DISNEY PRESENTS ANGELINA JOLIE AS MALEFICENT

<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody> <tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-3N6Lx6VAlgo/U4pR6QH72UI/AAAAAAAAfhs/6ef3xakg_EA/s1600/2.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="320" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-3N6Lx6VAlgo/U4pR6QH72UI/AAAAAAAAfhs/6ef3xakg_EA/s320/2.jpg" width="221" /></a></td></tr> <tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">year: 2014 rating: **</td></tr> </tbody></table> <div style="text-align: right;"> </div> Humans suck, fairies rule, and once you give a curse, you can’t take it back again…<br /> <br /> Those are a few important things learned from Disney’s dark adaptation of SLEEPING BEAUTY where the title character MALEFICENT, played by Angelina Jolie, stalks the daughter of her former love, a wicked ruler who stole her wings, turning Maleficent into the type of woodsy antagonist that should make children shudder only now, in a vehicle geared mostly for teens, the nefarious curse-giving wench is not only sympathetic, she's a new form of superhero. <br /> <br /> <table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody> <tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-lJTujHz--q4/U4pR-lU9RFI/AAAAAAAAfh0/VCznr4AVIvQ/s1600/1.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="200" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-lJTujHz--q4/U4pR-lU9RFI/AAAAAAAAfh0/VCznr4AVIvQ/s200/1.jpg" width="161" /></a></td></tr> <tr><td class="tr-caption" style="font-size: 12.8px; text-align: center;">The Cartoon</td></tr> </tbody></table> Jolie looks perfect in the role, but her transition from victim to villain leaves little time for the actress to savor an already established character's lusciously sinister malice, something Jolie seems born to embrace with delightful venom... <br /> <br /> But once Aurora, the King’s daughter, hidden away and protected by three clumsy fairies, grows into a docile Elle Fanning, Maleficent has already become a passive caretaker. With only days before falling into an inevitable and possibly eternal coma, scenes where the vulnerable princess wanders through the murky forest aren't very suspenseful or interesting...<br /> <br /> Until things get shaken up with a twist on the "true love kiss" and the conjuring of a noisy dragon. But for the most part, MALEFICENT feels like being read a bedtime story well after you've fallen... sound... asleep...

2014, angelina jolie, disney, remake

DISNEY PRESENTS ANGELINA JOLIE AS MALEFICENT

year: 2014 rating: ** Humans suck, fairies rule, and once you give a curse, you can’t take it back again… Those are a few important ...

A MILLION WAYS TO DIE IN THE WEST

<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody> <tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-MyfrW9rYtz0/U4hIrQNCjvI/AAAAAAAAffA/uwCqw9glh7w/s1600/a_million_ways_to_die_in_the_west_1.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="320" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-MyfrW9rYtz0/U4hIrQNCjvI/AAAAAAAAffA/uwCqw9glh7w/s320/a_million_ways_to_die_in_the_west_1.jpg" width="218" /></a></td></tr> <tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">year: 2014 rating: ***</td></tr> </tbody></table> When Seth MacFarlane’s cowardly sheepherder, Albert, confesses that he’s more like the guy in the crowd who pokes fun at the hero’s shirt than he is the hero, it’s a clever line… But as the actual in-the-flesh star of his first fully live action motion picture, we’re gonna have to judge the man’s shirt ourselves…<br /> <br /> Seth gives great voice-overs but his on-screen acting style is more Jerry Seinfeld mellow than Woody Allen neurotic... Although, he tries his very best for the latter, rambling on and on about everything that bugs the living hell out of him. Meanwhile the side-characters, including Anna, played by Charlize Theron, and Liam Neeson’s dastardly outlaw Clinch, don't seem convinced they're in a comedy…Which isn't so bad since the performances in A MILLION WAYS TO DIE are laidback and natural, and Albert’s plight is involving: When his girlfriend dumps him for another guy, he prepares for a showdown but finds himself pitted against a much more lethal adversary, that being Liam Neeson, the husband of his budding new love interest, Theron.<br /> <br /> <table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody> <tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-PDpkkXKCTKE/VIor3rb0j6I/AAAAAAAAlbw/00AZk69ubgQ/s1600/a-million-ways-to-die-in-the-west-seth-macfarlane-poster.jpeg" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="200" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-PDpkkXKCTKE/VIor3rb0j6I/AAAAAAAAlbw/00AZk69ubgQ/s200/a-million-ways-to-die-in-the-west-seth-macfarlane-poster.jpeg" width="137" /></a></td></tr> <tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Promo Poster</td></tr> </tbody></table> While the title supports all the action-driven gags in the first half, mostly seen in the trailers... including a guy getting his head crushed by a block of ice... the funniest (and/or cleverest) lines are observations about the 1800’s: like how no one smiles in photographs and examples of old school racism.<br /> <br /> These probably won’t evoke belly laughter like the sporadic bouts of "toilet humor" attempt to do, but each subtle quip provides McFarland a chance to philosophize in his own bold fashion, not letting any minority group or religious sect off the hook. <br /> <br /> With gun fights, gorgeous exterior shots, an intentionally melodramatic soundtrack and a bevy of expository montage sequences, the movie plays out like a bonafide Cowboy picture with jokes on the side... And if you paid to see an actual story unfold, that's fine enough. But if you’re expecting TED or something drop dead hilarious like BLAZING SADDLES... Best look somewhere else, pilgrim. 

2014, charlize theron, comedy, liam neeson, matt clark, seth mcfarlane, western

A MILLION WAYS TO DIE IN THE WEST

year: 2014 rating: *** When Seth MacFarlane’s cowardly sheepherder, Albert, confesses that he’s more like the guy in the crowd who pokes...

MARION COTILLARD & JOAQUIN PHOENIX IN THE IMMIGRANT

<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody> <tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-HvGigMmUljU/U4egYBE2MGI/AAAAAAAAfd8/tKLoCqOtEnE/s1600/j1.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-HvGigMmUljU/U4egYBE2MGI/AAAAAAAAfd8/tKLoCqOtEnE/s1600/j1.jpg" /></a></td></tr> <tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">year: 2014</td></tr> </tbody></table> <div style="text-align: right;"> </div> The term “out of the frying pan, into the fire” has never been more befitting than in THE IMMIGRANT, where Marion Cotillard plays Ewa Cybulska, a polish refugee stuck on Ellis Island during the 1920s...  <br /> <br /> About to be deported, Ewa meets Leon, played by Joaquin Phoenix, and doesn’t trust him one bit... Not even when he takes her home to an apartment, provides her with food and a comfortable bed… She obviously realizes, deep down, something’s not only up his sleeve but his heart is beating desperately there.<br /> <br /> <div style="text-align: right;"> </div> <table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody> <tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-j6wv0QMQmzc/U4egcDcK7sI/AAAAAAAAfeE/8x41r7jZAtA/s1600/j2.jpg" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-j6wv0QMQmzc/U4egcDcK7sI/AAAAAAAAfeE/8x41r7jZAtA/s1600/j2.jpg" /></a></td></tr> <tr><td class="tr-caption" style="font-size: 12.8px; text-align: center;">rating: **</td></tr> </tbody></table> A bizarre "romance" ensues, which is completely one-sided and unrequited. Phoenix, no stranger to eerie, creepy losers, holds an intense candle for the soft-spoken Ewa that burns to the touch. And Leon is not just another pimp. He also runs a minstrel show where his ladies perform before snaring potential customers. <br /> <br /> The most interesting scenes involve Ewa reluctantly becoming a prostitute, all to pay for her (unseen) sister’s rehabilitation. Cotillard's expressions are morose and melancholy yet there’s a world-weary countenance mixed in: She may be new to the tricks, but is no stranger to the rodeo. And while the lovely French DARK KNIGHT RISES actress blends into the stylishly somber atmosphere, Phoenix, as a character possibly inspired by Ben Gazzara’s creative yet oblivious strip show owner in THE KILLING OF A CHINESE BOOKIE, seems surprisingly out of place… <br /> <br /> As does Jeremy Renner as Leon’s cousin, a charming magician promising Ewa a way out of the nightmare. Not only is Renner's gentleman suitor much too good to be true, he slights the film's edgy realism. Through all the exasperating torment, and no matter how many traumas our put-upon heroine suffers, it all seems too easy, somehow. 

drama, indie, jeremy renner, joaquin phoenix, marion cotillard, period piece

MARION COTILLARD & JOAQUIN PHOENIX IN THE IMMIGRANT

year: 2014 The term “out of the frying pan, into the fire” has never been more befitting than in THE IMMIGRANT, where Marion Cotillard...

CURSE OF THE WEREWOLF & MORE OLIVER REED CINEMA

<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody> <tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-KMWkuiUhq8w/U4Tj4YahaeI/AAAAAAAAfYk/qu-LI1ax0BI/s1600/333.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://4.bp.blogspot.com/-KMWkuiUhq8w/U4Tj4YahaeI/AAAAAAAAfYk/qu-LI1ax0BI/s320/333.jpg" width="209" /></a></td></tr> <tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">year: 1961 rating: ***1/2</td></tr> </tbody></table> <b>THE CURSE OF THE WEREWOLF:</b> A man gets bitten by a wolf and slowly turns into one… Which probably sounds extremely familiar but the British run Hammer Films will have nothing to do with anything that basic…<br /> <br /> The setup, before we even meet Oliver Reed’s Leon, is bizarre, eerie and creative, introducing the story set during the colorfully antique 1800’s where a beggar is thrown out of a tavern and then ventures bravely, or perhaps stupidly, into the last place he’s wanted: a lush castle where an aged King has married his beautiful young bride… <br /> <br /> This prolonged introduction doesn’t seem like one at all: The sympathetic beggar’s backstory plays out like a story in itself, making the blunt, heartless turnout that much creepier: After being locked in the dungeon with a life sentence, through the safety of steel bars he’s fed by a young mute servant girl around ten years old. When of-age, after resisting the now decrepit king’s advances, she’s thrown into the same dungeon where the beggar – the same bearded “creature” she had visited and fed since a very young age – rapes her. Then she escapes to a small town, is taken in by a friendly couple, and dies after an abnormally wrenching childbirth.<br /> <br /> Soon enough the adopted parents realizes the child isn't completely human. One of the best scenes involves the local priest explaining the werewolf curse in its very origins.<br /> <br /> <table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody> <tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-ukDi2HtSc28/U4Ovkmmkv6I/AAAAAAAAfVI/EYpRTYXh3_w/s1600/curse-of-the-werewolf-hammer-horror-films-3739574-800-431.jpg" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://2.bp.blogspot.com/-ukDi2HtSc28/U4Ovkmmkv6I/AAAAAAAAfVI/EYpRTYXh3_w/s320/curse-of-the-werewolf-hammer-horror-films-3739574-800-431.jpg" width="238" /></a></td></tr> <tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Reed Changling</td></tr> </tbody></table> When off-screen sheep start vanishing within the outlying fields, we’ve now legitimately entered a werewolf flick with a neat dash of suspenseful mystery therein, catching sporadic glimpses of the kid in fang-form till he grows into Oliver Reed, who, despite being a great actor, hams it up quite a bit… which isn’t entirely his fault. By the time the primary story begins, forty-five minutes into the bizarre costume melodrama, there’s a lot to be made up for – and Reed’s romantically intense Leon is the perfect culprit for the inevitable grizzly wolfdom. <br /> <br /> The most effective scenes happen in town when Leon turns furry with fury on a prostitute and then his jovial workmate. The direction by Hammer stock Terrence Fisher keeps the violence minimal, leaving the viewer’s imagination to do the dirty work, although there are jarring jolts of violence, implied or otherwise, adding to the Gothic peril. <br /> <br /> At a the very end, when Reed’s Leon changes in front of the entire town... including his silver-bullet wielding adopted father... he romps around the lush promenade like a frantic actor in a stage play, or a demonic monkey broken loose of the organ grinder's leash, adding to the strange combination of pathos and terror that makes Hammer stand alone in the monster genre. <br /> <br /> <table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody> <tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-o3pMAzaNg3g/TwTnNrVEUfI/AAAAAAAADlE/3EZGJtsJohE/s1600/tumblr_l7mhj0NagO1qcfex0o1_500.jpg" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img alt="" border="0" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5693930051058553330" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-o3pMAzaNg3g/TwTnNrVEUfI/AAAAAAAADlE/3EZGJtsJohE/s200/tumblr_l7mhj0NagO1qcfex0o1_500.jpg" style="float: right; height: 200px; margin: 0px 0px 10px 10px; width: 137px;" /></a></td></tr> <tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">1973 rating: ***</td></tr> </tbody></table> <div> <b>REVOLVER: </b>A promising, clever premise of a government official, played by the genuinely tough Oliver Reed, who surreptitiously allows a prisoner to escape and quickly abducts him as exchange for his kidnapped wife, almost succeeds.<br /> <div> <br /> While there are a few great moments, some involving the convict, Fabio Testi, showing gruff Reed (described as "a dog without a home") the ways of thiefdom... which should have been more of the film... the side characters, like a popular folk musician strangely connected to the bad guys and long bouts of plodding (horribly looped) dialogue, muddle the lean storyline. And yet Reed, with a scowling catfish countenance, is more than watchable, while Testi's much too pretty as a believable challenger. Although their ultimate camaraderie, which builds throughout, seems genuine and works for the poignant climax while iconic composer Ennio Morricone, known for his usually intense Spaghetti-Western soundtracks, provides a flowery, dated score more befitting a frolicking light comedy or game show.<br /> <br /> <table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody> <tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_bFgFFecXa_Q/S8izQyU9tLI/AAAAAAAAAPA/MR4xK1_0P78/s1600/venom5.jpg" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img alt="" border="0" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5460811649155708082" src="https://3.bp.blogspot.com/_bFgFFecXa_Q/S8izQyU9tLI/AAAAAAAAAPA/MR4xK1_0P78/s200/venom5.jpg" style="float: right; height: 200px; margin: 0px 0px 10px 10px; width: 184px;" /></a></td></tr> <tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">year: 1981 rating: **1/2</td></tr> </tbody></table> <div> <b>VENOM:</b> A sickly rich kid and his grandfather are taken hostage in their two-storey mansion by two servants and a mercenary...<br /> <br /> Earlier that day, the kid picked up the wrong snake from the pet shop and now a deadly Black Mamba slithers around, mostly inside the vents, providing a snake-eye lens...<br /> <br /> A clever enough reason for a group of people to be stuck together in a double-danger setting, but it's a kidnapping movie first liken to an episode of a TV cop show... the snake merely serving as peripheral while too much time is focused on the police outside the premises, especially Nicol Williamson as the overly confident captain, hindering the intensity lurking within the premises where Oliver Reed, as an edgy, violent chauffeur and Sterling Hayden, as the family patriarch, initially stand out but are ultimately wasted in a movie that could have/should have been much ssssssscarier.<br /> <div> <br /> <table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody> <tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_bFgFFecXa_Q/S8IsiiagcGI/AAAAAAAAAFg/xv2jF2EYX38/s1600/thesearethedamned.jpg" onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img alt="" border="0" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5458974670191620194" src="https://3.bp.blogspot.com/_bFgFFecXa_Q/S8IsiiagcGI/AAAAAAAAAFg/xv2jF2EYX38/s200/thesearethedamned.jpg" style="float: right; height: 134px; margin: 0px 0px 10px 10px; width: 200px;" /></a></td></tr> <tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">year: 1963 rating: ***</td></tr> </tbody></table> <div> <b>THESE ARE THE DAMNED: </b>A cold war sci-fi British import dealing with a gang of black leather clad hoods, in which Oliver Reed is the moody, dangerous leader who, using his own extremely gorgeous sister, Shirley Anne Field, as bait, coaxes a millionaire, MacDonald Carey, into being mugged.<br /> <br /> These three characters, after some running around, eventually wind-up inside a mountain compound (underground but not really) where a group of mysterious children live, all extremely cold to the touch... We know they're part of a military/government experiment, but why? Who are they and what exactly is their purpose? And don't they believe in recess? <br /> <br /> The mystery builds in a TWILIGHT ZONE fashion but eventually plunders into cliché idealism dealing with yet another morality lesson on nukes. But the marvelously flowing camerawork, and Reed's terrific intensity, makes the journey better than the destination: thankfully there's more of the first.</div> <br /> <div> <table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody> <tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-hsNiyMnoMfU/U37F-pF-_ZI/AAAAAAAAfRc/NTi7S04Nog8/s1600/Oliver+Reed++The+Sting+II+%281983%29.jpg" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://2.bp.blogspot.com/-hsNiyMnoMfU/U37F-pF-_ZI/AAAAAAAAfRc/NTi7S04Nog8/s1600/Oliver+Reed++The+Sting+II+(1983).jpg" /></a></td></tr> <tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">1983 rating: **1/2</td></tr> </tbody></table> <b>THE STING II:</b> Not sure what Hollywood was thinking. "Let's make a sequel to THE STING and replace Paul Newman and Robert Redford with Jackie Gleason and Mac Davis." </div> <br /> But it's really not too bad. Seems like a made-for-TV flick that you watch digesting dinner. Gleason and Davis  are grifters pulling two cons at once: screwing doofus kingpin Karl Malden out of money on a fixed boxing match and getting revenge on baddie Oliver Reed... playing Robert Shaw's character from the original... for killing a fellow grifter. In this role, and providing a legit edge throughout, Reed takes Shaw's villain to the hilt, making him someone not just worth ripping off, but stopping... permanently. Which won't be an easy task. <br /> <br /> There are some fun moments; nothing gained, nothing lost overall. The main con gets a bit confusing as Davis pretends to be a professional boxer, but the little moments in-between are enough to carry things moderately. Mac Davis and gal drifter Teri Garr try their best to carry things along while Jackie Gleason is basically collecting an easy paycheck. Thankfully we have Oliver Reed to remind us, and the characters, there's always something to lose. </div> </div> </div> </div>

eighties, hammer films, oliver reed, seventies, sixties

CURSE OF THE WEREWOLF & MORE OLIVER REED CINEMA

year: 1961 rating: ***1/2 THE CURSE OF THE WEREWOLF: A man gets bitten by a wolf and slowly turns into one… Which probably sounds extre...

CAGNEY GOES TO WAR IN CAPTAINS OF THE CLOUDS

<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody> <tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-Y7q2FmhBC80/U4M_Ug9zchI/AAAAAAAAfUM/1Mjo2Hh7NPk/s1600/captains18.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://3.bp.blogspot.com/-Y7q2FmhBC80/U4M_Ug9zchI/AAAAAAAAfUM/1Mjo2Hh7NPk/s1600/captains18.jpg" width="140" /></a></td></tr> <tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">1942 rating: ***1/2</td></tr> </tbody></table> James Cagney’s stalwart expression on the poster, and a glorious title like CAPTAINS OF THE CLOUDS involving Canadian Bush Pilots fighting in World War II, could be misleading for anyone loving the tough, snarky, womanizing Cagney: the persona that built his reputation before venturing into more serious matters – especially after the Second World War broke out...<br /> <br /> But most of this film has the pint-sized icon, playing a daredevil pilot stealing jobs from his fellow airmen using every trick in the book, acting shrewder than ever.<br /> <br /> He’s got his sites on a younger pilot's gorgeous fiancé – she too is a money-grubbing rogue and both make a fiendish pair. Brenda Marshall is the perfect mix of lovely and deceitful, wisping her long black hair while planting a soft spike into kindhearted idealist Dennis Morgan. Scenes involving Cagney teaming up with Morgan and Alan Hale in their own cargo business lead to the group joining the RAF where Cagney’s cocky persona, training young fliers to take risks instead of following orders, gets him in hot water with the hard nosed military elites: Like all Cagney’s best characters, the ramifications mean nothing... He’s in it for the thrills and blind adventure and the audience takes part. But last thirty minutes, as the group fly off into the inevitable battle (accompanied by Winston Churchill’s famous speech), seems a bit rushed and doesn’t live up to the energetic first act of double-crossings and Arial scenery over plush Canadian exteriors.<br /> <br /> Director Michael Curtiz, a few years shy of CASABLANCA, wields each shot with precision so there’s never a dull moment. But Cagney being Cagney is what really delivers the goods throughout this overlooked gem, far exceeding your typical wartime propaganda.

action, brenda marshall, forties, james cagney, war

CAGNEY GOES TO WAR IN CAPTAINS OF THE CLOUDS

1942 rating: ***1/2 James Cagney’s stalwart expression on the poster, and a glorious title like CAPTAINS OF THE CLOUDS involving Canadia...

ADAM & DREW RETURN IN BLENDED

<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody> <tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-5_RDfCZfh8U/U4JKdhI1CJI/AAAAAAAAfT0/0VXtKJIQZbs/s1600/trailer-for-adam-sandler-and-drew-barrymores-blended.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="320" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-5_RDfCZfh8U/U4JKdhI1CJI/AAAAAAAAfT0/0VXtKJIQZbs/s320/trailer-for-adam-sandler-and-drew-barrymores-blended.jpg" width="164" /></a></td></tr> <tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">year: 2014</td></tr> </tbody></table> <div style="text-align: right;"> </div> Just when you thought it was safe to go back to an Adam Sandler movie, up rears BLENDED, a romantic comedy crossed between THE BRADY BUNCH and just about any other throwaway “Happy Madison” production from the last decade…<br /> <br /> <table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody> <tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-bB2bu8TyAmc/U4JKh3xLizI/AAAAAAAAfT8/5V825dT3ZlE/s1600/2.jpg" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="320" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-bB2bu8TyAmc/U4JKh3xLizI/AAAAAAAAfT8/5V825dT3ZlE/s320/2.jpg" width="164" /></a></td></tr> <tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">rating: *</td></tr> </tbody></table> And to think the popular teamup of Sandler and Drew Barrymore, who made the ‘80s generation cheerfully nostalgic with THE WEDDING SINGER followed by the sweet and sappy 50 FIRST DATES, would be part of a venture where their cozy chemistry was not only the least important aspect of the story, but is hardly recognizable past the horrendous side characters including each of their three children… his girls, her boys… and especially the tourists in Africa, all taking part in a “Blended” vacation where an eclectic assortment of couples experience a brand new honeymoon… The catch here is both Adam and Drew's families are using the same fake name to get a free trip, becoming a pseudo clan... And of course Cupid lurks around every corner.  <br /> <br /> Former SNL alumni Kevin Nealon's role, part of a March/November relationship with an airhead blonde, is almost as unfunny as the lounge band of African singers who, providing a zany Greek chorus, brings BLENDED to an embarrassingly awful (and to some, even racist) level, possibly even surpassing JACK AND JILL in the cringe factor. <br /> <br /> <table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody> <tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-yZq5yU-mk4c/U4AqWDB8kuI/AAAAAAAAfSs/UaNwK-c_jOM/s1600/1390941794000-SANDLER-BLENDED-SNEAK-MOV-jy-0234.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="320" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-yZq5yU-mk4c/U4AqWDB8kuI/AAAAAAAAfSs/UaNwK-c_jOM/s320/1390941794000-SANDLER-BLENDED-SNEAK-MOV-jy-0234.JPG" width="203" /></a></td></tr> <tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">As dumb as it gets</td></tr> </tbody></table> A good half hour before the trip, we learn about our leads… Barrymore is a divorced and neurotic “closet organizer” who, after a reluctant blind date with Sandler at Hooters, tries her best with equally frantic sons while Sandler, a widower, is dealing with his own problems, especially an athletic oldest daughter mistaken for a boy despite resembling a gorgeous magazine model.  <br /> <br /> The only time Sander and Barrymore have chemistry is when all the distractions are gone: herein the chick flick audience will get what they paid for. But not a minute goes by without some kind of awkward intrusion by cast members seeming like GONG SHOW contestants that never get gonged... <br /> <br /> Perhaps the once mighty Sandler considers himself Teflon to bad comedy, and the last few years he’s just daring the awful jokes – some which seem intentionally futile – to bring his faithful audience down. Not even the signature "baby talk" sweetness, more forced and sappy than ever, works like it did in his leaner youth. And while past films had special guest stars playing themselves, ranging from Bob Barker to Al Pacino to Vanilla Ice, the owner of Dick's Sporting Goods makes an appearance... Talk about obscure! <br /> <br /> No matter how you slice it, fans of THE WEDDING SINGER will most likely sing the blues along with the latter 50 FIRST DATES crowd. And when BLENDED finally ends, a cutesy closing credit singalong provides nails in an already sealed coffin, so get out while you can! 

2014, adam sandler, drew barrymore, romantic comedy

ADAM & DREW RETURN IN BLENDED

year: 2014 Just when you thought it was safe to go back to an Adam Sandler movie, up rears BLENDED, a romantic comedy crossed between ...

REVIEW OF X-MEN: DAYS OF FUTURE PAST

<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody> <tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-9T5Ah9bmAok/U39Cc9e6P0I/AAAAAAAAfRw/M2vq0-GVFzc/s1600/x_men__days_of_future_past___2014____retro_poster_by_camw1n-d7ahfne.png" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="320" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-9T5Ah9bmAok/U39Cc9e6P0I/AAAAAAAAfRw/M2vq0-GVFzc/s320/x_men__days_of_future_past___2014____retro_poster_by_camw1n-d7ahfne.png" width="217" /></a></td></tr> <tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="background-color: white;">year: 2014 rating; **</span></td></tr> </tbody></table> <span style="background-color: white;">Following CAPTAIN AMERICA: THE WINTER SOLDIER, Marvel continues with the Political Thriller template, and in X-MEN: DAYS OF FUTURE PAST, none other than Richard Nixon is in cahoots with a greedy entrepreneur who plans to exterminate mutants by using robotic war machines…  </span><br /> <br /> That’s President Richard Milhouse Nixon, the <i>current</i> Commander-in-Chief as it’s 1973 since Wolverine was sent back to the past so that Mystique, also known as Raven, doesn’t get captured by authorities which would result in… well let’s just say there's no more X-MEN if he doesn’t set things straight...<br /> <br /> And of course Logan's not alone, providing the last entry, FIRST CLASS, to coincide with the original lineup – although FUTURE PAST is more of that movie’s sequel with Hugh Jackman serving as special guest star. Meanwhile the likes of veteran members Patrick Stewart, Ian McKellen and Halley Berry are wasted on a subplot dealing with some kind of purgatory dimension resembling the THOR universe: The best scenes are also the funniest, mostly having to do with Wolverine's '70s culture shock and slacker mutant Peter aka Quicksilver and his penchant for not only speeding past everyone else, but perceiving them in the same wry, sarcastic manner Wolverine did in the original film, also directed by Bryan Singer which, to give due credit, started the Marvel monopoly in the first place. And those were indeed the great old days...<br /> <br /> For <i>now</i>, in the midst of an otherwise promising time travel espionage, one excruciatingly overlong sequence involving Xavier in his virtual reality brain-machine, trying to coax Raven from assassinating a mutant-hating businessman (the only real villain on board), deletes potential as the characters waste so much verbal energy explaining and/or pontificating past and future events, nothing very suspenseful occurs in the meantime. 

2014, action, hugh jackman, marvel

REVIEW OF X-MEN: DAYS OF FUTURE PAST

year: 2014 rating; ** Following CAPTAIN AMERICA: THE WINTER SOLDIER, Marvel continues with the Political Thriller template, and in X-MEN...

DISNEY PRESENTS JON HAMM IN MILLION DOLLAR ARM

<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody> <tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-JfItBC7cknI/U3uqZWXfx8I/AAAAAAAAfQE/LN5b0KAq1kA/s1600/Million_Dollar_Arm_poster.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="320" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-JfItBC7cknI/U3uqZWXfx8I/AAAAAAAAfQE/LN5b0KAq1kA/s1600/Million_Dollar_Arm_poster.jpg" width="216" /></a></td></tr> <tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><b style="background-color: white;">year: 2014 rating: ***</b></td></tr> </tbody></table> <span style="background-color: white;">During the same weekend that Walter White investigates the possibility of a giant nuclear lizard, Don Draper is having a more subtle problem but not without a load of stress...</span><br /> <br /> In this true story produced by Disney, Jon Hamm’s JB is a sports agent with his own company… one that can barely tread water. Knee-deep in debt and having possibly lost a lucrative athlete to a larger firm, JB gets an epiphany one night...<br /> <br /> While reluctantly watching the strange game of Cricket on an India cable station, he realizes that one of the “bowlers,” the name for that sport’s pitchers, could very well crossover to big league American baseball and provide him unique "uptapped" cliental to keep his business going... Or not.  <br /> <br /> Setting up JB as a no-nonsense womanizer, after a peripheral introduction to a possible love-interest in the form of a down-to-earth tenant, he travels to India where MILLION DOLLAR ARM, beginning as a fish out of water tale, centers more on two Indian athletes, chosen after fifteen entertaining minutes of nationally televised tryouts, shown through a fun montage sequence where Hamm partners up with Alan Arkin as a drowsy yet wise old agent. Eventually, JB takes the young men back to America where they could, in six months time, become ready for professional baseball tryouts… an extremely long shot.   <br /> <br /> The film never gets too corny while centering on the young hopefuls, but it does come close: Learning English way too soon, eating tons of pizza and not completely adhering to Western culture, the mid-section is so Disney-oriented the screen practically grows mouse ears. Thankfully Hamm, the MAD MEN actor who's no stranger to edgy and driven workaholics, keeps things unpredictable as he becomes intentionally lost in the mix, making the two underdogs and their suspenseful attempts to achieve the near-impossible really matter.  

2014, alan arkin, disney, jon hamm, sport

DISNEY PRESENTS JON HAMM IN MILLION DOLLAR ARM

year: 2014 rating: *** During the same weekend that Walter White investigates the possibility of a giant nuclear lizard, Don Draper is h...

AN ECLECTIC BRATFUL BAGFUL OF ROB LOWE CINEMA

<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody> <tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-2UfQTy3Tvms/VKCC7OEZ7RI/AAAAAAAAlxI/GvNrLDWPSUc/s1600/title00_054937876.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="179" src="https://2.bp.blogspot.com/-2UfQTy3Tvms/VKCC7OEZ7RI/AAAAAAAAlxI/GvNrLDWPSUc/s1600/title00_054937876.jpg" width="200" /></a></td></tr> <tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><u>year: 1985 rating: ***1/2</u></td></tr> </tbody></table> <i>Rob Lowe was the likable mannequin of 1980's cinema... His films and performances range from comatose to vigorous, and either defined the Brat Pack decade or got lost in video rental abyss... So let's take a look at a few of Lowe's eclectic cinematic endeavours, years before rebooting his career as a dramatic television actor...</i><br /> <br /> <span style="background-color: white;"><b>ST. ELMO'S FIRE:</b></span> A group of college graduates, a few months after leaving the cozy nest of dorm life, wind up on their own in the big city yet still have each other to depend on: Thus in 1985, when the so-called “Brat Pack” was in full form, ST. ELMO’S FIRE was the navel-gazing follow-up to THE BREAKFAST CLUB as Judd Nelson plays Alec, the group’s shallow mentor, a hopeful in politics who switches from Democrat to Republican because the pay is better. His girlfriend Leslie... another CLUB alumni Ally Sheedy... doesn’t want to get married – a wise choice since Alec has the philandering sex drive of a Kennedy. And Emilio Estevez’s Kirby takes the lightweight mantel: he’s smitten with a gorgeous doctor (Andie MacDowell) and tries everything to land a date.<br /> <br /> <table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody> <tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-jCtArHPiHVM/UtnnCHmWQ4I/AAAAAAAAceM/z0ovO4I1nlk/s1600/title00_001817667.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="200" src="https://3.bp.blogspot.com/-jCtArHPiHVM/UtnnCHmWQ4I/AAAAAAAAceM/z0ovO4I1nlk/s200/title00_001817667.jpg" width="178" /></a></td></tr> <tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Rob Lowe as Billy</td></tr> </tbody></table> The artistic bookends are two polar opposites: Andrew McCarthy’s Kevin is a hopeful journalist while the “still partying like he’s back at school” Billy, a scene-stealing Rob Lowe, plays sax and women despite having a wife and child.  <br /> <br /> Demi Moore’s Jules is the most enjoyable... She’s as wild as Lowe's Billy and, having an affair with her boss and a penchant for cocaine and good times, her girlfriends, including mousy Mare Winningham's rich kid Wendy (hopelessly in love with a womanizing Lowe, providing the most intriguing "romance"), doesn’t understand what makes her tick… like an inevitable time bomb! Leading to a heartfelt conversation between Lowe and Moore, which includes the meaning of the film's ambiguous title. Director Joel Schumacher’s script never lets the clichés rest and the dialogue's far too contrived to seem completely real. But by the end there’s a feeling you really know these people – although you might be torn whether to hug or slug them.<br /> <div> <br /> <table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody> <tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-wsW85B9sJ18/Utnnr8guQXI/AAAAAAAAcec/Mw_kXN7lewU/s1600/Youngblood.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="140" src="https://2.bp.blogspot.com/-wsW85B9sJ18/Utnnr8guQXI/AAAAAAAAcec/Mw_kXN7lewU/s1600/Youngblood.jpg" width="200" /></a></td></tr> <tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">year: 1986 rating: *1/2 </td></tr> </tbody></table> <span style="background-color: white;"><b>YOUNGBLOOD:</b></span> Hilariously banal ice hockey version of ALL THE RIGHT MOVES has Rob Lowe as an American playing for a Canadian team.<br /> <br /> He's got a tough coach played by character actor Ed Lauter, some rowdy teammates including Patrick Swayze, love interest Cynthia Gibb (who just happens to be the coach's daughter), and older bro Jim Youngs teaching him how to fight like a real man, despite resembling an Elvin supermodel. The filler dialogue goes absolutely nowhere, and the action on the ice, cutting back and forth to the locker room, kills any rivalry-driven suspense. It's like watching a soap opera while surfing sports channels, or vice versa.<br /> <br /> Rob Lowe can act, but not here. And prepare to witness Keanu Reeves, who has a difficult enough time performing in English, speaking French!<br /> <br /> <div> <table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody> <tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-Y6AAKsUdKn0/UtnoqDUBwII/AAAAAAAAcek/7gHNoZdH10A/s1600/class1.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="176" src="https://2.bp.blogspot.com/-Y6AAKsUdKn0/UtnoqDUBwII/AAAAAAAAcek/7gHNoZdH10A/s1600/class1.jpg" width="200" /></a></td></tr> <tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">year: 1983 rating: ***</td></tr> </tbody></table> <span style="background-color: white;"><b>CLASS:</b> </span>Two movies for the price of one... The first has Andrew McCarthy as a shy freshman at a strict Ivy League college, meeting confident rich kid Rob Lowe and dealing with his practical jokes. Lowe has a lot of energy here, and makes for a worthy antagonist-mentor. The second has McCarthy, after striking out with girls his age, hitting the big city with Lowe's money and advice: to find a <i>real</i> woman and get laid.<br /> <br /> Well he does, but with Lowe's mother: gorgeous forty-year old Jacqueline Bisset. And while the sex scenes are overlong and overdone, as if they remade THE GRADUATE more steamy than implied, the May/August relationship is involving.<br /> <br /> But when both stories collide... McCarthy and Bisset hiding the truth from her son, and his best friend... things get overcomplicated: making one yearn for that first movie dealing with college life banality. <br /> <br /> <table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody> <tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-SqB17vFqxZY/Utnpvxc-cLI/AAAAAAAAcew/v7Q42nNn6zc/s1600/illyours.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://3.bp.blogspot.com/-SqB17vFqxZY/Utnpvxc-cLI/AAAAAAAAcew/v7Q42nNn6zc/s1600/illyours.jpg" /></a></td></tr> <tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">1987 rating: *1/2</td></tr> </tbody></table> <span style="background-color: white;"><b>ILLEGALLY YOURS:</b> </span>It's sad when you track down forgotten films by a great director, in this case Peter Bogdanovich, and cannot find a trace of what made them great. TARGETS, THE LAST PICTURE SHOW, PAPER MOON and SAINT JACK are nowhere to be found here: It's basically a revamp of WHAT'S UP, DOC? with Rob Lowe filling in Ryan O'Neal's shoes, a handsome dolt donning nerdy glasses, while Colleen Camp plays the Streisand independent-woman-in-trouble role role.<br /> <br /> YOURS is a whole lot of silly running around with nowhere to go, and while Bog started his career channeling Howard Hawks, Samuel Fuller, Alfred Hitchcock and (his once close friend) Orson Welles, he ended up making keystone cop silent films with sound and absolutely no purpose... What's up, Pete? <br /> <br /> <table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody> <tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-VIOHk2kL6i4/UtnrM_EVOgI/AAAAAAAAcfA/5q9kMlfhawg/s1600/fg-the-hotel-new-hampshire-05.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://3.bp.blogspot.com/-VIOHk2kL6i4/UtnrM_EVOgI/AAAAAAAAcfA/5q9kMlfhawg/s320/fg-the-hotel-new-hampshire-05.jpg" width="272" /></a></td></tr> <tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">year: 1984 rating: *</td></tr> </tbody></table> <span style="background-color: white;"><b>THE HOTEL NEW HAMPSHIRE:</b></span> Arguably, this was Lowe's lowest point, and Jodie Foster's too... The film adaptation of John Irving's fantastic novel centers on the eccentric nomadic Berry clan but focuses mainly on the teenage son, played by Rob Lowe, and daughter Jodie Foster, during the purgatory stage of her career, two sexually curious, coming-of-age middle children (both infatuated with a sexy bear suit wearing Nastassja Kinski) of a quirky Beau Bridges who runs the hotels with an ever-optimistic look on life no matter how many bad things happen. <br /> <br /> The book delves with casual irony into subjects like terrorism, rape and incest, getting away with turning a glib cheek to all things taboo (including homosexuality, which wasn't as discussed in the early/mid eighties). An abundance of overly obvious symbols, like, for instance, a dog named Sorrow, works in the novel because it's strictly thematic and never forced. But on the big screen it comes across pretentious and silly, par for the course of this particular motion picture.<br /> <br /> HOTEL was probably made because of the success (and brilliance) of Irving's THE WORLD ACCORDING TO GARP, a much easier narrative to translate: it's at least about something, or rather, someone. And while GARP centered on a mainline story with tragic weirdness surrounding it, this centers on weird tragedy with no real story to be found: in what might possibly be the worst adaptation ever made. <br /> <br /> <table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody> <tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-EM0MG4Ud_jg/Utns3BEPQOI/AAAAAAAAcfM/A0Qu2qUs1yw/s1600/BAD%252BINFLUENCE.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="190" src="https://2.bp.blogspot.com/-EM0MG4Ud_jg/Utns3BEPQOI/AAAAAAAAcfM/A0Qu2qUs1yw/s1600/BAD%252BINFLUENCE.jpg" width="200" /></a></td></tr> <tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">year: 1990 rating: **1/2</td></tr> </tbody></table> <span style="background-color: white;"><b>BAD INFLUENCE:</b></span> Here we go again... A wimpy, passive guy who seems to have everything he wants, only he can't stand up for himself. Has no guts and is secretly dying for a mentor to show him the way...<br /> <br /> Enter a confident drifter who turns his life around, and around and around and around some more.<br /> <br /> James Spader, breaking from his villainous yuppie template, is the nice guy. Rob Lowe, fresh from a  scandal that would ruin his career for a while, is the rogue helping Spader score a beautiful lady and progress in his job: but with a price. He can't shake Rob loose, and eventually is enveloped in an extremely ironic sex tape scandal, a beating, and then a murder... The first half is Film Noiresque and builds nicely. The last half, as Lowe turns from dapper sociopath to full blown psycho, becomes your typical kill or be killed fare.<br /> <br /> <table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody> <tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-bOAWShn5H2U/U3hb1-JNEFI/AAAAAAAAfMs/XB4_qP0KpCk/s1600/images.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://4.bp.blogspot.com/-bOAWShn5H2U/U3hb1-JNEFI/AAAAAAAAfMs/XB4_qP0KpCk/s1600/images.jpg" /></a></td></tr> <tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">1986 rating: **1/2</td></tr> </tbody></table> <span style="background-color: white;"><b>ABOUT LAST NIGHT:</b> </span>By far the most energetic duo of ST. ELMO'S FIRE was the bad boy and the bad girl. That being Rob Lowe and Demi Moore, who, only a year later, have all grown up...<br /> <br /> Which is the first flaw of ABOUT LAST NIGHT, yet another Brat Pack venture that expects us to see twenty-something going through a mid-life crisis, and trying to figure out about a life that they're already well weary of.<br /> <br /> That's not to say NIGHT doesn't have good moments. The chemistry between Lowe and Moore, playing two busy professionals living in Chicago, is engaging enough... For a little while... <br /> <br /> <div style="text-align: left;"> </div> It's interesting how Lowe's character has to be described as too handsome to be hanging around single's bars. Instead of finding the right angle or opening line, he simply implies his intentions are good while "beating 'em off with a stick," making him a guy not everyone can relate to. Which provides the scene-stealing regular guy Jim Belushi, as Lowe's exposition spouting crony, a chance to grab the spotlight... but he's not alone...<br /> <br /> <table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody> <tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-Z34rdYo1yv0/VKCDRscrZlI/AAAAAAAAlxQ/NNDF8-KUkJs/s1600/about.last_.night_.rob_.HC_.png" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-Z34rdYo1yv0/VKCDRscrZlI/AAAAAAAAlxQ/NNDF8-KUkJs/s320/about.last_.night_.rob_.HC_.png" width="238" /></a></td></tr> <tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Rob Lowe</td></tr> </tbody></table> Playing Demi's girlfriend is Elizabeth Perkins, who a few years later would prove a decent leading lady in a tale about a man who is really a child: the polar opposite of this movie.<br /> <br /> Perkins is like the supporting "fun gal" from classic comedies while Belushi, as everyone's favorite drunk uncle, are a combined color commentary on an otherwise dull pretty boy/pretty girl matchup. <br /> <br /> <div style="text-align: left;"> </div> Of course the title ABOUT LAST NIGHT... refers to the awkward moment when "victims" of a one-night stand bring up what had happened, and those three following dots imply that <i>something </i>extends from that particular night where the true romantic entanglement/adventures exists. But other than the comic relief co-stars providing the only real honest evaluations of sex and... more and more sex... what we're left with is an awkward silence with plenty of background noise. Although every once or twice, if you really listen, there's something to be heard, and learned, herein.<br /> <br /> <table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody> <tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-epEWVkmOKFU/U3hb9y9M6fI/AAAAAAAAfM4/XHVL5n7Jk7c/s1600/Picture+1.png" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="200" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-epEWVkmOKFU/U3hb9y9M6fI/AAAAAAAAfM4/XHVL5n7Jk7c/s1600/Picture+1.png" width="141" /></a></td></tr> <tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">1984 rating: **</td></tr> </tbody></table> <span style="background-color: white;"><b>OXFORD BLUES:</b></span> It's difficult if impossible to root for a guy who has everything going for him. Even if Rob Lowe's character is a climber that really wants to get the girl, and has to travel across the Atlantic to win her heart, his confident leather jacket wearing gigolo is so unsympathetic, you'll find yourself rooting for the bad guys...<br /> <br /> And they're not so bad, really, just a conceited bunch of British rowing jocks at Oxford University that have no trust in Lowe's Nick Angelo... The only person in his narrowed corner is fellow brat packer Ally Sheedy as Rona. Despite the second credit she's merely filler, providing the ingenue spotlight to dreamgirl Amanda Pays, who, as Lady Victoria Wingate, doesn't find it too hard to be attracted to the perfect looking "Ugly American," and there's little to no chemistry between the duo since there's hardly any problems in the first place... That is if you don't count a few snobby Brits led by future WARLOCK actor Julian Sands, trying his very best to add something, anything, to pick up the lethargic pace.<br /> <br /> What OXFORD BLUES has going for it is the sport of rowing, shown in gorgeous exterior shots of a picture/postcard England, and an eventual ROCKY fashioned underdog vibe that, although given some potential early on, wags itself to sleep since our hero, hardly up the creek without a paddle, has very little obstacles<i> </i>to be either interesting or relatable.<br /> <br /> <table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody> <tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-5jTQJs8nN50/U3jzDLVxz5I/AAAAAAAAfNY/c-JnsQ4FFN8/s1600/MV5BMTkzMzgwNzIwN15BMl5BanBnXkFtZTcwMDE3ODE1NA@@._V1_SX214_AL_.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="200" src="https://3.bp.blogspot.com/-5jTQJs8nN50/U3jzDLVxz5I/AAAAAAAAfNY/c-JnsQ4FFN8/s1600/MV5BMTkzMzgwNzIwN15BMl5BanBnXkFtZTcwMDE3ODE1NA@@._V1_SX214_AL_.jpg" width="127" /></a></td></tr> <tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">1988 rating: *1/2</td></tr> </tbody></table> <span style="background-color: white;"><b>MASQUERADE:</b></span> Finishing our retrospective, not including THE OUTSIDERS which will be covered at another time and place... In MASQUERADE, Rob Lowe’s Tim Whalen has all the advantages of a good-looking sailboat aficionado but without any money.<br /> <br /> That’s where Meg Tilly’s Olivia Lawrence comes in handy, although their mellow romance feels legitimate and not of the gold-digging nature. Tim seems smitten with the breezy heiress, who only has a wicked stepfather to contend with. Enter a potentially good villain played by the always interesting John Glover – which doesn’t last very long…<br /> <br /> The romance between Lowe and Tilly are what dreams are made of… sleep, that is. Their drowsy affair is reignited with several twists having to do with Lowe not being who he seems. Meanwhile Tilly, perfectly cast in THE BIG CHILL, seems in a dizzy daze throughout. It’s like she either forgot how to act or just didn’t care. And future MELROSE PLACE resident Doug Savant, as a lovelorn local cop turned something unexpected, is a pale replacement for the villainous Glover, making this a Neo Noir melodrama that lacks… well... just about everything.</div> </div>

brat pack, eighties, nineties, rob lowe

AN ECLECTIC BRATFUL BAGFUL OF ROB LOWE CINEMA

year: 1985 rating: ***1/2 Rob Lowe was the likable mannequin of 1980's cinema... His films and performances range from comatose to v...

JON FAVREAU WRITES & DIRECTS & STARS IN CHEF

<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody> <tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-EdD3aEzatvc/U3lwm0MmG4I/AAAAAAAAfNo/ujBr4MA_PV8/s1600/Picture+1.png" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="320" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-EdD3aEzatvc/U3lwm0MmG4I/AAAAAAAAfNo/ujBr4MA_PV8/s320/Picture+1.png" width="248" /></a></td></tr> <tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">year: 2014 rating: **1/2</td></tr> </tbody></table> Fans of SWINGERS, good news… That film’s writer and star is back in indie form after directing and igniting the IRON MAN franchise, and then crash landing with the big budget misfire, COWBOYS AND ALIENS… <br /> <br /> In CHEF, Jon Favreau plays Carl Casper, a name that sounds like a superhero but his powers are in the kitchen… of someone else’s restaurant. That’s the first of three dilemmas...<br /> <br /> His boss doesn’t want any original menu items, making Carl’s work a dull template, eventually beleaguered by a top food critic who, going viral on Twitter, shares an awful review that turns into an online feud, eventually making our put-upon hero look ridiculous. And on top of quitting his job, Carl’s a weekend dad for a moody son who wants more and more time: The funniest scenes occur as Favreau displays his usual neurotic charm, trying desperately to climb out of a seemingly endless hole. But halfway through, as the main plot ushers in… of a once great restaurant chef running his own food truck… it’s all sunshine viewed through rose-colored glasses, deleting the edgy banter that made MADE and SWINGERS so engaging.<br /> <br /> One problem is how easily Carl comes to own the truck in the first place, conceived and handed down by his ex-wife and backed by her rich ex-husband, played by IRON MAN himself, Robert Downey Jr., in a caustic cameo surprisingly awkward and unfunny (Jon’s ex partner Vince Vaughn would have worked better). But this scene’s purpose is how Carl floats into what should be a risky venture, which, through his son’s twitter account, becomes such an instant smash there’s little left for the characters, or the audience, to worry about.<br /> <br /> If the intention was to make a feel-good road movie about a father and son bonding, Favreau's hit a home run. Or if exploiting delicious looking food is a factor – this could very well be the CITIZEN KANE of taste buds. But for anyone who prefers a dash of perpetual stress as an essential comedy ingredient, CHEF, while somewhat satisfying, is a meal that leaves much to be desired.

2014, comedy, dustin hoffman, food, jon favreau, road movie, robert downey jr.

JON FAVREAU WRITES & DIRECTS & STARS IN CHEF

year: 2014 rating: **1/2 Fans of SWINGERS, good news… That film’s writer and star is back in indie form after directing and igniting the...

THE 2014 MOTION PICTURE OF GODZILLA

<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody> <tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-f9CwFlYjAFc/U3WhDWgE1_I/AAAAAAAAfJY/NsoIbBbojoU/s1600/Godzilla-2014-Movie-Poster2.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="400" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-f9CwFlYjAFc/U3WhDWgE1_I/AAAAAAAAfJY/NsoIbBbojoU/s400/Godzilla-2014-Movie-Poster2.jpg" width="228" /></a></td></tr> <tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">year: 2014 rating: ***</td></tr> </tbody></table> <span style="background-color: white;">In the original 1954 Japanese film and the 1998 American reboot, GODZILLA was a giant city-stomping lizard that had to be defeated... </span><br /> <br /> Other adventures pitted the creature against way more sinister adversaries, and director Gareth Edwards begins a new chapter as if it were a second movie: Godzilla is no longer waltzing across heavily populated cities, turning humans into pancake… Like Arnold in TERMINATOR 2, the beast is now bodyguard.  <br /> <br /> The first act is like an overly-dramatized conspiracy film, and Bryan Cranston's Joe Brody has the right amount of intense melodrama... As an American scientist living in Japan who lost his wife to a nuclear plant catastrophe, and using his signature BREAKING BAD growl, he makes us believe there’s something rumbling underground, and it's no earthquake!  <br /> <br /> Meanwhile, the introduction of <i>another </i>formidable (and downright villainous) monster is like meeting a Raptor when you know T-Rex is on the way – a snack before the main course. Much of the military buildup that follows plays out like today’s extensive news coverage: Everything they see, we see, as if the movie itself were endless reels of hi-def footage till we get a bit closer to the action, witnessing first hand the rising of gigantic limbs while hearing the sound of shrieking war cries: This edgy perspective, even when Joe’s paratrooper son, Ford, becomes the central figure, gets a bit tiresome, especially since there aren’t many human characters to root for… Making Godzilla, in the midst of a somewhat evacuated Bay Area as if it were an immense boxing ring, that much more the essential hero – not only must he gain the upper claw against two nuclear-strapped adversaries (and eventually acquires the power to breath fire) but he’s the only thing in the movie that <i>really</i> works.<br /> <br /> With a title like GODZILLA, that’s a given… And since the smack-down final act is well worth the price of a ticket, there’s limitless sequel potential: Whatever form of eclectic menace threatens mankind, Godzilla, more of a reptilian badger than the iconic dinosaur from hell, surely has our back.<br /> <br /> Thankfully, we won't suffer through a prolonged barrage of unanswered questions before getting to the good stuff next time, since most of the exposition stuff is behind us now... Let's hope. 

2014, bryan cranston, creature, disaster

THE 2014 MOTION PICTURE OF GODZILLA

year: 2014 rating: *** In the original 1954 Japanese film and the 1998 American reboot, GODZILLA was a giant city-stomping lizard that h...

ORIGINAL JAPANESE GODZILLA VS THE NINETIES AMERICAN REMAKE

<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody> <tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-C9olhFJXNpc/U2_n7FArN2I/AAAAAAAAfD4/7KuC0aRaBUc/s1600/Gojira_1954_Japanese_poster.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="400" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-C9olhFJXNpc/U2_n7FArN2I/AAAAAAAAfD4/7KuC0aRaBUc/s1600/Gojira_1954_Japanese_poster.jpg" width="281" /></a></td></tr> <tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">title: GOJIRA year: 1954 rating: ****</td></tr> </tbody></table> Like KING KONG before and JAWS after, here’s a timeless classic that builds momentum leading to the entrance of the feared antagonist, and, using a sense of palpable, underlying doom, even during pockets of downtime, the story remains intensely intriguing throughout...<br /> <br /> Forget the Americanized GODZILLA: KING OF THE MONSTERS where a tacked-on Raymond Burr strolls around Tokyo recalling events from the real GODZILLA, using each scene as if they were memories or newsreels, or memories of newsreels…<br /> <br /> The 1954 Japanese film, actually titled GOJIRA, begins with a rumbling in the ocean as witnessed by a boatload of Japanese sailors. But we don’t see anything till Godzilla actually shows himself to a group of beach-dwelling locals and then, later on, rears up in full shriek from a mountainside… teasers of what's to come. We all know it’s merely a man in a costume (Haruo Nakajima to be exact), but the way the beast is shown sporadically, and with only a trace of its full frame... And since he's spoken of as an impending threat by the military or a rare species that should be taken alive and studied by a wise old scientist (Takashi Shimura from IKIRU and SEVEN SAMURAI)... By the time Godzilla ravages a city using lethal vapor-breath, tripping around power lines and stomping cars and buildings, he truly deserved his moment of gloriously formidable destruction.<br /> <br /> <table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody> <tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-SDNY9E4n7gM/U2_ow7rrTSI/AAAAAAAAfEI/MrKshYR33IE/s1600/Gojira1954.jpg" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="200" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-SDNY9E4n7gM/U2_ow7rrTSI/AAAAAAAAfEI/MrKshYR33IE/s1600/Gojira1954.jpg" width="161" /></a></td></tr> <tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Original Title</td></tr> </tbody></table> Meanwhile, each human character has significance to the plotline… especially the old and young scientists – the latter developing an underwater weapon that could skeletonize the monster to avoid worldwide havoc. Excluding the screeching female role, the performances are good and yet the people never outshine what, or rather, <i>who</i> really matters. <br /> <br /> With gorgeous black and white cinematography ranging from the terrifying (and now iconic) rampages to one particularly moving scene... as the camera glides slowly across a choir of young girls singing a prayer for the city’s fate… And with a historic aspect on the nuclear repercussions from World War II, the original GODZILLA is deep and thoughtful, and even sympathetic… <br /> <br /> At the very end, as two intrepid heroes dive into the ocean, moving slowly across the surface to stealthily take out the monster for keeps, we see a docile Godzilla waking from an underwater nap, looking humanly groggy and naïve to the circumstances, making this a creature to both fear and feel for.  <br /> <span id="goog_2081903547"></span><span id="goog_2081903548"></span><br /> <table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody> <tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-kUAoSw-k6m8/U2_oDIMmENI/AAAAAAAAfEE/Q9ivI26kRT0/s1600/godzilla.jpg" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="400" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-kUAoSw-k6m8/U2_oDIMmENI/AAAAAAAAfEE/Q9ivI26kRT0/s1600/godzilla.jpg" width="272" /></a></td></tr> <tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">title: GODZILLA year: 1998 rating: *</td></tr> </tbody></table> The teaser/trailer for Roland Emmerich’s GODZILLA was admittedly pretty good: a man fishing on a pier sees the ocean rise into a mysterious mound that winds up being a gigantic reptilian eyeball…<br /> <br /> Which is the best thing the horrendous 1998 remake has to offer, a highlighted scene that would have been much better used only in the promotion: once GZ's on the big screen, marking the first sign of the rebooted beast before ravaging New York, the movie goes downhill… and then some... <br /> <br /> Actually, most of Godzilla’s reign occurs as if he were taking a breezy afternoon walk across Manhattan… With so many shots of the creature’s giant green claws, you’d think Emmerich had more of a foot fetish than Quentin Tarantino for Uma Thurman… <br /> <br /> But what goes on inside the surrounding office buildings makes this a true howler… Matthew Broderick’s Dr. Niko having neurotic arguments with his ex, Audrey, seems like a rehearsal for a Neil Simon romantic comedy, neither caring that a giant monster is about to take down the entire city just outside their windows… So any impending threat or a palpable sense of doom is gone. Even when the adventurous third banana Jean Reno, as the Robert Shaw/Captain Quint of the film, is introduced for action-packed potential, the awkwardly balanced humor and suspense amounts to little more than, once Godzilla hatches a bevy of eggs, a banal JURASSIC PARK Raptor rip-off – perhaps the title should have been GODZILLAS. <br /> <br /> If given a dollar for each time someone (male or female) refers to Matthew Broderick as being cute or adorable, you'd be reimbursed for the ticket or rental price of this abysmal reboot that hopefully gets made up for with the upcoming Bryan Cranston vehicle – which won’t have a problem surpassing this particular catastrophe, but that’s a monstrous given.<br /> <div style="text-align: left;"> </div> <div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"> </div> <div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"> </div>

creature, disaster, fifties, jean reno, matthew broderick, monster, nineties, nuclear, remake, takashi shimura

ORIGINAL JAPANESE GODZILLA VS THE NINETIES AMERICAN REMAKE

title: GOJIRA year: 1954 rating: **** Like KING KONG before and JAWS after, here’s a timeless classic that builds momentum leading to th...

DEFENDING KEVIN COSTNER FOR WATERWORLD & THE POSTMAN

<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody> <tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-vSJJ4aqMdW4/U292bqfFhmI/AAAAAAAAfC0/pOmVzz3SS_A/s1600/1.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="320" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-vSJJ4aqMdW4/U292bqfFhmI/AAAAAAAAfC0/pOmVzz3SS_A/s1600/1.jpg" width="212" /></a></td></tr> <tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">year: 1995 rating: ***1/2</td></tr> </tbody></table> <span style="background-color: white;"><b>WATERWORLD:</b></span> When Dennis Hopper, playing a snarky villain named Deacon, the head of a rogue band of villains called Smokers, who, in a world where there is no land, only ocean, thanks to global warming’s effects having melted the polar ice caps…<br /> <br /> When Deacon pulls down his eye patch to show us one eye missing, it's followed by an evil cackle… which is as corny as this mega-budget Kevin Costner vehicle, originally deemed a box office flop, gets.  <br /> <br /> The best scenes have Costner’s Mariner, partly fish with gills behind his ear and an ability to swim with skillful resilience, on a sleek, primitive catamaran surviving through various drifters and those Smokers that appear out of nowhere, riding gas-grumbling jet skis. But there<i> is</i> a plot: A little girl named Enola exists on a floating city along with her caretaker Helen, played by Jeanne Tripplehorn. Enola has a map on her back which will supposedly lead to dry land, and the bad guys really want it.<br /> <br /> Mariner winds up reluctantly protecting Enola and Helen, and we have a good twenty minutes as our hero survives in the deep blue sea, with company. His boat is a character it itself... With everything from a gun to sails that extend from hidden contraptions, we experience this neat skeleton-like vessel through the eyes of not only its captain but two strangers learning, the hard way, how and how not to keep it running.  <br /> <br /> Sure it's a lot like Mad Max… this is, after all, THE ROAD WARRIOR on water… but Mariner can be even more selfish and independent, and potentially cutthroat and cold-blooded, taking a while to warm up to the only people who can help him find land: not a transition that comes quickly or easily.<br /> <br /> Bookended by two raging battles, WATERWORLD really works when we have fewer characters. Dennis Hopper goes overboard, spouting the kind of dialogue you wouldn't expect from someone stuck in a landless post-apoc future, although he can be ghoulishly charming. And thankfully, Costner plays the part of a loner so well, he and FANDANGO director Kevin Reynolds make this isolated <i>world</i> a place that seems very real and, for the most part, genuine and unique.  <br /> <br /> <table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody> <tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-04bIqFM3RiE/U293KR3cTRI/AAAAAAAAfC8/W0Vku609v4Q/s1600/2.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="320" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-04bIqFM3RiE/U293KR3cTRI/AAAAAAAAfC8/W0Vku609v4Q/s1600/2.jpg" width="209" /></a></td></tr> <tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">year: 1997 rating: ***</td></tr> </tbody></table> <span style="background-color: white;"><b>THE POSTMAN:</b> </span>Kevin Costner took a huge gamble with the Western epic DANCES WITH WOLVES... one that paid off considerably... And another on WATERWORLD, directed by Kevin Reynolds, which basically got him all wet...<br /> <br /> So it was time for Kevin to try another epic, this time set on land in a post-apocalyptic future, which Costner, like he did with WOLVES, directed himself.  <br /> <br /> Beginning with the most involving scenes, the first fifteen minutes has Costner’s unnamed character traveling the barren landscape with his pet mule, grabbing cigarettes from a broken machine and wiling away the hours of a dead world. They wind up in a ragtag conclave of survivors, performing Shakespeare, when the lead villain and his henchman appear... way too soon. Will Patton’s General Bethlehem is a nomadic Napoleon crossed with Hitler crossed with... you name the dictator and Will plays him to the hilt, and beyond. <br /> <br /> THE POSTMAN keeps an intriguing, action-packed pace when Costner’s desperate rogue is taken prisoner and, through the next twenty minutes, has to escape. Then, seeking shelter in a cave, No Name becomes The Postman when he finds a mailbag with letters strapped to a skeleton.<br /> <br /> In order to exist in a “small town” of survivors, complete with a hard nosed sheriff and a wispy love-interest, reminiscent of any old school Western, Costner’s scruffy hero pretends to be a Postman in a world that’s “getting better.” But the problem with Costner’s third epic are the long, dragged-out moments between the action, and the melodramatic score when Postman realizes his importance in rescuing mankind: He was much more intriguing as a reluctant maverick fighting to save his own skin than when he's out to save everyone else’s.

epic, kevin costner, nineties

DEFENDING KEVIN COSTNER FOR WATERWORLD & THE POSTMAN

year: 1995 rating: ***1/2 WATERWORLD: When Dennis Hopper, playing a snarky villain named Deacon, the head of a rogue band of villains c...

SETH ROGEN VERSES ZAC EFRON IN NEIGHBORS

<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody> <tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-6sRifT7JK9E/U2zdrQ5IcaI/AAAAAAAAe9Y/ACp0NRrWxjE/s1600/1.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="320" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-6sRifT7JK9E/U2zdrQ5IcaI/AAAAAAAAe9Y/ACp0NRrWxjE/s320/1.jpg" width="182" /></a></td></tr> <tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">year: 2014</td></tr> </tbody></table> <div style="text-align: right;"> </div> A young married couple, played by Seth Rogen and Rose Byrne, suddenly feel old when their new next-door NEIGHBORS, consisting of an entire University frat house led by Zac Efron, party like it’s 2014…<br /> <br /> Promoted as a rivalry between tubby regular guy Rogen as Mac and muscular pretty boy Efron as Frat brat Teddy, instead much of the film consists of each side holed up inside their own property, wondering how to play the next hand against either unseen antagonist. <br /> <br /> <table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody> <tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-aYTdwni6Y54/U2zdwlWm9_I/AAAAAAAAe9g/EV3gXtzLFUs/s1600/2.jpg" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="320" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-aYTdwni6Y54/U2zdwlWm9_I/AAAAAAAAe9g/EV3gXtzLFUs/s320/2.jpg" width="182" /></a></td></tr> <tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">rating: *1/2</td></tr> </tbody></table> Teddy's buddy Pete (Dave Franco) is way more sensitive and caring than Mac’s wife, Kelly, wherein Rose Byrne slips out of her usual passive character and really goes for it: providing her husband an equal partner-in-crime to shut down the party for good. Their schemes range from flooding the frat house to causing a love-triangle rift between best friends, but none of the results are involving or humorous. And when Efron’s desperate Teddy plants airbags to catapult Mac around like a rag doll, it’s much too farfetched. <br /> <br /> Rogen and Byrne have the bland chemistry of a brother and sister who happen to be married, while Efron and Franco seem part of a “bromance” that would garner five minutes in a throwaway sex comedy. Meanwhile the punchlines are too <i>inside</i> to be funny: the characters know each other way more than we ever will. It's as if two comedy genres crashed into each other and were never quite sure how to deal with the repercussions.  <br /> <br /> If the put-upon married couple (much too wild to seem like worthy victims) didn’t have rowdy neighbors they wouldn’t be interesting at all… Not even Judd Apatow would waste time on their neurotic marriage, consisting of an infant keeping dad and mom from a social life. And if Efron and company were allowed to party all night without restraint, they’d have a lot more fun than the audience, who deserved a much better time.

2014, comedy, dave franco, rose byrne, seth rogen, zac efron

SETH ROGEN VERSES ZAC EFRON IN NEIGHBORS

year: 2014 A young married couple, played by Seth Rogen and Rose Byrne, suddenly feel old when their new next-door NEIGHBORS, consisti...

COLIN FIRTH STARS IN THE RAILWAY MAN

<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody> <tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-TX7s7hor9m8/U2qEKCXwl1I/AAAAAAAAe9I/AcUH3kP7vkA/s1600/Film_Review_The_Railway_Man-0a12e.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="320" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-TX7s7hor9m8/U2qEKCXwl1I/AAAAAAAAe9I/AcUH3kP7vkA/s1600/Film_Review_The_Railway_Man-0a12e.jpg" width="152" /></a></td></tr> <tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="background-color: white;">2014 rating: **</span></td></tr> </tbody></table> <span style="background-color: white;">If there were an Oscar for movie trailers, THE RAILWAY MAN would be nominated since it has everything for a prisoner of war drama, neatly "captured" within a three minute time-frame… </span><br /> <br /> And yet, while thematically resembling an Oscar frontrunner, RAILWAY the motion picture, starring Colin Firth as Eric, a mild-mannered train enthusiast in England who meets the woman of his dreams (on a train, no less) and mentally goes back to his harrowing World War II experience as a POW in the Pacific, has way more style than substance.<br /> <br /> The flashbacks center on a troop of British soldiers forced to build an impossible set of train tracks across a thick Asian jungle, taking us out of the troubled present-time romance of Eric and Kidman’s Patti, the latter getting advice from Stellan Skarsgård as Finlay, formerly in charge of Eric’s imprisoned troop...<br /> <br /> The backstory has an intriguing BRIDGE ON THE RIVER KWAI aura, yet there are surprisingly few scenes about the men and their plight, a true life tale loaded with gritty potential.  <br /> <br /> Once young Eric, played by a perfectly-cast Jeremy Irving, lands in trouble for putting together a radio, the film narrows down into beatings and torture by the prison’s young Japanese ringleader, Takeshi… That is, until the main plot is unveiled as the adult Eric ventures to Japan, seeking revenge on his former captor.  <br /> <br /> For a two hour movie, RAILWAY ultimately feels like a short film… Not that it should have been any longer, but despite the dramatic score reminiscent of a SCHINDER’S LIST style epic, and the talent on board, we’re never given enough depth in either story, past or present, to make this a cathartic journey worth taking.

2014, colin firth, drama, nicole kidman, stellan skarsgard, war

COLIN FIRTH STARS IN THE RAILWAY MAN

2014 rating: ** If there were an Oscar for movie trailers, THE RAILWAY MAN would be nominated since it has everything for a prisoner of ...

ORIGINAL BATTLESTAR GALACTICA SWIPED BY THE HAND OF GOD

<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody> <tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-QT8XiAcrjRA/U2lEFIGv01I/AAAAAAAAe8k/kXi6ZtQmuAw/s1600/Picture+7a.png" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="320" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-QT8XiAcrjRA/U2lEFIGv01I/AAAAAAAAe8k/kXi6ZtQmuAw/s320/Picture+7a.png" width="166" /></a></td></tr> <tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">year: 1978</td></tr> </tbody></table> <table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody> <tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-fQAyGDSpV1k/U2lETtMQnNI/AAAAAAAAe8s/eA2XXoaEkbw/s1600/Picture+7b.png" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="320" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-fQAyGDSpV1k/U2lETtMQnNI/AAAAAAAAe8s/eA2XXoaEkbw/s320/Picture+7b.png" width="166" /></a></td></tr> <tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">rating: ***1/2</td></tr> </tbody></table> Richard Hatch, who played Captain Apollo on the original BATTLESTAR GALACTICA television series, lasting only one year before a premature demise... morphing into another shortlived venture set thirty years later wherein Apollo was long gone... energetically shared on a Cult Film Freak interview that his personal favorite episode was THE HAND OF GOD…<br /> <br /> “I just like the essence that there was a message from Earth. I loved being up in the Star Chamber… I loved the whole feeling of it. It wasn’t an Apollo episode necessarily, but I just liked the episode a lot, I thought it kind of left with this kind of mystical feeling of hope, of something greater out in the universe... I love the feeling of that.” So THE HAND OF GOD, a title that resurfaces in the 2004 reboot, is the final episode of the series, and reintroduced the Cylons, those silver-plated heavies that stalked the Galactica, the surviving vessel of a once-numbered host of immense battleships, and the return of the menacing Cylon Raiders, razor-like warships providing dogfights reminiscent of the original STAR WARS... Since cash ran out halfway through the BG series, the Cylons were too expensive, as were the outer space special effects… even though a lot of the same stock shots were being used again and again...<br /> <br /> Child actor Robbie Rist, who would, only one year later, play Doctor Zee on the ill-fated follow-up GALACTICA 1980 – centering on an aged crew (sans Apollo) finding Earth thirty years later – described the dogfight repetition as: “One Cylon ship was always crossing my screen from left to right before it was hit by a human's guns. I guess making new FX shots was too expensive.”<br /> <br /> <table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody> <tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-1YaSLZWM1k0/U2lDhnXaBzI/AAAAAAAAe8c/kCge4JNCSok/s1600/Picture+4.png" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="320" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-1YaSLZWM1k0/U2lDhnXaBzI/AAAAAAAAe8c/kCge4JNCSok/s320/Picture+4.png" width="214" /></a></td></tr> <tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Richard Hatch & Anne Lockhart</td></tr> </tbody></table> Very wise observation, Cousin Oliver, and after the laser-blasting first half of the original show’s one and only season, the crew either dealt with in-house traitor Baltar or found other antagonists to grapple with including a group of dreary Nazi-like soldiers, or met with special guest stars such as Fred Astaire... and it just wasn't the same. <br /> <br /> HAND OF GOD brings us back to the primal roots, centering on Apollo bringing Starbuck (the devil-may-care Han Solo type), and their two lady friends, up into The Star Chamber: an isolated section of the starship located at the very top/back, somewhere near the main thrusters.<br /> <br /> For Starbuck, this is the perfect location to score, but Apollo has his own more tactical agenda...<br /> <br /> At that observatory vantage point, the far regions of outer space can be viewed from a silvery cockpit chair gripped inside a domed structure, where a built-in monitor picks up random signals and/or distress calls, and in this particular case, The Galactica is receiving some kind of signal from what could be… Earth!<br /> <br /> Turns out being a possible Cylon trap, and that’s where things return to the good old days. The plot has Starbuck and Apollo preparing for a do-or-die mission to the Cylon warship… To sneak inside and disable the shield activators so the Battlestar can, like the STAR WARS Death Star, blow up the impending vessel before it destroys them. "She's an orbiting killer, capable of destroying every ship we have," a grim Colonel Tigh warns. <br /> <br /> <table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody> <tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-GVvwuNAdPWw/U2lEoQhmJ9I/AAAAAAAAe8w/J23Yb4BsFyE/s1600/Picture+1.png" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="200" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-GVvwuNAdPWw/U2lEoQhmJ9I/AAAAAAAAe8w/J23Yb4BsFyE/s200/Picture+1.png" width="131" /></a></td></tr> <tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Cylons Return</td></tr> </tbody></table> A cool episode liken to classic WW2 <i>perilous mission </i>flicks, the only downside being the collection of side-characters giving long-winded farewells to the brave warriors. And finally, Apollo and Starbuck, once inside the Cylon War Ship, wind up climbing down a metallic ladder, quickly face off with a sole laser-blasting Cylon, and that’s pretty much that…<br /> <br /> More of a rushed HIGH NOON showdown than a full-fledged action-packed battle, and yet it's nice to see the iconic Cylon in partial glory once again: Providing THE HAND OF GOD a neat farewell to a show that, to save money, had to get rid of the best thing it had going...<br /> <br /> Making this episode not an intentional finale but an attempt to possibly venture into season two, promising Cylons would reign once again – a distress call that, like an eventual message sent from Earth after Starbuck and Apollo split for the celebration downstairs, was never heeded.<br /> <table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody> <tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-OnFGfkFaUZw/U2lEz20VZ0I/AAAAAAAAe84/edEKdKHdZLk/s1600/Picture+3.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="458" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-OnFGfkFaUZw/U2lEz20VZ0I/AAAAAAAAe84/edEKdKHdZLk/s1600/Picture+3.png" width="640" /></a></td></tr> <tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">"You'll be okay, Starbuck, I see a large black man with a mohawk... Your TV future is set."</td></tr> </tbody></table>

dirk benedict, interview, lorne greene, richard hatch, robbie rist, science-fiction, seventies, TV

ORIGINAL BATTLESTAR GALACTICA SWIPED BY THE HAND OF GOD

year: 1978 rating: ***1/2 Richard Hatch, who played Captain Apollo on the original BATTLESTAR GALACTICA television series, lasting o...

SPIELBERG DESIGNS A.I. FOR KUBRICK

<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody> <tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-dOBvESQGq_s/VqIA0g6PpEI/AAAAAAAAq0I/6iSuCFBQZcU/s1600/Screen%2BShot%2B2016-01-22%2Bat%2B2.12.55%2BAM.png" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="400" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-dOBvESQGq_s/VqIA0g6PpEI/AAAAAAAAq0I/6iSuCFBQZcU/s400/Screen%2BShot%2B2016-01-22%2Bat%2B2.12.55%2BAM.png" width="231" /></a></td></tr> <tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">year: 2001 rating: **1/2</td></tr> </tbody></table> The most intriguing aspect of A.I ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE is discovering where Stanley Kubrick ends and Steven Spielberg begins: A project that Kubrick was preparing since the early eighties, and then realized could be technologically realized after seeing his friend Steven's JURASSIC PARK, and so, with a completed script and storyboards, Spielberg took over when the legendary director died after completing his maligned opus, EYES WIDE SHUT…<br /> <br /> As is common, ARTIFICIAL consists of three acts, only these seem like separate movies altogether: Opening with William Hurt’s Professor Hobby lecturing a group of technical designers on a new form of Artificial life: a child that will look, breath and feel very human. The character, immersed in exposition, is both speaking to them and us... After which we cut to a high class couple whose son (an only child) is in a coma and probably won’t recover: Enter SIX SENSE phenom Haley Joel Osment as David, literally created to love his new family, especially Monica (Francis O’Conner). Here’s where the movie, with futuristic settings and ominously slow paced dialogue, feels as much like a Kubrick film as possible i.e. Spielberg paying homage to his mentor: from the white pod-like vehicles to the slow-paced yet intriguing conversations... The only difference is the John William’s soundtrack pulling heartstrings as David's finally loved by his reluctant new mom. But after her human son recovers from the coma, David becomes a mere plaything, and not entirely wanted. Thus the second act becomes more of signature Spielberg film as our young hero, after accidentally endangering his sibling, is set free to live on his own with a talking Teddy Bear "super toy."<br /> <br /> <div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"> </div> <table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody> <tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-dOHl2UD66ig/VqIBJTbME_I/AAAAAAAAq0Q/AVPGhJBfdEM/s1600/Screen%2BShot%2B2016-01-22%2Bat%2B2.13.03%2BAM.png" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="400" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-dOHl2UD66ig/VqIBJTbME_I/AAAAAAAAq0Q/AVPGhJBfdEM/s400/Screen%2BShot%2B2016-01-22%2Bat%2B2.13.03%2BAM.png" width="281" /></a></td></tr> <tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Boy and his bear</td></tr> </tbody></table> The action flows with Spielberg’s signature gliding cameras and bombastic soundtrack, but the character of David, joined by a male prostitute robot Gigolo Joe – played by Jude Law, attempting the kind of roguish energy of a young Kubrick-directed Malcolm McDowell combined with a devilish dash of David Niven – becomes second string to a robot destruction circus/derby, resembling a white trash Monster Truck show set in a MAD MAX: BEYOND THUNDERDOME style future. <br /> <br /> A.I. attempts returning to the Kubrick roots after David finds his origin in Manhattan, where ice caps had melted the city into a watery ruin. Reminiscent of Keir Dullea’s arrival in the “Jupiter condo” in 2001: A SPACE ODYSSEY, the third act has David seeking a “blue fairy” since he was raised on, and mirrors the story of, Pinocchio – and eventually, thanks to those long armed, giraffe-necked aliens that Spielberg turned into cinematic messiahs since the 1970's, David gets a last wish, one the audience has to suffer a prolonged half-hour to finally reach. <br /> <br /> While there are intriguing aspects of A.I, it’s much too convoluted with pathos and melodrama to be a truly involving adventure and at the same time, the action-packed mid-section disrupts the character development from the Kubrickian setup, which is the most thought-provoking and entertaining. But let’s give credit to perhaps the best character on board: the robotic, talking Teddy Bear, who seems more alive than mechanical, providing Jiminy Cricket logic and stealing the show.

haley joel osment, stanley kubrick, steven spielberg, william hurt

SPIELBERG DESIGNS A.I. FOR KUBRICK

year: 2001 rating: **1/2 The most intriguing aspect of A.I ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE is discovering where Stanley Kubrick ends and Steven ...

REVIEW OF THE AMAZING SPIDER-MAN 2

<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody> <tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-WK5y8VL0ElE/U2NCYEKrW8I/AAAAAAAAe7U/UN0KGuS9NOw/s1600/amazing-spider-man-2-thoughts-questions-spoilers-vhraood.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="400" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-WK5y8VL0ElE/U2NCYEKrW8I/AAAAAAAAe7U/UN0KGuS9NOw/s400/amazing-spider-man-2-thoughts-questions-spoilers-vhraood.jpg" width="263" /></a></td></tr> <tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">year: 2014 rating: *</td></tr> </tbody></table> <span style="background-color: white;">When you glance at the latest Marvel villain Electro with a squint of the eye, he sort of resembles Mr. Freeze from the infamous BATMAN AND ROBIN, which is pure heaven compared to THE AMAZING SPIDER-MAN 2...</span><br /> <br /> Andrew Garfield was way too hipster-mopey the first time around, and now he can’t stop cracking wise as he jovially leaps through the air defending residents of New York City. With a witty line for just about everything, his goofy behavior as superhero awkwardly clashes with the real guy inside, Peter Parker…<br /> <br /> During corny scenes with love interest Gwen Stacy, Garfield’s performance is downright TWILIGHT, or else he’s so smug and sarcastic there’s never a sense of urgency... But Pete ain't the only problem here… Instead of legitimate foes we’re stuck with boring antagonists who hate Spider-Man because they really, deep down, love him to tears: This includes Jamie Foxx’s hammy portrayal of gap-toothed geek Max Dillon, a frustrated electrician at the plot-pivotal Oscorp Corporation who, once he falls into a vat of electric eels, can manipulate his very own lightning bolts and plunges into light sockets. After his first face-off with Spider-Man, the glowing menace winds up at an old school sanitarium where he's eventually sought after by villain number two, or one, or something… Enter Dane DeHaan playing THE DARK KNIGHT style Harvey Dent/Two-Face of the film… That is, it takes a really long time before Harry Osbourn changes into his own inevitable persona – in this case, Green Goblin: An 11th hour transformation resulting in two bland battles for the price of one, making the epilogue's intentionally campy robotic <i>Rhino</i> seem a much better candidate to have battled Spider-Man the whole way through and, simplistic or not, at least he has pride in his villainy!

2014, action, andrew garfield, jamie foxx, marvel, superhero

REVIEW OF THE AMAZING SPIDER-MAN 2

year: 2014 rating: * When you glance at the latest Marvel villain Electro with a squint of the eye, he sort of resembles Mr. Freeze from...