Reviews

Boy did I have high expectations going into this movie. After making two of my all time favorite films, Insomnia, and Memento, and making a solid debut film in, Following, I thought Christopher Nolan could do no wrong. And while this film isn't exactly wrong, it just isn't better than Tim Burton's Batman. Hell, in my opinion it's a little worse than Batman Forever.

What problems do I have with the film? For one thing Christian Bale. I always cringe when I see a graduate of the Keanu Reeves school of acting, and Bales deep monotone whisper did just this. For god sakes show some emotion! Guy Ritchie was able to pull that style of acting off in one of Nolans previous films, Memento, but in this it just doesn't work for Bale.

Getting back to Nolan, it's hard to smell his stench in the movie. The beginning of the film is evident with his type of dialouge and dark artsy cinematography, but as the film goes on, you forget it's Nolan's, and it will remind you more of David S. Goyer's (the co-writer) Blade films. The second half of the movie is filled with little dialouge, and because of this the film just drags on to its way too long 2 hour and 20 minute end. And whats with all the one liners? It seems that Nolan and Goyer stuff the film with way too many inappropriate for the time jokes. But my biggest pet peeve with the movie was the score. It wasn't as much that it didn't hold a candle to Danny Elfman's classic Batman score, but more that I could not recall ONE time that it wasn't playing in the background.

On the plus side, Katie Holmes does a good job as the love interest, and Michael Caine is great as Alfred. Gary Oldman also gives a fine performance. I could however do without Morgan Freeman's character who is basically to Batman exactly what Q is to James Bond.

While the premise of the film about Bruces fear of bats was excellent, the rest of it just doesn't work as well as it worked for Burton (and even Schumaker in 'Returns) if you are more of a Batman fan than a Nolan fan, you'll probably enjoy the film a lot more than I did.

6/10

Bamboozled is the story of a black television writer named Pierre Delacroix who is a lot more Bill Cosby than Chris Rock. Because of this, his writing gets criticsized by his boss for ''not being black enough''. Outraged by this Pierre creates a modern day Minstrel show in order to get fired, but the show turns into a hit.

As you can tell from that summary the film starts out on a funny note, but as it goes on it gets uneven turning darker(no pun intended)and trying to send out a message. I would have enjoyed it more if Spike had chosen either to make this a straight out, some what political comedy or a more serious film.

Damon Wayans does a great job as Pierre Delacroix. His accent makes you forget who he is and belive he is Delacroix. Equally good is Michael Rappaport as Delacroix's boss Thomas Dunwitty. The problem here wasn't the acting, in fact I can't think of anyone in the cast who stands out as sore thumb. The problem was the way the story moved. I enjoyed the beggining of the movie because of the humor, and at a certain point in the film, the comedy is abandoned as Spike wants to focus more on a message. This unevenness leaves you having to belive in the movies ridiculous concept, that a minstrel show can become a hit tv in the 21st Century.

The movie ends on a higher note in a somewhat Lynchian way, but whatever message Spike wanted to send out either gets lost or seems unneccessary. That being said the first 3 quarters of this movie are very funny and feel like a sketch from Chapelle's show. In the end though the movie fails to send a distinct message, it leaves you thinking and leaves you entertained.

7/10

Heavyweights is the story of a group of kids who with the help of their counselor go on a mission to take back their fat camp from a crazy man who has never interacted with kids before (played by Ben Stiller) who is intend on making it into a money making informercial.

I first saw this as a child, and absolutely loved it. I must have watched it again on at least 5 other occassions. Recently I was in the video store and came across a copy of it for sale. After convincing my friend to buy it , we went back to his house and popped it into the VCR. I wondered if the film would hold up after all these years. Did it? Absolutely! In fact I may have gotten bigger laughs this time around.

I do not understand why this film has a 5.1 rating, after reminding this movie to my friends they all recalled loving it, and everyone I recently watched it with loved it. Ben Stiller's character is hillarious, and the rest of the cast is great. Besides Ben, Kenan Thompson is the only other actor in this who went on to become somewhat of a star, which is suprising because all the kids give great performances. Tom Mcgowan, the man who plays Pat, seemed to be chosen for the role because Chris Farley passed on it, and John Candy died, but he gives a great performance.

I know it sounds cliche, but Heavyweights is truly one of the few movies that people of all ages will love.

9/10

Anchorman, the comedy about female reporter Veronica Corningstone (Christina Applegate) coming to a San Diego news program, and stealing the main anchor spot from the pompus 5 time local emmy winner anchor Ron Burgundy (Will Ferrell), starts of with plenty of laughs, but towards the end, it gets to a point with the style of comedy is gets redundant, especially Steve Carell's character, who while giving some good laughs, just gets tedious. Will Ferrell does a great job as Ron Burgundy, along with his collleagues, played by (discluding Carell), David Koechner, and Paul Rudd. And cameos by Jack Black, Ben Stiller, Luke Wilson, and Vince Vaughn (who actually has a pretty important role) keep the film from getting boring. For what it's worth, I got some good laughs, but I doubt I'll see this movie more than twice. I might have enjoyed this more, if I hadn't rented Old School the night before I saw this. Still, this isn't that bad of a way to spend your money.

7/10

The main difference between Volume on and Two, is that in the latter, Tarantino ditches the violence in favor of the dialouge. That's not to say there aren't some great action scenes, but it felt a little uneven after all the fighting in Volume One. Like I said, it does have some adrenaline pumping scenes, like the fight between The Bride and Elle, the training scenes with Pae Ming (forgive me if that is not his name, but it's something along those lines), and the chilling burying of The Bride's living body, but it couldn't hold a candle to the adrenaline rush I got from Volume One.

I know this movie was supposed to focus more on the plot, and the dialouge in this ones will feel right at home compared to Tarantino's other movies. But I still felt a little cheated, especially the way Bill was killed. I was hoping for a much grander final showdown between him and The Bride.

Maybe it was just because I was wowed so much with Volume One, and the way it unfolded, but Volume Two just seemed to fall out a bit to straight forward for a Tarantino movie. Non the less I did enjoy the film in particular the amazing performance of David Carradine, who seems to be the next Travolta that Tarantino pulled out of post fame B-Movie obscurity. I will say right here that Carradine deserve at the least an Oscar nomination for his role. In fact, all of the cast give great performances, and there are no weak links.

7/10

PS- You don't need to see the first one to go into this, in fact it may make Volume One more enjoyable if you see it after this.

I was embarrassed when I asked the clerk at the video store if he had this movie. But me and my friend wanted to see what all the hype was about, after this got the #1 spot on the worst 100 list. Is it the worst movie of all time? No. Is it a bad movie? Absolutely. The film starts with a long dance scene and takes a while to get to any dialouge. All the dance moves are similar, and all seem extremely, for lack of a better word, ''flamboyant''. The camera work is nauseating, most of the shots were awful, and a lot of the time the camera just spun around, giving me a headache. There are a few good acting performances, but they were out shined by the razzie worthy acting, that the majority of the cast gave, in particular Christopher Jones, the leader of the O.C. crew, who's performance is so awful that it isn't even laughable, and is just downright annoying. The awful screenplay, done by the films director, Christopher B. Stokes, must have been a pain to spell check since every other word is, ''dat'', ''dis'', or ''y'all''. Stoke's characters are incredibly shallow, so it's hard to feel any emotion for anyone in the film, when Lil Saint was shot to death, I laughed out loud. All the characters are disgraces to their respected (our previously respected) races. The films only redeeming quality is, that it is funny for all the wrong reasons. If you and you're friends are looking for some good laughs, I would recommend this as a rental. I give it a 4/10.