tireless_crank Reviews

Blown Away (2019– )

Truly scraping the barrel

[4/10 · 7 August 2022]

All the lines are scripted and badly delivered. Not an ounce of originality in a Tom of talking. The emcees were fatuous and obnoxious. The only saving grace was the photography and some of the final glass objects.

Hello, Bookstore (2022)

Story arc submerged in sea of repetitive talk

[2/10 · 16 May 2022]

I grew up in Massachusetts, attended college there and love the place. I love books, love bookstores and so I had hoped to love this movie but was dramatically disappointed.

There was little background of the main character and much too much of the movie was a talking head - his - reciting poetry or making off target remarks about random books.

The book business must be interesting but little of the inherent process came across.

Interactions with long time customers were obviously staged and repetitive. The time line was confusing, sometimes customers were in the store, sometimes, during the pandemic, they were locked outside, doing business through a closed door. There were many too many shots of his back as he talked through the closed front door, and collected credit card information for the occasional customer.

He even states that all the other stores in Lenox and down in NYC were open for customers, but he wasn't but no mention of why.

I lived in NYC through most of that time and saw the struggles of small stores - not much of his struggle came across.

The cinematographer was seemingly baffled on exposing the shots when the outdoors was bright and the inside dark.

The film was supposed to be a documentary but the movie came across as a completely staged collection of shots and the editors only realized in the editing process that the story was really thin.

When was the decision made to make the movie? Without the pandemic and the fundraising, there was no story. When were the 'pre-pandemic' shots actually done?

The final film was too much of the main character talking to the camera, making believe he was spouting wisdom to his customers and very little that was interesting.

All in all, save the price of admission.

The two stars are for the occasional lovely shots and because I love western Massachusetts.

Rita Moreno: Just a Girl Who Decided to Go for It (2021)

Rita slid down a few notches in my estimation with this documentary

[4/10 · 21 June 2021]

The original West Side Story was a favorite of mine - and still is - but this documentary told me too much about Rita Moreno - and not in a good way. I lost respect and admiration for her in the face of her advanced egotism coupled with her continuous need to speak ill of others and play the victim. The documentary's format of focusing the camera straight-on at her talking endlessly doesn't help matters, much less involve the audience in a meaningful way.

Ms. Moreno is unceasingly self-involved and manages to say something gratuitously negative about virtually every important man in her life. She had an eight year long love affair with Brando, then accused him of 'forcing' her to have an abortion and continues to portray herself throughout as a helpless victim - of both him and the Hollywood system. Really? You can't have it both ways - winner of the EGOT yet a hapless, naive victim.

Perhaps even more egregious and difficult to watch was her unabashed defilement of her late husband, Lenny. Ms. Moreno was married for 35 years to a man who loved her passionately and was utterly devoted to her and her career by any measure (or so it appears) - yet in the documentary, she claims (unprompted) that she didn't love him and was never happy because he was controlling. Once again, she claims status as a victim - for 35 years? Shameful to say about someone who is no longer here and who did everything possible to help her career (by her own admission).

It seems that she finds it necessary to tear down any man who was important and contributed to her life, leaving herself as the sole responsible person for whatever success she had.

All in all, this film was hardly a documentary but rather a too-long paean to an attention-crazed egotist who seems to have little empathy and no regard for others' feelings - nor respect for the dead.

Ready or Not (I) (2019)

A horrible, waste of time and money

[2/10 · 17 September 2019]

I have no idea why I decided to see this total piece of crap. It was boring, crude, unenjoyable and without any sense of humor. The sole enjoyable characters were the malignant aunt and Andie McDowell (who remains lovely and believable no matter the vehicle.) Avoid this waste of time and money.

Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street (1982 TV Movie)

Good as an aide memoire for those who have seen the live production

[4/10 · 21 March 2017]

I saw this originally with Len Cariou and loved it but the filming doesn't capture the what live theater imparts. I honestly didn't care about the ingenuity of the staging; the physicality of the principal players was distracting. The 'youth', Chris Groenendahl had a nice voice but towered over the Judge and the Beadle and the idea that he was frightened by them was ludicrous. Joanna looked much, much too old and was not the figure of a fair maiden. When she sang "Green Finchet And Linnet Bird" I wanted to turn the sound down. Angela Lansberry played this as if she was informing the entire theater and it seemed too much overdone. This was a badly done filming and the defects overwhelmed any good points.

The Last Shot You Hear (1969)

Unfortunate quality for an actual screen release

[1/10 · 12 May 2013]

Everything about this screams bad TV movie. The acting was wooden and the cinematography and color rendition worse. The transitions were terrible, the lighting amateurish and the music sometimes silly. It was originally screened in B&W, that may have dimmed its awfulness but in its original color, it just looks strange. The lights are overhead, making every character raccoon-eyes in many scenes and the sets have the evenness of color one associates with shot-for-TV serials where there is little custom lighting, just brightness. Many shots are characterized by the shot-from-down-low with-something-in-the-foreground really amateurish look. I felt sort of sorry for Patricia Hanes; the film made her look gawky and unattractive. Don't waste time watching this, it will darken your day.

The World Was His Jury (1958)

This movie as a bigger disaster than the ship sinking

[1/10 · 10 September 2012]

This was just a terrible turkey of a movie. Terrible low or no budget scenery, worse script. In order to pad this out to 81 minutes the script threw in some silly sub-plot of marital discord between Edmond O'Brien and his wife. She wanted to leave him because he had a record of one hundred and fourteen acquittals and his clients were all scum. The sets destroyed every possible illusion that this might be real; the inside of the bridge of the ship looked like a big room with two ship's wheels. In the first scene, six sailors walk in with a flag draped coffin and sit it up on sawhorses in front of the ship's wheels. The Captain died in some foreign port and now they are sitting his coffin up on the bridge? No explanation can make any sense out of this. Except for a couple of scenes in anonymous rooms and one action sequence, the entire rest of the movie is set in a courtroom, a courtroom run by rules made up by screen writers. This is a horrible waste of time, not even bad enough to be good.

Hands of a Stranger (1962)

Worst directing since Ikea instructions

[2/10 · 3 September 2012]

My God, this was terrible. The acting of the brother and sister varied from histrionic to dead flat. The directing was incredibly stilted and, in some cases, made no sense at all. It seemed like 50% of the shots were of one person in the dead center of the screen looking at the camera and talking and talking and talking some more. In one scene, when the bad guy was emoting the two other main characters stood fully twenty feet away - and they talked across that space. Then, after being warned something bad would happen if she went closer, the girl did actually cross the gap. And guess what, the bad guy grabbed her. The the other guy approached and said,'Let her go' - and the bad guy did! How's that for motivation. Then the bad guy gets shot by an unseen gun - the absence of a gun goes unremarked. The makeup looked like a thick coating of spray paint, not a pore or wrinkle to be seen. Everyone had the complexion of an Asian Indian - but it only went so far. The little boy's makeup only went to his Adam's apple and the white of his lower neck looked like a bib. It's difficult to believe this was on TCM and the host talked about it with a straight face. Truly a horror show.

The January Man (1989)

Interesting characters, totally useless plot.

[4/10 · 17 June 2010]

The only superlative about this movie is Rod Steiger's role. This is by far, the worst role he ever played, totally overdone every time he is on the screen with a hairdo modeled on Harpo Marx and the expository style of Hitler. Danny Aielo gets short shrift from the screen writer and Harvey Keitel gets used and thrown away. Kevin Kline has a bizarre accent, strange affect and a great ability to suppress the laughs he must be feeling at the dialog he was asked to say. Alan Rickman was cute and extraneous, Susan Sarandon was there and Mary Elizabeth Mastrantonio has large and attractive boobs for a small woman - she didn't have much of anything else to do in this film.

Plot - stupid, ridiculous, complex and extraneous.

Beyond the Limit (1983)

Surpassingly mis-cast film

[1 February 2010]

It was difficult to watch this film because of the miscasting of Richard Gere who seems at last partially anesthesthetized through the entire movie. There is not one bit of passion in his manner or his speech and, whenever he is on the screen, there is a hole through which all tension drains. Bob Hoskins is not a convincing Latin at all, neither in accent nor in manner. Better casting in these two parts would have improved this film immeasurably.

An interesting, semi-error shows many of the main characters sweating through their shirts. In tropic and sub-tropic regions, locals have heat adapted well enough so that they sweat almost unnoticeably in normal conditions and thus can appear crisp and unruffled in temperatures where those of us from more temperate climates sweat like water buffalo.

The Bribe (1949)

this coulda been a contenda

[11 December 2009]

what a shame, this could have been an iconic film noir but it is, if not spoiled, at least hurt by some bad casting and bad performances. Good enough plot and great characters. Ava Gardner at her luminous best and Charles Laughton in the best characterization of his career. Unfortunately Vincent Price needed to dial it back about 30% in the first half of the film; when he finally turned into the bad guy he was right on key. Perhaps he has only one 'happy' character to play and that was it. Richard Widmark in his less manic or Richard Conte would have been great. The biggest negative in this cast was Robert Taylor in his typical coarse way. His emoting is confined to the lower half of his face and his characterizations are always intensely shallow and unaffecting. Kirk Douglas or Bogart would have made this into a film of the level of Casablanca.

Dancing in the Dark (1949)

a truly colorless Technicolor musical

[1/10 · 11 December 2009]

This was introduced as the 'rarely seen' Dancing in the Dark when it showed on the Turner Classic Movie channel - and after seeing the first half I knew the reason why.

William Powell's character went from a totally self-absorbed PITA to a lovable, caring personality in a blink with little of import to cause that change. Mark Stevens, while a handsome man, is just a cardboard figure; but the absolute worst was Betsy Drake. There is not a single spark of life in her and it is totally unbelievable that any fellow actor could believe she would project on the screen and want to cast her as any part, let alone a lead. Whenever she speaks energy just drains off the screen and I gave up the movie just after the audition scene.

Of course the songs are wonderful and I always wondered why the real Bandwagon only had truncated versions of such great songs. Try thinking of Betsy Drake singing on half the screen and Cyd Charisse on the other. The comparison is so one-sided that Betsy Drake might even be some strange unknown gender - human but with no gender-based allure.

Mirage (1965)

Strangely uneven movie

[5/10 · 7 October 2008]

This was a strange movie - not only was the plot extremely convoluted and implausible, the dialog shifts were odd. The incidental dialog was marvelous, witty, cute and not dated at all. This excellent incidental dialog made a strange contrast with the main dialog which was generally turgid and pompous. Everything was overly dramatic and the score announced every turn in the plot with a little flourish more worthy of a low budget TV movie than a film with a major Hollywood star.

I realize this was 1966 and movies were a lot more uptight but,immediately following a scene where Diane Baker asks Gregory Peck rather plaintively, "Don't you want me?", there's a transition to the next morning where Peck enters the bathroom completely dressed, silk dressing gown and all - clearly he wasn't swept away by passion. He clearly wasn't going to join Baker in the shower. He was wearing more clothes than Cpt Ahab, and with the same loving manner.

Gregory Peck had all the acting ability of a tall, unfunny Howdy Doody. When George Kennedy beat up Gregory Peck, I was mentally cheering Kennedy on. The best character was a police lieutenant, played by Hari Rhodes,who, in a few lines defined his character and established a personality perfectly.

Turnaround (2002)

My God, what a horror show

[1/10 · 8 October 2006]

I can't even guess what the writer/director/editors were collectively thinking about when they pushed this film out the door. There is a semi-serviceable plot but everything else about the movie is so poorly done that it hardly matters. A platoon of police fire from their multi-shooters (no six shooters here) randomly into a bus station, without regard for the bystanders and everybody inside is dead except one woman is is lying against a wall. Are the police excited, interested? Not much? Is there any flurry of activity, like other support vehicles, calling for ambulances, etc? No. Do they actually look around to see if anyone is wounded or playing possum? No, perhaps they have been shooting magic bullets that kill without wounding and they 'know' that everyone is dead? They sort of walk around, staring into the distance, talking tough, ignoring the guns scattered around. The one woman left alive has a bruise on her forehead but no other marks; clearly the magic 'bruising' bullet strikes again.

That's when I quit.

Johnny Allegro (1949)

interesting but silly

[5/10 · 27 January 2006]

While Raft never does any role is any way but very straight forward, the image of the hero is just too starched. Raft ends up on a tropical island without a change of clothes yet in the succeeding days he always appears in the same suit and tie, often with a hat, always perfect. He runs through the steaming jungle and never appears sweaty - what a hero! It is these kinds of conceits that seemed so cool now make these B thrillers just silly. The mastermind, George MacCready, with his smooth evil voice was the real star; the unlikely use of a bow and arrow as his offensive weapon of choice, along with the ease with which this slightly built man drew back the nominally 70 lb bow, made everything fun. No this things don't have to make sense, but they were enjoyable and exciting when the world was simpler and young.

Foreign Intrigue (1956)

strangely passive movie

[3/10 · 25 August 2005]

The plot of this movie has been reviewed before and I have no surprises to add to these summaries, since there are are very few surprises. Several strange characters asking questions, yet it all comes to little. Even then big 'surprise' of the source of the financier's money was predictable.

The only surprise - and it wan't planned by the director - for those of us like me who were born in the last 50 years, was Genevieve Page as a semi-sexy mistress. I have always associated her with 'mature-women' roles and have assumed she was born "mature".

Other reviewers saw the background music as a plus. I saw it as a decided negative, way too overwrought and intrusive. In the Third Man the noticeable theme music added to the suspense, emphasizing the dynamism what was on the screen. In this movie, the loud flourishes seemed out of place against the wooden movements of the actors. This entire thing was a throwaway.

My score of 3 points was given because the picture was in focusand it wasn't too long. It was not quite as bad as The Curse of the Aztec Mummy but close.

The Closer (2005–2012)

terribly lame -- extreme spoilers contained

[14 June 2005]

The first Episode: Lots of padding so they could cut it later for an hour including commercials. It was clear, clear, clear from the beginning who the body was and who the most probably killer was. There are several big->huge plot holes -

1) who was, and where is, the person who recognized the victim when he was in her new job.

2) iris scans on a 4+ day old body - I don't think so. The orbs would have been a swollen mass of goo by then.

3) Christian Scientists generally don't get medical care (although they do wear glasses and get dental work) but that probably doesn't keep them from having a physical medical exam and drug tests - probably a requirement for a high level job.

4) Victim took over a 19 yr old identity - but what about credentials etc. to get this high level job.

5) How did the victim survive the requisite background check?

Ugh!! for first show. May have jumped the shark already.

The July 11th episode.

Man, this show is just a horror. Kyra Sedgewick dresses like she's agoin' to the market in small town Alabama - not very professional attire for any kind of a leader. The plot elements themselves violate, ignore or misunderstand a myriad of federal laws about research and patient confidentiality. I predict in the next episode that Kyra solves a crime with a hairpin and a moon pie while her staff tries to storm her office with torches and assorted sharp tools..

America Undercover: Left of the Dial (2005) Season Unknown, Episode Unknown

documentary on the rise and first major stumble of Air America Radio

[6/10 · 15 April 2005]

This documentary aired on one of the cable channels in the MidAtlantic area the week of April 10 2005. It reminded me of nothing so much as prior documentaries on Internet startups of the 90s. Lots of excitement, lots of confusion followed by shock as reality hits. The only obvious difference was that their product was, and is, the liberal take on politics. The weakness of this documentary is that nothing was explicated in any depth; there was a lot of on-camera time by a few radio personalities demonstrating for all the world to see that liberals can be as single-minded and obnoxious as conservatives. I would have preferred much more about the behind the scenes maneuvering that caused the real financial crises.

The Village (2004)

art-house posturing

[1/10 · 19 March 2005]

I actually saw this movie on a plane and was amazed that it didn't come with a warning that it was unsuitable for sighted, hearing people. Besides all the internal discontinuities and truly silly plot twist, how the director got all these quite excellent actors to actually speak these empty bombastic lines is quite beyond me. Probably that's where all the budget went. It certainly wasn't the special effects that were limited to creature costumes that looked like they were created by 'goth' teenagers on Quaalude.

While the photography was pretty, much of the time the actors were squared up to the screen, acting like crazy right into in camera with the best sincere off-Broadway serious tones that signal that "Hey, pay attention. What I'm saying has important meaning here."

This movie will appeal to those who like their symbolism obvious and who enjoy Renaissance fairs. I got this movie for free and still wanted to ask for my money back.

The Amazing Dr. Clitterhouse (1938)

the title is an unappreciated joke

[26 January 2005]

It has always been surprising to me that more people have not looked closely at the name of the main character. Clitterhouse is certainly an unusual name and a web search for the name turns up only a street and school in London and many references to this film. The film name is, in my opinion, a joke by the writer on the film censors and film critics of his time by using a elaborate spelling of the word 'clitorus.' While it is not an obscenity but a perfectly normal anatomical term, it is certain that, not until fifty years later and 'Austin Powers, the Spy Who Shagged Me" has a word so closely tied to actual sexual activity or anatomic parts been used in a motionpicture.

As for me, I enjoyed the picture quite a bit but loved the title even more.

The Paradine Case (1947)

The two best things in this movie are not the leads

[16 December 2004]

Yes, I do agree with all, or at least most, of the other comments. Gregory Peck is my least favorite 'major' actor - sort of a tall Howdy-Doody and he is even more terrible than usual in this role. The role requires some gravitas while Peck contributes wooden-ness. It is a stretch to believe he is capable of passion in any way. No wonder they have no children.

On the other hand Charles Laughton is his great, evil, lecherous self. The real high note in this movie is Alida Valli who is incomprehensibly beautiful - even if she has only one expression - and the movie is worth watching just to see her closeups. She has several more cheekbones than the average person - with beautiful shadows under them all.

The Rose Tattoo (1955)

certainly not the masterpiece I expected

[24 October 2004]

After hearing about this movie for years I finally saw it in its entirety. What a disappointment!! Burt Lancaster is a character who claims to be the grandchild of the village idiot and whose behavior proves that genetics is a science. His acting is so hackneyed and stereotypical as to be ludicrous and embarrassing. Anna Magnani is over-the-top but sympathetic as the grieving widow who is holding a torch for her husband long after his torch is out. The behavior of the townspeople is more like the inhabitants of a small town in Sicily as filmed by Fellini than the residents of a small town in Louisiana which they are supposed to be. Marisa Pavan is subdued and lovely but interchangeable.

Bus 174 (2002)

Stunning and enthralling

[13 August 2004]

There is little that can be said about this film that isn't obvious in the film itself. It is amazingly well-crafted (with the exception of the superfluous sociologist sequences) with the editors building their points up to the last ten minutes at the bus which are among the best done scenes I've ever scene on film. The fact that they were working with only existing footage is truly amazing, like building an opera from random tunes recorded on a street.

The Brazilian police are shown as incompetent and murderous. Once Sandro fired the gun in the bus, he was doomed. It was the mistakes of the police that got the girl killed also.

The vision of the Brazilian penal system certainly lends some weight to the portrayal of the street kids as in the grip of a monstrously distorting and abusive society.

Reinforces my desire to never visit Rio.

The Four Feathers (2002)

terrible remake of the original

[3 July 2004]

With the sole exception of the additional character played by Djimon Hounsou, this movie is a flat, terrible remake of the original. The obligatory big battle scenes were unoriginal and could have been from any John Wayne western.

The original had all of the elements - including humor - that made a movie enjoyable. The original did suffer from the West is best syndrome but considering the year it was made, not too badly. I watched this on DVD and found myself anticipating the damn thing being over. I oftened wondered why the Brits didn't collapse of heat stroke in tight woolen uniforms in the 105 degree heat of the Sudan.

mini-spoiler

There was one startling discontinuity - while the two British protagonists are suffering and starving their teeth are brown and discoloured (and by all rights they should be suffering from Vit C & B deficiency). The next day as they are fleeing across desert and the hero fights with the jailer, the hero flashes at least 50 bright and shiny teeth as he struggles - he has more teeth than Jaws. Perhaps the prisoners' semi-yearly teeth cleaning just happened to occur prior to their escape.

Saboteur (1942)

A couple of the strangest non-sequiturs ever

[29 May 2004]

The first is mentioned above, where one of the heavies waxes poetic about his children and his son's long golden curls.

The second is where the 'heroine', Priscilla Lane is being kept as a hostage or prisoner. One of the keepers brings her an ice cream soda, she asks 'How Much' and then digs in her purse for the 15 cents. A completely bizarre short sequence.

Think of how much better this movie would be with John Garfield and anyone else replacing Bob Cummings and Priscilla Lane. Both Cumings and Lane are much too much the lightweights to bring any credibility to their parts. The major mechanisms in this movie are as series of Deus ex Machina occurrences.

sort of a waste - but Krueger is great.