fredtee Reviews

Serena (I) (2014)

A story with a beginning and an ending, but no middle

[5/10 · 4 May 2024]

Love Serena, the "strong" woman years ahead of her time. Hate Serena, the psycho-maniac. Love George Pemberton, the romantic. Hate George Pemberton, the cuckold.

Serena wants to deliver a dozen children, but miscarriages the first and can have none after. She goes sociopathically jealous after she learns Bradley Cooper fathered a child before her marriage.

Bradley Cooper wants to move to Brazil and his thousands of unspoiled acres. Why? So he can cut down the trees and leave the ground bare, as he does in North Carolina?

All ends when a panther kills George and a fire kills Serena.

I am told any good story has a beginning, a middle and an end. This movie has a very long beginning and a very short ending. But where is the middle?

Napoleon (2023)

Napoleon: No Vive La France

[8/10 · 4 May 2024]

Highly entertaining, regardless of historical inaccuracies and the absence of historical detail, (except for the XXX-rated sex scenes between Napoleon and Josephine).

Napoleon's military and political genius is lost here, notably when he curtly dismisses a general who advises his army spending the winter in Poland before resuming the war in Russia with a "Get Out!"

No wonder, the French don't like this movie. No "Vive La France" when Napoleon is defeated in Russia and later by an alliance led by Great Britain rescued by Prussians.

Having been financed by Apple, can we look forward to a multiyear episodic series? Possibly cast Donald Trump as Robespiere and Joe Biden as a drowning soldier?

The Poison Rose (2019)

Where's the Noir?

[1/10 · 29 March 2024]

Whatever happened to the cool Travolta of yesterday. Here he behaves and dresses like a slob with a permanent hangover, running around from place to place with no clear aim, unconvincingly killing his multiple attackers who are armed with repeating rifles, , using only a single pistol

Even Morgan Freeman seems asleep at the switch.

The only 'noir" about this disaster is the opportunity to fall asleep watching it. The only suspense, when will this turkey end?

Turns out, Travolta's daughter Ella Blue Travolte plays Becky, his long lost daughter. How did this bit of curious casting come about.

Then there is the "Waking Dead" Dr. Mitchell. Someone take him out his misery, please. Oops, a mental patient did.

I liked the only redeeming value of this nightmare; the legs of the Dutch actress Famke Janssen, prominently displayed "the night after." Makes me want to travel to Holland.

Dark Crimes (2016)

Hopelessly muddled plot for closet mysogynists.

[1/10 · 2 March 2024]

Jim Carrie, known and loved as the man with a thousand faces, here appears as a ghostly dead-man-walking.

. Is the the little girl the REAL killer who reveals the surprise ending to a corpse. Is the slouched Jim Carry on the couch, shown in a still shot at the end of this disaster, a dead man?

None of this is clear in a hopelessly muddled plot. Seems like the director accidentally (or intentionally?) dropped the script on the floor, then randomly shot the pages in the sequence he picked them up.

Someone must have pointed out to the Director that he had exhausted his budget, so he hurriedly pasted in an ending that bears absolutely no relationship to the foregoing.

I saw this movie two or three times to figure this out; but cannot tell for sure for fell asleep every time.

The only exciting shots were of brief sado-masochism in a sex club. So if you're a closet misogynist, this movie may be for you.

The Last Movie Star (I) (2017)

As we grow old and feeble we continue to have moments of energy and joy.

[8/10 · 16 August 2020]

Terrific nostalgia movie. One of Reynolds' best roles, even as the supporting cast is mostly annoying and serve merely as animatronic props. Amazing resemblance, really, when you consider that a couple of years following the filming of this movie Reynolds had died.

You need to be older to appreciate the nostalgia. The fact the world closes in ever tighter as our loved ones and friends disappear and we learn to live with chronic pain and ailments and relive segments of our life in dream sequences..

Reynolds careens from collapsing on the floor or on a couch to fitfully removing his first wife from a nursing home, or singing at a wedding, or giving lucid speeches.

A bit overdramatic, for sure, but those scenes makes the point most critics of this film have overlooked. As we grow old and feeble we continue to have moments of energy and joy. These moments may be brief, and grow rarer as we age, but they are true and real moments, nevertheless.

Bravo on a terrific film, and a fitting tribute to Burt Reynolds



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Carlito's Way (1993)

Sean Penn and DePalma should buy all the prints of Carlito's Way and burn them.

[3/10 · 9 May 2020]

Up to his neck in alligators, Carlito gives up the opportunity to cooperate with the DA against his dope addicted criminal lawyer and take off clean with his girlfriend and $70,000 in cash savings.

Not Carlito's way; he's a gangster with morals....who facilitates getting his criminal lawyer killed in a hospital bed. Go figure Carlito's motivation.

Score this film a zero-point-zero for its plot.

This is a Scarface movie containing DePalma's directoral skills but without Michelle Pfeiffer. Penelope Ann Miller simply cannot hold a candle to Pfeiffer's zing.

A Sean Penn who turns from a whimpering nerd into a murderer. If I were Sean Penn I'd buy all the prints of Carlito's Way and burn them....his role and acting that role are an outright embarassment. So is the total unbelievability of the two murders he commits on a small boat with two other people on board.

DePalma uncharacteristically shows little detail of this very key plot twist...and should therefore also buy all the prints of Carlito's Way and burn them

Conclusion, if you loved Scarface, you'll love Carlito's Way, but a little less. No, a lot less.

Stargate (1994)

A LSD trip to nowhere

[1/10 · 22 April 2020]

Ouch, what a mess. A Stargate trip to nowhere.

The science makes no sense, the plot makes no sense, the time travel makes no sense, the characters make no sense. Even the Egyptian revisionist history makes no sense.

What a shame blew up all that amazing alien technology in the alien spaceship. Mostly the ability to bring people back from the dead and telesport anything at a moments notice.

I really expected Kurt Russell to stay behind to become the new RA, with his newfound son. And James Spader to escape the clutches from his domineering father in law and force-fed wife by returning back to earth.

With the outrageous special effects I felt I was on LSD throughout the entire movie.

The Talented Mr. Ripley (1999)

The Not so Talented Ripley

[4/10 · 9 April 2020]

It really stretches the imagination that Tom Ripley could possibly get away with any of these murders.

(1) Tom Ripley brutally kills Dickey with an oar in a fishing boat,but police considers this a suicide based on a single fraudulent letter? Give me a break.

(2) Tom Ripley kills Freddy with a stone bust and drives off with the dead body in Freddy's car. Police cannot trace this murder? Give me another break!

Tom Ripley kills his gay travel partner on board a cruise ship and throws the body overboard, but no one figures this out? Give me another, another break!

Dickey's father believes the suicide of his son, with an ace detective who cannot trace the fishing boat? cannot find the body? Enough, already.

Lavish scenery, a travel brochure for tourists to italy, good acting......but incredibly faulty logic. tom Ripley must be the clumsiest murderer of all times, while also being the luckiest of all times.

Next (2007)

Clairvoyance meets The French Connection.....NOT.

[3/10 · 30 August 2019]

If a Russian terrorist group has successfully important a a ten million ton nuclear bomb, I doubt the lead FBI agent would spent much time chasing a 2-minute clairvoyant to find this weapon.

Let alone tie him to a chair with surgical eyelid retainers, like in Clockwork Orange, to find the location of the detonation; thus the bomb.

Furthermore, I doubt the terrorists would waste much time trying to kill the clairvoyant and risk exposure. They'd spend their time making demands of the US government, but alas, the motivation for the nuclear detonation is never made clear.

The clairvoyant's trick to foresee the future and thus change it is an excellent ploy for a sci fi movie....but unfortunately not in this mess.

Remember (I) (2015)

No Country for Old Nazis

[10/10 · 13 June 2019]

Fascinating Holocaust revenge movie. Better title would be, 'No country for old Nazis."

Can't help but shout when the neo-Nazi with the German Shepherd get killed.

A Jew turns into a Nazi; A Nazi turns into a Jew. Credibility of this plot is shaky on many levels, but who cares?

This movie got a ten-minute ovation at its first screening plus many awards, but lost money at the box office. Seems like the movie-going milenials are more interested in CGI fiction-fantasy movies with robo-humans in the rapid-fire scene changes of a video game than gradually developing plots with good acting.

The Wife (I) (2017)

Feminist Dogma

[3/10 · 22 May 2019]

Nice photography, good dialog but altogether feminist dogma.

What the feminist reviewers miss is that the husband has the "big ideas that sell" while the wife is able to bring characters to life to make the books readable. The wife does the hard work writing the books while Joe plays Mr Mom..

The fact is, without the husband the wife could not sell a single book.

All this comes to a head in Stockholm, accepting the Nobel prize, after some 40 years of marriage? Give me a break.

Den of Thieves (2018)

Tough Guys with Tattoos Chasing Tough Guys with Tattoos

[9/10 · 27 April 2019]

I liked the entire show, except for the phony plots.

Tough guys with tattoos, and fabulous looking women in skimpy outfits sitting around until told to leave the room when "man's work" is to be done in the form of nearly choking a guy to death.

Guards in a federal reserve building, looking tough without tattoos, but dumber than dumb when facility power goes to brownout followed by battery backup video cameras going on the blink with an EMP blast from a mysterious device smuggled into the Federal Reserve Bank with the stolen armored car.

FBI and SWAT guys standing around doing nothing more useful than modeling uniforms that read "FBI "and "SWAT"

Shootouts on an LA freeway during rushhour!

A needless subplot of a wife upset because her tough guy tattood husband talks dirty on his cell phone with another girl, then comes home at 6 in the morning? Did she think she married an angel? Instead of divorce papers she should be serving him a hearty breakfast when he gets home.

You can't but love this stuff.

Can't wait for the sequel. Hope the guys guarding the London banks do a better job than the tough-looking but clueless dodos guarding our Federal Reserve banks.

Meet Joe Black (1998)

Claire Forlani is a serene Goddess, who captures Mr. Death

[8/10 · 20 April 2019]

I was absolutely mesmerized by Claire Forlani. She has the most outstanding facial expressions; her eyes are absolutely hypnotic.

Brad Pitt and Anthony Hopkins are, as ALWAYS, fascinating. But Claire Forlani stole this movie. She reminds me so much of Audrey Hepburn that it is almost painful recognizing that Audrey is gone forever.

I can see why Star Wars fanatics would see a Star Wars trailer and leave after "Meet Joe Black" begins. No, it is not a movie for video game and fantasy movie fanatics with their constant scene switching and chaotic action.

Oohmygod. Anthomny Hpokins actually dances with his daughter for nearly a minute in a classic quiet ballroom dance without jumping around like a Mexican jumping bean.

Heaven forbid. Anthony Hopkins and Bradd Pitt actually enjoy watching fireworks together from the terrace for 20 seconds.

The intrique concerning Anthony Hopkins's business is, frankly, irritating because of its simplistic idiocy. Brad Pitt's "lovemaking" is what you would expect from Mr Death.. seriously in need of a bucketful Viagra pills.

But Claire Forlani, like a Goddess, serenely rises above all the action around her. Where is that coffee shop again?

Fracture (2007)

Entertaining, but don't fall for the plot holes as big as the Grand canyon

[3/10 · 17 April 2019]

Ted Crawford is of superhuman intelligence, but cannot figure out that he could be tried twice if his wife died in the hospital..once for attempted murder and then again for actual murder?

Are the nurses, the security guards, all those contributing to Crawford wife's death in the hospital when she was taken off life support going to be convicted for accessory to murder? All equally guilty as Crawford, since he was acquitted of attempted murder that put her in the hospital in the first place

The "magic bullet" Willy-boy retrieves from Craword deceased wife's face is just a fifth bullet; add it to the bullets already in custody fired from the same gun. Pure theatrics.

Confession evidence is witheld in Court because the cop was screwing Crawford's wife? No one else in the police station interrogation room? Not likely in any Police Station with video monitors or mirrored windows.

Must be police from a Keystone Cop movie. No one checked the unfired gun from Crawford against actual ownership papers and registration numbers. They'd quickly identify the gun Crawford is holding is really the cop's gun...and vice versa.

If they had planted the bullets as the cop wanted matched against the planted gun (briefly considered by Willy-boy in the courtroom) ...it would have been more credible against what happens in real life. Not only that, but Crawford should have anticipated that...how would he have handled that?

Lust for Life (1956)

So realistic I thought I was a fly on the wall.

[10/10 · 10 December 2018]

I love all of Kirk Douglas' movies. No actor today compares....none!

The movie is so realistic I felt like a fly on the wall. I have never seen a tortured soul as well developed as Kirk Douglas does here.

The Cinemascope and technicolor and musical score were a perfect blend. Compare the color brilliance of technicolor with the washed-out 4Kx4K digital theater projections today. When I go to the movie theatres today I wish I were home watching the far more brilliant color productions on my large screen TV.

Minnelli's direction has a genius for color composition common in all his movies. Look at Gigi and American in Paris, for example, and compare with Lust for Life.

The movie accurately portrays why the VanGogh paintings are such chaotic blends of color and composition. I can honestly say, "they don't make them like this anymore."

The Horse Soldiers (1959)

Fabulous cinematic color cinematography, mediocre acting, lousy battle scenes

[4/10 · 5 July 2018]

The best part of this movie is the grandiose color cinematography, especially when compared with today's washed-out digital projections. Color Deluxe and Techicolor in Cinemascope, is so much more brilliant than today's substandard digital 4096K projections on the "large "screen.

John Wayne acts like well, John Wayne. He is an authority figure great at giving commands, riding a horse, strutting around and speaking in that unique John Wayne drawl. But projecting serious emotion is not his strong suit. Recalling, over a bottle his wife being butchered by 2 doctors looking for a tumor that does not exist is not very convincing....until he smashes a stack of glasses off the bar counter.

William Holden stays behind to tend to a few wounded soldiers, expecting a one-way ticket to a notorious military prison? This William Holden would be more convincing running across the bridge ahead of the troops to friendly lines, shouting, "I'm a doctor, I am too important to be captured."

The war scenes are....war scenes? Confederate soldiers jumping off a train running like zombies down the same street, getting killed? Cadet kids marching down a field like robots, getting killed?

John Wayne shouts, "sound the bugle, you know what to do," and his soldiers spring instantly into action, knowing exactly what to do. John Ford must have been out arguing with William Holden while a junior flunky directed these battle scenes...or so it seems.

Land of Mine (2015)

Not exactly an eye for an eye.

[9/10 · 10 March 2018]

The Germans took an eye, whereas the Danes took a nose.

Germans, young and old, got killed by land mines laid by Germans. What do you expect, have Danes get killed by land mines laid by Germans?

The Danish sargeant does a lot of yelling and some face slapping, and Danish soldiers urinate on a German soldier. So? What do you expect?

I did not see a Dane shoot a German in this movie. Time to pickup a copy of Schindler's list, just to compare.

Sorry, but the sound of trains carrying millions to gas chambers and concentration camps will take a thousand years to quiet.

The only good Nazi is a dead Nazi...and plenty of Germans were Nazis.

Please, do not give me the "get over it, forgive and forget" crap.

Kiss the Sky (1998)

Tower of Babel with A Menage-a-Trois and a monk

[5/10 · 4 March 2018]

The script was written by someone on opium, how else to explain the psychobabble about relationship between men and women.

I know of many stressed-out white men with a family, young children and a nice house, who remember nostalgically a carefree trip while they were young and single. A good number even take a trip with their buddies and without their wives to briefly re-live the single life while in their 40's male midlife crisis.

But to leave all that behind for a brief Menage-a-Trois with a promiscuos young blonde on a distant Philippine island?

Then there is a bamboo Tower of Babel built to "kiss the sky" complete with a monk and language barriers...a metaphor for what, exactly. After the tower collapses in a heavy rainfall the monk doles out some Buddhist wisdom about "finding paradise only in your heart." Ouch.

This is a movie for men whose physical passion has left their marriage as they reach middle age and lose the energy to cavort from sunup to sundown chasing women while drinking and taking drugs. But they can dream, can't they?

Most movies have a "turning point" in the third act to resolve the problem laid out in the first and second act. Here Jeff inexplicably jumps into bed with a photographer on the very night he returns to vainly rekindle the Menage-a-Trois. Is he just plain stupid, given the blonde rents a room nearby in the same hotel? The writer must have overdosed on opium at that point.

Movie Reviews: Roman J. Israel, Esq. (2017) Season 1, Episode 21

No good deed goes unpunished

[9/10 · 31 January 2018]

Autistic lawyer, kept as a stooge in the background writing briefs. for criminal defense attorneys appearing in court.

Denzel Washington surprises...usually think of him as an action hero, or an action gangster. But an autistic lawyer?

Not so autistic that he cannot figure out how to collect $100,000 reward money to finger a killer, while hiding his identity.

No good deed goes unpunished, and poor Denzel gets killed for his great legal service helping criminals with his expertise of legal loopholes and encyclopedic memory of criminal case history....for wanting to make a buck.

His legacy is a class action suit....and a well fitting suit and tie.

The Prestige (2006)

Suspend Disbelief...Then Enjoy

[6/10 · 28 January 2018]

Magic requires suspension of disbelief.

Disbelief that Telsa invents a transportation machine, but the transported items are really clones of the original. So what happens to the original? "A little bit more work and I'll have that solved" says Telsa. We must belief that Angier (Hugh Jackman) drowns himself every perfprmance so his clone can instantly appear on the balcony?

Disbelief that Borden (Christian Bale) is hanged for a murder he did not commit. The final scene shows all the Angier clones drowned in their watertanks. The cops never checked backstage, to figure out Angier killed himself? Not even the Judge, who asked for a private disclosure of the magic trick during the trial?

So where is the magic? The magic is that the movie is really interesting and entertaining, as long as the viewer suspends all possible disbelief.

The price of the ticket is worth just seeing Scarlett Johansson in the low-bosom-cut period dress. Her figure is magic all by herself.

52 Pick-Up (1986)

Great porno , not so great mystery

[8 January 2018]

Trrrific porno stuff in this 1987 movie. A party to die for; whatever happened to those good times, reminiscent of Studio 54 in NYC in the 70's?

Women were shown either as helpless or as sex toys. None of the 2017 Wonderwomen fighting men in cartoons.

Not much suspense, but snappy dialoque, if you like "pussy" talk.

Schneider must have taken a lot of money to take this part. All through this movie, he worries more about his money and his wife's election than his wife getting killed...who predictably gets kidnapped, drugged with a needle, and raped by the sleazy villain. (We know this because the villain removes his shirt while Ann Margret and the villain sit on a motel bed, just before the scene gets cut....bummer).

Bodies get shot all around, but Schneider is afraid to go to the cops? No cop can figure out these dead bodies ?

Ann Margaret is shown swimming in the pool in a one-piece swimsuit, but no shot of her outside the pool. Bummer.

On the other hand, John Travolta's wife is shown with her boobs hanging out as her shirt is pulled off (no bra, folks). That scene alone is worth the price of a ticket. John Travolta married Kelly Preston in 1991...so it is not likely you'll see Kelly's boobs anytime soon again

The Gambler (III) (2014)

Movie Should Have been Titled, Java the Hut

[6 January 2018]

The highlight in this movie is John Goodman as a fat Mafioso-Philosopher type.

But boy, is Goodman fat! Fatter even than Java the Hut...the main reason I stopped seeing ridiculous Star Wars movies. Fatter than Marlon Brando near the end of his life.

Goodman shot from the front, the side, the back....nude, in a Sauna. Does the Director not know the word, STOP?

The real gambler here is John Goodman, gambling that showing his fat body will not destroy his career.

I hear Goodman has gone on a diet and lost lot of weight. Must have been motivated while watching himself in this movie. Or his friends who saw the movie telling him, "John, lose the fat."

The Gambler (III) (2014)

A Better Ending is Needed

[6 January 2018]

Decent film, except for the end. Much better ending for Wahlberg to have lost everything with a final spin of Roulette, and then have been killed by his Mafioso-style lenders. Which is what the movie wants you to believe...Wahlberg has a death wish.

Instead, after winning the BIG money with a single spin of the Roulette wheel we see Wahlberg running through the city to visit his student/girlfriend. Ouch! Does anyone really believe he now stopped gambling?

Of course not. I suspect he ran through the streets in excitement because he figured a more sure-fire way to gamble, namely bribe players into fixing sports games.

Either ending could have been a better fit then telling Goodman, 'Fuck You," and running off to see his student/girlfriend. No real imagination with that one, just sudsy Hollywood.

Where is Martin Scorsese when we need him?

Mr. Brooks (2007)

A Primer on How to get Away with Murder

[8/10 · 5 January 2018]

Very, very entertaining.

A primer on how to commit a murder and get away with it...with meticulous planning and execution.

Mr Brooks uses the vacuum cleaner in the house where he commits the murder. And a plastic bag to collect the gunpowder. He also removes the bullets from his victims.

Also a primer on how to blackmail should you witness and have evidence of a murder.

Killing with an axe, guns, a shovel, a pair of sciccors; its all here. All in good spirit, all in "fun."

Kevin Costner's acting is the very best he's done; he is so convincing that I now suspect a few suave and debonair people I know from my personal life to be serial killers.

I even like Demi Moore as the cop with the great hunches and the world's fastest reflexes, but always a few steps behind Mr. Brooks' murders. Worth $60 million with a father who thought she should have been born a son. You'd figure she can afford a sex change operation. Is that why she only wears pants, never a skirt to show off her legs?

Then there is Mr. Brooks' daughter. He loves her enough to kill for her, she loves him enough to kill him. Now, there is a REAL dynamic duo. ---------------------------------------- There are plot problems, of course. Mr. Smith is charged with the serial killer murders because he urinates on the floor, leaving his DNA. After all his meticulous cleanup, why would the killer now leave urine at the crime scene??

Mr Smith gets caught with his gun whose firing pin has been disabled by Mr. Brooks. Would you not figure Mr. Smith might have checked his gun prior to leaving his apartment, recognizing who he is dealing with? (Mr. Brooks had surreptitiously entered Mr. Smith's apartment on a previous occasion to get an imprint of the safety deposit box where Mr. Smith is thought to have kept the original photos and digital camera card of a double murder).

The Comedian (III) (2016)

Funny. Reminds of Lenny Bruce but more sympathetic and without the cocaine

[9/10 · 13 December 2017]

Terrific move. Funny, if you like anecdotal foul-mouthed humor. Reminds of the Lenny Bruce movie, "Lenny," without the cocaine and sex. Jackie presents a much more sympathetic figure than Lenny.

I bet DiNero spent a lot of time prepping for this role, to get the comedic timing right...which he performs better than many professional comedians.

The jokes can be considered demeaning to women, which does not fit today's emasculation of men by women who consider a comment on their body as hsexual harassment, and a pinch in their butt as sexual assualt. This may explain the movie's failure at the box office and its quick release to TV.