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Reviews
Greystoke: The Legend of Tarzan, Lord of the Apes (1984)
Great Movie, timeless
I saw this when I was 19 in the theaters when it came out in 1984, and have again many many times since. There are very few movies that are touchstones of my life and this is one of them. They gave it a realistic look with special effects unmatched at the time. This movie still holds up to this day, as all great movies do. It is the undoubted best Tarzan movie ever made. It is still strange to me why the first Tarzan book was never made except for this one. Interesting to know that this was Andie Macdowell's first film. Her beauty still holds up, 33 years later. Her daughter is an actress now. That kind of stuff freaks me out, as most of us don't want to confront age. This film is timeless though. Its a travesty that it only has 3 stars here on IMDb, considering the academy awards it was nominated for, and the great acting performances, including Sir Ralph Richardson's last performance before he passed away. It is clearly Lambert's best performance before or since. And Andie Macdowell is well, Andie Macdowell. This film evokes a sense of wonder, that very few films can. When I am feeling a little lost, I plug in and watch this film. It lifts your spirits. It makes you feel that your time hasn't passed you by, and that there is hope for the future. At least it has for me, from age 19 to 51. I have seen reviews where people have called it slow and boring. Then obviously they don't want a normal progressive story line. They should go to action and other genre, and not bother putting in their less than 2 cents worth. Tarzan decides to make a decision at the end, that few of us except the truly great ever can make. We should all be so lucky.
Mr. Holmes (2015)
Redemption, mystery, and whether memory loss is such a bad thing
A lot of pathos in this. I give it a 9 of 10. It asks us the question that most of have never thought of asking before...Is loss of memory due to age, always a curse? Or can it be a blessing? This film is also about redemption, with a mystery twist thrown in. We don't all get redemption for our perceived regrets. But its good to see it in the movies. Especially when we all reach that certain age. When we confront who we were and who we are now. And who we hope to be in the future. Ian McKellen is brilliant as usual. Only English actors it seems, get better as they age as fine wine does. Laura Linney melts into the role, and is unrecognizable as herself. The boy Milo Parker, shows better as a genius kid, better than any kid actor I have ever seen.
The Forger (2014)
Good movie, great ending
It was a good thriller, good drama, and the ending was very touching. In real life, things don't come together at the end, as it does in this film. But hey, what do we watch the movies for anyway? We all need escapism from time to time, to take our minds off the obstacles that we all face. You can get it from action movies, but from time to time, you can get it from a great ending like this one had. The great acting displayed displayed by Christopher Plummer, and Travolta show that age can improve the talent that both men have, having watched them both for so many years. It was the finest performance that I have ever seen from Travolta. I do not know if he wasn't nominated for the Oscar, or this will make this coming years nominations. If not, shame on the voters. The past 2 years have witnessed the loss of many such performers, that were touchstones of our youth. It should remind us all to appreciate the ones still with us, when they perform in there twilight, as Plummer and Travolta have done in this movie.
Miss Meadows (2014)
Great movie
Haven't seen many good movies lately, but this was great. This one is a little bit of a stretch on reality. Even in high crime areas, we do not see this much crime coming on the heals of another crime, and the neighborhood is borderline cookie cutter There are people like her character out there, but very rarely to this extreme. We do know there is always more beneath the surface than meets the eye. Some pseudo psychological dramas tend to dwell too much on one aspect or another. This one does not. Gotta love Katie Holmes. This movie shows the breadth of her talent. Until this, we haven't seen her in any lead role. Guess she had to produce it to show what she could do. Obviously her career was interrupted for a while by her marriage to Tom Cruise. Hope we see more of her in the years to come.
Effie Gray (2014)
Very good, but, could have been better
The movie relied more on the social interaction, than maybe giving us the scandal that resulted from the social interaction. It is a matter of taste here. It is, though, very well done period piece and brilliantly acted. Anything that exposes history to the otherwise ignorant is to me, always worthwhile. If the scandal itself had been shown, I might have given it a higher rating. This is of course if the quality of film making had continued. Many would regard the film as slow, but then again, most period pieces are slow. Dakota Fanning shocked me with her perfect English accent, her being an American, born and raised. As for Emma Thompson, well, there's no beating her by anyone in the business.
The Thing on the Doorstep (2014)
The movie needed to be dated to the period of the story. But otherwise, it was very good.
I review this from the standpoint of having read most of Lovecraft's work. As with all of his screen adaptations, this story should have been true to the period. Lovecraft's time, was well suited to his Gothic horror. It's hard in the 21st century to translate this. That being said, I thought this movie was more faithful to the script, than most screen adaptations of his work. One scene involving the narrator's wife, does stretch credulity. But otherwise, the producer and director deserve credit, for being faithful in spirit to Lovecraft. Most of what I have seen in the adaptations, is camp at an extreme level that to me is a disgrace to his memory. I give this an 8, due to it being more true to Lovecraft than any such adaptation I have ever seen.
The Phoenix Project (2015)
Great movie if you like science
The other reviewers were bored with this, and you will be too, if you don't like the scientific method. I found the character development and motivations well done, unlike the other reviewers. The other reviewers obviously wanted something more exciting. I myself was riveted. Biological Science does use mice and rabbits, and hot girls and wacky entertaining scientists aren't usually involved, so if that is a motivator, don't watch it. I am not a science geek, but if you have a moderate attention span, and are moderately intelligent, you may like it, or think it was excellent like I did. I didn't give it ten, only because the ending was a little disappointing. The moral question part of the ending was great, but the characters reaction, as far as the success of the experiment was concerned, was a head scratcher. Remember that the success of an experiment is to get a positive result. Yes, there was tragedy. But the experiment wasn't about human issues.