Change Your Image
debbiedoesdialogue
Ratings
Most Recently Rated
Reviews
Legends of the Fall (1994)
A poorly-aged block of bad cheese
When Brad Pitt's character screams "God DAMN you God!" from the front porch of his Montana home, we got the sense, even in 1994, that this film had jumped its shark midway through the second act. In retrospect we realized it began well before.
Top class in this film is its cinematography, which won an Oscar for a reason. Beautifully shot, it makes the sweeping topography of the American West and its interlopers fun to look at, and, one might even argue, breathtaking. But the fun ends there as our interlopers, in this case three brothers, their father, and an absolutely ridiculous love triangle.
It's not just that the dialogue surrounding this budding menage-a-trois that keeps us cringing through every line, it's the way, now, that Susannah, the object of affection, is framed: precisely that, and no more, and incapable of meaningfully battling off 90s-haircut-model-suitors who then scream barely-believable lines at each other as they attempt to sort out their own emotions about it.
Society has moved on from all sorts of ridiculous social zeitgeists but managed to still enjoy films that captured them; Legends of the Fall won't be one of them.
Condor's Nest (2023)
A punchy, dialogue-driven affair that's just hot enough to sizzle
Condor's Nest swings hard, doesn't entirely land the punch, and yet manages to take us to the ninth round with a pulpy, character-driven overtone.
Jacob Keohane is excellent, if singularly morose, as Will Spaulding, an American pilot who watched a Nazi colonel execute his bomber crew, and travels to South America in search of revenge against that same colonel, played by Arnold Vosloo. We encounter a twist as it turns out certain Nazi figureheads thought dead turn up alive in Argentina, and the singular chase spirals out of control.
The production value isn't quite there and one assumes this film was produced on a smaller budget - the car chases are nothing to write home about, and the bits of action are spaced too far apart to allow the longer "standoff" sequences to properly bite - but its punchy script, menagerie of characters, and character actors, from Michael Ironside as a Russian spy to Jackson Rathbone as a misogynistic Nazi cokehead, ultimately make this an entertaining, if probably less-than-acclaimed, watch.
Hell or High Water (2016)
A dog of a script, one of Sheridan's worst
Taylor Sheridan has made quite a name for himself since Hell or High Water released in 2016, and this title is a reminder that his earlier efforts were overstuffed.
Among this film's most pretentious scenes are a needless charactery bit where Margaret Bowman scolds Jeff Bridges and Gil Birmingham over a steak order; overstuffed and utterly contrived, it's one of the worst bits in a film packed with them. Sheridan's shaky script leaves his actors playing caricatures of themselves, from Ben Foster's good-hearted-bad-guy to Chris Pine's absurd soulfulness.
Sheridan has improved at his craft since these days - though his indulgences are still littered in his work - but this is a piece of early auteurship you're better off leaving to the archaeologists.
The Banshees of Inisherin (2022)
Truly Outstanding!
Banshees of Inisherin is a true standout in the 2022 class of releases and it's due in large part to stellar writing by auteur Martin McDonagh.
Of course, no script is worth anything without the actors to pull it off, and Colin Farrell and Brendan Gleeson take smart writing and run with it. They are spectacular and breathe life into the narrative and ultimately make the movie worth watching in spite of its deliberately spare design.
But one gets the sense that McDonagh's writing transcends his actors here and that even less talented actors wouldn't have dragged it down. It's dour at times, it's heartfelt at others, it's bold, truthful, a biting commentary, all at the same time. The screenplay gets a 10/10 from me - truly masterful - and everything else is just icing on the cake.