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Reviews
Good Night, and Good Luck. (2005)
Quite possibly a perfect movie
On leaving the theatre, I realized I had just seen what is quite possibly a perfect movie. Not merely was every actor somehow just right for their role, but the cadence of dialogue, the scene timing, the intimate view of the period, all just simply worked. And worked well.
The drama, for all its understated restraint, is very powerful, and actually leaves one feeling breathless. The masterful choice of letting the major players speak for themselves through archival footage was clearly the right choice.
A carefully placed clip of Eisenhower near the film's end summarizes not merely the preceding story, but offers a warning for the future, as well as reflecting current events. I have never seen a movie speak so perfectly about past events while delivering a timely message that may contain a word about what could lie ahead.
This really may be the perfect movie.
Choosing Matthias (2001)
Manipulative and preachy
"Choosing Matthias" is possibly the most cliché-ridden movie ever made, featuring a groan worthy, over-the-top performance by Caia Coley. Ms. Coley's directing is just as bad as her acting; she takes on both duties in this production, and fails at each.
Charlie and Maggie are a married couple touched by tragedy when their young son is kidnapped and killed in the big city. The requisite marital problems, rage, and god-questioning ensue, and the following ninety-odd minutes take us from one canned scene to the next. The ending is as maudlin as it is predictable, complete with an almost-literal cliff-hanger "climax".
Predictability is always a problem with movies like this one, but "Choosing Matthias" makes it all too easy for us to guess where things are going, even when much-needed exposition is missing from the first half of the movie. Every stock character makes an appearance: the wise-cracking delivery guy; the empathetic friends; the kindly old man; the concerned social worker with the permanently furrowed brow; the all-merciful deity.
It suffers not merely from atrocious acting, eye-rolling dialog, and a stale Christian "trials of Job" undercurrent, but from amateurish technical issues. There's a weird sound problem in a couple of scenes that makes some off-camera characters sound like they're talking into an empty Kleenex box. To extend the drama of several scenes, or perhaps due to a lazy (or broke) director who chose not to re-shoot, the frame rate is noticeably slowed, sometimes immediately before dialog.
Wow, this is one bad movie.