Week in Reviews 5/25 - 5/31

It was another solid week of movie watching. I started the week with the 1967 Best Picture winner, In the Heat of the Night. I'm really impressed with the way the acting and thematic elements still hold up. Despite being made 40 years ago, the movie really doesn't feel dated.

This week was especially good in terms of the acting performances that I saw. Performances by Sidney Poitier, Anthony Hopkins, and Paul Newman all hold their own with some of the best I've ever seen. In fact, Hopkins was so good in Remains of the Day, that I'm actually questioning whether that is his absolute best performance........and, yes, I've seen The Silence of the Lambs.

The Absence of Malice (1981)

Directed by Sydney Pollack
Starring Paul Newman & Sally Field

Acting: 8.5
Cinematography: 7
Plot: 8
Entertainment: 6.5

Cumulative: 7.5



Before Sunrise (1995)

Directed by Richard Linklater
Starring Ethan Hawke & Julie Delpy

Acting: 8
Cinematography: 7
Plot: 7.5
Entertainment: 7.5

Cumulative: 7.5




In the Heat of the Night (1967) Best Picture Winner*

Directed by Norman Jewison
Starring Sidney Poitier & Rod Steiger

Acting: 8.5
Cinematography: 8
Plot: 8
Entertainment: 8

Cumulative: 8




Remains of the Day (1993)

Directed by James Ivory
Starring Anthony Hopkins & Emma Thompson

Acting: 9
Cinematography: 8
Plot: 7.5
Entertainment: 7

Cumulative: 7.5




The Truman Show (1998) Rewatch*

Directed by Peter Weir
Starring Jim Carrey & Laura Linney

Acting: 8.5
Cinematography: 9
Plot: 10
Entertainment: 8.5

Cumulative: 9

Memorial Day Weekend

Well, my parents were down for the weekend and I got to watch a bunch of movies, plus I have a bunch that I have seen over the past two weeks that I have not yet been able to review. On with the reviews:



Once (2007)
Directed By: John Carney
Starring: Glen Hansard, Marketa Irglova





This movie immediately jumped into my top 10 (#7 currently). The music and the acting is flawless. Throw in a $150,000 budget and the fact that the movie was filmed on Sony Handycams and you have a complete gem of a film and probably the best movie soundtrack of all time.

Acting: (9)
Effects: (10)
Plot: (8.5)
Entertainment: (10)

Cumulative: (9.375)




Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull (2008)
Directed By: Steven Spielberg
Starring: Harrison Ford, Cate Blanchett, Shia LaBeouf





Same old Indiana. I have to admit that I enjoyed this film and most Indy lovers will as well. That said there were multiple flaws and while past films always teetered on the edge between realism and absurd, this installment leans heavily into the absurd camp. Definitely not unseating Raiders or Last Crusade from their respective spots on the Indy list, but I did like it more than Temple of Doom.

Acting: (7)
Effects: (7.5)
Plot: (7)
Entertainment: (8)

Cumulative: (7.375)



Before the Devil Knows Your Dead (2007)
Directed By: Sidney Lumet
Starring: Phillip Seymour Hoffman, Ethan Hawke, Marisa Tomei





Acting: (9)
Effects: (7.5)
Plot: (8)
Entertainment: (8)

Cumulative: (8.125)




Body Snatchers (1993)
Directed By: Abel Ferrara
Starring: Gabrielle Anwar, Meg Tilly, Terry Kinney





Acting: (5)
Effects: (5)
Plot: (5)
Entertainment: (5)

Cumulative: (5)




A Shot in the Dark (1964)
Directed By: Blake Edwards
Starring: Peter Sellers





Acting: (7.5)
Effects: (7.5)
Plot: (7.5)
Entertainment: (7.5)

Cumulative: (7.5)




In the Valley of Elah (2007)
Directed By: Paul Haggis
Starring: Tommy Lee Jones, Charlize Theron





Acting: (8.5)
Effects: (7.5)
Plot: (7)
Entertainment: (7.5)

Cumulative: (7.625)




Hard Candy (2005)
Directed By: David Slade
Starring: Ellen Page, Patrick Wilson





Acting: (7.5)
Effects: (8)
Plot: (7)
Entertainment: (7.5)

Cumulative: (7.5)





Donnie Brasco (1997)
Directed By: Mike Newell
Starring: Al Pacino, Johnny Depp




Acting: (9)
Effects: (8)
Plot: (7.5)
Entertainment: (8.5)

Cumulative: (8.25)





Cinderella Man (2005)
Directed By: Ron Howard
Starring: Russell Crowe, Renée Zellweger





Watched again for the first time in a while and I had previously underrated it.

Acting: (9)
Effects: (9.5)
Plot: (8.5)
Entertainment: (9)

Cumulative: (9)




Dead Calm (1989)
Directed By: Phillip Noyce
Starring: Nicole Kidman, Sam Neill, Billy Zane





Billy Zane is a horrible actor in this one and the ending is just plain stupid. Plus what does the beginning of this film have to do with anything else?

Acting: (5)
Effects: (5)
Plot: (4.5)
Entertainment: (5.5)

Cumulative: (5)





I Am Legend (2007)
Directed By: Francis Lawrence
Starring: Will Smith





The animal effects in this movie are terrible. Very disappointing.

Acting: (6)
Effects: (5)
Plot: (6)
Entertainment: (6)

Cumulative: (5.75)





Ordinary People (1980)
Directed By: Robert Redford
Starring: Mary Tyler Moore, Donald Sutherland




Boring, boring, boring. Watch Good Will Hunting instead, it puts this movie to shame as far as therapy flicks go.

Acting: (7.5)
Effects: (6.5)
Plot: (7)
Entertainment: (5)

Cumulative: (6.5)

A weekend with the guys.

Well the guys got together for a weekend of movie watching and we knocked out four movies in the course of two days. I finished off the weekend watching The Big Lebowski on my own (LD). All in all it was a solid weekend. All of the movies were new for me, but Derek had a couple repeats. As he likes to say I was probably the only guy in our age demographic who had not seen The Matrix as he was with Braveheart. All five movies moved into my top 100, though Dr Stangelove is hanging in right at the bottom.



Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb (1964)
Directed By: Stanley Kubrick
Starring: Peter Sellers, George C. Scott




Acting: (8.5)
Effects: (7.5)
Plot: (8)
Entertainment: (8)

Cumulative: (8)

Derek:
Sellers and Scott were both outstanding. The Cinematography and plot were both ridiculous; which, I assume, was the intent. It was a clever satire that probably would have struck a chord more had I been 20 years older.

Acting: 8.5
Effects: 7.5
Plot: 8.5
Entertainment: 6.5

Cumulative: 7.5




Annie Hall (1977)
Directed By:
Starring: Woody Allen, Diane Keaton




Acting: (9)
Effects: (7.5)
Plot: (8.5)
Entertainment: (9)

Cumulative: (8.5)


Derek:
Woody Allen's wit is really the only reason to watch this film. His paranoia and neurosis set the stage for some great lines and his delivery is usually perfect. I've never been a Diane Keaton fan. While the young Keaton was a bit easier to swallow, she still didn't do much for me. I was actually a bit let down by this one.

Acting: 8
Effects: 7
Plot: 7
Entertainment: 7

Cumulative: 7




Brick (2005)
Directed By: Rian Johnson
Starring: Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Nora Zehetner




Acting: (8)
Effects: (8.5)
Plot: (8)
Entertainment: (8.5)

Cumulative: (8.25)

Derek:
Brick is a film that has to be admired what it attempts and what it accomplishes. Taking the classic film noir experience and translating it into a west coast high school setting sounds alot like the classic square peg in a round hole scenario. It would have been so easy to go over the cliff and fall into a parody, but the film manages to walk that narrow line and create a compelling drama. The dialogue is tricky and difficult to deliver with a straight face. The young cast, most notably Gordon-Levitt, do a remarkable job of fitting the classic character molds normally assigned to actors twice their ages. My ratings for this film actually went up after reviewing it.

Acting: 8
Cinematography: 9
Plot: 9
Entertainment: 8

Cumulative: 8



The Matrix (1999)
Directed By: Andy & Larry Wachowski
Starring: Keanu Reeves, Laurence Fishburne, Carrie-Anne Moss




Acting: (6.5)
Effects: (10)
Plot: (9.5)
Entertainment: (8.5)

Cumulative: (8.625)

Derek:
This has been one of my absolute favorites since the first time I watched it in 2000. 2 Terrible sequels, several copycats, and the simple passing of years changed my impression. The action, though dynamic and revolutionary at the time, has been emulated and mocked so many times that it's impact is almost non existent. The stylistic cinematography looks a bit dated now. The acting has always been mediocre, I used to think that the film looked so good that it didn't matter. Apparently, the Wachowski brothers thought so as well (see: Matrix Reloaded & Revolutions). I still think it's an awfully good Sci/Fi film and I hate to punish an original film in retrospect for what is ultimately something that can't be helped, but it simply doesn't produce the jaw dropping awe that it used to.

Acting: 7.5 (Reduced from 8)
Effects: 10
Plot: 10
Entertainment: 9 (Reduced from 10)

Cumulative: 9



The Big Lebowski (1998)
Directed By: The Coen Brothers
Starring: Jeff Bridges, John Goodman, Steve Buscemi




Acting: (9.5)
Effects: (7.5)
Plot: (8)
Entertainment: (9)

Cumulative: (8.5)

Some Best Picture Winners and...

This past week I had the pleasure of watching two Best Picture winners and also quite a few different movies. I was pleasantly surprised by one and enjoyed almost all of them with the exception of Ice Age 2.




Amadeus (1984)
Directed By: Milos Forman
Starring: F. Murray Abraham




Considering this was a semi-musical including of all things opera and on top of that was the Director's Cut (exceeding 3 hours) I fully expected myself to hate it. The third thing against it was that it is not entirely factual which puts me in the position of being a hypocrite because later in this review I am going to bash on a movie for being nonfactual, but this is my review and I get to take liberties like that. I had to watch it in two sittings because we had things to do last Saturday, but I was absolutely drawn in by this film. The settings and the overall story line of the film was great and all of the acting was very good. All things considered this is a very solid film and has aged very well.

Acting: (8.5)
Effects: (9.5)
Plot: (9)
Entertainment: (8.5)

Cumulative: (8.875)




All About Eve (1950)
Directed By: Joseph L. Mankiewicz
Starring: Bette Davis, Anne Baxter




In comparison to Sunset Blvd. this provided some solid all-around acting performances and a scene stealing, young Marilyn Monroe. The plots are somewhat similar, but this is much more believable and provides the better value. It won the Best Picture that year, but for some reason is not remembered as fondly as Sunset Blvd.

Acting: (8.5)
Effects: (7.5)
Plot: (7.5)
Entertainment: (8)

Cumulative: (7.875)



Flags of Our Fathers (2006)
Directed By: Clint Eastwood
Starring: Ryan Phillippe, Jesse Bradford, Adam Beach




A solid war movie that tends to stray to far from its path in the middle and end.

Acting: (8)
Effects: (8)
Plot: (7.5)
Entertainment: (7.5)

Cumulative: (7.75)



The Last King of Scotland (2006)
Directed By: Kevin Macdonald
Starring: Forest Whitaker, James McAvoy



Now I get to be a hypocrite, but for good reason. This movie was moving along nicely and then they decided to go extreme with the punishment of McAvoy's character and throw in a ton of violence that was completely unnecessary and ruins the last half of the film.

Acting: (8)
Effects: (6.5)
Plot: (7)
Entertainment: (6.5)

Cumulative: (7)




The Lost Boys (1987)
Directed By: Joel Schumacher
Starring: Jason Patric, Keifer Southerland, Corey Haim, Corey Feldman



I ended up watching this after I caught a famous scene that I remembered from my childhood and figured I would see how it was.

Acting: (5)
Effects: (7)
Plot: (7)
Entertainment: (7.5)

Cumulative: (6.625)




Ice Age: The Meltdown (2006)
Directed By: Carlos Saldanha
Starring: Ray Romano, John Leguizamo, Denis Leary, Queen Latifah




Severely taints Ice Age which was a decent movie. This is a sequel that should never have been made of course who am I to judge since it made $195,329,763 at the box office.

Acting: (5)
Effects: (7)
Plot: (4)
Entertainment: (4)

Cumulative: (5)

Week in Reviews 5/5 - 5/11

Until recently, I hadn't had much interest in westerns. As I age, my tastes continuously change. This week I watched two of the great westerns ever made, Butch Cassidy & The Sundance Kid and the 1992 Best Picture winner, Unforgiven. Both films were tremendous. They both secured spots in my All Time top 100 list.

While it has somewhat become a personal mission of mine to watch as many different movies as possible, I also think it's important to view movies multiple times. Our perspectives are dynamic and in constant flux. Our take on a given film will rarely be the same each time it is seen. For this reason, I am also making an effort to re-watch as many movies from my past as possible.

Here are the reviews for this week.

Unforgiven (1992) Best Picture Winner*

Directed by Clint Eastwood
Starring Clint Eastwood, Gene Hackman, & Morgan Freeman

Acting: (8)
Effects: (8.5)
Plot: (8.5)
Entertainment: (8)

Cumulative: (8)




Butch Cassidy & The Sundance Kid (1969)

Directed by George Roy Hill
Starring Robert Redford & Paul Newman

Acting: (9)
Effects: (8.5)
Plot: (8.5)
Entertainment: (8.5)

Cumulative: (8.5)




Re-watched Favorites:

Road to Perdition (2002)
Directed by Sam Mendes
Starring Paul Newman & Tom Hanks
Acting: (7.5)
Effects: (8)
Plot: (8)
Entertainment: (8)

Cumulative: (7.5)

Thank you for Smoking (2005)
Directed by Jason Reitman
Starring Aaron Eckhart

Acting: (8.5)
Effects: (7.5)
Plot: (7.5)
Entertainment: (8)

Cumulative: (7.5)

A few more oldies...

The last seven movies represent an interesting mix of classics and run of the mill films. The biggest surprise was Sophia Coppola's The Virgin Suicides. A dark comedy about coming of age in the 1970's I thought everything was done pretty well. The Outsiders represented a slightly different coming of age movie stemming back to the 1960's. The cast was extremely strong and represented pretty much every major movie star of the 80's. The Age of Innocence was an intriguing film considering it was directed by Martin Scorsese. Definitely a different film than I have ever seen from him. Daniel Day-Lewis puts in another memorable performance and moves further up my favorite actor list. The last note was on the film Sunset Blvd. This is listed as #16 on AFI's list of the greatest movies of all time. I was extremely disappointed with it. Gloria Swanson's performance may be the most overrated performance of all time. I did appreciate the cinematography of the film, but everything else left me saddened that this film is so highly regarded. I can understand that it was a major attack on the Hollywood lifestyle at the time and openly mocked the whole concept, but in watching it as a stand alone film with no background into the production purpose etc. I feel it was just an average film.




The Virgin Suicides (2000)
Directed By: Sophia Coppola
Starring: Kirsten Dunst, Josh Hartnett, James Woods, Kathleen Turner


Acting: (7)
Effects / Cinematography: (8.5)
Plot: (8.5)
Entertainment: (8)

Cumulative: (8)

The Outsiders (1983)
Directed By: Francis Ford Coppola

Starring: Matt Dillon, Ralph Macchio, C. Thomas Howell, Emilio Estevez, Rob Lowe, Patrick Swayze, Tom Cruise, Diane Lane

Acting: (7.5)
Effects / Cinematography: (7.5)
Plot: (8)
Entertainment: (8)

Cumulative: (7.75)

The Age of Innocence (1993)

Directed By: Martin Scorsese

Starring: Daniel Day-Lewis, Michelle Pfeiffer, Winona Ryder

Acting: (8)
Effects / Cinematography: (7.5)
Plot: (7.5)
Entertainment: (7.5)

Cumulative: (7.625)

Sunset Blvd. (1950)

Directed By: Billy Wilder

Starring: Gloria Swanson, William Holden

Acting: (6)
Effects / Cinematography: (8)
Plot: (7)
Entertainment: (7)

Cumulative: (7)

Prince of the City (1981)
Directed By: Sidney Lumet

Starring: Treat Williams, Jerry Orbach

Acting: (7)
Effects / Cinematography: (6.5)
Plot: (7.5)
Entertainment: (7)

Cumulative: (7)

Buffalo Soldiers (2001)
Directed By: Gregor Jordan
Starring: Joaquin Phoenix, Ed Harris

Acting: (5.5)
Effects / Cinematography: (6)
Plot: (6)
Entertainment: (6)

Cumulative: (5.875)

Frankie & Johnny (1991)

Directed By: Garry Marshall

Starring: Al Pacino, Michelle Pfeiffer

Acting: (6)
Effects / Cinematography: (5)
Plot: (6)
Entertainment: (5.5)

Cumulative: (5.625)

Week in Reviews 4/28 - 5/4

It was a relatively slow week in regards to the number of films that I was able to see. I started with the 1980 Best Picture winner, Ordinary People. I was incredibly disappointed initially. I only watched half the film on Sunday evening and had to give myself a pep talk to finish the film later in the week. The film picked up steam in the second half, but still left me baffled regarding the honors this film has received.

The Fugitive and Philadelphia were both quality films from the early 90s. The year 1993 was an outstanding year for the cinema. One of the all time greats, Schindlers List took home the Best Picture honor, but it was complimented my many other great films like Jurassic Park, Tombstone, and Philadelphia.

Here are the films I saw this week.

Ordinary People (1980) Best Picture Award Winner*

Directed by Robert Redford
Starring Donald Sutherland & Mary Tyler Moore

Acting: (8)
Effects / Cinematography: (7)
Plot: (7)
Entertainment: (5.5)

Cumulative: (6.5)





The Fugitive (1993)

Directed By Andrew Davis
Starring Harrison Ford & Tommy Lee Jones

Acting: (8)
Effects / Cinematography: (7)
Plot: (7)
Entertainment: (7)

Cumulative: (7)




The Diving Bell & The Butterfly (2007)

Directed by Julian Schnabel
Starring Mathieu Amalric & Emanuelle Seigner

Acting: (8)
Effects /Cinematography: (9)
Plot: (8)
Entertainment: (7.5)

Cumulative: (8)




Philadelphia (1993)

Directed by Jonathan Demme
Starring Tom Hanks & Denzel Washington

Acting: (9)
Effects / Cinematography: (8)
Plot: (8.5)
Entertainment: (8.5)

Cumulative: (8.5)




The Golden Compass (2007)

Directed by Chris Weitz
Starring Dakota Blue Richards & Nicole Kidman

Acting: (7)
Effects / Cinematography: (9)
Plot: (7.5)
Entertainment: (7)

Cumulative: (7.5)