Technical Difficulties…

Apparently the company running the server for this website has deleted all of my content from the last 7 years. I will be reposting some or all of my old articles soon. Please stand by.

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Weekly Mini-Review: On Golden Pond (1981)

Hepburn_Fonda_On_Golden_Pond

Story: Family dynamics between an old couple, their daughter, and the son of her husband-to-be change when everyone visits during a summer at the family cabin.

Review: The cinematography in this movie is absolutely phenomenal: indoor, outdoor, and nature photography that positively paints with light. Although all the actors are consummate professionals, and excellent actors in general, I don’t think they were right for the parts they played. Henry Fonda  and Katherine Hepburn feel too much like they’re officially playing the curmudgeon fuddy duddy types and are pretty much only genuine in short bursts with the other characters. About as close as Hepburn can get to this kind of part is the one she played in Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner. Both of them seem like the kind of old folks who stay sharp as tacks and have a tough time acting any other way believably. Nonetheless, they were all enjoyable to watch. The ending resolution between the Fondas felt like it came a bit too easily, but the fact that they really were father and daughter in real life makes it interesting enough to watch their acting in the key scene so that I can forgive the theatrical writing.

Recommended for: Fans of family argument movies, fans of great cinematography

Content notes: (PG) – A tiny amount of swearing and arguing, but nothing particularly offensive.

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Weekly Mini-Review: Johnny English Reborn (2011)

j-eng

Story: After going into hiding to avoid the shame of a flubbed mission years before, an older Johnny English is trained in martial arts by monks and called back into action to catch a ring of assassins.

Review: The comedy in this sequel alternates between over-the-top gags and humor so dry it chafes, but doesn’t rely on embarrassment-humor quite as much as the first one. Most of the best jokes are actually fogey humor (viz., the bad guy runs frantically while Johnny saunters behind/takes an elevator and catches him anyway), but a lot of it also relies on the premise copied in the show Spy wherein the protagonist is highly trained despite being a goof.

Recommended for: fans of adventurous-old-man-movies, fans of spy spoofs

Content Notes: (10+) – Some crude humor

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Weekly Mini-Review: Hidaway (1995)

Cool special effects from the finale scene.

Cool special effects from the finale scene.

Story: Near death experiences link the mind of a suburban husband and father with that of a kwazy serial killer who goes after teenage girls – directing the killer’s attentions toward the man’s daughter.

Review: The first time I saw this movie, I only saw the last 2/3 or so. The beginning adds nothing, so it turns out that’s the best way to watch it. The writing is about average (all the characters are as dumb as turkeys), but the acting is pretty good and, oddly enough, the hyper-stylization with CGI and nifty lighting actually does seem to compensate for its TV-late-night-movie-like shortcomings. Anyway, I thought it was cool when I was a teenager. I think the show Movie Magic did a special on the FX used in the movie too.

Recommended for: Cheese ball paranormal movie/show fans.

Content notes: (YUCK, X, 14+) – Some fairly gross special effects, one short graphic sex scene near the beginning. Otherwise fine.

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Does Film School Make You Watch More or Less Movies?

One of the funnier aspects of being in a real bonafide film school now is that all of the teachers continuously prod students to watch more TV and movies. This is hilarious to me because I accustomed to watching hours of TV and movies every day. To watch more would almost require skipping classes. I have, therefore, been trying to cut down on my viewing so I can get more work done. I’ve recently taken to watching things a snippet at a time during meals and such, although this is not exactly the richest of viewing experiences.

Contrary to my experience, however, this demand appears to apply to most of my classmates. Apparently, many of them only watch 2, 3, or a handful of films per month. I think I would suffer severe withdrawal symptoms if I did that – at least for the first 6 months or so. That’s what happened when my family moved to an apartment that had no access to even antenna TV (although we had zillions of tapes and DVDs, so I wasn’t forced to quit cold turkey). But that’s about how long it took me to stop hurtin’ for more TV.

Ironic though it may be, the workload of really digging into making movies in film school is actually making me watch fewer movies than before. I can’t speak for my cohorts yet. Maybe I’ll ask around in another month or so and find out. But, that said, is it better or worse for film students to go entire days (or longer) without watching TV and movies? It worked better for me when I was a math student, but I was taking 3-4 different music classes every semester to keep me sane back then. Ho hum…

Quick update (as I originally wrote this over a months ago), many of my classmates say they now watch even less stuff (maybe a TV show every week or so). I’ve hit sort of a middle distance, now, where I watch 1 or 2 TV episodes a night and sometimes a movie if I can play it in the background of getting some kind of work done. Still having some difficulty maintaining a healthy balance between getting work done and reminding myself why I’m doing the work by watching stuff.

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Weekly Mini-Review: Mister Frost (1990)

Frost happily welcomes the policeman while standing over his buried victim. Nice visual irony.

Frost happily welcomes the policeman while standing over his buried victim. Nice visual irony.

Story: A nutty serial killer, or possibly Satan, drives a female psychiatrist and a cop loopy.

Review: Goldblum does a good job of being cheerfully creepy, but the other actors fall short, and the ending, sadly, has no witty turnabout or cunning trick. Not really worth seeing.

Recommended for: Someone who left the remote on the counter and is too ill to care what’s on TV.

Content notes: (PG, 10+) – some shots of dug up ‘corpses’ at the beginning, minor violence later on.

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Weekly Mini-Review: A.I. Artificial Intelligence (2001)

AI mirror shot

Story: In a society of limited birthrate, a couple whose son is in a coma adopts the first robot child ever designed to feel love. When the couple’s son reawakens, the robot boy (guided by a literal belief in fairytales) is thrust into a perilous journey in hopes of recapturing the past.

Review: Yes, it was directed and the screenplay written by Spielberg, but the fact that it’s based on a 1980s dystopic sci-fi treatment by Stanley Kubrick is hardly difficult to notice. The characters are all more than a little bit cracked and even the sweetest moments are also unmistakably creepy – although this owes greatly to the blocking and cinematography (viz., a little boy peering over a counter is made eerie by the mirror reflection of his eyes in the countertop just beneath them). My favorite element of this film was the character Teddy, a robot teddy bear. There’s a great novelty in how real he looks running around onscreen, but he’s also a multilayered character with many good lines. He is the most tragic character of the piece though, in my opinion because *spoiler alert: he follows the boy all through the story only to end up alone in the end*  Fair warning though, the story is kind of meant to rip your heart out.

Recommended for: Kubrick fans, dystopic futuristic movie fans, cool special effects fans, sad movie fans.

Content notes: (YUCK, 16+) – Some pretty gross special effects, very dark and demented character actions.

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Weekly Mini-Review: Sense and Sensibility (1995)

Sense-and-Sensibility

Story: Upon the death of a wealthy Englishman, his son denies any inheritance to his step mother and his three half-sisters. This forces them to move to the country, where husbands are slimmer pickings. The two older sisters chase men, and vice versa, through a series of social and emotional hoops.

Review: Not as good as the 1995 Pride and Prejudice mini-series, but this might have been largely due to the fact that they had to squeeze the whole story into feature film length. The editor made some stark and unsubtle, yet likely necessary cuts to accomplish this. Also, the lead actress looks a bit too old for the part and some of the actresses have a more modern feel that they should. They don’t seem to fit in the era. That said, it’s fun to see a large portion of the supporting cast from the Harry Potter movies in another film during their younger years. Overall not bad. Not great either, but not bad.

Recommended for: Jane Austen movie fans, period English melodrama fans

Content notes: (G) – Safe for anyone to watch.

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Weekly Mini-Review: Three Days of the Condor (1975)

condorendshot

Story: When a member of a CIA office for reading and analyzing published material for hidden codes returns from a lunch run to find the whole building has been wiped out by a hit squad, he is forced to go on the run and track down the responsible parties.

Review: Different from the usual spy thriller in several key ways. Firstly, the hero relies primarily upon a vast store of random knowledge gained from reading random things and cheesy mystery novels, and he’s always suspicious of everyone. Basically, he’s brighter than the average protagonist. Secondly, the hit man isn’t the slightest bit malicious or sociopathic. He’s just a professional practicing his craft. This seems both more realistic, and somehow creepier. Overall, it’s a pretty god movie. That said, I would recommend fast-forwarding past all the parts with Faye Dunaway. It’s not really her fault, but those scenes are some of the worst, clunkiest, least believable dialogue in all of moviedom.

Recommended for: Fans of thrillers, Robert Redford’s less dreary flicks, political movies.

Content notes: (PG, VV, 10+) – Some explicit things are said once or twice, people get blasted with guns but it’s less graphic than TV is nowadays, there isn’t really porn but there is a gratuitous sex scene with hands squeezing bare limbs and such which takes up way too much runtime.

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Weekly Mini-Review: Johnny English (2003)


Story: When all the other spies are killed in one swoop, an over-confident, under-competent British spy and his slightly smarter, under-confident sidekick must save England from a madman’s plot to overthrow the kingdom.

Review: The protagonist sort of feels like a cross between Black Adder and Maxwell Smart and the writing sometimes feels like it’s trying to be a bit too American at times, but the movie still does a considerably better job than Carell’s Get Smart or Chan’s The Tuxedo at the whole comedy spy thing. There’s a great example of classic toilet humor in there too. I know I shouldn’t think it’s as funny as I do, but I can’t help myself. Overall, not fantastic, but worth seeing if it’s handy.

Recommended for: Fans of spy comedies, or Rowan Atkinson.

Content Notes: (PG) – Some innuendo in dialog, but it would likely go over kids’ heads.

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