Reviews Written by AlbertV
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March 11, 2001
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March 11, 2001
Entertaining
While not masterful, El Cid certainly has its strengths.
rinjiro's review is too dismissive. The costumes, the cinemtography, the sweeping vistas of Spain and a very offbeat ending make for a pleasurable viewing. The jousting scene is also not to be missed.
El Cid doesn't quite compare to the great cinematic epics of the twentieth century, but it is worth repeated viewings and it is a classic on its own terms. ... -
March 11, 2001
Enduring and Absorbing
Bogdanovich's first film is also his most enduring and engaging. From superb performances to moody and shadowy visual compositions, The Last Picture Show remains an elegaic and moving masterpiece. ... -
March 11, 2001
Give it a shot.
Never mind the moronic review posted by MessyKid73; he has nothing intelligent to say about the film itself. Green Card is more absorbing than the overrated and silly Truman Show and certainly more thoughtful than the the sickly sentimental Dead Poet's Society. Depardieu and McDowell have chemistry and some touching moments together onscreen.
Weir's comedy is sophisticated, entertaining and worth repeated viewings. ... -
June 21, 2000
Gimmicky and unsatisfying
Contrary to what Eroticbittersweet might think, I'm neither intimidated nor am I unable to grasp the film's "intent."
Although the film has a promising start, it quickly degenerates into sensationalistic cinema, replete with brutality and gruesome scenes which allows the film a pretext for a violence quotient.
So the character's psyche has a dual nature? So what, this isn't particularly original and once we learn that Ed Norton has merely projected Brad Pitt, the film refuses to do anything with it other than stage more inane violence.
Interestingly enough, the heavy-handed symbolism is one of the few interesting things about this movie.
After all is said and done, Fight Club celebrates what it pretends to present tongue-in-cheek--lurid violence.
This isn't a film about the "human condition." It's a film about how one can be bamboozled into thinking a film with a gossamer story-line and violence can have artistic merit.
A five-star rating should be reserved for masterpieces (of which there are few), not melodramatic hokum. ... -
June 19, 2000
Poignant, subtle and and Altman-like
I find one reviewer's take on Boogie Nights as a "flop" amusing, considering he or she was expecting something "feel-good" with dancing and music.
If you reduce Boogie Nights to pornography made for a masturbatory delectation, then you have obviously missed the film's point and should relegate yourself to feel-good pap such as Grease.
There is much you would miss if you looked no further than what viewers consider repulsive.
Dirk Diggler contradicts assumptions we have about male virility. In our phallocentric culture, a man who is well-endowed is considered a "he-man" but Dirk Diggler is emotionally frail, a self-proclaimed karate enthusiast who bluffs his way through violent confrontations and proves to be passive during an attack by gaybashers.
Finding surrogate parents in Burt Reynolds and Julianne Moore, the characters discover life is harrowing and fraught with danger when venturing outside the security of the surrogate family.
If you want feel-good dreck or if you're easily disturbed by characters with darker psyches who are sometimes amoral, turn on your T.V. and dissolve your intellect in the froth of FRIENDS. Dubbing Boogie Nights brainless only reflects the lack of thought in one's critical approach to the film. ... -
June 19, 2000
Suspenseful, thoughtful and distinctive
What was and is a refreshing departure from the spate of sci-fi films that are little more than Star Wars or moronic gunplay potboilers in disguise (See StarGate and Fifth Element), Gattaca offered something more intelligent.
The film has its flaws, but it distinguished itself by aspiring to something more than laserguns and tiresome spacemuppet circuses. ... -
June 19, 2000
Escape from viewing
1 of 1 Yahoo! Users found this review helpful Escape From LA is more potboiler hogwash straight from the bowels of Hollywood.
What is nothing more than a B-Movie vehicle for Kurt Russell is also what is accelerating his decline in credibility as an actor.
Some appallingly stupid scenes (among many!): The basketball challenge and the surfing.
Idea for next installment:
Escape from Wretched and Brainless Filmmaking ... -
June 19, 2000
Chilling and Surreal
Frankenheimer's magnum opus is hypnotic and unnerving and the performances are top-notch. One of the few films that deserves to be on AFI's 100 list. -
June 19, 2000
An interesting departure for Eastwood
0 of 1 Yahoo! Users found this review helpful Overlooked in its release, White Hunter, Black Heart is an interesting character study of an obsessive man and his unique moral code.
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Classic Western
rinjiro, I've read several of your reviews and I have to ask: is "mediocre" the only word in your finite vocabulary? You say all the spaghetti westerns are mediocre. I couldn't disagree more.Leone expanded the parameters of the definition of "western." He brazenly broke many of the rules of traditional western scene compositions. One such unorthodox quirk was filming a smoking gun and the victim in the same shot--considered a no no in the western filmmaker's Bible.
A Fistful of Dollars boasts good cinematography, good directing, an interesting laconic protagonist and a memorable score by Ennio Morricone. This and the other films in Leone's Man with no Name trilogy are some of the last significant contributions to the western genre. ...