Change Your Image
almagz
Reviews
Cloverfield (2008)
Mr. Toad's Wild Ride
Attach a video camera to the belly of a chimpanzee using lots of duck tape. Let it loose in some yuppie party where no one appears to be really interested in each other, much less interest the audience.
Gorge yourself on nostril shots, bun shots, ceiling shots, anything in short that a chimpanzee's bellybutton could possibly focus on for a split second. Let the camera fall off , it won't be noticed-strap it back on. Allow this to take up a half hour of film.
Fighting nausea and motion sickness, follow these in-significants out on the street. Congratulate yourself, you are now one of them. Godzilla is out there somewhere and this one spawns little friends.
I can't think of how anyone could write a spoiler for this Junior College grade idiocy.
Solaris (2002)
Was all that footage necessary?
Not having read the book, I cannot direct my comments in terms relative to original excellence etc. I saw a movie, pure and simple and it stands on its own for me.It is a pretentious philosophical sci-fi psychodrama suffering from endless views of a lady's profile (with no apparent purpose) and of the main hero sweating in his wife-beater shirt or showing his buttocks, that was frankly far from scary and just plain boring. It also suffers from what I call the 2001 malaise, that is an ending that is just as much subject to individual interpretation as it is a loose end that appears to need tying. An intellectual challenge? Only if one decides to make it so, and I was hardly inspired to do so.
The (real) characters never appear to be in any actual physical danger. The only thing threatened is their ability to distinguish real from unreal etc. or figuring out a reason for the whole mess. This movie could have been aptly titled "Confused." Considering how much of its running time is cluttered with filler love-making scenes and somewhat obscure fade backs, it could have been better done as a much shorter Twilight Zone episode where the uncertainty of an ending has always been at its best. Too much film wasted on facial closeups and not enough on a better evolution of the story line. The things that will stick with me longest about this movie is probably the hump on Natasha's nose.
O Convento (1995)
Another very naked emperor
Uh? I recommend watching this movie six times in succession if you really think you must honestly understand it. Once was too many times for me. First of all, there is no indication this took place in a convent, at best it is a monastery. Nuns do not have those libraries and there is little indication the feminine presence was accommodated in many other ways.
The photography may be worthy, but it comes as a complete surprise to me that this movie was preceded by any kind of written guideline. If I had to guess, I would have thought that a director, producer or something and his entourage stumbled on a picturesque location while on a wine tasting tour and decided then and there to call in some uncommitted actors and cameramen and just wing it.
The researcher is constantly reading and doing mysterious things on his computer. The deep philosophical conversations with no apparent purpose remind me of Junior HIgh school conversations I used to have with my more gifted friends. The ending? Who knows? Frankly, who cared by then? If I had been present, my urge would have been to follow somebody, anyone to their lair and make sure that any unused remaining film was destroyed.
The Descent (2005)
Feminism encounters gore
It is nice to now that women don't need men around in order to be satisfactorily terrorized. Saw the flick on my DVD player and my lady and I alternated between 3 and 4X speed so we might have missed some of the plot development leading up to the gruesome blood orgy. When we finally settled on regular speed I could not help but muse that all their monsterness notwithstanding, most of the terrors still maintained somewhat male characteristics. Was there a subliminal message there?
Possibly I was trying to read too much into it. This was EC comics pure and simple, only without that scattering of voluptuous T & A interspersed in order to appeal to the puberty driven young males such as myself who bought those comics before they were banned by an act of Congress. I guess I am just still a prurient teen-age male at heart. Without the T & A it just didn't cut it.
Color me immature and a chauvinist etc. How about doing "Flesh-eaters of the Moulin Rouge" next?
The Wicker Man (2006)
Too many loose ends?
I saw both versions and though there may have been differences in the presentation of details, neither one really connected the beginning to the middle to the end of this movie. The more one tries to make a linear, coherent story line out it, the more one becomes aware that there are additional little "loose ends" apparently just thrown in to "hang."
Was the sheriff being tested to see how far he was willing to go in saving a child in the beginning? Could he not have been contacted to start the search just on the basis that he had already been chosen to be the father years earlier? Since no bodies were found in the wreck, are we to assume that these particular Wicca actually possessed supernatural powers? When our hero inquires about what happens to male offspring he accepts the non-answer without a blink. Is finding a missing girl more important than uncovering continuous infanticide? What is the connection with the doll and the red dress all about anyway? Does the woman out farming that appears to be almost identical to the schoolteacher indicate another unexplained mystery? Is that the old man that flew him lying in that bed and just why is he there? Or is he instead the one with the bloodied face he finds on the beach?
I just don't have the time to view both versions again to see if I have missed some of the connections. I also don't care of I had failed to view them the first time. A bit of a disappointment. The alternate ending with the two women apparently out to get pregnant in the outside world is either an poor set-up for a sequel or merely an indication that the kook group is getting prepared for some future bad crop. But then of course that's the way everyone gets pregnant in that society-or is it? By now do we care?
The Pink Panther (2006)
Why Call it Pink Panther?
First let me state I am sort of Steve Martin fan. Sad to say, I am almost sorry he made this movie. Whereas Agent 007 was more or less defined by the writer and subject to cosmetically varied renditions, Inspector Clouseau is a character almost exclusively created by its principal portrayer, the late Peter Sellers. To those of us who are old enough to have appreciated the latter, this movie is almost certain to disappoint if we are expecting a reincarnation of sorts. The Steve Martin offering should be evaluated and left as a one-shot, somewhat funny on its own merits and hardly the building block for sequels. Steve Martin is a zany and multi- talented comic, but let's face it, all he can successfully create is a Steve Martin character in a different role and setting.
The painfully choppy and very uneven beginning is possibly due in part to Martin's uncertainty about exactly what was expected of him and his discomfort at the unfair challenge presented. He knew that many eventual viewers would be expecting to see more than just him playing the part of a bumbling fool, but also playing the part of a Sellers playing that flagship comedic role. In the first stages, I could not help but identify elements of Ernie Kovacs and specifically his Dovetonsils Poet Laureate character. Martin was reaching for what he had not apparently decided, and all he was giving us was an affected fop. Problem is, the Clouseau we had come to be fond of was not of all things, a fop.
IC(Clouseau) was a seriously intent misfit whose self-esteem was not matched by his capabilities. There seemed to be a cloud hanging over his head and at times reminded us of the Sad Sack of comics. Sellers managed to make the character expressive in the unspoken second take, giving the look of utter and complete disorientation at the unfortunate turn of events at times underplaying the role in the midst of every conceivable misfortune, and then returning doggedly to eventually triumph through no merit of his own. He was a Chaplineque Oedipus pursued by the Furies. Martin on the other hand grins, clown, exaggerates at a more vaudevillian level. Steve Martin is after all Steve Martin, a ham, and always begging for the laugh.
The movie does get a bit better as Martin seems to give up searching for the desired impression and settles down to more or less himself. There are occasional moments of coincidental Seller-like gags, such as when the character suddenly gets up just as he is about to be kissed. The worthless vase destroying the priceless table is another, so is the cut chandelier etc. but these moments are not to be expected. Most disappointing are the too- obvious parallel substitutions made for the original. Looking behind the drapes just doesn't come up to entering the apartment looking out for Kato. The mayhem between Sellers and his suffering Oriental sidekick at times had us almost rolling on the ground laughing, that of Martin and his French "partner" never gets beyond the Three Stooges level. His superior, rather than the criminal seems to have the primary agenda, and the former thereby loses some of his credibility as a primary indirect victim of IC's ineptitude as in the originals. The hospital scene is of anything overdone, but does it evoke our sympathy along with the laugh? No, not really.
Summarizing, the movie is funny enough and keeps one's attention level with sufficient gags to make up for its creative and/or imitative flaws. Chances are that if this had not been a hybrid of sorts and a purer vehicle for Martin's talents it would have been funnier. Whoever thought that the movie would benefit from associating it with the original concept made one major mistake at the outset. Those they may be drawn to see it because of its title do so only because they have seen and enjoyed the originals, and on that basis are also the least likely to recommend this rendition to others. Oh well!
Transamerica (2005)
Definitely Worth Seeing
A wonderful movie addressing one of the more sensitive personal issues of our time. The plot is intelligently complex but honestly up front avoiding the often merely pretentious vagary of certain "art" films. The characters are more than adequately developed and the performance by the female lead is Oscar-worthy.
Unlike Brokeback Mountain, this offering dealing with yet another aspect of the alternate life- style does not limit itself to clandestine sex and roughly sketched personal unhappiness set against a background of majestic natural scenery. The story keeps moving, painting a clearer, more detailed image of the troubled, conflicted and even tortured souls in their quest for identity, recognition and ultimately respect. Most beautifully, even when it is over it makes one think, empathize, and seek to understand.
I actually look forward to seeing this movie a second time, after a timely interval, because the wealth of personal relationships and their interwoven complexities presented deserves it. This movie is not to be judged as part of any agenda or crusade. It is just plainly well done. Produced at 1/14th the budget of BM it also received nowhere the hype of the latter. Time will prove which of the two has the real lasting power.
L'âge d'or (1930)
Someone Is Bound to Like This
When something can be anything you want it to be or mean, it's bound to register with someone as being rather special. But just as the shape of a cloud in the sky may appear to one of us or remind us of a battleship, and to another of his aunt's rear, and yet to another absolutely nothing other than a cloud, this does not make this cloud meaningful except for the viewers' interpretation. Anyone who might find throwing a stuffed giraffe out of a window brilliant, or worthwhile for that matter, without relating it in some context, is possibly merely trying to impress us with his or her intellectuality.
Submitting to this movie as the dreams of a madman does quite nicely, especially since there is no standard or expectation for what said dreams would be like, and even if we were mad ourselves, this would hardly give us sane reference points for comparison. A love affair with this movie entails the same risk as seriously interpreting Nostradamus. Whatever real meaning was being conveyed at the time might be buried in the private jokes, musings, or provincial minutiae of its day, and to a select few radical intellectuals at that! I did spot a bit of an agenda even with my limited capacity though.
The movie is definitely anti-Fascist and to some extent anti-Italian. I noted that although the years 1929-30 were years of great public works and urban renewal in Italy, any indication of this seemed avoided. Furthermore, (avant-guarde academic spinners take note of this for your next class) the very short cropped haired man with the mustache in the party segment near the end is a caricature of Victor Emmanuel III and his tall female companion none other than Queen Helen, formerly Princess of Montenegro. Without an understanding of potential historical relevance, even the apparent irrelevance is beyond the competence of academic or other intellectual poseurs who would bask in irrelevance to impress us.
I gladly add my own paint buckets to the defacement of this cinematic joke. But in an adaptation of the famous mot by the little boy; The movie really has no face (to deface). Paint would help it burn though.
Rudy (1993)
Beyond the Individual
Rather than repeat the many parallels to Rocky etc., or concentrate on the underdog prevails theme which is obvious, Rudy's value reaches beyond himself. Football is a team sport and though Rudy may become a mediocre component of the team from a strictly athletic point of view, his dedication and doggedness actually provide the team with an intangible ingredient.
The inspirational speeches Rudy practices repeating early on are more or less done as a fan of Notre Dame. His efforts when actually there transcend the fan and become inspirational by example. The story may be rather simple and the ending predictable, but what's wrong with a true-life based account that makes one feel good? A movie I would recommend dragging one's children to see. They may not like or understand football, but that is not what it is really about. It is about values, and good ones at that.
The chances of this being shown on MTV are slim.
Brokeback Mountain (2005)
The Malborough Man can be gay
Mediocre westerns have been filmed on grandiose backgrounds where majestic mountains and great divides have somewhat compensated for fifteen minute plots where a group of unwashed ragtags eating beans take up an expendable hour getting from point A to point B. To some extent this movie shares that unremarkable distinction.
If the intention of this movie is to present the male homosexual experience in a memorable, unforgettable, landmark way, it fails terribly. Two rednecks with the vision, ambition, and sophistication of one of the Clampetts are brought together carnally as they herd (watch? protect?) sheep in very cold weather. It is the way in which they first get it on that in my opinion dooms this movie to the level of mere fashionable shock. They get it on pure and simple and with the skilled directness of professional porno actors. There is little if any pretense at affection, seduction, exploration, discovery, etc. and the application of spit so artful! I could not help thinking that if it had involved the sheep instead, it might have been done more gracefully.
They drink a lot, swear a lot, complain that sheep-herding and cow-punching is no way to get rich, and apparently get it on a lot since they are rarely near the sheep and their job performance is a bit questionable. The rodeo bit is brought in eventually as another indication (I guess) of men being macho, financial failures, and gay. The author apparently wanted to convey a story of true love being trapped and doomed by circumstances leading to an unhappy ending. Well, Romeo and Juliet this is not. As they lead their separate lives, our two main characters meet to get it on at varying intervals and their get-away love nest gives title to the movie.
The continuous frustration expressed in their inability to conveniently become life partners is not enough to earn them much sympathy with this viewer. The limited diet of their wilderness tryst is a subject at times, but they never bother to fish. Is it that they don't like fish? They ride horses, enjoy the beautiful scenery, discuss how unfair the world is to them, and apparently get it on so much, they don't have time to fish. Thing is, it is the limited scope of their world that is limiting their opportunity. If they truly love each other, why not get away somewhere else-say San Francisco? Is it because there are no sheep or cattle to herd there? Or that there is no need for heavy construction equipment there? It seems that they are more afraid of leaving their redneck environment, then they are of being miserable and horny most of the time.
In the final analysis the movie would have been better titled Redneck Mountain, and the acclaim it may have received is probably in no small way due to the present "correctness" trend in artistic circles. I can't say I was qualified, or interested in judging the actual acting. For one thing it would make a difference knowing whether the protagonists are actually gay or not. Except to those that choose to make this movie a flagship for their cause, I am afraid that the acting performance is doomed to be forgotten.
A tawdry, sad, exploitative movie.
I retrospect I can see that this review will succeed in pleasing almost no one. The true homophobes will feel I am too kind giving it four stars (three are for cinematography) and those desperate or fashionable enough to feel obligated to taking this movie to their heart will think me insensitive, a closet gay-basher or whatever.
Fact is I have no desire to pass judgment or express an opinion on any aspect of the entire alternate sex issue. I am limiting myself to the story and the character development as a worthy movie. Now, the majority of gay people are going to feel committed to seeing this movie for obvious reasons. Certain straights are going to see the movie and force themselves to like it in a patronizing sort of way. I fall in neither of these categories, so I am going to call things as I see them, plain and simple.
The relationship between the two men is never developed past the purely physical. Other than small talk and what they have been doing for a living, one has little idea at what they have to talk about. They are both cheating on their wives and the beautiful mountain location is not the inn of the seventh happiness but merely a far away place to hide their unpopular activities.
The way the children and wives are handled by them is selfish and insensitive. So they are afraid to come out, but other than for the fact that it is inconvenient and possibly dangerous in their circumstances, little else is developed on the subject. Now it isn't as if they have serious careers or other critical factors keeping them from moving elsewhere. Their wives indubitably would be better off without them. So they make (or fail to make) their choices and if I were gay, I would be far from pleased with this movie. On the other hand, if you've decided you're going to like this movie, by all means go see it.
My Blue Heaven (1990)
Zanily Funny
I hadn't even heard of this movie until I stumbled across it on late night TV and found it more than adequately funny. As a Sicilian, I got over any real sensitivity on the mobster subject long ago. The beautiful thing about Martin is that he can be absurd in almost any role he plays and still be likable and funny because of that very absurdity. This allows him to doing characterized spoofs of even evangelists with relative impunity. The magic formula is that just about everything he does in a role would supposedly make one dislike him, but one doesn't.
I am not exactly sure what failed to make this movie more of a box-office success, or why it got so little attention. I would think that there would have been enough Martin fans to give it a good flying send-off and kept it there. Possibly it was due in part to the fact that by the time the movie was made, the movie-going audience demographics had started to change considerably. Adults were becoming more likely to rely on TV and video-tapes for their viewing fare, unless they thought a movie had the scope and grandiosity to benefit from the very large screen. The movie houses depended more and more on the teeny-boppers who relied on them as social outlets or at least just another place away from home(ugh!). And most teeny-boppers lacked many of the points of reference that would make the whole New York/wise guy/FBI/not really bad guy shtick really funny. Then of course it was also the beginning of end-less violence and computer generated special effects which youth saw and popularized as an extension of their video games.
Considering the more recent offerings such as Bewitched, this movie is on a different plateau altogether. If you are in your forties now and have been exposed to the Sopranos, by all means see this movie if you missed it originally. Chances are it will make you laugh, hard. And is that not what a good comedy is supposed to do?
Capote (2005)
Title a bit misleading
Though thanks to this movie I know a bit more about Capote than before I started, this is hardly a biographical movie which should have been more accurately titled :The Writing of In Cold Blood.
Having found the author insufferable during the many years he spent being merely a personality after the completion if this last book, I confess to some bias in his regard. Though I can hardly flaw the acting, the plot is rather limited and slow in its development. In the final analysis, one is left more or less with just a general feeling about our hero(?). The man might have been extremely talented with his use of words, but there is little creativity or imagination that I could find in the writing of his revolutionary(?) non-fiction novel. Capote is similar to a vampire drawing blood from his victim(s) in order to achieve or retain his status. Just a vain, deceitful, despicable little man. It is hard to imagine that anyone actually loved him in his lifetime.
For those that may not be too familiar with his brilliantly imitated style of talking, I recommend watching this movie with subtitles and possibly even turning the sound off.
Eating Raoul (1982)
Murderously Innocent
As we drift further and further from the heyday of swinging (before HIV was a well-known etc.), this movie may lose a bit of its relevance. Still, it will probably remain one of the definitive black comedies of the decade.
The main couple begins and remains sublimely innocent until the end. In a world where everyone is screwing or trying to screw each other, their humble ambition and traditional commitment to each other sets them apart, and makes them actually likable in spite of. . .what they actually do.
It is not really material as to whether the affected characters deserve what they get since rather than real identities, they are portrayed more as individual reflections of a sordid whole. In contrast, our well-defined black heroes endure on to their deserved reward. A must see movie for those who are not satisfied with Jackie Chan humor.
Leonard Part 6 (1987)
Better (worse) than expected.
What did the big time critics expect anyway?
Pink Panther it is not. Matt Helm he is not. Idiotic it is, and that is the primary reason people should choose to see it. I like Cosby because he makes me laugh. The fact that almost everything else in addition to the main character is loony makes the vehicle that much better.
High-brow criticism of this film is a waste, and dishonest. Is there anything more idiotic (and to me irritating) than Three Stooges comedies? Yet some critics have elevated their finger in the eyes, hammer to the head antics to the classic level. Did not Jerry Lewis achieve fame and become an actual icon by usually playing an idiot and sometime spastic? Or leaving the declared comedy genre, is there anything more idiotic than the usual martial arts fare where one man is choreographed to take on twenty adversaries with added sound effects without anyone getting even a nosebleed? Let's get smart here (now that was really idiotic), if you didn't think talking in your shoe in a phone-booth was funny, you have little business going to see this offering.
If there is anything subtle to be dug up out of the inane script, it may be a bashing of the San Francisco/Bay area culture, environmentalists, and social activists-all darlings of the liberal left. Possibly, just possibly, if the script had been bashing Orange County, tel-evangelists, and the military it might have gotten better reviews. If you own any Toxic Avenger titles, then by all means see this movie.
The Cave (2005)
Wasted Photography
After a somewhat promising beginning, this movies settles down to being merely a spelunker's nightmare. This is one of the rare times when the T&A steroid was seriously missed by this viewer. One way to describe this movie would be as a rip-off on Fantastic Journey without R.Welch, without the science fiction and without a clearly defined purpose.
The production values gives the viewer continuous hope that something really exciting is about to happen. To the extent that death can be exciting, or possession by something evil, supernatural, alien etc. one is endlessly strung along until, guess what? The movie is over. A very difficult thing to watch to the finish, whatever it was.
2046 (2004)
Have a good cry.
Great cinematography and character development. Still, I was not easily fooled by the tempest in the teacup aspects of this non-linear doom and gloom epic. The long and short of existentialism and its occasional aficionados is that it remains merely a philosophical scaffolding explaining and justifying the inability (or often the unwillingness) of someone to be happy-or responsible-or constructive-or whatever may be positive.
The little boy in the Emperor's New Clothes said it most succinctly: "But he's not wearing any clothes!" Though I enjoyed the movie, it was more or less out of a morbid curiosity to see how far the director, as apparently there was no writer, was willing to go in challenging us to meet him on some intellectual plateau.
At the end, one is left with a painful knot in his throat and maybe a tear in the eye identifying, at least hypothetically, with a shallow materialist who could not accept the love of possibly one of the most beautiful women in the world and definitely his intellectual equal. So Christ tells Mary Magdelene to get lost and ends up dying on the cross by himself and knowing it could not have been any other way. Why? But why?
Some may say that it was because he saw his lost love as perfect and believed nothing could replace it. It would then be merely a matter of perspective. I, on the other hand find it more plausible that he became enamored with his own great sorrow and narcissistic would not allow anyone else to diminish it. Being a prince in hell has a certain existentialist appeal.
Great stuff for anyone who enjoys going to piano bars to listen to Oscar Levant while crying in his cognac snifter. Not me though. Not for another two plus hours.
Robots (2005)
A little for everyone
The movie was entertaining and the special effects marvelous. Often I rate my movies taking into consideration how often I have to move around in my seat. If I do so too often, it is an indication I would rather be somewhere else, doing something else. This was not the case.
I can't believe that the adult jokes and innuendos are a legitimate cause for controversy. Between MTV, popular music, school and the hood, most eleven and twelve year olds (outside of Amish America) will hardly be tarnished by them. Who Shot Roger Rabbit? may not have had the quips nor the written adult gags but was infinitely more sexually suggestive and ran with a PG rating. If anyone did not understand the adult humor, chances are they did not pay much attention to it, so what's the harm? More importantly for the kiddies, the movie had a moral and a positive one. This cannot be said for most of the blood and gore special-effect laden trash we are constantly being bombarded with.
It is possible the makers of the movie added most of the adult gags to avoid boredom, and who can blame them? Let us nor forget a lot of adults went to see this movie with their children, and were entertained by these "extras." Let's not be sanctimonious hypocrites. It was a movie intended to be enjoyed by the whole family. What's wrong with that?
Bewitched (2005)
Bewitched more like Cursed
I am really not entitled to write a full comment on this movie since I turned it off before it was half over. Someone apparently way over his (their) depth tried to turn a lightweight single-gimmick TV comedy into a "play within a play." The result was hardly Pirandello's "Six Characters in Search of an Author." More like Chevy Chase finds his physical co-ordination meditating in Lhasa, I am afraid.
The losing gamble is in part making the male character the actual lead. The original TV series was successful only because viewers turned on to Samantha for one reason or another. The male lead was a good-natured schnook at best, and when the actor playing the role was changed, a lot of us barely noticed. E. Montgomery twitched her nose, her zany family often interfered, and a lot of us were ashamed to admit we were biding time waiting for Barbara Eden in Genie.
Making the schnook into a schmuck that finds redemption is a dismal failure. From a neutral fixture we now have someone intensely dislikable we are going to eventually like? Truth is, a lot of us just plain disliked him because there was too much of him and with too little to offer.
In the final analysis, female beauty can be shallow, average looking males can't. Maybe the movie could have benefited from the additional casting of Jerry Lewis in his prime. But I doubt it.
Gladiator (2000)
Nitpicking is only criticism
There is so little to find wanting in this film and not wanting to merely repeat its many deserved praises, all I can do is question a couple of historical points.
It is unlikely that a Roman general would be sold into slavery and forced to fight in the arena. Exiled, yes. Killed maybe. Asked to commit suicide to retain his property, most likely.
It is unlikely that he would return to find his family crucified, of all things. Romans were very specific about who got crucified and why. Romans usually avoided it, no matter how cruel the tyrant(?) was.
Roman legionnaires would NEVER have a tattoo unless they were barbarians who got one BEFORE joining a legion. Marking or mutilating the human body was expressedly anti- Roman. No statue or depiction exists of a main-period Roman showing a body-marking. The bonding feature the writer was attempting was an inappropriate borrowing from the 20th century German SS.
Great entertaining movie nonetheless.
Alexander (2004)
A matter of priorities.
In filming an epic about one of undeniably greatest military leaders of all time, it would seem obvious the emphasis should be placed on what may have made him so. A certain amount of creative (or speculative) licence on the part of writer(s) or director is understandable as the former may wish to imprint themselves on the finished product, borrowing, in a matter of speaking on the subject matter's immortality. Alexander's Freudian and bi-sexual aspects in Stone's production encroach so excessively into what may have been our hero's military prowess, that the focus of the entire movie seems greatly misplaced.
Male to male sex in Greek society is a given, even more so if we are going to consider these same men far from home for extended periods of time, in strange lands etc. Leonida's 300 Spartans were 150 pairs of lovers, but once one realizes that most, if not all, Spartan soldiers spent most of their time away from home taking care of each other sexually while their wives, daughters etc. engaged almost exclusively in Lesbian sex in their absence, the sexual habits of the famous 300 loses a lot of its story value. To further illustrate, Ceasar was bisexual and many Roman soldiers resorted to homosexual activity in Gaul and other frontiers because they found it preferable to having sex with local women who, by their standards at least, "smelled bad." Concentrating too much on these sexual aspects in treating either the Battle of Thermopylae or the Gallic Wars would readily be dismissed as "prurient." Why then should Stone's effort be exempt from this accusation?
Alexander's psychological complexities, destined at best to be speculative, result as being more indicative of the filmmakers' confusion than his own. Oedipal elements and accompanying Furies are liberally inserted and reinserted visually telling us he has problem, but when our anti-hero (super-hero-whatever) expresses himself both his speech and/or the excessive background noise negate whatever deeper understanding of the problem was intended . As was probably true, Alexander did draw parallels between himself, Achilles, and Hercules-in the former case maybe going as far as occasionally wearing a lion's skin, but this was if anything the result of already having become a dominant warlike force, not a factor contributing to it. Alexander was the cavalry leader in his father's army, perfected the phalanx, subdued and united (temporarily) Greece, conquered Egypt, founded Alexandria, and later Persepolis. Apparently, these things were not very important to Stone and time will bear out the error of his priorities.
There are nine nominations listed somewhere on here in reference to this movie. Four are, at least to me, rather obscure in source, and unrelated to either acting or script . Five are for the "worst" in an equal number of categories. It easy to dismiss this movie as a major mistake without being an homophobe. All too easy.
Around the World in 80 Days (2004)
Three Stooges meet Tom and Jerry
Mercifully I fell asleep after thirty minutes of this stupid farce. I suspect I will return the DVD without seeing the rest of it though I am a bit curious about the performance of our governor in it.
This movie is representative of the malaise that seems to have infected a goodly percentage of our cinematic product. We have wonderful visual and other technical tools at our disposal but often waste them to bludgeon the viewer with endless car chases, flaming explosions and illusionary martial arts. The result is usually a cross, as is in the case of this movie, between a Three Stooges comedy and a Tom and Jerry cartoon.
Those of us who have progressed to the point where we like to laugh and possibly think at the same time cannot always be soothed by the thought what we're watching has been 'dumbed down' for the family. We're part of the family too, and often are the ones paying for the tickets. This Disney offering falls into the category of those that back in my youth parents used to drop off their children to (usually a matinée and part of a double or even triple feature) along with a dollar each to spend on candy, often to be used as projectiles aimed at fellow attendees. The parents did not usually go with them. It would have given them a headache.
Shame on you Walt Disney, for it was not the children that gave me the headache on this occasion. It was all that mindless stupid action in your movie.
PS I noticed there was an "alternate beginning" choice on the DVD. Was there an "alternate" entire movie as well? Maybe I'll go back and check.