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minty-miller
Reviews
Black Bear (2020)
The idea is good but not the execution.
The idea of the film within the film is nothing new but it's always good for exploration. Unfortunately, this film fails spectacularly to add anything to the genre except perhaps chaos and confusion. It's not helped by the muddy scenes, partly caused by the digital compression used to stream movies these days, so best seen on the big screen when we can! But to be perfectly honest, give it a miss!
Fargo (1996)
Still a fresh reminder of what sound in a good thriller is all about!
Happened to be browsing through my old VHS collection the other day and came across Fargo, which I recorded back in 1999. It hasn't aged a jot and is as memorable as I well, remembered it! Watched on a crappy old TV but listened to through a decent HiFi (I've kept an excellent example of VHS HiFiness for such purposes) the standard stereo soundtrack to this film (as with all the CB's films) is superb, bringing hidden depths to the surface as the music envelopes the ratcheting tension. If only more recent movies could be as precise with their soundtracks instead of ruining them with overblown sound! Then of course, there's the excellent cast with a story that's so compelling in its telling that you become quickly absorbed and just don't want it to end! If you haven't seen this film before or it's been a while since, do yourself a big favour! Blows most of today's cinematic crap out of the water....YAAH!!
The Hunger Games (2012)
Paper thin and watered down
The trouble with this movie is that I'm old enough to have seen many of its antecedents. So before The Truman Show, which is essentially the same idea as The Hunger Games, we have Battle Royale, The Running Man and of course, Rollerball. They all deal with mass entertainment in a dystopian future society and they all have their flaws. What's really disappointing about The Hunger Games is that unless you've read the book, the film will give you only a fleeting glimpse into why the games are called that. There's nothing else to help the naive reader make sense of the plot and because of this, the involvement of children will seem a bit odd to anyone who hasn't read the book. In fact, that's something you should take into account when reading many of the reviews of the film as they're written by people who have read the books and can fill in the wide gaps in the film without even thinking about it. Some have said its plot line is mildy satirical, but in my view that's just an excuse for a poorly filleted and disappointing adaptation of a marvellous book.
The Shadow Line (2011)
Plenty of style but insufficient substance!
Great to watch but after a while the brooding and completely humourless characters begin to jar. Is there no happiness at all in these people's lives? Even the joy of a confirmed pregnancy has to be tempered by a nagging delay as the nurse checks her scanner and looks worryingly at the screen while her patient looks worryingly at Gabriel. It's as though the director has deliberately checked every scene to ensure maximum gravitas from his characters as they go about their admittedly fascinating lives. I just wish it had the kiss of reality that The Sopranos brought to the small screen. Shadow Line bears some comparison with Tinker Tailor in terms if its unremitting gloom but none of its characters feel like their gloom has been earned through years of unremitting grind and conflict. I enjoyed it for what it is but in the end, I found it less than it was hyped up to be.