Reviews

If you like endless self-indulgent monologs that seem to be written by the loneliest guy in the world this is the show for you. It's about two unfunny guys hanging around at a bus stop in rural germany who constantly ramble about things in a most uninspiring way. It's beyond boring and the only purpose for this i can imagine is to be some kind of audio wallpaper for very very lonely people so there are voices in the apartment. The frustrating thing about these german tv shows is that the actors are fine most of the time but have absolutely nothing to work with. The direction seems to be non existent and the script consists solely of some opinions of some guy. It's just lazy filmmaking of the saddest kind.

A familiar story told in a very boring way which is camouflaged by constant unnecessary jump scares and other tricks in the book of a filmmaker who has nothing to say.

The main character is portrayed in a manner that borders on comedy almost slapstick. She is constantly on the verge of a nervous breakdown. Screaming, crying, jumping around like a lunatic, breaking things just from the beginning. It makes any form of progression impossible so there's never any real suspense or tension just senseless technical scares. The performance is really hard to endure and the rest of the cast doesn't help much either.

Even if you think you have to watch every horror movie out there (like me unfortunately), do yourself a favor and skip this one. There's nothing to gain from this.

David Lowery: yes

Epic dullness awaits. The only battles are between the actors and the pompous script. And there is a fox that looks as if it jumped onscreen just out of a Shrek movie. But what does thy fox sayeth? Nothing. And then something.

Very charming movie. Direction is very natural and on point thus the whole ensemble is simply a joy to watch. Recommended.

The ridiculus concept of this movie would be almost acceptable If it was't so boring. Weak characters and Hillary Swank making a face that seems to say ' just give me my money so i can leave this embarrassing excuse for a movie'. The heavyhanded analogies between the robot-mother and the 'woman' are truly cringeworthy. Third Rate in any aspect and a real waste of time.

I like Ballard and I like the director of this movie so I gave it a try. Had to stop watching after 30 minutes. The plot got nowhere, the actors all gave annoying performances. No fun, no suspense, no drama. I think they thought it was art. In my eyes it wasn't. Maybe some tax-thing? They definitely had money to burn.

If you are looking for a movie that treats similar themes in a more intelligent, subtle and elegant way watch The Exterminating Angel.

Unbelievable dull. A lot of drama is anticipated. There is actually not one single original thought or emotion found here. Cinematography is sub part, too. Just a big yawn is all you get.

I go a long way to watch a decent action thriller It's a most entertaining genre so you will accept a lot of baloney just to be allowed to witness some wildly choreographed sequences of mayhem and violence. So of course I watched this. But this is so stale and boring in its attempt to be cool and stylish that it's simply impossible to enjoy. Even booze and weed won't help you here. There is no payoff really. It's just a shame for all the good actors involved.

This is sub-standard run-of-the-mill horror with no story, no character-development, a ridiculous cast and worst of all: it isn't thrilling or scary at all. Just one helpless and unimaginative executed "scare"-scene senslessly glued to the other. What a mess! There is nothing here that you haven't seen before at least a thousend times. Especially the episodes with the school-bullys are cringeworthy formulaic. The only thing clever about this is the marketing. They sure had me thinking that this wasn't just a trashy horror-flic. After the first dull "scary-basement" scene, i knew what i was in for. Watched ist till the end in disbelief, though. Still can't believe how boring this was. Sad.

The poor children. That were exactly my thoughts while i was watching this with my three kids in an nearly empty theater. I really felt bad about bringing them. Not that i dragged them! It was their wish to see it. Basically because they listened to some of the audio books about the little dragon which this fiasco was based on. So we went, and i felt bad. Still i can't remember being disappointed by an animated movie this way. I mean they're not all great, but most of them deliver some eye candy or some slapstick at least. It's not that hard to be entertained if the people behind a movie like this just put a little love into it. It really isn't. But the moment the film started i was quite shocked how utterly uninspired it all was. And i mean UNINSPIRED!

First of all there was almost no work done in the backgrounds. It was like a layout for a "real" film to be made. Just a few very ugly trees, a few bald humps and that was it. It looked like a cheap video game from the nineties. All creatures involved looked like cut out of cheap rubber foam. If one payed attention to the nostrils of the dragons, they just looked like holes drilled in a wall. The movements of everybody involved gave the impression that everybody was sedated somehow. Everybody moved totally slow, and everybody moved exactly the same way (young or old).

It was incredible. As if these people fiddled around on their laptop for a few days and than the money ran out. I couldn't believe my eyes. Even felt ashamed for everybody involved in this sad excuse of a movie. The script wasn't any better at all. In the books the little dragon is a curious little creature who explores his world. It's aim is to learn or prove things. In the movie he's just a stupid brat with a flat voice. Sounds harsh, but it's the truth. The reason for this is that the scriptwriters in lack of any ambition chose to let his stupid mistakes actually be the only reasons that things happen.

Speaking of lack of ambition: these kinds of movie are supposed to be funny, don't they? Well, it's hard to find anything funny here, the idea of the team behind this about "funny" being lifeless characters acting like morons and using stupid accents. In both cases for no reason. Oh yeah, and there's farting, of course, the last refuge for the uninspired.

My children watched in silence, really trying to feel good. Still feel bad when i think about it. There are a lot of great movies for children out there. Do yourself and your kids a favor: avoid this, it's made either by cynics or idiots. I fear both.

Frankly, i think Scorcese suffers from a personality crisis for quite some time. This movie is another example that this director, who made milestones of Hollywood history once, totally lost his style and constantly tries to follow tired trends. That he's successful with it, tells more about his audience then the quality of his recent movies. A good example for this is the nerve-wrecking soundtrack of this mediocre remake, which dive-bombs the viewer with one blaring rock song after another. Who does Scorcese thinks he is? Quentin Tarantino? It would be excusable for a beginner to over-spice his first movie with his favorite mix-tape. I like music and i like movies. What i don't like is to be pestered with someones dated musical taste when i want to see a gangster-movie. My God, just read the list of songs at the end credits. It's insane! You have to be numb to endure this.

"Let's see. We've made thousands of western movies an more movies of alien invasion then anybody can count. So why the hell not join these topics?" That's probably the thoughts of the people who produced this movie an hired half a dozen screenwriters to mess this sweet idea up. And messed up it is. It's a run of the mill western movie with some aliens thrown inside. Most of the time it looks like shot for TV, really uninspired stuff. That nothing really happens, doesn't help either. Really. Just riding horses, talking heads and exploding stuff. If there is any surprise, suspense or thrill to be found, i missed it. Even the aliens aren't great to look at. Just monsters like you've seen a thousand times before. Harrison Ford is playing some kind of villain here an i never noticed what a hack he can be, making faces all the time. He's really bad here, but not in the way he's supposed to. He definitely should call it a day soon. Daniel Craig looks quite ugly. Maybe it's the hat. But he presents a very fine pair of t*ts. An ugly guy with t*ts may be the perfect cast for a British secret agent, but i doubt back then in the good old west men sported pectorals like that. They just didn't knew how to grew them at that time. Well today they know. Craig is proof enough. Sam Rockwell is totally wasted here. Good for him. If you expect some entertaining no-brainer, action, thrills or anything spectacular you WILL be disappointed. But great idea!

If you're into advertising and look for a cinematographer who can manage to deliver some decent, slick images for a reasonably price you can give "Snowman's Land" a quick look. As a show reel.

Otherwise you are well advised to stay away from it. This is the typical "hey, i know a great location, let's just go there and shoot a crazy movie"- kind-of-picture. Yes, the location, an isolated hotel-like complex in the middle of nowhere, is quite impressive. Unfortunately the people behind this are so in love with it, that they choose to make it the real star of the movie! This can be a great idea if you are Stanley Kubrick or Robert Wise. In this case this decision makes this picture about two totally implausible hit men without a hit a painful lesson in how-to-bore-the-audience-to-death. It's full of brainless dialogs, too. 2 stars for the location. Enough said.

Watch Tommy Lee Jones as an old guy with long hair and a big hat. He left is family in favor of spending his time with an Indian tribe. Cate Blanchett is his daughter and she's pretty angry with Jones for being a p##spoor father. Unfortunately her daughter is abducted by a creepy Indian voodoo-doctor and his fierce crew (their business being human trafficking, slaughter and torture). Of course Blanchett needs daddy's help to save the daughter. Good guys hunt the bad guys, you've seen it a 1000 times.

So what does kitsch-master Howard do to infuse that old plot with fresh blood? Well, nothing! But wait he does something special: Everything in his picture happens because of the stupidity of its protagonists. So we got good idiots hunt the bad guys. That's something new. If you're in the right mood that can be quiet funny, but if you really like the good old hunting story you'll be disappointed. Performances are all solid, though, so it's slightly better then staring at a wall.

A planet full of nasty apes is a great idea. Someday somebody will make a great movie about it. Until then you'll have to watch this one:

Wahlberg is lost on a strange planet and who of all people does he encounter? Kris Kristofferson! Complete with his groomed beard portraying some kind of a caveman. One wonders why he isn't wearing cowboy hat and boots. Then we have little Tim Roth as a British(?) chimp. Burton orders: "You're a chimp! Act like one! Make at least 10 grimaces a second!" And Roth obeys. He is the bad chimp, so he tries to look really mean, but doesn't. Roth also hops around a lot. It's real method acting, you know. As if the bad apes aren't, well, "bad" enough, there are also "good" apes, who talk like liberals, so the kids who watch this mess hopefully will turn out as "good" citizens one day. Of course they won't listen to the drivel of the good apes. It's too boring.

Talking of boring: Wahlberg gets captured by the bad apes in a boring way and soon escapes in a boring way. Then he's on the run and has to talk a lot to the other humans and a female chimp (Carter) which has the desire to be just as smart as him. Sometimes we see Roth the chimp, who wants Wahlberg back. he gives orders to his favorite gorilla, then hops out of frame for the most time. At the end he and a lot of other apes get whacked in the head by Wahlberg and his feel-good-posse. Some big apes roll around on the floor in deadly combat. The final duel belongs to Wahlberg and Roth the little chimp, which leaves the monkey completely bonkers. Finally a real chimp saves the day and shows Roth and the others how to act. Obviously Burton had no influence on the animal.

The last minutes gives us a tiny impression what this remake maybe should have been about, would it have been made by a director with a vision.

It's amazing how easily some so-called "cineasts" can be fooled. Since Tsukamoto made his entry with his manga-goes-experimental-trash epic Tetsuo his admirers are always eager to describe his amateurish and boring outings as "challenging" and "visionary".

The only thing really astonishing about this so-called director is that in his work there is no bottom-line in sight. Who would have thought that he could come up with anything worse than the terrible pretentious "Haze"? And yet we have "Nightmare Detective" a black hole of a movie that negates any form of talent for everyone involved. Despite the actual idea that someone can enter the dreams of others, there is absolutely nothing original to be found here.

But yeah! i forgot - of course i just don't get it because this stuff is so "challengening" for the average viewer.

In my eyes the "average viewer" is more than used to wooden performances, bad lightning and shaky hand-cameras, you can watch it on cheap TV-Shows every day. Dreams in movies have a very long history and it's really embarrassing how the subject is treated here. There is no effort made whatsoever to visualize an actual dream-sequence. Instead we get a shaky camera and pools of blood. The actors sometimes give the impression of being actually forced to participate in this mess. I guess they felt a little "challenged" too much by Tsukamotos total lack of ideas.

And hey - if you really don't want to believe that this is trash, just wait for the cheap Eric Satie-Rip-Off in the soundtrack. Just awful.

"The Business" is basically your run of the mill "from rags to riches and back to the gutter"-gangster-story, that's been delivered to you since the 30's. The plot even has the femme fatal, which is desired by the hero, but "belongs" to his nemesis. The drug-trafficking, partying and cocaine sniffing is shown here in a realistic way, which isn't something one should take for granted. Memorable is a disturbing image of a head on a stake, which comes quiet surprising and shocking. All 4 lead actors (and even some of the others) deliver 100% and are great to watch. Geoff Bell in particular gives a real terrifying performance. What a great face!He could be a James Bond from hell.But as i said, they're all worth the time watching this. The general plot is very weak, though, and the ending is rather disappointing. The final clash between the hero and his tormentor under a sewer is rather ridiculous and gives the impression of being created in lack of better ideas. The payoff is very weak. If you can live with that, "The Business" is great fun, but not a good movie.

This movie is so silly, you've got to love it. The way the actors keep a straight face to the nonsense their up to is absolutely delightful.

There are countless great scenes to witness. My favorite one: When Inspector Lohmann studies Mabuses "secret" plans he's informed that a bank has been robbed. Immediately he pulls out the master-plan out of a heap of shabby looking pages. The "plan" is shown briefly. Do yourself a favor and push the stop-button there. You'll see some badly drawn figures, a few stars and the words "unternehmen stadbank" (operation city-bank?). That's the plan of a mastermind of crime! Watch the scene when informer "Locke" is chased by his gang. It's a very bad copy of the chase-scene in the beginning of the original version. It's good proof how good Fritz Lang actually was.

25th Hour:

Duration: very long

Style: "Talking Heads" Galore!

Characters: stolen from better movies

Script: 100% fascinated by its own importance

Lead Actor: tries to look like Gary Oldman. Bad Idea.

Acting: trying very hard (hoping for Oscars)

Direction: trying even harder (screaming for Oscar)

Dialog: If you would cut it down to half, there would still be enough pretentious gibberish for three boring movies

Editing: just watch that "hectic" broker-scene and you'll think your still in the early nineties

Soundtrack: sometimes trying to give it all a humorous touch, but totally fails.

Worst scene: (besides the "in the know"-broker-scene) two guys looking at ground zero, having some kind of important conversation, barely looking at each other. very, very symbolic. and cheaper then special effects, of course. these guys want to tell you something!

pay off: if you like ugly dogs, there might be something in it for you.

"One of the best westerns ever made" from "Cult-Director" Monte Hellman! Yeah right! For people who always like to watch the next "best" "cult-movie" this western may be a work of art. In my eyes is just pretentious. Just bland faces using erratic dialog. But Mr. Hellman sure isn't Ingmar Bergman. He hasn't the sensibility nor the talent to handle stuff like this. Just take a look at how he messed up Willefords "Cockfighter". It's really a wonder, that "Ride in the whirlwind" is that good. Maybe Hellman wasn't at the set at all? Even Peter Fonda did a better job with "The Hired Hand". This is the kind of picture that gets a cult-following by viewers (mostly men, i guess) who crave to have found something special. But hey! This isn't even intellectual. It isn't even hard to understand. All you pretentious cineasts: Watch "Last year in marienbad" instead. That will give you mucho stuff to think and guess about. If you' re interested in existentialism - read a book about it. You won't find anything philosophical here. And why is the title of this movie "The shooting"? It should be called "The riding" instead, so every viewer would know what to expect.

What can you say about a movie where 90% of the story is told by a narrator?

Yes, not only the introduction, not only the epilogue; the whole movie you get everything told. From the feelings of it's protagonists to their psychological development. It's almost like a perverse kind of children's book. In some scenes Wishaw shows his feelings by acting but you get them told anyway ( and of course why he feels that way!). I know I'm repeating myself, but so does the narrator. The result is unbelievable boredom.

Another problem is Tykwers "style" which is basically that of an ambitious film student. In every scene he tries something different to impress, but always fails. With his pompous efforts and sets he manages to make "The Perfume" look like a never ending commercial from the early 90's.

This movie is such a mess, that the question if it is a good adaptation is pointless. But if it's of any interest: the scriptwriters have painstakingly included everything from the novel, it just doesn't make any sense anymore, because in Tykwers heavy hands it turns out to be just another serial-killer-movie. Only this time with costumes.

If you frequently go to the movies, avoid this one. It doesn't deliver.

In the recreation of historical facts personal memory should always be reconsidered with the greatest care. Every decent historian knows that. Especially in the traumatic surroundings of the battlefield the own experience is often strongly blurred. That's why history books don't read like adventure stories. War isn't "real" so it can be reconstructed. War takes place. That's a big difference.

It seems that what Spielberg and Hanks wanted to do is to give history its share of adventure at all costs. By intending this they accomplished a glossy pro-war-movie for the kids to enjoy. When you read the comments on this platform there is much talk about "reality". I wonder that so many veterans seem to meet in the IMDb. Maybe they do. Maybe it's just a bunch of schoolboys who like to discuss if the used weapons sounded right. Needless to say that this kind of attitude is disgusting, even when cultivated by little boys looking for attention.

It's even more disgusting how "BOB" delivers for this very kind of audience. The action-like but naive (and wrongly) reconstructed fighting tableaux, the strong use of over-sentimental music which tells the viewer exactly how to feel, the urge to portray the soldiers as "ordinary man" fighting for a better world. All this elements reveal that BOB is the propaganda of our time. Most likely appreciated by the modern "ordinary men" fighting for "peace" in Iraq, right know.

So if your out for revenge, blood & guts on a very sentimental journey which doesn't force you to think about people killing themselves this is the right thing for you. If you have 780 Minutes of spare time.

For those interested in some unsentimental (and therefore more profound) memories: read "Something about a soldier" by Charles Willeford.

P.S.: Most of the German language spoken in this series is laughably wrong. But as long as the MG's are rattling the right way that doesn't seem to matter much.

Many horror-movies have stupid heroes. This one has a stupid villain. It's impossible to figure out what evil goal he pursues and he seems the be the last one that bothers.

So if there are two brothers and one of them is Vincent Price you know it's a strange family. Price keeps his brother locked up, because he's ugly. Messed up by some Voodoo priests in the dark continent some time ago. This brother is so hideous that the audience isn't allowed to see him until the end of that yarn. And that's very clever of director Gordon Hessler, because the exposure of that seemingly horrible disfigured face seems to be the only reason to watch the whole movie.

But before the ugly face is revealed you have to endure the "adventures" of a man with a red mask, who wants to take revenge on those who gave him some voodoo-medicine that lead to his apparent death. The ugly man payed for this medicine, so that as a dead man he would be allowed to leave the room his brothers keeps him locked in. Maybe NOT acting like a complete lunatic would have been an easier way, but like i said: this is a stupid villain.

After this mastermind seems to be dead, the only concern of Price is the exposure of his brothers ugly face to the public. So he hires the very same men that sold his ugly brother that medicine to bring up another body as a double for his dead brothers corpse. Any questions? I hope not, the story doesn't get any better. Since the men don't know how to bring up a dead body, they kill the landlord of the voodoo priest they brought to england to make the potion for the ugly man. What? After that the real brother is buried (alive). You want to know what these guys are doing who where hired to bring the witch doctor to england, so that he could brew this potion that they threw into the ugly mans room , so that he could swallow it to get out of there? You know what they do? NOTHING! It's a meticulous plan after all.

But the ugly brother is very lucky that this movie hasn't just Vincent Price in it, but also Christopher Lee as a surgeon. And if a surgeon is portrayed by Lee you can be sure that he needs dead bodies for some reason. So the body snatchers who work for Lee (some Burke & Hare guys of course) steal a corpse. Which one? Of course the one of the ugly guy! But after paying for the body Lee hasn't a new object for his research. He has a new lodger. Yep, the ugly man likes the surgeons house and forces Lee to keep him as a guest. Why? Because the man is stupid. And now he wants to do his crazy deeds.

He puts on a red mask and goes "prowling" (at least that's what he tells Lee). So the guy is running around London with his stupid red mask on his face, looking like the elephant man or something and is killing one of the guys that tried to help him but didn't. On one of his sprees he is forced into a brothel by some drunkards. That's stupid but good. Good for the audience, because you can see Hesslers idea of a vile lifestyle. After some kissing, laughing, tit-grabbing and singing you are back with our villain who seems to be a bit out of place in this kind of place. After having wild sex with one of the girls he slashes her throat and beats her husband. A lot of very unrealistic blood is spilled and our villain heads home. What did he want in this part of the town in the first place? You'll never know. But soon he's going to kill Lee and the other one of the men he hired to free him by poisoning him. After a lot of mambo jumbo the truth is revealed: the ugly man was the scapegoat for Prices evil doings in Africa! And finally one got to see that damned face. It looks like someone has thrown a very small cake in it. The nose is a little to big and it's a bit dirty. I see lots of uglier persons at the subway stations in my city every day. It's a pity that they don't wear masks like him. Watch this movie only if you all the time in the world.

First of all i have to say, that i'm a big Nigel Kneale Fan. I think he's the king of creepiness. The Quatermass-Movies he wrote are really terrifying (especially the one with the pit!) and his television-work is remarkable, too. In Halloween III Kneales (uncredited) influence is obvious: witchcraft, nihilism, modern technology and a general nastiness that is seldom in U.S. American horror- movies.

The most people, who don't like this movie are upset, because Michael Myers isn't in it. Regrettably a large number of the general audience wants to see the same movie again and again. That's why so much unoriginal movies are made. So Halloween III without Michael Myers? So what? The second part had him and it was boring from the beginning. Since then, nothing much has changed in Myer-land. One franchise worse than the other. In my eyes the 3rd part is the best of the sequels, because it has something the others haven't: a creepy premise and some truly shocking moments. ( Or do you think snakes and insects crawling out of the head of a little boy in front of his parents isn't shocking? Think again.)

I won't even go into the political aspects of this movie considering mass media, because i'm a horror-fan and only interested if a movie works. This one does. Of course there are the obvious mistakes of a cheap movie: strange coincidences, illogical plot twists etc. But you know what? I give a s*** about logic, if the general tone of a story is build up consequently it's all right with me.

Wallace does a great job in establishing an evil thread and he doesn't give away the goods to soon. The character of the evil wizard who wants to kill thousands of children (and their parents) just for the fun of it, comes from the mind of a genius (Nigel Kneale, i guess). The idea of involving artifacts from Stonehenge in a big mad scientists laboratory is great, too. And the main character? Come on! A guy who goes on a dangerous investigating trip with an unknown girl and grabs a six-pack of beer before leaving, can't be that unsympathetic! By the way Atkins does a great job here, considering that his role sometimes tends to the ridiculous. My advice: Watch this, without expecting a Carpenter-Movie and you'll be surprised what you'll find.