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Jules et Jim (1962)
Don't look too hard for meaning
What pseudointellectual garbage. If you watch this film and want to pull your eye out, because of the disastrously monotonous rhythm or the flat one-dimensional emotionless acting, whether by design or accident, it is perfectly normal for you to do so. Sometimes there's no hidden meaning or allegory, sometimes there's no underlying Godard-esque meaning.
Poirot: Murder on the Orient Express (2010)
Great cast, Brilliant story, Horrible direction = mediocre movie
As an avid Agatha Christie reader, and a long time fan of David Suchet I was awaiting the release of this episode of Poirot for over a year.
I was amazed at how perfectly the actors were casted, so they perfectly fitted Christie's description of them in the book. However, we're talking about a long book that requires time for digestion of details, development, and also to avoid monotonousness in the rhythm of the movie.
Aside from the fact that numerous details of the case were omitted presumably because of time limitations, Poirot's character was perverted with the added religious characteristics (catholic, praying type, etc.) which is not part of the book and the description of character in any of the Christie books. I believe her original ending is much more fitting and in accordance with Poirot's character description.
To this day, I always thought what would have happened if David Suchet had starred in the original 1974 Murder on the Orient Express, instead of Albert Finney, and I can now say for certain that I will never find out! The original enjoyed a great director, an amazing all star cast and enough time for the development of the plot, none of which was present in the 2010 version. I only wish that the great David Suchet was there present in the original.
Iran Is Not the Problem (2008)
Boring and Monotonous
Monotonous, a rather presentation and propaganda like approach as opposed to an upbeat exciting illustration.
I mostly agree with the points made in the movie, but I find it hard for others (who've never heard of this) to follow. As I mentioned the slow rhythm is quite boring and tedious.Some of the experts get away with making statements without any explanations. I find the "clearly, this is so" approach quite unacceptable.
The take home message is that this is not a documentary, but rather a presentation! The filmmakers are using what looks to me like power-point bullet form format for almost the entire time.
I'd give the content an 8 out of 10 but the movie as a whole sucks for the above reasons! Only watch this movie if you have no idea about Iran, or would like to learn of the historical involvement of the US in the middle east in the past and present.
300 (2006)
Extremely weak and corny
I'm not even going to bother with the historical aspects of the movie, because this is a fantasy, and an extremely loose adaptation of the Greek historians account.
I loved the graphics and the battle scenes. Fantastic use of lighting and an excellent job of cinematography.
The story however was extremely weak. You'd think that a great epic battle that has survived more than 2500 years would be portrayed more fully and attractively, but I'm saddened to say that many aspects of the original plot was ignored to make room for an almost completely fighting movie. In addition, I found the entire dialog to be non-original as if it was copy pasted from a bunch of other movies.
I thought the first half an hour of the movie was very decent, it was thereafter that the dialog became extremely repetitive and corny. For instance, Leonidas giving the same speech over and over again in front of his army. Some things didn't even make any sense, as at one point he says something and an hour later he retracts it.
Battle scenes take almost 90% of the movie. I love the battle scenes but after seeing an hour of that I grew tired, to be honest I was bored. I want to see 2 hours of fighting I order a UFC pay per view, when I watch a movie I want a decent plot and turn of events.
Loud and deafening, my friends and I all came out of the movie with headaches, and I'm used to loud sounds and noises. Leonidas especially grows louder and louder by the end, to the point you just don't want to hear him again.
I have no idea what's the purpose of all the ugly faces and lepers in the movie, or the Hunchback of NotreDamme for that matter.
I must say I was disappointed greatly, and do not recommend this movie at all unless you're a guy under 18.
In the end, I must say I can't believe anyone can get offended by this movie, I have read reviews of people from both Greek and Persian backgrounds, and this movie is so ridiculous that can only offend a child. 5 out of 10.
Daei Jan Napoleon (1976)
Brilliant picture based on a brilliant novel
Being born in the post revolutionary Iran, I only heard others sing praises on the excellence of this TV Series; only to find out for myself that not only did it live up to the hype, but more.
The powerful portrayal of the delusional Daii Jan Napoleon by the acting guru Gholamhoessein Naghshineh whose every performance is as colorful as any brings forth a feeling unlike any to this point in Iranian cinema.
The supporting cast is a compilation of the best leading actors Iranian movie-making has seen to date. Keshavarz, Sayyad and Karimi are only few of this star studded cast.
Of course the brilliance of Pezeshkzad's writing is unquestionable, and Taghvai brings this masterpiece to life decently. My only complaints are the dubbed nature of the dialog, awful sound effects and the sloppy editing of the movie, which is understandable due to the limited equipment of Iranian Television and Radio in 1976. Nonetheless the entertainment value of the movie is high enough for the audience to ignore these flaws.
Definitely a must-see 9 out of 10.
Citizen Kane (1941)
I doesn't matter how artistic the movie is as long as it's not fun to watch
I had to watch this movie for a my film1400 in college and fell asleep three times during my first time watching it. Yes, great cinematography, great camera angles, light, bluh bluh bluh, and oh my god it was made in 1941. Bottom line is if you think about whether you'd prefer watching this movie at your leisure over a lower rated movie, like lets say Untouchables 99% of people would choose the latter. Why? because this movie is perhaps the most well-made BORING film of all time. Unless you're trying to find out all the cool movie-making techniques used in the movie, as opposed to paying attention to what's actually going on in the movie you're not going to like this. 5 out of 10 at best!
Meet the Fockers (2004)
What a waste of time
Perhaps the most poorly written movie in which legendary acting icons of Hoffman and DeNiro's caliber star. I don't know what these guys were thinking accepting this movie. Whatever happened to Jake LaMotta's and Rain men and Max Caddy's and Midnight Cowboys? How can these guys have become so desperate that they make a mockery of the career they spent decades building it.
The rest of the cast, excluding Barbara Streisand which I still have respect for (because she's an awesome singer and not just an actor) demonstrate new possibilities in the highest levels of terrible acting. Not only the movie is not funny anymore, it's actually degrading on some levels. "Dina Dina mobina..." Is this supposed to be funny, or the writers were high when they were writing it.
I have no respect for De Niro and Hoffman anymore. It's like you're a fan of these used-to-be-great icons and all of a sudden you're betrayed into learning that these guys have become so low that they rather star in the worst possible movies though with big payoffs than actually taking the time to devote their skills to a project that contributes in a positive way to the industry that helped make them. I hope to see better choices of acting from De Niro and Hoffman, because I still can't accept that they have totally lost their ability to give brilliant performances. Maybe I'm wrong, but the future will tell us.
M - Eine Stadt sucht einen Mörder (1931)
Lorre's best performance
I'd say this movie was one of the best movies right from the beginning of cinema till the 30's, nonetheless an extremely weak movie if one looks at the history of cinema. This movie would be around 999 in my 1000 best films of all time list. Quite frankly there's little to appreciate, except the fact that it has some genuine elements to it that were original, nonetheless they are utilized weakly.
This is my final analysis of this movie and what I think has led to the downfall:
Story: Original for a 1931 movie, some elements of suspense and thrill, but not to the point, (e.g. police procedure throughout the movie and i can see where they wanted to go from that, but it's quite unrealistic and impossible) far fetched, and unbelievable, certainly unfulfilling and boring. Way too much over-explanatory material (at least 40 minutes of the movie is police procedure and meetings that are quite unnecessary about which frankly, the audience couldn't care less) which makes the movie a super sleep pill!
Characters: Almost the entire characters are briefly introduced, we don't really know much about them, thus most of them are impersonal (maybe except Lorre's character, and Elsie's mother)
Direction: As I said the movie does have some elements of suspense, and thrill: e.g. 'M' at the back of Lorre's overcoat, Lorre's whistling, the mother waiting for her child's arrival) which are done perfectly in my opinion, But I can't see how Fritz Lang expected the audience to react watching approx. 40 min. of pointless meetings & conversations e.g. Wernicke reads 6 pages of police reports on the phone for Stein.
Music: The movie has no music, and interestingly enough neither does it any sound effects. Weak!
Camera Work, Cinematography: Camera is shaken continuously throughout the movie, mind you not as an effect but because it's sloppy; the scenes are blurry
Mese En Scene: Very to the point, not much of frame space spent on background, not many close-ups, no music, no sound effects, no added sound except for annoying noises from time to time: e.g. someone screaming, whistling, etc.
Light: A 1931 movie, and not an Orson Welles film so naturally light is terrible, nonetheless expressionistic.
Montage: Just a matter of putting the film together, nothing special
Acting: I give Peter Lorre 8/10 for acting, as he is quite a gifted actor, and his performance at the end is applaud-able. As for the rest of the cast, unbelievable, weak, and quite frankly uninteresting, except maybe for the balloon vendor at the end of the movie!
Novecento (1976)
Expressionism or Nonsense-ism
I'm still furious over the fact that i wasted exactly 255 minutes of my life watching this movie. I can understand this can be shocking considering the cast and the crew involved in the picture. I try to break down the elements that i think has led to the downfalls of this movie:
Direction: From what I have seen from the master filmmaker Bernardo Bertolucci I can say considering his other works, this movie can only be the result of a one-take-per-scene scheme, and seems like director Bertolucci just wanted to get it over with. Not wasting anytime, bad scene? tough? lets go to the next scene, we still got 200 more minutes to shoot!
Story: The story is a major snooze fast; it is impersonal, at times unnecessarily appalling (major rated R for material for no reason) There is no way the viewer can identify with the characters, they have been given little to no depth, we don't really know anything about many of the characters, and why they do certain things, and there are no explanations given for what they do. It is assumed that we are already familiar with the concepts of Padrone, Communism in Italy, and the lives of Peasants and their relationship with the Padrone. So many missing blocks here...!
Acting: I can only say that this movie features one of the best casts in the history of cinema, including greats such as Robert De Niro, Gerard Depardieu, Burt Lancaster, and Donald Sutherland. While the performances are given by such amazing actors, the characters receive little help from direction, montage, and the script!
Music: I consider myself an enormous Ennio Morricone fan; and indeed his music in this movie is quite beautiful as in his other films, however, except in some minor scenes--mostly in the scenes where there's nothing going on--the music is irrelevant to what we see on the scree, mainly because of the soft music (very similar to the Legend of Greensleeves music) we are already falling asleep, even at the peak of the climax scenes and where enormous elements of suspense or shock are present.
Cinematography/Montage/Mese En Scene/Light: To sum up the collective faults of the above elements give the viewer a pure indifference, that is quite inevitable; half way through the movie, (i.e after 2 hours) most viewers merely leave, and the rest furiously continue watching it, just so they never ever have to do it again! Extreme artificial light and contrast is used, to convey allegorical meanings, consistent with Bertolucci's expressionist style. Montage is done by Acralli--a close friend of Bertolucci--it almost contains all the shot footage with nothing to throw out, which makes the movie incredibly long and tedious. As I mentioned before the choice of Mese En Scene is quite inappropriate: e.g. irrelevant music, inappropriate images, unnecessary nudity (including 2-3 scenes of CHILD nudity!) which finally brings us to the last element, cinematography: it is done in the worst possible way, very similar to 'Once Upon A Time In America' use of dead colours, in a blurry, rigid, shaky format!
In the end, I'd like to point out that many scenes and elements of film-making in the movie is set so they convey allegorical meanings and symbolism, which makes the movie incredibly rich, but meanwhile confusing and ambiguous. So if you're a die hard Bertolucci fan give the movie a shot by all means, but make sure you also give a look to Italian History following World War I and the lives of people in the southern Italy. I hope this review help you appreciate the movie better!
The Merchant of Venice (2004)
one pound of flesh
Al pacino is extraordinary, and indeed Oscar should win Al Pacino this year, if it has any credibility at all! To be able to draw such profound emotions from the audiences, both hatred and powerful sympathy. I can't emphasize enough on Pacino's impact on the story. Everyone was just dazzled in the theater as we watched this gorgeous piece of work. Jeremy Irons' Bernardo is fascinating, and his performance not only induces such great force of tragedy and sympathy but extreme frustration which i must admit is brilliant film-making on the part of director of il postino, Michael Radford. This is without a doubt one of the top ten films of 2004. The only criticism as far as i can see is the effect it will have on antisemitic parties, who just await a spark to start their infamous attacks once again as they did for Mel Gibson's The Passion. All i have to say to this film is: Just watch the film for what it it. After years movie makers have finally decided to make this extraordinary work of art, even though it branches on a very negative image for the Pacino as Shylock. Don't do anything you might regret.
Star Wars (1977)
Overrated
In my opinion, Star Wars (1977) -- believed by many to be the film that started it all -- is in fact, a weak microcosm of what 70s Hollywood tried to accomplish, which was producing films such as the mentioned, with blockbuster budgets in light of attracting youngsters to the theater.
Hollywood was quite successful in doing so, however, what has aroused my curiosity is the fact that despite the agreement of most people in the extremely poor quality of the audio/visual effects, the bad acting save the performance by great Alec Guinness, audiences have allowed the mere interesting story that's been as unique as Terminator and Matrix at their corresponding times; in addition the publicity given to Star Wars, aside from what we here from parents --teenagers/early teens of 70s-- effect their judgment.
I saw this film for the 2nd time in my life in the class, and now as a film student, and never in my life have I seen such annoyance caused by ridiculous techniques used to assemble special effects, the horrible noises of the trashcan look alike R2d2, to which so much screen time is given.
In my opinion as a movie fan and student the movie is quite terribly done, and by God don't start with "Well, it's been done 30 years ago!" I still watch Nosferatu form early 90s and enjoy it quite much!