alexanderchalkidis Reviews

The Rocketeer (1991)

Surprisingly great comedy

[8/10 · 19 June 2023]

This film has a classic vibe but where it shines is in the off beat ridiculous comedy where you least expect it. Some may find it corny but they are missing the point.

I would put it in a list of under rated Disney movies for sure.

Good cast with the obvious exception of Timothy Dalton who is terrible in any movie in my opinion. Every scene is lovingly set up and the cinematography has many hat tips to classical Olsen Goldies.

The plot is slightly predictable but then it surprises you. Overall very refreshing take, family movie for sure, not sure if a modern young person will put up with it though.

World Gone Mad (1963)

Typical rubbish

[1/10 · 28 January 2019]

This sort of comedy was standard for a whole generation that had nothing better to watch. Predictable copies of what was happening abroad, absolutely nothing original about it

Stealth (2005)

Top Gun meets Artificial Intelligence

[5/10 · 20 January 2016]

There have been many movies about Artificial Intelligence lately. Most of them pretty good actually, generally quite thought provoking. Especially for those of us who regularly talk to our phones and rely on cloud services for daily stuff. Close to home as they say. But none of them were fun.

So here are three hitech warplanes who get a new team-mate. An all singing, all dancing, all watching and listening plane that learns on its own. If you know very little about drones, you might think it is somehow close to reality. If you know anything about military protocol you will not. But that isn't the point.

Everyone says "Top Gun" when you speak about plane movies, but by the end, this is more like "ET" meeting the "Iron Eagle" trilogy. Epic stuff. People smile at the right time, salute, explode and laugh just when they should be. Well made movie. For its kind. As long as you don't try and relate anything you see to anything in the real world, geography, politics or technology. They even threw some romance in for good measure.

This is not for everyone. If I wasn't in the right mood, it wouldn't even be for me.

Burnt (I) (2015)

Rocky does cookery for kids

[6/10 · 19 January 2016]

This is not meant to be a movie for kids. Nice looking guy, romance, cookery....it is datenight material. Our hero is a genius fighting ghosts from the past. But he does it in such an easy way, nobody gets worried. Kids can watch this, no problem.

If nothing else, it is a great antidrug advert. Kids, don't take drugs because bad people will chase you for money, you ruin your life and it is generally a big dark cloud. No needles, no mess shown. Quite the opposite. For someone who hasn't really thought about cooking as a job, this is a great introduction.

My eldest is twelve years old now, time to start thinking about careers. Well if he wants to be a chef, this is one way to start getting excited about it. The importance of teamwork, good ingredients, hard work, presentation and many other facets of the job. Sure, they are glossed over in a very female-audience-friendly way, but it still works.

Bulletproof Monk (2003)

Great job of a mediocre idea

[6/10 · 18 January 2016]

It is pretty hard to take a film seriously when it starts with two monks sparing on a bridge and flying around. That whole karate/flying/Chinese wire trick...really...why? But "Bulletproof monk" pulls it off well. For starters, it is the first movie with an explanation of how to walk on air. But mainly the two lead roles are likable and drive the story forward all the time.

The old guy from Tibet is neither Jackie Chan, nor some martial arts guru. More like a regular guy you might want as a neighbour. The young guy is a New York pick pocket, smart kid but not falling into any easy pidgeon holes either. None of those overdone slow motion stylistic shows action movies on a budget often fall for. If our hero needs to take out ten bad guys, OK, he does some fancy stuff, but he gets on with it.

Plot is the normal thing. We all have to protect some ancient scroll with the secret to ultimate power. Twist is that some Nazi has been chasing it since the second World War. Yeah, we have heard that before too. But it really doesn't matter, the take is fresh. My kids watched it straight after the Spiderwick Chronicles, same story, protecting a book from evil, but they didn't mind at all.

The girl in the film is interesting too. While Star Wars fans pine and groan about Rey not getting her own doll, the female lead in this film is cool, sexy, sweet, tough, able and with a nice twist at the end does real equality sort of stuff. In all, a great cast guided by an obviously good team, makes a great job of a mediocre idea.

The Revenant (I) (2015)

Stunning cinematographic feat. How on earth did they film that?

[8/10 · 6 January 2016]

If this wasn't such a fantastic piece of storytelling, I would be interrupting every three minutes to ask "how the hell did they make that shot?" Even if you know a lot about special effects, this film will have you scratching your head all the time.

There are shots that start as close ups, go super wide, half way up a mountain and then close to something else miles away. There are interactions with animals like the bear, shot in a way that defies any cinematographic, animal training, prop, or other trick you can think of.

I can't wait to see some sort of "making of" that will allow me to sleep at night when I understand how they did it all. Instead of that jerky, overdone, getting us all motion sick, hand-held camera, there is a wide angle system which sucks you into the action in a way we haven't see before.

It doesn't matter if you don't like DiCaprio or dislike "that type" of movies. This is an awesome piece of work, worth watching regardless simply for the technical artistry.

Experimenter (2015)

OK if you don't know the story

[5/10 · 6 January 2016]

There is absolutely nothing original about this film. At best it is a mediocre dramatized version of some experiments. It almost makes you wish you watched a BBC documentary about the events instead.

Wynona Ryder is badly cast because you are always expecting her to do something more impressive or more sexy or more...well anything. The pseudo theatrical backdrops and Miligram talking to camera would have been original, maybe a hundred years ago.

In all disappointing. Worse still, I am afraid that people not aware of the work of the real scientist it depicts will not even fully understand his other experiments which are very briefly described in passing.

The proof of the complete lack of structure of this film is the ending of course. There was nothing to go on, the guy wasn't Alan Turing or Jimi Hendrix, nothing dramatic to end with.