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danicabrown
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Reviews
Princess Daisy (1983)
Interesting Plot but not enough script
I have not read this book, so I can't comment on how the movie may compare to it. But having watched the movie, even without reading the book, I would imagine that some little things are probably missing.
The story: In the 1940's Francesca (Lindsey Wagner), an American actress, meets, falls in love with, and marries a Russian Prince, Stash Valenski (Stacey Keach). The two have twin girls, Daisy and Danielle. Danielle is mentally retarded from birth and Stash has her secretly institutionalized. Stash believes it to be insanity, which runs in his family, and which he is greatly afraid of. When Francesca learns of what he has done to Danielle, she takes both of her daughters and leaves her husband, going to America. When the girls are 6, Francesca decides to return to work to get the money she needs to put Danielle in a home. But she is killed in a car accident. The girls are then given to their father, who by this time is living with a woman named Annabelle (Claudia Cardinale) in England. Prince Stash picks the girls up from the airport and immediately takes them to St.Anne's home for retarded children, where Danielle is left. Daisy is told to forget her sister and never mention her, but eventually gets her father to allow her to visit Danielle at the home every Saturday. Daisy's new home is not unhappy, as she gets along well with her father and wonderful stepmother, but her older half-brother Prince Ram Valenski (Rupert Everett), son of Prince Stash from a previous relationship, is always unkind to her. Though Ram lives with his mother in Scotland, he often visits. When Daisy is 16, Prince Stash is killed in an airplane accident. Daisy's finances are in the control of her half-brother Ram, who we come to find is obsessively in love with Daisy. After Ram rapes her twice, Daisy enlists Annabelle's help and escapes to America for school. Years pass and Ram, in an attempt to get her back, cuts her off financially and Daisy is forced to work to support herself and Danielle's tuition at the home. She works for an advertising company, under her boss North (Paul Michael Glaser), and a business tycoon Patrick Shannon (Robert Ulrich). Though leery of men, she eventually allows North close enough to become great friends, and briefly lovers. When Ram informs Daisy that Annabelle is in debt, in the hopes of getting Daisy back , she decides to become a model for the company she works for in order to support Annabelle, Danielle and herself, rather than go back to Ram. During the course of working as a model, she and Patrick Shannon fall in love. Ram is still obsessed with Daisy, despite all the years and her obvious hatred for him, and has been involved in a relationship with a Daisy look alike. Ram, desperate to ruin Daisy financially so that she will have to come back for him, leaks to the press about Danielle. The damage is contained by Patrick, and Daisy confronts Ram who then kills himself. Daisy agrees to marry Patrick and takes her place in the world as Princess Daisy.
The movie is 3 hours long, and though interesting, was obviously made for T.V. It moves slowly in areas, and then very fast in others, so that you always feel as though you may have missed something. Perhaps these are little things, but I just couldn't shake the feeling that things were left out, little scenes that may have better explained other scenes, or script that brought a better understanding to certain characters or relationships. Wagner is only in the movie for the first half hour, and the relationship with Francesca and Stash is never delved to deeply into. Though references are made to Ram being cruel to Daisy when they were children, you only see Ram as a child for a brief second when he first meets Daisy, so you have no idea what kind of things happen. The relationship with Patrick and Daisy is moved through too quickly, and though you feel Patrick is a great guy, you don't really understand how they got so close, so fast, or fell in love. The performances were OK, and I was surprised to see how many well known people were in this (Stacy Keech, Lindsay Wagner, Robert Ulrich, Rupert Everett, Paul Micheal Glaser, Ringo Starr) and in such small roles.
Generally the story was interesting, the performances OK, even if it did move too fast through certain areas and too slow through others. The locations were beautiful and fun to watch. It's an enjoyable enough movie if you happen to catch it on t.v. and have nothing else to do, but not good enough to go looking for.
Imagine Me & You (2005)
Could have been so much more
I was disappointed in this movie. The basic concept of the film; Rachel (Piper Perabo) married Heck (Matthew Goode) and on her wedding day falls in love with Lucy (Lena Headey), was a new and exciting concept that should have been used to show the audience that love is good, in any form and between any two people. Instead, it said that love should be gone after at any cost, whether you hurt those you care about or not. It sent a horrible message. I never felt the chemistry between Rachel and Lucy, or any sympathy towards them and their love. Instead, I spent the entire movie thinking of Rachel as selfish and irresponsible, not good feelings to have towards your main character.
The only character in the movie with any morals was Heck, the poor husband. I expected a beautiful story of how love can be, whether with someone of the same sex or a different sex, and instead was shown how irresponsible, and careless, people can be when they believe they are in love. Rachel's character never seemed to really care about Heck, or even Lucy, for that matter. She wanted what she wanted when she wanted it. When she wanted Heck, she was with him, and when she wanted Lucy, she was with her, caring nothing for the damage she was causing to either. And honestly, I never bought Lucy and Rachel's love for one another. I could buy the friendship, but the "being in love" thing never worked. It seemed like Rachel never even considered being in love with Lucy, or having feelings for her that weren't simple friendship, until she found out about Lucy's sexual orientation. Then all of a sudden we are expected to believe that it's love. It seemed like Rachel went, "Oh, she's a lesbian, OK, maybe I like her more than a friend then". The whole first part of the movie, in the scenes that involved Rachel and Lucy meeting (the wedding, getting the ring from the punch bowl, the dinner, the grocery store) you never get anything more than friendship on Rachel's part. Definite attraction on Lucy's though. But then Rachel spends all her time asking people if they believe love at first sight is real. You certainly don't see the "love at first sight" on Rachel's part. In the end, it wasn't even that Rachel got a clue. It was Heck who finally realized that she would never really be his again, even if she stayed, and told her to go. The only selfless character in the movie.
I could see where the director wanted me to go in this movie, and yet he never gave me the avenues to get there. His choice of actors was not the problem. Matthew Goode was superb, so much so that you relate more to his character than the others. His character was the only one who seemed to have any depth, like he was the character they meant to center the movie around, and the others were afterthoughts. Lena Headey was also fantastic, though certainly underused. Her character seemed to care more about what she was doing to Heck and Rachel's marriage than Rachel's did. And you could tell she was guilty about it. I found Piper Perabo to be wooden, as seems to be the case often. No depth, no real feeling, I felt absolutely nothing towards her character and couldn't have cared less about her wants or desires or what happened to her in the end.
The director must have known that it would be hard to feel anything towards the main character (Rachel) but disgust, and so at the end put something in there to show us that Heck would be alright. But a 30 second clip of Heck meeting a woman on a plane who obviously feels that "love at first sight" feeling for Heck, can't fix an hour and a half of problems. You see Rachel and Lucy for a second too, but you never get the feeling THAT relationship would work, and you certainly know that for however long it lasts it will be Lucy carrying it along. He must have known that we would never buy the love between Rachel and Lucy and would spend the movie feeling for Heck. He was right.
In the end, it isn't a movie I would buy or recommend to friends, unless to use as an example of Matthew Goode's scope. And his portrayal of Heck is the the only thing that has me giving it a rating above a 0. That 3 is all for him.
Jersey Girl (2004)
Good, Funny, Touching Movie
~SPOILER WARNING~ Origionally turned off to the idea of seeing this movie after the Bennifer thing, I ended up renting it off Time Warner In Demand around 2 a.m when I was bored and there was nothing on t.v. That said, I'm ashamed of myself for writing it off originally simply because of the Jo Lo aspect. This movie is produced by the same guy, Kevin Smith, who did Mallrats, Finding Amy, Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back, Dogma, etc. Like the others, Kevin Smith put his mark on this one with his normal style of dry, hilarious wit. Again, there are many actor "pop ups", with Matt Damon and Jason Lee both making an appearance. And of course, Ben Affleck and George Carlin.
The story centers around Ollie Trinke, a hot shot publicist in the music industry. The first half an hour is spent showing what brought Ollie to where he is today. He meets and falls in love with Gertie (J.Lo), they marry and are thrilled when they get pregnant. But tragedy happens. Within seconds of giving birth, Gertie suffers an Anuerysm and dies. Ollie, missing his wife and perhaps a little angry with the baby whose labor caused his beloved wife's death, throws himself into work leaving his daughter in the care of his aged father. After about a month, the strain of work, taking care of the baby and his wife's passing have taken there toll and he makes an unforgivable blunder in the music industry by knocking his client and a large room of reporters, all in front of said reporters. This results in his "banishment" from the entertainment industry and his taking his young daughter to move back into his childhood home with his father in New Jersey (Hence the title). Skip ahead 7 years, and Gertie and father are now doing well, with the later working at the Sanitation Department in the small town of Highlands. He meets and becomes interested in Mia (Liv Tyler) the girl working at the local video store. All the while though, he dreams of the life (wealthy, status) that he once led. This story is filled with love, humor, resentment and the final understanding that everyone has to figure out their priorities in life and put them first.
I enjoyed this movie throughly and never once found myself not throughly thrilled with it. I wrote this comment on the movie purely because I felt horrible at having never given it a chance and wanted to let people know the truth of the movie. Too many people I know besides myself (hubby, parents, siblings) didn't see this movie just because of the J.Lo, Affleck thing.
I strongly recommend this movie for anyone. It's even a movie guys will like (is a Kevin Smith movie ever anything but?). But women too will enjoy the wit and tenderness.
Signs (2002)
A real look at the inner person
Prior to finally watching this film, I had heard very little about it. I had seen the trailers, seen the box office records, but other than my sister telling me it had creeped her out, had heard no comments on how other people felt about the film or what the film was about.
The trailers led me to believe that the film was about Aliens and would be scary, and while it is indeed about Aliens, the film touches on so much more than that.
The film, while a little jumpy and perhaps a bit of a "horror" flick for its suspense, was not a mindless film. It was one where you needed to pay attention. All of this director's films are that way. Hidden messages that you must remember later on in the film. I find that to be positively stimulating. I was in no way bored, as other reviewers have stated.
The film centers around a man, Graham Hess (Gibson), and his struggle with god. His personal faith lost after his wives death, he gave up on his church and is trying to live a normal, albeit sad, existence with his children and his brother (Pheonix). Each of the characters has their own "quirks". You can see that each of them has anger at life.
In this film, the aliens are used to symbolize Grahams fight with god. Instead of god, it is the aliens. It almost seems as though god has sent the aliens to remind Graham of his presence. While Graham is trying to make sense of what is going on once the strange "goings on" begin, it is very much like Graham's struggle with his wives death. There is shock, denial, acceptance, fear and anger. He battles to save the family that remains as well as himself. When Graham realize's, at the end, how to kill the alien that has entered his home, it's amazing. It shows that there are no coincidences. His wife, with her dying words, showed part of how to overcome. Hinting that perhaps she knew what would happen. That god had given her the words to show Graham the way. And the fact that the person who killed his wife, Reedy, also in a statement to Graham, gave Graham the final piece of information needed to save his family. Reedy stated that it was like he was meant to fall asleep at the wheel at exactly that moment, when she would be there. Like he was meant to kill her. And the wife said the same. That it was meant to be. And it was. So that both people could, in the end, show Graham the way. Each had information. Had Reedy never hit Graham's wife, I don't believe Graham and he would have ever had the conversation they had.
It was very complex, a true look at the struggles of a family, of a man, when faced with unbearable loss. But instead of a dramatic, sad film to show these struggles, the director used a fear that everyone has. The fear of Aliens. This allowed everyone viewing the film to have a fear already, better equipping them to feel what Graham felt and follow along in his journey.
Moll Flanders (1996)
A heartwarming experience
Moll Flanders is a unique movie. It shows you the essential qualities of life. You are brought through a storm or yearning, need, love and loss, feeling each bit of this movie as though you had lived it. The characters are not unique, but their stories are so heart wrenching and real that you feel their loss, their elation, with them. From the very beginning, you understand the loss of a parent. And throughtout the movie, you feel as though each pain brought upon the main character (Robin Wright) is your own pain. While not personally being a big fan of Mrs. Wright's, I found her performance to be exceptional in this story. Her sense of the loss of a parent she had never known, the strive to fit into the world, to adjust and make herself a world that would better her, and then finding the love that she so desperately needed, was conveyed clearly. I felt like I understood every thing she was going through. I could relate to something that would never happen to me. Each actor was outstanding in this film, seeming to have felt their respective parts and taken on their persona's. That is quite rare in today's movies. This movie can move you to great depths of happiness, weariness and sadness.
The Great Mouse Detective (1986)
Not Disney's Best, But Still Fun
While this isn't one of Disney's best movies (i.e. Beauty & the Beast, Cinderella, etc), it is still a wonderful movie. My 3 year old son and 1 year old daughter love it, and my son enjoys singing along to it (although the bat in it scares my son and my son covers his eyes whenever the bat is in a scene). It sticks to Disney's wonderful family film making quality and is a lot of fun to watch. Any Sherlock Holmes fan can appreciate this movie. The songs are origonal, and the general story line is good. The movie was made during the time when Disney wasn't having the best luck with films, and all of those same films (Oliver & Company, The Rescuers, The Aristocats, Fox and the Hound, etc), while being good films, have something different about them. I can't put my finger on it, but the films Disney made in the 70's and 80's are just different from all the others. They are good family films, and always fun to watch, but are never on a Disney fans "classic favorites" list. So all in all, I would give this movie a 7 out of 10. Good enough to own and watch, but not one of my top favorites from Disney.
The Black Cauldron (1985)
Not a Good Movie
I am a hard core Disney fan. I have seen every Disney animated movie out there, and own a collection of over 20 on DVD and VHS. But I had never heard of this movie until it was rereleased in 2001. So, I immediately bought it, without having viewed it prior to purchasing it. BIG MISTAKE! I took it home and my husband, myself and our 2 year old son sat down to watch it. I never finished it, although my husband did, and I sold it online 3 days later. Not one of us liked it. At first it seemed like a Sword in the Stone kind of movie, which is a movie I like. But then, about 15 minutes into it, I (23 years old) started to get a little freaked out and scared by it. Not terrified, just uneasy. The main villian, whose name I do not remember (something I do NOT feel guilty about) is a scary, skeleton like creature. His lair (which seemed to be very simular to Maleficent's lair from Sleeping Beauty, another movie I like) was a dark, awful place. Within 45 minutes, my 2 year old and I were in his bedroom reading books that I hoped would get him to forget about the movie he had just seen. It was not easy considering he was still crying, but at least no longer holding on to me for dear life. To be honest, I could relate to my son, as I had felt like shielding my eyes for the short time I was watching the movie. This was NOT a kids movie. Now I understand why I had never heard of it before, and why Disney does not advertise about it a lot. It does NOT fit Disney's good movie mold. I give this movie a 0 out of 10 and a recommendation to all viewers not to waste your time or money on this movie, especially if you have small children. Disney has so many good movies out there, and I hope people will remember that and do not judge Disney based solely on the viewing of this one, awful film. Rent Cinderella, Beauty and the Beast or 101 Dalmations instead. Those will give you a pleasent evening with your children.
Anne of Green Gables (1985)
A Wonderful Film For All
When I was 12, my mother brought home the first book in the Anne Series. I devoured it. Then we spent the next 2 years locating all the other books for me. And just like the first, I loved all of them. We became stationed overseas, so I couldn't watch the movies, in fact, didn't even know they existed. But when we returned to the states, and I saw the first movie, this movie, that was it for me. I eventually bought both Anne of Green Gables and Anne of Avonlea. And when I wore the VHS's out, I was lucky enough to have them come available on DVD. I now own all 3 on DVD, and had to order them from Canada (at $40 a piece). Yep, I am a huge fan. I love them so much, that I introduced my 9 year old neighbor to them. And ended up getting her, her mother and her grandmother hooked on them. The first two movies are exacts of the book (although reading the book is of course a whole other experience). I loved the fact that they stayed true to the story, to the characters, to all the fans love of our "Anne girl". The third movie is good, but does not stick to the last few books at all really. This is based on the fact that Colleen Dewhurst (Marilla) had passed away, and the last books included her quite a bit. So they had to do a bit of revising. But I am so happy they made the 3rd movie, I don't care. I waited 11 years to se e Anne and Gilbert get married, and to be be able to actually see it with my eyes, rather than just my imagination and heart, was a wonderful gift. I recommend this movie and the books for all, especially mothers hoping to give there daughters a love of reading with good, wholesome, material. 10 out of 10!