UACW Reviews

The Legend of Zorro (2005)

Seven Years Later

[11 December 2006]

Antonio is back and as good as always and Catherine really shines in this one - she was good in the first but here she almost steals the show, and she's not the kind of actress that does that very often.

The story at first seemed very thin. The film opened as you'd expect any sequel to open - with an extended action scene that goes on forever - followed by a totally unbelievable plot twist that just doesn't want to play.

But keep your eyes open. This might be a 'save' by the writer but it's there still the same.

There are bad guys and lots of swashbuckling derring-do but frankly those scenes don't seem as good as in the first of these films, although CZJ's work in them is hilarious and inspiring.

It's the kind of movie you'll want to get up afterwards and clap your hands with a big smile on your face. Kudos all around.

Apocalypto (2006)

Disgraceful

[11 December 2006]

Preliminary reports on this one seem positive - until you check what people on the other side are saying. Those on this side - the white conqueror's side - of course see nothing, hear nothing, know nothing.

But as soon as you realise how enraged the Mayans have become over this one and why, what small measure of enjoyment you planned on is gone forever. This is yet another project by the gentleman we have come to know as regarding 'lesser races' as anomalies that don't even need to be tolerated.

We happened upon this by accident - otherwise it would not have happened. And it's far worse than one could have imagined or expected and the protests are growing.

In a word it's an 'outrage'.

PS. Mel: you can try to censor all you like but people won't stop speaking their minds.

The Bourne Supremacy (2004)

Pale in Comparison

[11 December 2006]

This one's pale in comparison to the original and runs more like a Vin Diesel movie. The locations are not as exotic - or would you like to spend the next two hours in - Berlin?

There are plot details you may find disappointing. Enough said - see for yourself.

This one builds on the original plot-wise so it's good you've seen the original first so you can understand the story better.

But the first of these was a great romp around beautiful locations in Europe and this one is a lot of hyper-fast editing that's going to leave your head spinning and your soul asking for better.

An Unfinished Life (2005)

Nice

[11 December 2006]

Swedish movie about US country life filmed in Canada. Redford goes one further than ever before, playing a character with a definite mean streak and the look in his eye is something you've probably never seen before.

Freeman is his usual and as such and with Redford on screen you know this is going to be good. JLo - it's not that she's bad but why oh why pick her for she certainly is not good either.

Lasse's come a long way since Mitt Liv som Hund and this might not be one of his big movies but it's not bad either. Things wrap up very nicely thank you and the screenplay is cleverly and craftily woven.

Mrs. Henderson Presents (2005)

Choppy

[9 December 2006]

Stephen Frears needs no introduction; you can currently see his work in The Queen starring Helen Mirren and a quick check here at the IMDb will clue you in to how good he can be.

But this appears to be a 'BBC' film both for better or worse. This is not totally factual and the breadth of the material means things are going to be jumping around from time to time. Too little time is spent introducing the characters and you really have to remind yourself now and again 'this was made for the telly' even if it wasn't.

But the perks are many. It's a solid British production with excellent casting and acting - and a Spinal Tap contribution you may not be expecting - and some of the song and dance numbers are just too good. Of course they can use compression on the vocals today to get effects unavailable at the time and certainly on stage but it's good rousing entertainment.

It's basically the true story - or based on the true story - of the Windmill near Picadilly in London. It's not at all deep but it is good - if choppy - entertainment.

The Very Thought of You (1998)

Good Writing

[9 December 2006]

This is a well written piece by Peter Morgan, author of Stephen Frears' and Helen Mirren's The Queen currently making the rounds of the theatres. Director Nick Hamm is certainly not without a CV either. One unfortunate aspect of it all is the absolutely terrible title given the film in the US - truly there is no excuse and it belies the mentality in that country.

As a romantic comedy - of a sort - it beats anything that ghost town Hollywood be capable of; there are elements here which won't be obvious to you on first viewing and that's to your advantage.

Joey Fiennes: he talks like Shakespeare! There's a least one scene where you expect him to blurt out 'oh I am fortune's fool'.

This is refreshing and highly original and well worth a view. Ourselves we saw it on the telly, so we'll have to hunt it down as a rental or a purchase to benefit fully by it.

The charisma between Fiennes and Potter is palpable. As many say, Potter seems the blonde Roberts, but she's very much a match in talent as well. The conceit of this film - a girl who has her back to the wall and nowhere to go and simply gets on a plane to go somewhere, anywhere - has very much the feel of other movies in the genre such as French Kiss. It's a cathartic setup that works well and frankly Joey Fiennes has something his brother will never have.

Definitely worth the view and possibly the purchase.

Must Love Dogs (2005)

To Begin With

[9 December 2006]

Hollywood was dead: to begin with. There is no doubt whatever about that. The register of its demise was signed by this movie and countless other samples of schlock. And Hollywood's name was good upon 'Change, for anything they chose to put their hand to. Hollywood was as dead as a door-nail.

Likewise dead were the US movie critics. Berardinelli gives it 2 1/2 because he's a twit. He even calls it 'easily-digestible'. Evidently he can swallow strange stuff. Justin Chang of Variety commits the ultimate indiscretion in calling the screenplay 'literate'.

Carina Chocano pegs it accurately however when she writes 'Must Love Dogs must not love movies very much'. And Neil Smith of the BBC hits the door nail right on the head when he writes that Lane's earlier Oscar nomination looks less and less deserved.

But it's not Lane's fault and it's certainly not Cusack's fault - in fact it's none of the actors fault - you can even see how poorly they're directed and how painful some of the scenes were to play.

Must Love Dogs is an insult: it's the kind of insult only a dead movie industry would dare come up with. It's effrontery. It perseveres only because said movie industry have a near 100% hegemony in the domestic theatre market. Even Turkish romantic comedies - if there are such - would rate better than this.

Need someone to blame? Go all the way back. This abomination was supposedly based on a novel. By one Claire Cook. So start there. Next on the chopping block is Gary David Goldberg who unequivocally demonstrated his lack of talent by writing the screenplay. Goldberg is also the director and producer, so he's into this up past his eyeballs.

Warner Bros and Fox are involved in financing and distributing it, so they're on the firing line too.

But the ultimate cinema criminal here has got to be the boob who suggested taking this abortion and making it into a movie in the first place.

Shoot them all.

Prime Suspect 7: The Final Act (2006)

A Farewell

[7 December 2006]

This is a way for Tennison, Mirren, Granada, and Prime Suspect to bow out gracefully. This is a classy production nearly four hours long and some have suggested the actual crime story is secondary to the personal portrait. Perhaps, perhaps not - but when you're ushering out an icon like this series you have to give time to that too.

Hats off to Tom Bell for his final appearance in the series. He was magnificent from day one, episode one, and he was exceptionally excellent here as well.

A word about the series as a whole: Dick Wolf didn't write it. This is no random shuffle, no one dimensional drama. It's thick and it's gutsy and everything is in three stark dimensions and ultimately it's not even crime drama either: it's very much social commentary. People don't work this hard and this long at something only to have a forty five minute L&O filler.

The first episode introduced the characters - and how they do it is something the hacks in Hollywood should bloody well study. 2 is about racism. 3 is about child molestation. 4 is about motherhood, corruption, and a return to 1. 5 is about gangs. 6 is about genocide. 7 is about... ?? Watch it and see.

Another word about the series: no sooner had the final part of The Final Act been shown than ITV came out with a beautiful boxed set. 10 DVDs all told with commentary and interviews on the last of them. Personally I find it a bit annoying after spending 70 quid to be reminded on each disc that I wouldn't steal a car so I wouldn't steal a DVD. But it's a beautiful set and a no-brainer as for purchase.

And Taylor's a lucky man, hitched as he is with a goddess.

The 40-Year-Old Virgin (2005)

Something About Uncle Arthur

[3 December 2006]

Uncle Arthur needs to get laid and he gets the assistance of his mates at work. You'd almost expect to see Cameron Diaz as co-producer.

Don't miss the outtakes and special features. They're often funnier than the movie itself (alternately not at all as funny).

Apatow's wife does a great bit part as Nicky. And watch for her in the deleted scenes. It's Jane Lynch and Seth Rogen (who also co-produces) who have the most chops. A lot of this is evidently ad-libbed with Apatow shouting out possible dialogue to the actors as the cameras roll. There's a lot of humour here and a lot of talent.

But if Bill the Bard were called in to do a rewrite, he'd probably start by asking why so much sexual and scatological humour for the mosh pit but nothing for the others paying a shilling for a cushion.

And at the end of the day this is a Hollywood film with all that means: shallow, formulaic, and ultimately leaving you feeling the cultural heritage of Tinsel Town is barren.

Prime Suspect 3 (1993)

She's Back

[3 December 2006]

Everything everyone is saying about this one is true. One thing to add: it's a lot for a single sitting. It runs almost four hours. People couldn't have had an option when it was transmitted on telly - they had to wait for the subsequent episodes - but when you rent or purchase it now you can't be forced into that option - and you'll find it nigh on impossible to break things off at the hour or two hour mark - it's just too good as everyone says.

Perhaps the best news is that Lynda La Plante is back. Episode two wasn't bad - but it wasn't La Plante's writing and it didn't have her magical hand on it. This one does. It's as if she took all the stuff she found out worked in the first episode, concentrated it, and flung it back. Everything is deeper, grittier, gorier.

There are seven huge episodes in this opus, all told twenty two hours of viewing. So to single out any one episode and say it's 'best' is going to be difficult, but taking only the first three it's not hard to see which excel more than others, and this one has to rank right at the very top.

Prime Suspect 2 (1992)

Bit of a Dip

[2 December 2006]

This one isn't written by La Plante and it shows. The cacophony of the station room is replaced by a hum. Things are more sorted, the plot details pointed to ostentatiously.

This one is about racism - about how racial tensions cause destruction all around. Many of the familiar faces from the first episode are back, but others are unfortunately gone.

This one goes on forever. All these episodes are four hours long but this one feels that long. Two hours through it and you'll expect an ending and then you'll check the clock and you're likely to yelp 'OMG another two hours?'

It's not bad - but it does drag. As all these stories, it's incredibly complex and intricately woven - and it will beat most television crime drama fare. But odds are at the end of the game you'll long for the return of La Plante.

Prime Suspect (1991)

Plateau

[1 December 2006]

Normally when things are this good you predict 'it's all downhill from here' but with this series things never dip really - small bumps in the road perhaps but the quality is uniformly high.

These are close on four hour dramas. They weren't shown in one stretch on the telly but if you get the boxed set that's how they'll be presented - with no pauses in between and no signs of where they would have gone either. (Thank you British television.)

Episode I is written by the creator of the series and it's nigh on perfect with all the stacked decks where you want them and a masterful revelation of the lead character 'gradually'. Tom Wilkinson great in a small supporting role.

This one has everything and some of the sequels won't have it as well. Upon viewing the start of episode two the girlfriend immediately blurted 'one was cacophony in the station room - this one is a light hum'. You want that cacophony and this one has it.

Get comfortable for you're in for a heady four hour ride.

The Bourne Identity (2002)

European Adventure

[1 December 2006]

Here's an attaché full of cash and an attractive someone of the opposite sex. Now gallivant through the most picturesque cities in Europe, hang out in posh flats, eat at great restaurants, and imbibe the countryside. OK?

This one's got it all, and the casting here is very good, with Damon perfect for his leading role, Cooper great in his supporting role, and Potente literally making the film work.

I'm no fan of Ludlum but they say the movie follows the book in idea only. It's well written and paced and actually is more fun than its successor. Was quite the surprise. Not sure if it's a keeper but it's an enjoyable view.

Walk the Line (2005)

It's All Reese

[30 November 2006]

They say Reese is the best paid actress in movies today. After making this movie for sure. And after seeing this movie it's understandable.

It's no exaggeration that she carries the entire flick. Look at her awards here at the IMDb and see just what she picked up - a zillion gajillion. And it's very much deserved.

I've never been a fan of Johnny Cash or known much about him and after seeing the film I'm fairly sure I never will be either. His was a twisted sad existence and if the movie is accurate, it's only the bubbly Reese/Carter who gave him respite.

Phoenix and Witherspoon supposedly sing and play all their songs but in at least one case this is improbable. Whatever.

Kill Me Again (1989)

They Always Do It - And They Always Fail

[30 November 2006]

Flesh and Bone, Gigli... One could make a long list. Actor A shacks up with Actress B - and what do you know? They want to make a motion picture together!

And they're almost always terrible. This one is no real exception.

Madsen plays a psychopath who would scare Madsen. All Madsen basically has to do is break things and looked 'pissed'. OK, he's the guy everyone has to run from. And everyone - or at least almost everyone - has a run-in with him.

Don't look for elegant plot twists here, and don't look for elegant movie-making, and don't look for great acting either - especially on the part of Kilmer who looks like he's auditioning for a high school play and doesn't know his lines.

This one is as close to being worthless as you can come without being totally worthless. There is very little to buoy up this one. All things considered it's best to avoid it.

Go rent Gigli instead.

PS. Hey IMDb: lighten up on the censorship, OK? Nobody benefits by it. Not even the people in Tennessee.

The Interpreter (2005)

6 years since

[30 November 2006]

When this one was made it was six years since Sydney Pollack directed a major motion picture. Amongst his credits you'll find They Shoot Horses, Jeremiah Johnson, The Way We Were, Three Days of the Condor, Bobby Deerfield, Tootsie, Out of Africa, Havana, The Firm, Sabrina.

Not bad. He himself says he's a better director than actor, and of late he's been doing more producing than directing.

This one was supposedly shot inside the UN in NYC. Parts of it were also shot in Mozambique, which helps bring the budget up to a cool 140.

The only thing difficult with this one is Penn. A perennial cowboy saddle face and expression locked into an aspiration to be a Robert De Niro with none of the range or chops. Penn always looks like he really truly hates everybody and everything, is totally inexorably concerned only with his sorry self, cannot conceive people could actually care for one another, and it's therefore obvious that it becomes impossible to feel any sympathy for Penn's character - and in this flick you have to feel sympathy for Penn's character or the movie fails. (Luckily we have the comely Kidman to gawk at instead. She might be all skin and bones these days but at least she can convey a modicum of warmth and human emotion and not look totally phony as loser Penn always does.)

Check the deleted scenes as well. There are parts of the running official release which make very little sense. If you see what's been cut out you'll understand a bit better. Not that you should have to do this - this is definitely a blooper on the part of Pollack & Co - but it will explain a few things which otherwise might remain appearing hopelessly incompetent - most likely due to changing plot twists at the very last minute and calling in a zillion gajillion writers to fix things up.

Pollack goes on a diatribe in the 'featurettes' about the slaughter of the television screen and 'pan and scan' and I at least think it's good he did this. Thank you for that, Sydney!

Look for a cameo by Thunderball's Pinder.

Parallels with Three Days? There's a line of dialogue that can be an insider joke, but still I think not. That people want to see parallels? Obviously.

Little Odessa (1994)

Great Camera-work; Heady Content

[30 November 2006]

It's the camera-work which first impresses in this one. The shots are so well taken.

Roth is excellent, bordering on superb, and should win the Hugh Laurie Award for the best job done portraying (and sounding convincingly like) a 'north a-merican' by a Brit.

Are talents like Schell and Redgrave wasted? Hardly. More: their Russian is very good - something you wouldn't expect from a flick like this. Sometimes the language is almost overly simplistic but the accents are very good.

This is a taut thriller - a scary one - and there are scenes which may have you gasping because they're so stark. As in 'Casino was a Bugs Bunny movie'. Something like that. Is this good? That's another matter. A lot of this is lent by Roth's performance - he's a cold blooded killer and he plays it with more the poker face than Hopkins in Remains of the Day.

Denouement? Watch for it. When the movie's over you might miss the fact it's over. Is this a highly recommendable flick? Hard to say. Some excellent work here. But will you enjoy it? Benefit by it?

That's a much more difficult question.

PS. Hey IMDb! Stop correcting our spelling and giving us no chance to correct your incorrect corrections. Suggesting corrections is one thing; forcing them upon us is quite another.

Broken Flowers (2005)

Sophomoronic

[30 November 2006]

Jim Jarmusch wrote the script for this in two and one half weeks. It shows.

This is Rainman meets Ghostbusters (if Jarmusch can do it so can we) meets About Schmidt (in some 'scenes' he even looks like Jack) meets Lost in Translation with Murray's trademark deadpan used to the hilt - used so much that it becomes tiring, overdone, frayed and worn out, and starts falling flat on its deadpan face.

Fade in, fade out... Fade in, fade out... Some scenes are only seconds long. The movie never gets any tempo because Jarmusch is always doing a fade in, fade out...

When we got to the end, beginning to suspect this was a sophomore effort (you can start to tell because of the silly camera tricks it starts to devolve into) the girlfriend asked 'how could they sell this - how could they sell this to the likes of Bill Murray, Sharon Stone, Christopher McDonald, Chloe Sevigny, and Jessica Lange? They were probably offered a $30 gift certificate and a bag of popcorn!' And I spontaneously replied 'because they liked it - liked the prospect of making it. Because you can enjoy making a movie without being able to enjoy seeing it.'

Changing Lanes (2002)

Something to Know

[27 November 2006]

I did something this time I've rarely done before: see what the 'professional' critics said before I formulated my own words. And it might be the last time I ever do this. For whatever 'critics' give us in terms of a preview of a movie we haven't seen yet, they're basically a bunch of full of it snobs with a POV none of us have and none of us want.

Why go off on such a tirade about these riffraff? Because they chew up the ending - the ending to this flick which is the one good thing about it. Critics, you'll realise sooner or later, are heartless nerds. They have no souls. They don't go to the movies for the same reasons we do; to them it's a job; to us it's a life; we have a life; they do not.

So don't believe them on this one. The ending is good - very good. When we saw it we yelped for joy. It came so unexpected and it was so brilliantly orchestrated, you wanted to join in a standing ovation.

And the ending is what makes the movie. This is no action thriller, no Michael Douglas 'watch me unravel at the seams and have some fun with the destruction and chaos'. This is a movie with a purpose, with hope - and you might not see it at first, but that's not your fault: the movie makers are toying with you. For your own benefit.

A definite keeper. A sure winner. Music by Bob Marley.

The Seventh Scroll (1999– )

Embarrassing

[26 November 2006]

It takes a lot of hard work to make a movie good, but it might take even more work to make one bad - really bad. In this gem everyone succeeds.

Let's not talk about plot holes here. Let's talk about craters instead. Ravines. And let's please talk about acting - and directing. The only halfway decent acting performance is by the colonel - or was it a general? And as for his name? It's not given here, so who knows? Credit for his piece de resistance is lost forever.

Roy Scheider? Why does he always get these horrible parts? Either he just can't land the good roles or he has terrible taste, and in this turkey he lands another good one and unless he's absolutely desperate for work (which the poor guy might be) he has terrible taste. Playing a heavy named - Grant Schiller? Schiller is German; Grant is not. Who comes up with these stupid names? Oh that's right: the singularly lacklustre Kevin Connor who has not a single impressive credit to his CV and also commits the ultimate insult of directing - or actually refraining from directing.

The absolute worst acting in the movie is by Katrina Gibson who shouldn't even be allowed on a sound stage to pluck litter. According to the IMDb, Gibson's been in an episode of Judging Amy. That must be the worst episode ever in that series.

Rounding everything out: you can't really have a bad bad movie unless the music is really stupid and annoying, but fortunately Canadian McCauley comes through with flying colours.

This one might work on slow kids in the five years of age range but hardly on anyone else. It will bore ten year olds and get them climbing the walls and screaming in protest.

Strangely we watched this one all through to the end. We were perversely fascinated by it, mostly and primarily because it was so bad. But recommend it to anyone? Why?

It takes a lot of work to make a bad movie, and this one succeeds in all possible ways. And it only makes you appreciate all the more how much work it takes to make a good movie.

Close Encounters of the Third Kind (1977)

Nope

[15 November 2006]

He's very successful. Are there any directors more successful? He can put together a blockbuster like few others. His love of the movies is obvious. He had Schindler's and Jurassic up the same year.

He was Lucas's henchman for the making of the Indiana Jones movies. He met his future wife on movie #2. He's considered one of the most powerful names in Hollywood.

But I do not like his writing; I do not think his directing is good; and I am not impressed with his own story lines. Jaws was a very big nothing to me, and so is this one.

Close Encounters, forgive me, is not science fiction - it is speculation, speculation in contemporary surroundings. There's a whale of a difference. Both Jaws and Close Encounters lack the one thing Lucas brought to the movies Spielberg made for him: fantasy. It is this fantasy which is the essence of science fiction, and Close Encounters has no fantasy.

Some people like this kind of movie; I don't. I find this type of movie exploitative, preying on human fears and weaknesses. This type of movie gives us nothing - it only 'takes' - which isn't exactly right, as the dude already got the price of admission, half a billion dollars, and should do more than that - such as truly entertain.

Ingemar Bergman once said that the ultimate test of a good director was the ability to 'kill one's darlings': to be able to scrap a particularly favourite scene, no matter how cool, if it destroys the whole. Bergman, as many other European directors and a smattering of US ones, is considered an 'auteur'.

Spielberg is no auteur. He can hardly direct. He can put together blockbuster productions and make them work, pull off the most amazing F/X scenes, but directing involves a whole lot more than that.

And Spielberg will go so far as to rewrite a movie, irrevocably alter its contents and portent, to squeeze one putrid dirty scene in there that he just can't let go of. That is not professional directing.

He's made money; he's a success like few others; most people regard him in the same breath they mention the George Lucas of old, and I really liked at least one of the Indiana Jones movies; but none of this means Spielbergs own efforts are going to be good.

The box office may say otherwise, but I say: 'no'. This is not good; don't waste your time.

PS. John Williams may have written a couple of memorable themes for the Star Wars series, but take him out of his Sousa study and he's worthless. There are few composers who delve to the nadirs this luckless person can drop to. His music for Jaws is regarded as 'so good'; I think that's malarky. Likewise his music for this 'opus'.

Spielberg was the one who supposedly recommended Williams to Lucas for the Star Wars movies, and that turned out OK. But Williams was supposed to write a love theme for Star Wars Episode II, and how did that turn out?

The man has no gamete glands whatsoever. None. His 'filler music' is notorious and unfortunately his style (or lack thereof) has been copied by others, notably David Arnold in ID4. Some of those scenes would do well with no music at all; this is a kind of thinking lesser gifted people cannot achieve.

Listen to the music of Maurice Jarre in The Year of Living Dangerously - or rather do not listen to it. If you know the movie you will know what's behind that comment. People like Jarre have passion; they can create; people like Williams, I am sorry to say, have no passion and cannot create: they can only scribble meaningless notes across a page.

More or less how Spielberg sketches a movie he's about to author and direct.

Identity (2003)

Some People Never Get a Second Chance

[15 November 2006]

Do NOT read any reviews before seeing this movie. NONE. Every professional critic is adamant about not giving the plot away, and yet all do, in some way or another.

You are going to either love or hate this movie - there is no 'in between'. Yes, the clues are there from the beginning, as there must be in all movies of this genre, so you could possibly pick it up early on.

Some of the acting is superb. John Hawkes is a stand-out with many; he gets some fantastic lines. You may have seen Pruitt Taylor Vince in Murder One, where he plays more or less the same kind of part.

Direction can be magnificent at times. Timing and precise writing in other words. Don't be surprised if you feel the movie is playing tongue in cheek with the audience and the genre.

Should you go see it? My question exactly. I went because the g/f wanted to see a movie - any movie - and because the pickings have been so exceptionally (and dismally) slim for so long. Is it better than the average fare out right now? Perhaps. Is it a good movie, a great movie, a movie which will go to history as one that either moved you or set a precedent? No, I think not.

Again, once you find out what the BIG BAD SECRET is all about, you're going to either love the movie or hate it. That's not very encouraging - I know that. It is not Ten Little Indians; it is not The Usual Suspects; it is not a thriller, or a horror movie, and certainly not a mystery. It's a bit of all of these, and yet none at the same time.

Kudos to the director for finding a way to get to the meat of the story early on so as to not waste time on character and plot development. The Sartre book is a nice touch. For what purpose I do not know, but it's put in front of your face so deliberately, you almost have to laugh.

Without a Trace (2002–2009)

Murder One - Plus One

[15 November 2006]

We've been big fans of LaPaglia's ever since Murder One. The Aussie gent has put on a few pounds but he has something - as do almost all the regular cast here: Jean-Baptiste (remember her from Mike Leigh's Secrets & Lies?), Close, Montgomery, Murciano - this is an ensemble effort, and ensemble efforts are always more appealing.

But it's especially the writing that's good. Don't count on anything here. Don't think you've seen them all if you've seen one. The series also has a good heart, and the SO is continually gripped by the denouement - precisely, I suspect, because neither she nor anyone else can ever know how things are going to turn out. So no, it's not formulaic in that sense.

We're not big fans of violence or any of that, but you won't find a lot of it here anyway. You will find 'human' people, people who work on a force and who make mistakes, who follow down every lead but some don't work and you will find out about that... It's limited to one hour minus copious ad breaks, but that's about as close as you can get.

If you liked Murder One you're sure to like this one. Without thinking about it we've found ourselves tuning in week after week, it's that good, really it is.

PS. The original title of this comment contained an acronym; the programmer writing the code with which to review comments has programmed the system to reject acronyms as 'shouting'. Oh well, better luck next time - and on next hire.

Roadhouse 66 (1984)

Faulkner Say Hayseed's Good!

[15 November 2006]

Lemme see if I done got this right:

Hayseed peoples they be peoples too and most of your cinema pickings they's for city folks with pretensions and academic duh-grees and walking around using fancy French words and stuff like that.

But a good old boy likes a good barroom brawl now and then and some cute dixie chicks - and you should have more skin than Daisy used to show on prime time - and oh but we gotta have a great big old car race with clumsy looking backwoods Chevy 56s and 57s and they gotta rev their engines like they got no mufflers no more.

And we gotta have some good old country picking through this here race and - intermittently as they say - throughout the movie.

But here's the trick: you don't almost have to pay nobody any good money to do no good cos them hayseeds what like movies like this they don't know much about no film making anyways, and as long as ya got the obligatory nudie bonk with female nipple and round female breast in subdued light and stuff and someone playing who's ostensibly studying James Burton on guitar, then that's real fine Slim - they'll never notice the difference! No way!

And the money keeps on coming in... And who said money doesn't make the world go 'round?

PS. For the best laugh of all, waiting until the closing titles - listen to the music! The people who made this movie - who are these people? Oh goodness.

Deep Blue Sea (1999)

Stellan Saffron Sam & Renny

[15 November 2006]

'Stellan here.' 'Stellan? It's Saffron Burrows.' 'Oh hi! How did you get my number?' 'Renny. How are you?' 'Fine. Did you sign up for Son of Jaws?' 'Uh, actually no on several counts.' 'Oh?' 'It's no longer Son of Jaws. It's Big Blue Sea now.' 'Besson won't allow that either.' 'So what do you think? Have you read it?' 'Unfortunately - you?' 'Yes - and this isn't why I left modeling.' 'Or I the theatre in Sweden.' 'Hello? Anyone there?' 'Yes - who is this?' 'Sam Jackson. Who am I talking to?'

{And here our friends continue to discuss their options, confronted as they are with a screenplay by writers from Cagney and Lacey. Ugh. We continue.}

'Saffron and Stellan, Sam. How are you?' 'Ha! I'm not sure! Have you guys read this?' 'That's what we're talking about.' 'So what do you think?' 'The Long Bite Goodnight!' 'Haha!' 'Haha!' 'They're paying well. I need the work.' 'I need the work too, Stellan, but this?' 'We can have a good time.' 'If you say so, Sam!' 'Just stuff it and go to work. Agreed?' 'OK - but ouch this one is absolutely awful!' 'Yes Saffron it is - but it pays the bills.' 'Too true, Sam. OK, I'm in. You guys?' 'OK. Three months from it'll be all over.' 'That's the spirit! Stellan?' 'As I say, I need the work. I'd rather not but...'

Greetings to the 'Los Lamos' programmers.