Change Your Image
chrissythomster
Reviews
Everybody's Fine (2009)
over-sentimental expositional rubbish
There is a very good film that stars a Hollywood legend playing against type as a retired widower taking a road trip, along the way facing issues about his own life and those of his relationship with his offspring. 'About Schmidt' is that film's name and it is wonderful. This film is NOT that film.
While 'Everybody's Fine' follows a very similar premise, unfortunately it doesn't share anywhere near the same quality of theme, character, performances or dialogue as Alexander Payne's vastly superior film. This effort is tentative at best in its character and plot set up - the reasoning behind why the kids are so distant with their father is only barely convincing as De Nero's Frank Goode actually seems like a fairly normal kind of guy, as oppose to the fastidious, over-bearing patriarch suggested by his off spring. My main problem with the film is its over sentimentality in the final third of the film. The director cranks up the melodrama with weepy strings on the score and some awful examples of expositional dialogue making abso-bloody-lutely sure we have no doubt what EVERYONE and EVERYTHING means, with ill-advised voice overs, dream sequences and only the very happiest of endings on offer, which is in itself deeply unbelievable as anyone with a dysfunctional family knows, you cannot un-do a lifetime of bad feeling with a few Christmas lights and a well-cooked turkey. The fact that lots of these reviewers are calling De Nero's performance here the best for 15 or 20 years really just shows how far he has fallen from his truly great performances in the 70's and 80's. Soppy over explained but undercooked melodrama that really should've been better considering the wealth of acting talent available.
Red Dragon (2002)
Miscast, poorly scripted and directed remake of superior Manhunter
I can't believe that this Ratner remake has a higher average score than both Ridley Scott's Hannibal and the original Manhunter. While Scott's film has been accused of being overly stylisted and self indulgent, and Manhunter a little dated, what with it's Miami Vice setting and all, both are so much better films than this weak remake.
I find it very strange that Edward Norton, Ralph Fiennes and Harvey Keitel, who are usually reasonable guarantees of acting quality, seem utterly bored throughout the entire film - delivering line after line of bland dialogue, devoid of any emotional depth or believability whatsoever. Norton in particularly seems to be just going through the motions, much as he did in The Italian Job, so I wonder if this was just another big payday for him to support other projects he had a genuine interest in? Apart from the fact he looks about 12 - there is no torment in his character supposedly driven to despair by this terrible talent. His lines are not said with the conviction of a man driven, compelled to do this work because that is his curse and his gift, a man emotionally shattered by what he has done and what he knows he must do. Anyone who has read the novel will surely lean much further towards William Peterson's Graham than Norton's - looking tanned, toned, with a fine head of blonde locks, with only a manly scar on a six pack to suggest any history.
Similarly, Fiennes, who has made a career of playing understated and typically repressed characters, seems way out of his depth here - at least he made an attempt at emotional depth and character, though it falls way short of the power and detachment of Tom Noonan's Dollarhyde in Mann's film. I presume because Fiennes had impressively played one psychopath in Schindler's List, they he could do it here - he sure didn't get this part from The English Patient or End of the Affair.
And Kietel as an FBI head honcho? He can play offbeat, he plays quirky, he plays anti-authoritarian, he's a tough guy, he's a loner chock full of barely retrained fury. He's Bad Lieutenant! What he isn't Good Jack Crawford, a suit, a leader, a worker for 'The Man'. Further more, and not being harsh to Harvey, but he never really comes across as the brightest of men, so all his lines sound rehearsed and as if they should come from someone else. Sorry, but this just ain't your bag Keitel.
It is no secret that while Hopkins gladly reprised his role in this film, he was decidedly unhappy with the script and his role within it - really just re-hashing almost word for word what Brian Cox did so brilliantly in the original. Of course, he is still chilling and deserves his place as one of the most memorable film characters in movie history, but he over eggs the soufflé here resulting in a bit of campy old nonsense. The opening 10 mins was excellent, but like the rest of the main cast, boredom seems to get the better of him so his Lecter in this film is more of a pantomime villain, rather than the wonderful creepiness of his performance in Lambs or the much more restrained insanity yet genuinely sadistic as in Hannibal.
Only Emily Watson and Phillip Seymour Hoffman come away with any decent acting chops here. Hoffman is brilliant in almost anything he's in, so here his smarmy, oily Tatler hack is excellent both in this film and in comparison to the character in the book and the original film.
Of course, a heavy dollop of blame for all of this must be served to Bret Ratner, who for a while now seems to be on studio speed dial if they want someone to take over a tired franchise to try and eek a few more dollars out of it. His films are about as safe and mainstream as you can get. He is the epitome of the typical big budget studio director. Don't take chances. Play to the masses. Do what the studio tell you. Take your massive paycheck. And why not I guess. Fair play to him. Say what you like about Manhunter, Lambs and Hannibal, but all of them had suspense and used the plot, dialogue, cinematography and performances to capture the mood of the film and give it genuine tension - here Ratner captures none of that and thus what we see is just a watered down version of what previously was a great story with wonderfully drawn characters put in difficult situations.
Finally, I have to mention the shocking editing - exactly what you would expect by a guy who made his career on action films - too fast, no time to establish and increase tension, just go straight in for the kill. About as subtle as a brick in the face. To be fair to the editor, he has cut many financially successful action films with Ratner, but any bloke who is responsible for Showgirls should not be put in charge of cutting something like this.
in short. Poor
Grindhouse (2007)
Tarantino bores with more banter boll ox, but at least Rodriguez knows what this whole Gringhouse thing is supposed to be - funny, disgusting, and way way over the top!
Call the Cool Police but am I the only one who thinks Tarantino is a one trick pony? He established his trademark snappy dialog and pop culture referentialisms with his first two films and has been trading on that success ever since! Like a Bon Jovi concert, each and every effort tries and fails to recapture the spirit of the original, only to fall back on the tried and tested to save its ass. Everyone has been wetting their pants about the whole Grindhouse thing ever since the banana-chinned one first starting blabbing about it, but I'm not too sure why - surely for two experienced filmmakers it should be no trouble at all to copy a sub-genre that at best is cult viewing and at worst a load of old balls, poorly scripted, poorly acted, poorly produced - so why should such filmmakers be given huge credit for recreating such shoddy films on a much larger budget?
Having said that, Robert Rodriguez's 'Planet Terror' is an excellent example of everything these types of films should be - humor, fighting, sex, loose storyline only held together by the sheer unbelievability and gross out quality of the action sequences, and the so-bad-it's-good effects that gave all such low budget gore-fest such a cult status. Basically every aspect needs to be way over the top and Planet Terror delivers in buckets, from the deliberately hammy performances from actors we know can really act, to the excellent 80's John Carpenter style soundtrack, and an excess of blood and exploding body parts I haven't seen since Peter Jackson hung up his butchers chopper. Great fun.
SPOILER ALERT!!!
I for one much preferred Planet Terror to Tarantino's effort - Death Proof - which is 20% grind house and 80% typical Tarantino fodder whereby the characters spend what seems like an eternity exchanging snappy one-liners and pop culture references, while offering almost nothing in the way of character or narrative development. Further more, for its 90 min run time, the first 45mins is spent with a load of characters that you never see again.
I guess it could be argued that Tarantino cleverly turns horror conventions on its head by forcing the viewer to invest time and energy in these characters, only for them to be suddenly snatched from us in an original, but not wholly unexpected way, thus calling into question our preconceptions of everything we may see thereafter. A notion further suggested by the introduction of the new (yet very similar) characters in the remaining 45mins - supposedly we should be expecting a repeat of the first act, but it is clear from the off that these girls are very different from the last unfortunate bunch.
If this generic tinkering was his intention it didn't work for me. I was left with a feeling that I had just wasted the best part of an hour of my life watching attractive women spouting unlikely Tarantinoisms, only for the whole thing to begin again with a load of new, yet equally attractive characters doing exactly the same thing. I have heard that Tarantino has said these girls talk just like women talk today - well I don't know what women he's hanging out with, but most of the girls I know are not anywhere near as rapier-witted, poetic or downright pretentious as this lot. I think it's more a case of this is how Tarantino would talk today if he was a woman. There's far too much exposition and choreographed dialog that tries desperately to recreate some of the genius scripting seen in Dogs or Pulp Fiction. Unfortunately it fails on all counts, and while the car chase scene is impressive, it is completely at odds with the rest of a movie that is far too well acted, slick, and rehearsed to be considered part of the Grindhouse canon. Ultimately, we are left with characters we don't really give two shits about, so the Thelma and Louise style retribution is solely for comic effect from caricatures - a tone that is lowered to limbo height for the abrupt farcical conclusion crudely tacked onto the end as if to say "see, I was only messing about! Look how funny and violent Grindhouse is Tarantino style". Kurt was on good Snake Plisken form though, frowning and growling his way though, and all credit to Zoe Bell though, who for a stunt woman put in an excellent acting performance - though if your stunt woman is getting credit for her acting you know the film has gone wrong somewhere.
If Tarantino had wanted a slapstick Charlies Angels with added "MotherF*#ker!" business he should'v made one from the out set. I was left with a feeling that poor old Quentin was happily making another Tarantino movie, until someone (probably Rodriguez) reminded him that this was supposed to be a Grindhouse flick. Of course I could be taking it all too seriously, as neither film is supposed to be taken as a piece of cinematic art, but where Planet Terror succeeds in introducing the genre to a new breed of movie-goer with tongue firmly in cheek, Death Proof feels more like the bastard offspring of Pulp Fiction and Britteny Spears's Crossroads
than Grindhouse, like we'v seen and heard it all before, but much much better.
I'd give it 7 out of 10 for both films or 8 for Planet Terror alone or 5 just for Death Proof. Don't believe the hype people.
Snakes on a Plane (2006)
shoddy gimmicky tripe that even Sam Jackson can't raise above banal toilet fodder
I don't know who greenlit this load of old arse but they were either a complete cinematic imbecile or had been tootin' grandpa's old medicine pipe. The plot is so utterly ridiculous offers one of the strongest arguments yet that Hollywood movies are indeed made for those with the intelligence of a baboon's scrotum. The idea of some uber-gangster loading a plane with deadly snakes as an effective way of offing a witness is so utterly absurd it makes any of Dr. Evil's schemes complete criminal genius - having said that, the scriptwriter should get some credit for originality - we're unlikely to see this story turn up in anything else. For any who might think I lack a sense of humour, the film was marketed as an action movie, not an action/comedy/horror, and there isn't enough comedy or horror in it to justify the label anyway. We have the obligatory 'blonde chick with over-sized funbags' in a completely unnecessary sex scene getting bitten on the afore mentioned hooter, and a ludicrous 'bloke getting bitten on the knob' gag - both hopelessly out of place in the overall pace of a film supposedly built on and action and tension. The cast did as well as anyone realistically could with the Cleveland-steamer of a script, though they might well wonder why they bothered - especially the likes of Julianna Margulies, fresh from her excellent work on The Sopranos, and Anchorman's David Koechner, who clearly got lost on the studio lot on his way to the the set of another, much funnier film. However,I have to say, I have absolutely no idea what Sam Jackson thought he was doing signing up for something like this. His lines were hammy and clumsily fudged together in one of his poorest performances to date. It's as far away as you can get from Pulp Fiction. Really Sam! You should be ashamed of yourself! If there are any positives, they are the snake CG effects, which are actually pretty good, and there are some interesting/original (albeit highly improbable) deaths. All in all, its a sorry state of affairs if studios are happy to spend millions on festering turds like this at the expense of something that might actually offer a bit of creativity and require the viewer to be conscious while watching. I can't help thinking this was the jettisoned script for Anaconda 3 that some coked-up studio exec found written in faeces on the wall of George Bush's toilet. See this if you like Lake Placid, Cabin Fever, or Ghosts of Mars, or alternatively if you have an IQ of a dead cow's teat and reckon Battlefield Earth and Batman & Robin are underrated cinematic gems!