My Movie Matinees (with Mini-Reviews) from 21 Nov. 2005 to 31 Dec. 2005
Submitted by bertie on Tue, 11/22/2005 - 13:58
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- Monday 21 Nov. 2005: All the King's Men (1949) I might be over-rating this (8.5/10), but it's not only a great movie about American politics it's a great movie full stop. The story is told concisely and yet fully, with masterful editing and unpretentious yet fascinating camerawork. Also, it has some of the best ensemble acting you will ever see.
- Tuesday 22 Nov. 2005: Rocketship X-M (1950) The winner and loser in the first space-race. Made in a hurry to be released before Destination Moon. It won the release race but lost the quality race. The writers were apparently unaware of Newton's laws of motion. Their rocket makes a sharp 90-degree turn into orbit while the crew staggers around as if it had turned into a driveway. Then they need to keep the motor burning until the moon's gravity grabs hold of them and sucks them to their intended destination. (Whose First Law of what?) But something goes wrong and they end up on Mars. Bet NASA would love to know how to make that mistake. Saving grace: feminists would probably not condemn it. Rating: 6 / 10.
- Wednesday 23 November 2005 Star Wars: Episode 1 - The Phantom Menace (1999) Would you believe we watched the first half of this last Saturday and forgot the second half until today? A feast for the eyes, but a movie made for children, with absurdly capable children in the most heroic roles. I wonder if Geoge Lucas is aware that the word 'senator' is related to words such as 'senior' and 'senile'. The senators of Rome were citizens of age and experience, not teenagers. Rating (of a senior not yet senile): 7 / 10.
- Thursday 24 November 2005 The Guns of Navarone (1961) Part 1.
- Friday 25 November 2005 The Guns of Navarone Part 2 - Are Americans familiar with the simile "It was like the curate's egg: good in parts"? This movie is like the curate's egg. A scattering of quite good dramatic scenes among a majority that don't quite work, and a few that are plain embarrassing. Same goes for the action scenes. Worth watching for the cast of stars and the good scenes, but not as good as it might have been. Rating: 7 / 10.
- Saturday 26 November 2005 Annie Hall (1977) It all works brilliantly until the roundup of highlights at the end. Even though the highlights sequence is entirely appropriate to the narrative style of the movie, it still jars. Other than that, Annie Hall is nearly faultless - and wonderfully funny. Rating: 8.5 / 10.
- Tuesday 29 November 2005 Three Days of the Condor (1975) This is a movie that I had seen just one time many years ago and remembered enjoying. When I saw it listed at my local online DVD emporium I added it to my order, which arrived by courier today just in time for lunchtime viewing. I wasn't disappointed. Think The Bourne Identity as it might have been done in the 70s. Only without the amnesia and without the Web and without a car chase (dang!). But otherwise a lot like TBI. Strong cast, strong story, worth seeing for historical comparison if you like the TBI series. Rating: 7.5 / 10
- Wednesday 30 November 2005 Things to Come (1936) With a soaring and prophetic screenplay by H.G. Wells, actors such as Raymond Massey and Ralph Richardson, some of the best fx work of the 30s, and direction by William Cameron Menzies, this is easily one of the most important sf movies ever made. Wells's war starts in 1940 and continues into the 1960s - amazingly accurate if you count the Cold War. By war's end feudalism has returned to most areas. But eventually...well, I don't want to spoil. A nuclear war would have been appropriate, and Wells had already invented the atomic bomb before WW1 in his novel The World Set Free , but he doesn't have one here. Nor does his space technology have rockets, although, if you listen carefully, he does get the 'stages' aspect right. The final scene is one of the most dramatic you will ever see. Rating: 8 / 10
- Friday 2 December 2005 And Starring Pancho Villa as Himself (2003) I've mini-reviewed this movie before, here. I consider it to be a very underrated work. Rating: 8 / 10
- Saturday 3 December 2005 The Bone Collector (1999) My old Ma loves this movie. Which is somewhat surprising, since she usually isn't fond of movies with scenes as gruesome as some of this one's. Probably she likes it because of the empowered women and disempowered men. Denzel Washington does well as a quadraplegic. You might not like the plot resolution, which comes out of the blue and shows the bad guy to be nowhere near as imaginative as he has seemed. Rating: 7 / 10.
- Sunday 4 December 2005 The Island (2005) [I watched this late Saturday night, but I'll mini-review it here.] Think The Sixth Day meets The Matrix . A tale of horror for the ethics of genetic engineering (organ farming) livened with a chase sequence and explosive plot resolution. The action is quite spectacular and, of course, quite unbelievable, and the extent of the gross immorality needed for the story is also, one hopes, highly unlikely. Rating: 6.5 / 10
- Tuesday 6 December 2005 Batman Forever (1995) Its best aspects probably come from Tim Burton's contribution, seeing what a turkey the next in the series turned out to be. Tommy Lee Jones and Jim Carrey get the best of it. An embarrassingly groupie-like role for Nicole Kidman. Not in the same league as Batman and Batman Returns . Rating: 6.5 / 10
- Thursday 8 December 2005 Oliver! (1968) [part one]
- Friday 9 December 2005 Oliver! [part two] This is one of the greatest movie musicals. With strong story basics by Dickens, direction by the great Carol Reed, a perfectly chosen cast, staging and musical direction that makes nearly every number a show-stopper, and, most of all, the amazing songs of Lionel Bart. Let me repeat: this is one of the greatest movie musicals. Rating: 9 / 10.
- Saturday 10 December 2005 The Hunt for Red October (1990) One of Tom Clancy's 'Jack Ryan' series, but I always think of Harrison Ford as Jack Ryan, so I classify this as a submarine movie. As such it's not too bad, although there are a multitude of improbabilities involved in getting 'Dr Ryan, a writer of books for the CIA' to where the action is. This fault and others are counterbalanced by a good strong cast who are always entertaining to watch, if not always convincing. Rating: 7.5 / 10
- Monday 12 December 2005 Judge Dredd (1995) This DVD is my brother's, I would never have bought it. What an asault on the senses: - visually garish, with a seemingly incessant pounding musical score. It can lay claim to one of Sly Stallone's most wooden (if plastic-encased) performances. And I hope Max von Sydow was paid an exorbitant fee for his appeance in this. In a word (I can't resist): dreadful. Rating: 5 / 10
- Tuesday 13 December 2005 High Crimes (2002) Think What Lies Beneath meets The Verdict meets A Few Good Men , and you've pretty much got this pedigreed. Ashley Judd does well enough in a demanding role, and Morgan Freeman is, as usual, near perfect. Rating: 7.5 / 10
- Wednesday 14 December 2005 The Man in the Iron Mask (1998) Terrific story (by the screenwriter of Braveheart), great cast, terrific locations and sets. But, above all, a first-class in-depth examination of the concept of 'honour'. Rating: 8 / 10
- Thursday 15 December 2005 To Kill a Mockingbird (1962) This is wonderful, but the ending has always seemed to me too 'pat', too literarily 'neat', too warmly sentimental (despite the story's claim to harsh realism) in the style of fiction that caters to American middle-class values. Rating: 8 / 10
- Thursday 29 December 2005 War of the Worlds (2005) I was actually frightened by this movie. Bravo Mr Spielberg! Literally awe-inspiring fx; very, very good acting, particularly from Tom Cruise; reasonably faithful (with one major exception) to the book; and did I mention that I, a fairly mature adult and experienced movie watcher, was actually struck with vicarious fear by this movie? Thanks too, Mr Spielberg, for including some of the great H.G. Wells' narration. The novel has perhaps the best opening paragraph in science fiction. I must mention what I consider to be two big faults, both of them plot faults, and one of them due to Wells himself. First, how likely is it that aliens of superior intellect would lack the know-how to protect themselves from...what it is that defeats them? This was perhaps less glaring a fault in the 19th century when the novel was published, but it seems very glaring now. Second, the aliens were planning their invasion for so long that they planted their weapons way back before humans came to America? Sorry, this idea makes for some great, some very great invasion sequences, but it is just so very implausible. But I was blown away, or rather, frozen to my chair, and I'm going to watch this again soon. I confidently predict this will establish itself as one of the greatest sf movies. Rating: 9 / 10
- Friday 30 December 2005 The Great Race [part one](1965)
- Saturday 31 December 2005 The Great Race [part two] One of Blake Edwards' most enjoyable comedies, re-teaming Jack Lemmon and Tony Curtis, both of whom make the most of their caricature-characters. As does Natalie Wood, scorching the screen as a beautiful, aggressive feminist. Almost stealing the show is Peter Falk as Lemmon's klutzy sidekick. The plot about a motor race from New York to Paris (France) is put aside in the second half of the movie and another movie's plot is substituted (The Prisoner of Zenda), after which the main plot is resumed and rapidly concluded. Come to think of it, a mini-western is included in the first half - so the plot is shamelessly padded. It's all hilariously funny, however, so see it if you never have, and preferably on a decent-sized screen. Rating: 7.75 / 10.
- [ OOPS! Updated the wrong list. Sorry.]
:-) You're too good to me.
I thought War of the Worlds was unbearably bad, with Broog humorously highlighting some of my own complaints, but I did enjoy Freeman's reading of the novel's excellent opening paragraph, which gave me chills.
Not that the dread Spielberg needs me to defend him but, "unbearably bad"? Have you changed your mind?
Your link didn't work for me, but perhaps you were linking to "I had a good time at Worlds, though." If so, I'm certain I never thought it was anything but a bad movie. I did see the first half (my "favorite" half) of it again recently and thought that was unbearably bad, so I guess my opinion did change for the worse. Not sure why: I can't imagine how I ever enjoyed it in the first place.
I'm sorry you weren't scared spitless for the duration, like I was. A little spitlessness now and then is character-building, I think :-D Oh, and I got some grins from broog, but he makes the same two major criticisms that I do.