Got knocked up with The Sars last week. Here are some movie reviews:
COMEDY
Old School
I wanted mindless entertainment and got it in the jugular. Will Ferrell kills me. Four Stars!
Jackass
This visceral attack on the senses is the bravest comedy of our time. God bless you Spike Jonze! Four Stars!
Human Nature
A straight up masterpiece 'from the mind of Charlie Kauffman,' a phrase rightly equated with greatness these days. I should add that this wasn't a DVD, and I missed the first ten minutes, (which will generally make me love a movie a whole lot more). Four Stars!
PSEUDO INTELLECTUAL CRAP
Full Frontal
Someone find boy-wonder his leash already. He calls Full Frontal one of his most provocative films when plainly, it's his worst. Why is The Limey in this movie? Are film-students supposed to write about why? Is anyone supposed to care? Flatter than the sequel to Week-end At Bernie's and hardly redeemed with its oh-so-dated-and-far-from-risque discourse about the representation of The Black Man in Cinema. Watch the inane improvised character "interviews" to see why screenplays are necessary. Or better yet, don't!
Talk To Her
Well acted, stylistically impressive, thematically cohesive, yet somehow this story about a man who loves his women comatose fell short for me. I wanted it to be more about the female bull-fighters, please.
SPELLBIRD
Catch Me If You Can
It may have been the fever, but I liked it. I don't want to say anything good about it, because it's part of the 'you have to expect it to stink to enjoy it' phenomenon sweeping the nation of late. At 141 minutes, it's the best utterly-bloated Spielberg movie so far, most notable for its up-tempo pacing and the fun in fantasizing about being a disenfranchised 16 year old con-man airline pilot in the late 1960s.
COP MOVIES
Dark Blue
What I don't get is why the guy who wrote Bull Durham would decide to direct a screenplay by the guy who wrote U-571. Dark Blue is apparently based on an Ellroy story, who I always hear great things about, but by the time the hardened racist cop starts about-facing (in dramatic-courtroom-scene-fashion) all I felt was annoyed. It's not only unbelievable and stupid, it's a lie I'm sick of hearing. (Maybe if he was visited by three ghosts in the night or something.)
Narc
Otherwise known as Rush ll. Jason Patric's good at being that conflicted narcotics officer who goes in with good intentions, then loses himself to heroin addiction, all the while being so cool with his smoker's voice, five o'clock shadow, and that whole 'you don't know who I am' attitude so appealing to adolescent boys. Ray Liotta's fat in his role, but he's too much of a nice guy to be Joe-Pesci. It starts and ends impressively well, and plays with your expectations like you'd expect in between. Like an R-rated episode of 'Law & Order: Criminal Intent' with lots of slick crack-using flash-back scenes and brutal stabbings for an image system. Still, on that alleged 'grand scale', I'd have to say it was above average.
Your fever reviews are great!@ I'll be sure to see this Catch-Can picture, it soundz like a laff-riot!
New theory: the excellence of writing increases in proportion to the number of exclamation points!
Posted by: D on July 15, 2003 01:33 PM .So you did get sick last week, eh? was it the smokeasy that put you over the edge? I should hope not...erm... !!!, right?
I've always been fond of exclamation proliferation! You can qualitatively muscle up even the flimsiest of prose! With! The! Inverted! "i"! I! Think! The! English! Language! Should! Do! Some! More! Lingual! Theft! And! Snatch! That! Spanish! Thing! Where! They! Put! An! Upside-down! Exclamation! Mark! At! The! Beginning! Of! Every! Exclamation!
Today! Is! My! Birthday! And! I! Got! Wicked! Drunk! On! My! 2.5 Hour! Lunch! Break!
I wish I could get sick and sit around and watch movies for a week. Godspeed!
Posted by: adampsyche on July 16, 2003 05:59 AM .Lockwood's Long Shot:
The chances of getting eaten up by a lion on Main Street aren't
one in a million, but once would be enough.