Reviews
Red Rock West (1993)
good once
This movie was great the first time but on second viewing the glaring plotholes stick out. For instance, the ending..wouldn't he police just radio ahead and stop the train and arrest Michael with his stolen loot?
JT Walsh..cool but underplayed... and funny how he doesn't bleed from that knife sticking out of his neck. Lara Flynn Boyle..gorgeous, but couldn't act her way out of a wet paper bag. Lessee....what else? Dwight Yoakum as the truck driver. What happened to the guy that got in the truck with him? He just disappeared. Oh well....at least it wasn't "CodeTalkers"
Le battement d'ailes du papillon (2000)
Suques
How do you spell "sux" in French? How about "snore"? Even "Magnolia" was better than this tripe (another French delicacy, by the way) and it was about 3 hours too long. But that's another topic for another day. PS if you see this just to see "Amelee" (Audrey Tautou) forget it > she's only onscreen for about 1/2 an hour.
Five Easy Pieces (1970)
Great movie but...
I love this movie but there's one thing thats always bothered me. When Nicholson's character leaves Texas and visits his sister in the recording studio, then returns to pickup the girlfriend, are we supposed to believe that he drove all the way from Texas to Seattle and back, and then back to Seattle again? Doesn't make much sense.. about 5,000 miles of driving in a couple days.
Other than that this is a GREAT movie. The young Nicholson is brilliant and every other performance is superb too. One of the best movies of the 70's.
The Day of the Jackal (1973)
ZZZZZZ.... wake me when something happens
This movie is about as exciting as watching paint dry. The only
time my pulse picked up even a beat was when the French babe
got out of bed naked; other than that this movie is BORING. (Read
the comments from "Pete Kelly" for details... I won't bother.) The
only comment I have to add about the obvious holes in the plot is,
why does the police commisioner, who has the entire police force
of France at his disposal, have to be the one who discovers the
Jackal and single-handedly mows him down with machine gun
fire at the last moment? (If the character had been developed a bit
so there was a feeling of mano-a-mano between the two, OK, I can
buy that; its fiction; but there's not- he's just an anonymous French
[usually half-asleep] beaureaucrat with a fuzzy mustache)
Even though the Bruce Willis-Richard Gere vehicle wasn't much
better, at least it had a little tension, pacing, and an ending; not the
anticlimatic patience-testing of this one.
I MADE myself sit down and watch this one after seeing bits and
pieces of it for years; another two hours of my life I'll never get
back.
A Christmas Story (1983)
The best! of all the Christmas fare.
Somehow I had manage to miss this one until I happened upon it a few years ago while flipping the channels one bored Saturday afternoon, and came in right at the tongue-stuck-to-the-light-pole scene. I was immediately captivated and charmed by this sweet, funny, nostalgic movie. I've probably seen it ten times since, and every time it makes me laugh.. The casting is perfect with Darren McGavin as the crotchety but lovable father, Melinda Dillon as the beautiful, fun-loving, and long-suffering mother, and Peter Billingsley as Ralphie. Billingsley is every 9-year old American Boy, with his overactive imagination and dreams of a Red Ryder BB gun. This film has many funny moments, and some poignant ones too. But what makes this film work is its authenticity. Whether its Ralphie imagining himself going blind from "soap poisoning," his little brother's terror of sitting on Santa's lap, or the scene where he confronts the schoolyard bullies, every scene rings true. The narration by the story's writer, Jean Shepherd, is an added bonus. It's a gem! P.S. To all you Grinches who hated this movie, why don't you go and watch another Tarrantino flick. It's more up your alley.
Nostradamus (1994)
BOR-OR-OR-OR-ING
First of all this Tcahcky Tabacky or whatever his name is is one of the worst actors ever. He couldn't emote is way out of a wet paper bag. The casting is ludicrous. Rutger Hauer and F Murray Abraham in the same movie? PUHLEASE! And Amanda Plummer as the Queen of England? It is to LAFF! Also laughable are the soft-porn scenes that seem to pop up every time the story starts to drag. Although the women are (kinda) beautiful , and we get to see lots of T & A, the sight of Nastydumass' naked butt is shown once too often. And he's SO somber when he gets busy,, he must be having visions of his future veneral diseases. Don't waste the $1 it will cost you to rent this one.
The Hotel New Hampshire (1984)
Read the Book
This is a perfect example of why good, literary novels shouldn't be made into films. I read this book (along with his other best-sellers "World According to Garp" and "Cider House Rules") back in the 80's when they were published, and I thought they were great, serious works of fiction full of colorful, off-the wall characters fleshed out in engaging prose. Unfortunately, all of this is lost in this film adaptation.
I don't know who Tony Richardson is, and if he directed any other movies, but if they are as poorly-lit, badly-recorded, ineptly edited, and haphazardly narrated as this one is, I'll pass.
Although the movie sticks pretty closely to the original, it just doesn't work on the screen. The first third of the book, dealing with the first Hotel New Hampshire, is truncated into a five minute, voiced-over series of vignettes under the opening credits. This is all of the movie you need to see, because the director uses his entire bag of tricks here.
We seem to enter in the middle of a story, one everyone (except you) seems to already be familiar with. Random characters and situations are thrown at you, with no apparent continuity, sense, or narrative flow. When the story gets dark or uncomfortable, the director resorts to cheap gimmicks like fast-action photography. It may have been funny when the Keystone Kops did it, but it is most definitely UNfunny here.
Wallace Shawn, sporting a bad wig, motorcycle jacket and towing a performing bear, shows up and just as suddenly, disappears. (We do encounter him later in the film, but now he's bald and blind, and although he's back in his native Vienna, his German accent seems to come and go mysteriously. It's also 10 or 15 years later, apparently but somehow he's the only one who is any older.) Rob Lowe looks pretty and vapid. Jodie Foster looks sexy, talks dirty, and acts tough. Beau Bridges just looks befuddled most of the time. And the actress (whoever she is ) who plays the mother has such a tiny part that she barely registers.
Incest, rape, murder, accidental death, suicide, radical German nihilists with bombs, pornography, and a lesbian in a bear suit are all in this movie, and it's all BORING.
All I can recommend is that you read the book. Everything that is confusing, depressing, and just plain weird in this movie makes great, if quirky, sense in the book.