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maryasha_lubelska
Reviews
Basic Instinct 2 (2006)
Michael Douglas was 48 in Basic Instinct 1
Perhaps my maths is out, but as Michael Douglas was born in 1944 that means he must have been 48 in 1992, the same age or maybe a couple of years older than Stone in Basic Instinct 2. The difference is that Michael Douglas was really ugly in 1992, while Sharon Stone still looks pretty good to me. When BI 1 came out, it was almost universally panned - I remember when my friends came back from the cinema they were saying things like, "The plot makes no sense" "Michael Douglas is just so ugly" "they've got a psychiatrist who wears glasses to look clever," and "the dialogue is so lame and flat it's unbelievable." Then a lot of bisexuals started to complain about BI and no one could see why anyone would bother to complain about such a movie. Then it seemed to capture the public imagination, in a way that Basic Instinct two will never be able to do - we've moved on as a culture and we expect more.
BI2 is just as enjoyable as the first movie. Yes, it's corny and implausible in every way, and the dialogue is just as silly. The London setting made a good backdrop for the action. It would perhaps have been better to make BI2 about five years after the first movie, instead of fourteen years later, but this way we get to see Stone as a veteran seductress of the witch variety, which I think is the way her character would develop in the fourteen year gap between movies.
Hoboken Hollow (2006)
What is it about Texas?
As a European who has now seen umpteen horror movies set in Texas I have to ask: what is it about Texas? There are always people going along the road, a clear blue cloudless sky (clear blue is the new thunder, and lightning, and sunlight is the new Gothic)and they always meet and very foolishly take the mickey out of people with squints, slow gaits and terrible teeth, who are all in cahoots with each other: the lady in the shop is in on it. The sheriff is in on it. The cleaner is in on it. So are the cats, dogs, pigs, goats, octogenarians and five-year-olds. All evil killers. There can't be a single honest homestead in the whole of Texas, or at least homes where the inhabitants are not cannibalistic are in the minority.
This film was a disappointment, being identical, in almost every way, to other films about homicidal Texan families that I have seen, but featuring poorer acting and less atmosphere.
Shopgirl (2005)
The Princess and the Pensioner
No, I am not able to accept this - that there may be some very pretty, slim 25-year-olds who have to chose between a rich man of about sixty and a young, financially embarrassed weirdo. I appreciate that it is possibly supposed to operate on the level of "fable" and that the men are supposed to be "types", but even there it is unconvincing that these would be the only "types" that she would be meeting. If the shop girl were to meet these two at all, then she would be meeting men far better than this, so it all seems remarkably like an older man's very wishful thinking. Who the hell is Steve Martin trying to kid?
I am sure that I do not look anything as good as Claire Danes, but I nevertheless, compared to her, am totally inundated with offers; I thought that young women were attracted to older men because of the security they bring, but Ray Porter does not offer that security at any point, and if they'd made him forty, instead of about sixty, he would have still be an "older man" from a twenty-five year old woman's perspective. I know that it's a man's world and all the other clichés, but Hollywood simply looks risible when it panders too much to a particular fantasy. I find it especially risible, and tellingly indicative of the writer's vanity, that the narration implies that the only reason that the female character chooses the guy her own age over the old guy is totally within his control, (because he "wants part of her but not all of her") and nothing to do with his age.
Wolf Creek (2005)
What a disappointment
This film was recommended to me by a couple of friends; I think I was partially impressed by the ideas of a film that would scare me. However, I was not prepared for a film in which nothing of significance happened for such a lengthy part of the movie; in horror movies I think that the preamble should not be longer than is required to establish that the characters have an expectation of safety.
The nutter was boring, and when he shot one of the victims she got off quite lightly. I thought the nutter was supposed to enjoy torturing people for months, but he seemed quite anxious to end his captives' lives.
I was disappointed when the film ended, because I thought that there would surely be something more horrific ahead. I give it two stars for some beautiful Australian scenery (unfortunately rendered a little jerkily by the camera-work.)