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Assassins (1995)
Tchit-tchat
Wow, this movie is bad. One of the worst movies with Driven. A plot that focuses exclusively on vilains, and a race to be the #1 hitman on the market. A weird twisted opening that sets the tone horribly, we are then featured to Stallone making the same face the entire movie and acting like this :( Gee 1 hour and half of watching Stallone make the same face and muttering his awful english, what a delight. Then the narration is appalling, the cinematography pretty mediocre, action scenes are poorly shot -- and the stuff you see quite laughable. So basically you have one shooter that nobody seems to know where to find, can' lock up, handcuffs won't do, but he's able to smash car windows, survive car crashes by the weeks, a fall of four floors, can jump out a building off a balcony and not break a sweat...but he still manages to die ! It's idiotic to the extreme.
Why is there a character who appears right at the end to die in twenty seconds ? What's the point ? Why is the movie about hitmen but Stallone can't even kill a mouse ? Why are we seeing an entire movie about two men trying to kill each other in the most pointless ways over an hour and a half ? How can you be caught by the cops and then not be tracked down despite killing a boatload of undercover agents ?
The movie is very shallow, in several ways. The plot-line, Stallone meets Electra and "Oh hello ! How are you ?" basically. The classic gentleman criminal, who has his ways and manners, while Bain comes off as more vicious and brutal. And they both hang along. The only time Stallone smiles is when he's in front of that chess game and relives it, but overall his acting is weak and atrocious. He's also very dirty in this movie, who ever dressed these actors is terrible - what are with these sweaters ? And the hair cuts ? Why is Banderas always licking his fingers ?
But the worse part has to be the shooting. What is this Lucky Luke ? Bain outshoots a room of shooters without missing a target with two silent guns in both hands !! Then Stallone from his the backhand shoots backwards through Electra's sun glasses and rips the gut of Bain ! How about that !
There's no soundtrack, the photography is dull, and the direction lame. Overall, Mr Action Man movie like any other.
Daylight (1996)
Breath George don't let it beat you !
Yeah this is a really bad script and directed movie mostly intended for TV on a boring sunday afternoon. From the credits to the ending, the movie just fails. It's a cast of washed up and discount actors, Amy Brenneman can't act. As for Sylvester Stallone, I'm sorry, the guy can't speak fluent english. I had to put on the subtitles ! I just don't understand what he's saying and it's not the only aspect of this movie I don't get....I don't understand the entire movie !
Between the poor characterization, the generic stereotypes which tells you the writer really didn't fetch far his ideas -- the fact that they are all introduced the wrong way but yet somehow the lead actor doesn't have any ! We have no idea who Latura is and where he comes from, there's no background on this guy and we discover along the way bits and parts of his character. Bad writing.
The direction is bad -- the scenes are poorly shot. The stunt of the car driven by thieves that crashes into the truck full of chemical explosives is terribly shot -- we don't really see how the car managed to fly into the tanks. There's too much use of replay, quick movement or slow pace. There's no soundtrack. The quality is quite dusty, cinematography mediocre at best, the movie looks more like it was made in 1986 rather than 1996.
Then the plot is weird, this character police security officer George appears from the beginning but he dies half way point ! Why ? Why spend all that time with him and then kill him half way point, makes no sense. So many elements make no sense. Why do some cars explode including the windows but others don't, how is it possible that some survived in such an accident and of course naturally a former super trained rescuer is right on the location of the accident, how fortunate. But I don't get it, he says he knows a way out, then he tells Madelyne he never had a plan and simply jumped in to rescue them and hoped to freelance a way out. For what ?! To go between four ventilators and all this trouble ? That makes no sense. But then he actually remembers of a chamber they can reach to, manages to fall off a ladder and then retreats backwards and I don't know, finds a way to escape on the surface of the river !
The best part however, is perhaps witnessing Latura and Madelyne fighting with electric current ! I don't think I've seen a movie where electric current was so easily wrestled down, considering there's fuel and water all over the place. There's only a few feel-good moments to kind of make-up for a totally improbable unrealistic picture. Just try and think about the number of people in the world who could actually do what Latura does in it without any help or equipment. It's ridiculous. Add to that lousy acting where all the characters take turns to speak and Latura pleading George to breath into an artificial tube and then funny-haha ending where he says "Yeah but let's make sure we take the bridge this time!"
But the biggest disappointment is that once again, this movie is a big budget, and the potential was never materialized. It's just a waste of money and time. Just another proof Stallone can't write, can't direct and can't act.
Driven (2001)
Car flick with Rocky speech.
If you can get through the first five minutes of this dope, I applaud you. Between the distorted images, upside down, the infernal flashes and inverted editing, the cinematography is as good as any bottom feeder could have made it. This thing, is so poorly filmed it's atrocious. Did the producers look at it at some point before ever releasing it ? Because it's bad. It's about as bad of shot movie as there is alongside phone-filmed 2016 Ben-Hur.
The plot, is absent. The characters are stereotyped, the dialogues have no substance, the racing is science fiction, at no point is the movie ever really about racing and I'm not sure it was about anything. It's not about relationships, not about business, or laws of gravity, it's just a silly flick I guess is aired around 11 pm. The names of the protagonists look like they were stolen out of a you know what kind of R-rated movie.Jesus could you find more tacky than Jimmy Bly and Joe Tanto ? The cast is awful, either too old or too inexperienced, too difficult to understand as well -- hey here's a thing, if you're hiring a german actor, can you actually find one that SOUNDS english ? I'm sorry but you can't hire an actor with an english as bad as Til Schweiger, poor guy could hardly speak. Stallone, look, I don't understand what he's saying. I really can't. I have no idea what he saying half the time.
But between the flying cars (which would immediately postpone the race), the drivers saving themselves from a car accident in a lake, seeing fans on a podium and then seeing them again on a podium in Tokyo (what? the chick was hot, not hard to recognize even at the back), go-fast around Chicago in a champ car without a helmet on and infested with subplots that go nowhere to a disjointed ending.
This is why you can't hire an acting crew and think you're going to kick-butt because they're all good looking. Guess what ? They're all good looking in the movie business ! You cannot direct a movie this way. You need actors who have charisma, know their role and can act. Driven doesn't provide that and instead proceeds itself in laugher. We know the theme, the old veteran who grooms the young kid, that was done years ago in Bull Durham. The movie is built too much around clips, quick shots of car girls, overview shots, because the content is too poor and goes missing. The CGI are obvious, champ cars do not crash like that or float over water by the way. The champ car staff is so awkward, there doesn't seem to be a trainer in there, only agents and girlfriends and again too many shots of beautiful women it's an invasion.
None of these actors really show any skill or belief in their part, haven't heard Pardue do anything since that, Stallone did additional garbage and the rest vanished off. You don't understand the purpose in this junk, wether relationships or sportsmanship, you don't get i. Between that and the horrible soundtrack picked by a teenage 13 year old, you don't get it. The ex-wive comes off as spiteful but apparently everybody in the movie points to Tanto being the loser and the sabotage artist. You don't get anything from this movie.
At least it's great for advertising.
Tin Cup (1996)
So, what's the name Tin Cup for already ?
I see all these reviews and I keep falling on "Bull Durham". Like this movie was supposed to join the level of Bull Durham. Listen, it's not going to happen. It would be like finding a better baseball player than Babe Ruth...you can't. Finding a better basketball player than Michael Jordan...you can't. The poetry, the philosophy, the wisdom, the level of insight, the humor, the romance, the climax, the ability to stretch a movie without a story and still captivate the viewer, Bull Durham's a masterpiece and it will never be topped again. Starting with the beginning, the references to baseball, you feel the thrills of the sport and then the number of great lines "I'm the player to be named later" and so and so on, this is a movie full of great lines. Unfortunately for Tin Cup, the script is too poor. Not enough good content and it doesn't really impress us. It was more about promoting a sport through the US Open and star golfers than promoting it through the script and the passion and knowledge of the characters' themselves.
Golf anyways, is boring to watch and I doubt you can relate as much easily to golf than to baseball. But still, with a good cast. this should be a better movie. The whole Tin Cup nickname makes no sense to me, more an attempt to find a Crash Davis 2.0. or Nuke Lalloosh nickname. I didn't get it, doesn't work for me. The movie has a few funny passages but nothing immortal, nothing we haven't already seen. Just not what I expect from Ron Shelton.
The two characters Roy and Molly spend hours flirting with each other, it's a little lame. It's a lot flirting to set up a predictable ending without any sexyness in the end. And at some point, Roy's stubborn antics are just kind of boring, we lose interest in the movie near the end. The whole "I'm going for the win" was funny once but systematically ? Ugh. There's just nothing you're crazy about in this movie, neither the dialogues, the passion, the sport of the romance. Just two characters that end up hitting on each other.
Last but not least, if the main character is from Texas, just get an ACTUAL actor from Texas, stop trying to pretend a fake southern accent this stuff just doesn't cut it. My gosh they need to stop making fun of other people's accents -- Kevin Costner doesn't have a southern accent and he didn't needed one. You can go to Texas university and not be from Texas it's okay but my gosh stop faking these southern accents when you can't ! Really annoying.
Heat (1995)
Outsmarting vilains
This is probably one of the most far-fetched movies and wasted casts of all time. It starts with a heavy heist, spectacular but right from the beginning, you can tell that this picture is going to out-smart itself, with cheesy soundtrack and ridiculous slow pace. The whole theme of the movie, is let's make these vilains so damn smart, let's show how intelligent they are and let's make sure the cops repeat it 15 times so that the viewer gets it....BORING !
Why would a team of gangsters hire somebody off the street they never worked with until the last moment ? And why wouldn't McCauley just gun down the other thief in the van and get rid of him, instead of trying to pay him his share TO THEN kill him in the middle of a parking lot ??? Where is the sense in that ! Why give him a meeting in a cafe, give him his money but then plan to kill him ? Oh my goodness this makes no sense at all. For a gang of pros they really know how to screw up like amateurs if this is going to be the theme. And then the cops, they start off as a team of tools, who can't get any information by their own department but need cons on parole or ex jail birds and check this out, Vincent schedules a meeting with Albert an informant who for some reason has his brother coming into town (why would Vincent agree to visit his brother anyway?) from Phoenix and he holds some really special information about the current case he's investigating. Wow, just like that, an outsider from Phoenix knows exactly the authors of a big heist by lucky fortune because he once met an ex-jail bird in custody, right in the middle of some street. Who wrote this script ? This is bad, this is far fetched, this is a draft, this is not a script. How can the police or the FBI not have a list of cons working in a perimeter instead of going through informants who's dialogues make no sense ! Man this is the way to make Police look absolutely useless.
So just like that by recognizing the word "slick", the LAPD then manages to identify several gang members without really revealing it to us, considering how appalling they are we have our doubts. But even with a team spying on them the gangsters still manage to outsmart the cops by spying on them as well !
But there are too many shortcuts in this movie, I don't understand how the Police suddenly gets the bank heist information at the last minute, gets there in time and then not just fire one gun shot but at least a thousand of them in the middle of the street (lucky pedestrians) from some narcotic agent who turned heel, makes no sense to me, and they still lose out on the two criminals. Never understood the diner scene and the confrontation, especially to talk about nothing and a cop trying to convince a criminal not to commit a crime like that makes sense. Why does the gang who seemed so determined to kill Waingro forget him for so long and how the hell does he get Trejo's adresse ?But the shooting is the most outrageous scene of all, there is no way that the police can risk flying bullets and crossfiring kill pedestrians in the middle of a gun-shooting -- just let the criminals go and sacked them in a turn or whatever but don't stand there stray fire impulsively, this is absolutely ill-advised. This scene is completely nuts. If you did not secure the perimeter before it is impossible to get into this kind of a shooting, this is cowboy stuff, not to mention the moment where Vincent shoots Cerrito holding a little girl hostage in the head.
And even after that scene, there's still a good 45 min, the movie is way too long, doesn't move fast enough, lingers too much on useless dialogues that get the story nowhere, the scene with the new-boyfriend watching the TV and the suicide girl I mean who cares when you're 2hrs30min in the movie just get it going ! The structuration of the script is completely wrong, these scenes do not add anything to the picture and especially not at the climax of the script !And the ending ends exactly like the whole movie is, far-fetched, a final chase where Pacino has legs of a 30 year old in the body of a 55 year old and shares a fraternal truce with McCauley, it's just not good at all. This whole theme of outsmarting vilains and making them look more glamor than they are is quite lame and uninteresting. Too bad, a lot of good actors, could have projected something so much better.
Padenie Berlina (1950)
A spectacular movie about WW2, despite its bias.
You can't hate this movie just because it was made for Soviet intent and purposes. It's a fascinating work of art. While the sotryline is lame and overwritten by the stands of historical figures, it doesn't lose much of its interest. Tchiaoureli, directs one of the very first "kolossal" productions at the time, a 2h45min long picture, depicting the war, the battlefields, the camps, the very last hours of the III Reich and the inevitable triumph of Stalin on the steps of his private jet.
The cinematography is quite brilliant, the color very rich and dense, there's a lot of depth, the special effects were kept inside the picture, which gives these spectacular shots of the battlefields. Quite remarkable how Tchiaoureli modeled these decors, sound fx and the burning ruins of Berlin. You have to praise the effort (even though at times the director must've ran out of energy or money for unconvincing fights at the end and real shots of actual footage of Soviet military fanfare ) for trying to reconstitute a catastrophic moment of history into a work of art, tied up in between satire and and spectacle.
Hitler's wedding is absolutely hysterical. One of the best scenes of the entire movie. You have to admit, it is hilarious to a degree to see this criminal wedding Frau Eva after being so sure, so sure he would raise Moscow to the ground, and there he is standing 6 meters underground marrying his mistress without much conviction knowing this is the end. A very, very humiliating moment for Hitler, add to that the background orchestra which intentionally makes it even more ridiculous.
Many of course tried to disapprove this opposition between the hysterical one-dimensional angrily demoniac Hitler and the poised clever-thinking Stalin, but truth is at these stages of the war, it was pretty much that way. Hitler tried to blow up Germany if it could save his Empire from Soviet conquest. Hell if h ran out of population to enslave and kill, he would've attacked penguins in Antarctica that's how lunatic he was.
But be there as it may, the movie is undeniably successful in the mastering of montage, the academic style, a powerful reconstruction of the context, magnificent settings, the scene where Goerring shows his gallery to Krupp quite impressive, the camps at Kalinigrad, the drowning of the German population in the metro under Hitler's orders, how despite all the devastating shooting and bombing the landscape and color are always bright which is interesting, there's an attempt to clearly show "Mother Russia" as never scorned by the War. It's funny the attempt to portray realism and sensationalism. anecdotic behavior and outrageous caricaturing (the scene where Hitler meets Orsenigo and his low humor is met with fake applause and laughs by his advisors). The moments of grave drama are never directed with a tragic tone but the satyrical ones are. It's a very interesting movie that reverses the conventional wisdoms of movie making of the time, with Soviet movie making culture. Not quite Eisenstein or Donskoï we get that, but I would say it's a good compromise between political judgment and artistic research.
Also, praise the works of Leonid Kosmatov, Vladimir Kaplounovsky and Shostakovitch's music is excellent, a composer of great talent.
Troy (2004)
An insult to the Iliad
What the hell is this ? I could not believe Peterson would actually take the public, the admires and the legacy of the greatest poem ever told for idiots. This movie is based on the iIliad ? Since when are movies based on fictional stories ??????? Usually a movie is based on real events, but a fictional story ? That is a mind-blowing, and not just any story, the most iconic story that has lasted throughout humanity to the present day. Basically a few funny characters just stole names and rewrote one of the biggest defections displayed on cinema.
This poem was turned into a portrayal of real events- that's actually what is presented to you, as factual events, as if retracing Alexander the Great's expeditions. How ? The Iliad is a story within a mythology, how can it be factual ?
A lot of high paid and awarded actors participated in this movie, which was essentially the lone motivation for it: bringing up a team of "big names" except none of them are well casted and consequently cannot act.
Here's the story of the Iliad: it opens on a chant, the wrath of Achilles, who threatens to leave the Greeks because Agamemnon stole his captive Briseis. Agamemnon the leader of the Greeks who was awarded this expedition decided not to give up his own captive Cryseis, responsible for the pest Appolo sentenced on the Greeks. The siege has already been going for nine years and it took the Greeks ten years to prepare for it.
The entire Iliad leans towards Hector's death - he is Achilles' pendant, his choices, his greed all lead him to his final confrontation with Achilles. In reality Hector is a coward, he is marginal in his family, he disregards his wife Andromache and he believes Apolo will hit Achilles and offer him the victory. But Hector folds and flees away from away Achilles, embarrassing himself and Ilion by going around the city three times! The poem ends with Hector's funerals. Not Achilles'!
In this movie there aren't even any gods: where are Athena, Aphrodite and Apolo ? Where is Diomedes, Antenor, Stheneleus, Cassandra ? where are Patroclos' funeral games ? Why is Patroclos so young when he is much older ? Why is there the roman turtle formation ? Why is the landscape inaccurate ? What are Lamas doing in ancien persia ? There are so many characters missing and those who are present die when they don't.
The worst part is: where are the dialogs ? How can you possibly write bad dialogs if you base it on the Iliad ???? Where's the dramatic dimension, the tragic conjoncture, the struggle between destiny and fatality, excellence and cowardice ? In return we have Peter O'Toole and his 'will of the Gods' who sounds like he's making fish noise with his mouth - the lowliness of the dialogs "love your wife and defend your country", it is just unbearable.
Brad Pitt: drink cool aid, eat a pimento and stop looking at yourself in the mirror. Clearly, he tried to reach into a viril grave voice, but failed. Instead he sounds constipated much like Keanu Reeves in the Matrix "Trinity, I love you, but I really need to go to the can!"
Last but not least, the CGI aren't even that good, the fighting terribly disorganized, lead warriors would fight on chars and many historical inaccuracies regarding military equipment.
A very shallow movie.
La La Land (2016)
Hollywood's acclamation falls flat
A massacre. This is bad, this is really bad. I really haven't' seen a movie that bad and god there are number of them every year, in a long time and so outrageously awarded. Every possible cliché is present. The traffic-jam encounter, seen that in For the love of the game; the people dancing on top of the cars singing about Burritos, i've seen it already: the start of the relationship in front of a movie, seen it a hundred times already, it's like two people collide into each other on the side walk or at the park and they fall in love. It's funny because just a year ago, Woody Allen did a musical and La La Land is a clear copycat. And the ending is predictable by a mile "and they met again at this bar and he played the song and they wondered if whatever had been different". Please, this is overdone !
It's hard to believe that the hype, the campaign, the distribution of awards, the columnists who are bought out, is actually real. The whole 'modern day musical' and 'an incredible bet !' is a joke.
This is not a musical. This is a caricature of High School musical, it's on the same level as any other sitcom out there. But, has any of these members of the jury of the Golden Globes and Academy Awards ever watched The Sound of music ? Want to hear an actual musical performer ? Julie Andrews. Not Emma Stone. Julie Andrews.
Ryan Gossling ? I'm sorry but i just don't understand what was going through the director of casting's mind. When I think of male performers, yeah Astaire, Paul Robson. But what is Gossling doing in a musical ?I thought a musical was supposed to be a movie with an actual score and performers ?
Chazelle's lone motivation: building a famous couple. He wants the girl he's the most attracted to, that's what this movie is all about. It's to propel Gossling/Stone duo right up there with Betty/Dunaway, Andrews/Van Dyke, Costner/Sarandon, and say, "I created an iconic couple!" No you didn't !
This is a lazy script, that doesn't give homage whatsoever to the great musicals, its romance is as insipid as the romance in Creed and cheesy as in My all American.
Who does Chazelle think he is to believe that he is the first to draw four girls in a red, yellow, green, blue skirts ?
The camera work is terrible, it loops, it takes detours - it wants to be creative but there is no discipline to it and that's why it looks bad. The fundamentals were not respected. To be honest, you feel like screaming throughout the entire movie.
I remember when Moulin Rouge came out, I was unimpressed by the lack of depth and flavor of the characters but the montage in the format of a video-clip, was quite entertaining. This however, does not back up the hype.
Dances with Wolves (1990)
Greatest western of all time.
What in the world is with this 250 IMDb list ? I cannot believe DWW is excluded !
The greatest western movie ever done, one of the most well directed movies ever made, a state of the art cinematography, a brilliant color and stunning decor, by far and it's not even close.
This movie, believe it or not, was produced with only a $20MM budget- Costner had to guarantee his own house! Do you know how much John Carter cost ? Look it up.
Dances with Wolves, is the material proof, that low budget movies are sometimes the best ever made.
The story could not be more moving. Is does not encourage apologia of patriotism, courage, lakota natives or the United States. It's an elaborated think piece of an adventure through the struggles of segregation, the civil war, the conquest over the frontier, the last remaining tribes and the expansion of the northern federation, peace, friendship and nature. All characters play their role perfectly - there's not a single miscast. Costner incredibly displays as a rookie an epic voyage in the mid-west to find himself befriending a native-American tribe and their civilisation. The insight, the language, the manners and the buffalo hunt, are extremely rich and plastically breathtaking.
The score is brilliant. Might be one of the best scores ever written. All along, the score simply corresponds perfectly with every scene that requires a matching music.
You cannot deny that, whether you think there's not enough this or that, that Costner has delivered a colossal effort to offer us a movie that will go down as one of the greatest film pieces in cinema history. Never once do you get bored, look at the time, in fact, you wish this movie never ends, and when it does, you are not disappointed by the ending.
The CGI are spectacular - you really believe that the buffalo hunt is real. I urge everyone to check the making of this movie.
DWW follows the great traditions of westerns, simultaneously renovating the genre.
Moulin Rouge! (2001)
An interesting hit clip
Christian, a young bohemian poet, arrives in Paris with no means. He falls in love with Satin, a captivating lead dancer at the Moulin Rouge. The young woman is not insensitive to the young man, but she is not indifferent either to the Duke, a boisterous extremely-rich bourgeois, who could provide for her future indefinitely. The two men's favors fall short at the end of the movie, where Satin dies on stage of pneumonia.
If the intrigue is platitudinous, the romance flat and no languish, the characters have no depth - the realization of this piece is quite admirable as it delivers the apotheosis of the esthetic video-clip, minced and glittering. Despite being outrageously tacky, it's a successful musical and the criticism should be softened.
Batman Forever (1995)
A caricature of its own
Generations of adults dreamt during their childhood, and sometimes beyond, of this indestructible and valiant knight. Dick Tracy...no wait, I meant Batman Forever, pays tribute to it with this simpleminded moral piece. On the opposite side of Dick Tracy...excuse me, Batman, lays the abominable lunatic Mr. Enigma who wants to federate the underworld and does not hesitate to attack the innocents and ensnare them to his state-of-the-art devil device. But what is this blond woman, fiery and glittering, doing here ? What exactly is her use ? Her plastic ? It certainly isn't for her depth or insight.
Helped by a new adopted partner and a blond babe,Dick Tracy...excuse me, I meant Batman, triumphs his own colors: silver and black. The entire movie references to equivalent graphic elementary colors. The filthy colors represent the evil clan, the mob - the dusky tones, represent Justice.
Dick Tracy...excuse me, I meant Batman, has everything: the deep green eyes, the technology, the blond, even the partner. Yet, why does he make everything so much more difficult for himself ?
If you have ever watched Dick Tracy (this time I got it right!),then you'll realize Batman Forever is an attempted remake that fails to deliver the candor and the delights the viewer expects to see in this unrealistic piece. Schumacher completes a movie without plume.
Eyes Wide Shut (1999)
Did I miss something or is there no story ?
Bill Harford is a young doctor, who ventures out of his luxurious apartment on the Park, into the decrepit neighborhood,after his beautiful wife Alice, admitted to him she fantasizes to cheat him with another man. His quest for sexual encounters leads him to a troubling experience that could cost him more than his vertu.
At the beginning I didn't think much about this movie, I figured that Alice would be the focus of the movie as she fantasizes about having sex with another man. So naturally I was expecting her to initiate herself and her husband to new sexual experiences. Instead she's one-dimensional and plays an uninteresting person with silly lines. The movie lingers on and on, Harford wanders in the streets and then decides to hook up with a prostitute at her apartment until his wife calls him. Then he decides to leave and check into the club where an old college friend ( Nick Nightingale ) plays, which of course was 25 yards away. So basically Nick reveals that he is hired to play blind-folded at a very private party and commits the rookie mistake to give him the address of the party. It's a costumed party, and Harford manages to buy late-night a costume and get there a little late with a cloak and a mask.
There, he is welcomed by a fleet of staff, in front of a grandiose house- all of them are men by the way. He discovers it's an orgie and we ask ourselves: why and what exactly does Kubrick want to share to us about this exaggerated baroque orgie ? Maybe that the bourgeois have the means to create their sexual opera ? The struggle of hedonism ? The consequences of desire ? The inanity of passions ? The quest for liberties over a conquest ?
There is nothing spectacular about even the orgie - believe it or not there are already clubs who provide these kinds of sexual orientations. Kubrick clearly committed a mistake of ignorance. Harford does not participate in any activities, he has been spotted as an intruder. A hooker urges him to leave the party before he can be identified. A whole twisted staged plot encircles Harford who is threatened to stay shut. We then ask ourselves again: what is the big deal about this orgie ? Is this party worth the secrecy of identity ?
But after that the movie fails to develop the climax. Harford reads in the newspaper about a prostitute who overdosed early in the morning. He is convinced that he is being the center of a hit ? That's not a sufficient intrigue.
The movie then ends in a confrontation between Victor, an older friend of Bill. Victor was there that night at the house. The outcome is greatly disappointing. All evolves around the secrecy of this orgie, the extreme measures that have been taken to protect the fetichism of the wealthiest corny men in New York. Yes, rich men like to hire escorts for their kinky fantasies, it is not tabou, it is everyday in the newspapers after another scandal surfaces.
It's all shortcuts, incoherences. How does a pianist who just moved in N.Y., gets contacted to play at this orgie ? How did he get contacted in the first place ? How many times has he been there ? Why would an outsider recommend a pianist to people who have to means to hire 30 staff employees ? Are you telling me they can't hire themselves a pianist ?
The quest for sexual identity seems to be the subject of the movie but really the characters mistake themselves on their own identity. Since they do not know what they want, they convince themselves they are seeking sexual experiences, in order to have a purpose. All seem to enjoy the idea of fantasizing and playing, and that is why Bill follows a hooker to her place (which he never touches) and amuses on adultery.
For a movie that apparently wants to shock or excite, it massively fails.
Inside Man (2006)
Story doesn't work, too many shotcuts, loop hole.
Too many caricatural mannerisms, the black man inspector who wears on his hat and his trendy suit, two black men acolytes, talking on the phone with his girlfriend, the classic references to my girlfriend wants an expensive ring, the old secretive bank chairman who made a fortune dealing with the Nazi, the blond ambitious cut throat lawyer.
Let's be clear: this is not a realistic scenario. There are so many unbelievable, improbable scenes that just cannot happen and make a heist successful. Are you telling me that the Police cannot figure out who sponsored the bank robbery ? What kind of robbers would siege in the MTB, spend 13hours in there just to breech a hole and set up a stash ? How exactly do these cons know what apparently only the chairman knows the content of his keep ? Sounds awful weird.
Then, please, the whole exchange between cons and Wasington and Foster, what is this ? A soap opera?
There is nothing in this movie that would make this heist in reality successful. In no way would security cameras implode, the Police would be alerted immediately by the Security company that immediately gets a signal if the Bank under heist. Seriously, are they trying to convince us that this establishment has multiple flaws in their CPU security equipments ? BS!
Now many people have already pointed the inaccuracies and movie-mistakes. First the fact that the brief-case held by the Cheik priest was not carefully inspected. I can't believe a squad would not search for a device - please! This is taking us for imbeciles. Then, there is no way the bank robbers would be able to stay so long in the bank and hope to just run out the front door without being exposed! All the hostages would recognize them, the tapes would basically prove who are the thief, multiple evidence would be at hand for the Police to figure out the cons. How can four robbers, if not terrorists, could possibly be convinced they could handle so easily the entire NYPD department ? But miraculously the head chief of negotiators would call it off ? Come one, this is bad. Plus I don't see how in the end Owen is capable of so simply walking out without being busted - it just doesn't work ! It's laughable.
The actors play themselves, they don't embody the characters at all, they simply reproduce their most well known mechanical mannerisms that made them so famous for throughout their career. There is very few insight and plot development, only at the end for 30seconds and very predictable. It's so poorly done, between the fast forward and the flashback, it is very incoherent. Mostly it is trying to make the cons so much more smarter than the cops.
Fight Club (1999)
Trash, hateful, fascist.
The biggest rubbish of all time, this film is fascist, ridiculous, unbelievable, promotes hate and violence, talks about nothing worth being adapted on screen.
Again, what is this movie about ? A bipolar man founding a hooligan gang that commits crime in the U.S. Wow, what a waste of time and this is what is wrong with people: people have no taste. The cinematography is terrible, the acting terrible, the characters dull and the dialogue laughable.
This is all testosterone and gratuitous violence, scenes that have no relation, no linear coherence.
It stinks, it's fascist, it's Sylvester Stallone bull material.
Superbad (2007)
Slow, too slow, and boring.
The directors blew this one: this has been overdone already. It's a scrappy, messy, disorganized, terribly pace, slow, maudlin, and really the directors made no effort to build a story.
So what is it about ? I don't get it, is it just a girl asking a guy to buy her alcohol ? That's not a movie script ! So if it's just gags and a couple of teenage boy jokes, then why not just make sketches out of it ? Really, it feels like I watched four hours, with the never ending scene at the grocery store, the the cops prowling, then the party where nothing happens.
There simply isn't enough substance.
The Green Mile (1999)
Best Stephen King adaptation, Hanks delivers as usual.
Only reason I did not awarded a 10, is simply because the beginning of the movie wasn't very interesting and didn't seem very necessary to introduce the viewer to the story. In the book, there are two narrators, and the golden rule is when you rewrite a great book, it' s only going to appear inferior.
But the cinematography is very good, the actors do their part, even though it is clear Hanks outplays the rest of the cast, the scenes are pretty shocking but strikingly well done. Maybe people might not like how prison centers are portrayed, especially the lack of excessive violence used on jailbirds.
Why I thought was also a negative was the repentance of the death rowers - really, these criminals cannot be changed, no brain surgery can change them - I just on't buy the repentance, it's very sentimental.
But overall, everyone should see this movie, you have to understand the book was published in six volumes, it cannot be reduced into an hour and a half.
American Beauty (1999)
Did I miss something or is there no story ?
One of the most overrated movies and the reason why Kevin Spacey is incapable of getting any serious role and who by the way actually says he is the best impressionist of all time when he can't even match the voices he imitates (hi, I have sunglasses, I'm Jack Nicholson).
I am stunned that this movie could make such a buzz at the Academy - where's the story ! What is it about ? So the narrator is a dead man. I repeat, the narrator is a dead man ! This has to be the silliest script of the 90s, the actors are awful, it is maudlin, shockingly tacky, incredibly slow and cheesy, none of the events make any sense, there's no purpose, the characters just wonder and yawn.
Quite frankly,I'd rate Scream higher than American Beauty. It is a waste of time and attention.
Raging Bull (1980)
Raging Bull is the reason why Rocky is a joke
This movie doesn't necessarily connect with you, even if you are a boxer, the story is barely narrated, it goes back and forth - but the performances, the twists, the violence, the insights, make it a very good movie. De Niro is absolutely brilliant in a brutal, tormented, jealous angry husband who makes his wife's life impossible. This is exactly what should be brought up to Stallone's face every time to remind him that it is wrong to not care about the point of directing good movies, and it's a shame this movie rarely gets talked about when it comes to De Niro's career. Mostly now all you hear is the Godfather (more like godly boring) and Heat, which aren't very good movies. But Raging Bull even if Scorcese doesn't convince you with his picture, cinematography and filming, provides some really good actors. Everyone acts well, and you see the progression that sounds natural, Jake drives them all nuts and his destiny can only be a major downfall. The problems would be the symbolism, at some extent, it's boring. But the best shots are the realistic aspects, the domestic violence, the mob, the boxing,
De Niro is the proof that back then, sports movies gave you more insight on what goes on in the sport.
Per qualche dollaro in più (1965)
A sing along movie with macho performances
This movie is no different than any of Eastwood's western: it's silly, it's cliché, uninspired, macho, stereotyped, hardly tackles any historical events that occurred, testosterone, and same grin facial expression throughout the entire movie.
The dialogue is a mess, it's pretty much two guys thinking highly of themselves because they get to shoot guns for 15 min non-stop. Gosh, even the Blueberry the comic book in thirty volumes managed to come up with better story lines.
One again, Eastwood looks li,e he has sand in his mouth and and teeth because it's the same exact facial expression that pretty much sums up his acting skills.
This is a just a music of guys looking at each other, shooting guns, scratching their bulls, that's not the recipe for a good movie. And some of the quotes from the movie are incredibly cheesy.
Lawrence of Arabia (1962)
Not as good as everyone says
There are multiple historical, factual errors in this movie. I don't understand why it is so critically acclaimed. The movie rewrites history and in the end the movie Peter Otoole is the most overrated actor history. Omar is an excellent actor who deserved more recognition and praise than Otoole.
But the story is too contrived and inaccurate to enjoy it, especially for a historical figure as celebrated than E.T. Lawrence. It just doesn't work. The fact that a movie so far fetched as this one is considered as one of the top #3 films ever mad leaves me very worried about the seriousness of many movie critics.
The Shining (1980)
Kubrick is disloyal to the book, and it shows.
What makes the Shining great as a book ? Character development. The main protagonist is a normal man, a loving husband and father, who doesn't show any signs of insanity. But then he is enchanted, he slowly turns mad to the point that he is consumed by a state of crime. Instead, in the movie, Nicholson goes nuts from the beginning, hardly plays his true character, Duvall shouts, and then the ridiculous chase between him and his wife and their son, and the final trail inside this ice maze, was the ultimate embarrassment.
You have a great cast, and the only intention is to sabotage a great story just for what ? Ego and pride ? As usual, Kubrick demonstrates again his intentions of betraying great novels to turn them into silly soap movies.
I'll give it a two because Nicholson tries hard, but the script is so bad that it is basically the same ambiance that reigns from the start to finish. It is really maudlin.
Inglourious Basterds (2009)
Most overrated movie of the 21st Century
Tarantino is so full of himself, but the only achievement I can acknowledge is that he has reached unconditional praise and success for movies that are vastly overrated, severely violent, so incoherent that they should be changed to fantasy genre because of their lack of realism.
Inglorious Bastards is basically Ocean's Eleven remake with violence and 100% ego displayed. There's no story, it's not funny, nobody is even trying to act.
I don't have a problem with directing a comedy about WWII - after all, the Grande Vadrouille is a sensational and hysterical movie, that manages to ignore completely the gravity of the war and the occupation. Why ? Precisely because it is a real comedy.
All the fundamental laws for directing a movie are missing, it's alarming.
Town & Country (2001)
Warren's rock bottom movie
Warren Beatty has directed four of the greatest movies of all time: Bonnie & Clyde, Shampoo, Heaven can Wait, Reds. I really admired Warren for not starring four movies per year, an instead choosing quality over quantity and salary - but after Reds, he somehow managed to fin himself in the incomprehensible Ishtar, and now Town and Country, chick flick rubbish.
What is the story ? It is as shallow as an episode from Sex and the City. There is absolutely nothing in this movie, it is shallow, it is dull, the color isn't that good !
And the reality is, this movie sidelined Beatty for 15 years. To this date, Beatty is set to released a new picture after 15 years, hopefully, it might illustrate seriousness.
Little Miss Sunshine (2006)
Wait, they forgot to write a story !
What exactly is this movie about ? A family ? A road trip ?
I don't get it, it might be cute sometimes, but really, a little "gag", a little "haha moment", does not make a movie. You can't rely on a confrontation with a police officer that falls on adult content to carry a movie. And the rest is just a van circulating on a highway. Seriously ? Every ten minutes, it's shots of a van driving on a highway - now they do happen to stop for eating, buy drinks, sleep over at a motel. That's not a movie. And then, the pathetic cheesy choreography that you could already see a long time ago, sinks it.
It's really a shame because there are some good actors. But there's no story. No, this is mediocre, period.
The Blues Brothers (1980)
A no-show
I'd give this story a fat zero if we were enable to on this site. What's the story ? The script doesn't develop any story, it doesn't even attempt to, it doesn't even bother, and I'm not sure if the directors even had the intention to do so in the beginning. It's a fraud - it's a rip-off of the Saturday night sketches that they piled up together and consequently, it is so contrived that it just doesn't work.
I've ever seen a movie that talks about nothing more than the Blues Brother. They managed to do a rip-off of "Give somme lovin", the best soul song of all time, and it sound awful. Basically, the directors were only interested in three things:
- Showing a rodeo and police cars crashing.
- a three ring circus in a jail with jail birds singing along.
- a final trail with the two gangsters chased down by an army of cartoon soldiers reduced to "hut-hut" for fifteen minutes.
That's not a script. Don't buy the hype.