Reviews

I am a science-fiction and action movie fan primarily, I give huge leeway in Star Wars and Star Trek movies, despite gaping holes in their plots and stories or how the same, idea is being used yet again.

This movie surprised me when it hit me so hard, no action to speak of, but an amazing, touching story of Gilbert Grape and his family, mostly Gilbert himself and his life, taking care of his incompetent family and working as a grocery store clerk to keep everything going.

This is the first time that I'd seen Leonardo DiCaprio in any movie. He played Arnie, Gilbert's mentally challenged little brother. DiCaprio does an amazing job in this role, he's completely charming as the slow younger brother and he really deserved the Oscar for best supporting actor in a really tough year that had Tommy Lee Jones take it away for his roll in "The Fugitive".

Depp is also fantastic as the oldest brother, keeping his family together, but knowing that he'd be better off leaving and going off on his own, held back by his obligations.

I was blown away that this movie didn't get nominated for best picture, it was truly deserving and one of the most unappreciated movies of the last decade.

I am amazed by the complete contrast of comments by various other viewers. I realize that reviewing movies is a bit like explaining why you like a color or your favorite food, there's plenty of reasons to disagree no matter if you like it or hate it.

"The Loss of Sexual Innocence" is a series of loosely (and I mean loosely) connected sequences that show how the main characters have lost some piece of their innocence (not necessarily sexual) over the course of their lives.

The whole movie isn't junk, some sequences are amazing visually or inventive (one sequence of someone's vacation was shot entirely through the windows of their lovely cottage for example), but all in all, the movie fails because of the lack of continuity between the scenes and the difficulty for the viewer to associate and hold all of the pieces in their mind by the end of the movie. Many people will just laugh this movie off as ridiculous, and I have to say, I can see their side of things.

One thing I hate about some movies is the idea of a movie being artful because they want to be artful (artsy). It is a tragedy in many movies that could be great or at least good. If you want to make a point, if you want to make a film, just make the film. If it happens to be artsy, then fine, that was just how it turned out. If you inject artsyness just for the sake of it, you're weakening the movie to the point that it's nothing but artsy junk with no substance. This movie is certainly guilty of some of this. It ends up being incredibly pretentious.

I loved this movie. It's visually stunning and the casting and acting was superb. The story was already layed out (approximately), so Luc Besson concentrated on Jeanne herself, the person and what she was like and why she did what she did.

I have to admit to putting myself in Jeanne's place, feeling what she must have been feeling along the way. I think without that, it probably would have been a much duller movie, although probably entertaining.

The battles scenes, of which there were many, were graphic and brutal. Dismemberments, swords and maces swinging, lots of pain and death. The ensuing desolation at the end of a battle were weighty and gave a a horrible look at the conditions of the time.

My final impressions... Joan of Arc, if the portrayals were accurate was a driven young woman, deeply religious and deeply confused who was probably at least partially insane. If she were alive today, no doubt, she would be treated with common drugs and would lead a normal life. I felt very sorry for her and her situation and for the way that she was treated. I know people would argue that there is no need to feel this way, because she was clear and sure of her purpose. I don't feel that this was ever the case and she was sure only that she was going crazy if she didn't do something.

Movies don't usually move me this way and I'm really amazed.

I don't know exactly what went wrong with the movie. I wasn't offended by the religious comments. Maybe the movie was too religious for me, I'm not sure. The bottom line is, except for a few funny (mild chuckles) moments, I just didn't laugh and didn't find it funny.

Most of the moments are Ben Affleck and Matt Damon moments. I liked their characters but found that the movie failed despite them. I don't want to say that Smith should have used them more or anything like that, I think they were handled well, it's just that there wasn't enough offered by the other characters. Chris Rock and Selma Hayek especially seemed like useless characters that were just left with nothing to do, but they did things (unfunny things) anyway.

I never did get Jay either... of course, everyone likes Silent Bob, but Jay is just a dumb guy who hangs out swearing and saying stupid things that would be offensive in any setting, not just in a religious one.

If you must see the movie, wait of the rental. This is unfortunate, because I'm a huge fan of Smith and really liked all of his other stuff, Clerks, Mall Rats and Chasing Amy. These were all really good films.

Hilary and Jackie was an interesting story, that is, I'm sure the lives of these two people was interesting, but it should have been tackled differently.

Story isn't enough to make a good movie. There are a few key pieces to the movie, the beginning wrapping around to the ending, the split of the movie into Hilary's point of view and Jackie's point of view and the weird relationship between the sisters.

The beginning was interesting and near the end, I was dying to find out what the woman wispered to Jackie on the beach when they were small. When the end finally came, I was left asking if it was some kind of science fiction or time travel/space warp movie. It made no sense to me at all.

The splitting of the movie into two points of view worked in some cases, but not in others. Just not enough effort was spend trying to make the dialog work from both sides. In the end, to explain Jackie's reasons for acting the way she did, they had to change Hilary's dialog altogether, add lines etc... Where it did work was with pieces of the movie that we never saw from Hilary's perspective in the first place. This means to me that it should never have been split up into two perspectives.

Finally, the weird relationship between the sisters and the sharing of Hilary's husband... just strange. I didn't get it. It isn't the sharing of a husband, it's that neither Hilary or her husband wanted it to happen, but they do it anyway. THEN, the most dumbfounding event is that Hilary is then scared that Jackie will find out that she's continuing to sleep with her own husband! Hilary is SHARING, maybe someone who wrote the movie should look that up. There has to be a limit to what one person will let their sister get away with.

All in all, I can't recommend this movie.

Setting, general feel and the pacing of this movie are excellent. The movie starts well and keeps your interest throughout.

Sure, the general plot idea has been used by movies and TV for a few years, but this is the best of the genre of cyberpunk type sci-fi movies bar none ("Strange Days" would be second).