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Reviews
What to Do on a Date (1951)
A more innocent time
We follow a young man named Nick, who is aided by his savvy friend Jeff in getting a date with the cut girl next door, named Kay. Of course, to modern eyes, this film seems completely ridiculous, but in 1951 times were much simpler and a "weenie roast" wasn't something people snickered over.
Nick seems to be a socially immature, penny pinching teen who gets dressed by mom in the morning. His friend Jeff carries himself with supreme confidence and seems to realize that dating isn't a bunch of complex games. You'll laugh, you'll cry, you'll thank MST for being there the whole way.
2'd mostly because the acting is truly laughable, the only person who seems to know how to act here is Jeff.
The Lost Battalion (2001)
Good, but not great
This movie was decent in that it displays the carnage of WW1 fairly accurately, particularly the camaraderie shown between soldiers on both sides.. IE when the American private is returned to the 77th to deliver the German terms for surrender and he looks to his German escort and says "So long, buddy", and the German replies "Auf wiedersehen, kamerade". However, while the historical accuracy isn't in question, I'd like to talk more about this piece as a film..
The writers were obviously not New Yorkers. Being a New Yorker myself, I found myself getting irritated with the constant references to New York.. "I'm comin ta gitcha ya Bastards fear the Lower East Side!", or "Right where we're supposed to be, not like you guys like Johns looking for a cheap trick on 14th street". THEY'RE NEW YORKERS, WE GET IT. SOme of these lines were downright cheesy and unnecessary.
I would also like to eviscerate the cinematographer.. the lens flare thing they did through the entire movie was extremely annoying and distracting as all hell. Also, even the most mundane scenes had the hand-held camera feel, what was up with that? Major Prinz and the General talking, or when Major Whittlesee received his orders from General Alexander were just two of the more mundane scenes that were hurt more than helped by the shaky camera..
Other than that, I thought it was a good movie, but not great. It's both nice and disheartening to see a forgotten story during a forgotten War immortalized in film while the rest of the market is FLOODED with increasingly monotonous WWII movies. WWI enthusiasts should see this.