Reviews

Nick Parks is truly a great animator. Sadly, his Wallace and Gromit series is limited to only three, half-hour episodes.

Though "The Wrong Trousers" won an Oscar, my favorite is still "A Close Shave." It has an interesting story and a really positive atmosphere to it. It is also, in my opinion, funnier than the other episodes. And the sheep are really cute.

Kids will love it, as will adults who still like to watch cartoons.

Really bad and stupid--so bad it isn't even funny. Kind of like "Plan 9..." You want to laugh at it, but it is so serious you can't.

Like the other fellows commenting, I too was lured to the theater by the exciting teaser. I was 13 years old at the time, and it was the last time I was fooled into seeing such a bad SF effort! Totally disappointing, even for a kid.

This educational and good looking film moves right along. Just when a scene becomes slow, we cut to an entirely new sub-story with an entirely new set of characters.

You will find yourself surprised from time to time when you suddenly see the famous face of an actor you didn't know was in the movie. For instance, Robert Redford suddenly appears towards the end.

On the whole, this movie tends to glorify rather than condemn, yet we see lots more of that kind of thing when dealing with the clear-cut issues of WWII. Still, you have to give them credit for not making the Germans come off as monsters--the Panzer division's generals are actually quite sympathetic characters.

The movie makes Market-Garden seem more like a big adventure instead of a great waste of human life and treasure. Recall, the area in Southern Holland the allies were attempting to liberate was held by the Germans until the last weeks of the war, fully 6 months after the failed attempt to capture Arnhem!

By God, it's been a long time since I saw this. Probably about 18 years ago?

The movie tells us (kids) all about human blood and the circulatory system. Very professionally put together--Disney-style animation, plus human actors--it was directed by Frank Capra, for pete's sake!

Kind of an overkill. I wonder if the very high production value is worth what amounts to a film-strip's worth of information on the human body? But boy will those kids watching it learn: even now I can clearly remember Dr. Baxter being challenged by Hemo himself to name what common material most resembles human blood, to which the Doctor immediately answers "sea water."

An excellent movie, one of my all-time favorites. I watch it more often than I listen to "Die Zauberflote" on CD.

Bergman changes the story slightly and shuffles some of the musical pieces around, but the result makes better sense than the original. Pamina's struggle is presented as a custody battle between Mother and Father. The depression of wintertime in the far north is brought out clearly in the attempted-suicide scene. And all the knicknacks and props lying around...are pure Sweden! I didn't realize that until I visited Gothenburg last fall.

Bergman's comical, warm and cozy images really fit the music. Not that "The Magic Flute" from Mozart needs much improving...after all, 9 out of 10 German composers agree that it is the "perfect" German Opera. But Bergman's images go with it so well I consider it the perfect staging of the opera.

Satanic Attraction was a hard-to-find video. This is not at all my kind of movie--a slasher flick from late eighties Brazil-- but my friend Sarah provides the voice for one of the characters in the English language version!

The movie takes itself fairly seriously, though the acting is pretty bad. Nothing but cliche characters, of course no character development. But with a group of non-professionals (several of them students from the US visiting Brazil) providing the voices for the dubbed version, the final result is pretty hilarious. I enjoyed it in kind of a "Mystery Science Theater 3000" way. Actually, I'd nominate the movie for their lampooning. It would be an honor!

The story is hard to follow and seems pointless toward the end. The end is anticlimactic as well-- "What just happened?" Because of the poor acting and sound quality, it is hard to separate the story they want to tell from all the running around and screaming.

No, better yet: this film could use someone like Woody Allen to provide an entirely new dialog and storyline like he did in "What's up Tiger Lily?"

It's extremely funny, in several different ways. The original movie, some sort of Japanese secret agent adventure, looks hilarious to begin with. Then Woody Allen (in his very early years) replaces the Japanese dialog with his own script and voices that go along with the action. He also splices in (crudely, but he did it that way on purpose) scenes of "The lovin' spoonful" band singing some good music.

This movie is very special...supposedly it is the inspiration for Mystery Science Theater 3000. It's as quotable as "Monty Python and the Holy Grail." See it, but be warned--you may split your side laughing.

This is my early favorite. Though Star Wars is flashy and fun, it breaks the laws of physics and gets the space travel all wrong.

Kubrick lets the spacecraft carry the story forward quietly and majestically, yet at no point is it boring. "2001" is really the opposite of the loud, short-attention span space movies that have always been the norm. You must keep watching because there are countless detailed things going on at all times--antennas turning, computer screens flashing, machines smoothly operating--that are all critical to the story, yet not explained except visually. It's a real treat for the moviegoer because it assumes some intelligence on your part.

There are really only a few minor technical flaws I could point out (but why bore you?). It is amazingly advanced for its time (1968). It has the look and feel, the sights and sounds of what spacecraft MUST be in order to function properly.

So what if the dialog is uncomfortable, stiff and stilted? This is one of the only movies to get it right technically. It also introduces HAL 9000, the hypnotically perfect-talking computer, the most famous movie computer character of them all.

The first 20-minute part, the prelude, consists of proto-humans (hairy apes!) roaring and bashing each other with animal bones. It's bearable because of what comes at the end of the prelude. The transition from savagery, as the beast triumphs over his foe and hurls his thighbone club into the air, to civilization, as the bone turns into a satellite gracefully gliding by in orbit (to the opening bars of "The Blue Danube Waltz") sends chills up and down my spine every time.

The last 20 minutes are nothing but psychedelic colors and absurdly out-of-place scenes, as the astronaut Dave goes through a portal to "the infinite." It's a sharp contrast to the rational, paced logic of the middle section of the film, similar to the deep contrast between the pre-civilization primates and the space-faring people of 2001.