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snoozejon
Reviews
Grand Slam (1978)
or Australian
I disagree with the comments that only Welsh people will enjoy Grand Slam. I traveled Australia last year and was very shocked to learn that it was quite popular there also. Perhaps it's a rugby thing. I have also showed it to some English and American friends (who have no concept of Welshness) and they enjoyed it also.
It has everything you could possibly want. A solid storyline, great humour, drama (on occasion), great comics, attractive women and a Hollywood (Oscar winner) legend in Hugh Griffith.
If you get a chance to see this (no matter where you live), see it. It'll make you want to have a weekend in Paris with your drinking buddies at the least.
AVP: Alien vs. Predator (2004)
The answer should have been a bit more in the title. *SPOILERS*
No offense intended to anyone who enjoyed Alien V Predator, but I have to say I was very disappointed.
Considering the potential to make a battle of epic proportions between two of Fox's greatest extra-terrestrial villains, it was a pretty poor effort.
Sure, the Alien/Predator battle scenes were excellent, however there were simply too few. Don't get me wrong, I'm all for measured amounts of action and plot, but the plot and dialogue were so poor that the film needed the extra Alien/Predator action.
Personally, I would have set the story on far larger scale, included many more battle sequences between the two psychotic ETs, hired a better director and set it in a location with more potential for destruction. Also the film is called ALIEN V PREDATOR and not Alien V Predators and Humans. The tag line was total rubbish : WHOEVER WINS, WE LOSE. No actually, Predator wins and so does the human because the Alien Queen and all her soldiers get an ass-kicking! (Oh but an Alien comes out of the Predator's stomach at the end, but so-what ? Nothing else happens unless Fox make enough money warrant a sequel.)
Totally milking the franchise by Fox. Then again I didn't really expect much from the director of Mortal Combat, Event Horizon and Resident Evil!
One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest (1975)
Nothing else comes close!
This is in my opinion the greatest American Movie of all time (be it directed by an Eastern European and produced by a second generation Eastern European/American.
It has everything I personally look for in a film. The acting is so convincing that if you didn't know otherwise you'd swear it was real. The script and ad-lib are fantastic. It's intriguing, humorous, emotionally charged, heartbreaking and politically biting all at the same time.
Foreman, Douglas, Nicholson, DeVito, Lloyd and co will never (ever) top this or even get near it if they live to be a hundred.
I hold this movie responsible for my failure to pass the Biology, Chemistry and Physics exams of my final year of School. The night before the papers, I was so engrossed in this movie I stayed awake until 2am and could not get back to sleep after.
I know Jack Nicholson could play the standard non-conformist in his sleep but "One Flew Over The Cookoo's Nest" is the closest Hollywood has come to genius. It should be shown to anyone having a hard time fitting in, feeling a bit different, getting force-fed useless crap from teachers, bored in a tedious working environment, dominated by parents or pushed around by work management. If you watch it and absorb it it will bring out the MacMurphy in all of you.
A total timeless classic because it was relevant when it was made (five years before I was born), it is relevant today and it will still be relevant after I am firmly in the ground.
Titanic (1997)
A tragic historical incident, dumbed down in order to empty pockets of the MTV generation in the name of popular culture.(Spoilers)
Once upon a time there was a director by the name of James. He brought us wonderfully, thrilling science-fiction such as Terminator and Aliens. These movies were the stuff blockbusters were made of and he looked to have a fantastic future ahead of him as the dawn of computer generated special effects landed upon the film industry. Terminator 2 showed gave us glimpses of what was possible in this new era.
.......and then it happened...................1997........countless awards..........obscene amounts of money............outlandish barrage of advertising............maximum profit margin........Titanic was here!
I have never (ever) been one to jump on the bandwagon and be overly critical for the sake of it, in fact I have often taken the opposite stance from the majority just to get an argument going. Titanic however was a film I only took one single positive out of - that of Kate Winslett being absolutely gorgeous throughout!
Quickly - the dialogue was like something out of Beverly Hills 90210, the acting was more wooden than my nephew's tree house, images meant to terrify were actually comical (man falling from ship and hitting propeller), historically false (don't even get me started because there's too much), it had dire theme music (up there with the bodyguard for cheese) and the pointless love story was so tedious, self absorbing and pathetic that it disrespected the plight of everyone else involved (I was glad when he died and disappointed when she did not).
It was plainly obvious from the word go that this picture was designed to appeal to MTV watching, bubblegum chewing, boy-with-car chasing, teenage girls (DeCaprio himself resembled something less heroic than the weedy member of a boy band) who would drag their sex-starved boyfriends out for a three and a half hour chick-flick hoping to get lucky later! The worst aspect was that it did not stop at that point. Millions of dumbed down, culture vultures went to see this expensive waste of celluloid because "it cost so much to produce it must be great" and "Steve and Barbara said it was good and they know their movies".
The crowning glory arrived when Titanic swept the boards at the Academy Awards. King James of Hollywood had a serious moment of silence for the victims of the fatal evening on which his three and a half hour farce was based. It looked to me as if he was praying for forgiveness after making a fortune off inaccurately portraying the circumstances that lead to the death of a lot of people.
However, if people are stupid and sentimental enough to buy into this kind of rubbish they deserve to get ripped off. Good luck to Hollywood if that is how they want to make money, I'd do it if I had those kind of chances in life!
It is right up there on my all time worst movies list with other silly, historically false/human interest tripe like "The Patriot" and "Pearl Harbor".
Dead Man (1995)
Pretty decent Western.
"Dead Man" stands out from most modern day Westerns because it does not try to glamorize the old American West. It pretty much tells it like it was and presents things from the point of view of someone who (like the audience) is used to more civilized surroundings.
Johnny Depp looks and acts convincingly in the part of a "tenderfoot" who has ended up a nightmarish situation and has turned to violence as a means of survival. However, as we soon find out, he is only prolonging the inevitable.
The other characters are also very good with some excellent performances all round.
I like it because it does not glorify the era like "Young Guns", "Tomestone", "Ned Kelly" and other such pictures. It also makes it's point about the US Government's systematic slaughter of it's natives without getting on it's soap box like "The Last Samurai" and "Dances With Wolves".
Bad points for me were - 1) it became pretentious and overlong towards the end and - 2) there was always a feeling that I was watching "Pulp Fiction" set in the old West. The opening sequence (dialogue heavy and titles to follow were straight out of Tarentino) and the red-neck rapists in the woods were either a big nod towards QT or maybe it was just me.
Very enjoyable, but just because it's by a cool, art-house director does not make it the best Western ever.