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Ben-33
Reviews
Extraña forma de vida (2023)
Pretentious film for young people
I was a big fan of Almodóvar movies back in the day but now I'm slightly saying to wonder if I was wrong all along. This about the level of a film school effort. Extremely obvious. Also, haven't we done the gay cowboy thing? It's now really just a trope.
I might be wrong, but I'd say it would be hard to be drawn in by this film unless you are under 17, pretentious and a gay cowboy.
I was a big fan of Almodóvar movies back in the day but now I'm slightly saying to wonder if I was wrong all along. This about the level of a film school effort. Extremely obvious. Also, haven't we done the gay cowboy thing? It's now really just a trope.
I might be wrong, but I'd say it would be hard to be drawn in by this film unless you are under 17, pretentious and a gay cowboy.
I was a big fan of Almodóvar movies back in the day but now I'm slightly saying to wonder if I was wrong all along. This about the level of a film school effort. Extremely obvious. Also, haven't we done the gay cowboy thing? It's now really just a trope.
I might be wrong, but I'd say it would be hard to be drawn in by this film unless you are under 17, pretentious and a gay cowboy.
MH370: The Plane That Disappeared (2023)
Really dumb. But the truth of how to generate viewership has been revealed to me.
I pity the poor sap or team of saps who had high hopes of being documentary film makers and truth seekers only to find themselves on this worthless project. Netflix has worked out how to "do" a "documentary". All it takes is flashy graphics and ridiculous conspiracy theories. Hint or explicitly say it was the CIA, KGB, MI6 plus the Australians, Malaysians and Chinese (surprised Mossad didn't get a look in), then interview some very sad, desperate relatives who are grasping at any straw for hope (or perhaps blame) and you're on to a real corker.
Of course, very clever, very boring aeronautical engineers who actually know how these things work are no where near as good TV as conspiracy crackpots with exotic accents spouting completely impossible theories. I was really hoping this would be an in depth look at how the evidence was pieced together bit by bit by dedicated technicians and scientists. Far from that. This was pathetic. I'm done with these sham documentaries.
The Last Blockbuster (2020)
Lots of men (only men) talking about renting videos.
Lazy documentary. There's one woman who has a genuinely interesting story as the owner of one of the last blockbuster stores. Then there's a stream of middle aged men, mainly D listers - reminiscing about renting videos.
14 Minutes from Earth (2016)
Rich white guy's home video
An extremely rich Google exec with the personality of a sack of potatoes pays a load of engineering clowns in a vanity project. My 12 year old asked if the film had been made by Google because it seems like an infomercial.
The ONLY thing that takes this from a 1/10 to a 2/10 is the hilarious incompetence of the engineers. My daughter and I were in fits of laughter watching one disaster after another. They made the rip cord too long so he couldn't actually deploy his parachute. They only worked this out during the first jump. One of the support crew had to sweep in and pull it for him. Then they found out that the steering toggles weee too short and he couldn't reach them! He just drifted away. They'd broken off the gps antenna on the way out of the plane (the door of which was too small!) so the couldn't find him in the desert. Oh perhaps someone should have thought about having a helicopter available to find the guy.
Then there are the landings. He basically just hits the deck each time. Hilarious. We played one of them 8 times ove. What a hoot.
Oh and the part where the engineer literally exploded the balloon before takeoff. Comedy gold.
At the end of the whole thing the journalist asked him what it was like to be in the stratosphere. He literally used the words "cool" and awesome. I think there was a "nice" in there also. What a true poet.
Anita & Me (2002)
Very Disappointing. Poor effort.
I had high expectations following "My Beautiful Laundrette", "Bend it like Beckham" and (less so) "East is East". The histories of British Asians fitting into their adopted home has had many good runs on the big screen, as well as a number of excellent TV and radio series (Goodness gracious me, etc). This one falls flat. Inspite of a good start it rapidly went down hill.
Ultimately this was a horribly typical BBC effort, complete with strong regional accents, whacky over-acting characters, a "those were the days" soundtrack, and lots of "issues" in an attempt to be worthy.
I found myself cringing at many points during this film. The writing is predictable. Every possible cliche was dragged out and aired. In fact, I have trouble thinking of any cross-cultural/cross-generational devices that could have been used that weren't. The characters were thin and cliched: the eccentric non-conformist minister; the well meaning but ultimately racist old woman; the over weight, overbearing aunt; the pushy Indian parents; the working class neighbour; the 'wise' profound grandmother; the motorbike riding thug. The script was weak, with every chance to shock the audience with overt racist dialogue from the two dimentional racist white characters taken. And why it had to be set in the 70's (apart from needing an excuse for a 70's soundtrack) is a mystery. Possibly it make unbelievable characters slightly more believable to people born after 1979. I don't know.
Even these things aside, good acting could have carried this into respectable obscurity. Instead, the usual "BBC comedy" suspects were wheeled out to ham it up. "Bend it like Beckham" had far better comic acting (and serious acting, in fact) than this, with a virtually unknown cast.
In summary, a lazy cliched script, over acted, in a dull predictable story. Give it a miss.