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Dolores Claiborne (1995)
Too many plot holes and stupid story arcs to be able to enjoy
First off I can't say I've read the book so I'm not sure how close to the Stephen King book the movie is, but for me the movie is mostly just male bashing and how they make women behave badly.
The reason I rated the movie so highly had more to do with the acting and the cast than with the storyline. Kathy Bates is of course fantastic. Jennifer Jason Leigh is very good and Christopher Plummer is always a good actor, but I think the story let him down a bit here. Judy Parfitt and David Strathain do an exceptional job as well.
It is just the story is so stupidly unbelievable I'm not sure why the issues were not confronted when the screenplay was written.
Here are my list:
- Dolores' house is completely vandalised, yet the police do nothing about it. Even when the police visit the house and see the giant words painted on the house and the windows broken never ask about it or question what has gone on. Hey how about the police do their job and investigate the death threats as well?
- Dolores' house has a well on the property, walking distance from the house, that nobody in the family knew about, even after living there for years. What nobody walked there before?
- Dolores' house being so close to a body of water would mean any well on the property should be full of water. Which it wasn't. There is no way you have a house that close to the water without the water infiltrating in such a hole underground.
- I believe the body of water that Dolores' house was next to was not fresh water, because of the boats and ferries we see throughout the story. So any well on the property must give you salt water (not fresh). So what is the purpose of a well if it can't give you fresh water?
- If the argument to the point above is it was a fresh water lake next to the house, than again I say why have a well on the property when you can just gather your water from the lake?
- The Detective's motivations were too stupid to be believable. We are told the Detective has some kind of grudge against Delores because he still believes she was responsible for her husband's murder. But never tells us why he thinks she murdered her husband? The husband was on his property and fell in a hole and died. What makes him think his wife killed him? There is not even a resemblance of a smoking gun. His undue motivation to get Dolores is just stupid.
- In the movie Madame Donovan confesses to Delores that she killed her husband by cutting his brakes when he visited his mistress. Yet the Detective never mentions this and he doesn't seem to be worried that a rich man in town who's brakes had been cut dies in a car accident after he just visited his mistress.... What kind of Detective is this? The Detective who loves to recite how near perfect his record is yet what the heck happened to that investigation where millionaires, mistresses, murder and sorted affairs have happened? Oh no wait, he doesn't give a second look into that man's death because he is so caught up in some poor old lady who's husband fell down a well. The character of the Detective comes across like a dog barking up a tree waiting for its prey to come down...and guess what...it doesn't. Pretty much the Detective in the beginning of the movie is exactly the same guy as the end of the movie, no real development at all.
- Let's get some facts out of the way here first Dolores worked for the Donovan lady for over 20 years before Donovan died, even moving in with her. After 12 years Donovan changed her will to leave everything to Dolores. The old lady falls down the stairs and dies. No jury is going to believe Delores killed the lady for the money. She was going to inherit the money anyway, she waited 8 years, if she was going to kill her for the money she would have done that 8 years before. So all the speeches by the Detective meant nothing. Sorry, no jury is convicting and old lady on that. No lawyer is even necessary. So for most of the movie I felt like there was no way Delores was ever going to jail for his anyway.
- Selena remembers being molested by her father only when she gets a cup of hot cocoa from the cafferierta on the barge. What about remember jerking off your dad every time you walked past the seat where you did the deed? Why was the cup the trigger when she barely looked at it when her dad gave it to her? She had been on that barge before and didn't remember that seat, or the event even though that seating area where it happened should have given her a sick feeling in her stomach. It is just a clunky ill conceived story arc. Selena should have felt sick to her stomach even getting on that barge.
- This story has too much male bashing. Peter the boyfriend, bad. He comes across as using young girls, using his position of power in the company. Detective, bad. He has an unnatural obsession to 'get' Delores'. Men in the small town, bad. They are the ones responsible for vandalising Delores' house. Joe the husband bad. I won't even bother putting down the reason here. The male Banker, bad. He allows Delores' money to be taken by her husband and she accuses him by saying 'you wouldn't have allowed it if I had been the one to ask, because I am a woman'. Probably the 'best' male character in this story is the Constable because he is generally too shy to say anything in this story, but he did say the truth in the hearing at the end. Yea ! One good point for males in this story.
- This story has too many female victims. Delores, victim. Her husband abuses her (she also gets her husband killed, but well let that slide). Selena, victim. Daddy abused her. Boss abused her. Drugs and drink dependency. Madame Donovan, victim. Husband ignores her, he has affairs. (She kills him though so you know so gets revenge).
Hey, I'll tell you the story line real quickly. All men are bad and women are just victims who do bad things only because men force them too. And if somebody says what about Dolores and what she did to Donovan? They are both women? Yeah, but Dolores didn't do anything to Donovan. Donovan through herself down the stairs and when Delores got the rolling pin...didn't use it.
Great Performances: The Collection (1976)
Is it better to know or ignore?
A great piece of acting by all and visual arts from the 70s all have that underlying raw emotional connection, because the things like the internet and mobile phones don't exits .
This is from a play which explains why there are mainly just four actors running the show.
Stella (Helen Mirren) is the wife of James, without any children. She comes across as a bored house wife.
James (Alan Bates) is Stella's husband.
Bill (Malcolm McDowell) is a bored homosexual toy-boy caught up in a relationship he finds stifling and smothering.
Harry (Laurence Olivier) is Bill's older moneybag lover.
The story revolves around a night that Stella and Bill spent together at the Westbury hotel away from where they live. Both Stella and Bill give out suggestions that they may have had sexual relations. There characters like play acting - in the tv show.
There is some comment on the internet that Bill did have the affair with Stella, but the tv show explains to us in many ways he has not.
For an example when Harry says "You know how church bells bother me, don't' they bother you?" and Bill says "I never hear them." Church bells ringing is the sound of people getting married and it bothers Harry because of his underlying fate that that he will never be with a woman. But to Bill 'I never hear them' means he doesn't care about women.
James confronts Bill, asking if he had sex with his wife, Stella. Bill likes playing James along, where there may be a bit of an underlying play on James as a man. As Harry says many times that Bill is from the slums and he likes playing games. Which is what he is doing in this show. Bill does admit "I'm only telling you because I am utterly bored."
When Stella says to James (her husband) " I just hoped you understand", and begins to cry. What she is saying that that I thought you'd understand what I was really trying to say and that is 'I wanted you to be jealous and to fight for me.' (in a nutshell she wants her husband to show he loves her) But James doesn't do that.
The show is full of sexual connotations:
-Olives signifies sex. James says to Stella do we have any olives and Stella says we have none in the house (they are not having sex). Bill offers James olives but he turns him down.
-Bill telling James regarding having the affair with James' wife - "I just don't do such things". James thinks Bill is saying he doesn't have affairs with other people's wives, but Bill is saying he is gay and therefore, he 'just doesn't do such things'
-Bill saying "I'm having cocktails"...."I'm standing for parliament. I'm going to be minister for home affairs". The homosexual connotations of 'cock' in cocktails, and 'home affairs' or homosexual affairs.
- Stella's constant companion of a white pussy cat is an indication of her being in heat (even walking around the room with it to sexy jazz music), and wearing red lipstick.
-The many references to a knife being a male organ including the knife being in Bill's hand and James telling Bill "lucky it didn't end up in your mouth" -Harry saying to James "Women are very strange. Of course you'd know more about that than I do." The whole tv show comes down to probably the only time anyone is truly honest and that is when Bill tells James the truth about what happened that night with Stella. Bill makes the decision to final telling James the truth because of the insulting way James was dealing with him, Bill wanted to hurt him but saying the truth.
"We didn't do anything. We just sat in the foyer and talked about doing it." This hurts James because during the whole show Stella is making out that 'she was taken advantage of by Bill'. But here Bill admits they did nothing...but they both were thinking about it.
James is not the husband trying to restore the honour of his wife...he has to face that his wife wanted it.
So what does the end mean?
Stella doesn't care that her husband does/or doesn't know the truth. She is sitting in a sexual suggestive pose with the cat when her husband comes to her and there is no suggestion that he intends to ravage her. The tv show doesn't need to tell us anymore because we are adults and can see where this is going.
Her English husband will take the whole affair as the English do. They will carry on as is and ignore what is going on around them (As James said to Harry "I don't think I'll mention this to my wife...forget all about it). And his wife might not have had that affair with Bill but she has given notice to her husband James, that she sure as heck won't be just talking about it next time.
The Haunting of Borley Rectory (2019)
Nearly everything is bad, but the writing was the worst.
The writing is so bad that I actually re-watched it just to work out how many times people repeated what another person had just said....the amount boggles the mind. If you plan on watching it, down a drink every time one of these gems comes up.
Robert: That's because it's classified.
Edward: Classified?
Edward: This area has something of a reputation you see.
Robert: Reputation?
Edward: It burnt down in 1939, before the war.
Robert: Burt down?
Laura: He reached the point where he was too terrified to sleep.
Robert: Terrified to sleep?
Robert: Other times its music or comedy.
Laura: Comedy! Really?
Laura: As quick as I saw her, she was gone.
Robert: Gone?
Laura: It has history.
Robert: History?
Robert: That's my guarantee.
Jenkins: Guarantee!
Robert: It would help to know what I was listening for in particular, sir.
Jenkins: Listening for!
Robert: They're just young men like us.
Harry: Us!
Robert: Who was she?
Harry: Was!
Robert: So what's your opinion?
Harry: My opinion!
Harry: They are the work of the deluded or liars.
Robert: So I'm a liar?
Harry: Your case is slightly different.
Robert: Slightly?
Robert: I ran.
Harry: You ran!
Harry: It's not the houses that are haunted, but the people.
Robert: The people!
Maryanne: It's you.
Robert: It's you.
Point of Terror (1971)
Even more than I was expecting
I must admit I wasn't sure what to expect when I first stated to watch this movie.
It's main disadvantage is that the director must of thought the lead actor was going to actually go into the music business because they won't stop playing his dated music. So much so that at times it will leave you wondering whether you are watching a movie or a extended music video? They would have saved 30min of run time, if not for the music.
But putting that aside, there are so many things going on to like, the acting is good - except for the main actor though that is passable. Probably the best work is done by the first girlfriend who I thought was totally believable..I was thinking she really did fancy him.
What this movie has got going for it, even though I will admit it's probably by fluke, is that it does give you the feeling of what the early 70's is like. The sixties had just gone by and this is the period just before disco took off, and you can feel it. The girl's in this movie play well with what they are set up for what they need to accomplish here. The colours in the music venue, what they are wear, the phrases they use, the dance moves! Just great. Oh, and that bikini....
So sit back, don't take it so seriously. Travel back in time and enjoy, I did.
Whodunnit?: Death at the Top (1975)
*** SPOILERS *** Why you can't really solve this show.
Anybody trying to work out who is the murder in this weeks installment of Whodunnit will have to be Sherlock Holmes himself. There are too many leads that don't get resolved.
There are unintended mistakes in the show enough to throw off any sleuth. We are specifically told at the beginning of the show that only the murder can lie. But there are errors in nearly every bodies recollection.
Take into consideration.
At the beginning of the show when the murder happens the glass the victim drinks from is on the victim's right hand side. Yet when the last witness shows us what he saw the glass is in the victim's left hand side. Which is a moment before the earlier scene. This seems to be a mistake as it has nothing to do with the solving the case.
When Peter Arnold picks up the victim's medicine off the secretary's desk, the secretary - Carol. Snatches the medicine from him and places it at the far end of the desk, out of his reach. In another look back from Ian's perspective, he takes up where the previous scene ended and we find the medicine is in a new location and another new bottle is added to the mix. The bottle has moved position on the desk without any reason.
We see Ian walking around with a green folder under his arm. During the meeting in the beginning the victim asks Ian for the figures and Ian gives him the folder. We see the victim open the folder and touch the pages inside and then picks up a pen and puts it in his mouth. A moment later the victim dies.
The fact that the pages inside the folder might be poisoned and once it passes onto the victims hand the poison could have passed onto the pen, then the victim puts the pen in his mouth and dies. Is never considered by the show. To make the possibility even more likely Ian, after his interview, when he leaves from the detective walks past the desk and looks at the green folder still sitting there. The detective is watching him and Ian walks out of the room - making the possibility of the pages in the folder poisonous even more likely.
The first time we see the victim in a memory throwback he is talking to Carol the secretary with a pen in his mouth. What happens to the pen is unknown. Could that pen have been poisonous - definitely.
The cigarettes and the cigarette box is a complete mess altogether. It constantly moves on the boardroom table - and opening and closing. If you look carefully you will see the original 2 cigarettes that were in the cigarette box get thrown into the trash bin. Maybe the murderer had placed them there waiting for the victim to smoke one, but alas they got thrown out. The cigarette box is then filled with another packet of cigarettes. Which we are shown are not poisonous. Yet the detective never checks the bin to see if the original cigarettes are still in the bin. Any one on the board could have reclaimed them from the bin (just looking in the bin would show you that they are in there) and put them back in the box.
Still a great show, but the chances of getting the answer are barely buckley's.
Titans (2018)
These people making it actually read the comic!
Good lord!
These people making it actually read the comic!
Even StarFire's different persona kinda goes with the show.
Please do The Judas Contract and Titan Hunt...two of the best Titan story arcs ever done.
Whodunnit?: Fly Me, I'm Dead (1975)
Honor Blackman
Honor Blackman is on the panel in this show as listed here but it does not show up on her list of credits under her name. Not sure why.
I tried to contact IMDB to fix this but there 'Contact Us' web page is hopeless and it just palms me off to a Questions and Answers page.
Anyway, if IMDB could fix this that would be great.
thanks
George T
Vanilla Sky (2001)
Snow white and the 7 dwarfs comment
The board members are referred to as the Seven Dwarfs - a clear reference to the story of Snow White. The board consists of six men and one woman. The team of doctors also appears to be six men and one woman. Both groups have control over part of David's life. One in real life and one in his lucid dream."
6 men (dwarfs) and 1 woman (snow white), means one of the dwarfs is missing!!!
Tom Cruise, is that dwarf...me must be Sleepy!
Maybe not, anyway I thought it was a funny point.
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