Saaska P Reviews

The Adventures of Mowgli (1973)

A Classic

[10/10 · 2 October 2007]

"Mowgli" is far truer to the spirit of Kipling's story than the singsong Disney version (incidentally, there are no songs to speak of in this one). Animation is rather unusual, with rather sweeping strokes and not a lot of color detail, but very detailed movements. I for one love watching Bagheera (who is female here for grammatical reasons), and Tabaqui is also a treat. It's always been hard to stop an episode of "Mowgli" in between, especially the Red Dog episode always has me sitting on the edge of the seat.

This is a classic that every Russian child since 1967 grew up with and I keep returning to it. One of the best in Russian animation, and that means something.

Battle Royale (2000)

Eat your heart out, Hollywood

[9/10 · 4 January 2003]

Battle Royale can get very gruesome at times, but seldom, if ever, has gore been so badly needed to communicate the message. Forget painless 3-figure casualties, these deaths make themselves felt. Once you absorb the film's initial premise, you believe everything that is happening on the screen. You believe it down to your bone and your stomach. It IS happening out there to this boys and girls. You start believing like there's no tomorrow. To be sure, there is no tomorrow for many of those kids. And some of them accept it quite readily. I for one was terrified of how easily I accepted the terms of the game. How quickly I started to sympathise with some the characters enough that I wished they killed others. One even suspects that some adults might find it hard to suppress hot ready surges of a certain feeling generally manifested in the words "serves 'em right". And it's frightening. One keeps asking oneself questions, and those are difficult questions.

Beyond the plot, this film is about how we are made what to do what they call 'grow up' and how we are made to kill each other, if not as immediately as in Battle Royale, and how we come to get used to it.

Acting is superb. I wish teens in some blockbusters (cough..cough.. Potter and the Over-the-top Acting) took a leaf out of these guys' books. Kitano was a bit of enigma to me in this one. I almost hoped he would explode with emotion towards the end, but Kitano never does that, does he?

I don't expect a Gaijin could fully appreciate the references that Battle Royale makes to Japanese political situation and school system, but their implications for a native viewer must be profound. Definitely deserves a second viewing.

May not be a classic, but quite close. 9/10

Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets (2002)

I do so hope they act better as they grow up

[6/10 · 20 December 2002]

Not that it's bad, mind you. Quidditch scenes are fascinating, visuals and camerawork are effective as ever. Robbie Coltrane and Dame Maggie Smith are as you've come to expect. Branagh is adequate and Jason Isaacs as Lucius Malfoy is definitely an asset.

That said, the second instalment in Harry Potter series is miles weaker than the first, and I mean it. And the weakest part is acting. The director is too busy getting the hell on with his story to pay any attention to how the younger actors are faring. And they are disastrously overacting! Looks like they've forgot what they still remembered a year ago. Not that overacting is exclusively their privilege. Older actors are at it, too. And that makes the Potter world seem very unreal. You are hardly allowed to forget it's the adaptation of a fairytale book you're watching.

Dursleys gathering round Harry to ask him what he'll be doing when the Masons arrive, twins putting on big eyes when their mother threatens Ron, or, God forbid, Seamus Finnigan laughing - scenes like that in any other movie would send director's rating crashing into the white cliffs of Dover. Mr Columbus must be grateful it's HP that he shoots. People'll munch at it anyway.

I understand this is essentially a kids' movie, but one can remember some kids' movies which are good on multiple levels. There is very little in this one for adults. I'll take Oliver Wood's new Quidditch training plan and leave, if you permit. 6/10

A.I. Artificial Intelligence (2001)

A tragic and beautiful hymn to human creativity

[10 April 2002]

It has been said after the release of Sixth Sense that Osment's success is solely due to the power of motherly instinct in female humans. While he does some cute faces in the A.I. too, I feel that his performance in this one is of much greater scale and depth, and could make some leading actor Oscar nominees feel shame. For Osment alone this movie is worth watching.

A.I. is Spielberg being Kubrick-y and pretty much excelling at it. Still, I still can't shake off the suspicion that the ending was pure deus ex machina to save a sort of happy ending and show off some Spielberg ET baggage... Even if it is, the first powerful two-thirds more than make up for it.

As Professor Hobby says in the opening scene, in the beginning, didn't God create Adam to love Him? Created in the image of our Creator, we are destined to feel the same burning need create ourselves.

This movie explores the frontiers of human creativity. Are we not demiurgs? How far we can go? Could we capture even the most elusive? Could we create something in our own image? A child that looks in every aspect as a normal boy yet is not one, who does not change forever, a child whose love may outlive the human race. A toy with huge market potential. What a momentous achievement and what a fundamental flaw. Pinoccio theme, which has been criticized as overdone, is in my view crucial to the entire story. To watch David's belief in the Fairy is painful but the fact that he has been DESIGNED so and cannot change makes it near unbearable.

Tragic and beautiful film.

Wag the Dog (1997)

Great.

[8/10 · 24 March 2002]

Considering that it was made BEFORE Levinski-Clinton laundry-cum-proof epic unfolded and BEFORE the actual Yugoslavian NATO farce took place, this movie looks like some serious prophetic stuff.

Dustin Hoffman delivers a striking performance. The producer's passion, ambition, desire for recognition, emotionality and even a bit of naiveté are brilliantly convincing.

De Niro is less perfect, I'm getting an impression that the only part the man has been getting to play lately is one of Robert De Niro Himself.

Politically, Wag the Dog also makes a good point. In a country where public seriously believes a president elected thanks to multimillion donations from corporations to be acting for the good of the public, in a country whose foreign policy's major feature is an unthinking demonization of any nation that strays across the path of any member of the current president's corporate donors, this should be refreshing. In view of the latest Enron-Bush scandal I shouldn't be surprized if a small positive war is to be fought soon in the Middle East. Expect your Shoe.

The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring (2001)

Wake up people!

[7/10 · 15 February 2002]

For Pete's sake people! 9.1, Top 2 of all time! What's happening?

Honestly... has three hours of squashing orcs become a universal idea of a cinematic masterpiece? Remember there once were some niceties like complex characters.. their development.. their feelings.. uh.. unexpected and beautiful turns of the story.. some nice camera work.. interesting evil? Anyone?

Is it strange to want good guys explained and endeared to me before I even start to like them? I know they're some of them good looking but sadly I'm not a teenage girl. Is it too much to ask bad guys also explained? One of them has a really big black stick and is proficient in using it - that should be enough? Oh, then there's the little eventuality of being, like, born out of mud and having a wee bit of a weakness for black in dress - and so not having very good looks... But hey the All Blacks might be scarier and lots of people even like them! Oh the nicest looking is the good one? Doesn't it sound a bit fascist?

Is it cheeky to ask for a few shots in a 3hr movie that could make good art when stilled? The circling camera sweep routine has apparently been burnt into the firmware of WETA's computers somwehere right down Mount Doom - it's been used I've lost count how many times.

What of a story? I'm sure if you tried to recount it to anyone who hasn't read the book or seen the movie you were having a hard time. Seems to me that the screenplay misses a lot of messages from the book.

My greatest actor grudges are Frodo, and Elrond. McKellen is definitely getting his Oscar for best supporting role - that Frodo needs a hell of supporting. Don't know if Wood would be playing well, for he has very little to play. Hugging Gandalf and pulling faces when hit by a spear - not much room for an actor's feat. And 'have you not heard nothing Lord Elrond has said?' He said 'My name is Smith. AGENT Smith'.

Now, hey, hey, don't throw stuff at me! The movie's beautiful and yeah, it's based on a great book, and yeah it tries hard at transferring it on the screen. Whether it manages is a big question tho. Stop for a moment. Inhale. Count to three. Exhale. Is this movie head and shoulders above Casablanca... American History X... Fight Club... The Usual Suspects... any great film you still remembered before Christmas 2001? I hope there's still sanity in many of us to say NO.

7/10

Out of Africa (1985)

I had a farm in Ah-frica...

[6 November 2001]

I notice that the people who dislike Out of Africa the most are American and Canadian, which is rather characteristic. I guess those guys expected a kind of Sara Michelle Gellar - Ryan Philippe routine from an aristocratism-obsessed Danish woman and an English aristocrat at the beginning of the century. What do I have to tell to them... go rent an XXX action. Streep and Redford (less so) do just great walking the blade, carefully balancing passion and dignity. To call Streep's reaction to the news of Finch Hatton's death lame is in itself a high attainment in lameness.

The important words are at the very beginning: 'I wrote about the others because they're so much easier to write about'. So the movie's all about love and that's something she's not written into the book. Still, there's so much more to Blixen than what we get to see. We aren't shown the real struggle for the farm and her life on the farm and among the natives, which could harm the compassion for the pain she's in when she's forced to give it up. We don't get Lulu, which is a pity and we don't get Kamante much, which is a big miss. Redford's a bit too banal for the task of portraying Finch Hatton of the book, but who isn't?

Still, Out of Africa as a film is a whole another, and to me new, side of Out of Africa the book, and that's gratifying. Also, unlike the book, it portrays Blixen as a bit of a bitch, which she must have been, even though that hasn't a gram to do with being a good friend and a great writer and storyteller.

I was debating whether a movie was best to see before or after reading the book, and I'm inclined to think you'd be better off first reading the book. You'd spoil nothing and appreciate so much more. Or perhaps reading the book belongs in between first and second watching `Out of Africa'.

I don't know about Streep's accent, but think 'I had a farm in Ah-frica...' was a bit too stressed. But 'If I know a song of Africa, does Africa know a song of me?' part was as perfect as anyone could have wished. That sums it up. The movie places a strong emphasis on some things albeit to the harm of some others, but it does so with great elegance and it is still beautiful. You can look up accolades for the musical score or the scenery elsewhere. --- 8/10

Pearl Harbor (2001)

Excellent SFX and suitable actors can almost make up for silly dialog, stupid story, and patriotic hysteria

[5/10 · 15 October 2001]

There are nice points. We have, after all, Disney and ILM. They do what their standard requires in visual effects. Sound effects are also great, and if you've got Dolby in your theater, you're up to some good sound. Mark Hamill is quoted as saying that he suspects George Lucas would do without actors were it technically possible. PH's casting people know better than that. They remember how a well-cast Crowe made women fell in love with the otherwise unremarkable Gladiator. Patented female attractors Hartnett and Affleck do their job of bringnin some money out of ladies' purses and into the box office.

That's about it. Everything else is dreadful. Story's a mix of the simplest of love triangles, and "dead lover turns out to be alive" routine. 'Trivial' would be a huge understatement. The lines are stupid enough to make an idiot turn red. Acting is mostly helpless, but for crying in a bucket, how can you expect one to look following the flapdoodle in the script. I found it hard to feel for any of the people in the movie, American or Japanese, with the possible exclusion of Danny.

Ridiculously pompous patriotic gibberish that follows the bombing is a nightmare. It reminds me of the worst Soviet specimen of the genre. First the movie forgets about Japanese atrocities in Asia then takes the cry to such heights that what Americans did to Hiroshima and Nagasaki would seem justified.

The movie evades the real question: how a thing like Pearl Harbor could happen. US have cut up Japanese oil supply. Almost entire American fleet in the Pacific is at dock at Pearl Harbor, and a Japanese fleet disappears suddenly. Where would they be heading? Oh there's a serious problem... Let me think... How about... uh, Pearl Harbor?

The usual review goes "it may not be quite historically accurate, but" etc etc etc. It is NOWHERE near historically accurate, period. Go watch it, girls enjoy the star hunks, everyone enjoy the effects. Then put what you saw on a shelf of your memory labelled "FAKES" and rent "Tora, Tora, Tora".

If you want a war movie, the greatest of all time is "Come and See". I doubt you'll ever want to see another war movie again.

5/10

The Emperor's New Groove (2000)

Extremely Refreshing. Pure easygoing delight.

[7/10 · 15 October 2001]

Great job, Disney!

At last, a movie that's not sickeningly cloying, has no irritating song stuff, disgustingly clicheed story, or CG everyone's fed up with. What it does have is a great humour that will keep you bursting with laughter till the end. Pure easygoing delight.

While adults will enjoy absurdist and sarcastic humour, probably the kind you'll find in Alice in Wonderland, kids will have their own share, and it's a generous one. As with Alice, surprisingly these two parts overlap a great deal. That's what made Alice a huge hit back a century in England and that's what makes The Groove such a great family movie today.

8/10

Dune (2000)

Weird if you haven't read the book, horrible if you have

[2/10 · 16 September 2001]

This movie is an attempt to fit a saga such as Frank Herbert's into $20M and this sad fact is apparent in every CGI sequence, in every landscape, in every interior and costume. The book is such a great material for a superb movie. Unfortunately, Dune 2000 is anything but that.

Every other actor is miscast. Think of the formidable Thufir Hawat, a mentat capable of devising "plots within plots within plots", a mentat whose very name strikes fear in the hearts of his enemies. We have a fat old man who can but shout 'B*****ds!' at the charging Sardaukar. Think of the Fremen, the people who have lived in a desert all their lives, people who can kill for a gallon of water. They didn't manage to find enough lean-looking people. Think of Stilgar, the natural born leader, who radiates authority. With all due respect for Uwe Ochsenknecht, he's just not doing the job.

Granted, it's hard to find an actor young enough _and_capable of portraying such a complex character as Paul. But Alec Newman doesn't have charisma, authority and commitment that MacLachlan so powerfully communicated in the 1984 version. And his relationship with Chani looks much more like mother-and-son.

Interiors. Corrino, the Imperial House, and the Atreides, "men of honor and principle", could do better than live in flashy rooms looking like a dream of a nouveau riche. Costumes. Most of the them look like they came out of Batman and Robin. Landscapes. Think of the beauty of the desert: sunsets against the endless ripple on a sea of sand stretching to the horizon, the black-and blue of the desert by moonlight. They used poor quality gouache backdrops. If they couldn't afford a trip to Sahara, why on earth couldn't they at least get some decent photo imagery?

Now one could forgive all this and more, had the director managed to communicate the essence of the story. But that, too, has went out of the window. It could be understood if the director shot his Dune about something different, but John Harrison apparently has no such ambition.

Two main points of the story, Paul's oracle and Fremen dream about making Dune a paradise, were lost. Words 'Kwizats Haderach' have been uttered but twice. If not about this then _what_ Dune _is_ about? Where is the Fremen desire to see their world green, to see rain where none had been before, to see streams running where but sand has been? Where is Paul's agony of trying to avoid the Jihad?

My grudge list is not half complete but I'll shut up for now. One should not even attempt to shoot Dune with such a budget. You can't do it, and your failure may scare off people who can. I do hope one day a great director will meet a competent producer and they'll employ the finest actors and genius designers... and we'll finally see Dune come to life. Until then... horrible.

DragonHeart (1996)

Sad stuff

[4/10 · 11 June 2001]

This movie has such inexorable B class cheapness to all its scenes, effects etc as to make you think they spent 80% of their budget on Connery. It's like watching some Wing Commander stuff after Star Wars (quite apart from content).

Story can be described in one word: FLAT. And oh my God I can't remember a villain so uninteresting since long long ago. We're given neither a reason he's so wicked (an inborn defect, we're lead to think:) nor any real convincedness or flair to his wickedness.

If you're out for Connery rather go rent `Hunting Forrester'.

The Talented Mr. Ripley (1999)

It's clever, it's beautiful, how come you dislike it so much towards the end?

[6/10 · 3 May 2001]

Contains spoilers

"Some are loved by gods, others hated. Of those who inspire hatred of gods, some manage to live with it." Minghella is a great director. He made Damon play that creepy Ripley chap so convincingly, his craving so strongly portrayed, I could hardly believe it, remembering Damon's disastrous performance as the Good Will Hunting. He managed to make Paltrow look just a little bit overdone, which is a remarkable achievement. Much has been made of Jude Law's performance (oscar included), and though I really failed to see anything noteworthy, he was alright.

Hoffman is brilliant as Freddy. Italian footage is spectacular. Camera is excellent.

Yet... half an hour before the end I hated the film so intensely, I was almost surprised to find myself hating it even more in the 30 minutes that followed.

Why? It is abominably slow. And all the passion is spent on painting the psychological background for the murder in the first part of the film, and none is left even to try to make it convincing or just plain logical. Halfway into the movie you become absolutely sure that Ripley will kill Dickie, yet when he finally does it, you can't believe it. Ripley escapes, each time by a margin narrowing so rapidly as to become negative by the end.

Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon (2000)

Such a poor storyline

[5/10 · 30 April 2001]

CTHD is the most overrated film I've seen so far.

The story is very uneven, there scarcely is any character development. It has some obvious inserts to please Western taste, which only makes it more unbalanced. Its only good feature is a dignified exit.

Just one example of inconsistency. (** minor spoiler) If a woman can become competent enough in martial arts to kill the headmaster of an all-male warrior school after stealing the sacred book of that order (even not having read it in full), I am inclined to think it serves them right( **). Chow is absolutely pathetic playing a kind of a benign martial arts grand master, benign to the point where he starts resembling Robin Williams (yuck!).

Seems to me that it is no more than an average fighting movie. The fighting scenes are good when they're not flying, which they do all the time. Overall, if you're not interested in kung fu, there's not to see in this film (and maybe even if you are as well, as follows from some posts here).

One pleasant thing is photography though, which is on somewhat higher level than you'd expect from such movie.