Reviews

Short answer is: no it wouldn't.

Spoilers ahead. You have been warned:

Two sentence plot summary: A unsuccessful musician gets thrown into an alternate universe (without any explanation of how and why) where various (pop-culture) things haven't happened but almost everything else is at is it today: Among them Harry Potter, Oasis, cigarettes and the Beatles. He recreates the Beatles' songs as his own, becomes famous and almost doesn't get his girl (but of course comes clean very publicly and gets her in the end).

So what do we have here? A whole bunch of problems.

The problem with the plot: It's lazy writing from A to Z. You know: The type of romantic comedy where the two fated lovers cannot confess their love for one another over a huge amount of time (and 2 hours of movie-time) because people are interrupting, phones are ringing and doors are knocked on. In the end the guy gives up fame to get his girl. Original? Not in the slightest. Even the universe-shifting at the start merely exists to string scenes together in which Beatles songs can be played (and then mostly only fragments thereof).

The problem with the actors: The protagonist and the girl are likeable enough. No one else in the movie (apart from the two who also remember the Beatles) is. Kate McKinnon doesn't ever seem to catch a break with the lousy scripted stereotype characters she's handed - and this movie is no exception, making her play the standard money-hungry agent. Most of the side-characters are only there for the "cringe-humor". The drug using firend. the fake fanboi-friend, the father, the mother, the neighbor, the list goes on.

The problem with the humor: It feels like the movie desperately tries to put in a funny moment her and there but this basically boils down to the protagonist finding out that X isn't there in this universe, googles it and finds something else unde the same name. Calling this a RomCom would beg the question: "What comedy"? The theater was reasonably full but there wasn't a single laugh. A few isolated chuckles was the best it ever got.

The music: The movie very heavily relies on the recognizability of Beatles songs. Which is to say: The music - when it's a Beatles song - is great. Any other time it's 'meh' at best (and the recognizability of Oasis today is more of a: Oasis...who?). And here is really where it all falls apart. If it weren't for the nostalgia (i.e. if the Beatles were replaced with a fictional band and fictional songs) then this movie would be utterly boring to watch.

2 Stars for the Beatles songs. Zero stars for anything else.

*** Warning, mild spoilers ahead ***

Ok, what sticks out about this movie? Nothing much. The acting is lackluster. No character has a character arc - understandable because none of them are given any significant screen time. The whole movie is basically one endless 3-hour brawl (with some battle scenes blatantly ripped from Star Wars/Lord of the Rings). Some of the brawls are so over-the top that they are ludicrous (even by comicbook standards). Example: When you break a moon into pieces and hurl all of them at someone on the planet below within one second then the impacting pieces should not just make a puff of dust when they land.

The motivation of the villain makes no sense (after achieving his goal the universe will just be back to the earlier situation soon enough). Given that it's hard to emote with a villain in the first place having a full CGI villain makes it even less likely. Some of Gamoras mood swings in the matter where we're supposed to emote with him or her make even less sense.

Speaking of CGI: It's on a level we've come to expect with some weird exceptions. E.g. in one instance we see Bruce Banner's head in the open cockpit of the Hulkbuster armor while he's standing around in the background - and it looks like someone just copied it in with MS-Paint. Seriously. Not even Photoshop quality but MS-Paint.

The humor is relegated to one-liners and most don't land. The serious one-liners are predictable and pithy. The music score is effective if somewhat over-the-top pathos-heavy (but that's not unusual for US films, so it' one of those things we've come to expect to have to endure)

The overwhelming feeling is that this movie was "designed by comittee". The boardroom idea seems to have been: "Take the things that people enjoyed in other movies and make them non-stop". Problem is: It doesn't work that way. Gems in movies are that because they are rare. Taking the time to lead up to them makes the payoff all that sweeter.

After coming back I rewatched the first Avengers movie just to see if my memory deceived me. But no: It is a way, way, WAY superior film in every respect.

***This will contain mild spoilers**

Here's the good, the bad and the ugly on this movie:

The good: I didn't mind the slow pacing of the movie. Hollywood needs to embrace more of this to create atmosphere and get the moviegoer immersed in the setting. This movie does so but sometimes goes out the other side. The 'computer girlfriend' was cute and some of the ideas involving her were interesting, setting the 'next level' beyond asking how human can replicants be: how human can software be? More human than human?

There's a few nice nods to the original from the advertisements to the musical score to the recreation of the landmark look of the Tyrell Corp. building and some minor set pieces.

The bad: Ryan Gosling just isn't a very good actor. He does his best, I guess, with what he got given. He's the pretty face du-jour and puts (female) bums in seats. That's about all there is to say about him. Not one of Harrison Ford's best performances, but he's alright. The main villain likes to drone on to no point and purpose. The female villain is even more pointless in her motivation. As antagonists go they come off as stereotypes more than anything. The CGI of the exteriors and interiors is OK.

The ugly: The other female is no Daryl Hannah - even though they obviously tried to cast a lookalike. The rest of the supporting cast is weak/one-dimensional and some of the expositionary dialogues are downright cringeworthy - explaining things that *must* be known to the character being talked at to the point that they might as well be holding up a neon-sign with "audience, listen up". As for clichés: "Give me your badge and your gun and you have 48 hours". Really? Cameos: Edward James Olmos' cameo is unnecessary for...anything. A de-aged Sean Young hits the uncanny valley (just as the de-aged Kurt Russel did in Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2)

While I applaud the boldness to forego the incessant fast cuts of other movies the director has no capacity for distinguishing between a shot necessary to build an atmosphere vs. one that is just "O-golly-gee". If they had taken out the latter the movie could have been cut by 30 minutes and would have been better off for it.

3D - oh my. 3D is the bane of movies these days. Entirely unnecessary for this movie (I know of only one movie where 3D adds a stylistically logical element and that is "Tron: Legacy", where the computer world is in 3D and the real world is in 2D)

The movie also lacks any sort of emotion. The director seems to think that putting a tear in someone's eye denotes deep emotion and will grip the audience. We see basically *everyone* in this movie shedding tears - and none of it touched me one bit (quite a feat!). There's no nuances, here. There's no small facial movements (like the great scene between Priss and Roy in the original where they talk with just their eyes). The replicants are more terminators than artificial humans when it comes to emotions. So are the humans, come to think of it.

Conclusion: Worth watching? If you liked the original: Maybe. Just so you can say you've seen it and know why the original is a masterpiece (because it sure as hell is compared to this) Otherwise this is a movie you can easily skip.

***Warning: Contains mild spoilers***

Well, what can you say about this picture? Does it have good acting? Certainly not. Does it have a good story? No. Is it watchable? Strangely, it is (once anyways).

The micro-formula for the movie can be reduced to this: Hero finds kid and tries to get rid of him. Kid is thereby brought into a position where he will be in danger from random weirdly dressed group. Kid screams. Hero returns and dispatches group with repeated (and repetitive) sword action. Hero wants to leave. Kid screams. Kid finds some random form of transportation, fixes it and is taken along by hero. Cut to 'Death' group, that chases our hero, killing some random guy.

Rinse. Repeat. (Ad nauseam)

So why did I not turn it off after the third or fourth repetition? Simply because I wanted to find out what weirdly dressed up group would enter next.

The music is strange. Swordfighting to boogie or polka feels...weird. The music used in Quentin Tarantino flicks for similar scenes is 'fitting' by comparison. The dialog (what little there mercifully is of it) isn't worth listening to. Some of it even doesn't make sense given the 'history' they had set up in the opening credits. The kid, thank god, only screams and doesn't talk too much else.

Not to spoil the climax or anything, but did anybody else think the resolution to the final fight was bizarre? At that point I might have suspected that the movie was supposed to be a spoof - if it had been funny at any other time prior to that.

So I'll give it a 4/10. You can rent and watch it once. The movie will probably be -barely- worth the fee for you.

Excellent entertainment. It has it's small flaws, but it also has a lot of big strenghts.

The animation is so beautiful it's breathtaking. Watching what looks like a million pieces of glass fall to earth in slow motion in one scene is a visual feast in its own right. Attention to detail has always been the forte of anime - and here it is taken to a new level. The color scheme sets it apart from most other animated movies, and the combination of ultra-high tech look with traditional Japanese music works astonishingly well.

The story - well I am in two minds about that. Certainly it is original, and it moves along smoothly. The story is also not too far dumbed down for the lowest common denominator, and we even get to be treated to some political and socio-critical comments.

The characters seem human. They gain a little depth and the violence they dish out isn't just there to make you go "Wow". They don't just kill and walk on. The heroine even has nearly a hysterical fit after she kills. This helps no end to identify with the human side of the protagonists.

However, the point I dread in most anime movies is the long "I'll explain the meaning of life, the universe and everything"-speech which seems to be a must in these type of films. Unfortunately at this point most writers make complete fools of themselves and 'Akira' is no exception here. When watching it once you can just get over it and move on. But if you watch it many times, like I have, this scene will get on your nerves. This somehow devalues what would have otherwise been the best anime movie of its time (and it is this part which elevates 'Ghost in the Shell' to the number one spot in my personal hit list of anime)

The ending is OK, although I think the animation guys totally flipped their lids in the 'mutation scene', but it's fun to watch nevertheless.

If you have never seen anime before this will change your view of what animated movies can do.

9/10

...about this film that hasn't been said. Well one thing: check it out at your local video rental store. Why? Because you will have to go through this movie frame by frame to catch some of the gags in it. Examples are the poster at the 'comic stash' behind Jason Lee , The 'Brain plug installation - the Provasic way' poster in the animal lab(Provasic ? Remember that name from 'The Fugitive'?), the 'experiment' detailed under Suzannes name tag on her cage, the posturing of Mooby the Cow which mirrors Buddy Christ from Dogma, and countless more.

Speaking of Dogma: The cross references to all the other View Askew movies are so ubiquitous that you hardly can catch them all, right down to the poses and props of the 'clerks' which are 100% in sync with those of the movie of the same name. Every name and every reference is there for a purpose. Try to spot any movie name or similar said as an aside, and you will notice that they are all references to things said in earlier movies of the 'Jersey Trilogy'

So why do I like this move? I'm not a fan of fart or gay jokes. Neither am I a fan of 'stupid buddy' movies like 'Dumb and dumber' or 'Bill and Ted' or 'Dude, where's my car?'. But this movie is unique. It's for the fan. For the person who looks for the detail. For the person who gets sick at 'Greedo shooting first' and all the other small things that make movies either a hit or a flop. It's for he fan who enjoys the recollection of fun moments by a gesture, a quote or an outright homage to another movie. It's for the fan who likes to have his brain activated while watching - this is why this movie is surprisingly mentally stimulating even though its content is mostly inane.

Ultimately it's not the story, nor the cast that make a movie a hit - it's the depth of the picture. It's how much you get the feeling that this is not just 'make believe' to get you to shell out a few bucks, but the feeling that here are people having fun by doing what they want to do - and letting you in on it. This is why Star Wars worked, and this is why this movie works. There is depth here (No, I am not comparing the quality of Star Wars to this movie - don't even think that for a second). But in Star Wars it was the feeling that the characters have lived in this universe for a long time, and here it's similar. Through the other movies we get the feeling that here is a background community. A history from which the action unfolds. We as fans are privy to that history - and the fact that this history isn't spelled out to any schmuck who wanders into this movie makes it all the more sweet.

Of course the cast must meet minimum standards, and I am surprised at how excellent Jason Mewes plays his part (from life). At no point do you get the feeling that he is being played to the wall by the big names around him. All 'round they do a pretty good job of it (as most of them have done in the other Kevin Smith movies).

The story? Not important. It's just a vehicle for shuffling our heroes from one goofy situation to the next - and it does this exceedingly well. There's no lengths, no parts you want to skip upon rewatching, and that is very rare these days. Everywhere you have Smith's trademark long, convoluted and vocabulary laden monologues and dialogs going on, which I have fallen in love with since his treatise on 'subcontractors on the Death Star' in 'Clerks'.

I recommended this to a friend who hadn't seen any of the other movies in the series, and he loved it. Then he went out and watched the others. When he got back and THEN rewatched J&SBSB he just said "WOW".

And that's about the best one word summary I can give this movie: WOW.

10/10

This is a masterpiece of its own, and it was cloned to become a defining movie of another genre - the Spaghetti Western ("For a Fistfull of Dollars"). By chance I saw the two back to back (first the western, then the original), not knowing that one was a remake of the other, and I have to say: The original is better.

The lighting, scenery and camera-work is very nice - right from the opening shot. Some scenes will be immediately recognizable by all movie aficionados - especially the 'Mos Eisley cantina scene' (I almost fell out of my chair, laughing).

The movie emphasizes much more the characters and the plots/intrigues going on. It's all about whose plan will be successful in the end. Kurosawa even forgoes some action sequences like a big sword fight with two huge rivaling gangs, just showing the aftermath of a street strewn with bodies. If he'd wanted he could have easily turned this into an action packed blood-fest a la 'Kill Bill' right there, but he didn't - and I have to give him high praise for this.

Not that 'Kill Bill' is a bad movie (quite the opposite). Just that such slaughter would not have fit the overall flow of Kurosawas work. When he shows action there is a point to it. It is to demonstrate how superior his hero is at sword fighting or how underhanded the bad guys are - not to show gory scenes of senseless violence for the pure spectacle of it (as "For a Fistfull of Dollars" would do 3 years later)

This is one of his greatest films, and I can see why it has earned such high praise. Go check it out.

First time I saw this I wasn't impressed. Maybe because I expected more action from a Sci-Fi movie. Then I rented it on VHS, and upon re-watching I figured something out: This is one of the very few movies that gets better the more often you see it. It is a subtle movie. Slowly but surely this one has made it into the top 5 of my 'best movies of all time' list.

I don't particularly care for the director's cut version, though. The inner monologue is missing - which gives you some of the most thought inspiring moments, and some of the added scenes downright make no sense at all. if I'd seen that one first I might never have given it a second chance.

The cast is exceptional. Every one of them does a really fine job. Especially Rutger Hauer who otherwise has very few good movies to his name (maybe 'Day of the Falcon') delivers a stunning performance. Most of the cast who were unknown before this movie have moved on to fame (and some to fortune) - and rightfully so.

From a technical point of view there is not much to criticize. More than 20 years later this movie still doesn't look dated (apart from 'Atari'-neon signs). The atmosphere is created with a lot of attention to detail, and the models of buildings are some of the most beautiful and believable ones I have ever seen.

Now I recently read the book on which it is based ('Do androids dream of electric sheep' by Philip K. Dick). It's a quirky read and, frankly, not a very good book. It has too many plot holes, deus-ex-machina devices and logical inconsistencies, plus a total letdown of an ending. What it does add to the movie is the setup of why the atmosphere is like it is (polluted, dark, many 'freaks' around), and the nice question whether the Hero might be a replicant himself.

...on which it fails. (MINOR SPOILERS AHEAD)

The story: It makes absolutely no sense (as some others have pointed out, this is due to the re shooting of the end to make it more palatable to the average sissy audience). But I realize that if they had tried to stay conform with the new ending then they would have to take out ALL the visual gags. Now, I am not a huge fan of making everything air-tight logical, but what they wanted the audience to swallow here in contradictions makes star wars seem like a factual documentary in comparison. So why make a write off even more of a write off by adding a non-fit ending? I don't know. What can you do when the story falls apart? In what types of movies can you just sit back an ignore logic errors? A screwball comedy? A kill-fest? A psycho-nightmare? A super hero movie? None of these surface, so we are stuck with a terribly written movie (that had an ultra-thin story to begin with) trying to take itself seriously.

The humour: There was barely any. A shot at AOL here, and pun on Microsoft there. A bit of over-the-top depiction of a conservative's wet dream. Not nearly enough to make this a 'fun' picture.

The suspense: There is none. The entire story is evident after the 'square dance scene' (15 minutes into the picture) - and I hadn't seen any trailers nor the original. BTW: That isn't square dance what they are doing - but I digress (I was young, I needed the money ;-) ).

Actors: Bette Middler did surprisingly well. Although she usually gets on my nerves she plays an attitude similar to her role in 'ruthless people' -something which suits her. All others looked bored out of their skulls. Kidman? Lets not go there. She's just not an actress. How she ever got a leading role I'll never understand. Brodderick has had better days, as had Loviz. Glen Close? I almost felt sorry for her, having to deliver that totally contrived ending monologue full of contradictions. I have to applaud her for getting A MILLION VOLTS THROUGH HER LIPS AND NOT EVEN A SMUDGE MARK TO SHOW FOR IT. The 'plan' she has does exactly the opposite of what she wanted to do from the very start. Sheesh, They must have fired the continuity guy/girl after the first day and forgotten to refill the job. Walken? He was OK, but I have seen him MUCH better. I hope he loses that 'I shat my pants'-walk. It looks like Jack Palance in his last movies. Maybe it's the same medical condition?

The computer graphics: Texture mapped boxes without shadows or depth as houses? Puhleeese. I could do better on my laptop in half an hour. The robot-dog looked ridiculous.

Resume: 2 out of 10 (because I actually sat through it. The movie DOES hat a good point going for it! At 93 minutes it is mercifully short.