Reviews

The script is frantically trying to get to the next scene almost all the time.

Its also trying to be 2001 A Space Odyssey without possessing the artistic quality of that film.

For instance, are we supposed to take this film as a serious scientific exploration, or as a film where you can fall into a black hole and communicate through a time loop to your daughter. It cant be both.

This film would have simply been better served to be about Matty M giving up his dream of ever coming home and settling on the new planet with the embryos. Instead, thats an afterthought.

Then have his daughter still save the planet, get over his death, and on he deathbed receive a message at last that the new planet was colonized. Matt would never know the Earth was saved, she would have her redemption and the film would not have strayed into the surreal.

Here's Why,,,,,,, make of it what you will,, Batman hardly in the film.

Writing in a gap of 8 years for no real reason.

Having Bruce Wayne turn into a self imposed bum during that entire time for no reason.

Writing out any possibility that Batman had any other adventures for no reason.

Using Bane a complete tool without any motivations of his own.

Could they have made the final Bane vs Batman fight any less eventful? It looked like Christian Bale in a costume throwing half hearted slaps, not the highly skilled league of shadows warrior.

Could they have made Bane's death more anticlimactic? I couldn't believe how much I didn't care when it happened.

Could they have made it more obvious that the sealing cops underground scenario was a pure plot convenience to hire less extras and/or allow for Bane to be able to do whatever.

Could Gordan's letter and even his entire "wife left him" back story been made less important? Both were mentioned. Neither mattered in the least.

Loved how the entire concept of martial law was summed up by Scarecrow sitting in a room playing judge. Psyche, that was terrible and cartoonish.

His back is broken!! YES!!!! Awesome. To fix it, let's let him sit around doing nothing for 40 minutes of film after which the back will be fixed magically with no ill effect. Oh yeah his bum legs will be magically healed as well. As a matter of fact all of these ill effects have absolutely no bearing on the plot whatsoever. Great writing Nolan. Thanks.

Let's also try our hardest to make this 3rd film feel instead like the 5th sequel to film 1, with as large of a sense of several missing films in between as possible, while making sure that film 2 feels as irrelevant to what's going on as possible. Have you ever seen a void of story feel more important than the actual story that had been told at that point? Now you have.

First things first. Not bad. For what it is.

It's a shootemup, just as advertised, and to the positive it does well in the first half of making you care about the 2 main characters. Anderson is cool, and I left wishing that I knew more about her. The same with Dredd. Anderson specifically had some great development, first tentative, then regretful in killing, and then realizing the necessity of it all and becoming confident in her decision making. Dredd forcing her to make the decisions was a conceptual touch which was excellently handled.

I recommend having at least 2 drinks as I did while watching, as it is one of those films that begs for you to experience it in such a way. Pot might actually help if you are so persuaded.

The violence is pretty well handled, especially the skinning at the beginning and the flaming head of the opening scene. I loved the guy smashing into the windshield also.

I also enjoyed the setup for how they got trapped in this damn building. Mama didn't just trap judges, as Dredd later explains she would have gladly let them go. She did it so that the man they took prisoner wouldn't spill the beans on her operations and honestly the sequence of events leading to this decision was nicely done.

After that, there isn't a whole lot else to be said to the positive.

It degenerates in the second half as though they were trying to finish the movie off as fast as they could without thinking about it.

The most egregious example is mamas death. The most undramatic death I've ever seen for a bad guy/girl. I almost thought I was watching My Little Pony for a moment as she floated in a cloud of colored sparkles for what seemed like forever before disappearing in the least violent way possible given a head first landing from a kilometer up. Didn't I deserve a better payoff? And what was up with the heart rate bomb? Way to plant that seed 2 seconds before it was used, and then have it not really matter at all. I guess they were trying to look for more of a purpose to simply throwing her off the building when that was the only logical and obvious thing to do from the beginning. So in order to act as though there were more to it and that they were thinking outside the box (which they weren't) they ham fisted this heart rate bomb into the fall when it would have been the same scene whether it was there or not. Did Dredd need that as a reason to throw her off? I guess so.

Anyway the whole firing gatling guns across the corridor scene along with the evil Judge scene were just kind of extraneous. He gets out of the way of course and then fights off the evil good guys naturally. The funny part was that the evil good guy had him dead to rights, but instead of just shooting him he basically invites him to drinks and I don't know what the hell he was thinking was going to happen but he gets his ass kicked for being an idiot.

The second most egregious example of racing to the end is having the build up to a big Anderson vs. Female Judge moment which lasts 4 seconds and doesn't matter. No payoff to that. A complete waste.

All in all the evil Judges showed up just to fill in time.

And somebody remind me how Dredd survived a bullet that left a 4 inch diameter hole in a concrete wall? I was sure that was a dream sequence, but nope. He survived a kidney shot from a cannon. Very impressive.

Then of course the big battle with Mama's henchman is completely missing. Dredd and Anderson kill the last few people as though they were peons before Mama reveals what is supposed to be her big suspenseful wrist band bomb, and the film ends.

It's OK. A good watch if you're drunk or high. If you're a big fan it's as much as could be possibly hoped for, meaning that it's really a cliché' future film without out any real inspiring concept to speak of, but done as good as possible. I do think it's better than Blade Runner however, although that film did have a more interesting concept. Dredd is simply better handled and I wish the two could be married.

One funny note. My wife immediately said Robocop when she saw me watching it. And we all know how crap that series was.

But films like Dark City did far more at building suspense and intensity. And that film did far more at building a world as well. Mega City one is only half interesting, as the movie left no clue why this city really existed or what had happened, or if the characters knew or didn't. It would have been more interesting to know that they didn't know why the world was the way it was than the film just not caring whether they did or not.

So all in all, thinking back on people saying they saw this 3 and 4 and 5 times in theater, I have no idea why. It's a fun mindless watch once film. That would be understandable. Why you would see this again I have no idea.

I give it a 5/10. Maybe a 6 if I'm being generous.

And now you know that I have been fair, and that this is the truth of what this film is.

It did feel like Stanger Tides was actually part 5, and we skipped over part 4.

First off, I'll say the film was solid. The mermaid sequences were stunning, Blackbeard was stellar in every way, and I loved the twist ending with the surprise motivation of the Spanish.

But as for the rushed feeling, for one, there are a number of things we are just told to accept from the beginning of the film such as Barbossa having the peg leg and being in the British service,,,,, OK,,, perhaps not that big of a deal, but what about this, Cruz's character has come to accept Black Beard as her father. Fair enough, but wouldn't that have been much more powerful if we had gotten to know each character first and then in a "Luke I am your father" moment seen her learn that he was in fact her father. Instead, we're just told that she's learned this and any build up to the discovery is hacked off at the knees.

But more importantly perhaps was the lack of character development in some areas. Most specifically with our new priest. Why was he there again? It's not really clear. And for the love story between he and the mermaid, which was in effect taking the place of the displaced couple of previous films, the pair felt extremely underdeveloped.

Likewise was the back story of Cruz and Depp. I mean it was there, they did mention it, but it just didn't really resonate as significant.

NOW, those two issues can be resolved by a future film, and should a 5th film bulk up the characters of Cruz & the priest and their motivations and/or relationship with Depp, then this film will grow stronger in retrospect, but as it stands now, it just felt like either they were underdeveloped, or that their back story deserved more than an "oh by the way" and perhaps should have been explored previously, before embarking on this story itself.

Plot Synopsis:

Lily tries out and gets the lead role. She freaks out about it. The end.

Review:

That's all that happened. Nothing else. That's it. She tried out for the role. Got it. Practiced a bunch, and stressed about it. That's all that happened. I heard a lot of people saying it's freaky and will leave you wondering what happened and I thought they meant in a Pulp Fiction kind of way, but NO,,,, it's in a NOTHING HAPPENED kind of way. Seriously, nothing happens. I don't get the hype.

When I say it was too politically charged, what I mean is, is that there was clear message that Insurance people are just a bunch of evil parasites who are nothing less than murderers.

I mean if you believe that, I don't know what to tell you but the message was portrayed in such an over the top manner as to be quite annoying. It was hammered into you in nearly every scene. John brings up the cliché'd yet flawed logic that other countries have significantly better healthcare systems by identifying that some eastern countries have you pay when you're healthy, instead of when you're sick. I failed to see the point because either way you have to pay correct? Regardless it hardly seemed worthy that this man should die due to the system in place here.

And the portrayal that all insurers have in place a team whose sole mission it is to deny your coverage based on any little picky discrpancy on your application is paranoid at best and quite unbelievable.

Likewise the criticism of the insurance formala is ridiculous. Does John realize the goal of an insurance company is to make money? It's a business afterall. They aren't going to pay him $300,000 for his treatment if they only expect to recover $30,000 over his life in premiums. Would you take a $270,000 loss? Insurers aren't charities. They aren't morally bound to pay for everything you need just because you want them to.

So all in all the whole demonization of this guy as an insurance provider is laughable. I love my insurance, it's been great. Now when they make a saw about trapping my politician who voted for higher taxes and trying terrorists in US civilian courts, then I'll take a look.

Taken by itself "Hannibal Rising" is an above average film with great cinematography, decent acting, and a good storyline. A story like this however has a lot not only to live up to, but also to build upon, and in this regard it is often hard to recognize this Hannibal from cannibal we've all grown to love.

The most positive point of this film is that we get to understand Hannibal's fragile psyche through the tragedies of his early life, the death of his sister in particular. This moment gave him both motive to become the killer we know as well as exposing him to canibalism for the first time.

What we don't understand from this film is why he chose canibalism as a way of life. This is a revenge film, and it's never clear why after he completes his revenge Hannibal continues his path of murder. It is implied that simply no humanity is left, but at no point in the picture is Hannibal interested in taking innocent lives, and so one has to wonder how he choose to do that later.

Also present his Hannibal's early life in Medicine. To compliment that we would expect to get a taste of his love for language, but that is never seen ether. The poetic Hannibal who is smart and manipulative never shows up in this film, and it's hard to believe that this soft spoken boy becomes the outlandishly clever man who was locked in a basement with Clarice.

What is present however is perhaps the genesis of Hannibal's later love for Clarice. Taken out of context Clarice might very well represent Hannibal's need for an adult version of his sister, and may well have played that part in his later life. I appreciated seeing that as it does give a bit of a boost in meaning to Clarice's role in the early films, and answers the question of why he felt so attached to her.

Overall this is a slightly better than average film, but the flux in continuity of character is a bit hard to swallow. I knock it down a point on that alone. The better points of the film are to be expected, however they were done very nicely.

It's exactly what it needed to be. Marvel pumps out 3 movies a year. 2 big ones, and a third movie just to be there. Ghost rider was that 3rd film and in that respect it was good. Spidey and Fantastic 4 will presumably be movies you could rank at 8 or 9, which makes ghost riders score of 6 very appropriate. It' better than average but not spectacular. Check it out at the dollar theater. Buy it if you're collect comic films.

As for the movie itself, I felt the impersonation of Mephisto was good. He was demonic enough without being over the top. The 3 goons who are pawns of Blackheart wind up as lame challenges. None of them present much of a challenge to Ghost Rider.

I give it a 7. It was a decidedly good movie, just not one in a genre that I usually watch. It's a love story, and so I dock it a point for that. It's not a classic by any means and so I dock it a point for that. Also there are some weird subtleties that I don't particularly like. For all of it's wisdom there is no explanation at all for how the letters are able to traverse time. That's probably the most obvious. Also I'm not really sure how reeves was dumb enough to get run over by a bus just before he finally met the girl he'd waited for, for 2 years. So I dock it another point for those minor points, and well I guess just because it's a love story. yeah I know that's 2 points for love, but that's what I'm giving it. Ordinarily I'd give a love story a 5 as a ceiling score so consider that it actually received 2 bonus points. Not bad ehh? It scores high with it's symbolism. The highlight of the movie was the climax at the end, where the girl tries desperately to save his life, when she realizes that she's ignored the only important detail of the story. It was a fantastic ending.

The telling portion of the story though came when keanu was talking with his brother on the roof and explained to him the symbolism of the house itself. How it doesn't relate to nature in the fact that you can't access the outside invironment in anyway. No stairs leading to the water, no windows to open. It's just glass, and while you can view all that's going on around you, you can't touch it, or sense it in any other way. For those unexperienced with what architecture really is, that is it. What does a building mean, and those lines in the movie explained it well.

Still, there's no explanation as to how the building, while it relates to the deterioration of keanu's family life, relates to his newest relationship with his future girl. I suppose the solitude of the structure allows him the opportunity for introspection, and that introspetion allows each of them to focus on what they really want, which turns out to be each other, but an explanation would have been nice.

You have to love the dog.

How much better does it get when Superman hugs the front of the plane and lands it in the infield of "I guess is was the Mets" stadium. Thousands of fans cheering for a hero they haven't seen for years, doing something so amazing that they had never seen before. It was an incredible scene, that brought a bit of a tear to my eye, but only for the power of the moment. Fantastic.

And how great was Kevin Spacey? He stole the show, a perfect Lex Luther. He was evil, he was appropriately funny, and he was just plain entertaining from start to finish.

The plan was perfect, using the crystal with the kryptonite, the addition of his son was interesting, and louis lane angle was thoughtful.

All in all I couldn't have expected better.

I do give it an 8 for a few petty reasons though.

First, and I could be wrong, but In all my reviews of comics, I've never known of Superman to have a son, a pretty big departure. Where are they going with this? I found it interesting as a story, but I had to give that a hum? Secondly, Brandon Ruth has no lines. He practically says nothing, except towards the end of the film where he delivers a good speech to his son. That was powerful. But the rest of the time. He poses really, but says nothing else that was very effective or even memorable. On the other hand, it worked, so maybe they were avoiding ruining the movie with too much dialogue. The Character was still good, but that for me was noticeable, as was the fact that the Clark Kent portion of his character was entirely useless. Really he didn't do a thing.

Lastly, I've been waiting patiently for an actual superman villain. Where is Darkseid? Bring out somebody, ala Zod, for him to fight with. Luther is good, but a God vs. wiley normal guy isn't as exciting as it could be.

But who cares about those. The movie was great. I give it a solid 8, and perhaps a little more. It's not a 9, but it was very good. I'd say in all honesty, X1 & 2, Spidey 1 & 2, and Batman Begins all beat it, but it's just behind those, better than Punisher, Hulk, X3, the original batmans, and possibly even it's own predecessors.

One more note, they did a wonderful job portraying him is a dedicated protector of the planet.

And lastly, How great was the Spidey 3 promo. Who can wait for that. It looks killer.

It was alright. A little thin, yes you don't have any idea what the phoenix is really doing, but I think you can chalk that up to her character being both confused and out of control. Sure they kill of cyclops, but you didn't actually see him die, and jean doesn't visually remember him dying, so perhaps he's still around. And although wolverine kills the phoenix is an awesome seen, come on, she's the phoenix, she could rise again.

The cure story line works, but it does seem to be missing something. I almost wanted to seen a scene where they found the boy, or more about rogues involvement. Perhaps there are extended scenes on the DVD which will help with this.

I saw somebody mention that Juggernaugt and Multiple Man join the cause for no particular reason. Yeah that's about right. But again you could chalk that up to the fact that Magneto rescued you. I mean if you were imprisoned and somebody rescued you, would you not help them out regardless? You probably would. How far was wolverine from helping magneto in the first movie? Go back and watch it, he could have been pushed to the dark side given slightly different circumstances.

So it's unpolished, this movie, but it's not bad, and it's a must see if you watch comic movies. It's certainly not as bad as Daredevil and Electra, but expect it to be subpar to any of the spidey or x-men flicks. Just go watch it.

Ask yourself this question. Would you care about the personal life of the person next to you when your options are swim or drown? No! you wouldn't. That's why it's amusing to me that this movie is getting lower ratings because of the fact that there's no story build up. If you ask me, these types of movies get too much story buildup. Poseidon focuses on what the characters focus on, survival. The perfect display of this is the scene where an otherwise wholesome character kicks another good character down an elevator shaft to avoid both of them dying. Isn't that what you would do? Yes it is. This movie is brave enough to not save everybody, to not have very many heroes, and to have it's characters act as a real person might act. There was no worse seen in movie history that during volcano, when a man jumps into a flaming pit of lava to save an unconscious person who he doesn't even know. What was the point? A real person says, well I'm safe, and he's unconscious so he won't feel it anyway, therefore I'm leaving. That's what a real person would do, and that's what this movie does. It gives real terror, and real reactions without a bunch of contrived sappy moments. I say good work.

This movie really reminds me of edwards sissorhands,,, hummm i wonder why. It's very good in a legitimate way, but the worlds that Burton bring you too are always far enough off the edge of reality that they're hard for me personally to connect to.

As with Edward Sissorhands, the movie is very meloncholly, as it takes you completely through the journey of one mans life. Do yourself a favor and watch "The Last Emperor" and you'll see what I mean. There is a very depressing feeling about watching a story that begins with a man being born and ends with him dying, all the while you see all of the significant things that he did with his life. At the end, you don't say "Wow that was good", you say, "Well, I guess that's the end" The film is excellent though and should be watched by all. It is a very human story, and probably is the best I've ever seen and presenting a human story while mixing in fantastical elements. This is down as the fantastical elements are revealed in flashbacks which are forewarned as being overly dramatic.

Great Great,,, watch it,,,,, you'll probably give it more than a 7!!!!

I wanted to see this movie so bad. I'm not a huge vigo fan, but he definitely deserves a chance to be a mainstay actor, so I've watched the movies he's released since the Rings's movies.

The premise of this movie is good. It intends to relate the common human experience to the nature of violence and how we perceive it in contemporary society.

The first 30 minutes of this film do just that. We see Tom (Vigo) as a common small town middle class man, who works hard to maintain a small but popular diner amongst the locals. He has a standard American family, and overall he is just what everybody in America would like to be. He has a great life.

Then tragedy stikes him, but he comes out on the good end. He is shaken by an attempted robbery on his diner, which he thwarts by leaping into heroic action, whereby he kills the assailants.

This event happen in the first 20 minutes of the film, and undoubtedly, this is the climax of the film. From here, Tom and his family try to reconcile the traumatic events, but when Harris's character arrives to insinutate that Tom isn't who he says he is, the intent of the movie is washed away when Tom reveals that he actually isn't who he says he was.

From here on out the movie completely removes itself from the guiding principle of peaceful man vs. violence, and instead embraces the violence outright. With seemingly no emotion one way or the other, Tom commits one violent act after another. An oddly placed sex seen in which tom and his loving wife beat each other before getting it on gives way to greusome death scenes which are symbolic of the films move from principle to imagery.

What they wanted to do, was show that Tom could not escape his past, but what is left out, is why Tom left that past exactly in the first place, whether or not he was multiple personality or just a good liar, why his wife took him back in the end, why he showed no signs of knowing who Ed Harris's character was until much later, and even then to no dramatic effect, and several other details.

The movie just simply falls thin of it's own intent, as though the writer/director, became more intranced with the gore effects than concentrating on the overall movement of the story.

Even the "climactic" seen with his brother, which is horrifically acted, shows no sign of emotion, and in the end we know very little about the circumstance surrounding Tom and his mob roots. Who was he? Why was he doing all this? How did he get good at fighting? We simply do not know. So much more could have been put into this film that had so much promise. Somebody should take this idea and run in a new direction with it. It really is a good concept.

Good film, and enjoyable. WARING THOUGH: YOU MUST HAVE SEEN THE FIRST ONE.

THE GOODS: Kate Beckinsale looks hotter without her hot leather outfit The film picks up immediately after the first one, and i mean immediately. The story flows directly together as one cohesive unit while revealing new details about the underlworld,,, umm,, uhh,,, world.

Kate Beckinsale looks hotter without her hot leather outfit Michael has a great scene where he tests the nature of being a vampire by eating real food. I thought this was actually a very good touch. What does happen? It's a good thing to draw you into the pros and cons of being a vampire. Michael is just a great character anyway. he's strong but submissive and trusting. He knows that he is the rookie, but he uses his strength like a pro.

Kate Beckinsale looks hotter without her hot leather outfit.

The action is good, the visual looks of the creatures is good, the feel of the film is good, the acting, the direcing, etc. All of it is good.

Also, the revelation of the more ancient history of the vampires is very interesting, and is really what i went to see the movie for. I love vampire flicks for their history, I mean, you have an immortal creature. Just imagine what they've seen in their time, and how much their life has changed over the course of their history. What would a man born five thousand years ago think of this day and age. It's an intriguing thought, and the movie does a good job of approaching those issues. Should there be a third film, they'll likely need to relay on that idea.

Oh and trust me, Kate Beckinsale is hotter without her hot leather outfit on.

THE BADS: Once again, this film kills off nearly every major character. I haven't quite understood that yet, it seems silly. A: you've destroyed anything you've created to build on. B: what is the likelihood that now dozens of these immortal creatures, who have lived for centuries upon centuries, have all died withing weeks of each other. It just seems chaotic. I really don't know where else they can go with future films, unless they just aren't planning on it. They'll have to invent some people we've never heard of before.

The intesity that you felt with michaels character from the first one isn't there anymore. How great was it to watch michael running away from shoot out after shoot out. I mean think about it. He was going to get on a train. All of a sudden there's a shootout. Then his house is broken into, selene captures him, some crazy looking guy bites the heck out of him in the elevator, he wakes up to a snarling vampire, he jumps out a two story window, dogs chase him, more shooting, he gets in a major car wreck, he gets thrown out of a window, some crazy guys abduct him, etc. etc. etc. This doesn't really exist at all in the 2nd film.

So watch it for what it is.

all of the scenes with naomi and kong were great. their attachment was don't superbly. her relationship with her homosapian love interest was done spectacularly as well. however,,,, Jack Black was terrible I thought. His character was sorely underdeveloped, and he just isn't an actor you can take seriously. You never know where he gets the map from for the island, you don't have any idea what the movie he is filming is about, and i guess he's fearless because he's more concerned about his camera than falling a hundred feet off a log that kong is shaking, and into a pit of giant insects. there are too many ridiculous things that happen too. dinosaurs fighting in a tangled web of vines hundreds of feet in the air, men running side by side with a stampede of brontasaurus, etc. etc. it's just campy. The 70's kong had better dialogue, and a better ending with kong's heartbeat fading away. I don't think the ending to this one was anything to write home about. Also the natives in this one just fade away and are never heard from again. It's bizarre, although they are scary as all hell, which was a plus. I give this an objective opinion of a 6. I was thinking 7, but there are honestly too many shortcomings. It's better than average, but well short of what it could have been.

This is one of those movies that seems really great, feels really great, and is really great, but when you look back on it, it just doesn't add up. You kind of have this, "so what" feeling. Don't get me wrong. It was enjoyable, creepy and tense, with appropriate character development. There was acceptable acting, and a neat script with some clever hocus pocus elements, but they all tied together like a flat soda. There just wasn't any fizz. Actually I recommend watching this movie, and the book would probably fill you in on the rest of it that wasn't filmed quite nicely. Spoilers forthcoming: So the ship was from the future, ooooh ahhhh, and? So the sphere had some kind of psychological impact on them. What this was or why we don't know. Was the sphere alive? Who knowns, we come to find out that the only talking it does is actually another character talking through the sphere, and the sphere itself. Where does it come from? Another mystery. Again, I liked it, and I understand and appreciate the ambiguity of the concept, but it was just too much. In the end you didn't know anything that you didn't already know in the first 20 minutes. It's like the movie says, "Hey, what's going on here?" and then answers itself, "fooled you, there's nothing going on at all! We really had you going there." Watch the Abyss. It's a far superior film. Either version.

Stellar is the only word to use for this perfection of film. Nothing I have ever seen compares. You follow the life of one man, literally from birth to death, and in that time you see glory, sadness, vulnerability, love, anger, and all of the other emotions that cover the spectrum of human emotion. The direction, the script, the acting, it is all flawless, as though you were really watching the events of this man unfold in real life, and by the end, you will have a new perspective on the concept of what a human life can mean. Not many films have that power. There is nothing more passionate in film that to watch the young emperor run after his mother. There is nothing more triumphant that to see him set out to right the wrongs of his empire. And there is nothing more sad than to see him aged and powerless, returning the ruins of a place which had once been his entire world.