handmethatspanner Reviews

Whipsaw (1935)

Not eithstanding -- I'm a Loy fan

[8/10 · 16 September 2024]

And with significant allowances for, by todays standards, really corny dialog...

This is a gem and not even a comedy.

These are two Greats just hitting their stride.

It serves best as a slice of life from an era we will never see. In particular as an illustration of trains, planes, & automobiles.

Given what has to be considered really zero-technology, this is really well shot and staged.

You might think that this will be a slow moving script but unlike so many efforts produced *just after the war*, this steps along handily.

With apologies for requisite suspension of disbelief where cars and road travel in really foul weather are concerned, it is an interesting aside that we see illustrated here the use of supplemental oxygen for at-risk infants. Prior to the mid 1950s incubators for newborns did not exist. Many children suffered debilitating outcomes, generally over vision problems and blindness.

This is one to buy -- probably in a collection.

The Good Shepherd (2006)

1961 plus flashbacks

[9/10 · 11 September 2024]

I am 6 in 1961. Deniro is about 17. He remembers better than I.

For me this is a story about naïveté and the desire to preserve it. Which can not be achieved successfully apart from an ivory tower lifestyle or serious mental impairment. It also lightly discusses systematic corruption, and undue influence.

The French dub this type of story a 'Roman a Clef'. Definition online.

We can say that as a mystery it follows true to type. All the pieces are there to be assembled at the end. There are no surprise rabbits pulled out of the hat.

So this is pretty much history dramatized with rather understated plausibility.

The cars, the clothes, the attitudes of the characters, are really well realized with certain allowances made for the early 20th century flashback scenes.

In this time almost everyone was a 'straight man'. The characters portrayed are more tightly wound even than that. Though I think Deniro and Damon go a bit too far in that regard.

The Whole Cast is simply stunning. I bet they did this for the love of it.

Even the smaller parts are played by notable heavyweights, so well that you can't really see just how good they are.

To fill out your understanding of what will follow this story in the real 1963; Everyone knew that Joseph Kennedy was rather bent and not unsympathetic to the Nazis (but so was Ford). Though I am sure he deplored their methods.

But this story is rooted in the NINA discrimination resulting from the Irish Famine because though hardly mentioned JFK and the consequences of WW2 & WW1, the Great Depression and Prohibition weigh in heavily here.

So the scene with Pesci's mob character is essential if underplayed. Why?

Recall that J. Edgar Hoover has been running the FBI since the Depression -- and all that goes with Hoover... JFK is supported by the mob in getting elected. Part of the deal is that, even though the mob will lose Cuba ( something they built up during Prohibition) they won't get hammered in the USA, except that John and Robert start moving against them, but that is after our last scene here.

It parallels the commentary about living with the English and they with the USA -- an illustration of 'politics making strange bedfellows'.

My mom used to say if you lay down with dogs you get up with fleas.

This whole story is about getting rid of fleas. And how expensive it can be to get clear of a debt you have incurred or how upset folks get when you ignore a debt -- see Russia.

As well as what your choices do the those around you.

No matter how desirable you might think that the early postwar era was . . . Or the 1960s . . . You do not want to return to that.

This WILL BE a cult classic long after we are all gone.

From Paris with Love (2010)

Well crafted comedy-thriller

[7/10 · 29 August 2024]

High technique cinema.

A conventional story with all the surprise of the wheel of stars in the night sky.

It starts out like a plodder doing standard moves to build/drop your expectations for satisfaction.

Then the tempo picks up and the sharp eye will notice clever flashes of stagecraft & blocking that is captured in brief snatches.

Yes, as mentioned elsewhere there are unforced errors in some of the acting and action bits -- like the binoculars snafu.

And no, you know what will happen, just not how they will show it to you.

All of the twists are lined out like the course of a race track but -- it is the craft of film making that is so watchable.

In stage presentations you can't move your perspective. The cinematographer does that for you in movies.

This effort is rather well done.

A standard recipe done deftly and presented with flare -- even if it is only a simple marinara with thin noodles -- neither of which has been over cooked.

Simple. Light. Almost delicate for a thriller. Despite there being no surprise -- it is the style of the waitstaff who appears with your desire and disappears before he is a bother.

Alien: Romulus (2024)

A long way from Dark Star...

[7/10 · 28 August 2024]

Straight up -- a cautionary tale.

"...perhaps your purpose in life is to serve as a warning to others."

The punchline is: you don't want to live in a 'company town'. The point being that, as dumb, and inefficient as government is -- where there is no regulation . . . There is no freedom to choose.

Superficially, we see the convenient bad science and the associated plot 'gimmees' that are the hallmark of mediocre writers serving big-budget movies. On the other hand, movies are made for young people who are not widely read nor have they seen thousands of movies.

So ***** stars for the writing.

Since the zeitgeist of media is dominated by gamers, it is pointless to expect great acting from a work that "looks" like it is escapism. This actually has a big point to make but few will see it.

So ****** stars for a fresh round of relatively unknown actors with some workman-like performances that are throw aways -- to...

A rather brilliant production design albeit one serving up ridiculous premise points and some really lame science that Newton would pin you to the wall or.

So ******* stars for the set, blocking, and stunts.

The real standout is the cinematography which could have been more mysterious with less light but was really good and sets the mood of 'consistency with the previous efforts in this disjointed series' with less clinical detail and a shifting focus or outright soft focus ( although it could have been the Cinemark projectionist adding to the presentation ).

So ********* stars for images, lighting, and editing.

There was quite a lot going on to edit. This is a non-stop-roller-coaster.

Predictable and still enjoyable.

I mean really, as movie goers we know: Do not split up. Do not stop for romance. Be careful when you open the front door. That emotional choices get characters killed off.

All of which is obligatory for a horror film as opposed to a science fiction film.

I am not a horror fan. The original Alien crossed over and blurred things. It was a basic Girl in a Castle with a Monster -- in Space.

Alien: Romulus is a dystopian warning about certain excesses.

And well worth watching.

Manderlay (2005)

A perspective too European for my taste

[6/10 · 31 July 2024]

By which I mean... In the US a great deal of allegory is set in a science fiction context or as pseudo historical costume plays.

For many across the pond America is a sort of Sci-Fi context.

I went from TV viewer almost directly to live theater audience member and stage crew.

I built the mind space for allegory watching Twilight Zone and Outer Limits with a deeper immersion into Star Trek.

Being familiar with the commentary of the time from critics that Star Trek was either Father Knows Best -or- Wagon Train -- in space. OK, a place to take my first steps.

In school theater we did modern classics and discussed classical Greek plays -- skipped most of Commedia dell'Arte and went right into titles derivative of Shakespeare; West Side Story.

A few years later I am still participating in theater, community and paid professional.

Much discussion over drinks with cast and crew after shows and of 1970s Contemporary Art Films of small stature came up in conversation.

This led me to video tape movies and I went all-in watching thousands since I found work in the 80s in video rentals -- while still doing theater.

Allegory works best, I think, when it insulates the viewer from his own emotional context to better examine whatever the writer was working to illustrate or comment upon.

Both of my parents were born in 1931... Some of that splashed onto me. These were Depression era kids who developed a strong left leaning mindset. That generation does not get to come to grips with First Hand World Issues until the Korean conflict (shaped by witnessing WW2).

I am still in school during Vietnam... The Regan years of confrontation with the Soviet Block are when it becomes real for me.

In Manderlay I was unable to separate my anger over the racial injustice from the idea that von Trier was striving to illustrate.

Naïveté does not readily lead to wisdom nor justice.

Roddenberry did an episode *we all got* about race -- as well as Global Conflict -- featuring two 'Last Opponents' locked into battle forever with no one to survive (that episode where one is white pancake on the left and the other is white pancake on the right). Even at 11 years of age we all got it.

But being in the future we could all see it at a safe remove.

So a cinematic play set in America works well for Europeans but not so well for Americans.

America, for Europeans of the boomer generation. Is a place of imagination and fiction.

At the time it was said that a poor man in America is one who washes his Cadillac 'himself'....

For me it was too close to home.

Possibly if I had worked the show as a play and been through the whole Casting, Rehearsal and Run experience I would get more from it but as a movie . . . No.

65 (2023)

Good enough for bigger little-kids

[4/10 · 18 May 2024]

Parts of the imagery were well captured and the live cinematography was up to standard.

The CGI was rather hit and miss -- I'm sure there were budgetary considerations that set limits on time, talent and processing.

Actually a really good cast -- but you really can't go wrong with kids, even bigger kids. And all they had to do is express anger, fear, and fright. The acting, in so far as there was a script, was all that anyone could expect and no doubt they brought more to the screen than was on the page.

As for the pages . . .

A concept right out of the late 1950s. Rather good production design and values for a budget film.

Not nearly enough background research done -- this was written in a long afternoon by mildly intoxicated adults looking over the railing of the patio -- who clearly forgot that the internet is available to random folks who could become audience members and have more curiosity than these two writers do.

The temporally mis-located plants are forgivable -- I don't think many will recognize the west coast is a cheap substitute -- should have been filmed in a dense and lush tropical location dripping with humidity -- akin to other famous dinosaur movies that you can name.

Really a deplorable action script with gross unexplained blocking and movement -- not that it was bad but the audience will know that movement is wrong in that place and no explanation is given for why our hero makes that mistake -- quite reasonably, since he is not an explorer.

Complete with one predictable, convenient plot development after another -- worst of all failing to take the opportunities presented by the scenario for Adam's character's greater development.

If you were going to do an old school - 'I rescue you then you rescue me' -- Robinson Crusoe on Mars-1964 would have been a better starting point.

One must hope that Adam Driver had a lot of fun or got big bucks up front.

A very 'pretty' piece of fluff with a climax that is suitable only for the students who never read about the Chicxulub impact. That bit of artwork was right out of When Worlds Collide-1951.

The cinematic visual presentation is evidently where these two excel

Don't let these two write anymore without some supervision . . . I am available.

The Artifice Girl (2022)

Not done watching &THIS is must see!

[9/10 · 23 April 2024]

Why don't we have more writing like this!?!?!?

This is some of THE tightest dialog delivery I can remember. It would be exhausting for the actors but this would be a TERRIFIC stage play.

Compelling, outraging, provocative and introspective.

This is what genuine science fiction can fulfill best; to induce questions in the mind of the reader . . . Or the viewer.

The casting is immersive due in part to most of us not being familiar with all but one face.

Once I read commentary suggesting that Sci-Fi is improvisational in the jazz sense -- where the 'player' begins with a theme and improvises freely around that.

I think Jazz is often playing any note that fits but is not readily expected.

I can't say that this surprised me but I have an enormous background in Sci-Fi.

This WILL be used in film classes.

The Beekeeper (2024)

Huge Stathan fan -- but...

[5/10 · 6 February 2024]

Not up to par for Mr. Stathams previous efforts. Stunts were lackluster and hugely aided by crafty camera work. Actually rather well cast considering that we have a WHOLE PILE of actors playing Americans with coached accents that ALMOST pass, salted with a couple of the genuine article or maybe they just had better coaching.

Verges on science fiction as the technincal implausibilities stack up one after another. Its a hero piece so verisimiliyude is not required, but... I said FIVE stars because I really like Jason Statham -- a guilty pleasure.

But this one was plagued by thin writing. Almost saved by the production values.

Except where does anyone find an old stone mansion, common to England, and supposed to be built in America. Expedient, at best.

Illustrates why good writing prevails and lame writing -- is limp.

The Breakfast Club (1985)

I spiked the 9 to pull for a higher than 8...

[9/10 · 5 January 2024]

By happenstance I am fan of film since I was small so finding myself working in a video store { that could be hard to explain to much younger people } in 1986 after seeing this film in old-school, 1000-seat auditoriums -- and then recommending it to customers was an easy win for me.

At the time I told folks all of us need to see this every ten years or so just to be reminded of the feeling.

Nearly forty years later I am thinking that this will be, for its time, analogous to The Importance of Being Earnest in an entirely differently glib way.

Hughes, for pop cinema shows much of the same insightful attributes as the Victorian interpretations of their own time of Wilde, et.al, in theater.

This extends into wider themes high-pointed by the ruminations starting in the time of Mary Wollenstone Shelley and our many interpretations of THAT work since the original.

The Breakfast Club will be in the same sense timeless while of a different time -- still discussing how we feel *today* -- and yet each time feels that same way for those who lived it.

Wednesday: Friend or Woe (2022) Season 1, Episode 3

I liked it but...

[7/10 · 25 December 2023]

This is so politically motivated that the 'slumber-free' cheer and the rest wonder at the vilification.

Even so, this is remarkable well done. I am confident that the cast was really well led by the writers and direction. There is enough 'on the page' that the editing can step along briskly. Even the doofus boys are well written. The first episode drags a bit but this features the set-up. Ep.2 shows us Wednesdays character. Ep.3, this one, goes overboard on the two-dimentional mean kids but no hero fares well unless the villains are serious.

I liked best the dialog 'asides' which are numerous and quick enough to keep the viewer interested and chuckling.

Extraction (II) (2015)

A Bruce fan but - DNF - good for a film class

[4/10 · 22 November 2023]

I get that this is part of BW's swansong. This was as good a techno-spy-babble script as any of them are if predictable. I like that some once significant faces get to work with hopefuls yet to rise.

The real flaw was in the hands of the producers. They forgot that movies are a visual medium and went quick-dirty-low budget with the cinematography. Though this could have been (generously) an artistic choice that just did not pan out.

I came to this title through the so-called sequel which seems unrelated apart from the naming convention and which I liked well enough to seek this one out.

The writers had it all there -- it was the implementation from page to screen where the tapestry got thin.

Now almost no one gets it right the first time they make scratch waffles.

I will be looking for the - whatever they call it - part three.

Wild Mountain Thyme (2020)

Maybe it's because I'm a redhead -- or was

[9/10 · 15 November 2023]

Really, I am astonished at so many of the other reviews.

Ok -- the accents are commercial Irish accents -- but most of you lot would not be able to wade through the real thing for 5 minutes.

This is about compromising with the minds of others and the futility of resisting.

This is a weird happily ever after story that illuminates the rough road so many travel in the quest for love.

The best part about this is the casting. Not that these are all Irish faces but that these actors have dug deep to show us some Irish characters -- with thin dialects.

You might not know but The Irish have iron constitutions (not uniquely). The characters written are such as these -- which makes them irascible, stubborn, willful, and driven . . . Not always to long life and happiness.

This is also about the attachment to that land which some of you will recognize as 'old country', and there are MANY old countries.

If you get to traval far from your home you may meet folk that are sprung from old roots set into old soil, found in old countries.

I must say I am sad for those who did not feel the charm in this story. Have so many of you lost the mystical in your souls?

Maybe this has something to do with me being a redhead (or I was before it turned white), and my mom and her sister, who are of serious Irish extraction. You do not want to try to keep up with us drinking unless you are sprung from certain other northern european strains (never, ever, had a hangover, and not for lack of trying) and all my ancestors are.

Firefly (2002–2003)

2023 is years enough gone that this's so fun!

[10/10 · 22 October 2023]

Disclaimer: I am a huge fan. I own about 2000 sci-fi novels. I own the series and the movies. The writing is inspired. The 'first' episode shown features intricate and terse dialog that speaks volumes in each syllable.

Not having seen it yet you will still recognize this cast as marvels in each their own rights.

And here the ensemble meshes oh so well. Even the set design is inspired. The world-building takes a few poetic-licenses as one expects with Sci-Fi and is more evocative of the world we lived in when this was new. Much is criticized regarding the stylings of the weaponry and western flair that glosses over the whole production: let me explain this to those with a novice view of sci-fi. Regardless of where built and how distant 'colony' worlds are separated from where ever home might be, horses and donkeys are the first choice for the early generations due to the fact that horses plus grass make more horses, etc. And a kinetic weapon is far more reliable and constructible than any electronic beam or force projector type you can imagine. Besides, flying-hammers are not easily defeated nor blocked and dissipate far less than, as one example, a plasma beam in atmosphere. Tech aside, the characterizations light up the screen and the supporting actors ( thank good writing and direction ) hit all of their marks and make us love/hate them explicitly. You will probably need to own this since you will be watching it more than once. Surprisingly, even the score is great.

The single good thing about the show having been cut short is that the creative inspiration easily outlasted the number of episodes such that none of them are perfunctory.

Were it so that I could watch this as a new infatuation rather than an old lover.

Almost Famous (2000)

Well, you had to be there!

[9/10 · 30 September 2023]

Apart from a terrific cast, many of whom are ancillary, that often give some of what *I* think are their best portrayals -- and snippets of some terrific rock tunes, The costumes are right, most of the cars are right -- this is a really good look at what life actually looked like.

It's an endearing story, much as we wish it had been . . . If only we had all been so deep.

BACKGROUND: "...it only takes eighteen minutes a page." Great line!

Man. We were so young in '73 ( the year I graduated ).

Our optimism would take a hard one to the ball-sack in '74. The Gas-Crunch was the beginning of a slide we could not stop.

It could have been that Carter would pull us out of the dive but he was the kind of man you wanted as a next-door neighbor. . . ( He TRIED to get the US to establish a real energy policy ) . . . Then there was the fall of the Shah ( a putz ).

It became apparent that a great neighbor was not who was needed as President. Too nice a guy. We were not worthy of him.

This is after Nixon ( & Ford ), for you kids, the guy who sold us on China ( which looked like a really great idea at the time ) and saved us from being ravaged by foreign gold traders by de-linking the Dollar from gold. This was also the hamstringing of our Space Program.

Then we got Reagan which frightened everyone. But it also poleaxed the Russians, which was ALL to the good. No one else could have bamboozed them like he did.

Then The Wall falls, the USSR falls . . . And it has been like nine-pins -- with everyone falling.

NOT that this was the only path forward to the 21st Century ( thank you Walter Chronkite ). But no one could agree on a vision that included everyone. We have been in a stall ever since.

Goof-ball that he is, Musk is the brightest, if variable, star we have. And he shoots off weird coronal mass ejections in odd directions.

*The next ten years ( '23 to '33 ) will be up to a generation that represents my grandkids -- Your future growth and glory is NOT on one planet -- nor in little screens, with toy blocks on them, that run on batteries that can't last for five years.

You will need to reinvent yourselves into MY grandparents generation. Those were the kids born in 1900. They went, actually, from Horse & Buggy to the Space Shuttle -- in one lifetime.

You CAN do this.

No one can do it for you.

When we are gone we will still be pulling for you.

*** A message I want all of you born after 1974 to take to heart.

The Flash (I) (2023)

9 Because no film is perfect

[9/10 · 27 August 2023]

DC makes a comeback -- and they might make it stick!

Maybe Zack Snyder's Justice League Directors Edition -- is not a fluke (if a shaky one).

Now then I must tell you that in the comics from the fifties and sixties, if you were a fan, you had to read all of them.

DC was IT -- for a time -- and Marvel was just fun and a bit different, quirky and had imaginative art that appealed to intoxicated college students -- the newcomer from after the days when The Batman was new and your heroes were on the radio (which is my parents era).

Having read all of the old Flash comics and remembering most/some of them, I recall the fundamental issue raised in *this script* re: the consequences of time travel.

I watched George Reeves on TV in B&W on a tiny screen . . . Well not so tiny as an iPad . . .

I watched Batman (the parody?) in the 60s.

I read of Earth 2 and 'alternate' incarnations of the Flash in 15 cent comics from a rack in the local drug store.

I saw Superman in the 70s and we were all IMPRESSED. DC was a THING -- again!

Then they lost it 'cuz the studios went nuts over cheap sequels -- which spread to all the studios and we got . . . To where we are today. Which is really sad for those of us who remember -- before.

{ a note to the younger viewers -- the first time we see ANY character interpose themselves through solid matter was in a George Reeves -- Superman episode when he 'interpenetrates' an impervious vault with a criminal inside who is trying to out-wait the statute of limitations . . . This would be about 1958 or '59 } {also; although we read of The Flash moving faster than time several times as well as translocating into alternate universes; Earth II -- we "see" Superman "travel" faster than time to rescue Lois Lane in the '77 sequel -- which was a pretty good one}

And it's sad, but less so, for the young ones who don't remember movie houses with more than 1000 seats in one auditorium or rising as a single mass to give standing ovations to Star Wars A new Hope that first day.

Then Marvel reinvents itself with Spiderman-Tobey Maguire and we get the Marvel Universe . . . Which might have imploded recently during the time of which I was NOT happy with the DC universe and a lackluster track record with too many guys cast as The Batman which sometimes showed inspiration but -- really -- how many reboots can the audience take?

Here we see real inspiration in bringing all the schizophrenic DC gyrations into a cohesive singularity WHILE tying in some of the better thinking of the original comics.

WELL DONE!

Yes -- I could have voted for ten stars but no film is perfect.

I will probably have to buy a copy of this one.

You all have so much to dig into -- if you have the interest in where DC has traveled on its journey to THIS effort.

Three Thousand Years of Longing (2022)

Watched twice over a couple of years

[8/10 · 7 August 2023]

It gets better with time. NOT what you would call a kids story it IS for the child in us.

It is about self examination and the life well considered. It is a cautionary tale of sorts. It is a story about love, affections, lusts, passions, & respect.

This one is seriously underrated. Besides a great cast it is lovingly captured.

There are things you see over more than one viewing. One favorite bit is the motes of 'stuff', how they were lit, how they move with hallway scene blocking.

This is one that will be a cult classic for quite a while.

This could easily be mounted on stage for live theater -- if you could cast it... It helps that I have a theater background and one, I am whimsical and two, I am a fan of movies and three, I am a hopeless romantic.

This will serve best those who are like me.

Asteroid City (2023)

..."Sorry -- am I not in this part" ... ( I snicker )

[8/10 · 6 August 2023]

Now, I remember this era.

I remember the TV shows and what are now considered icons and memes of that time, since I am of that time.

While nostalgia has probably morbidly overtaken people not native to THAT time -- I am astonished at how well it is portrayed, all-be-it hyperbolically, by more recent humans.

Wes Anderson's work may not appeal to everyone but I like his peri-animation take on cinema. I will skip detailing the artwork.

As in W. A.'s other works it is great fun tweezing out all the faces sprinkled in you might know from their other efforts. In this case it is fun as an old fart to recall just whom these new faces are likely intended to reflect as individuals or stereotypes.

I will probably need to buy a copy of this.

The Thomas Crown Affair (1968)

Superior craft --Suffers from old technology

[9/10 · 12 July 2023]

There is nothing I can say about Faye Dunaway & Steve McQueen . . . Just all Aces. The co-stars and supporting cast are appallingly realistic -- clad in what seem to be corny costumes but are just what was worn then. I note here particularly Yaphet Koto who I think first appears in film here -- later of Alien fame.

The story is contrived but not as much as the '99 re-make, and is the weakest part of the production -- if necessary.

One of the best composed soundtracks, apart from the title song which is a pop-hack, yet it is poorly recorded by today's standards.

The work, taken as a single piece with many movements is wonderfully composed -- and out of print or just really hard to find as an aftermarket studio re-recording by Michel Lagrand.

The soundtrack is presented only monophonically in the film with poor rendering. This is 1967 -- the boom in Jazz popularity for Boomers in 1980 is informed by this sound track and, surprisingly by the Schultz-Peanuts jazz riffs that a certain generation was raised on.

Jewison none-the-less manages to paint images of that time and for that time that despite relatively low technology is evocative, delicate, industrious, and engrossing.

This is worth owning a copy -- and I do.

Red Dragon (2002)

Brilliant cinema regardless of genre

[9/10 · 20 May 2023]

I like caper movies. I like detective movies. I am not a fan of horror nor grimnoir -- but this is just terrific movie making.

Dynamite or crackerjack, even inspired casting, while accurate, fails to take note of the supporting ensemble actors.

Emily Watson is nothing short of brilliant in her own short scenes -- also worthy of note is the few bits we see from un-named police officers & FBI supporting characters.

Some of this is to be credited to Brett Ratner of whose work *some* I like but this is nothing short of masterful direction.

This production is favored by good soil to cultivate wonderful plants into but the editing, the direction and the cinematography must be credited to the producers. The Dino De Laurentiis studio regularly disappoints me -- this is the exception.

The Matrix Resurrections (I) (2021)

A *7* for politics

[7/10 · 30 March 2023]

First viewing is just fun, games, and nostalgia with pretty pictures.

Second viewing is for all the quick-cuts and micro-images the production designers, editors and director spun into the visual narrative -- and the appreciation of a long movie that does not seen overly long.

Third viewing is for the several bits of dialog culminating in the last scene where we are warned about 'the easy path', delegating responsibility -and- philosophically accepting -- yielding to -- the notion that all life is suffering whereas the point is that there *is no easy path* and things like eternal vigilance and a constant struggle for forward progress against the current are our lot in life AND the source of satisfaction in the journey rather than the destination.

Nobody (I) (2021)

A bit too short!

[8/10 · 22 March 2023]

Leaves us wanting more. Clearly the door is left open for a sequel.

I hope they intended that this be funny! I was snickering much of the time. This was just plain fun -- of the guilty pleasure variety.

The gotta keep Michael Ironside involved!

Recent 'losses' to the action movie community may have had a thinning influence on the lead characters we have become accustomed to seeing for . . . Several decades in some cases.

Gratefully we still have these stalwart's efforts preserved -- you DO own copies on disk -- don't you?

We see here a worthy set of hands behind the camera and faces in front with sufficient capabilities to fill the void.

We must hope that the writers and other creatives can continue to stretch for the next rung.

All they need is an implausibly goofy premise to be treated most seriously and then continue to let the humor peek out in the editing.

I would have said this was an *8* if it had been a bit longer!

A Foreign Affair (1948)

In 2023 -- you need to see this

[9/10 · 24 February 2023]

1948 A different time that THIS time, 2023, is reminiscent of.

Cycles.

I was born 7 years later in the hot part of the Cold War. The Red Scare was THE THING. McCarthyism and sharp polarization. A well documented period of what we know as cancel culture. Not a new thing then or now. If we can avoid bloody sacrifices ( Rome ) and immolation ( The Dark Ages ) we will be lucky.

From one point of view the Reds were a balancing influence rather like the Moon and tides effects the real motion of the Earth. Note that we are, oddly, less stable since that fall of the Soviet Union.

As a species it seems we will sacrifice anything, at that moment, to increase stability over perceived unpredictability.

A Foreign Affair (1948), what we call a Rom-Com today, is an insightful look at what was happening THEN without in-your-face hyperbole -- while still illuminating so many social issues that we feel are so au-courant today, yet are oh so not new at all.

And it is done quite charmingly if, from the perspective of a new century, a bit stilted and contrived.

It feels a bit like a theatrical melodrama with substantial comic-relief.

This is a piece that could be and should be done on High-School stages -- if there are any Theater programs still offered in US High Schools anymore.

There is a great deal of really well composed dialog and lyrics (?) delivered with substantial second and third order significance.

Maybe they could watch this in English Lit. Classes.

This should be watched and not forgotten.

Moonfall (2022)

The stuffed shirts missed all the FUN!

[7/10 · 14 February 2023]

Moonfall 2022

OH! Come ON, you nay-sayers! This was made for popcorn and sodas.

Fun. Prettymuch completely ignores Newton, Einstein, Maxwell and still it is fun. So 2001 A-S-O it ain't.

By my count there are five acts with several left-turns.

Shines on family values and vaguely (slightly) sneers at political correct K453n ladies and inflexible Old Guys.

Traditional goodguys vs badguys bits pop up here and there.

As expected, sparkling digital effects with better than average production design is on display ( Ooooh -Shiney! ). The basic storyline is conventional schmaltz with substantial off-hand humor that is indifferently cast about.

Highlights the importance of those who do not fit in and outliers in general. Surprising that this film did as well as it did in China where (as the poet said) 'Conform or be cast out' is the standard.

An oh-so-convenient escape into a possible sequel . . . Of course. Not exactly a guilty pleasure but clearly no-nutritional-value entertainment.

With a big nod to David Weber - if you have read him thoroughly you will know why.

Gone Girl (2014)

Superb Cast -- dumb story

[5/10 · 13 February 2023]

It's like the writer phoned it in. Soooo conventional plot complications. It's like a comedy of errors but it isn't funny. Excellent production values and it seems a zillion folks really like this. These are the same folks that watch re-runs of football games.

My guess is that the telegraphing of events is from the writer as opposed to the director. It almost cookie-cutter with better actors. And these are a few of my favorite actors -- who CAN do suspense brilliantly. But not here.

Slow... Predictable... ...maybe if I had the world's best popcorn and a hot date to watch this with.

I don't know how many times I have seen these plot elements before...

This might work well as a cautionary tale for the congenitally naive done by terrific producer, cast and crew.

Clearly a book (unread by me) that I will work to avoid.

Fahrenheit 451 (2018)

The contemporary idiom has changed

[8/10 · 9 February 2023]

I read the book, so long ago. I saw the film as an adolescent -- and several times after that.

Naturally the book is literary. Bradbury was poetic and prosaic and also a visionary.

An argument could be made that Truffaut was nearly a seminal artist in film.

This is a telling for this century. A message piece, it is no less a cautionary tale than the first two iterations -- but it is tuned to minds from THIS century.

As if the originators of the storyline -- knew -- something could happen.

I say it it an 8 because it needed to be said once more. Not because it is 'high art' or features great insight. It is an 8 because it will be watched, understood, and appreciated by minds born after 1999.

The last time I saw the 1966 movie was in an English class in high school -- by which time it was old news to me.

How many people do you know under 35 who read no books?

That is why this is an 8.