leon-geyer Reviews

Avatar: The Last Airbender (2024– )

Flat as a flunder

[3/10 · 12 March 2024]

Sorry I say this, but most of the acting of the diverse characters played by teens is bad, and of the adults, to be true, minimum the half too. Little actors were convincing, main characters so and so, but often the secondary ones were really bad. Not always its the fault of the actors, it can be casting, and it seems mainly to me that directors did not care much about that part. Or writers, seems they did not care much either about giving dialogues depth. If they cared, it did not came through too often.

I was constantly thrown out of the story by the acting...

CGI good, but what made that possible is the good art design. There often was detail and I would say love in designing the tribes & their logic, spaces, clothes; specially the ships. Also the bending choreographies were coherent.

Memory (I) (2022)

Excellent cast in minor roles

[8/10 · 8 July 2022]

I didn't expect a movie in which I would be surprised by the acting, but a decent action movie. Nevertheless, I enjoyed a lot the quality of the secondary roles. Besides of known names in the supporting actores, I enjoyed the acting of minor characters like the widows, the child, the hooker, even the drunk guy at the bar - and the mise en scene gave them also space for it, in a subtle way. I looked a many of them in IMDB.

I Am Mortal (2021)

Sometimes too simply thought and made, sometimes it works

[6/10 · 16 January 2022]

Its a christian film, with quite a simplistic discourse about that we shall trust destiny given by god and not humans=science. Thank god (ejem), it does not insist too much on this speech, its is just latent, except when it is delivered in one moment in a monologue out of context.

The dialogues are quite basic, the storyline too, but I didn't dislike the film as whole as much as I was fearing at the beginning. I liked some actings, the main characters (except in the final speeches), and the effects where sometimes interesting (coherent with little elements & CGI). Ok, sometimes too cheap. At the end the storyline took an interesting turn in a character, which could have given some (needed) complexity. They had some ideas, could have been a good film.

Cosmic Sin (2021)

Starts not good, gets worse.

[2/10 · 20 June 2021]

Actors trying to do their best. That are the two stars. But actors can not fight such a senseless plot, mostly bad effects, absurd costumes.

Year 2500, and humanity still uses assault riffles against zombies and Freddy Krueger talking rattlesnake-language. There are so many scenes where you just think "?????". And others on which you wish fast forward.

The Tracker (2019)

Lundgren goes spaghetti western

[5/10 · 23 November 2020]

The film is strange. I liked some actings, I was surprised with Elizabeth Kinnear, who I didn't know, and liked the performance of many Italian actors. The performance of the writer and of the director not, the story is incongruous, a lot of details are absurd and/or absolutely cliche. Ok, the director gave the actors some space for silences, I liked that. So, I enjoyed some actings, but suffered the rest....

The Assassin's Code (2018)

Title and posters can be misleading

[10/10 · 12 February 2020]

Due to the film poster and the title & (unimaginative) subtitle, I thought I was going to see a superficial action film. Very wrong, from the beginning I noticed a film with good acting, also in many supporting roles (like Anweis) and even short roles (Cipolla), with a smooth pace (giving space for calm shots of silent reaction of actors), atmosphere, fantastic background music, original scenes, a script with some kind of unexpected twists, etc. Ok, there are quite some cliches - some which work for me well, as making clear it is a detective story, film noir like, etc, and others which don't (the cartoonlike introduction of the assassin, the dumb detective caught of guard -?? -, the bad bad mafia leader). Anyway, the films gains in complexity and has really interesting (and some beautiful) scenes. I enjoyed the film, and to be true, I think the former title should have been kept : Legacy. I finally understand at the end of the movie the actual title, and revealing it then is an interesting idea, but it leads to associate the film to other style of products (assisted by the ordinary poster and the empty subtitle).

The Courier (2019)

Hard to watch even in fast forward

[1/10 · 27 November 2019]

As ouch says: painful. Pity Oldmans, Kurylenkos and Shas talent wasted in this. The storyline is plain, the little dialogues absolutely dump, the editing and sound try to force suspense and fail spectacularly. But the worst is the direction. A good example how bad direction can ruin good acting.... Some actors managed to still make their characters acceptable, like the mentioned, but some are, I guess due the directing, insufferable, like Moseley. I am sure the director has better (in the sense of my taste) work, too - overstatement can have humor, but it is easy to mismanage. The only thing I liked in the film was that in the action scenes, the characters were often realistic - not talking of splatter blood, but the acting of pain and fear.

Trouble Is My Business (2018)

Overacted, but kind of funny

[3/10 · 22 October 2018]

The acting is terrible, but I would blame for that mainly the director skills. Well, a director has to do several stuff besides guidance of acting performance, and I think other work isn't that bad. The genre is more than clear and the art coherent, the mise-en-scene is sometimes too predictable (mainly the shots), and the dialogs are funny, not that overdone like the acting. This is a film where the people did a lot of things, the main actors wrote and produced, other staff is in secondary roles, so it seems like a heart-project. If you can live with overacting, it is a interesting homage to Film-Noir. PD1: Thinking about it, maybe the overacting (also overstatement of mise en scene with details like CloseUps, tear on cheek, etc) is on purpose, there is people who like it (Jim Carrey, overacts in most of the films, but he can also, as he has shown sometimes, act in another style). Well, in that case, it isn't lack of skills, it's just a style I don't enjoy.

PD2: Funny is also so much people taking negative comments personally, accusing of trolling, manipulation, and other conspiracies. 'common, everybody is free to have an own opinion, and everybody shall decide what to take from them.

Moontrap: Target Earth (2017)

As bad as it can go - except SB

[1/10 · 28 June 2017]

Well, this is a good example how the power of will of an actor can save ... its own performance. Sarah Butler does endure in good to acceptable acting, despite, and AGAINST, the worst case scenario: awful directing, bad dialogues (both unconvincing and simple language), absurd story, ridiculous actions, sometimes (not absolutely all) terrible co-actors, and a quality of image in effects and post-processing which can't be called bad quality, it can't be called quality at all! (so let us call it Sam, as D.A. did with weather. Sam-CGI ).

Often, very good actors are taken apart by bad direction. Sometimes their work can survive. But I never saw, so far, an actor enduring against such a quality-hostile environment. Chapeau, Sarah Butler = my respects. How did she manage to maintain her own motivation despite the absurdity of the filming conditions? Just to observe it, I fast forward through this piece of - you know. I didn't know her, I investigate her after this movie. And I surely will try to see her in other films.

The Eagle (2011)

Moral values....

[5/10 · 19 June 2011]

I liked the historical investigation in this film, combining the real facts of the novel and of the Battle of the Teutoburg Forest in Germania, with a lot of quotidian elements of the age. Great work in that aspect. Acting of Jamie Bell and the leader of the Seals too.

But well, my point: some can see in it conspiracy theory, but often, when I see mayor Hollywood productions related to war, I kind of notice certain moral values according to the politics of the US. Like terrorists as main threat after 9.11, conspiracy against US during the Irak wars, the value of the flag while critics in aftermath of Vietnam, maybe I can't tell exactly. The main theme in this film is treason. OK, regaining the honour trough the eagle, which ends to be the flag. And friendship, caused by honour, promises, and not betraying (mentioned many times). Anyway, the priority seems to me to be the bad bad value of treason - the guy who says when I ran from your father I ran form myself and that group which comes to regain their honour and essence (instead of living with their families), the seal warrior (no association with the US naval forces at all?) showing what happens to the one who betrays his people (to a son of him).

I left the cinema thinking why is this theme so extremely strong, and now I remember - there is actually massive criticism of former soldiers against the US war politics in public media, gaining conscience regarding absurd economical interests behind the lies about war reasons (oil pipe routes in Afghanistan, the canal in panama, oil hegemony in middle east, weapons showcase, and so on).

I'm not saying that all the scriptwriters have their office in the pentagon, but there are many ways to help a film reach massive screening.

2012: Doomsday (2008 Video)

Good example of worst film

[1/10 · 25 March 2011]

I never saw such a bad plot, as absurd, pretentious. Bad acting is normal to see, even to that extreme, but such a absurd plot, intentions and terrible realization is really special.... Christian message? if you ever have been Christian, you wanna quit, you even won't be able fall asleep (although you try hard) being so fascinated with the absurdity of this stuff. It is so bad it can be cult, the new Ed Wood!!!! Just a pity that it looks like the guys took the making of their film serious, not for fun as trash-authors usually do, I really hope I am wrong....

I keep my copy with care, cause I want to have examples of the worst film I ever seen for my pupils.

PD: I lost the copy!!! DVD sleeve empty!!!! Any link?