roystephen-81252's Reviews

Catherine the Great (2019)

2/10

Half movie, half raw video - this thing is not even finished

29 December 2019

Has anyone sat this through to the end? Or everybody watched this on their phones? Am I the only one who noticed that from halfway through ep. 3 picture quality drops significantly? The movie look disappears, in most scenes replaced by raw-looking video footage! It seems to me that the final color grading is missing in almost the entire ep. 3 & 4. Have they run out of money? Or they simply realised that it is not worth finishing?

Beautiful colors, great costumes, lavish sets - but not much else. Nigel Williams, who also penned Elizabeth (2005, another boring failure, starring Helen Mirren), is a bad melodrama writer and a poor researcher. I will avoid anything written by him in the future.

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Star Wars: The Rise Of Skywalker (2019)

3/10

What you deserve

19 December 2019

Okay, it's NOT worse than TLJ - but that's not saying much.

Some quick thoughts. I really wanted to boycott this movie, but after 40 years I just couldn't bring myself to leave the party like that. (To understand my perspective: I grew up with the OT, but I never jumped on the bandwagon of miserable prequel- and Lucas-haters. I love Ep.I-III, too, only a little less than the OT. On the other hand, I've found both TFA and TLJ deeply insulting.)

Well, The Rise of Skywalker does have the germ of a decent story (apart from the excellent Rogue One, that is actually a first for the Disney-era), and I bet THAT is the part that came from Lucas himself. Now that the sequel trilogy is complete, I think I know what he had in mind (for hints, rewatch the prequels and the Clone Wars animated series) - only Disney discarded most of it and botched the rest.

TRoS is an awful mismash of a movie, especially the first half. Disjointed, completely random scenes, assembled from half-baked ideas, scraps, TFA and TLJ outtakes. They obviously struggled (and failed) to stitch it together. (In this respect, TRoS IS worse than both TFA and TLJ.) Poor job, considering they used the same blueprints once again (yet another planet-killer weapon, really? and that's just the tip of the iceberg - if you saw the previous movies, you have seen 80-90% of TRoS).

And of course, you have the usual childish jokes that fall flat, the pointless scenes, characters and fan service - in other words, the typical JJ Abrams traits, complete with the usual horrendous editing, accompanied by equally dreadful cinematography. (There are a LOT of out-of focus shots, the color palette is often ugly, and the movie is dark and grainy as hell - believe me, old movies shot on film stock were NOT this grainy when new. TRoS looks more like it was shot digitally, and the grain was added later, for a very misguided attempt to look old-school. I don't care if they truly did use film stock. Whatever they did, it looks pretty bad.)

In summary, I didn't hate TRoS as passionately as I hated TFA and TLJ (maybe the bar got so low that I've become immune), but for me, it's still a far cry from what I call (the real) Star Wars. On the other hand, those who liked Ep.VII-VIII (both) will probably be pleased. They'll get what they deserve. No more, no less.

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Star Wars: Episode VIII - The Last Jedi (2017)

1/10

The Ultimate Facepalm Movie

14 December 2017

If TFA was a slap in the face, then The Last Jedi is a knife in your guts. It's a horrendously badly written, focusless, directionless, awfully long, stinking mess from yet again a director who does not have the faintest idea what Star Wars is about. TLJ reveals that there absolutely never was a story for Disney's sequel trilogy, after all. There are no character arcs either (save for, maybe, Kylo's). The only 'grand idea' they had was to kill our old heroes one by one and destroy everything they stood for. To destroy everything we loved about Star Wars. Did they at least replace them with something worthy? Well, since from Finn to Phasma, from Maz to Hux, from Snoke to the new characters (Rose, Admiral Holdo, or the Codebreaker) everybody proves to be nothing but filler (even more so than in the already dreadful TFA), the answer is a definite No. Stick to Rogue One. That's the only post-Lucas SW movie that is worthy of the name. The Last Jedi? A new low, but I'm afraid we still haven't reached the bottom of the barrel.

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Rogue One: A Star Wars Story (2016)

10/10

See, J.J? It's not THAT hard

17 December 2016

Warning: Spoilers

Now, that is how you do a decent spin-off.

After last year's abomination (ie. The Force Awakens) I was very skeptical about Disney's ability to properly handle George Lucas's legacy, but Rogue One delivers in a major way. The story, the characters (K-2 rules!), the performances, the sets, the costumes etc. are all fine. They're fresh, they show variety and scope. But most importantly, Rogue One is NOT dumbed down to insulting imbecility as TFA was.

It's not perfect, alright. It's mostly underlit. It's slower and longer than it should be. Being deliberately and significantly different, it occasionally loses the Star Wars feel. All in all, it's a little rough around the edges (especially CGI Leia's edges), but it does show a LOT more creativity than TFA did, and pays respect to Lucas instead of trampling on everything he'd built up so meticulously.

It's proof that you CAN be original, you CAN be different, even break with established SW conventions (like the absence of the opening crawl), and still retain the REAL spirit of Star Wars.

Rogue One rarely reaches the epic quality of Lucas's six-part saga, but it's a more than acceptable side story. And the spectacular finale that combines the visual grandeur of classic battle scenes from Revenge of the Sith, Return of the Jedi and the original Star Wars, is truly worthy of the Star Wars name.

I've been a major SW fan since 1979. I'm not anti-Disney, anti- Abrams or whatever, and I'm certainly not a 'hater'. TFA made me sad and angry, but this one, this 'rogue one', I CAN accept as a Star Wars movie. Much, much better than TFA in every way.

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Waterworld (1995)

3/10

Fish Max

13 March 2016

Warning: Spoilers

In the early 1990s Kevin Costner struck gold four times in a row with Dances with Wolves, Robin Hood, JFK and The Bodyguard. With Waterworld, however, he submerged himself entirely and hasn't really been able to rise above the surface ever since. This 'Mad Max on water' cost an enormous amount of money, but gained only modest success. (Though it was still better received than Costner's next post-apocalyptic vision, The Postman, which he directed himself. That movie was an undeserved box office bomb and a critical failure, though I personally found it thoroughly engaging, and overall a much much better film than either Waterworld or any part of the Mad Max franchise.)

The lukewarm reception of Waterworld might be attributed to several factors. The mutant hero with gills and webbed feet or the bleak (and wet) vision of the post-apocalyptic world were probably not attractive enough, and despite the huge sets and the multitude of extras, much of the film is devoted to the Big Blue. The ocean is beautiful, no doubt about that, but it is a bit monotonous for nearly two and a half hours. And the happy ending is not so happy either. Our heroes do discover the coveted land, but the Mariner, being half water creature, gets sick of it, so he leaves his prospective family on the shore, and returns to the sea, his real home.

The plot and the Mariner's character are, however, decently developed. (The weakest point is the illogical final confrontation, as the one person our hero truly jeopardises there is the child he tries to save.) The costumes made of fish scales look great (the Mariner's earrings are especially memorable), and Dennis Hopper in the role of the main antagonist is as wacky as always. Life after the great flood, as presented in the movie, seems more or less plausible, and there are no major problems with the dramatic structure or the pacing of the film either. It just doesn't grab you — probably because it really is nothing more than Mad Max 2 on water.

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Hollywood Ending (2002)

7/10

Decent fluff, but Woody can do better

13 March 2016

Warning: Spoilers

Woody Allen has always been a compulsive writer, but in the early 2000s it seemed he wasn't striving for making a particularly deep movie, rather for recreating the feel of his 'early funny ones' and returning to his slapstick roots. Unfortunately, 'the late funny ones' (Hollywood Ending, The Curse of the Jade Scorpion, Scoop, etc.) probably look funnier on paper than what ended up on the screen (with the exception of the outstanding Small Time Crooks). Allen does pique our interest, but he himself doesn't seem to be interested enough to really flesh out his comedic sketches.

One of his most glaring mistakes in this period is that he either forces miscast actors to play his younger alter ego (John Cusack in Bullets Over Broadway or Jason Biggs in Anything Else), or he himself gives a mannered, over-acted, sub-par performance, as in The Curse of the Jade Scorpion. In Hollywood Ending, he practically demonstrates how not to play a blind man. (In my opinion, Sean Penn in Sweet & Lowdown and Kenneth Branagh in Celebrity were brilliant Woody-clones — it might have been better if one of them had returned to play Allen's role here.) The other problem with the late funny ones is the lack of balance. The plot of Jade Scorpion was thin and unfocused, yet the dialogues were witty, while in Hollywood Ending it's the other way round: the overall plot is well-developed, but the scenes themselves are boring. Instead of fleshing out his ideas, Allen's mind is already working on the next sketch to be shot and released within a year.

Nearly 15 years have passed since then, but there's still no sign of Woody slowing down. Maybe he should have, but as long as he continues to make two or three truly great movies every ten years (and refrains from making such dismally awful pictures as Melinda and Melinda), I'll gladly pay the price of watching the fluff in between.

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Outbreak (1995)

6/10

A competently made thriller

13 March 2016

Warning: Spoilers

An Ebola-like but (naturally) even more lethal virus nearly wipes out an American town (with the help of the army), but Dustin Hoffman grabs the monkey (the primary host of the virus) by the neck and produces a life-saving anti-serum in no time, saving the world and his marriage, as well (thanks to the fact that his soon-to-be ex agonises a little more patiently than the others).

It sounds pretty dumb, but thanks to the decent script, the fine actors (you can rarely go wrong with Dustin Hoffman, Kevin Spacey and Morgan Freeman), the good pacing and the simple, but effective direction, Outbreak is actually a satisfying thriller that remains semi-plausible throughout and never gets boring. That's saying a lot, because most films in the genre are unable to keep up the tension and lack even a dash of realism. Outbreak does grab your attention, outlines a realistic scenario, and keeps you on the edge of your seat till the end.

Unfortunately, the last third of the film is drenched in the usual clichés — world-saving hero vs. pigheaded, war-obsessed military commander, deus ex machina supplied in abundance, mandatory happy ending, etc. —, but the competent execution ensures solid entertainment for the whole two hours. And with the climate change and the terrifying prospect of deadly diseases spreading to territories previously considered 'safe', the topic remains as relevant as ever.

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Octopus 2: River of Fear (2001 Video)

1/10

Below grade Z

13 March 2016

Warning: Spoilers

The same giant octopus that was partially destroyed in the first (laughably bad) instalment, returns. This time, New York Harbor is threatened by its tentacles, at least until they stick some dynamite into its mouth (again). Well, that proves to be a bad idea, because the explosion causes a tunnel to collapse and trap a group of children inside. The heroine (obviously not trained for emergency situations) does everything she can to ensure they stay and die there, but then the hero emerges from the air vent she had been staring at blankly for minutes, and evacuates the children.

As you could guess from the above summary, the filmmakers tried to spice up the paper thin plot (plodding forward without any ideas whatsoever) with disaster-movie clichés for the last ten minutes — to no avail. Of course, we watch a Z movie like this for the amusingly lame effects and to laugh wholeheartedly at some particularly ridiculous scenes. Unfortunately, Octopus 2 never really goes over the top, apart from a dream scene in which the octopus eats the Statue of Liberty, so we're simply left with a very bad movie. It's only the pathetic finale that somewhat makes up for the time wasted. The octopus that was previously blown to pieces returns again (you didn't expect that, did you?), so we finally get to see a whole string of dreadfully executed special effects.

The editor (who must have been working blindly like Woody Allen's character in Hollywood Ending), however, deserves an award. It must have been a gargantuan task to stitch the action scenes together so that there is absolutely no connection between the shots. And the effects team should get a bonus point, too, for successfully avoiding any integrity between the raw footage and the randomly placed effects.

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The Matrix Reloaded (2003)

3/10

Hollowness exposed

13 March 2016

Warning: Spoilers

Intelligent sci-fi or just a clever scam? That was the question the first Matrix film left you pondering. Well, the first half hour of the sequel has 'humbug' written all over it. Pretentious babble with empty, fake dialogues and overlong, pointless fight scenes. A shockingly boring and disjointed hodgepodge that is barely connected to the somewhat vague ending of the first instalment. The Wachowskis unashamedly borrow from a plethora of much better movies (Star Wars: Attack of the Clones & Return of the Jedi, Minority Report, Terminator: Judgement Day, Aliens, Lord of The Rings, you name it), but their own contribution amounts to zero. With Neo's and Trinity's love scene and the rave party at Zion they really scrape the bottom of the barrel, reducing the movie to a horrendous video clip.

Fortunately, things start to improve with the reappearance of the Oracle. That is the first scene that recalls what was good in the first Matrix movie. From there, the picture is a mixed bag: slowly, some kind of story does unfold, and we get to see a couple of great new effects, as well (the truck collision scene is truly outstanding). In the end, the Wachowskis prove that they haven't completely run out of ideas, you just wish they hadn't crammed all of those into the last third of the film. And the more plot twists are introduced, the more questions arise in their wake. Naturally, one excruciatingly drawn-out action scene after another ensures that the audience not dwell too long on the logical flaws.

Those who haven't seen the first movie will probably be completely baffled. Worse still, those who have will not get much smarter either. The one thing you might learn from watching Reloaded is how to take a couple of smart ideas and stitch them together in the dumbest way possible.

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Mirror (1975)

1/10

Unwatchable art

12 March 2016

Warning: Spoilers

A little boy turns on a television, and watches the flickering static lines. A psychiatrist uses hypnosis and laying on of hands to treat a bigger boy with a speech impediment, while the shadow of the filmmakers' boom microphone is clearly seen on the wall. A voice-over by a man explains where you should get off the road towards their house. A man does get off the road and initiates a conversation with a woman who is not the woman the little boy watches washing her hair. The ceiling comes crashing down. Another house (?) burns to the ground in the pouring rain. Later, newsreel footage follows. Bombs fall on Spain and a rooster is slaughtered. And so it goes, on an on.

It's artsy and all, and with a little imagination you can figure out what the 'mirror' in the title refers to. A man, who lost his father early and had all sorts of problems both with his mother and his wife, reflects on his troubled past, putting together his fragmented memories (the shards of a broken mirror) in a stream-of-consciousness kind of way. Or, possibly, the man is a symbol for Soviet Russia itself, though I wouldn't go that far. The problem is that there is no story you could follow, no characters you could identify with, no well-defined spatial or temporal frame of reference for the tediously drawn-out, obscure and disjointed scenes, and due to this lack of basic accessibility there is no message to take home.

Mirror is a respectable attempt at a unique form of filmmaking, but it requires such an effort on the viewer's part (with no reward whatsoever) that it is hard to imagine why anyone would not fall asleep or walk out of the theatre after a couple of minutes. If you love films like Derek Jarman's The Last of England, you should certainly give it a try, but for my part, I'll stay with Tarkovsky's Solaris or Andrei Rublev.

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Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon: Sword of Destiny (2016)

7/10

Watch it as a standalone movie, expect nothing, and you might be pleasantly surprised

8 March 2016

Warning: Spoilers

Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon is one of my favourite movies of all time, so I was naturally thrilled when I heard that a sequel was finally being made. But then, as details emerged about Sword of Destiny (modest budget, Ang Lee and Zhang Ziyi not returning, switching the language from Chinese to English, limited theatrical release), I knew it wouldn't measure up to its predecessor. I adjusted my expectations accordingly and that's probably the key to enjoy this movie. Forget that it's a supposed sequel to that stunning masterpiece, otherwise you're heading for a bitter disappointment.

Sword of Destiny veers considerably towards being a much more generic, fantasy-flavoured martial arts flick, but if you embrace it as such, it's not that bad, at all. The parallels with Star Wars (love vs. duty, good warrior monks vs. evil ones á la Jedi vs. Sith, extremely talented 'chosen ones' with clouded future) are just as apparent here as they were in Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon, but this time with a bit of Lord of the Rings (and Seven Samurai) thrown into the mix, as well. (I love both Star Wars and LOTR, so these are always welcome for me.) The visuals are actually a lot better than I expected. The movie looks beautiful, and in parts, it does have poetic qualities and a sense of grand scope, despite the overall feel of a made-for-TV picture. I know it sounds contradictory, but that was my impression.

What surprised me the most was the great epic potential of the story. Don't get me wrong, Sword of Destiny never realises that potential, but it does pique your interest. It makes you want to read Wang Dulu's pentalogy, to know more about the characters that the movie unfortunately fails to make you care about, and the backstories it touches upon too briefly. It is too condensed, too rushed, and it does contain some cheap clichés (especially in the final battle). It's not that there are too many or too long action sequences. They are fine as they are (and again, very well-choreographed). The rest is missing - that wonderful, epic story that is only suggested here. Now, if there was a three-hour director's cut I'd definitely want to see it. But that's just a dream.

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Looper (2012)

1/10

'Time travel is messy' – as is this poor excuse for a movie

8 March 2016

Warning: Spoilers

Another 'universally acclaimed' dud. Contrary to what critics claimed, Looper is neither intelligently written, nor competently executed, and the blame falls entirely on Rian Johnson, being both the writer and the director of this mess.

The movie doesn't have a clear focus, shifting halfway from being about the hero having to kill his own future self to being a mild Omen-type horror featuring a little boy with frightening telekinetic abilities. The pacing is slow and uneven, the cinematography (offering plenty of particularly badly executed, saturated blue lens flare effects) is ugly, and the poor establishing of time-frame, environment and characters, paired with the sloppy editing, makes certain scene changes hard to follow. Even the casting choices are odd. (Frankly, I don't see any similarities between Joseph Gordon-Levitt and Bruce Willis. I feel sorry for the former as he had to wear prosthetics to make him resemble Willis more, yet the result is utterly unconvincing.) The film wastes precious time trying to round out Kid Blue's totally pointless character, while glossing over Old Joe's much more important wife, Suzie or Abe. In fact, what we do get to know about Abe is conveyed through the laziest filmmaking device possible, Joe's hurried voice-over monologue.

Why Rian Johnson was given the opportunity to write and direct Star Wars Episode VIII is a mystery to me. His style is completely different, and in Looper he failed to come up with a coherent script. The only thing he proved is he can't even handle an action sequence involving only three characters (see the poorly edited final confrontation between Kid Blue and Joe 1&2 – where did the Kid disappear?). The answer must lie in the lazy approach of the material. 'Time travel is messy', says Old Joe, as if that solves the problem of the incoherent plot. Just like 'That's not how the Force works!' in the dismally bad The Force Awakens. OK, I do understand. Lazy writing, odd casting, poor characterisation and world-building, choppy editing, lens flares – check, check, check. Johnson might be a 'worthy' successor to Abrams.

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Dark Shadows (2012)

5/10

What you see is what you get

8 March 2016

Warning: Spoilers

Tim Burton's adaptation of the classic Gothic soap opera of the 1960s delivers exactly what you'd expect based on the theatrical poster and the trailer. The usual Burton fare: a very stylish, beautifully photographed Gothic-romantic comedy with the motif of fateful eternal love, balancing between the spooky and the campy, marred by an uneven script and capped by a less than satisfying, somewhat illogical final showdown (as in Sleepy Hollow).

Cinematographer Bruno Delbonnel (Amélie, Harry Potter & The Half-Blood Prince) was a great choice as his style perfectly matches Burton's. The gorgeous visuals, mixing eerie darkness and the colourful world of the early 1970s are the greatest strength of the film. Apart from that, there's nothing particularly interesting, nor particularly jarring here. Some jokes work, some don't. The story is all right, the pacing is okay, the characters are fine, though some of them are underdeveloped (especially Victoria/Josette and Carolyn), and the special effects are executed well (the one I liked the most was Angelique's 'fragile skin'). It's just nothing special.

All in all, Dark Shadows is enjoyable, harmless, but mostly forgettable entertainment. It may work best if you've never seen a Tim Burton movie, as the visuals are indeed impressive, and his unique style is probably the most consistent here (and in Sleepy Hollow). If you're looking for a Burton movie with a more lasting impression, however, check out Ed Wood or Big Fish instead.

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The Good German (2006)

5/10

A very stylish homage to film noir

6 March 2016

Warning: Spoilers

Steven Soderbergh's directorial debut, Sex, Lies & Videotape instantly marked him as one to watch, but unfortunately, he later proved to be a very much hit-and-miss filmmaker. He has made some great movies (like Traffic, Erin Brockovich, maybe Ocean's Eleven) and some atrocious ones (like Full Frontal or The Informant!), as well.

The Good German is one of his better efforts and it's definitely worth a watch, if for nothing else than the astonishingly faithful recreation of the film noir style of the 1940s and the beautiful black-and-white cinematography (Soderbergh's own work under a false name). I honestly feel the cinematography should have been nominated for an Academy Award. Thanks to the amazing lighting and make-up, Cate Blanchett looks jaw-droppingly beautiful in this one (and very noir-ish).

A word of caution, however: despite what the theatrical poster suggests, this is not a romantic movie like Casablanca, rather a blend between American film noir and the Italian neorealism of the 1940s. The tone is quite somber and the characters are not likable heroes, which is appropriate since the film is about how war twists people inside out (that aspect is masterfully conveyed through Tobey Maguire's genuinely chilling character), how it compromises our moral integrity and blurs the line between good and evil. It's about what people would do in order to survive such horrendous times.

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The Last of the Mohicans (1992)

4/10

Still not the version I've been looking for

5 March 2016

Warning: Spoilers

I was introduced to James Fenimoore Cooper's novel through an abridged graphic version made for filmstrip projectors when I was a child, and I fell in love with it immediately. It was only much later that I found out that the original book is painfully overlong and convoluted. I always thought, however, that the story itself, stripped of the unnecessary fat, would make an excellent movie full of exciting characters and non-stop explosive action. Unfortunately, none of the cinematic versions produced so far have been able to deliver that.

Michael Mann's take on The Last of the Mohicans (a considerable box-office and critical success at the time) is like a National Geographic special meant to cure insomnia. An elegiac lament with gorgeous widescreen vistas and lots of slow motion for forced emotional impact, backed by epic synthesizer music. Mann weeded out most of the action, humour and excitement, he mixed up the relationships and characterisations (why, oh, why?) and he basically eliminated the title character, Uncas, from his own story.

The result is a movie that has an overwhelming sense of longing, but not much else. A pondering, romantic picture that, in itself, might be beautiful to look at, but is ultimately boring and would never inspire a kid to know all about American Indians and the colonial history of the United States. Of course, it all depends on what you prefer — a plodding adult version or a breathtaking adventure movie that would finally do justice to a story that has captured so many kids' imagination around the world.

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Out for Justice (1991)

4/10

Steven Seagal at his best

5 March 2016

Warning: Spoilers

Steven Seagal has probably never starred in a particularly good film, but maybe that's not what we expect from him anyway. We want him to beat up the bad guys, defend the weak, be relentless in seeking justice and deliver his lines with a wooden face. We expect profound silences, deep meditations and a couple of snappy wisecracks here and there before lashing out. Out for Justice is one of those films — and in my opinion, it is easily Seagal's best.

It is not a cinematic milestone by any stretch of the imagination, and due to the excessive violence that instills blood into every frame, I wouldn't exactly recommend it for women and children either, but it might be a fitting choice for letting off steam after a high-octane football match. Needless to say, the moral message of the movie is questionable, but vigilante vengeance was controversial in Taxi Driver, too.

For those who like this type of action movies, Out for Justice offers exactly the right ingredients, served at an unrelenting pace, with no gratuitous romance or rose-tinted glasses. In a manner befitting the grim environment, Seagal remains unflinching throughout, his face smileless, showing no mercy or compassion towards the bad guys. It's a tough world and it's a tough movie for tough guys.

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Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone (2001)

10/10

Magic transferred from page to screen

5 March 2016

Warning: Spoilers

I had read J. K. Rowling's first Harry Potter book before I saw its cinematic adaptation (it happened the other way round in the case of the remaining instalments) and I was very pleased with the movie. I still am. Chris Columbus was criticised for being too slavishly faithful to the book but in my view that was just the right approach. The movie presented Harry Potter's world exactly the way I had envisioned it. The cast was perfect, the tone was perfect, the visuals were perfect. Granted, the book is richer and funnier (Rowling has a very British, wicked sense of humour) but it is ultimately a children's book with a universal message about the value of love, friendship and courage, so, in my opinion, veering towards a darker, more grotesque feel would have been a mistake.

Having seen the whole story, Harry Potter & The Sorcerer's Stone remains one of my favourites from the saga (for me, the top spot goes to the second one, The Chamber of Secrets). Rupert Grint and Emma Watson are especially adorable in this one, the former actually having his most heroic moment here with the wizard's chess.

Great entertainment for kids and the young at heart, endlessly rewatchable true movie magic that has a well-earned place among the greatest modern fairy-tales, that is, George Lucas's Star Wars (episodes I-VI) and Tolkien's/Peter Jackson's The Lord of the Rings & The Hobbit.

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Legend (1985)

4/10

Beautifully photographed fairy-tale, but the theatrical version is seriously botched

5 March 2016

Warning: Spoilers

First of all, I must admit that I haven't seen the much longer director's cut with Jerry Goldsmith's original score, but I will definitely check that one out and perhaps come back to re-evaluate Legend. The director's cut of Blade Runner completely shifted my opinion about that movie, and I see a lot of potential here, as well. (Moreover, the extended cuts of both Kingdom of Heaven and Gladiator are also better than their respective theatrical versions, and having seen what he cut out of Prometheus, it is safe to say that it's always worth giving a chance to the outtakes and long versions of Ridley Scott's movies.)

Legend is a gorgeously designed and photographed dark fairy-tale, but unfortunately the theatrical version gradually sinks into boredom and falls to pieces by the end. The beginning, however, is stunningly beautiful. Thirty years later, the visuals are still jaw-dropping and for that alone, the film is definitely worth a watch. No other fantasy film has such a dreamlike quality that carries the sense of fairy-tale magic.

Ridley Scott's fourth feature film could have been his fourth classic in a row – or is it? It all depends on the additional 30 minutes I have yet to see.

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Gladiator (2000)

10/10

The new standard for sword-and-sandal epics

28 February 2016

Warning: Spoilers

Being somewhat of a history buff, I've always loved historical movies. My only gripe was that up to the 1990s none of those movies really managed to convey a sense of authenticity. The sets, the costumes, the hairstyles, the battles – everything was too polished, too artificial. I think it was with movies like Dances with Wolves (Kevin Costner, 1990), Braveheart (Mel Gibson, 1995), Saving Private Ryan (Steven Spielberg, 1998) and The Messenger: The Story of Joan of Arc (Luc Besson, 1999) that things finally started to change, and historical films moved towards a more realistic depiction of the various eras – not necessarily in terms of historical facts but the feel. But one thing was still missing: a similar movie set in ancient times, that would reinvigorate the sword-and-sandal genre by matching the epic visuals of Ben-Hur with the new, grittier and more believable look and feel.

Ridley Scott's Gladiator, a wonderfully written, timeless revenge story with gripping performances from Russell Crowe, Richard Harris, and Oliver Reed (plus Joaquin Phoenix, Djimon Hounsou & Connie Nielsen), and accompanied by Hans Zimmer's and Lisa Gerrard's trend-setting, haunting score, was that movie. It truly revived the genre and was quickly followed by a string of similar movies (out of which, unfortunately, only one - Wolfgang Petersen's Troy – measured up to the high standard set by Gladiator). It doesn't really matter that Ridley Scott's movie is full of inaccuracies. It's thrilling, it's heartbreaking, it feels real. I have seen it countless times and it never gets boring.

Note: The extended cut is even better than the theatrical version.

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Blade Runner (1982)

9/10

From 'Blade Crawler' (original cut, 1982) to grand poetic vision (director's cut, 1992)

28 February 2016

Warning: Spoilers

Ridley Scott's phenomenal feature film debut, The Duellists, was followed by yet another masterpiece, Alien. His third effort, Blade Runner, eventually proved to be an all-time classic, too, but it didn't look like that back in 1982. I saw the original theatrical version back then and I was disappointed. It might have had to do with the fact that at the time I was expecting the magic and excitement of Star Wars (especially from a movie with Harrison Ford in it), and Blade Runner didn't quite measure up to that standard. Another plausible explanation for my then lukewarm response is that I simply found it painfully slow-paced and boring, and the dismal explanatory voice-overs made it virtually impossible to become immersed in the film.

The 1992 director's cut completely changed my mind, partly because I had grown up and got accustomed to art movies by then and partly because it removed the unnecessary voice-overs, which resulted in a film with a totally different feel. The deeply elegiac story about the true meaning of humanity finally matched the gorgeous visual feast.

Viewed strictly in its later incarnations (the director's cut and the 2007 'final cut' which is basically the same as the 1992 version with only minor alterations), Blade Runner is one of the greatest 'pure' SF films (not mixed with action/adventure or other genres) that has a solid place alongside such milestones as 2001: A Space Odyssey (1968), Solaris (1972) or A.I. (1999).

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Westworld (1973)

9/10

One of Crichton's best – a Western-themed Jurassic Park

27 February 2016

Warning: Spoilers

Michael Crichton's directorial debut is an excellent SF/Western/Thriller and a precursor to both Jurassic Park and The Terminator. While the script, based on an intelligent (and back then, quite original) premise, and containing all the hallmarks and recurring themes of Crichton's works (Man playing God, technology running amok and turning on its creators), is a little uneven, the film itself is quite possibly Crichton's best effort as a director – inventive, suspenseful and entertaining throughout, with a masterful transition from the light-hearted, easy-going first half to the increasingly menacing, violent and grim second act.

Yul Brynner's chilling performance as the Gunslinger dressed in all black (clearly a nod to his famous role in The Magnificent Seven, and a blueprint for Schwarzenegger's portrayal of the unstoppable killing machine in The Terminator) is especially memorable, but Richard Benjamin is also excellent in the role of the common man, the obvious gun fodder who has to dig deep into his inner reserves and defy the odds in order to survive.

The special effects (a groundbreaking first use of digital image processing in a feature film among them) are also quite good for their time, but it is ultimately the great story and the excellent execution of it that makes Westworld an edge-of-your-seat experience and one of the essential SF movies.

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Beneath the Planet of the Apes (1970)

1/10

Possibly THE worst sequel of all time

27 February 2016

Warning: Spoilers

While the first movie in the series, the adaptation of Pierre Boulle's excellent novel, was a somewhat mixed bag and ultimately a disappointment compared to the original material, the second one, Beneath the Planet of the Apes is simply an all-round disaster with a mind-numbingly stupid plot, horrible acting, incompetent directing and editing, and the lousiest special effects ever put on the screen.

Mutant humans with telepathic powers worshipping a nuclear bomb in a temple set up amidst the ruins of a subway station? Did the filmmakers deliberately pick the dumbest idea they could find? And what was the message? It is better to blow up the whole planet than to cede our power to apes or mutants?

But in the end, it's not the witlessness of the plot that counts but the execution. Make it exciting and at least semi-believable, and all will be forgiven. Unfortunately, Beneath the Planet of the Apes fails in every single department. It is both extremely boring and ridiculously cheap-looking, even for its time. By far the worst instalment in the series, a horrendous movie in itself, and quite possibly THE worst sequel of all time. (Although looking strictly at the extent of drop in quality, there are many serious contenders from Futureworld and Exorcist II or Speed 2 to The Force Awakens.)

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Planet of the Apes (1968)

4/10

Disappointing if you've read the novel

26 February 2016

Warning: Spoilers

My first encounter with Planet of the Apes was through an artistic, black-and-white comic adaptation. As a child, I loved it. Later, I read Pierre Boulle's original novel, and I thought that was fantastic, too. With that background, I was seriously disappointed with the 'classic' film. (To be fair, though, the later cinematic renditions weren't any better, either.)

I understand some of the filmmakers' decisions, like changing the ape society into a less advanced one, as the novel was practically unfilmable with the then available technology, but the oversimplification extended to the story and the characters, as well, and because of that little remained of the spirit of the book. The design and makeup of the gorillas are cool, Roddy McDowall and Kim Hunter give fine performances, and the last scene (being a clever twist on the book's ending) is very effective and memorable, but overall the film feels cheap and shallow, at least compared with the book. It could have been much much better.

For me, the third movie in the franchise, Escape from the Planet of the Apes, proved to be the most enjoyable. By basically turning the original story inside out while remaining faithful to both the plot and the spirit of Boulle's excellent novel, that is the one that got closest to the mark.

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Gyertek el a névnapomra (1983)

10/10

A great Hungarian political drama/thriller from the era of goulash communism

26 February 2016

Warning: Spoilers

Fábri Zoltán was a wonderful Hungarian filmmaker and this film (his last), that made its way to Hungarian cinemas in April 1984, is probably my favourite from his catalogue. If one wanted to understand how Hungarian society worked in the 1970s, during the era of velvet dictatorship, Gyertek el a névnapomra (Housewarming) is one of the films I would definitely recommend watching.

It is a superbly acted, suspenseful political thriller (at times somewhat reminiscent of such more recent movies as Michael Clayton or Erin Brockovich) told through both straight narrative and documentary-like witness testimonies. The elite of a country town are having a celebration in a luxury villa when an incident (resulting in an injury) disturbs the party. A journalist of the local newspaper investigates the case but she meets considerable obstacles, pressure and threats.

Fábri perfectly captures the atmosphere of the era and paints an accurate picture of its morals. Western viewers might be surprised to find how the behaviour of people wielding political power transcends history and geography. The issues presented here are indeed familiar across all borders and remain painfully relevant to this day.

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The Terminator (1984)

10/10

Frantic SF action

24 February 2016

Warning: Spoilers

I like all Terminator movies (especially the first three, all for different reasons and different qualities) and the prematurely cancelled TV series The Sarah Connor Chronicles, as well. It took a couple of years for the first one to reach me, but I did see The Terminator in a movie theatre and before Terminator 2 came out. I was actually surprised how well it worked, and having seen it countless times since then, I can confidently say it is just as effective now as it was back then.

The effects look a little dated today, the synthesizer-based music is pretty laughable, and the movie has an overall cheap B-movie feel (which I usually don't like), but these are minor deficiencies that do not lessen my enjoyment. The greatest virtue of The Terminator is its relentless pace, and in this respect, it surpasses all the other instalments in the series. It truly makes you feel the machine is unstoppable and allows you no rest, no breather. And the final showdown in the factory, when the terminator presses on even when it's nothing but a legless torso, is genuinely scary and suspenseful.

Great story, tense, chilling action, a perfectly cast, iconic character (Arnold Schwarzenegger) and one of the best pacing ever – The Terminator is a fantastic SF/action movie and a great debut for a great director.

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