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3/5 stars
We mainly added this to the queue because it was directed by Jonathan Frakes. It’s a cute movie with not-so-great science and a few cheesy what-would-you-do-if-you-were-a-teenager-who-could-stop-time kind of scenes.
2.5/5 stars
This seems to be my theme lately — not bad, not great, mostly eye candy. Owen Wilson plays a Navy navigator who’s plane is downed behind enemy lines. This is not a war-time film, but present-day-ish.
The DC Independent Film Festival kicked off last week, so Andrew and I decided to catch a couple sessions today. We caught two shorts fests: “Politics, Conflict, and Controversy” and “Cinematic Love & Death”.
I suppose I should have been prepared, during the first session (politics, conflict and controversy), for films with a message. I wasn’t. I’ve been a writer for a long time (not paid, not published, but a writer, none-the-less), and I know that a good story comes from, well, a good story. It needs strong characters with real problems and conflicts. If there’s a “message” to the story, it will come through the problems and conflicts that the characters encounter. There’s no need to hit the reader over the head with the message. Most of these filmmakers have not learned this lesson yet. Nearly all of them had a message and felt that they needed to shout their message at us stupid viewers.
Having said that, there were a couple noteworthy pieces during the first session:
In some ways I felt that the actually content of the protest was missing — I got a general idea of what they were protesting (the School of the Americas), but there wasn’t enough “evidence” to make me support the protestors. On the other hand, the documentary was really about the protestors, not the subject of their protests, at least that’s what I gathered. In that sense, it was well-done with an underlying arch that brought the film from beginning to end and told the story of the protestors without shoving anything down our throats.
This one was also more powerful than the “fiction” shorts that had a message to convey. Here, there was a message of sorts, but the filmmaker did not take sides. Rather we got to see both girls’ parents talking about their girls. We get the sense that the parents of the bomber, while sad that they lost their daughter, were supportive (not necessarily proud) of their daughter and her convictions. On the other side, we see the grieving parents and classmates of the victim.
This one was not as well crafted as Convictions: Prisoners of Conscience, because at times it seemed that some material was just thrown between scenes of the parents without a real plan for connecting events.
The second session was much more enjoyable than the first, though two of the pieces were almost indecipherable. Particularly enjoyable:
All in all, a fun afternoon. We’ll probably be back for another session or two next weekend.
2.5/5 stars
I’ll confess that I added this to our Netflix queue because it starred Sting. No, he’s not the best actor, but he’s pretty to look at. I didn’t really know much about the story except that it was vaguely related to Frankenstein and involved his creation of a female companion for his “monster”.
In the end it was a “not bad, not great” retelling of the story of Dr. Frankenstein. In this version, Frankenstein constructs a bride for his monster, but she scares the monster away and becomes a ward of Frankenstein. He decides to mold her into an independent woman, contrary to the standards for women of the day. But when she becomes too independent, Dr. Frankenstein resents her.
I probably wouldn’t watch it again, but was a decent distraction for an evening.
3.5 stars
Not bad, not great. A writer, played by Diane Lane, frustrated after a messy divorce, takes a vacation in Tuscany, and ends up buying a house. We follow her struggle to make the house livable while trying to rekindle both her love life and her writing in the process. A fun diversion.
3.5/5 stars
Ten years ago, nearly one million people were killed during three months in Rowanda by the Hutu militants. We didn’t hear much about it in the US because our news media was enthralled by the O. J. Simpson trial.
Hotel Rwanda tells the story of a hotel manager, Paul Rusesabagina, who keeps his family safe at his hotel during this madness. He also takes in over a thousand other Tutsi refugies and uses his connections to keep them safe as well.
This is not a “happy” movie, but is very well done. They manage capture a small bit of what the horror must have been without sinking into the pit of gratuitous gore. Don Cheadle does gives an excellent performance, along with most of the rest of the cast. The exception was Nick Nolte, who turns in an uneven performance, giving the impression that he’s drunk much of the time.
4/5 stars
This movie is a spoof of B-movies. Betty and Paul (a scientist) travel to a remote cabin in the woods to track down a meteorite which is sure to be rich in atmospherium. The cabin happens to be near a cave which, legend has it, is home to the lost skeleton of Cadavra (whatever that is). Dr. Roger Flemming is seeking out the skeleton as part of a plan to take over the world (cue maniacal laughter). On top of all that, a spaceship crashs in the woods nearby, and the pet mutant gets lose. This is all a recipe for a great B-movie!
The movie was a lot of fun. The acting was, well, B-movie, but B-movie on purpose. The dialog usually stayed just shy of being too over-the-top, although occasionally a gag was held for just a smidge too long.
A couple of my favorite lines:
2/5 stars
Bad News Bears grow up and play dodgeball. The humor grew up (or became a bit raunchier), too, but not much else. Not bad, not great, just a so-so diversion.
4/5 stars
This was a great spoof on horror movies! Sean decided to win back his girlfriend by acting as hero when zombies start to take over London. Sean and his deadbeat flatmate, Ed, set out to pick up Sean’s mother and his ex-girlfriend, and bring them to safety at his favorite pub, The Winchester.
Excellent, highly recommended hilarious movie.
Cool DVD feature: I don’t normally go on about DVD features, but this one had the best feature I’ve ever seen — Plot Holes. This feature had three sections explaining a few plot holes involving three different characters. Comic-book-like graphics showed what happened while the involved character narrated their story.
2.5/5 stars
Not nearly as good as the first. Here Elle Woods goes to Washington DC to introduce a bill against using animals for cosmetics testing. She uses her “blonde-ways” to charm members of congress and win votes for the bill. However, it just wasn’t as fun as the first — maybe the jokes had all been used up, or maybe I just was expecting too much. Not bad, but not great.
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