Movie Reviews
Snow Queen
It sounded interesting, with Bridget Fonda playing the title role. And it looks good. But the filming was amateurish, and thirty minutes into it, the damn thing was already dragging. I wasn’t looking forward to another two and a half hours of it, so I bailed out.
Into the Blue
For some reason, we seem to be encountering a lot of movies the recently deceased actor, Paul Walker, made that weren’t part of the Fast and Furious franchise. This was much better than I had expected. He is an unsuccessful salvage guy in the Bahamas, who stumbles on a fantastic two-for-one site: the rotting remains of the treasure ship Read more »
Cedar Rapids
An unexpectedly good comedy. It stars Ed Helms, one of the dudes who was responsible for The Hangover, and is along those lines, though not as gross. Ed is an insurance salesman who has basically never been out of Frozen Grizzly Scat, Minnesota, and gets a chance to go to the big city—Cedar Rapids!—for a convention. He’s never been on ... Read more »
Darling
Some films age well, some don’t. I recall being captivated by this when it was new, and I was working in Detroit before starting school at Michigan State. Today, we looked at it and got halfway through, realized there was nothing of interest going on, and turned it off. It looks great, but it is empty and cold, and I didn’t care to learn anything more about Ms. Diana Scott who, I must ... Read more »
Darkman
I’ve just had a revelation. I believe that picking up a full-automatic assault rifle makes you dumb. At least, that’s how it seems in the movies. (This would account for many otherwise inexplicable things in real life, too, such as the National Rifle Association and Sarah Palin.) When you have such a weapon in your hands, you have an irresistible impulse to fire off at least 6,000 rounds ... Read more »
Dark Passage
The same year this was made another movie, The Lady in the Lake, was made with the camera being the POV of the actor. In that case it was Robert Montgomery as Philip Marlowe. There, it was pretty much a gimmick. Not here, though you don’t seen Humphrey Bogart’s face until a little over halfway through. For the first part, we see him in shadow, or from behind, but ... Read more »
Date Night
I don’t know why it’s so hard to make a good comedy these days. Maybe it’s just me, maybe I don’t like the stuff that appeals to younger people. Though I must say I can enjoy a modern gross-out comedy as much as the next person, as long as it has at least some elements that are original, and is funny. So I really value the ones I laugh at, and this is one. ... Read more »
The Dark Knight
I just read an article about David Edelstein, a critic for New York Magazine, who gave this movie a fairly bad review. By no means a total pan (50%), but far from glowing. I understand he’s been deluged with angry letters, some of them tipping over the edge into what you might call hate mail. Now, I’ve read his review, and I don’t agree with all of it, but Read more »
The Caveman’s Valentine
A classically trained pianist has suffered a mental breakdown and lives in a cave in New York City. You can’t help thinking of David Helfgott in Shine. But Romulus Ledbetter is not as appealing as Helfgott, he is an in-your-face paranoid schizo who probably smells bad, and his family is aware of where he is. A friend of his is murdered, and he sets out to ... Read more »
Cavedweller
About 12 years ago a woman fled her abusive husband in Georgia, abandoning her two daughters. She had another girl by a rock musician, they tour, have a good life, and then she leaves him and he dies in a car wreck. Their daughter blames the mom for his death. Mom decides to go back to Georgia and re-unite her family. This is an obviously hair-brained scheme, none of the children want it, ... Read more »