Reviews

Spoilers Galore!!! Please don't read this if you haven't seen it.....twice. No, go ahead and read this. And if you haven't seen this badly misunderstood film once, go ahead and read this anyway.

This film needs to be saved. If every professional reviewer had seen this film TWICE, not once, I think it would have been announced with very favorable reviews, and better box office. In a sense, this film is an argument for the asymetrcial non-linear final cutting that Quentin Tarantino is most famous for. If only the audience knew what the characters knew or didn't know at the time, they would see a different film. Think there's little or no chemistry between Jolie and Depp? Watch the film the second time, and whammo, there it is. Did you think the artificial non-tobacco cigarette was a distracting triffle, silly to the film? Not when you know the truth revealed in the ending of the movie. Think the Depp character was too nerdy to attract the gorgeous Jolie's attention? EXACTLY !! And it worked!

Spoilers SPOILERS SPOILERS SPOILERS But read this ANYWAY!!

The never seen genius had to concoct a scheme to get the money, get the girl, kill the gangsters, and appease the police. In order to do this, the unseen genius had to re-invent himself as the ultimate nerd, so convincing, he would convince EVERYONE that he was the new image, and not the genius below. Everyone including the girl had to buy what he was selling. He wanted to be with Jolie to spend the enormous ill gotten gains with her, so he would find the meaning in life he wanted. The meaning that the character saw evaded the rich gangster, and the inflated ego driven Interpol agent after him. And once you've seen the film once, on the second time, then and only then will you see the genius at work. Because the genius not only sold himself as a nerd to the killers, the police and the girl, he sold the audience too. So everyone is wondering how can we believe the nerd can win a Jolie? And when will he get killed, being in so over his head? Watch carefully the second time, and you'll see every subtle move that Depp invents to push along his plot, and convince the others he's a nerd. The genius throws in just enough to reel in Jolie to his love, while still selling himself to everyone, including Jolie's character, that he's a nerd.

Have you wondered why Jolie's husband Brad Pitt, with whom she has the greatest of screen chemistries, was not cast in the part? Simple. He's too damn good looking. Impossible for Pitt, I don't care how much make-up they apply to make him look worse, could come off as the nerd who still wins the heart of the girl. Depp can and did pull this off. And only those who see the film twice will see that.

Perhaps the oldest working director in films (at least that would seem to be so for a successful stand-up comic WHO STARTED IN THE FIFTIES!) has turned out a beaut. Woody Allen has penned an adult romantic comedy with ten times the laughs (at least for me) of Pineapple Express. Called "Vicky And Christina Spend the Summer in Barcelona".

The star of the film is none other than the cold killer from No Country For Old Men, Oscar winner Javier Bardem proving his acting range goes way beyond scaring the s-word out of people. He plays a full of life, passionate Spanish painter-lover, and bless him for this. He nails a fine-wine getting hotter as she gets older Penelope Cruz, an equally desirable please-let-me-have-this Scarlett Johansen and a prissy uptight academic Rebecca Hall, who none of you ever heard of before (admit it). Sometimes more than one of them at the same time.

The acting is flawless. That's why Penelope and Scarlett stand out from other cinema hotties....they can act, they both have their craft down perfectly. Sadly, none of them go nude in the flick, but guys, there is a scene between Penny and Scarlett that will make you want to stand up and cheer anyway. YAHOOOOOO !!!

Woody's script shows two particular brilliancies, that seems to evade the rest of the hacks of Hollywood. He likes to insert his own film personnae into his films, and this time it's the Rebecca Hall character who does the Woodman's comedic pseudo-intellectual schtick. Really smart to switch himself to the woman, cause when he's used younger actors as himself, it becomes imitative parody and fails. And Woody himself it just too old for any make-up genius to make you think he is only 60, an age he passed a long long time ago. Rebecca is remarkable, holding her own against the two stellar screen beauties...and making her far less than super looks come out as still highly desirable.....in controlled passion coming out of it's containment at last.

Secondly, Woody brilliantly uses a narrator to make his cinematic novel come alive. The dialogue you would read in a novel comes to life in the faces of this great crew of actors. And instead of adding 30+ minutes of extraneous films to set the scene, or making stupid dialogue just so the audience can be informed of the plot, a simple line or two or concise narration keeps the film moving at a perfect pace. And Woody uses a young actor, not his old self for the narrator, which would have detracted from the youth and exuberance of the film.

Also, the musical score and the cinematography are great, simply great. Good job old guy. I loved the film. You made us old guys proud. And err, next time could you let us see Johannsen's goods. I KNOW she's shown you, you can't lie to M2b. So share.

Had to rush to catch this at the AMC-25 before it disappeared, as I suspected this was a wide screen venture. Well, it's a wide screen film awright, lots of swell CGI. The story is about these Necromongers led by the Human Flash who conquer planets on the way to the heavenly uber-verse, but the sole surviving Fallopian stands in their way, so naturally, the Flash King fights the Fallopian (Vin Diesel) and looses and Vin becomes the new King of the NecroMangia, this after he stages a thrilling escape with his new woman from a prison planet called Superhotfootentia. Or maybe Meltafleshatoria. Sumthin like that. Swell film. A little low on credibility.

Sauron, the evil eye, looses. He gets stronger. They keep telling us how he gets stronger and stronger and he just keeps losing. Imagine if he had won something? In Fellowship, the Orcs kill one Prince of Gondor. he kills about 50 of them first, but hey, who's keeping score? In Towers, some ronin riders of Rohan come upon an Orc battalion and guess what? Ork Stew! They do pretty well with 10,000 orkies in the battle of Helmskeep or Helmsdeep or whatever, until the newly whitened gray wizard shows up with a few thousand riders (Rohan-ians or Gondor-ians? I cannot remember) and, once again, 10,000 orcs are soon fit for the pot. At the same time, the large Tree-things retake the other tower city with the other white (bad) wizard, wipe out that army, destroy that tower and eliminate the Evil Eye's most loyal bad-white-wizard ally. I'd say at that point, that Sauron is doing very badly. Maybe Bagdad Bob would say he's just getting stronger, because that's exactly what Good-white-wizard says even as her surveys two massive battle victories. Imagine if they had lost? Now, in Rings, the evil eye sends another 10,000 orks against the capital city of Gondor: Minas Gerais. Well, some Minas, if not Gerais. How do they do? Well, okay until Aragon shows up with a new phantom army pledged to fight for the True King. That's 20,000 orks gone in two big battles, and just how many orks did the tree-things kill? Oh, and a GIRL kills his top flying magical warrior. This is not good for Evil Eyes! If I was the evil eye, I'd be worried at this point, wouldn't you? Nope, he's fine. So long as the Ring isn't melting in Mordor, he's just getting stronger. Yessirree. So, we take what's left of the Gondor-Rohan merged cavalry and ride out to the Doors of Doom to "distract" the last remaining 10,000 orks. I guess Evil felt a 30,000 man ork army was enough to bring back evil to Middle Earth. The schmuck! So's his only fear is a melting ring, he stations ONE killer giant spider to protect the Mordor furnace, and just sends out his last 10,000 orkies into a diversionary battle. Evil personified? Maybe. As dumb as they come? No doubt.

I can't say this was what Lina Wertmuller was shooting for. But it seemed to this viewer, that the luscious, sex-in-every-pore, Mariangela Melato was playing a super woman who always wins, no matter what. She adapts. To whatever. And wins. She won her first world by totally dominating her rich husband and all his servants. It worked. It was never her plan. It just worked. And so she tries to dominate Gianinni when they are stranded. It doesn't work. His survival skills are necessary and his personality is not to be dominated, at least not in the regular way. And so she surrenders to him. Not by plan. But still she surrenders completely and totally to him. And his passion for the conquered goddess becomes so consuming that he is now the conquered, the consumed. She's not in control, but she's in fact totally in control. Super woman has won. Super woman understands that this paradise they have fallen into works only if they stay in this Eden. The smitten fool realizes this too, but must bite the forbidden apple to satisfy his fool's desire to see the truth in front of his eyes. Once out of Paradise, super woman, armed with new tools learned in her stay in Paradise, begins a new conquest of her husband's world. She's super woman and she will win again, not by intent, but because she is who she is. The fool goes back to his fat wife and his foolish life and his foolish passions. He lost. She won. She always wins, all the time.

Thank you Lena, for this incredible film and this unfogettable film viewing experience. You should know, Lena, that the lovely date I took to this film in NYC's Paris Cinema so long ago, well, she shook at the climax of the rape scene. I think she actually had an orgasm right there.

Let the film professionals dwell in the horrors of wars and

Concentration Camps in Seven Beauties. Let them find their insights and meanings of the world in that. That's their world. This is Lena's masterpeice for the people. People living lives. Thank you.

Please read my spoilers and say yourself the admission!

The whole damn film is a Cryogenic Dream! It's a g-ddamn cryogenic dream!!! Who the Hell cares about someone else's cryogenic dream and why would they in the first place anyway?

How bad is this "daring experimental edgey" film? Do you care about Tom Cruise's personal nightmare? That he looses his face? His nightmare, not mine. Believe it or not kiddies (and I do mean kiddies!) there are strong people out there who can and do cope with worse than that. And they never had what Cruise at least got to have before he looses his face.

If you loved this film, you must have worked for CBS years ago....remember how they tried to save Dallas? They just decided to make the whole season a DREAM and bring back the ratings draw Bobby character. Now they do it in movies.

As slow as this awful film was, and even as useless an exercise in time wasting as watching Penelope and Tom fall for each other is, I had just that tinge of intrique. How could someone be disfigured in a scorned lover's vengeful attempt at double suicide and then be indicted for murder? How? How? Cryogenic Dream, that's how! A g-ddamn stupid who gives a damn cryogenic dream!!!!!

Experimental? Daring? Inventive? ABRE LOS OJOS, IMBECILE !!!!!!!!!!!!

Question. Was the original Spanish version based on the same lame pretext? I would have hoped for bettter from Europeans.

It pains me that this film is doing modestly well in the box office. I would like to think that the competition is equally poor right now. I really liked Crowe's Almost Famous effort last time. I hope to God he's not going to give us more of this stuff. Please.