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davibush
Reviews
Limelight (1952)
Love Charlie...but this is poor
I've loved Charlie Chaplin since I can remember, as the non speaking action man of his early movies that had pace and fun, culminating in City Lights .
This talkie , made at the same time as High Noon and so many other top movies that year, reveals how Chaplin was not keeping up with modern cinema. For some reason Chaplains voice is stilted , probably because he tried to remove his London accent and it grates. The scenes are short and there is no flow from scene A to scene B . The acting , apart from Nigel Bruce , is awkward and often hammy and over theatrical . The best of Charlie was when he does the couple of vaudeville routines , and the scene with Buster Kesten is , apart from Charlie's short legs joke , dreadful . I don't like to kick a man when he is down, but this film is utterly over rated , and in comparison to the movies being made in 1950 , is like something from the Ark. My love of Charlie is based on his famous character , the busy , athletic, cheeky and funny Tramp . Limelight is not of those, and is like watching a great singer when they can no longer reach the high notes. We fill in the gaps and weaknesses with our memory of better days gone by.
And Soon the Darkness (1970)
Not worth your time
Utter rubbish. Cheap (Cost Peanuts to make and looks it.)
An embarrasing effort to all involved . You have been warned.
It starts off slowly. There is no mystery to what is obviously going to happen.
The Man Who Knew Too Much (1956)
A Film That Knew Too Little
No idea what Alfred was thinking with this one . No chemistry between the actors , a collection of ' scenes ' and that dreadful song . A sort of Readers Digest travel tale with a murder chucked in .
The only redeeming feature was seeing Herman , the music maestro behind most Hitchcock films in the flesh .
Legion (2010)
Great fun...
The film starts off really strongly with some scary , unforseen moments . It is laced with some comedic moments . Sadly the film slips away in its attempt to build interest in a sequel . Not a bad effort.
The Lord of the Rings (1978)
A rocket that fizzled away
Jacksons LOTR is very similar to this animated effort. It begins with a well paced narrative , explaining the story and the animation is quite good, but not Disney quality. When the first Horseman arrives it really is creepy and frightening, and the Prancing Pony sequence is also chilling. Sadly , as the film moves on , the quality of the animation drops and towards the end, the director is racing through the story and the animation almost completely disappears. Obviously the makers had good intentions but bit off more than he could chew...or draw, and probably ran out of money. I believe Jackson did see this film in his youth and was determined to do the story justice, which he did beyond the call of duty. Worth watching , but will leave the viewer disappointed . Gollum as usual, stole the show!
Ivanhoe (1982)
A waste of talent...movie by numbers
It is hard not to compare modern films with their predecessors . On occasion the modern version is superior , but with this remake , the original is still the one to watch. Which is a pity because the cast of this 1982 effort is stuffed full of wonderful actors, from the main characters down to the smallest part. James Mason, Anthony Andrews, Michael Horden and Sam Neil, John Rhys Davies , Ronald Pickup , Julien Glover and Olivier Hussy are but a few of the accomplished actors who can carry a poor film on their own shoulders, but even together they fail to bring this movie above ' made for TV ' quality. All of the dialogue is spoken in the correct sequence, but there is no coming together of the cast as in Errol Flynns 'Robin Hood ' To be fair , the story line is varied, but the pace of the film is too slow, camera angles straight out of 1950s TV and poor production values . I read that this film is shown in one Nordic country every Christmas Day. The nights must be really long. So much talent produced a watchable but lifeless adventure yarn.