rcmoorejr Reviews

The Chronicles of Riddick (2004)

Another case of a sequel stinker

[2/10 · 4 December 2006]

Pitch Black is one of the best recent science fiction/monster flicks. Vin Diesel's character is a breakout performance, as is Radha Mitchell as the captain. The rest of the crew do good work, and the effects are solid. All of which makes watching 'The Chronicles of Riddick' so agonizing. The only component of the story line that actually links these films is Diesel's return to a prison planet to rescue the young girl he saved in Pitch - which is a small bit, almost a story within the story. The rest is pure nonsense, bad science fiction. To hear Colm Fiore's endless monologue, pretty much summing up the ridiculous sequel, of the 'quasi-dead'... It's painful to watch Chronicles, knowing they probably had a better budget than Pitch Black and utterly squandered it...

Warning Sign (1985)

Good cast... lowwww budget

[5/10 · 1 August 2006]

Sam Waterston... Kathleen Quinlan... Yaphet Kotto... Richard Dysart... all in all a good cast. It manages to never get truly laughable, even though it's pretty dated now. The story is actually not bad. Kathleen Quinlan is very good as a security guard trying to do the right thing when the biohazard erupts. Sam Waterston is okay...Yaphet Kotto would probably delete this from his credits if he could. What trips up this movie? The biohazard erupts and the plant seals itself automatically with steel doors. Then the government boys show up. Three lab workers who got out are rounded up and stuck in 'bubble boy' baggies, and they hang out with the rest of the townspeople in front of the plant through the movie(!)....they are conveniently unzipped in the final scene. A steel door protecting uncontaminated scientists is pounded by the crazed with a fire extinguisher... and in the final scene it is shiny and new when it opens to release the scientists... A jackhammer employed to cut a hole in the wall is clearly not working when the hole is opened. I must say, though, that it held my interest until the end.

Leap of Faith (1992)

A gem from Steve Martin - who has cranked out a lot of cubic zirconia

[8/10 · 12 April 2006]

There is much that works well in this movie - Steve Martin is playing a con man, a much fuller and better executed one than the 2nd banana he played in 'Dirty Rotten Scoundrels', which he dumbed down with slapstick. Debra Winger is excellent as his partner in running a road ministry built on sleight of hand and working the audience like a carnival. The location shooting works for it, and the supporting cast (Meat Loaf, Philip Seymour Hoffman, MC Ganey in bleached white hair?)is mostly very good, and if you like gospel you'll enjoy this. Music trivia: listen for the song on the radio in the pickup in the first scene. What doesn't work? It ends a scene too early - Steve Martin has suddenly had his cynicism upended and the film just ends. Liam Neeson can barely keep the brogue out of his role as a Texas Sheriff (so many others could have carried this role, why him?). There is certainly a statement about faith at the end of this movie, to wit: faith finds a way even if it has to work through a con man. The payback scene, unfortunately, is very predictable: it rains. For all the dreck Steve Martin has cranked out, this one will pay you back.

The New World (2005)

When a poet gets behind the camera

[7/10 · 31 January 2006]

Ever see 'Bad Boys II'? This film is the precise opposite. A change of pace from the likes of Bruckheimer, et al., the only explosions are the firing of cannons and a few muskets. Malick films are not for everyone. Someone leaving the theater behind me said, sarcastically, 'well, that was exciting'... If you have never seen a Terence Malick film, be prepared for long, lingering shots of tree canopy, of hawks caught in flight, and minimal plot. All the touches that got Michael Cimino in trouble for 'Heaven's Gate' are the soul of a Terence Malick film. I guess the trick is to make so few films they are considered their own genre... Also be prepared for recognizable actors (John Savage, Wes Studi, Christopher Plummer, Christian Bale) to play minor, even cameo roles (Jonathan Pryce is King James but with thirty seconds of screen time you'll only know this from the credits). Q'orianka Kilcher, the ingénue playing Pocahontas, represents the New World, and she gets most of the face time, beating out even Colin Farrell. The film stalls a bit when Kilcher is being trained as an English lady and goes back to England to be presented at court...but otherwise Malick succeeds in his revisionist/romantic look at Jamestown. A criticism: when Pocahontas is cast out of her tribe for helping the settlers (besides the first Thanksgiving, which is portrayed as a mercy flight, she sneaks them corn to plant), the English accept her like she's another guy in body armor and bad teeth. Being at the time one of the few females in camp, and being 'Natural', I don't believe her presence caused no ripples. Just an example of where Malick lets a popular legend overrun revisionism.

The Dukes of Hazzard (2005)

It's for laughs, right?

[6/10 · 13 January 2006]

Not having been a big fan of the series, I nevertheless decided to see the flick. Like Smokey and the Bandit, we're talking a movie where the muscle car and the T&A get the best camera angles, so think 'Wrath of Khan' (i.e. former TV series gets big-screen adaptation) and enjoy the ride. One or two little tweaks of reality sneak in: the General Lee sporting the Stars and Bars trapped in Atlanta traffic gets alternating cheers and jeers, and then is briefly trapped (in traffic again) in a black neighborhood where some homeboys are about to enlighten Bo and Luke before the cops arrive; near the ending, Daisy's physical endowments are enlisted to lure a dozen male cops away from a roadblock, only to be countermanded by a female(!) police supervisor. The movie adds a lame bit with Sean Scott literally choosing to love his car instead of a comely wench... Willie Nelson gets to yell out bawdy jokes while throwing Moonshine cocktails at police cars... With a movie like this the out-takes near the end are barely better than the footage that made it.

Lord of Illusions (1995)

Two story lines, two levels of performance

[7/10 · 1 December 2005]

What propels 'Lord of Illusions' to the upper ranks of my favorites (enough so that I own the DVD) is the beginning and the end. The scenes shot in the cult's desert dwelling, in the beginning where Nix has kidnapped a girl and Swann leads ex-cult members in saving her, paired with the ending, where Nix is released from the grave, are prime horror. The effects are mediocre now but still of sufficient quality that one stays with the story, but as I recall in 1995 I was impressed. Daniel van Bargen and Famke Janssen carry this movie's horror edge. Bakula looks and sounds more like he's making a TV Movie of the Week, acting 'small screen' and detracting from the film (O'Connor varies between schtick and somewhat intriguing). The plot requirement of the visit to the illusionist's club is what ties these together, and it's uneven, a little like the film. I would consider this worth renting, and keeping its age in mind. Daniel van Bargen is worth the price.

The Amityville Horror (2005)

An improvement. over the original, but why bother?

[6/10 · 26 November 2005]

The first AH was more faithful to the actual setting. The house, on Long Island, is a modest two story house on a small lot with neighbors close by, a typical suburban neighborhood. In the remake we have a setting out of The Shining, a three story rambling estate. In the original, which was not terribly frightening, the priest called in to bless the house was allegedly a close friend of the Lutz's, and he makes his entrance during the house warming early on. In this remake, he's an old friend of the killer's family and a stranger to the Lutz family and only shows up near the end to give speed to their urge to flee.

The 2005 remake borrows heavily from the genre, but in so doing makes a more frightening movie than the original. By letting the audience see more than the characters, it scares you more effectively than the original ever did. The production values appear to be better this time, and in total, this remake is scarier than the original. As for the plot... eh. They do a good job of remaining faithful to the original until the last part, where they try to pull in a tale of some colonial torturer - very lame. A colonial era house with a foundation of brick and cinder block? Fortunately the film maker only throws it in in the last ten minutes for those who crave something more compelling as modus operandi than the ghost of a serial killer. If you haven't seen the original, see this one instead. Then go see the house on Long Island and shake your head over how this sorry attempt to make money from a 'haunted house' got this far.

Breaker Morant (1980)

Among the best movies I have ever seen

[10/10 · 3 November 2005]

Begin with the moral ambiguity of the story - the British Army is subjecting three Australian officers to courts-martial on charges of murder during the Boer War. This was England's Vietnam. We hear testimony that, yes, the officers shot prisoners, all on the basis of a 'verbal understanding'... rule 303 (explained in one frame with a close-up of the carbine the soldiers used, .303 caliber), and you at least have a story that will make you think. Beautiful cinematography, a script that crackles... Add in some top-shelf performances (pretty much everyone) and I defy you to walk out of this movie not feeling a least a little changed. I won't tell you how the outcome of the trials, except to say that the audience is made aware that the trial is a political one to help the English get out of the war and keep Germany from going in...

Solomon & Gaenor (1999)

Deserves a wider audience

[9/10 · 1 August 2005]

If only for the fact that the producers sought authenticity in having a trilingual film (Welsh, Yiddish, English), and the starkly authentic look of the settings, the movie is noteworthy. It has a string of nominations and a few wins from film festivals. The players are utterly believable and there isn't a misstep. It's a tragic romance, which means a tearjerker, but to its credit it's not very predictable. Insofar as the families are of different faiths and mutually try to stop the relationship, then it might be a retelling of 'Romeo and Juliet', though anyone watching this movie and expecting "RJ" will be confused. Being one who dislikes subtitles, this movie is still well worth renting.

Man of the House (I) (2005)

Formulaic, saved by Jones, Cedric

[7/10 · 25 July 2005]

Tommy Lee Jones, one of my favorites, is type-cast as a Texas Ranger. Cedric is a minister with a criminal past, and the girls are just short of interchangeable bimbos. Anne Archer is thrown in to be a love interest for Tommy and does very little except smile sexily at the camera (which she does well... I also love Anne Archer). The storyline is very predictable, with few surprises. So why did I vote it 7/10? It's a comedy, the writing does rise here and there out of cliché, and the stars - Jones, in particular - have perfect timing. I watched the entire movie, laughed periodically (many's the recent comedy that gets no laughs), and, as one must, didn't take it too seriously. 99% of the pyrotechnics occur in the first ten minutes, and after that it's up to TLJ and the cast to keep it moving and, somehow, they do. With less interesting stars to work the lines this movie could easily drop to below 5...

Danny Deckchair (2003)

Am I the only one who found it boring?

[3/10 · 21 July 2005]

I borrowed this from Netflix because the posted copy sounded promising (yes, I know, it ALWAYS sounds promising). Rhys Ifans and Miranda Otto sold this for me, and I also tend to at least look at pretty much anything shipped from Australia; their films aren't consistently spellbinding (The Dish?) but are often of a quality missing in the studio flicks. I expected to laugh, I expected to want to see the whole film. I laughed once (damned if I can remember at what, but just once) and found the movie, overall, tedious. My wife and I kept getting up and attending to other issues without bothering to pause it. I kept thinking as I watched that 'I bet this sounded funny in the script reading'. For those who felt this outshone Pretty Woman... that's not much competition. It's not the worst film I've ever seen, but I'm afraid I take Rhys and Miranda off my 'must see' list.

Shock Treatment (1981)

I took twenty three years to see it - should've waited longer

[1/10 · 16 December 2004]

I was a Rocky Horror fan in the late seventies and took my wife-to-be on our second date to see it (a true test of a relationship). I vaguely remembered the announcement of a sequel, but as is otherwise noted here, Shock Treatment was pushed out the door and forgotten. I watched it on an old VHS, and turned it off twice. It was hard to understand how a creative force like Richard O'Brien could go from Rocky to Shock Treatment, but I've since seen it elsewhere. George Miller created 'Road Warrior' and then, under studio pressures, cranked out a lame sequel aka 'Beyond Thunderdome'.

As for Shock Treatment, after viewing it, there's two hours of my life I'd like back...