Reviews

I was expecting an English version of a tedious slasher flick, what a pleasant surprise. This film is intelligently acted, directed and written. The two leads are fully likable and, surprise, the blond girl doesn't die ... at least not at first.

A young London couple set off to the Midlands for a weekend get away. They end up in the Village of Rude Thugs and make a left turn into a forest frequented by local delinquents. The delinquents offend the nice young couple from the start and then things go quickly downhill as the delinquents turn homicidal maniacs.

Nicely paced, well acted (especially the part of the head thug) with a nice, remote, gloomy setting, Eden Lake is a good thriller.

And the film doesn't shy away from pointing fingers and suggesting something's wrong with a society when the kids running wild are just as amoral and devoid of ethics as their gangster parents.

As a fan of alternative, indie and foreign films, I wanted to see this. The way the filmmaker plays with the time line, bouncing forward and backward, is excellent and achieves the desired effect of upping the suspense and making the audience want to continue watching.

Vincent Cassel is always good as a physical, visceral French actor in a league full of bloated, overly intellectual performances. His cohort, Albert Dupontel's Pierre, is a calm counterpoint to Cassel's Marcus who is an emotional loose cannon.

BUT, I just had one problem. As usual, a glowingly beautiful model (Monica Bellucci) plays the lead, Alex. Most French filmmakers cast women who are photogenic above all else. Who cares if they can even say their lines? Just as long as they look stunning in wide-angle shots.

Bellucci's Alex is dead flat and predictable. She's a prop shoved up against Marcus, the live wire. She even has trouble delivering some of the key lines in the film, like when she mentions a premonitory dream she has or stumbles when talking about a philosophy book she's reading (ya know, that's all French model/actresses do? lay in parks all day in skimpy dresses while reading philosophy). They may as well had her say no lines and instead just walk around with a big sign on her forehead (or ass) that says FEMALE VICTIM.

My biggest problem with the rape scene isn't the length or graphic violence, but the flaccid, helpless behavior of Alex. She doesn't run, she doesn't kick, doesn't bite, punch -- or really DO anything most rape victims do when attacked. Several minutes go by before the evil rapist even bothers to pull out his modest pocket knife but does Alex try and knee him in the groin? No. She whimpers, avoids making eye contact with the camera and then cowers for 9 long minutes while he sodomizes her and then beats her into a coma.

I can't help but wonder what my favorite French filmmaker, Patrice Chéreau, would have done with this umpteenth re-telling of the stock Revenge Fantasy.

Wow, I thought I'd seen bad and then I watched this. I seriously thought this was gay porn at first. I mean, the girl in it looks JUST like a 14-year-old boy from the back. And the male lead is, well obviously Winterbottom picked him because of the size of his ween, because his face looks like the back of a bus.

So two young hipster morons meet and mate after a concert. There are long tedious closeups of them snorting cocaine, getting giddy on wine and talking Shiite. I was pretty sure most of the dialog was improv because it was so damn dull.

I can't believe this is the same filmmaker who made 'Code 42' and 'The Claim' -- both really good films with excellent plots.

Another very explicit UK film, 'Intimacy', is ten times better than this. It has a plot, conflict, tension and fantastic acting -- all the things totally absent in this one.

Great show. For once they got it right. The doctors aren't these godly heroes. I love it when Falco's character says: "Doctors diagnose, we heal." Really sharp, fun dialogue. The humor is dead-on good. The scene where the newbie nurse goes to lunch with the English doctor is hilarious ("Make-A-Wish Foundation"). Priceless. I like Edie Falco in this better than anything else I've seen her in. Sopranos was so ... over the top and pretty racist actually. Showing the irony between corporate-run hospitals demanding nurses not work more than so many hours, and the flip side where they are verbally intimidated to working insanely long shifts sounds like everything my nurse friends ever told me about their jobs. And the drug abuse that Jackie engages in is typical of medical professionals. They're around the stuff constantly, they're tired, in pain, whatever, the temptation is definitely there.

This is one of Ridley Scott's better films, up there with 'Alien' or 'Matchstick Men'.

There's been A LOT of dissing of this film, especially by idiots that refuse to even watch it. Most of them whine and moan about how the writer (David Twohy who wrote 'Pitch Black') got the terminology and endless DoD acronyms wrong. SFW. It's a fictional drama, not a documentary. You want a documentary? Watch the Hitler Channel.

I used to be a wildland firefighter and, yep, I'm a split tail. I've seen fictional wildfire movies where the tanker planes fly at night and the actors sprint through fields of flaming dirt (note to non-firefighters: dirt don't burn). Again, SFW. It was a movie, big deal.

The No. 1 reason I like this film is Viggo Mortensen's performance. He's way better than Demi Moore, not that Demi is bad. I don't think she deserved the Razzie for this. Again, that came from misogynistic armchair warriors who are unemployed and live with Mommy. Consider the source.

What this film does have is action, suspense, conflict, fast dialog, good character development -- all the stuff a movie like some horrendous Steven Segal mess is SUPPOSED to have but usually doesn't.

Rent this flick, keep an open mind and enjoy the show.

Also keep in mind, a very high percentage of the enlisted women who have served in the Middle East have been harassed, assaulted and raped -- by their own coworkers, not 'the enemy.' Then reconsider all these bad reviews and ask yourself what does that say?

Both these films came out at the same time. This one got slammed by some male film critics because the lead is a female (Foster). Which is absurd. Most of the critics who dissed this film ended up holding "Death Sentence" up as a better example of the vigilante genre. That's flat-out STUPID.

"The Brave One" under Neil Jordan's capable direction cuts right to the chase. We have action, suspense, character development -- within the first 20 minutes. In "Death Sentence" we have home movies. Yup, that's right. Kevin Bacon and family tearfully watch home movies. "Death Sentence" felt like it was four hours long and the last two was mostly incoherent violent gore.

In this film, Foster's character does a lot of self-analysis. And well she should. Now that she's taken up the sword, so to speak, is she turning into the unrepentant creeps who murdered her boyfriend and left her for dead? Buy this movie on DVD. It's worth it. Don't waste one cent on "Death Sentence" ... unless you want to watch fake home movies and mindless gore.