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Reviews
Madeleine Collins (2021)
Excellent intriguing story
A good story that unfolds well with a few mild surprises, but nothing very dramatic. Fits together well when all is revealed. Acting and production values are top class. The opening scene is important but its relevance only becomes clear as the story unfolds. An interesting character study of a woman struggling with mixed emotions and loyalty and of her relationship with those with whom she is involved. She does things that seem irrational and watching it we feel we would do things differently, but that doesn't make it not believable. Many of the other characters don't seem to understand her dilemma, while we do. Recommended.
Glass Onion (2022)
Worst movie I have seen in years.
Words fail me at describing how bad this is. Totally unbelievable story: I know it was meant to be. Terrible acting. Poor casting: Daniel Craig with a bad southern U. S. accent, really? Were those sets or CGI? In either case it was a complete waste of resource. Location would have been far far better. Don't get me wrong, I enjoy over the top spoof movies, if they are clever and stylish. This was none of that. Slapstick (non) humour. Agathe Christie style whodunnit all combined to create two hours plus of pure tedium. Confession: I abandoned it after just over an hour in disbelief as to how awful it is. Only movie I have ever given a zero.
Play for Today: The Other Woman (1976)
A stunning drama - unforgettable
Jane Lapotaire give a tour de force performance as an angry lesbian who disrupts everyone around her in her life. But it's not as simple as that with difficult topics such as mixed sexuality, and child abuse issues. Even today, 2022, this material would be considered courageous.
It is billed as a love triangle but that is a gross oversimplification of the complex relationships between all of the characters. The three main characters are a man and two women with a brief appearance of two other women. All five lives are tangled by this strong, feisty, troubled lesbian main character. Add to all of that there are religious and political issues discussed which are just as relevant today as they were in 1975/1976 when it was made and shown. There is also the British class system interfering in their lives. Television drama is rarely as good as this. Acting by everyone, including two children, is superb.
Mank (2020)
A lot of alcoholic ranting
The movie seemed to consist of Oldam (Mank) ranting on, offending just about everyone around him, and showing no human sensitivity. It was difficult to follow it chronologically despite descriptions between scenes. Maybe it was accurate but it was neither riveting drama nor entertaining. At times it had the oratory of a stage play but never achieved the rich language nor dramatic intensity such a play would have needed. It was more of a one man alcoholic rant than what the story could have achieved, given how brilliant the Citizen Kane script was.
Disappointing.
What We Don't Say (2019)
Awful
I gave up after the first half hour. It seemed bereft of direction, plot or story, just a rambling group of people saying not much.
Hope Gap (2019)
Understated, slow, brilliant break up of a marriage.
Annette Bening gives an Oscar worthy performance as the abandoned wife, embittered and hostile. Her change from happy wife to angry unhappy almost ex-wife with little more than facial expressions is brilliant. Bill Nighy is similarly brilliant as the husband. One feels for both and for neither: both are to blame. We experience the moment to moment pain of a man telling his wife he is leaving her and her in shock at hearing it. Then we experience the aftermath.
Josh O'Connor, in the slightly smaller part as the son is also at his best.
Not an easy film, being too close to how people really behave. Highly recommended.
The Good Liar (2019)
Wll acted con man story wthith twits and turns
Started well as a con man story, with hints that he had met his match in a con woman and would have made a great movie had it remained here. However, suddenly and almost without warning we are transported to modern Germany and then a Germany of the past for an almost different story, though subsequently providing a motive over and beyond money. This was two stories being told and either would have made a great movie, combining them, less so.
Be sure to watch the film to the end for the various twists and turns.
Extremely well made and acted, the two stars both being up to their best.
Hampstead (2017)
Pleasant enough but somewhat predictable
Loosely based on a true story but had it not been so, it would been not quite believable. American widow, Keaton, still unfortunately playing a much older Annie Hall, almost even wearing the same clothes, meets a man living in a shack on Hampstead Heath. An unlikely bond borne out of two very different needs. Heartwarming, light, beautifully photographed. Brendan Gleeson's acting is superb but fail to lift this movie out of mediocre.
Judy (2019)
An Oscar worthy performance. See it.
An Oscar worthy performance by Renee Zellweger. She totally gets into the character of Judy Garland. You will feel Judy's pain in this performance. Tells the story, a brief chapter in Judy's life, her brief comeback in London. A stunning, emotional tour de force. Slow at times but necessarily so for the impact of the pain and emotions. Highly recommended.
Maudie (2016)
Brilliant acting, superb cinematography
Both leading actors were superb, as was the direction and cinematography. Being a true biopic gave it value and depth. Unfortunately it was a painfully slow movie, the story could have been equally effectively told in a shorter movie.
Monsieur Lazhar (2011)
A beautiful film
A quiet and unassuming film that tells in simple beauty and detail the poignant story of a man who has suffered tragic loss, who takes a job as a teacher in a Montreal school. He relates to his class and they to him, the class dealing with a recent tragedy of their own. A totally believable telling. Reminiscences of the British film "To sir with Love", but subtler and with feeling. The acting by all characters, including many children is outstanding. Emotionally powerful and rewarding. Highly recommended.
While We're Young (2014)
Better than it first appeared
It began with some of the usual Hollywood light humour, but turned out to represent a far more perceptive view of relationships. The depiction of (the awfulness of) hipster lifestyle was excellent, though maybe a little over the top. In particular l liked the fact that when the primary protagonist entered a hall where a tribute ceremony was taking place, it did not consist of the usual disrupted ceremony due to the exposure, which we were expecting. The actual scenario was much more real and believable. In all a satisfying movie, with good real world humour and believable people.
The Wife (2017)
Oscar worthy performance bty Glenn Close
This is a slow moving totally believable and compelling story of a relationship between two writers. Both leading actors give outstanding performances but it is the character played by Glenn Close who owns the story and she tells it brilliantly. It unfolds slowly and meticulously with the feel of a drama written for the stage, which it is not. Highly recommended.
The Land of Steady Habits (2018)
Tedious tale of dysfunctional losers
Nothing happens in this movie that can be considered of the slightest interest to an audience. All of the characters are basically neither interesting nor likeable. They seem to wander around aimlessly looking tor whatever. The few attempts at humour fell flat. I could not finish it.
Film Stars Don't Die in Liverpool (2017)
Slow and tedious
Despite it being a true story and brilliantly acted by all, particularly Bening, two hours of watching an aging actress die does not constitute entertainment.
Oh! What a Lovely War (1969)
Best movie ever made
Shocking, brilliant, unforgettable. The most brilliant indictment of the idiocy of war. Don't be discouraged by the title or the fact that it is a musical.
It contrasts the propaganda and misinformation with the real horror and cost in lives of the war. It does it with music and song and with readings. All based on fact.
A film that you will remember for ever.
Two Lovers (2008)
Tedious and unconvincing
The primary male character, Leonard, played by Joaquin Phoenix is uninteresting and portrayed as a complete loser. That two intelligent, attractive women would show the slightest interest in such a hopeless loser is just unbelievable. Are we really meant to believe that these two women would fall head over heels for a grown man who is an idle assistant in his family's dry cleaning business and lives at home? Both at work and at his parent's home he behaves like a spoilt child. When I got to the scene here he is a car with three women on their way for a night out and I watched and listened to interminable singing and juvenile behaviour, I decided enough. If this film had more depth later on, then I wasn't prepared to watch the tedium to get there. What were these fine actors doing in something this bad? This film is tedious, unconvincing garbage.
The Adjustment Bureau (2011)
Almighty and angels in modern day New York
This is a very disappointing film, with many unanswered questions. There have been many almighty and angel stories in the past. Despite good location shooting in New York, this one does not work. It is a story of angels (never named as such, though strongly implied) keeping the world straight, on advice from their superior, who turns out to be whoever and whatever you believe him to be. Sound familiar? Mankind had been saved by divine intervention over the years. This time the hero, Damon, (character Norris) was tagged to be a good and wholesome president and these angels were going to make sure he got there. The love interest in his life, Blunt, (character Elise), was getting in the way, though it is not made clear why, so they had to be kept apart. I won't spoil the ending. It is a vehicle for special effects, though none of them are very spectacular. Some scenes are rather slow. Dialogue is poor. How Damon, Blunt and Stamp were ever persuaded to participate in this is a mystery.
I haven't read the original story by Philip Dick, but knowing his work, this was a travesty of the quality of story he wrote.
I fear this is a disturbing kind of pseudo religious message that is being foisted on our youngsters. Be warned.
Nowhere Boy (2009)
Unrealistic, unconvincing.
Having been brought up in working class Britain in the 40s, 50s and 60s I can say that this film is totally inaccurate. Britain was much grimmer than this. According to this movie, John Lennon had a comfortable middle class upbringing. John would have been 15 in 1955. At that time citizens of working class Liverpool experienced real hardship and poverty. They would have lived in small, cold, damp, terraced (row) houses, many of them with no bathroom, quite different from the comfort that everyone in this movie seemed to enjoy. Granted Lennon was brought up in a comfortable middle class home, as accurately portrayed in this movie, his friends, values and social contacts were working class.
Other inaccuracies: the records he stole were 7 inch 45 rpm. These were almost unheard of in Britain until around 1960. In 1955 records were invariably 10 inch 78 rpm. Fashions were "Teddy Boy" meaning very narrow tight trousers and long jackets. The fashions shown in the film came much later. The language was quite wrong: the F word was almost unheard in those days, even in working class culture.
The movie says nothing except that he was a boy who sulked because he was abandoned by his mother. His substitute mother was portrayed as a loving, devoted mother providing a comfortable supportive home, convincingly played by Kristin Scott Thomas. Anne Marie Duff, playing his real mother, was too young for the part and therefore unconvincing.
Rather than feel sympathy for the main character I found him ungrateful. The movie showed little of the Lennon who developed deep human values which he later brought to his music. It is difficult to correlate the child portrayed in this movie, with his comfortable (yes, that was comfortable for the era) upbringing, with the writer of sensitive songs like "Imagine", "Give Peace a Chance" and similar music.
I watched the movie and thought, so what? It neither grabbed nor captivated. Listen to Lennon's song "Working Class Hero". That is the story of his life, not this glossy, unrealistic fiction.
The Disappearance of Alice Creed (2009)
Started well, well acted but...
It started well and from the earlier reviews I was expecting a taut thriller. Acting and story line were all very good and it wasn't the usual kidnapping caper. It still failed to be that rarity which is what I hoped it would be; a movie where people do all the right things in a difficult situation.
Spoilers follow...do not read if you plan to watch it.
There were too many situations where people almost did the most sensible thing but then didn't. It transpired that two of the characters knew each other but didn't recognize each other from their voices. Unlikely. Then there is a scene where a victim has the clear upper hand but succumbs to hand back the gun and be tied up again. It just wouldn't happen. She gets the upper hand again and instead of grabbing the jacket to remove the keys from the pocket at arms length, she moves to do it within reach of her captor and loses the advantage again. Victim calls police from a cell phone, the location of which, to within a block is traceable in seconds. No police arrived at all.
Double crossing and betrayal at the end were almost too much.
Worth watching but not quite believable.
The Joneses (2009)
Worth watching - better than I expected
The movie tells the story of an artificial family created by a marketing company to live in a suburb and promote numerous products. The idea is that neighbours will buy the products to emulate the lifestyle of this, theoretically, enviable family. It starts as a fairly light comedy but becomes slightly tragic as it progresses. It is a sad reflection on the American dream of materialism and how low people will go.
Not quite believable and a bit too glitzy, but then this artificial family were supposed to be selling glitz. It felt as though it were made by an advertising agency with everything just too perfect.
There is a scene early on where the "daughter" makes explicit advances to the "father". This occurs before we are aware of what is happening and should have proved an issue for the censor.
Acting, script and production were all very good. Demi Moore and David Duchovny did a good job. Better than most Hollywood movies.
Harry Brown (2009)
Could have been a great movie
This movie started so well. A mild natured man with a past that included killing is pushed beyond his tolerance by the corruption around him of all the civilized values that he knows. He is pushed into taking action by the ineffectual police. He has the skills and nothing to lose; his family and friends are all dead. He does it believably.
Then the movie loses it. There is a scene where the career police officer organizes a confrontation with the local gangs. This is an unnecessary scene which detracts form the primary story.
Then the movie sinks into unbelievable Hollywood style "friend of the good guy was the real bad guy after all". The scene in the pub towards the end was unbelievable and ruined an otherwise excellent story line.
To limit the story to the retired Royal Marine cleaning up the neighbourhood with the bad guys getting justice would have been a far better movie.
The Boys Are Back (2009)
An unbelievable story
This movie was disappointing. All of the emotions and values seemed rather predictable. The situations the people got into were not realistic. For example the mother in law refused to look after the children when the main character (Owen) had a business trip to make. Just wouldn't happen the way it was portrayed. A bunch of teenagers arrived for a party and wrecked the house, but although there was a teenage son, he was of a different age group than these people who came from nowhere. This was fabricated to create a situation of tension while the main character (Owen) was away on his business trip. Totally unbelievable. The girlfriend refused him when he asked her to look after the kids for a few days. Wouldn't happen. The son couldn't look after his younger brother yet could get himself from Australia to England alone.
This was an attempt to make a weepie with a very unbelievable story. Acting was good, story and script not so.
Rachel Getting Married (2008)
Good story spoiled by overlong irrelevant scenes
The story has been told many times before. A child now grown up and in drug rehabilitation, returns home to a dysfunctional family with past secrets. This one is better than most due to believable, biting dialogue and Anne Hathaway's excellent portrayal of Kym, the central character. The movie captures the destructive effect of a girl dealing with her being cause of the death of a loved one through irresponsible behaviour. It deals with this in a totally convincing way without the usual easy redemption. There is a hint that the estranged mother shared some of the responsibility for the incident in the past but this is never resolved.
The film is spoiled by an overlong irrelevant speech scene at the pre-wedding dinner and a totally gratuitous dance scene at the wedding. Both of these go on for tedious minutes and seem to be telling a totally different story. Fast forward through these; you won't miss anything of relevance. Ten or so minutes of material dispatched to the cutting room floor would have created a better movie.
Marie and Bruce (2004)
Like a good European movie
If you are expecting the usual Hollywood pulp then forget this one. Much more in the style of Fellini or other abstract/surrealistic European directors. It is ostensibly a day in the life of a couple in New York. But is it? There are two primary characters who speak their innermost thoughts. Be warned, this is very graphic at times. This is overlaid with the banal chatter from the other people we encounter through the day. But is it actually one woman's thoughts and is the man in her imagination? Or is it the man's thoughts and fantasies? An intriguing movie that operates at a different level of consciousness than usual. Based on a stage play, which shows. It would have been even more gripping as a play. Acting and direction are all superb. Stay with it, it is worth it. It will haunt you for days after.