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Reviews
Super Size Me (2004)
Not believable
What a Crock. (Sorry Ray) Filmmaker eats NOTHING but McDonalds for 30 days. Gains weight. Health declines. Shocking!
Poor McDonalds. Why not Betty Crocker frosting? Why not almost any brand of granola? Or nuts?
Somewhere within the first few days we see a scene where the poor dedicated filmmaker eats enough food for 3 people and barfs. If filmmaker ate that quantity of "natural", "vegan" food, filmmaker would also barf, and gain weight, if he continued to eat after the point of feeling full.
The experiment was contrived. If there was an impending heart-attack after 21 days on the diet, as the film implied, filmmaker must be an idiot to have continued for the last 9 days. Oh wait, I know the answer to that. McDonald's food impaired his judgment too.
Please Hillary, or Ted, or Howard, or Morgan, review my diet every day. Tell me exactly what to eat. Protect me from businesses like McDonalds, who want to sell me the food I want to buy. I am too stupid to make that decision for myself.
Closer (2004)
Good acting can't save this movie
Watching these morally bankrupt characters go about their lives is similar to, but less interesting than, watching ants in an ant farm. That's how detached from them I felt.
But the worst problem is that there is almost no motivation for anything that happens. People say, frequently, "I love YOU now", or "I don't love you any more. I'm leaving", or "I've been having an affair" and there is almost nothing prior on screen to indicate why. Apparently these schizo people just wake up one morning and decide to make major changes in their lives for no apparent reason.
The only sympathetic, flesh-and-blood, character is played by Natalie Portman. There is not a camera angle or pink wig that can make her look anything less than stunning. There is one scene, not sexual, where she is in bed with a lover she has just been reunited with, bouncing around like a puppy for joy. In this short scene she goes way beyond the words, to communicate utter contentment, hope for the future, vulnerability. Her acting was terrific and made the film worthwhile.
Sideways (2004)
Boring, mildly funny, depressing
One review I read before seeing the film said that initially the main characters are unlikeable, but they gradually grow on you. So I waited through the first 30 min., then hour, for them to become interesting and marginally likable. Never happened. That was the fatal flaw in this film for me. There was detailed character development, but I never cared about either of the characters enough to be interested in what happened to them.
The approaches to life of these two middle-aged men are contrasted. One is a shallow "go for it", grabbing for any pleasant experience. The other is a depressed, alcoholic, lump who is just existing. The shallow one drags the depressed one around, trying to get him to enjoy life just a little bit. They get into some amusing scrapes. In the end, the depressed one is slightly changed.
Unlike 90% of America, I would rather have skipped this one.
Spanglish (2004)
Adam Sandler as sex symbol
I would not normally want to see an Adam Sandler movie, except maybe on video as a last resort. But this movie completely changed that for me. He plays a truly decent man, trying to understand and do what's best for the nutty women around him. There is humor in his performance, but it comes largely from his reactions to the other actors. No goofiness or pratfalls. He is a great dramatic actor.
All of the characters are drawn in detail. All of the acting lets you lose yourself in the film.
The thing I liked the best was the sense that the characters were really trying to do the right thing, as they saw it. Of course their frailties get in the way. But they are trying to do right by their kids, and their marriage, however screwed up they are. I liked that the movie underlined that sometimes the right choice means personal sacrifice. It was a funny, realistic, uplifting movie.
John Q (2002)
It's involving, even if the plot is simple
I enjoyed this film. As others point out, the plot is simple. Son needs a transplant. Father takes hospital hostage to try to get it. But a simple plot is not necessarily a bad thing. Sometimes you don't want to have to interpret everything.
I thought the characterizations of the little family were so sweet. The trivial spats of everyday life earlier in the film. Later, both parents fighting together, willing to do anything to save the child. Some contrived, but heart-wrenching, moments showing each parent's love for the child.
Denzel W. gave a very real performance as the decent, hard-working, blue-collar dad. Yes, he was almost perfect. Yes, the bad people were uniformly bad. Yet, the movie still works because of the strong performances of Denzel W. and the woman who played his wife.
Sylvia (2003)
Why are these people so sad?
The biggest failing of this movie for me was that it never sufficiently explains why these two talented, beautiful people spent most of their time acting tortured. There was endless suffering depicted on screen but I couldn't empathize with it because it all seemed self- inflicted. Not entertaining. Not enlightening.
Maybe you have to have read or known Sylvia Plath to appreciate the movie. But if I were any living relative of hers I wouldn't exactly consider the film a tribute.
Normal (2003)
Can't believe this was a made-for-TV movie
This is one of the best films I've seen in the last 5 years. The performances of Jessica L. and Tom W. were so layered. Lang took the midwestern, casserole-baking, blue shift-wearing housewife to the edge of stereotype, but did not make her unintelligent, or so rigid in her thinking that she could not change. Tom made his character so sympathetic that you can almost understand his strange decision. You can absolutely empathize with his pain as he goes through the process and watches the effect on his family. The film uses the story to raise the what-is-male? what-is-female? questions but not in a preachy way.
I usually don't notice the technical side of things, but the camera spend alot of time on the faces of the principal characters. Much of the story of their relationshiip comes from reading their faces.
Something's Gotta Give (2003)
Funny, witty, well worth it
Laughed straight through from beginning to end. Lots of physical comedy and reaction shots that would be "slapstick" if performed by less skilled actors, but are just hilarious when nuanced by Nicholson and Keaton. McDormand's angry feminist was terrific also, but she's not on screen very much.
I do agree with others who have said that it is most appreciated by the 40+ set who can relate to sagging flesh, reading glasses, and wondering, at their age, whether love is really worth it. At 47 I was one of the younger members of the audience.
You must suspend disbelief at times, but you can forgive this in a comedy. The worst case is at the beginning when Nicholson and the gorgeous daughter arrive at the beach house. The only reason you can believe that this beautiful young thing would be attracted to Nicholson is that he IS Nicholson. Any other actor playing the part with equivalent physical decline would never have been believable. It's Nicholson's charisma, not the character's, that make you believe the girl's attraction to him.
One nitpick - dental continuity. At the beginning of the film Keaton's teeth are yellow. Then about half-way through, they are much whiter. This would not be so distracting but for the glow-in-the-dark white teeth of Amanda Peet providing contrast.
Runaway Jury (2003)
Premise too unbelievable
I fell asleep watching it at the theater. Although the acting is very good, none of the protagonists is likable, unless you buy into the end-justifies-the-means moral relativism that excuses swaying a trial if you have a really really good reason. Add in a plot with a massive hole, which is that with the money and technology the gun industry was shown to have in the movie, the 2 lone jury tamperers wouldn't have stood a chance. They would have been traced and eliminated, if the case ever made it to trial. Add in the simplistic message that the gun industry is responsible for gun violence and a verdict against the gun industry will somehow solve the problem by ... um, oh yeah, it will "send a message" to the gun industry.
Terrible. Rent it if you must.
Pushing Tin (1999)
not very believable
I was attracted by the stellar cast but the movie is too unbelievable. The movie tries to drive home every 2 minutes or so what a dangerous and important job these people have, but minutes would go by while the characters were talking to each other or running around when NOBODY WAS LOOKING AT THEIR TRAFFIC CONTROL SCREENS!
There is also a sappy scene at the end where one of the controllers contacts his wife through the pilot of the plane she is on and we are supposed to believe that the crew has nothing better to do than usher the wife INTO THE COCKPIT to talk to her controller/husband through the pilot's microphone. Please.