Reviews

Fantasy films often disappoint, either through their poor special effects, or their writing. This film is a masterpiece of the first order, dramatic, sensitive, full of life and colour, with a true heart. For me there is only one flaw, and it is, comparatively speaking, a small one - the casting of the Falangist officer as the villain, and the Maquis as the heroes. The latter were in truth guerrillas who brought violence, death and destruction to a Spain exhausted by the horrors of the Civil War which had just ended. This complaint aside, the like the courage of Del Toro allowing us the luxury of being able to accept Ofelia's visions and adventures as real, and not merely the result of the over-excited imagination of a young girl.

The starting premise of this series is excruciating enough - a girl is raped so she causes misery and chaos by leaving tapes behind her when she kills herself. This is more than enough material for a mini-series, but the producers cruelly drag this out for four - yes four - seasons. Every possible teen angst angle is introduced, leaving the inevitable conclusion that the school should be shut down and most of the students institutionalised, either in prison or mental hospital. I was forced to watch much of this rubbish as my wife became mesmerised by the awfulness of the thing. It is highly "politically correct" (even including white supremacist allegations, student riots, serious mental illness, drug use etc). The increasingly aged "youths" are a joke - and the main actor, Dylan Minnette - cannot act to save his life, always having the same lost expression, like a rabbit in car headlights. Watch at your peril.

I hope the higher-level management with oversight of "Dr Who" - the Time Lords or whovever, soon step in and sack the writing, production and directorial team, and most of the cast - starting with the Dr herself. This was an embarrassment to the Dr Who oeuvre, disjointed, lacking in subtlety, occasionally puerile. What has gone wrong, do they want to destroy the series? I liked the revival of the old foes, but why no explanation that they are already extinct - where would an invasion fleet come from? Why the domestic drama aside, which occupied much of the middle of the show? The UNIT scene was shocking in its weakness. Why can't the writers/producers agree on a consistent approach; it can't lurch from comedy, to horror, to domestic drama etc, without ruining itself.

I am astounded at the fawning praise this insubstantial movie has garnered. It was apparently an "expansion" of a short film made by the director some years earlier; all I can say is that he can't have added much plot, character development or action, for this film has little if any of those things.

Don't get me wrong, I enjoy nicely crafted films which explore the human condition, but this isn't one of those. Nothing of much substance happens.

It may have been an excellent short movie; it should have stayed one.

I make no apologies that this review will likely come across as harsh; it is meant to be.

Whilst this pointless "reality" TV show has generally glowing reviews, and a good overall IMDb rating, I find it frustrating and annoying. This is another of those unnecessary and febrile shows that the television world is inflicting on the increasing dumbed-down population.

There are many things which annoy me about this show, apart from its shear pointlessness - one of the most annoying is the children. Both of them are spoilt brats, and the parents seem to have no idea that they are raising self-entitled monsters. Where is the common sense in letting the brats get away with what they do get away with? Who benefits from unleashing on an unsuspecting world two more "Little Emperors"?

If you ever come across "The Little Couple", change the station before you get sucked into this trash.

This is a great little movie, not perfect - the multiple threats are too improbable - but really atmospheric. The ending is a revelation, and makes a lot of sense given earlier details (though there remain unanswered, and probably unanswerable, questions).

I really enjoyed it, but it could be depressing and grim if you are not in the right frame of mind.

Normally a high IMDb score and critical acclaim indicate that a film has substance, style or other attributes which make it a good film. This one is more than two hours of dullness, with almost no plot development or character development for that matter. I can't believe the high score or the response of critics - have they taken collectively leave of their senses?

There is almost mo plot, and as an illustration of lack of character development, the depressed central character began the movie depressed, remained depressed throughout, and ended it depressed, seemingly unaffected by the events (such as they were) which occurred in the course of the film - some of which were harrowing enough in their own right.

I wouldn't say this was as dull as watching paint dry, but perhaps as dull as watching grass grow in a cemetery.

Avoid - and this has taught me to never take the IMDb rating or critics reviews as an objective measure of film quality. Thanks to this pretentious trash I am now depressed.

I realise that most have rated this movie more highly, but personally I found is unsatisfying, somewhat pretentious, and ultimately boring. There were flashes of humour, but I found the story insufficient to sustain a full-length movie, and the the tone of the movie variable. Perhaps it requires a particular view of rural 1980s New Zealand life - and a subculture of that - to appreciate this trifle of a film.

I found this film to be disappointingly predictable and a self- indulgent piece of "entertainment".It would have been more entertaining to watch paint drying - and about as easy to guess the next scene. The characters were all two-dimensional and lacking in any depth.

One detail that particularly irritated me was the lecturing manner - and content - of the supposed Columbia University philosophy professor. He addressed his class in a manner that no real lecturer would, speaking in over-written prose found only in bad novels - and poorer made-for-TV films. The subjects matter he seemed to cover was so eclectic and with such a tenuous connection to any school of philosophy that I wondered if the script writer was having a joke at the audience's - or academia's - expense.

The concept of one incident linking various disparate individuals, and thus illustrating aspects of life - or in this case New York city - is so over-used that it will now only succeed with a better than average script. Unfortunately, despite the reasonably capable cast, this was a forlorn exercise.

This 1992 documentary, the most watched BBC documentary ever broadcast, is an exceptional portrait of Queen Elizabeth II in the 40th year of her reign. It focuses on the public life of the Queen, highlighting the political role she plays at home and abroad.

I particularly enjoyed the image of the Queen as humorous but at the same time dedicated and serious.

The view of royal events were not entirely new, as we have seen them over the years in other documentaries, but as a comprehensive look at the role and operation of the modern monarchy this is a worthy companion-piece to the 1969 documentary, "The Royal Family", which focused more on the private life of the Royal Family.

I'm afraid that I found this movie to be terrible, with almost no redeeming features whatsoever.

As a piece of comedy, whose central theme is that it is OK to feel good about having an abortion, is problematic. But that storyline is obscured and largely driven aside by the rest of the movie.

The main character, Donna Stern, is a so-called comedian, who follows the modern tendency of using sexual and toilet humour in her "entertainment". She is a self-absorbed, rude and generally unpleasant person.

Without revealing plot details, she is cruel and insensitive to others, is close to being an alcoholic (if she hasn't already crossed that threshold), and has absolutely no judgement when it comes to her choice of material for her comedy act.

I find it incredible that anyone could actually think this is a good movie. My wife and I both regard it as trash, and only watched to the end for the ghoulish appeal of watching a train-wreck of a movie.

Please avoid, unless you like unpleasant people and toilet humour.

This movie is a rare and wonderful thing, a movie with no redeeming qualities whatsoever. My wife chose it during a visit to a shop to buy several cut-price DVDs. Had I noticed the cover statement that it was from the makers of "This is the end" I would probably have vetoed her choice. But whereas the former movie had an interesting premise - even if it was ruined by vulgarity, profanity and drug use, this movie doesn't even have an original or good premise. I was astounded to see that it has a fairly good overall rating; clearly the system must be manipulated in some manner. I refuse to believe people on the whole could be so stupid as to actually like this.

Though technically well done, this film is one of the most shocking films of the decade. I say not because it isn't well enough made - as a mindless action movie it would be successful enough - but because of its message and the response to it.

Americans, by and large, are extolling its virtues, the portrayal of a good American, a patriot. Non-Americans can generally see the broader perspective, and are less positive.

It is very unfortunate that Americans who criticize the film are condemned as unpatriotic or radical lefties. The truth of the matter is that I, though a non-American, am socially and politically conservative, yet find the message of the film to be offensive. Good patriotic conservative Americans, as well as those of other persuasions, should also condemn the ideas that the film glorifies.

The key messages are that Iraqis are bad and Americans are good, and that it is fine to enjoy killing the baddies. Kyle was a proved fabricator - the law suits by Jesse Ventura are proof of that - but that is beside the point. Boasting of enjoying killing anyone, enemy or not, is a sign of a serious mental disturbance or illness, or at the very least, a sign of the societal sickness in the USA that applauds the "right" to bear arms, and to use them with wanton abandon. Killing is what war is about, but there have always been limits to such conduct, and the film shows precious little of that restraint.

Obviously this is a fictional film, and not necessarily accurate, even allowing for the inaccuracies in Kyle's largely factual book, upon which it is based. But if the common American attitude to Iraqis, Arabs, Muslims and anyone else they see as the enemy, is as shown in this piece of mindless, gung-ho, chauvinist propaganda, then God help us all. Such an attitude can only alienate those who should be the Americans friends and supporters and will ensure that political instability, terrorism and global chaos prevails for generations to come.

If is very unusual for me to give up on a film before the end, even though afterwards I might feel that I have wasted my time. But this film is exceptional. I have never experienced such a waste of opportunities. A good - true - story, good caste of experienced actors, and the potential for some action, as well as some photogenic scenes, should have led to a reasonable film. It fails because it is badly written and badly directed. It is also poorly conceived - a comedy drama on such topic!

On a side note, there is a lot of confusion about Nazi art, in this film and more generally. The Germans both bought and stole art, from Jew and non-Jew. The treatment of artworks at the end of the war didn't always clearly distinguish between these different categories. There was a notorious incident in which the real Monuments Men resisted orders from their military superiors to send several hundred works of art to the USA, as war spoils. Unfortunately, although the western Allies, generally behaved responsibly, the Soviets stole what they wanted. Even today, many of those people who lost art to the Germans and then to the Soviets are still waiting for the return of their property. I won't touch on the theft of land and houses by the Communists after the war.

This is a great little film, quirky and intelligent. It is not your typical assassin film, and it may be too eccentric for some people's taste, but I enjoyed it. There are many levels to the story - without giving anything away - and it can be enjoyed on several levels. The teenage assassins are delightfully ruthless yet - at least at times - also endearingly vulnerable. All the leads give good performances, and Ronan and Gandolfin both give especially good performances. It is quite bloody, in a literal and figurative sense, but not gratuitously. I was disappointed that it wasn't critically acclaimed and that it didn't do well at the box office - the latter may have been been due to poor marketing. I really enjoyed it, though it wasn't a masterpiece, it was entertaining.