Reviews

I never got a screener for "The Artist" and was always curious as to what the fuss was about. So for ten years I waited until HBO showed it the other night. What a shower. I actually fast forwarded through sections when I realized the entire movie was in captions with no sound. Smug, self satisfied and tendentious, this was almost a complete waste of two hours. Some other reviewer pointed out the big problem: the lead has an accent and can't transfer over to talkies but this is hidden until the last five minutes and even then when the sound comes in it's unintelligible. The lead, (Jean Dujardin), is fine but too smug, too satisfied, through much of the movie. And rising star Peppy Miller (Bérénice Bejo) is very easy on the eyes. The movie could have been fixed quite easily because there were some nice moments and some interesting shots. Overall however The Artist was Ghastly.

I just rewatched Body Heat and thought I'd check back on the "original". Gad what a disappointment. Barbara Stanwyck seems miscast at the femme fatale and I guess I never quite noticed the convoluted script the last time I watched. And this was several decades ago. Fall i love with the gal almost immediately? I don't think so. Barbara --an oil painting she wasn't so I don't get how Walter Neff could have fallen for her quite so easily. There are some great moments, especially from Edward G. Robinson but alas, it seems terribly dated now.

Great sets, and lots of other reasons to watch this classic but don't feel bad if you never get to check it out. It's not one of Billy Wilder's best.

I think I saw this at the drive-in as a kid in South Africa when it came out. (TV was banned under the Apartheid regime) and I loved the movie then. Saw it again recently on TCM and it's held up pretty well. It's a slow intro for modern audiences and I doubt it would pass muster these days.

There are also an awful lot of good guys leading the charge and it got confusing even for my wife who normally catches these things way before I do. They all look alike and feel like mini George Maharis'.

But quibbles aside it's a great little movie, if you have the time and patience. Watch out for "Scotty" from Star Trek, the original series.

Ghastly beyond belief. A hardened space scientist is going to go all Ga-Ga over some alien plant\creature and stick his face into it. Really?? Ridley Scott is perverse beyond measure. This can't be the guy who directed Alien and Blade Runner. Did anyone even read the dreadful script before plotting out the scenes?? MIchael Fassbender was good. He's always good.

There are some stellar reviews here, especially the one from ViktorDrake so I don't know how much I can add except to say that there must be some way to kill an Alien, right? If they're running across the fields, (the little ones) and, early in the film, practically impossible to destroy then you have a very tough premise.

It's as if Ridley Scott is being perverse again. Destroy pretty much the greatest SciFi franchise with inane, asinine movies which make almost no sense. How did this get past the readers in Hollywood?? Oh, I know, it didn't have to get past any readers, just straight to Ridley's desk and way-ho away we go! Ghastly movie.

I was a kid living here when this went down and remember well storm it created. The general tone and feeling is good but don't dare dig into the true historical details or it will seem daft.

Worse than that is seeing Sasha Baron Cohen, at 6' 3" playing Abbie Hoffman (5' 7") and nearly twenty years too old for the part. These were students and young activists not nearly 50-somethings! I love Sasha BC as D' Ali G and Borat but here he is out of his depth and looks like some weird old man wearing a halloween wig. His American accent is terrible and I found it a great distraction.

I remember going to see this in the theaters when it came out in 1990. Everyone seemed to be talking about it in LA and, I think I thought it was "OK" back then. I remember thinking how weird it was that they all drove cars from the early 80s and 70s when it was set in the (90s) current time. Somehow things are always cooler in previous eras perhaps?

When catching it on cable recently I'd actually forgotten how the films ends which is kind of interesting (my theory on films is that if it "stays with you" and is memorable then it has served its job. I saw the Sand Pebbles when I was a kid and never forgot it. I never forgot the ending.

The Grifters sets itself up as a heist or Big Con movie in the way of The Sting but there IS no big con. We get to see the con Annette Bening did in a previous gig but we're sorta waiting for the three of them to get going and it never happens - which is a sort of con on the audience. It's almost like there's a missing character, someone cut out of the script and there's a big logic hole because of it. If Cusack's character is making $20 here and there from conning bar tenders out of change then how does he have paintings on his wall stuffed with thousands of $$??

Annette Bening having sex with a nasty, fat landlord to save $5? She's behind on the rent. Really. She's hotter than a frying tamale and even hotter in this film so she's really going to roll in the hay with some slob? Why not just do a quick con, after all, she's the queen at this sort of stuff. I mean this was 1990 not 1890. C'mon!

Fleeing from the mob and sleeping next to a loaded gun and full of fear, Angelica Huston finds no trouble falling to sleep and, in fact, sleeps so soundly that she doesn't hear Annette Bening rattling at least THREE keys trying to get into her motel, doesn't hear her walking in the motel room (this is after a previous scene where she (Bening) picks out the "perfect" motel key from a massive wad of keys) and is shocked to wake up to find her hands around her throat. Really??

Angelica Huston has great gams, Annette Bening is a doll for sure and, as much as I love seeing Bening naked, it does seem gratuitous now. Some of the other reviews nail why this film is flawed but it's not THAT bad and there are some great beats along the way.

Full disclaimer here, April Wright (the director) and me were in a Los Angeles writers' group for a few years. April was the one who always found time to give notes on stuff I was working on and they were GREAT notes. Often others in our group were "too busy" to give you a read on your latest draft or gave minimal feedback - so I always knew April was going to do great things Somewhere. I'd count April as a friend and industry colleague.

My wife and I watched Going Attractions: The Definitive Story of the Movie Palace on Turner Classic Movies and it was superb. I've been watching from afar over the years as April cooked up her Drive-In documentary and quietly rooting for her on Facebook but I had no idea this would be so good. So when a friend asks you to watch their stuff you watch, right? You just hope it's not awful or cringe-making.

This was a beautifully produced, slickly edited and moving documentary. There's a ton of sit-down interviews, loads of great footage and stills and beautiful, evocative shots of the few movie palaces which are still around and great footage of the bygone ones. A lot of care and time and effort went into this and it shows. The documentary team must have visited a ton of venues and locations, this is not something that was cooked up from afar, they actually take you to these amazing old palaces (the ones that are left) and one is left pining for these old movie houses which have been torn down and thankful for the great ones which have been preserved due to amazing love, and dedication from the owners, preservation groups and movie fans. This is an absolute trip down memory lane for anyone who remembers these magnificent movie venues and a real treat to watch. And yes, I can't wait to watch her Drive In documentary (Going Attractions: The Definitive Story of the American Drive in) next.

You know a movie isn't resonating with you when, nearly at the end, you realize you've actually watched it before and can't remember it. But still there are some fascinating aspects to this movie Pandorum. The editing, especially the fight scenes, is bizarre - it feels like there are missing clips or frames as we jump into one scene to another. Sloppy editing? It's pretty scary in places (just what you want to watch during a pandemic, right?) and some of the ideas are intriguing. Dennis Quaid as the lead? Hmm, not sure what he was thinking there, cast well against type.

I knew we were in trouble when I heard that Elton was making it himself as such vanity projects rarely turn out well. However, my wife saw it on a flgight back to LA from NY and said it was great. OK, I'll give it a try.

Ak. It started out in rehab and ended in rehab. It's not so much a BioPic as a sort of tale of a star's rehab struggles, which is fine for a documentary.

Where was the story of "Yellow Brick Road", which was a flash on the screen in a montage, where are the rest of the band? What's up with that weird Kiki Dee scene which just kind of ends? I remember at the time Elton was so kind to help resurrect Kiki's career which was floundering and it just sort of drops into the movie. Weird. Yellow Brick Road hit us all at school (I was going boarding school in the UK in the 70s so this was my generation) and it was amazing. We listened to it until the record was worn out.

Taron Egerton was sort of "OK". Too tall, too well-built but too little musical skill to carry off the famous tunes. I mean everyone in the world knows the great Elton John songs so why not use 'em?? Or start singing in the actors's voice then cut away to the real tune?

I loved the first season of Project Blue Book. I'm a big UFO fan and thought the early episodes, where they tracked real cases were quite well done but lately the episodes, while well done, are mish mosh made up from disparate parts. Case in point: Episode 8 of season two. Broken Arrow. I thought this was going to be about the famous missing Hydrogen Bomb on the east coast with a UFO angle but it was completely fabricated. When they did the recap (true story) at the end it had nothing to do with what we saw on screen. UFO stores are weird enough so why go to the effort of subterfuge and artifice? They can't say they are based on true stories any more. Which is fair enough but they can't claim to be basing them on true tales any more.