steve-266-903132 Reviews

Racer and the Jailbird (2017)

Goes from kind of exciting to very depressing.

[6/10 · 17 May 2018]

Well ... It's a very well made film, with a great cast, lead and supporting; it does have a few less than believable aspects to the plot I must say. But the first part is sort of the car racing + heist film you were promised.

Anyway, yeah, the first part is fine - plenty of chemistry between Gigi and Bibi, lots of action, it looks like it's going somewhere ... and then where it goes is rather dark. And then from there, it turns utterly bleak. Forlorn, sad, depressing; you name it. I felt like there was a dark cloud hanging over me afterwards, and I'm surprised my dreams that night weren't darker than they were. I generally like noir, but this was a bit much for me. Some people have a higher tolerance for that sort of thing than I do though. C'est la vie.

The Lobster (2015)

Awful.

[2/10 · 10 June 2016]

All I can add to the various other 1 or 2 star reviews is that Colin Farrell was in fact NOT particularly good in this film. The amateur actor / flat affect gimmick is just stupid. A good actor pretending to be a lousy actor = lousy acting. The same goes for the rest of the cast. All are obviously capable of doing excellent work, it is just irritating to watch a film that is bad on purpose. It isn't arty or clever or anything, it's just bad. Some members of the crew appear to have accidentally done their jobs well, the film is often beautiful; it just isn't worth watching.

And it isn't 'dystopian' either (enough of that already!) It's just a bad imitation of a Peter Greenaway film. Or something. Yecch.

Every Thing Will Be Fine (2015)

A very finely crafted film

[9/10 · 7 January 2016]

I do not have any idea why so many critics did not love this film. It had my full attention from the beginning of the first shot.

I quickly realized that the film was going to use 3D to (dare I say it) add depth to the cinematography. There are no 3D gimmicks used here, nothing flying at your head or giving you a headache - the 3D effect simply makes the imagery that much richer, much as the careful selection of lenses or film stock or any number of other a cinematographer's tools can do. Every aspect of the camera-work is fantastic (says me with a BA and an MFA in photography).

I really found it to be engrossing. There are a lot of individual vignettes that are shown separately, without any real transition between some of them but those are intended to be seen as parallel to one another. Other parts transition chronologically; the whole thing (I thought) flowed beautifully in large part because there were so many threads running through and between the various parts of the film. It's very linear, and yet it sometimes isn't.

And - James Franco did not annoy me. (I know, that's terrible of me to say) He often does, but this was a solid, mature performance. All of the performances were quite good, really; and they were built on a very good script. And you can tell that the person who put it all together has seeming effortless mastery of his craft. It's a film that's going to unfold in my head for a while yet. See it big if you can.

Sworn Virgin (2015)

Very moving, and fascinating

[8/10 · 8 May 2015]

I hope to revisit this with a longer review if I can, but for now I will say this film was deeply moving. I never, NEVER say that about a movie - usually that's a cheesy overwrought thing to say, but this film actually is. It's just a notch or two short of something like "The Diving Bell and the Butterfly". Totally different subject matter, of course; and not as wrenching, but really truly worthwhile. All I'll say is that the main story is about a woman who does or did not quite fit in, and the secondary story is about a young woman coming of age who does not *want* to fit in.

I might say that it's about a culture different than ours that somehow developed a way of accommodating people who do not fit into the mainstream, rather like the 'berdache' among North American Natives or maybe those known as 'hijra' of South Asia.

Take a look at: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Albanian_sworn_virgins for a little background.

Anyway, it's beautifully filmed, very well realized, and very affecting. I'll be thinking about it for some time. See it in a real theater if you get a chance.

Bota (2014)

A beautiful film

[9/10 · 4 May 2015]

As someone who is principally a photographer, my main comment about this film has got to be that the cinematography was fabulous. Every shot was perfectly balanced, or off balance when that was called for. Beyond that: the pacing was great; just the right ebb and flow. Not a fast- paced film, but not dull either. The arc of the stories was very nice, as was the development of the characters, and the acting is excellent. At least, I think it was - I was so busy watching the frame that the film just flew by for me. Seriously though, the relationship between the 2 female leads was fabulous.

I saw it at the SFIFF, and I'm going to try to bring a few people for the last screening of it. Maybe I'll have more to add after that.

Inherent Vice (2014)

Weirdly brilliant. Brilliantly weird.

[9/10 · 14 February 2015]

* I don't think I included any real spoilers; I tried to describe the film without saying anything. But, who knows…... I didn't. *

So let's say, hypothetically, that you are a filmmaker, and you watched Chinatown and The Big Lebowski and maybe one other film all at the same time on acid, twice in a row. Maybe three times. And subsequently, you had the idea to do a film noir in which everyone smokes dope instead of cigarettes, and it's set in the 60's near the beach in LA. And it's in luscious color rather than B&W. That's kind of what this film is like.

The cinematography is of course just gorgeous. It practically looks like it was shot on Kodachrome or something. And I love that there's a brief tribute to James Wong Howe, which most people will probably miss. There's an assortment of other little tributes to better known popular culture that are actually surprisingly multi-layered, but I won't give any details. You just have to know what they are.

Some say they can't follow the storyline - well, duh! The storyline pretty much smoked a big spliff laced with PCP or opium or something! But if you pay attention, you'll realize that the film actually does wrap up its various subplots rather successfully. I look forward to reading the book, but the film by itself is pretty successful in my opinion. It's one of very few films that I would pay full price to see again. Critics that don't like it are, in my opinion, not really watching the film that is in front of them. You have to take it for what it is: brilliant.

Wetlands (2013)

A brilliant, funny, touching weird film

[9/10 · 20 September 2014]

In some ways, it's rather conventional; a young woman trying to figure herself out. And in some other ways, it's outrageously crass and disgusting. But somehow, I didn't mind the crass, disgusting parts that much because I found most of them to be outrageously funny; and I'm pretty sure that's how the were intended. There's not as much female nudity as you might think (or hope for; the actress is very cute) and no really explicit sex. It's just hilariously lewd and over the top. By the end she's learned some important things, and it has the kind of happy ending that maybe it shouldn't but that I usually fall for.

It doesn't seem to be getting great reviews here (yet) and I have no idea why. I was worried that I was laughing so much at certain scenes that other audience members might be a little annoyed. I guess there's no accounting for taste. My GF, who's generally a kind of highbrow film buff, loved it too.

Gangster Squad (2013)

Good genre picture

[7/10 · 19 January 2013]

I'm getting a little annoyed with all the film snobs who are, well, snobs. This is a movie of a certain genre, and it does a very fine job of being that kind of movie! It is what it is, and it ain't what it's not. It's a gangster shoot-em-up B-movie, except with big-budget production values and cast. I like depressing, serious art-house fare as much as the next intellectual with an MFA (which, yes, I have) but I've also learned to appreciate formula flicks like this. It's not story- intensive because it isn't supposed to be. It actually has better acting and character development than I was expecting, and the production design, cinematography, and editing are all quite good; even excellent. Heck, it's worth it just for the sake of seeing Sean Penn as an over-the- top evil mob boss. I would say that it's worth seeing in an actual theater, but it'll make good DVD material too.

Red Tails (2012)

A truly great MOVIE

[8/10 · 7 December 2012]

Many folks have given this film terrible reviews based on the inaccurate representation of various technical issues; and they're absolutely right. And they've completely missed the point.

They get an A+ on their knowledge of aerial combat and its conduct in the skies of Europe, and an F- on their knowledge of the art, craft, and history of movie-making. George Lucas said plainly that he wanted to give the Tuskegee Airmen the full John Wayne, Hollywood hero movie treatment, and that's what he did to a T. I can only assume that many reviewers simply do not understand the genre AT ALL. It's a fable, a comic book; not a documentary, not a docku- drama, not anything else. If you understand and appreciate the old Hollywood formula for telling the hero's story, you will love this movie. If you don't like old school John Wayne hero movies, don't bother. It's that simple.