my favorite movies of all time. I found the ending to be stunning, watching this illusion fall like a house of cards is almost spiritual. There are no fancy special effects (other than the aerial view of the Truman's set; any other effects are quite transparent,) no out of control self-indulgent fanciness, no blockbusterism present at all. Merely solid craft work and an incredibly well done story.

That's all it needs. If you haven't already, see it.

Other than the fact that his presentation of himself as the "Average Guy on the Street" is a little questionable and VERY staged, Roger & Me has a major, major problem if Moore wants it to be taken as a factual documentary. The chronology of the events has been changed.

The concept of cause-and-effect is crucial to Roger & Me. One of the defining criteria of a documentary film is the absence of obviously fictional elements. Don't create events, dialog, costumes--and don't manipulate chronology. But that's exactly what he did. When Flint started hemorrhaging jobs, the city did not just stand by and do nothing, they tried to recreate the economy by building the Water Street pavilion, the hotel, and autoworld, attempting to raise tourism money. In the movie, the reverend comes to town for $20k to pray away unemployment, Reagan shows up and his advice is basically to move (wearing a UAW jacket--totally inappropriate for him). Now when Moore comes back to Flint, it's 1986 when the BIG layoffs are happening. It's been intermittent up to this point.

In the film these events are presented as a response to the massive layoffs that began in 1986, but Reagan actually came in 1980, the evangelist in 1982, and the tourism plan was in 1985. This is a huge problem for the film and basically disqualifies it as a real documentary because these visits/plans were not a result of the BIG layoffs.

These are well-documented, look around a bit, see what you can find. The hotel and Autoworld also went bankrupt before or early on in the layoff cycle, even though they are presented very late in the film.

Along the vein of the chronology problem, notice that Moore wants to bring Roger Smith to Flint to see the devastation. The film explains that GM, the richest corporation in the world, closed 11 North American plants. Work went to Mexico. With increased profits, money goes to shareholders. They then invest in high tech weaponry. Before this, they were the most profitable corporation in the history of mankind, but this decision is made to increase the profit margin further (needlessly, the film asserts).

So here's my point about that paragraph. They spend 28 seconds on these highly important facts. Now notice that they spend about 5-10 minutes on Miss America, and another 5 or so minutes on the crazy rabbit lady, simply because people will get a kick out of that stuff. That's also a big part of what I'm talking about. How can you discuss complex global economics in 28 seconds? Left out are the facts that there was a significant recession at the time, lots of unemployment, and lots of people buying imports which were cheaper and more efficient with the gas crisis. In order for plants to close, contracts had to be dissolved and the UAW played a huge role in this. This is pertinent information that people need to know if they are to be educated on this subject. Yet Michael Moore is harder on Miss America than on the UAW. He displays some condescension and ambush journalism tactics like with the wealthy old ladies at the golf course.

You see, I'm not saying he's lying, I'm saying he's twisting and distorting. The whole thing is just an entertaining film designed to fill theater seats. It's not pure documentary.

And like I said, Michael Moore is not just an average blue-collar "one-of-the-guys" type of guy, he's a media giant (admittedly this was not AS true in 1989, but he was still big). Putting on the baseball cap and jeans, not lighting anything, and walking in the front door of GM to try to get an interview with Roger Smith is totally absurd. They were very conscious decisions and very trite ways to get some entertaining footage.

Even if you can somehow dismiss those problems with Roger & Me, I have one that's a lot harder to deal with. This film was made on bad faith. He wants to present himself as the intrepid "Joe Plainfolks" going on a noble quest to bring Smith to Flint and force him to own up to the consequences of his decision. This goal was abandoned in favor of making a comedy. Whatever the serious, human, and compelling issues motivated Roger & Me were thrown out the window in favor of making a series of SNL skits.

Apparently Roger & Me is not meant to be seen as pure documentary, but as advocacy and partisan journalism, it's just that it's not marketed that way. Sadly, and this is coming from someone who mostly agrees with Moore's opinions, I have to call 'BS' on this film.

The more I think about Zeitgeist, the more I realize how ironic it is; Zeitgeist is more a symptom (and a fairly malignant one) of its subject matter than an antidote. The entire documentary purports to be inviting you to open your mind and educate yourself, yet when you do so all you find out is how hypocritical Zeitgeist is. So... we don't want to be unkind or cause hurt feelings, but we want to be academically correct. Yes, sir.

Here are just a few factual errors; this is by no means extensive.

The Crux was indeed visible from the Mediterranean 2000 years ago (in modern day it is only visible from the southern hemisphere), but it was not called the Southern Cross. It was referred to as Centaurus and was part of a larger constellation. Only the Australians referred to it as Southern Cross, and it's impossible that Australia's indigenous peoples were in contact with the people of the Mediterranean at this point in history.

Egyptian mythology simply cannot be distilled down to a bulleted list of character traits about two of its myriad of Gods. If you bother to educate yourself about Egyptian mythology, you will quickly realize that all of their gods traded roles and changed from dynasty to dynasty, pharaoh to pharaoh. Throughout Egypt's existence, Set's role was revised repeatedly. In fact, he was occasionally HELPFUL to Horus--he ferried Re through the underworld every night! This is among the most basic and simple facts about ancient Egypt and it blows my mind that Zeitgeist got it THAT wrong.

The Egyptians did not have a concept of good and evil as you & I understand it. The good and evil that we commonly understand were introduced to the world by the Judean philosophy. Applying modern ideas of good and evil to ancient pre- Judean cultures is folly.

But even more fundamentally, you simply can't use Egyptian history as a factual litmus test for ANYTHING, let alone Christianity. All their records dissolved when the papyrus disintegrated. Those hieroglyphs that represent what we know of their history are all spun political speech--you might think of it as the Fox News of the ancient Egyptian world. Egypt's legacy is its architecture and art, NOT its facts! Archaeologists have long since recognized this shortcoming and that we will never know the day-to-day common stories of Egypt and thus a "true" or "real" representation of its culture and people. Imagine 3000 years from now investigators attempting to piece together our heritage solely from stories on Fox News, and you start to get the picture.

Horus was indeed born on December 25th--but Horus dies and is reborn the other 364 days of the year, too. He represents the sun. HELLO? MCFLY? The laundry list of other supposed deities that were all born on December 25th is glazed over pretty fast. Why, pray tell, have I never heard this anywhere but Zeitgeist, even as a curiosity? It's... questionable, to put it politely... that this is the only source of this information. Its justification--it was stricken from the record by people who didn't want you to know about it. (I.e.... "The devil did it.")

The whole conspiratorial assumptions the film makes about Christianity inheriting the traits of Egyptian religion is pretty uneducated, and is a typical attitude of non- Christians/non-Jews. This was not a conspiracy. It was a deliberate, visible, calculated PR war between Judaism and ancient Egypt. When God blotted out the sun, for instance, it didn't just happen to be a random attempt to scare Egyptians. It was a direct, overt refutation of Ra himself. Any traits that first-gen Judaism took from Egypt was an overt assertion of its superiority. The same can idea can be applied to the pagan astrological attributes that Christianity inherited. It's not a conspiracy. For example, Easter and Christmas both occur on Pagan holidays, something the ancient Roman Catholic church did to appease pagans and make the conversion to Christianity a bit smoother (it is most likely that Jesus was actually born in April.)

Zeitgeist's portrayal of Christians burning their wallets (?) because of their interpretation of Revelation is not representative of the whole picture; those individuals are in the minority--but yeah it's out there. It is also personally offensive.

Feel free to look up my review on Loose Change, and all that business applies to the second portion of the film. I have no comments on the third portion of the film, which may or may not be accurate for all I know. I do not consider myself educated in that subject matter.

Additionally, I feel confident in saying Carl Sagan would not have approved of being included in this documentary, considering how wrong its astronomy was. And it's disrespectful to do so after he's no longer around to have any say about it.

But outside of the nitpicks, this film is a bad faith film. It's inviting us, the audience, into this world of privileged information that nobody else in the world has. If Zeitgeist does what it sets out to do in spirit, you should be able to see through this film.

Taking this film strictly as entertainment, it's actually quite amusing and a worthy watch. It is well crafted and nicely produced. The narrator (who I'm going to assume is also the editor) does not sound like a pimply-faced 14 year old, unlike Loose Change. But it should not be interpreted as documentary. Conspiracy documentaries are really coming out of the woodwork these days as a voice of their own, and while I encourage criticism and questioning, I encourage knowing what the hell you're talking about even more. I give this film a few dubious points for being among the first of its kind and amusing--but that's all I can bring myself to award it with.

Garbage.

But seriously, why even bother. I'm not so much angry with Hollywood as I am disappointed with the American movie-going public. Hollywood thinks we're gullible jackasses and they're right.

Rise of the Silver Surfer is high in the running as absolute epitome of Hollywood complacency and mediocrity, in close competition with Eragon, Snakes on a Plane, and Meet the Spartans. There's something mystically worse about a film that's so profoundly mediocre as ROTSS as opposed to "so-brain-gratingly-bad-it's-good," as was the case with your Space Mutinies or your Manoses or your Three Men And A Babieses.

How anyone can consider this crap entertaining enough to warrant even so much as a rental, hell, to even warrant 100 minutes of their life, is beyond my comprehension. After Kill Bill? After Die Hard? After X-Men? After Sin City? After 300? Are you serious? How much more obvious could it get that the director--hell, everybody involved, even Stan Lee himself--doesn't even care? Aren't you insulted? Do YOU care? I'm to the point that I no longer hate Hollywood for producing garbage of this ilk. I now am much more disappointed with you, the viewing public.

Let me tell you something, straight up. If you don't care about finding that special something that, if not transcendent of mere entertainment is at LEAST crafted by people who give a damn, you don't love movies. You're a poser. Period. This unending deluge of Hollywood tripe is your fault, not theirs. Get out of my playground and stay out.

So cast your no votes and pat yourself on the back. You'll have forgotten all about this little piece of disposable kitsch before you know it, but somewhere inside yourself, subconsciously, will remain the harsh truth. Get real or get lost.

I exclude 0-15 year olds from this tongue lashing. Around 16 or so, you should have enough figured out to know better.

This criminally underrated film, released in 1968 as the last "hurrah" for the Monkees, was intended to be end of the idea of the Monkees. Their career was on a rapid, stupefying decline. What they created was an epic acid trip, a bitter criticism of mass media and pop culture, and a surreal deconstruction of the IDEA of The Monkees--thus alienating the fans of the original show, and with the baggage inherent in BEING the Monkees, the young adult philosopher & artist crowd were unlikely to take interest. With a shoestring budget and poor marketing, it failed utterly in the box office. I was first turned on to this film by a friend of mine almost 10 years ago and it has yet to stop fascinating me.

This film is many things, and the story surrounding it is as important as its content. As you peel away its layers, it reveals more and more to you. Some of the puzzle pieces actually require some research, and I have no doubt that there is more to be understood about this film than what I currently know of.

On the most superficial surface layer, it appears to just be The Monkees being silly with significant format changes from the show. Presented are a series of disconnected sketches that could plausibly have been part of the serial, although edgier. It is technically an extended Monkees episode--gag driven sketch comedy, absurd, and inflatable.

However, when you deflate the film you are surprised to find that, unlike the TV show, it actually is not empty, and you get to the essence of what this film actually is. The Monkees were, in the film's own words, "a manufactured image with no philosophies," its artistic choices were dictated by corporate committee, and, legions of misguided Monkey-haters to the contrary, they had incredible talent. For some reason, perhaps lack of education, people projected this frustration on to the four guys themselves and mocked them mercilessly, which is a fundamental misunderstanding of media culture. Yes, the Monkees project is manufactured. The four individuals themselves, however, were innocent pawns.

I have a difficult time understanding why people never got that; continue to not get it.

Knowing this was their last hurrah, they recklessly deconstructed their own image. So here we have this motif of a self-aware fictional band put through manufactured situations attempting to become real. The underlying desire to be legitimate colors everything in this film. It is absolutely futile. Even if corporate media would allow it, the public wouldn't. Soon they are trying to break out, tearing up costumes, breaking the fourth wall, walking off set, waking up dead extras, any rule of cinema you can think of was broken. They individually tried, in futility, to break from character. Davie tries in vein to become a boxer, but it's just a publicity stunt. Mickey Dolenz tears off the fake arrows and kicks over the fake set to no avail. Peter's the dummy. He's always the dummy. Look through the metaphor. As human beings, artists, they were trying to break free from the image that they themselves were fictitious. They set out to accomplish this with the mentality that it was hopeless, I suspect. They get so desperate they actually start committing acts of war (blowing up the Coke machine, a simple but effective statement about corporate sponsorship), murder, and finally they commit suicide by jumping off a bridge. Even then it is not enough for them to break free of the image that's been created for them. Their deaths were just another scene for the film, and they are simply put in a tank and hauled off to storage for the next production.

Another layer to this film concerns some of its symbolism. The all-encompassing box represented their confinement both by pop culture and by their hateful director who forced them to break/lunch in a tiny room not unlike the Head box. They feel like marionettes being made to dance for their puppeteer's pleasure, forced to carry on this charade. This is why the only place in the film free will is discussed or even considered is in the box.

The final example I'll bring up--the list goes on but possibly the most telling, is the appearance of industry people in the film. If the party is watched frame by frame, you can see the director showing himself holding the camera in the mirror. And Victor Mature appears as a Godlike figure towering over the four, kicking them around. The sequences that include Head's staff in these contexts remove any doubt as to what this film is really all about.

They knew there was no chance whatsoever of this film ever receiving the recognition it deserved, and 40 years later that appears to still be true. But this mentality was huge to the underlying meaning behind this film, and what they actually were able to do with it. The Monkees at some point ceased to feel like people and started to feel like products. This film is an expression of the bitterness and resent created by the situation they were forced into and the people that forced them into it, and in a sense a triumph that their true selves finally came through and real art was created--against the most impossible of odds. In the end, real expression was accomplished and the Monkees project matured.

What the whole Monkees project, capped off with this film, accomplished, belongs with Andy Warhol and his multicolored photocopied Marilyn Monroes, and any number of likeminded self-indulgent postmodern/pop culture deconstructionist artists forced down the throat of every art student since 1970.

There is no other pop group before or since that could have created such a scathing, incisive criticism of media and popular culture. The factors that came together to create this situation, and subsequently, "Head," are completely unique and I highly doubt they would ever happen again.

Hey hey, they're The Monkees.

Worthy film, no doubt. A dying race of extraterrestrial omnipotent beings, called "The Strangers," abduct some human beings. They entrap them in an inescapable city that ultimately has no exits and conduct experiments on them, inhabiting the bodies of the dead to move freely among the humans. Eventually, they find what they are looking for. The film begins thusly.

Its "film noir but in color" style is executed to near perfect effect. I loved the various self-referential and early-gangster-film-referential tidbits. They're most obvious whenever May is on screen, but they're present almost throughout.

There are those who get confused watching this and get frustrated that they are so confused by it. It is intentional--you are watching this mostly from John Murdoch's perspective. John is starting out with a blank slate. In fact, his naked stumbling entrance into the story from the bathtub is arguably a metaphorical birth. Try giving it two or three viewings.

The story could definitely be called an odyssey into the human condition. As John makes his way through the city, trying to piece together who he is, he is dogged at every turn by The Strangers.

Eventually John learns a bit too much--as did detective Wolensky. The city is in fact, a complete fabrication created by the strangers in the hopes of overcoming their own mortality. They want to find the human soul and harvest it to overcome extinction. And find the human soul they do.

It's only weak point, to me, is the over-the-top melodrama. It serves its purpose and feeds the eerie atmosphere of the story, and if you can accept it, it probably won't cause any problems for you. But looking at it objectively I don't think I could argue against it being a downright hokey film. This really comes to a head at the climax of the film, which was, while strong, the film's weakest point. If you can't accept the melodrama, you may come away frustrated.

I definitely feel this one, though. It was underrated and largely overlooked. I recommend giving it a try.

A basic gremlins ripoff, this film is trying and failing one to be of those "so bad it's good" films. It's not. At all. It's just plain bad. Eye-bleedingly bad.

The movie hangs around an abandoned warehouse and shows an old man/security guard go through a couple employees and end up hiring a whiny do-nothing, or something. Then some things happen, some plush toys are bandied about the screen, then some other things happen. A guy catches on fire, and then some more things happen, end credits.

The puppets are not one one hundredth as scary as the acting and direction. The creatures are cute little plush toys that get thrust up against the "actors" and wiggled to and fro. The human beings at which the camera is pointed try plaintively to convince us that something scary is happening. The film's attitude towards women (or all human beings for that matter) is beyond reprehensible. Every last character is suicide-inducingly annoying. Every single line of dialog is either wooden or whiny, or both.

I could go on, but in the immortal words of Todd Barry, "This is like shooting fish in a barrel. No, it's like looking at fish in a barrel. No... it's like BEING SOMEWHERE NEAR A BARREL."

In short, this film is a train wreck. You don't want to stare but you can't look away. It just sinks lower and lower and you're so stunned and amazed, you want to see how the next 5 minutes can suck worse than the previous five.

There are not, in fact, more than 2 consecutive frames that don't induce cringes.

Now, it's been brought up that this film actually competes with Manos for "worst film in history," or at least MST history, but it is noteworthy that this film technically has a plot. Technically.

My recommendation: view with Mike & the Bots. Only way to stay sane through this one. (Even they try to escape... you'll love it.) For a great chuckle, search through the IMDb reviews and sort by "Loved it."

Which came first? The chicken or the egg? Stephen Hawking is an astrophysicist and quantum mechanic and has contributed numerous works now seminal to theories on the origins of the universe. He is widely regarded a genius; he considers this to be balderdash. Hawking himself has said, "They needed somebody to fill the role model of disabled genius. At least I'm disabled."

I hope this film didn't leave any hardcore physicist type behinds when it actually presented the story of Hawking as a person and not an educational lecture on the specifics of quantum mechanics; of course this was never the goal of the film. It's about Hawking. Not QM.

The film is not a technical masterpiece: basic documentary techniques are used. Few to no frills. Talking heads, basic photograph slideshows, b-roll, and a tiny, tiny handful of mood shots. The filmmakers have called attention to the edits on the interviews by leaving a split second of blackspace between the cuts. I consider this a sign of respect to the audience's intelligence. (That comment might not make much sense unless you've cut interviews).

The Philip Glass soundtrack is beautiful and perfect. It is, if anything, too minimal... but layering drama strings over the telling of these stories too much would probably be trite. It's not outside the realm of possibility, in my mind, that more soundtracking of the interviews might have been attempted and it was decided that it was cheapening the film.

I kind of suspect--and this is completely reckless, baseless speculation; I could be completely wrong on this--his real question is not "how" or "when" did the universe begin... but "WHY" did the universe begin--that is, if it "began" at all. I might regret going out on that limb and have to retract the statement, but it's just this feeling I'm starting to get having familiarized myself with his works and now, thanks to this film, a glimpse of who he is as a person.

To me, Hawking's true genius lies mostly in his ability to give the ideas of quantum mechanics to everyone. This film is amazing and uplifting, and Hawking is triumphant on many levels.

Darren Aronofsky's first feature, Pi, is an overly ambitious undertaking suffering fatally from a number of different problems. Pi is more a psychological character portrait than anything--it fails as a thriller. The narrative overall is barely enough to keep me interested--and has little to no replay value for me.

Max, a paranoid mathematician, is searching for a numerical formula that will express all the patterns of life and seeks to 'crack the code' of the universe. It is, in so many words, a quest for the Ark of the Covenant. It is not impossible to do this film, I don't think, but I do think Pi has failed.

I did enjoy the style and felt it worked well. Stark lighting, manic cuts and camera operation, and surreal audio all add to the psycho paranoia that could have made this a great movie. It doesn't have a whole lot of technical flaws, in fact outside of the acting probably none.

But the flaws are dealbreakers. The film's Achilles's heel is definitely its delusions of grandeur. Perhaps I've misinterpreted something--but the film seems to think its correct?! The Grand Unifying Theory of Everything? Nobody knows (yet), but I promise you it is not an inexplicable 216 digit integer. You are thinly veiling mysticism and numerology as science. The easiest way to solve this problem in the context of Pi, drop the bubblegum pop pseudoscience and, if you want to pretend that he found the correct Grand Unifying Theory of Everything, just leave it to the imagination. It should have been a complete MacGuffin. Or, make it clearer that Max is just plain bonkers. The film seems to believe its own drivel. Make it about Max's descent into insanity, and you've got a potentially good story. It may be successfully arguable that the film doesn't believe itself and is trying to portray Max as insane, but that's looking like a stretch from where I stand.

The next thing is the bad acting from the supporting cast. Everything was at least working for me until the conspirators' trap was sprung, at which point I had to start wondering, "Are you kidding?" Overall my suspension of disbelief just fell like a house of cards at this point. Please note that I do however feel that Sean Gullette's performance was quite convincing and worked well throughout.

And finally, I didn't care for the soundtrack. It hasn't aged as well as other successful electronica soundtracks of its day. Overall I have to describe Pi as being both self-righteous and pretentious.

Yes, Hackers rests comfortably on a throne of mediocrity. Its time and place etched into the American cultural psyche: 1995. The Information Superhighway was making its way into the lexicon, digital graphics were revolutionizing film-making (specifically compositing, and very soon outright fabrication would be feasible [3D]), and the media started talking about how computers would eventually replace TV's.

And riding this wave of media buzzwords, cultural trend, and just plain mythology–yes, some of this film is quite simply false–was the film Hackers. A veritable "magic carpet ride" into the a cultural mythology that vaguely resembled the reality of the information age. This film was very topical and current; watching this is partially like opening a time capsule from 1995. In fact, if there are any -actual- time capsules from 1995 to be opened in 2045 (or whatever), I hope they include this film. They probably should include a projector too, and an explanation of what celluloid is and how to thread it... but I digress.

But, I have to look at it on its own merit.

So, here are the cons: The characters are one-dimensional and cliché–and I mean, bad. It's style hasn't aged particularly well–like I said it was riding a cultural wave that partially imaginary. Its villain is dopey and unhateable. Its plot is strangely slow. You would expect the film to move faster than it does–it really doesn't get started until about 30 minutes in. Most of what it is doing before then is showboating and character development; however as I said the characters are horrifyingly clichéd and watching them develop narratively was uninteresting. Factual errors galore. They've been picked apart down to the letter, no need to rehash. Ubiquitous montage and b- roll sequences to burn screen time–and every last one of them tacky as all hell.

Here are the pros: It captured the imagination of a nation at the time and, to some extent, contributed to the "nerds are cool" attitude. I personally would have been thrilled to grow up when nerds were cool–but I'm happy to take a few arse-kickings for the team. It has a definite spunkiness to it and the young characters represent essentially the new (at the time) techno rebels. The plot is relatively solid, once it gets going. And, it's fun. It may not be great, but it's fun.

The soundtrack is a slightly mixed bag, it has a few atrocities but is mostly solid (UNDERWORLD).

12 years later, this film is definitely showing its age. It certainly is not terrible, and has some good qualities to it. But it certainly is no masterpiece. You can choose to take the bad with the good and enjoy it, or you can choose not to suspend your disbelief and get irritated with it.