Change Your Image
Downtown242
Reviews
Gomorra (2008)
yawn
After reading all the praise heaped on this movie, I expected something interesting. What I got instead was a couple hours of following around people while they do rather boring things. I didn't really think it was possible to make organized crime seem so banal. Perhaps the movie might have benefited from a few less characters. There was never really a reason to care about any of the people in this film. There was no real story to follow. There was no climax to the movie. It was all pretty much just a flat line. I think all of that stems from a complete lack of focus. Because it jumps from one character to the next, there is no cohesive plot. Rather we just get several stories that don't really leave us with anything. We see people being shot at, buying drugs, beaten up, but the audience is kept at such a distance from the action that it never really has an impact.
Predators (2010)
Fails to impress
There was very little about the movie that would justify its high ratings. The acting was not good, but that is OK in an action film. The only problem was that the action didn't impress much either. There were a few parts that were passable. Mostly I was just baffled by the poor writing. They piece together what has happened to them immediately, even though it is a completely unthinkable circumstance. They just ask each other questions and for no reason one of them always has it all figured out.
All of the problems would be forgiven if there were a character I liked or identified with. If the action wasn't fairly banal I would have forgiven it too. Nothing about the movie was enjoyable. I laughed out loud at how bad it was more than once in the theater. Save it for video.
White Wall (2010)
Good idea with bad acting and bad script
The movie is an interesting take on the whole post apocalyptic genre. It isn't anything new or particularly original, but it does deliver its own spin on a movie done a lot of times. I liked that the world wasn't such a ridiculous deviation from life prior to the disaster. The gangs weren't leather clad freaks like a Mad Max movie. People weren't all crazy and roaming around robbing each other. They had their normal jobs and lives. There was just an somewhat oppressive government trying to maintain control, and small cells of people rebelling against that system.
The movie looked good and had a decent idea, but the acting was very flat. Not one of the characters delivers a convincing performance. So none of the scenes have any emotional impact. This is probably due in large part to the stilted dialogue in the script. In the hands of a better write and director, I could see a big time Hollywood blockbuster. As it stands, it probably isn't worth much of your attention.
The Road (2009)
Not what I hoped for
The Road did deliver on some of what I hoped for. All of the burned out rubble and trash strewn roads looked very convincing. The destroyed and crumbling forests and the beaches littered with the remains of society were pretty incredible.
Unfortunately, the story matched the bleakness of the world every second of the movie. That would be fine if there were some kind of story arc. There was no real plot to speak of. There was no moment of levity and fun. There were two types of scenes in the movie. One of general boredom and malaise, and there was another of terror and panic. At the end of the movie you realize that there were really only two things that happen in the movie. They run from the cannibals, and they chase a thief. Both of those plot lines are resolved within a couple minutes.
There was absolutely no range of emotion. Viggo Mortensen (sorry if I misspelled that) was either worried or terrified. The child was either crying or complaining. The performance out of the kid was particularly disappointing. He looked about 10 years old, but he acted like he was 5. He sure wasn't very tough for someone raised after the apocalypse, who had presumably seen cannibals, corpses, and violence his whole life. There wasn't much connection or compassion with the main characters, because they didn't give us anything to relate to.
The last problem I had with the movie was what I couldn't forgive. The message was so feeble and insufficient. In a movie that bleak you expect something deep and probing about our existence. When you strip us down to the animal level and remove all the humanity who are we? We certainly don't get any answers or even ideas about that question. All we get is "carry the fire inside you" to survive. Seriously!? All that movie left me with was a vague feeling the people who killed themselves were right, and Viggo was a coward for not killing himself and the boy. That really isn't a feeling I enjoy getting from a movie.
Inglourious Basterds (2009)
Moments of brilliance but barely watchable
I went into this movie with high hopes, and I came out pretty disappointed. This movie was slow. If you are annoyed by pointless Tarantino dialog in movies like Reservoir Dogs (bickering about tips, or who has to be Mr Pink) prepare to be gritting your teeth 3/4 of the movie. About 5 minutes into the first scene I was squirming with boredom. this movie is all buildup with no payoff.
We wait for a good 2 minutes for a guy to come out of a dark corridor with a bat. We just stare at the tunnel while he thumps the bat against the wall. Presumably this is supposed to be suspenseful, but it just comes off as annoying. The first scene we know what the outcome is going to be, but we sit through about 5 extra minutes of pointless talking. I have no problem with a conversation if it furthers the plot, but every scene was way too long.
The problem seemed to be that Tarantino chose to follow the less interesting plots in the movie. This is not a Brad Pitt movie, and it certainly should have been. He was brilliant. I should add Christoph Waltz as Landa was great too. If the movie just stuck to them, and didn't bother to add the bizarre love story last minute between Shoshana and the black projectionist, or a painfully long bar game with characters useless to the plot, or waste so much time on the star of "A Nation's Pride"; it would have been far more enjoyable.
Also, for no reason Samuel L Jackson narrated 10 seconds of the movie. Then we never heard from him again. Mike Myers shows up for an unnecessary scene where they should have used someone else. It should have been an old English man, instead of Myers in silly looking make up. There was no reason to use a famous face for that inconsequential part. He didn't do anything special with that part. Knowing it was him only made it seem silly.
To be fair, this movie had a lot of moments that were funny. It had some violence that, while disgusting, paid off in a major way. The problem was the payoff was delayed so long, I was always just wanting it to be over by the time it happened. Don't buy into the hype. It was a movie, that could have been quite good and was instead ruined.
Gwoemul (2006)
Absurdly bad
After reading mountains of glowing reviews for this film, I thought I was in for something truly unique. It falls short in just about every way possible. The monster was interesting, but not particularly scary. The plot was full of holes and outright contradictions. The dialog was bizarre and slapstick at moments that required suspense and seriousness. There may be a great deal of cultural difference that is lost on an American, but it was simply ridiculous. The movie was never suspenseful and impossible to take seriously. I felt like I had been duped. The director must have been laughing at the people who sat through this garbage. Nothing about it was well put together, and it certainly deserves none of the accolades it has received.
I don't know that I have ever claimed a movie as the worst I have ever seen, but this movie may win that spot in my memory. I love the horror genre, both the good and the bad, but this movie was not scary or ironically funny. If you want scary watch the Texas Chainsaw Massacre. If you want funny, watch Dead Alive or Army of Darkness. There are better options out there, and I recommend using those. I think I would rather sit through Gigli or The Adventures of Pluto Nash on repeat a thousand times.