Change Your Image
tain-5
Reviews
Murph: The Protector (2013)
Disappointing
The whole film is about what a nice guy he was and what a senseless death he died. You know it from the start as everyone is talking about him in past tense but you expect some heroic deed, and although they refer to him as a hero at the end, there is nothing heroic ever mentioned that he did. You wait but nope. It would seem that it is just another case of a victim being glorified to make people feel better about it and recruit more to take his place. Disappointing sentimental drivel.
This requirement of having 10 lines is silly, some films just don't have that much dept to them and this is the case here. Only further thing to add at this point would be spoilers.
Earth 2100 (2009)
A vision of ecocalypse and ecotopia, new age is a sad one
Nothing but pandering to the eco fanatics. Soon all kinds of catastrophes will descend upon us, from the moderately reasonable (change in animal migration patterns) to the wholly absurd apocalyptic images, and claims of all sorts of resources running out simultaneously. The police shooting protesters made me laugh, I admit, but they left out cannibalism. Fresh meat is the best source of protein after all. Ah, but then we are saved by creating an ecotopia where we put whole gardens and windmills on top of our skyscrapers and ride bicycles while wearing those stupid looking racer helmets, you know, for speed. Its nice to see that even in the future people remain hopelessly delusional when it comes to their newborns. And the part about their friends moving out of the city to start, what I can only presume by then will be a hyper-organic farm, had me rolling on the floor. How "conscious" of them, they're the new age saints.
This watches like one of those asinine rapture fantasies, and is not even liberal in the classical sense. Being a Marxist of the Trotskyist persuasion, who conserves electricity, but doesn't recycle (due to it being little more than a waste of time), I can't say that I found it the least bit appealing. Right-wingers can't pin this cinematic abortion on liberal politics.
These newly risen hordes of eco- and health- fanatics are similar to the religious ones in more ways than one, the most annoying being the claim to speak for a higher authority (be it god, earth or nature). Why don't we get rid of all of them once an for all. We can only hope that all those prophesied catastrophes will help.
Inglourious Basterds (2009)
Canned cheese
Straight from the can. It combines the historical accuracy and realism of 300 with the premise of The Dirty Dozen. It's pulp fiction, true, but is it intentional kitsch. Having watched it, I thought it might have been but after I read an interview with Tarantino, I changed my mind.
It taps into that primeval want for doing bad things to people we don't like. Revenge, don't think so, well, maybe in case of the girl but she's not the audience, she's not even a basterd. Justice, not exactly that either, it's not a court in there and it's done from a contemporary and utterly simplified point of view. It does however provide a relief for that sense of powerlessness you might experience when confronted with "the heavy stuff", that is if you are ignorant enough to be able to talk yourself into it. And in the end, those cheers don't change anything or make you one of the "good guys".
I found the audiences reactions to be more amusing than the movie itself. Take the reactions people had to the scalping or "batting" scenes. On one hand the disgust and shock of some of the more sensitive of our brothers and sisters out there, just as highly emotional as the joy and bewilderment some of our domesticated animals have experienced. To be honest, the volume of graphic violence was rather small. Just a few rather short scenes in between all that talking and talking, French, German, Italian.
Getting to the one redeeming feature of the movie that I've managed to find, unintentional as it might have been, it made thousands of testosterone laden juveniles read subtitles. I find that hilarious.
How about this for a tag line: This is what the play from The Producers would have looked like had Germany won the war.
As a pulp violence showcase it's lackluster and as a serious war movie it's script is just ridiculous and mediocre, so except for the stylization and technical aspects, what's exactly supposed to be the movies appeal.
Star Trek (2009)
Generational gap
Times they are a changing. This new flavor of Trek will appeal to TOS fans because they shares some similarities. It's just as cheap (although not low budget), but then again completely lacks the originality of TOS.
The fans of TNG will find it absolutely abhorrent. Like a version of Macbeth where characters, although dressed in XVI century garb, are constantly jumping on trampolines and singing show tunes. (you have to remember though that what was once considered mere light entertainment is only now considered high art)
Then again this movie is clearly targeted at the new generation, if you pardon the pun. The same audience that seems to enjoy the new Batman, new Indiana Jones, the latest X-Man and Transformer movies. And The high rating is clear proof that its doing that job well.
The cast was not bad I have to say, especially Spok and Uhura, although Nero and Kirk could have been better. The look of it isn't bad either, the costumes, graphics and event the action sequences are all good form a purely technical point of view. However, the movie fails utterly when it comes to writing. Although there are numerous examples of the garbage the actors had to work with throughout the movie, none stands out as much as the "Scotty" sequences. Many have come to blame the actor, but even Alec Guinness would be unable to do anything good with those lines. Other more obvious examples include the "green chick", Kobayashi Maru (some things work out better as just a reference, like explaining the meaning of a joke spoils it), Scottys helper, young Kirks car ride, young Spocks fight, the glacier chase, the list goes on and on. And the villains are somewhat lackluster, even more so then in Nemesis and somewhat reminiscent of them.
Keeping in mind that it's entertainment targeted at a young male audience and not art, it is more than decent. However as a TNG fan I came to expect something more than just pretty visuals and familiar characters, there is clearly no food for thought here, nor any real drama, plenty of action and bad jokes though. 4/10
300 (2006)
Boring BS
This movie is total BS and what's worse it's utterly boring! Writing is bad, acting is bad, I really couldn't sit through it (and that doesn't happen to me that often). And so horribly pretentious, sigh.
Maybe it's just that this is not a history based movie but just pure fiction. Then again fiction has a higher potential. This makes it look even more like a huge screw up.
CG CG CG CG , that's all that it is, and that is the only thing that's OK about it. So if you're a giant CG geek, you can admire it for it's effects.
This deserves to be on my bottom 10 list. Fitting company for such "great" movies as Battlefield Earth.
Canadian Bacon (1995)
Eerie
To be honest, this movie isn't that good as a comedy. It doesn't have too many "haha" funny jokes and the acting isn't great either. 3/10
It has however one thing going for it that makes it worth watching (1st half is enough, I don't expect anyone to sit through the 2nd). The parallels to the first years of the G.W.Bush rule are remarkable. Oh, just substitute "Canada" with "Iraq" and "America" with "America" and this parody fits well and might not even be a parody at all (wink, wink). If you think it's too over the top, think again. And all of that 6 years before the actual events.
This movie deserves some credit for accurate Divination.
Lucky Number Slevin (2006)
Unfortunately, not funny.
This movie makes Hong Kong action flicks look like cinematic masterpieces. The acting's not that great but acceptable, 5/10. The script is another story however. It's like a "retarded 3rd grader wrote this".
The dialogs are so primitive and artificial that I might be tempted to enjoy it as a B movie, unfortunately as bad as it is, it's still not quite bad enough to be funny. -3/-10.
If you are one of the "I've never seen a Jewish mob boss before, this must be brilliant" people then the movie is for you. I personally want my money and time back.