m-de-werd Reviews

Photo de famille (2018)

A heart warming comedy about failed lives.

[10/10 · 6 January 2024]

I felt obliged to write a review when I saw the low rating. For me it a great example how to make a comedy about a sad theme - something the French probably know to make better than any other nation. However the end also reminded me of the La notte di Cabiria of Fellini.

The film deals with three siblings who all seem to have failed in life. The eldest sister Gabrielle earns her money as a living statue and tries to raise her son Solal alone. Solal is not satisfied with his mother's unsteady life and wants to live with his father, although he hardly knows him. The younger sister Elsa is a frustrated social worker and desperately tries to get pregnant by her husband Tom. The brother Mao is a successful designer of computer games, but is unable to cope with life and is in psychiatric treatment. As a child he stopped talking to his mother and only communicated with his teddy bear.

Whereas the Pierre, the father of the three was mostly absent, the mother Claudine is a psychiatrist and especially Elsa accuses her that she always talked to her like a psychiatrist. The film starts with the funeral of Pierre's father, the family tyrant. His widow Mamie is suffering of dementia and doesn't even knows her own son. Very much against the will of her brother Elsa decides that she and her sibling will take care of their grandmother so that she won't be sent to a retirement home. Of the chaos in the life of the three even gets bigger. However Mamie also gives them new hope. She dreams of going to Saint Julien. The time that the siblings spent there together seems to be more of less the only positive memory of their youth.

Things only gets worse. Solal moves to his father, much to the disdain of his mother Gabrielle who desperately tries to find a more stable job. Elsa is left by her understanding husband Tom and Mao fails when he tries to commit suicide. However in their misery the three find together and decide to take their grandmother to Saint Julien. But then Mamie dies. At the funeral all meet and embrace, but nothing is solved. Solal doesn't return to his mother and Tom and Elsa don't get together again.

Nevertheless Gabrielle, Elsa and Mao go to Saint Julien without Mamie and they want reconstruct that photo of the three of them as children. They put on children's clothes and Mao has a teddy bear. Even this goes wrong, because the owner of the garden chases them away, but the three have a big laugh. This seems to be the powerful message of the film. Even if everything goes wrong, you can still enjoy life.

Poirot: Appointment with Death (2008) Season 11, Episode 4

Agatha Christie would turn in her grave

[1/10 · 28 July 2023]

Although in general I like the series with David Suchet this episode was the worst adaption for Christie that I have ever seen. Although Apointment with Death is not one of the my favourites, it is a well-written novel. But this film has nothing to do with it. The writer has just taken the title, some characters and elements of the novel and written his own story with a new setting, new characters and a completely different and silly plot.

We are not given a clue how Poirot found out the very confusing solution. And why do the murderers simply admit what they have done and kill themselves, if before they had planned everything so carefully? Poirot had no real proof in his hands. Christie's heir should never have allowed this. His grandmother would turn in her grave.

One of bad elements that I have not seen in other comments is the way archaeology is presented here. Agatha Christie's second husband Max Mallowan was a well-known Assyriologist and Christie took part in excavations. She could be called an expert. I am studying Egytology and Assyriology myself.

Apart from the fact that in the novel there are no archaeologists and excavation, the story in this film is completely ridiculous. They are digging for the scull of John the Baptist. An expert like Christie would never written such nonsense.

Ja zuster, nee zuster (1966–1968)

A classic TV-series from the Netherlands

[10/10 · 27 February 2023]

I seem to be first to write on this classic Dutch TV-series. Although it was meant for children, many adults liked it too. And actually it is remarkable that I can still remember so much of it. But the stories and the songs. I was only between the age of 4 and 6 when it was broadcasted. However I think it has left a deep impression on people of my generation. A year ago I met some old friends of mine and they could all remember it.

It is a pity that it was only shown in the Netherlands, because for me it was one the best TV-series ever. And the rest of the world is never going to see it, as most of the tapes have been deleted afterwards. Those tapes were expensive and they didn't consider something for eternity. Luckily the outdoor scenes were filmed on classic film material you can find some of the wonderful songs on Youtube.

A few years ago there has been a motion picture based on the series, but as I don't live in the Netherlands anymore I have not seen it. I don't know if it is comparable with the TV-series, but I am glad I still have my memories.

Heimat: A Chronicle of Germany (1984)

A TV legend

[9/10 · 2 December 2022]

For many years I had heard about this TV series, but I had never seen it, because in the early 1980s I was a student and didn't have a TV set. Later I did see Zweite Heimat., which I liked very much. The last weeks I could finally see the first series, when it was repeated on German TV.

I agree with other people that it was one of best pieces of drama that was ever made for TV. First, I intended to rate with a ten, but I made it a nine, because there were some flaws. What I liked the least was the recasting of the older Paul with another actor. Why Paul all of sudden left his home, his wife and children was the big mystery of the whole story. But the Paul who returned from the USA was not only played by another actor his personality had also nothing to do with the sensitive Paul from the first episode. He had turned into a boring cliché of the rich American.

Moreover, I was disappointed by the last episode, that was dragging too long. I had the feeling that with the death of Maria the story had finished. The life of her three sons and the flashbacks were much less interesting than the older episodes. Nevertheless, the series as a whole had many wonderful moments and great actors.

My favourite episode was Hermännchen, which stood a little bit apart and could been a separate movie. For me it was one of the most wonderful coming of age films that I have ever seen. And it was perfectly casted with by Jörg Richter, the son of the producer. I think nowadays it would be a bit problematic to have a 16-year-old playing erotic scenes with an actress who is nearly twice as old.

Killing Patient Zero (2019)

Important theme, but in a rather boring form

[7/10 · 23 May 2022]

As only three people have reviewed this documentary so far, I thought it would good to give my twopence. I have been very much in doubt how to rate it. I agree with "laragi" that documentaries that mostly consist of interviews are boring. From this point of view it is not a good film. Nevertheless it was the theme - the myth of Patient Zero - that interested me. AIDS came up shortly after I had my coming-out and I remember how frightening the whole situation was and how it affected my life and those of other gay men.

And of course one of the most intriguing stories was "Patient Zero" - the French Canadian air steward who spread the illness over North America. I heard the name "Gaetan Dugas" only much later. It is ironic that it was someone with good intentions who spread the myth. Randy Shilts did a great job to make society aware of the importance of AIDS. I have not read his book "And the band played on", but I saw the film based on it. Although Shilts stresses that he didn't want to make Dugas into the scapegoat for AIDS, this is exactly what happened. It is simply this kind of stories that people want to hear: "the man who was responsible for AIDS".

"Killing Patient Zero" does indeed debunk the myth that Gaetan Dugas was the one who was responsible for the spread of AIDS. Ironically it was his willingness to help the researchers that put him in that position. Because he gave many names of his sexual partners they were able to draw clusters. Very small misunderstandings can have deep consequences. He was named Patient O with the letter "O" for "Out of California". But the O was misread for a zero.

On the other hand I can't say that the film rehabilitates Dugas. He might not have been "the man who spread AIDS", but there is still that other very negative story that although he knew he was ill and would probably die he simply kept on having sex with many men and accepted that they might get sick and die too.

During the film his former colleagues and his friends keep on telling what a great guy he was. I do not doubt that he was charming and a brave guy who didn't hide that he was gay. But during the only scene in the film in which he appears in person, Dugas doesn't make a very sympathetic impression on me. In 1983 an AIDS Forum took place in Vancouver. The panel members were honest to say that they did not know for sure how it spread, but still they gave the advice to "decrease the number of sexual partners".

Dugas took a lively part in the discussion and kept on bombing the participants with his questions. As long as they were not 100 % sure they should not give any advice to people. One panel member recalls to have said to another. "We need might to get him of the microphone soon or he might destroy everything we reached over the last hours with his questions." Also other fragments prove that he simply ignored warnings not to spread the decease.

Nevertheless the film is definitely worth watching if you are interested in the theme. It does give a good view of the situation gays were in at the time, the beginnings of AIDS and the whole controversy about Gaetan Dugas.

The Accidental Tourist (1988)

William Hurt's best role: I could feel with him from the beginning to the end

[10/10 · 22 May 2022]

I think I must have seen this film in the late eighties or early nineties. And then I again yesterday. The reason was the death of William Hurt some weeks ago. I would exaggerated to say that I am real William Hurt fan, but I liked him and for Macon Leary in "The Accidental Tourist" was for me definitely his best role.

Also at the second view I was very moved by this film. It is a slow-paced romantic drama with some comic elements. Very little happens but then all of sudden there is a twist. But the good thing that from the very start I could feel with the main character. Macon Leary is not a really likable character, but I could feel with him. His doubt about which woman to share his life with and the pain about the loss of his child. Just like the first time the most moving scene for me where a boy in Paris reminds of his murdered son.

Also Geena Davis' part Muriel is really likable. Her efforts to get in touch with Macon and to catch him as a husband and father for her son make a quite rude impression. And it may seem irrational that she puts all her odds on one card and follows him to Paris. But sometimes such irrational acts have success. L liked the deeper message of the film that life is not a business trip. You can't plan everything beforehand.

I could imagine that for some people the film is a bit boring, but I decided to give it a 10, but in its way the film is perfect. William Hurt is great, but also Geena Davis and Kathleen Turner. I loved Macon's weird siblings and we should not forget the Corgie dog Edward. She should have got an Oscar for the best supporting non-human actor.

L'art du crime (2017– )

Interesting idea but bad realization

[5/10 · 18 March 2021]

So far I have only seen two episodes of these series: Un fantôme à l'opéra and La malédiction d'Osiris. I am not sure if I will watch more of them, as I was very disappointed. The idea to come crime stories with art history was interesting, but the stories didn't make sense. What was even worse was that I just couldn't stand the main characters and their hysteric behaviour.

Changeling (2008)

What a silly story!

[3/10 · 23 November 2020]

I have seen this film on TV, but I turned it off after fifty minutes. Normally I would never write a review if I had not seen completely. However I was so irritated by the extremely positive reviews with nine or ten stars that I just had to give my five cents.

I don't care that this film is supposed based on true facts, the story is so ridiculous that I couldn't watch it any longer. I can't believe that a mother whose child has been kidnapped would accept a strange child as hers, if she would have been more or less normal. If the press would be gathered there she would flatly tell them that it is not her child. Everybody in the neighbourhood, the teachers and the children would confirm it. So it would never work.

I was not in the less impressed by Angelina Jolie's acting. On the one hand she tries to play a self-conscious single mother and career woman, but on the other hand she is helpless creature who lets them force a strange child on her. I wasn't moved in the slightest bit by it. Moreover it was very disturbing to watch Jolie with her painted botox lips. The whole time she reminds of a caricature of modern beauty craze and not of a woman of the 1920s.

The only positive thing I liked were the streetviews with the oldtimers and the streetcars, that did remind of the past. Nice cars, bad acting and a really silly story.

Love Machine (2019)

Rather disappointing

[6/10 · 24 October 2020]

I have known the main actor Thomas Stipsits since he became known as a cabaretier in Austria. Although he is good for the role, the screenplay is bad. The most interesting part is the road of the main charakter into working as a call boy. After that the story gets boring. I am sure they could have done much more with the theme and the actors.

Roots (1977)

A stupid soap opera on an important theme

[3/10 · 27 December 2019]

I have to admit that it is a very long time ago that I have seen parts of Roots when it was first presented on Dutch television. I still a kid at the time and certainly not a movie expert, but even then I thought: Oh, God, what a stupid soap opera. I could understand that it was important that films and TV would deal with slavery and black history, but should it really be in such a primitve way? At the time what irritated me most was it ethnocentricity. The first episode was supposed to be in Africa, but there were just Afroamericans who behaved like Americans. I didn't even know that the whole story was a fraud and stolen from other books, but it didn't seemed a bit historic to me.

Poirot: Dumb Witness (1996) Season 6, Episode 4

Bad script makes Poirot look like a fool.

[6/10 · 7 February 2019]

In general I love the Poirot series and I have to say that this episode was in many ways entertaining. However the original story was changed so much, that it simply makes Poirot look like a fool. I feel the need to defend Christie, because this was not the case in her novel.

The first main flaw is that in the TV version Poirot does not prevent the murder. He knows that someybody had tried to kill Emily Arundell and that it will happen again, but the only thing he does is make her change her testament. This is so unlike the real Poirot. In the novel he is not able to prevent the murder for the simple fact that is has already taken place. The letter in which Arundell had mentioned her suspicions and asked for his help, had arrived too late.

Even worse is the solution. Although Poirot doesn't have a single proof he presents his theory in front of all the people involved and the killer, who before had planned everything meticulously, simply admits everything. The Poirot that we know from Agatha Christie's works would never take such a risk. In the novel he realizes that he can't prove his suspicions but writes to the killer who then commits suicide. Only after this he reveals the solution to the others.

I really don't mind minor changes from the original story, but not this way!

Second Serve (1986 TV Movie)

Impressive but in many ways dishonest

[7/10 · 1 March 2017]

I think it was about 25 years ago that I saw Second Serve for the first time. At the time I had a personal interest in the problem of gender identity and Renée Richards was probably the most famous – or notorious – transsexual in the world. So I was quite curious to see the film, but in the end I was rather disappointed. When saw it again recently it was the other way round. Probably because of my low expectations I thought that it is not such a bad film after all. The best part is definitely when Richards is still a man struggling with his gender identity. On the other hand the part after the operation is too smooth and superficial for my taste. It looks as if the only problem that Richards has a female are the reactions of other people.

Of course I have to admit that Vanessa Redgrave is really fantastic in such a complicated role. Few actress could have played a male so well. But here we come to the biggest flaw. Why was the main part cast with an woman and not with a man? Richard Raskind – or "Radley" as is he called in the film - was a 100 % male. How hard Redgrave tries, especially in the close-ups you can see that she is a woman playing a man. On the other hand Renée Richards after the "sex-change" looks like a real woman and in some ways an attractive one. The real Richards did not. I think it is dishonest that Second Serve creates the illusion that an operation can turn a man into a woman. Of course there have been a number of famous transsexuals like Christine Jorgensen, April Ashley or singer Amanda Lear - who was born as Alain Tapp - who were really attractive women, but the male-to-female transsexuals that I have known personally just looked like men in drag.

Although just a small part of the film deals with her career as a female tennis player I think it is unfair that she is only presented as a victim of mean morons. Richards was already in her forties and had never been a real top player as a man. Still she had a male physique and was towering over her rivals. I can understand that other players didn't want to play against her and were deeply frustrated when they lost. Interesting enough it was Richards herself who called it "a particular stupid decision" that in 2004 transsexuals were allowed to take part in the Olympic Games. Maybe some would call her a hypocrite, but I think most of all she was a human being. And it is human never to stop doubting.

It is hard to discuss Second Serve and not talk about the real Renée Richards and the problem of gender identity. According to some studies of all the people who consider a sex change 97 % give up the idea after a while. And of the 3 % who actually go on a considerable number has regrets. Richards seems to be one of them – at least now and then. In 1999 she said in an interview: "I wish that there could have been an alternative way, but there wasn't in 1975. If there was a drug that I could have taken that would have reduced the pressure, I would have been better off staying the way I was - a totally intact person. I know deep down that I'm a second-class woman." She never wanted to be a role model, but her life can teach many interesting lessons about the hardships of transsexualism.

Der Feuerteufel - Flammen des Todes (1999 TV Movie)

Lots of action, but a ridiculous script

[3/10 · 6 February 2017]

I saw this film just a day after I had been in the Kunsthistorisches Museum in Vienna and had bought a book about Hieronymus Bosch . A weird coincidence, because the film starts with an explosion in the Kunsthistorisches Museum right in front of painting of Bosch! That very same day soldiers stopped a terrorist who wanted to enter the Louvre, another museum of world fame. Of course terrorism at tourist attractions is a greater problem today than it was in 1999, but still I think it is a bit tasteless to invent "terrorism" where it has not happened so far. I you do, at least the story should be good, but this is definitely not the case with Der Feuerteufel.

It has lots of action, spectacular fire effects and quite a number of well-known Austrian and German actors. The story is supposed to be some highbrow mystery about secret codes in paintings, but it doesn't convince at all. The main characters are not very credible either and the dialogues are weak. Even worse is the solution of the killings. Till the end we don't know why he did it or how he got the technical knowledge to cause those highly complicated explosions. I really wonder why the Austrian television has invested so much money in such a ridiculous script.

Das Sacher. In bester Gesellschaft (2016– )

A boring film about a fascinating woman

[3/10 · 29 December 2016]

I have only seen the first part of this two part TV-film, but as nobody has written a review yet I will be the first. I live in Vienna and know the hotel Sacher quite well, so I was really looking forward to it. Unfortunately the film tells very little about Anna Sacher, the legendary director of the hotel, and concentrates on some rather uninteresting fictional characters: a editor couple from Berlin and an Austrian count and his wife who is a secret writer. In between is the weird story about a girl who is kept as a prisoner in the cellar of the opera - a mixture of the Phantom of the Opera and the story of Natascha Kampusch.

I was glad that on the same evening the Austrian television showed the documentary film "The queen of Vienna" about Anna Sacher, who was indeed a fascinating person. A butcher's daughter who after a long struggle becomes the first female director of a European top hotel. A close friend of the high-society and the cultural world when Vienna was one most of the most thrilling places in the world, a pioneer of equal treatment for women and a sworn enemy of Vienna's notorious antisemitic mayor Karl Lueger. Even Anna Sacher's personal was full of drama. As her great love was already married she made her daughter of fifteen marry his son. When she was 20 this daughter committed suicide.

I was not very enthusiastic about the actors either. Ursula Strauss has very little in common with of the real Anna Sacher and Nina Proll plays the imperial mistress Katherina Schratt like a cheap slut. I can't understand how Robert Dornhelm could make such a bad film about such a good theme.

The Hunter (IV) (2011)

The thylacine at last

[8/10 · 27 June 2016]

I didn't know much about the film, but the very fact that it deals with the "Tasmanian tiger" was enough reason to watch it. As a child I had a book about Australian wildlife and one chapter dealt with the thylacine - I prefer that name because it looks so little like a tiger to me. It was so sad to read that the warden in the zoo in Hobart realized that with the death of the last thylacine a whole species had died. It is easy to understand why it such a popular animal: on the one hand it looks like a dog, but on the other hand it is so completely different - just like some kind of extraterrestrial pet. I hope to the efforts of the last years to recreate it through its DNA will be successful but I am rather pessimistic.

But now back to the film! I have to admit that I was not 100 % enthusiastic about it. Although it has a mystic atmosphere, the pace of the action is very slow. Apart from the last half hour very little happens. Although William Dafoe's acting was not bad, I had difficulty to identify with the main characters. For me the two real stars of the film were the Tasmanian landscape – and the thylacine itself. I was so completely convinced that it would remain a phantom until the end, that it was a shock for me to see it alive at the entrance of the cave, so small and vulnerable. And after less than a minute the hunter shoots it and burns it, so that even the hope to save its DNA is gone. A sad ending to a sad film.

Longtime Companion (1989)

The best film about AIDS

[10/10 · 3 February 2015]

It is more than 20 years ago that I saw this film for the first time. Yesterday I have seen it for the second time and again I was deeply moved by it. For a part it is because of my personal memories of the beginning of AIDS. I had my coming out in 1981, but it was in 1984 that I first heard about the "new disease" – Europe was a few years behind in this respect. Like the people in the film at first I didn't take it seriously, but then I was struck by insecurity. Is it risky to kiss somebody, because HIV is found in saliva too? Looking back I have to be glad that my coming out was not ten years earlier. Otherwise Longtime Companion might have been my story too. Although I knew some people who have died of AIDS, none of them was a close friend of mine.

But apart from this personal aspect I think Longtime Companion is a wonderful film, probably the best about AIDS. Like the first time there were two scenes that moved me to tears: the final scene with the fantasy, where the survivors meet those who have gone. And of course the scene, where David tells his dying love to let it go. I didn't know that Bruce Davison got an Oscar nomination for this role, but he had deserved to win.

Single Bells (1997 TV Movie)

A brilliant black comedy

[9/10 · 27 January 2015]

I seem to be the first to write a review of this TV-film, which is a pity because Single Bells is one of the best Christmas comedies ever. I wonder if the film is ever shown abroad but nearly every year it is shown on the Austrian TV. Although in the meantime I know it by heart I still enjoy its black humor. A striking contrast to the many tame Christmas comedies made in Hollywood.

Best of all I like Inge Konradi and Johanna von Koczian as the two contrasting grandmothers, but all the actors are great: Mona Seefried as the frustrated housewife, Martina Gedeck as her career fixated sisters, and even the two child actors. Three years a sequence was made with the title "Oh Palmenbaum" (Oh palm tree)with the same characters celebrating Christmas on Mauritius. Although it didn't reach the level of the original it is still fun to watch.