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Here are some of my faves, in no particular order. These are films I wanna watch again and again. So don't wonder why, say, Nosferatu or 2001: A Space Odyssey is missing, this isn't supposed to be a list of the world's greatest movies.
Harold & Maude
Doing Time on Maple Drive
Shawshank Redemption
Sound of Music
Top Gun
To Be or Not To Be (original version with Jack Benny)
Duel
Take the Money and Run
Sleeper
Dogma
Cruel Intentions
Seven Samurai
Beautiful Thing
Priscilla, Queen of the Desert
Blues Brothers
Finding Forrester
Ratings
Most Recently Rated
Reviews
200 American (2003)
I've seen worse...
An intriguing, promising idea that is wasted. Poor writing, pedestrian acting (generally ok but sometimes awful), second rate direction and photography. I wasn't drawn into the story or the characters.
Not an abysmal movie but certainly not what I hoped for.
Oh, and Tyler/Ian's Australian accent? Looks like American audiences were fooled. But it needed a lot more work to be convincing to any Australian.
Northmen: A Viking Saga (2014)
So bad, it almost works as comedy!
At first I thought this movie was a half-decent, easy-to-watch Viking action flick with some terrible issues but a couple of redeeming aspects, and I was going to review it a such.
But then I watched a couple of scenes again as I was writing this review.
I realized I had it all wrong! This movie is meant to be a spoof!! It's trying to do for the Viking action flick genre, what "Vampires Suck" did for the vampire genre, or what "Airplane!" did for the disaster movie genre!!! How did I figure out it's meant to be a spoof? Because it's well-made technically, but gets too much wrong to be a real Viking movie. Far too much.
For example, look at the character of the princess. At first she pretends to not speak their language. Then all of a sudden she speaks fluent Viking, with a lovely Scottish accent. Then, it turns out she has frequent prophetic visions. Then we discover she's also an expert healer who knows how to prevent gangrene. And she recognizes the herb she needs for it, growing right there, within arm's reach! But that's not all! She is also an expert archer!! This gal's far too much of an over-achiever for us to take her seriously as a Viking-era Scottish princess. She's clearly meant to be a parody.
It doesn't stop there. In the battle scene on the moor, she's been knocked out cold by an attacker who miraculously seems to have forgotten to kill her. Even though killing her is the bad guys' main agenda. How do we know she hasn't been killed? Because she turns up again later in that scene, just in time to save the hero from a nasty death!
Then there's that huge, sheer cliff that the Vikings have to climb after they've survived a horrible shipwreck and can barely sit up straight.
Then when they get to the top, instead of resting, they immediately encounter an enemy force, right there, unavoidably close and heading, lemming-like, towards them and the cliff. They're outnumbered 4 to one including many on horseback, yet in their exhausted state our heroes manage to kill all but one of their attackers with only a couple of Viking casualties. It's a terrific fight scene, but it needs too much suspension of disbelief.
Surely we're meant to be laughing?
But we're not, even a little bit.
Unfortunately this movie takes itself too seriously to work as comedy.
It's not a spoof.
Pity.
It could have been hilarious.
As it is, it's nothing more than a second-rate, easy-to-watch, Viking action flick.
Surprise, Surprise (2010)
Poorly done, don't bother.
I wasted my time watching this movie, and I'm writing this so you'll avoid making the same mistake.
I'll start by saying that somewhere in there is the germ of what might have been a really, really good movie. But the one they made isn't it, no way. It's a huge let-down. If you want a movie about "gay couple deals with new-found homophobic teen son" try the Swedish hit, Patrik 1.5. It's far more worth watching even if you hate reading subtitles.
The big problems with Surprise, Surprise include poor writing and mostly bad acting. I've seen high school kids do a better job of creating credible characters. I was also put off by the substandard lighting, although that look might also have something to do with the way the colour rendering was done in post-production.
If the characters have any emotional journey, or if they develop at all, we as audience aren't let in on it. That includes David's apparent about-face in the climax. There's no reason for him to behave that way. We haven't been allowed to see anything that would explain him changing. It doesn't add up.
So the big argument that happens as the aftermath of what he's done, also doesn't work.
There are some occasional decent moments with this movie, but there is far too much wrong with it (and I've only scratched the surface here, believe me).
On balance, skip it.
Little Athens (2005)
Not bad, but what is it trying to say?
I watched this film because someone whose opinions I respect told me it was terrible and I needed to see for myself. He was wrong. But not entirely.
The acting, camera work, script, locations, sound track etc reflect decent production values and an honest intention on the part of the filmmakers, but on the other hand, the main characters are all pathetic losers (which is not the same as saying the acting is bad, which it isn't).
There are some brilliant moments like when Jimmy discovers the dead guy on the sofa (and what he does next), and when we discover just who Steve is cheating with, and when Aaron chases his girlfriend out of the house as she escapes with her friend Carlos. But overall it looks like it's going nowhere...it seems pointless...like the lives of those it portrays.
At first I was constantly trying to work out how the 4 threads were supposed to interconnect, but they really don't, not even at the end. It's just a day in the lives of 4 sets of people who happen to know each other and whose lives occasionally cross paths either on purpose or by chance as they go about what they have to do. When I realised that and simply watched it for what it was it got more interesting.
Some reviewers have panned it for a 'contrived' final scene. I disagree. We have little clues all through that these characters have all known one another, at least in passing, for years and it should be no surprise that they go to the same parties together.
This is not the kind of movie I would normally seek out but I'm glad I did.
Watercolors (2008)
Sensational gay coming-of-age movie
This is one of those rare movies that stays with me for hours or days after, a "must see" that I know after only one viewing that I will return to again and again.
On the whole it is simply sensational, in plot, acting, direction etc. It is beautifully photographed (including some incredible underwater scenes).
The title puzzled me a bit until I realized it captured the key interest of both of the main characters: Danny, the artist, and Carter, the swimmer ("water" colors, get it?).
Occasionally one has to suspend disbelief but such moments are far outweighed by the overall impact. Example: the scene where it rains inside the living room, but the effect of that rain is to give the scene a surreal or magical quality that helps us feel what the characters themselves are feeling.
The ending is ambiguous rather than your standard happy ending but strangely "right".
In places the sound was a bit odd, e.g. a scene where Carter's skate board almost drowns out the conversation, and it was hard to hear the first few words of the scene where Danny's mom is talking to him on a bench at the beach in long shot (as soon as we came in close the sound returns to normal...I think this is a post-production error). But such fleeting flaws were not enough for me to reduce my score on the movie overall.
It's awards are well earned and this movie should be a 'must see' for anyone with an interest in gay cinema.
Let's Go to Prison (2006)
Funny, quirky, black comedy
This has to be one of the funniest movies I've seen for a long time. Brilliantly acted, edited and directed. Punchy script. Nicely drawn characters. Nice plot twists, unpredictable but vaguely credible character development. It won't appeal to everyone, but if you have the stomach for it, (violence, gay themes, extremely strong language etc) then it's a "must see".
I watched this movie 3 times in 3 days, it grabbed me so hard.
This movie is not your typical "prison" movie. Yes, it depicts some real rough stuff quite graphically, and the whole point of it is that Nelson gets treated badly not just because he's a wuss (did I spell that right?) but mainly because his cell-mate John is bribing other prisoners to beat him up, foul his food, etc. But the way this movie is put together is unbelievably funny, despite the bleak subject matter. In fact I barely noticed how dark it was, I was laughing so much. And of course, being a comedy at heart, it has a happy ending.