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smythp
Reviews
The Good Thief (2002)
A mess
As I haven't seem the original "Bob le Flambeur" I'm not in a position to compare the two versions.
In the right hands this could have a been a good (possibly great) film. Unfortunately in Jordan's hands it's just a mess. As in many of his other films Jordan has good ideas but seems to be incapable of carrying them through successfully.
An immediate problem is the constantly mumbled dialogue. In a film with pretensions at a complex heist plot that's a complete no-no. It may be realistic in a real-world sense but it's certainly no fun for the viewer. The cast are good and the cinematography is fine. The biggest problem is the script. It comes across like a first draft with numerous logical holes, spurious scenes and cardboard characters. Some of the plot twists are very reminiscent of the Oceans series and one has to wonder how much of an influence they were on the plot, particularly in the later stages of the film. Here they just don't work as they aren't sufficiently developed or underpinned to convince. It's almost as if Jordan was writing the film as he went along.
Mimic: Sentinel (2003)
Feeble sequel
I won't labour the details since I think most of the points I would make have already been made by others. The acting is pedestrian at best. The plot is as thin as clingfilm and is a rather poor homage to Hitchcock's Rear Window (Please note: regarded as something of a masterpiece by many).
Rear window works because we see everything from the main character's (Jimmy Stewart) perspective, namely the wheelchair, in his bedroom. Everything the audience sees is from that vantage point. Jimmy Stewart's character is a helpless observer who plays no part in any activity outside his bedroom. This creates an atmosphere of claustrophobia and racks up the tension continuously. This reaches an unbearable point when he sees the murderer returning home to his apartment, which his girlfriend has just broken into, looking for evidence. This tension is created by the knowledge that Stewart is powerless to warn or help her.
The same scene is recreated in Mimic: Sentinel but is completely flat and offers us absolutely no tension whatsoever. There are various other nods to Rear Window which immediately tells us that the writers didn't really have anything new or novel to say in this film. There are various plot elements that seem to do little other than fill in time (in a film which seems overly long at 78 minutes). For example when he attempts to report the danger to the police, his mother starts an intimate affair with the officer whom she had met briefly once before several years ago? Then there is the kooky, doped up sister, who walks around flapping her arms all the time. The main character is too active to be the impotent character Stewart plays but he's also too feeble to be a real hero character.
Leaving the Rear Window connection, there's very little rhyme or reason to the rest of the plot. No explanation is provided for many plot elements and very little motivation is given to any of the characters. It's all just an excuse for some atmospheric shots of not very scary giant insects dragging people off into the dark and some occasional shots of blood splatter. No attempt if made to create a feeling of impending dread as any real person would have in such a situation. None of the characters are in any way sympathetic and it's hard to get worked up enough to care about the film when we don't care about any of the characters.
We're left with a film which lacks the substance of Rear Window and which fails to provide any substance of it's own. I wouldn't bother spending money to rent it but if it's on TV and you're a completist who liked the other two Mimic films, then go ahead.
Miami Vice (2006)
Disappointing
I just got this out on DVD and I was very disappointed. Any reviews I'd read praised the film when it was released so my expectations were quite high. Sadly it didn't live up to the critical hype. I hated the TV series so for me the fact that it wasn't a remake was an immediate plus. Sadly however, apart from that and Jamie Foxx's cool haircut, there's very little to praise about this film.
So what's wrong with it? It's slow, there's no characterisation, no storyline to speak of and the acting is wooden. People drift around like they are sleepwalking. The cast give the impression that they don't really care and it's difficult to believe that the characters are real people.
One reviewer rated it a triumph of style over substance and that's probably fairly close to the mark. It's hard to believe that 'Last of the Mohicans' or 'Heat' are by the same director.
Inside Man (2006)
A wasted opportunity!
The story had potential and given the cast this could have been a fantastic film. Sadly the result is nothing short of dull. It's almost as if the director was marking time waiting for the credits to roll around. What this film is completely lacking is any kind of drama, tension or emotion and that makes for poor cinema. We are never really engaged beyond waiting for things to get interesting, which sadly, never happens. What this film does have is some good ideas and plot devices but the director (and lets be under no illusions here - in the case of this film the fault lies purely with Spike Lee) wastes them with leisurely, lacklustre plot development and timing. In the hands of a Michael Mann or a David Mamet this would probably have been a superb film.
Mindhunters (2004)
Mildly entertaining remake...
This is basically a modern reworking of 'And Then There Were None' (itself based on the Agatha Christie story 'Ten Little Indians'), and as such it's mildly entertaining although definitely not scary. For a film to be scary you need to (a). have characters that the audience cares about and (b). build tension. Both are absent here. The two best actors both get killed off very early on and one can only wonder if that was at their own request!? I thought that the idea for the Puppeteer (a serial killer who manipulates his victims so that they bring about their own death) had potential but unfortunately the idea is wasted and the director himself seems to have forgotten about it after the first couple of deaths.
Another poor Hollywood knock-off of an original idea.