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stevegad
Reviews
Spartacus: Blood and Sand (2010)
I'm sorry Spartacus!
In my original review -based on watching half of the first episode of season one - I lambasted to over-use of CGI and other issues I thought were relevant at the time. I now totally distance myself from that review and after seeing the whole series I am now totally sold on this series. I understand we have the prequel to look forward to in January, followed by season 2 in summer 2011. Fine acting, great writing and more twists and turns than a snake convention, has seen this series go from strength to strength. Anyone looking for a fix of SB&S in the meantime, should see the question and answer session on the official site, where the main actors answer questions, chaired by one of the writers.
As I said in the header, sorry Spartacus, I was wrong about you.
After.Life (2009)
Enjoyable
I have to say I had a ton of reservations when I saw this title, but being something of an eternal optimist, I went ahead anyway. Thankfully, the slightly pedestrian pace is compensated for by the vision of the sultry ms Ricci, lying almost naked on the pathologists table, so the men won't be doing a lot of complaining. A friend of mine was confused about the same part of the movie as my partner and I were, namely the scenes near the end where it seems unclear whether the boyfriend actually makes it to his girl's grave, or really did simply imagine it. Maybe I should watch it again? All in all quite and engaging thriller, with something of a twist.
The Road (2009)
Hard to watch, harder to enjoy.
I feel like I've just watched a completely different movie to most of this site's reviewers. I found the story hard to become immersed in, as I was continually annoyed at the main character's string of bad decisions, bad attitude and apparent obsession with making their situation worse.
If you like a movie that constantly has you going "What?" or "Why the hell would you do that?", then this is for you. Personally - and I may well be missing something - having not read the novel - I found the film difficult to watch, and even more difficult to garner any empathy for the principal character. This is the first movie I've seen, in which I was actually relieved to see the main character die, knowing the boy would be much better off without the neurotic, gun-toting father, dithering between killing them both and hobbling away at the slightest strange noise. Of course, their situation wasn't lost on me, I just watched it as a father with his own son would watch it, and continually disappointing my son with irrational actions and rash decisions, wouldn't be top of my list of things to do, regardless of whether the world as we know it had ended, or not.
Maybe I should read the book, then have a rethink, but I can't see that happening. Not usually given to negativity, and possessing an ability to find the good in most movies - however bad - this just left me feeling frustrated, and when the movie ended with the boy saying his goodbyes to his father, I really didn't care. As the credits rolled, my partner and I both looked at each other, and made that face - you know the one, the WTF? face - not what we'd expected of this movie at all.
This is of course just my opinion, although almost nodding off a couple of times, probably said more than my entire written opinions. I may be missing something special, something so subtle as to slip beneath my radar, but a story that runs so contrary to actions I myself would take, does not make for compelling viewing, it simply made me want to take the lead by the lapels, and give him a good shake. As I say, for me, hard to watch.