Movie Reviews
The Yellow Rolls-Royce
Actually a trilogy, with the car being the connecting element that ties the three stories together. The car is a 1930 Phantom II, and lovely to look at, but I would not want to drive it. Believe it or not, it had a 25 horsepower straight-6 engine. Hell, there are riding lawnmowers with more horsepower than that! Wiki says it could go from zero to 100 KPH (about 60 MPH) in 12.5 seconds. ... Read more »
The Holiday
Cameron Diaz makes a really good living making trailers for movies, but she has just broken up with her philandering boyfriend. She lives in a fantastic, huge house with a pool and all the other trimmings of Hollywood success. Kate Winslet works for a newspaper writing wedding notices, and the asshole she has been hopelessly in love with for years just blindsided her by announcing his ... Read more »
Before I Go To Sleep
Before I Go to Sleep (2014) (USA, UK, France, Sweden) Well, damn it! This is the second time someone has stolen my idea! I wrote a short story titled Just Another Perfect Day, that involved a man who lost all his memories every time he went to sleep. He started from scratch each morning. Then a few years later there came what may be ... Read more »
No Escape
Owen Wilson and Lake Bell and their two lovely young daughters arrive in the Third World country of Cambolaonamland (it was filmed in Thailand and was probably meant to be Cambodia, though no country is actually named) just in time for the assassination of the Prime Minister and the beginning of truly horrifying riots targeting anyone with white skin. The carnage is incredible, and ... Read more »
No End
I saw and enjoyed Krzysztof Kieślowski’s Three Colors Trilogy. But not this one. It takes place in the ‘80s, when Poland was under martial law because of the Solidarity Union demonstrations. One woman’s lawyer husband dies suddenly … only he is still around for us to see, observing the action. His wife takes up the cause of a jailed man who her husband was trying ... Read more »
Criminal
John C. Reilly is a con man who recruits the young and inexperienced Diego Luna for a big scam he is running on a billionaire currency collector, to sell him a very good counterfeit of a one-of-a-kind banknote worth up to around a million dollars. Complications arise. As in all movies like this (and I am an addict of con movies) I keep my hand firmly on my wallet from the first frames … ... Read more »
Jurassic World
Special effects have come a long way since we were first wowed by Jurassic Park, back in 1993. Sadly, storytelling has not improved; in fact, in many ways, it has gotten worse. There are dozens of references to that ground-breaking film here, but making everything bigger, faster, and almost infinitely more elaborate hasn’t made up for the lack of something the ... Read more »
Gangs of New York
The first time I saw this, when it was new, I didn’t like it. I can’t recall precisely why. It seems much better on a second viewing, but it is still flawed. And the flaw is something I almost hate to bring up, because it has to do with the ending.
This two-and-a-half-hour movie builds from the very first scene to a confrontation between Bill the Butcher (Daniel Day-Lewis, in his ... Read more »
The Rocky Horror Picture Show
I first encountered the Rocky Horror phenomenon at a convention in Minnesota back in the late 70s. I was at lunch with half a dozen fans, who all fell to talking about this great movie. They then proceeded to describe it in great and enthusiastic detail. The business of water pistols and newspaper hats, shouting at the characters, and enacting scenes in costume in front of the screen was ... Read more »
The Man Who Knew Too Much
Alfred Hitchcock liked this story so much he made it twice. The second time was in 1956 with Jimmy Stewart and Doris Day, in VistaVision and Technicolor. Both versions have their strengths, but this is the better one. And when you add it all up, the reason this is weak is Doris, and the silly song she sings. Once I hear that goddam “Que Sera, Sera,” I can’t get it out of my head for the ... Read more »