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brockrhodes
Reviews
Ruggles of Red Gap (1935)
Forgotten classic...
The only reason I got a chance to see this movie is that Ed Norton put it on his Top 5 favorite movies list & he said the only reason he found it is because he read it in the screenplay for Barton Fink. Never heard of this movie, which is unreasonably hard to get, but it is now one of my favorites. This movie serves as a love letter to American ideals through the unwilling relocation of an old school English butler to the American West after he is lost in a poker game. Charles Laughton is naturally cartoonish, endearing, and very believable as Ruggles, who is emancipated through the experience. Leo McCarey, whose worst movie just might be the often named "American classic" An Affair to remember, delivers like the cinematic master he is. Wonderful film that everyone should see.
Black Swan (2010)
Fight Club for girls...
Great film. Top notch. Aronofsky is feeling his groove. This movie is dramatic, somewhat intense, visually stunning, and just silly enough to make it a modern American masterpiece. I call it Fight Club for Girls because I feel that if an alien culture were to invade and watch it and Fight Club they will learn A LOT about men & women. I love what Aronovsky does with feet. Movement in this film in general is enchanting. The visuals are so so sweet. & I respect the story - how well the feminine side of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde as both dramatic hallucinations & cold hard reality in the fantasy & fact that spill out of the soul of this woman & put on display in a wonderful dance juxtaposed against the stereotypical nature of the characters who surround her. One of the finest roles ever for a woman in American cinema, & its Natalie Portman's finest performance since The Professional.
Tron: Legacy (2010)
Waste of time....
Tron: Legacy is inferior to the original Tron in every way & is one of the worst movies I had the misfortune to suffer through. I saw it in IMAX 3D and still would have walked out had it not been the fact that it was the first night the theater was open. It's so shallow and tame I was offended. It was so horribly filmed it failed to make obviously gorgeous women in leather suits desirable. If you have any taste or sense, skip it or be sorry... The only redeeming quality this film has is its eerily good CG placement of young Jeff Bridges head on a younger actor. A more current Jeff Bridges is in the movie too, but instead of being kidnapped by the program from corporate headquarters like in the original apparently this time accidentally beamed off of The Big Lebowski set.