jt1999 Reviews

Battlefield Earth (2000)

not that bad

[1/10 · 30 July 2012]

Well, it wasn't really all that bad, now, was it? No, not really. I mean, yes, it was bad... but maybe not all THAT bad, not really, if you think about it. It could have been worse, that's all I'm saying -- much worse. I'm not quite sure how, but probably somehow. So go on and admit it. Admit it! All you haters out there, just go ahead and admit once and for all that you've seen worse films, more tedious and stupid films. At least this had SOME entertainment value, right?!? You mainly hate this one because of L. Ron Hubbard, or because it cost so much, or something along those lines. So just admit that there ARE worse films in the world, far worse. For example: "Manos - The Hands of Fate."

Oh, wait a minute -- that had sexy women dancing around in black lingerie.

Never mind.

The Hunger Games (2012)

WHAT hunger?!?!?!

[1/10 · 23 July 2012]

Someone want to explain to me the title of this pitiful snore-fest? ANYONE -- I dare you! Answer one simple question that should be so obvious it's ridiculous: What the hell has HUNGER to do with the PLOT???!!! They're not fighting over food...they're not trying to FIND food...

But maybe I'm not supposed to understand. Maybe I'm supposed to read the book to understand. Just like "Seabiscuit."

But that's just the tip of the pathetic iceberg. Definitely hard to know where to start the postmortem on this turd...but let's begin with the camera-work.. and I use that term loosely.

For years, the Shakicam style -- jerky, hand-held zooms and sudden, erratic pans (not to be confused with good, hand-held documentary work) has gained popularity in both movies and television. It probably started on TV shows such as"NYPD Blue," then later, "The Office." I guess the idea is to simulate documentary filmmaking, or reality filmmaking, or whatever the hell they call it these days. Movies like "Cloverfield" and "Blair Witch Project" used this style to convince audiences they were watching a home movie. Fine -- they made their point.

But somebody want to tell me WHAT THE HELL HAS "HUNGER GAMES" GOT TO DO WITH A HOME MOVIE SOMEONE SHOT WITH THEIR CAMCORDER?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!

What was Gary Ross trying to prove? It can't have been Tom Stern's fault (Eastwood's current favorite cameraman). He's been shooting extremely steady shots, from tripods, for years. You know, normal scenes you can actually follow that aren't a blurred, frantic jumble of swish pans and out-of-focus abstract images.

The only explanation is that Ross, a middle-aged guy with absolutely NO connection to the average teenager or 20-something, must have figured this was the way to play down to the demographic that loved the book. The shaky "reality" look is the only way to be "hip" -- and show teens this is really their movie, part of their generation, part of their reality-TV/camcorder/mumble-core/Internet upbringing. Right?!?

Wrong. What an awful, misguided miscalculation. For this disastrous decision alone, Ross should be banished from the DGA. Strung up and publicly tortured. Maybe required to suffer through his own "hunger" game (whatever the hell that means -- I'm still not sure).

I won't go into the how stupid and clichéd the script is, how it rips off "The Running Man" and "Westworld" and "Rollerball"... or how the idiotic, contrived "happy" ending with Catnip Whatever and her cross-eyed, pseudo boyfriend hammered the final pitiful nail into the coffin of this pitiful attempt at cashing in on a book series by launching a money-making movie "franchise."

Let's just say this putrid waste of celluloid is an embarrassment to the world of cinema and a permanent black mark that will never be washed off the once-opulent silver screen.

The Man Who Wasn't There (2001)

Slow, depressing, stupid, pointless waste of time... but Billy Bob great as usual.

[2/10 · 13 July 2012]

Here's a lesson in filmmaking one would have thought the Coen Brothers knew by now: great music, dramatic lighting and stellar performances do not a great film make.

That's it, plain and simple. All the impeccable craftsmanship one comes to expect from Joel and Ethan and Roger (Deakins) are here, no question about it. Unfortunately they forgot one thing: a story that's actually worth a damn. A reason to make a movie beyond fashioning a nifty black and white film noir just for the hell of it... but that's apparently what they've done.

"Fargo" was never one of my favorite films... but it's a masterpiece in comparison. It has what this one doesn't: a point. Some sort of reason for being. It leaves the audience with something other than depression. It tells a crime story not unlike this one, but through it we gain insight into some tragic and funny characters. We see desperate people pay the price for their misdeeds. It's basically a crime-doesn't-pay story, but an unusual one seen through an unlikely protagonist: a pregnant police chief who outsmarts everyone the same way Columbo did... unexpectedly.

"The Man Who Wasn't There" contains a similar crime-doesn't pay theme... but it rings hollow and flat. As opposed to William H. Macy's character in "Fargo," Ed Crane has no real reason to gain our sympathies... thus we don't really care what happens to him. He's basically dead already... so whether he gets caught or pays for his actions is irrelevant. And compared with Lester Burnham in "American Beauty," he takes no action and makes no change in his life. Lester Burnham started off "dead" too... but he changed. He took action. And that's the difference between a good story -- and sympathetic character -- and "The Man Who Wasn't There."

Admittedly, he twists and turns in this film are clever. Deakins's cinematography is genius. The Beethoven sonatas are beautiful. And the entire cast -- including Lolitaesque, classical piano-playing Scarlett Johannson -- is excellent.

But is there anyone who leaves the theater after this long, bleak film and NOT ask himself: "What was the point, exactly?"

Sunburst (1975)

Unquestionably the worst film ever made, end of story.

[1/10 · 4 April 2012]

Probably the only reason this amateur hour snoozefest isn't on the IMDb Bottom 100 list is that almost no one has seen it. If they had, it would have easily surpassed "Manos: The Hands of Fate" and "Baby Geniuses 2" as the most excruciating home movie ever. In fact, "Manos" now looks like a profound work of art in comparison, and perhaps deserves a reevaluation.

There's almost no way to describe the incredible badness of "Slashed Dreams"/"Sunburst." It goes way beyond the Mystery Science Theater 3000 level... and of course never comes close to hitting that so-bad-it's-funny, level -- just goes on and on in an early '70s, 16mm Ektachrome so-bad-it's-painful mode. Like a couple of high school kids went out in the woods with a camera. But a couple of high school kids with prefrontal lobotomies. We're taking no story here. No pace. No connection to reality and no idea how a film is actually made... however they did manage to obey every single Stupid Rule of horror films ever invented: kids go into woods, kids are threatened by maniacs, kids don't even CONSIDER leaving woods -- check. Girl is raped by maniacs, guy does absolutely nothing, and then they STILL don't even consider leaving woods -- check.

And in the middle of this lobotomized "Deliverance"/"Easy Rider"/"Last House on the Left" hybrid with a "Friday the 13th" poster, who shows up but of course, Rudy Vallee. Yes folks, Rudy Vallee. Just made sense I guess for the legendary 1920s jazz crooner to be included in a home movie thriller about a woman being raped by inbred hillbillies. All the sense in the world.

But far worse than Anything Else is the screeching, shrew-like banshee wail of some Joan Baez wannabe plastered over the home movie footage every ten minutes or so in order to convey the Tragic and Sensitive Nature of this very Profound and Serious Film about Rape.

Nurse, please hand me the leucotome. And welcome to hell.

Dream House (2011)

It's Turkey Time

[1/10 · 26 March 2012]

Yes, it's that time of the year... just before Halloween, and time to trot out the worst of the worst... the most ill- conceived, hideously boring, pretentious mess of a supposed thriller, and this year the stinker of the season is....

Dream House!!

But it's no dream.. it's a nightmare... a bloody awful snore-fest, stupid, slow, stolen and ripped off and cut and pasted from everything from "The Shining" to "The Others" to every good horror or suspense film you can think of....

... and all for what?!

For nothing. Absolutely nothing makes sense. Characters behave as if they exist in some parallel universe. And to think some idiot actually green-lighted this turd.

Well, it simply proves one thing: we once had Polanski and Kubrick and Jack Clayton and Hitchcock and Robert Wise.... And now, morons who shouldn't be allowed to go get coffee and donuts are handed the reins of $55 million dollar productions. Idiots without a clue about story structure are hired, no questions asked...without sense enough to recognize and fix the storytelling problems long before the post-production traumas begin.

I don't blame the screenwriter or producer. I blame the director. This picture shows Sheridan's limitations. It shows that he's either completely blind to the problems of a bad script or hasn't got a clue how fix a broken one when he sees it... Either way, he's failed as a director. He only knows how to get decent performances from actors when he has a good script to start with.

That essentially means he's an acting coach. Not a director. Directors understand storytelling.

This is what separates the men from the boys, Jim.

Sorry, pal. You were out of your league on this one. You might want to take Robert McKee's story structure course and try to learn something. Even Syd Field would help. Start with the basics. You'll learn.

Maybe.

Silent House (2011)

Could have been great...

[2/10 · 4 March 2012]

If not for the filmmakers deliberately sacrificing content for supposed style, "Silent House" could have been an intelligent and disturbing horror film -- perhaps even a classic. All the elements were in place: creepy location, good actress, decent story with a few twists. But regrettably, "Open Water" directors Chris Kentis and Laura Lau's decision to remake a low-budget 2010 Uruguayan film also includes its main gimmick: filming the entire movie in one (supposedly) unbroken, continuous take. And therein lies the problem.

This film, while ambitious on a technical level, demonstrates the importance of building up needed character and story elements no matter how innovative the camera work may be. In this picture, we know virtually nothing about the main character -- where she comes from, what she wants... how can we be expected to care or understand what happens to her? How are we expected to comprehend complex story revelations when half the time we can't even see the girl's face?

By emphasizing style over content, Kentis has sacrificed drama and effective storytelling. Hitchcock fared better back in 1948 with his experiment (some would say failed experiment) with extremely long takes, "Rope." Generally agreed to be one of his lesser efforts, Hitch's sole foray into real-time, single-location filmmaking worked to an extent because his characters were so well-defined and the story effectively constructed. Of course, he never made another film this way again, and for good reason: 1. audiences generally don't care how a film is made (filmmakers and critics do) and 2. the elimination of editing means stripping a film of one of its most important and creative components.

Editing is what separates movies from theater. It's an essential process that allows a filmmaker to creatively shape a story and actors' performances. Miracles can be worked in the cutting room. Scenes that don't work can be re-worked or removed. Performances can be strengthened and improved. Pacing can be improved. Suspense can be built. A director eliminating the editing phase of his film is like a sculptor hacking off one of his hands. So what at first might seem like a noble and innovative experiment in style is actually one of the most foolish and damaging things a film director can possibly do. He may believe he has achieved something significant and profound, but -- at least in this case -- the storytelling suffers greatly, and the audience pays the price: everything takes forever to happen. A slow, mundane conversation, which could have been sped up in the cutting room, now drones on forever. A walk to find a dead body, which should have happened in mere seconds, now takes minutes as characters plod about from room to room, being careful not to lose the cameraman following behind them.

Interestingly, "Silent House" fails in all the ways "Open Water" (which might have made a better one-take, real-time movie) succeeds. "Open Water" may have looked like a home movie shot with a camcorder, but it worked. It worked because we got to know the characters, we cared about them. We wanted to find out if they would survive... and how they would survive. With "Silent House," we don't know WHO the hell the girl is, WHERE the hell she's come from, and WHAT the hell she wants! So ultimately, we really don't give a damn. Why? The director was too busy worrying about his complicated camera moves.

There may be a place for a real-time, single-shot film... but this story and screenplay was unfortunately not it.

Sorry, Chris! I certainly don't mean to be unkind -- and I would happily give your film ten stars if filmmaking was about all creative, hand-held camera-work and precise focus-pulling. But last time I checked, it wasn't.

That said, you are without question a talented and ambitious filmmaker, and I consider "Open Water" one of the most frightening and bold exercises in low-budget filmmaking EVER.

I wish you continued success, and eagerly anticipate your next cinematic endeavor.

11:11 (2004)

For the love of God -- make it STOP!!!

[1/10 · 23 February 2012]

We must destroy them.....we must incinerate them, pig after pig, cow after cow....

And they call me an assassin.....

Who are they...... these people, these, these... "actors"....

Who, may I ask, is the Laura Mennell? .... the Kristina Copeland? .... the Brad Kidd.... the writers of the script.... the perpetrators of my demise..... the tormentors of my soul..... the assassins of my spirit.

And let us not forget the Barf Man himself, Michael "Barf" Barfaro.

Mike, I barf in your General Direction. You, sir, must be Stopped....

For the love of God, they all must be Stopped!!!!!!

Before it's too Late.

Thank you for this opportunity, and may God have Mercy on your Soul.

Amen.

The Return (2005)

Worst. Movie. Ever. And on top of that, slow.

[1/10 · 11 February 2012]

This absolutely horrid waste of celluloid is not only incomprehensible, it's something far worse -- slow. Ten seconds between each line of dialogue. It's that bad. I mean, PAINFUL. Excruciating. Worst direction of a horror film/thriller in the history of filmmaking. The idiot who directed it should never be allowed on a movie set ever again. EVER!!!

Gellar mumbles all her lines in her usual monotonous, brain-dead trademark style, as though she's reciting the phone book half asleep. Runs around with sleeves covering her hands in typical, infantile teenage-retard fashion. Sam Shepard's not too bad -- but he's in this sorry snore-fest all of 30 seconds.

Watch this film, and then kill yourself. Or do yourself a favor, and kill yourself first. You'll be glad you did.

In Time (2011)

Sheer Torture

[1/10 · 11 February 2012]

Horrible in every way, this unintentional laugh-fest may have been financed and released because of Justin Timberlake in the lead... but whoever gave it the green light never bothered to ask if Timberlake could act.. or if he had any screen presence. He can't, and he doesn't. And no chemistry with Amanda Seyfried at all. I mean zero.

I would not wish this film on my worst enemy. Getting through it is a grueling and painful endurance test. Its absurdity is matched only by its obviousness. More like an expensive student film than anything else, its pretentious script is filled with howlers and clunky, first-year film student so-called "banter." It's amazing the cast got through the takes without laughing.

No wonder Ellison withdrew his lawsuit. He'd probably rather his time clock hit zero than be associated in any way, shape or form with this amateur-hour rubbish. Truly awful.

Wrecked (2010)

127 Years

[1/10 · 15 January 2012]

This film proves why there is Danny Boyle, and then there's the rest.

In "127 Hours," this smart director instinctively knew how to engage an audience, thrill them, captivate them, and make them sympathetic to the main character without any other characters or story points to speak of.

The fact that he pulled this off is something of a miracle.

But he did so by realizing, among other things, that holding for 30 seconds or more on a static closeup of his lead actor while absolutely NOTHING happened was not the answer.

In fact, he knew it would be the death of his film.

Whoever directed (and edited) "Wrecked" doesn't quite understand this concept. These well-meaning amateurs can't quite wrap their minds around the idea that what's essentially a boring story doesn't have to be told in a boring, ultra-realistic way (despite how many reality TV shows have become successful).

That's why "127 Hours" was nominated for multiple Oscars... and who's even ever heard of "Wrecked"?? It was never even released -- despite having a major star in the lead role.

Maybe, with a good editor, this failed experiment in non-storytelling might have worked as a short film. Even with a terrible director who doesn't understand filmmaking, there are ways to turn the story of a car crash survivor into an entertaining 10-minute short. Features on the other hand generally succeed using a three-act structure and story revelations.

At least this wrecked attempt can serve as a lesson to future filmmakers: when portraying a character going through misery, don't make the audience suffer as well! People don't generally turn over their hard-earned cash so they can have a terrible time at the movies.

Pathology (2008)

Grisly, repulsive, offensive trash this world could have done without.

[1/10 · 16 December 2011]

There is no reason for this film to exist. No logical reason for it to have been made. Money? It grossed $108,662 -- with an 8 million dollar budget. A mega-flop.

Did someone actually think people would want to see this?

"An ugly film about ugly people doing ugly things" is how one critic described it. That pretty much sums it up!

Again, the question is, why? Why was it made? Why would Lakeshore Entertainment -- who I once thought of as somewhat respectable -- pour 8 million bucks into this? Did they really think there were people out there who get into watching corpses being cut apart and cracked open and played with... body pieces and organs being thrown around like gruesome toys, like it's all supposed to be some big goddamn joke?

And don't even get me started on the shots on the guy's ass in the first sex scene. I'm all out of vomit bags.

They would have loved this at Auschwitz. Probably one of Jeffrey Dahmer's faves. Manson? Probably too gross for him.

If this is what cinema has come to after 100 years, all I can say is I want out. Get me the hell out of the madhouse. Get me back to porn, to normalcy, to some decent entertainment that doesn't make me puke... This was worse than a snuff film, way worse. It makes me ashamed to be in the film business. Ashamed to be a human being. Ashamed to be alive.

Nice music and photography, though! Just shows you how important those things are to the success of a film.

Zero stars. Hopefully the jerk who made this will be dead soon. And boy, how I hope they toss his organs around the room!

Village of the Damned (1995)

Where's a flamethrower when you need one?!?

[24 September 2011]

Or an Uzi. Or a shotgun. Or a good old-fashioned Gatling Gun.

Doesn't matter... whoever might have managed to get ahold of one would have done what every other friggin' character does in this film: walk up to the platinum blonde kids from hell, and instead firing off a couple of rounds, stand there idiotically for about ten or fifteen seconds. Brilliant! Give those kids plenty of time to kill you, that's what you want to do! Don't shoot, don't bash their brains in -- just wait there a good, long time until their eyes start glowing.

This idiotic direction is emblematic of the entire film: it just sits there, doing almost nothing. Could have been directed by a sleepwalker... and that's with all due respect to Mr. Carpenter.

Music certainly didn't help either. In fact, it helped ruin the entire film.

Sorry, John. Got to put in a little more effort when re-making a classic. Kind of like you did when you re-made "The Thing." Remember those days? No, didn't think so.

Larry Crowne (2011)

Not all that terrible

[3/10 · 4 July 2011]

Stinker? Yes, in many ways. But look at the bright side: it could have been worse -- much worse. Go on -- admit it. "Larry Crowne on deck" -- that's funny stuff! And you have to admit that some of the end scenes were pretty touching.

So... what the hell were you expecting? Frank Capra?? Preston Sturges?? Woody Allen?!?

And you have to admit it's kind of cute seeing Roberts wave "hi Mom" from the scooter. Admit it -- only a hateful curmudgeon would deny that.

So maybe you might want to cut this picture a little slack. Yes, it shows a closeup of Tom Hanks in his underwear -- God knows why. No, it didn't make that much sense, yes the writing more or less sucked, but so what... we can't all be geniuses. Give Hanks some credit for trying to make a nice, little feel-good picture. We can't all be Jonathan Demme. Hey, if it were easy, we'd all be doing it!!

Road to Nowhere (I) (2010)

Tough, slow going even for die-hard Hellman fans

[1/10 · 15 May 2011]

While it would be nice to report that after a 20 year absence cult director Monte Hellman has returned with some sort of existential masterpiece on the nature of movie-making, complete with tragic death and lost innocence as some of its themes, this torpid, nearly incomprehensible muddle of a story about a young director making a low-budget film merely leaves one confused and numb.

What might have been a worthy companion piece to Lynch's "Mulholland Drive," Dennis Hopper's "The Last Movie" or even the great Billy Wilder's "Sunset Blvd." crawls so far up its own convoluted pseudo-intellectual ass that making it through to the final credits becomes an endurance test.

Hellman commented recently that directing is 90 or 95% casting. He might want to focus a little more on the directing next time, and find a script that has a compelling story and characters one can actually care about. But this has never been his forte, of course.

A good deal of the blame goes to the editor, who allows scenes to meander a half a minute or more after they've effectively ended. The version I saw resembled a rough cut, not a finished film, complete with such snore-inducing moments as the main actress staring at a blow dryer for what seemed an eternity.

If Hellman's goal was to make a "personal" film that he alone can connect to and appreciate, then perhaps he has succeeded. But wouldn't it have been wonderful if this revered auteur could have -- for once -- created something that others could appreciate, too, perhaps even understand and enjoy... a picture with interesting characters and a story worth telling... something that might have been considered releasable by a small but respected distributor.... possibly returning Hellman to the filmmaking world of the 21st century as a viable director.

Alas, this mood experiment with digital photography, bland 1-dimensional characters, a 1970s Leonard Cohen inspired soundtrack and a cryptic, fragmented storyline may appeal to his very close inner circle of fans, but will likely leave the rest of us out in the cold, bewildered, confused, and wondering what all the accolades could have been about back in the 60s and 70s.

Welcome to the Rileys (2010)

Didn't Dad or Uncle Tony have any helpful advice?????

[2/10 · 7 November 2010]

I'm giving this a 2, only because the performances were halfway decent.

But good performances don't a great film make. Actor's showcase?? I paid to see a movie, not a play.

Unfortunately, I got neither.

This film crawls along like a snail through molasses. Shots hang on too long. Scenes have little or no energy. There might have been a workable story in here somewhere, but the lackadaisical directing completely strangles it. The editing -- or lack thereof -- finishes it off. And the story is threadbare at best; a good director could have told it in ten minutes.

It's a bit of a shock to realize that one of the dullest snorefests in many a moon was directed by the progeny (Jake Scott) of one of our most gifted filmmakers (Ridley Scott) -- which leads me to wonder: where the hell were Ridley's screening notes when his kid was showing him a first cut???!!! Why didn't he stand up and say, "Kid, you know I love you and I'm proud as hell you made this picture... but you're gonna have an angry mob at your heels if you don't cut this thing down!"

And why didn't his uncle, the great Tony Scott, say to him, "EITHER FIRE YOUR BRAIN-DEAD EDITOR AND GET SOMEONE WHO KNOWS WHAT HE'S DOING, OR I'ILL COME OVER THERE AND CUT THIS S**T MYSELF!!!"

Why didn't just ONE of the film's producers -- or someone who possesses just a modicum of understanding of pacing and storytelling -- stand up in the middle of a screening, and shout: "CUT THIS SELF-INDULGENT CRAP DOWN, MOTHER****ER, OR YOU'LL PUT THE ENTIRE AUDIENCE INTO A F***ING TRANCE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!"

Clearly, Jake Scott needed help... but he either didn't get it, or refused to take it. Pity.

Perhaps this is his way of announcing to the world that he rejects the evils of successful, commercial filmmaking. Maybe this is his unique method of informing us that he loathes and rejects his father's and uncle's big studio successes, and wishes to be thought of as some sort of iconoclastic, art-house, Indie director whose trademark is pain-inducing tripe that only European film festivals could love.

Whatever his reasons, the result, as evidenced by this movie, is cruel and unusual punishment for the unsuspecting audience -- a cinematic endurance test of a film that hasn't got a hope in hell of succeeding, critically OR financially....or, unfortunately, advancing young Jake Scott's career.

More's the pity.

Shutter Island (2010)

Who the hell is in chahge heah, anyway??!!

[1/10 · 4 July 2010]

Hard to believe the great Scorsese had anything to do with this laughable stinker.

Even harder to believe the great Thelma Schoonmaker cut it!

There are many terrible things here: the direction, the acting, the music. But far, far worse than any of them is the editing.

The editing is absolutely atrocious. It so overwrought, so desperate to make the scenes succeed, so completely contrived and overdone that it almost defies description. And no, I'm not talking about the jump-cuts or continuity breaks. I'm not talking about ANY of that. That I can deal with. Some of it I even liked.

What I'm talking about is the Academy Award-winner's complete and total inability to edit a simple dialogue scene with cuts that tell the story.

It's as if she's lost every single ounce of talent displayed in "Goodfellas"... or "Raging Bull"... or "Casino." Just about EVERY SINGLE CUT is wrong... arbitrary, poorly timed, ill-advised, non-sensical.

I just watched a 40 year-old episode of "Night Gallery." A 60--minute TV show they cranked out once a week. What a wonderful pleasure to see good, effective, unpretentious editing!!!!!! Editing that serves the story. Editing that's almost invisible. Editing that's just about unbeatable.

And that was 1970.

R.I.P. for now, Thelma. You had it once. You were great.....TRULY great.. You made Marty's scenes jump to amazing, thrilling, exciting life. There was simply NO better editing on display in 1990 than in "Goodfellas." Simply superb.

Now, alas, the magic is gone. Your cutting in "Stutter Island" or whatever the hell it is, kills every bit of dramatic potential this hopeless turkey ever once had. Which of course is not saying much!

Yes, you had it....and now, dear soul, you've lost it. It's gone. I can only hope that maybe, someday, God willing....you'll get it back.

Meeting Spencer (2011)

Classy and Hilarious

[10/10 · 15 May 2010]

I was lucky enough to get to see this witty movie recently at a Sneak Preview. . Its a different kind of comedy, its really more old school, very sophisticated and intelligent - adult type of humor, subtle -- like a Woody Allen film, not like Jud Apatow films... Very smart and you really have to pay attention to get all the jokes,. It all takes place at one restaurant in New York on one night.

Jeffery Tambor plays a director trying to get his carer back on track with a famous play he wants to produce on Broadway. But while he's at the restaurant to get the financing set up, ten million things start to go wrong, such as accidentally bumping into a sexy reporter who it turns out, he actually has an affair withl years earlier.

Form there things get more and more crazed and its a comedy of errors - mistaken identities and people who turn out not to be who you think they are, and lots of surprises Very unpredictable and keeps you guessing to the end! I'm hoping thus will be out in the theaters soon, I want to see it again. You need to see it twice to get everything. A lot of familiar faces in the cast and great soundtrack too!

Brick (2005)

Not even a good student film

[1/10 · 8 May 2010]

This pretentious load of student-film crap is slow and painful torture.... confusing, rapid-fire gibberish being mouthed by non-actors, and unnecessary dolly shots do not a good movie make.... This is what happens when film students watch "The Maltese Falcon" one too many times... but Joseph Leavitt-Whatever is no Bogart, and whoever directed this amateur-hour affair is no John Huston, not by a long shot.

Lukas Haas, the cute kid in "Witness" is now a freak, suitable for David Lynch films. He and the rest of the cast seem to be asleep.

Whoever edited this -- probably the director -- ought to be shot. And by the way, smoke does not come out of a person's head when they are shot... this only happens only in bad movies.

This should be in the student category, not the professional feature film category. I want my money back.

Star Trek V: The Final Frontier (1989)

I've seen worse....

[2/10 · 22 February 2010]

... Once. "Manos, the Hands of Fate." That was worse than this, quite a bit worse: but it did have one thing: it had beautiful women in negligees wresting each other -- for about 20 minutes. This has a fat 45 year-old with 3 tits and a tail, in a cantina scene cloned directly from "Star Wars." Not to mention an obese, blue seductress Uhura, her fat legs and ass hanging out of some sort of insane bird costume, in this Method Acting Mess. She always wanted to perform before a "captive audience"? She must have meant the poor slobs who shelled out 8 bucks hoping to see another "Wrath of Khan," or at least a "Voyage Home." Captive" is right. I wonder how many people in the theaters tried to slit their wrists while crying out: "mother, make it stop."

No question about it, "Final Frontier" is not just an unmitigated disaster, it's cruel and unusual punishment. This is Star Trek from hell. This is Shatner on mushrooms -- or maybe peyote. This is Where No Man Has Gone Before and Wished He Never Had in the First Place. Or, to paraphrase a review of "Heaven's Gate: "It's as if Gene Roddenberry sold his soul to the Devil for the success of a TV series, and Devil is just now coming around to collect."

And don't even get me started on a drunken Kirk and a grinning McCoy singing "Row, Row, Row Your Boat" together, like they were lovers in some sort of demented gay fever dream. Then we've got the Hideous Dynamic Duo of Sulu and Chekov, hiking through the woods together... probably en route to a Barry Manilow concert. Then there's Laurence Luckinbill as Spock's brother???!!! Yeah, right! Amazing how these relations we never heard of suddenly crawl out of the woodwork when we need a new plot line. And not to forget Spock rocketing through the air after Kirk when he falls from a cliff in Yosemite. Sure. He catches up to Kirk and saves him ONE FOOT away from the ground. Where'd you get those nifty Rocket Shoes, Spock?!

Radio Flyer (1992)

one of the worst pieces of melodramatic crap ever foisted upon an unsuspecting public

[2/10 · 4 February 2010]

Back in the dark days of 1990, the hoped-for Heir to the Spielberg Throne (after the failure of supposed whiz-kid Phil Joanou) was mistakenly believed to be pretentious Spielberg wannabe David Mickey Evans. Evans managed to fleece the studios for over a million dollars, suckering baby-boomer executives into believing his screenplay -- a combination of nostalgic, 1960s references and a disturbing drama about child abuse -- somehow equaled good storytelling, and a decent film.

As Rod Stewart once sang, "look how wrong you can be."

But the novice's artsy-fartsy, "E.T."-inspired script convinced enough people he was the next Chosen One -- the New Spielberg -- and so a deal was struck to not only buy the script for more money than 99 percent of the world's population will ever see in their lifetime, but for Evans to direct the film as well -- even though he'd had never directed anything in his life.

Hey, how hard can it be to be another film-making genius, after all?

Two weeks into the shoot, Columbia found out. His dailies were called "totally unusable" by the studio -- or at least those level-headed enough to not to have fallen under the E.N.C. (Emperor's New Clothes) spell. All his footage was scrapped and recycled into guitar pics.

So what's a studio to do after sinking 10 or 20 million dollars into something they still believed represented the Resurrection of Steven Spielberg? Hire Spielberg himself to save the day? Columbia probably tried that.

Enter old pro Richard Donner. Hey, he may not be a cinematic genius, but he gets the job done. "Superman" wasn't too bad, after all -- and the first "Lethal Weapon" was pretty good.

So Donner steps in and grabs the directorial reins. Fortunately he manages to convince Columbia that the worst of the film's insipid fantasy sequences -- which would have played out like a ten year-old's acid trip -- have to go. Unfortunately, he leaves in the Crying Buffalo (ooh, how poetic) and the ridiculous, pseudo-Spielberg fantasy ending, complete with Clueless Mom perfectly content for the rest of her life to get postcards from her missing son as he circles the globe in his red wagon. Right.

But Donner did manage to get a decent performance out of Elijah Wood. And Lorraine Bracco as the Idiot Mom wasn't bad either. Maybe Donner should be reevaluated. Maybe he's not such a phony Hollywood hack as everyone has always believed.

The only reason I'm giving this over-baked misfire a 2 rating is that someone was smart enough to cast the great John Heard (but in the wrong part, of course). The kids do okay... though Tom Hanks' horrible, overly-explanatory narration nearly destroys every scene it intrudes upon.

One might think that after the David Mickey Evanses and Phil Joanous and Troy Duffys of the world, the studios might finally wise up. One might hope that these hype-driven film-making debacles might prevent the Emperor's New Clothes syndrome from ever rearing its ugly head again.

Doubtful!

Dark and Stormy Night (2009)

Not a movie

[1/10 · 1 June 2009]

This is not a movie. It might be a Groundlings Theater exercise. Or a practice for an SNL sketch. Or a junior high school play. But whatever it is, this ain't a film, no way, no how.

Doing a spoof of an old movie requires a certain belief in the genre, an understanding and respect for the source material. It also, and perhaps most importantly, means having actors who believe in what they're doing, believably inhabiting the characters they're portraying and the universe in which the story is set.

There is not a single moment in "Dark and Stormy Night" where anybody watching this misfire will ever mistake the caricatures and cartoon figures presented here for real people... or even real movie characters. The acting is all of the overblown, wink-wink, nudge-nudge variety, as if presented on stage and pandering to the audience's reactions.

Shooting on HD and converting to black and white is also no substitute for the rich 35mm film look of the movies this is supposed to satirize.

"Mad" magazine used to do hilarious movie and television spoofs, and they always worked - for the simple reason that the characters believed what they were doing, interacting in their own peculiar universes and never alluding to the fact that it was all a sendup. Mel Brooks knows this. So does Carl Reiner... and Woody Allwn... and whoever wrote "Austin Powers."

This is exactly why "Stormy Night" does not work: every single second, we're acutely aware the actors are doing a sendup... as if they're constantly trying to TELL us it's all a big joke. It's like comedians laughing at their own jokes.

That, of course, never works. And neither does this.

Trapped Ashes (2006)

"Tales From the Crypt" never looked so good

[1/10 · 20 May 2009]

Why would a smart and creative guy like Dennis Bartok come up with an embarrassing, insipid, boring, unfunny and revolting piece of pseudo-porn like "Trapped Ashes"?

If this is his tribute to "Tales From the Crypt," "Creepshow" and "The Vault of Horror," Bartok has seriously lost his way... and Freddie Francis is probably rolling over in his grave about now. Maybe Bartok should have made that story instead: clueless wannabe screenwriter desecrates legacy of legendary British director of "Tales From the Crypt," causing famed director to rise from dead and turn idiot writer-producer into Hamburger Helper.

So why did Bartok do it? Maybe he thought by rounding up a few veteran directors, his picture was in the bag -- no matter how awful the writing was. Or maybe he had an unconscious desire to destroy his chances of ever making it in this business. Hard to say. His therapist is probably the only one who knows for sure

But one thing's for sure: Bartok can kiss his Hollywood career goodbye!

Elegy (I) (2008)

Quite a dreary and dull affair

[2/10 · 11 January 2009]

Slow. Lifeless. Joyless. Passionless. Boring. Am I leaving anything out?

Oh, where to start the post-mortem on this one? Well, one could begin with Sir Ben Kingsley. If ever there was a less-interesting, passionless performer, I've never heard of him. Good actor? Absolutely. But not for this part -- he never should have been cast. Obsessed by his young student? I don't see it. He waxes poetic about her body, then never even touches her breasts. He claims to love her... yet he seems half-asleep. Maybe it had something to do with that transorbital lobotomy a while back -- that might explain the baldness. Does he ever even SMILE at her? Does he even seem to CARE?? If you turned the sound off, and couldn't hear the lame dialogue, you might think he detested her instead. I think the only look of happiness on his face was a stupid, s**t-eating grin, when he inexplicably shows up at a dance club to observe her. And from that point on he seems so pussy-whipped that we lose all respect for him anyway.

It's almost as if Kingsley was emulating Brando in "Last Tango in Paris." But that was a different movie, about a much different relationship. For an audience to care about a movie like this, the characters have to care about each other. They at least have to appear alive. In this case, they aren't, and we don't. Where are William Holden and Kay Lenz when we need them?

And what possible reason would a beautiful creature like Penelope Cruz have for falling prey to a bald, geriatric college professor? Because he's a wise old man? Because he's on TV? Because she needs a father figure? We're never given a clue into what makes her tick -- that's the problem. It's a superficial relationship at best. One actually longs for the Jeremy Irons remake of "Lolita." And at least Clint Eastwood's "Breezy" had moments of lightness. And it had Bill Holden. This doesn't.

There's a reason we've never heard of the director: she's of the glacially paced, cinema verite, documentary/neo-realist European variety -- probably lesbian -- who considers emotion as dirty a word as characterization. Dennis Hopper almost saves the day -- he's the only alive thing in this dud -- and then he dies! What a treat for the audience. And what an ill-advised, pointless and unnecessary plot point. Who green-lighted this script? And don't try to tell me the great Nicholas Meyer actually wrote it. Meyer, of the classic "Star Trek 2: Wrath of Khan" and "Time After Time"??? He must be on massive doses of Prozac these days. Or maybe he's the one who underwent the lobotomy.

And don't try to convince me this lackluster snorefest was once a Philip Roth novel. The great and hilarious Philip Roth, of "Portnoy's Complaint" and "Goodbye Columbus"????? "Dying Animal" is right. The book must have been written in his "Human Stain" period, after he lost his sense of humor. Well, at least this dead-on-arrival adaptation doesn't break the streak: a good movie has never been made from a Roth novel. And probably never will.

I'm giving two stars here, strictly in honor of Penelope Cruz's tits, which we see several times, thankfully -- though they're obviously not photographed by anyone who seems to care. And if we saw her ass just ONCE -- which we don't -- I might have given it a 3. And I'm not even going to get into the melodramatic plot twist at the end. If the director finally decided to go for some kind of drama, it was too little, too late. Nobody really cares about a tacked-on movie tragedy after two hours of monotony. All the characters could have been killed in a terrorist bombing and the audience probably wouldn't have really minded. Actually, that might have made a decent ending -- at least it would have woken people up. Or better still, kill them off in the first act, and put them out of their misery. Either way, senseless violence would have been preferable to another brain-dead, heartless, monotonous line reading (Dennis Hopper, as I say, is the one exception: he gives a funny, passionate, inspired performance).

On a technical level, there are also an incredible number of annoying, shaky, hand-held shots that serve absolutely no purpose, other than to distract. Couldn't the producer afford a tripod that day? Wait, don't tell me -- the director thought it was "art."

Welcome to European, no-talent, amateur-hour hell. Close the door on the way in. And watch the flames.

Lady in the Water (2006)

Lady Not in the Water

[1/10 · 20 September 2007]

Having heard "Lady in the Water" was even worse than "The Village." I rented it nevertheless to see beautiful Bryce Dallas Howard swimming around, as advertised, AND MENTIONED IN THE DAMN TITLE!

I'm thinking of suing everyone involved for false advertising. She's never even IN the water in this film, she's OUT of the water for the entire execrable hour and a half (except for a fraction of a second where she pops up from the pool at night, not even really visible -- just a shock cut where you can't tell if it's even a man or woman).

This is what's known as false advertising. Being promised one thing, and getting another. THE TITLE PROMISES A WOMAN IN THE WATER AND SHE'S NEVER IN THE GODDAMN WATER FOR THE ENTIRE MISERABLE MOVIE!!!!!

Shyamalan calls this a "bedtime story." I guess that's because it's very good at lulling the audience to sleep.

They should have called it "Man in the Water," since there are at least four or five scenes with Paul Giamatti swimming around in the pool... all kinds of great underwater scenes of sexy underwater nymph Giamatti diving into the pool, climbing out of the pool, making discoveries beneath the pool -- including a great sequence where he holds his breath for about five minutes underwater. For a minute I thought I was watching a sequel to "The Big Blue."

I don't know when it's going to happen, and I don't know how, exactly, but sooner or later, M. Night Whatshisname and all the other con artists, pranksters and thieves who foisted this sorry ass "entertainment" on an unsuspecting public are gonna pay. Dearly.

Desperation (2006 TV Movie)

Well-intentioned but terrible

[2/10 · 12 January 2007]

Yet another example of Stephen King completely destroying one of his novels by doing the screenplay adaptation himself and working with a compliant, talent free director like Mick Garris This book cried out for a fresh perspective, a unique voice, but merely got a standard TV director, a terrible B-movie cast and King, who should never be allowed to adapt one of his own books again.

The result of this disastrous decision is tons of terrible "serious" moments that King's manages to make work on the page, but are overwrought and laughable when acted out on screen, as well as many important scenes, character development and priceless, memorable dialogue ("Get in the car, pinko! Get in the car, fag!") inexplicably left out.

The only possible explanation is that King, as close as he is to the subject, once again completely forgot that not all the audience members have necessarily read the book! For example, the entire scene where the family in the RV is pulled over by the cop is omitted. The film begins with have the couple (the Jacksons) and the writer (John Marinville) being arrested and hauled into jail. While these scenes are mediocre and free of suspense, they at least make sense. But then King completely omits the scene where the family (the Carvers) are pulled over and arrested in their RV. So instead of seeing this family introduced on the road and then seized upon by the evil cop (Entragian), we merely find them already in the jail cell! No introduction to the father, son, or anyone else. No backstory of the daughter being killed, no set-up for them whatsoever.

So while we've got a somewhat normal introduction of secondary characters Mary and Peter Jackson and the supposedly wisecracking novelist (completely ruined here by the bland Tom Skerritt (sorry, Tom -- but there's a reason you never became a mainstream actor), the most important character in the film -- David Carver, the religious boy who ends up saving everyone -- simply shows up in the jail cell, unexplained. Un-introduced. It's as if the projectionist skipped a reel. Unbelievable. Stanley, Kubrick, where are you now that we really need you?!?

Other problems: the cop, Collie Entragian, frightening and funny in the book, is ruined here by Ron Perlman, alternately underplaying in his low, booming voice, or ridiculously overplaying in a crazed, over-the-top "look-how-evil-I-am" style. The result is laughable. Mick Garris's bland TV direction is lame as usual, and the only remotely interesting thing he offers is a preference for low, wide angle shots, which he apparently achieved with a special 45 degree lens extender, allowing the camera to seem positioned on the floor. Garris seems to think these wide angle shots are some type of revelation. Kubrick did something much more interesting in "The Shining" 25 years ago with a Steadicam and 14mm lens.

On the positive side, we've got some nice photography and art direction, some decent scares, and nice use of insects and animals. In fact, all the non-human cast members are great. I especially liked the dog painted to be a wolf. If only the human cast members were as inventive,

One small bright spot is Marinville's assistant,t and the red-headed chick he picks up on the road. The two of them almost make you think the movie won't be a disaster. The great Charles Durning looks alternately bored and confused, playing another unintroduced character who deserved much more screen time, especially in the jail cell. Matt Frewer is cringe-inducing in typical B-movie fashion, Henry Thomas is blandly terrible, while the kid who plays David Carver is actually not too bad -- in a low budget, B movie kind of way.

But worst of all, Annabeth Gish is now ready to be crowned the Absolute Worst Actress in the History of Civilization. God help us if she ever turns up in another TV movie again. I'm now going to try pray and summon all my religious powers to permanently erase from my mind the fact that this pretty no-talent is descended from one of the greatest silent movie actresses who ever lived. Depressed yet?