Reviews

That's just the beginning. Every scene in this film falls flat, there is zero chemistry among the characters, even in an intimate scene between Tucci and Rossellini, their romance isn't believable for a second. Tucci is a wonderful actor, as well as Shalhoub, Holm, Driver, and Rossellini, but their characters frequently look like they received conflicting direction, as a result they're not the slightest bit convincing. It's almost as though the actors themselves were gearing up for multiple takes and the director just stopped after a couple and said "okay, let's move on". There are way too many awkward pauses before, during, between, and after scenes, as a result there is no natural flow to the film, this is the director's fault, not the editor's. A lot of this becomes clear when you read the trivia section about Campbell Scott and Stanley Tucci arguing over the film before it was made, apparently they argued during filming as well, because this is the most disjointed, haphazard film I've ever seen. What a mess.

I'm not defending this awful show, but 70s television was inherently awful. People didn't have VCRs so there wasn't any way to record something and watch it later, these shows were meant to be viewed once and then forgotten. 70s TV was filled with variety shows and they were all terrible, from Sonny & Cher to Donnie & Marie and everything in between. The idea was clever, a Star Wars variety show, in the right context and with the right writers it could have been brilliant, but the scaled-down presentation of ideas that work on the big screen just don't translate to comedy performed by middle-aged tv actors. In retrospect it's easy to see that this show is the meeting of two completely incompatible worlds, but it's really not that much different from today's attempt to get as many dollars out of viewers as possible by exploiting popular culture. The awfulness continues today, there are a dozen terrible programs on Netflix right now, watch 3 Body Problem if you don't believe me.

I watched every single movie in the 1980s and somehow I never watched this one until tonight. It's horribly dated, the courtroom scenes are laughable, you don't just introduce surprise witnesses, there are legal steps to follow in order to introduce testimony. This legal authenticity issue permeates the film from beginning to end, worsening what is already a bad film with the presence of Jeff Bridges's mediocre acting. There is one scene where he becomes emotional, and the cringe level is off the charts, he's quite terrible. Not for one second is he believable as the owner of a newspaper, and his presence in the film is quite unconvincing in general; how much more intriguing would this film be if his role were handled by an actor with more dexterity, someone able to convey the manipulative mendacity critical to his story arc. Alas, we're left with Bridges. On the other hand, Glenn Close and Robert Loggia are terrific, and their on-screen chemistry is top notch.

Just kidding. Someone with a few million dollars to spend hooked up with someone else wanting to spend those dollars and the result is this unimaginatively-named film. I'm paraphrasing here, but when the young gentlemen walks in to see every color of the rainbow haphazardly splashed across walls, columns, floors, and roofs, he flatters her by saying what every young man says to every young woman painter: "you really have an eye for color". Look I wasn't born cynical I was made this way, thanks to films like this which have an implied contract with the viewer: BE ENTERTAINING. When this contractual obligation isn't fulfilled, you the viewer are left wanting, so maybe you've become cynical like me. If so, you won't enjoy this lazy attempt at filmmaking which inexplicably received several ten-star reviews on this website. Ten stars? Really? Who are you people who are so easily entertained?

Watch with the sound off so you can appreciate the lighting, clothes, and hairstyles, and also avoid the clunky dialogue and contradictory character motivations and the most boring coven ever put on the silver screen. If you want to see mildly threatening witches whose strategy is to talk you to death, this is your film. Sometimes old films can be good, but the people who call this film a "gem" just because it's old and no other criteria have probably fallen under the spell of these boring witches. Seriously, what is the witches' master plan? To remain hidden from the public? There is nothing stopping them from achieving this goal.

If for some reason you want to see Richard Jenkins in his worst role ever, you're in for a treat. There's absolutely no nuance to his performance, it's all overdone facial expressions, staring angrily at the floor, and angry mutterings, proving once again that a skilled actor is just one lousy director away from making garbage. The open ending fizzles out and leaves things up in the air with absolutely no resolution to the already ambiguous storyline...how many times have we seen this artistic ending, the audience has been tired of it for decades, please stop ending films this way, no one wants to see that.

If you think you're sitting through an emotional and spiritual odyssey with a satisfying conclusion, you'll be really disappointed. I'm just going to keep typing until I reach the character limit because this film has a very disappointing ending. I don't know why the main character made the choices he did, it's never explained. A very unsatisfying and lame ending that completely negates the main character's journey throughout the film. The ending didn't have to happen that way. Still haven't reached the character limit. Seventy more words to go, now there are forty-three, now there are sixteen, and done.

I know this film was originally in color, but seriously, the black and white photography and lighting are gorgeous, capturing contrast, shading, and brightness that just can't be done with color. You've got two full hours to appreciate the photography and nothing else, because the rest of the film is a jumbled, chaotic, incoherent mess. Scenes go on far longer than they should, emphasis is placed on inconsequential plot points and character arcs, and there are literally dozens of characters that are introduced, spend a few minutes on screen, and then vanish. Why even show them if they contribute nothing to the story? On top of all that, the "comedy" is nonexistent, everything from the obligatory angry little dog that latches on to pantlegs to clumsy fight scenes to dialogue that seems to want to be clever but just comes off forced and cringey. Why so many characters? I hate to repeat this, but there are just so many of them, and they don't do anything, just like the explanatory title cards that explain the story in case you're too stupid to understand what's going on. It's a shame that Bogdanovich had an opportunity to distance himself from the turgid and unwatchable At Long Last Love but he blew it.

We've seen the "unwillingly trapped in a settlement" scenario dozens of times now, it doesn't have legs any more, but they use it anyway. You know that Rick is going to get out somehow because otherwise there is no story. Michonne was one of the most intriguing characters from the original series, initially conveying the kind of deep exhaustion that most of these characters endure, and you could really connect with her when she joined up with Rick's group and finally had a home. I don't know, somehow along the way the story has just been beaten down so much and has become so repetitive that the characters don't have any more depth or relatability, just like that awful El Camino movie that came out years after Breaking Bad ended. What's the point of all this, it's just the same old stuff over and over again. The only good thing about this show is that if you find any of the side characters annoying, they get finished off pretty quickly.

This show is firmly entrenched in the tinkling piano blue filter genre, so you know it's going to be achingly slow, and it doesn't disappoint. What is initially a compelling idea becomes suffocated under layers of excessive backstory and attempts at conveying deep meaning with lots of facial closeups and filler conversations that don't go anywhere or add anything to the story. And in keeping with production mandates there is a female cop because there's always a female cop, although unlike in any other show she doesn't take down a man twice her size. This show could have been clever, even humorous, but the glacial pace quickly squashes any exploration of the central theme.

The life of Pu Yi is fascinating, do a web search on his name and you're in for several hours of compelling reading. This film tries and almost succeeds at distilling nearly seventy years of a remarkable man's life, but there's not as much depth as you might imagine, scenes of great conflict frequently don't telegraph, and it's hard to get a grasp of what's at stake during moments of high drama. For example, the details of the Japanese invasion of Manchuria are implied, perhaps owing to the constrictions of an already lengthy film, so maybe the whole story would have been better suited as a mini-series. Instead we get references to political posturing between Pu Yi and the Japanese diplomats, all of which would have had greater context if examples of the invasion were explicitly demonstrated.

This film is also an excellent example of the worst story-telling method of all time: time jumps. The storyline constantly jumps from the past to the present, sucking all the drama out of the respective timelines.

As much as I hated The Killing of a Sacred Deer and The Lobster for their weird characters and bizarre storylines, Lanthimos finally puts together a cohesive, engaging, intriguing film that truly stands out from anything else you might have ever seen. This film is a strange combination of Ken Russell, David Lynch, and Luc Besson, mixing and matching elements and throwing them all together into a bizarre universe of candy-colored, dreamlike absurdity that has a real heart at the story: the search for personal identity. Emma Stone is outstanding, and she completely understands this special world that Lanthimos created and just how she's supposed to react within it. If you can't laugh at "she grabbed my hairy business," then you have no sense of humor.

My only complaint with this film is the casting of Mark Ruffalo, whose acting skills haven't improved over the years. How in the world this man became an actor is one of the mysteries of the universe.

When Babette finally prepares her feast, it's a culmination of all the events that transpired before that time, so in that respect it's satisfying. What always bothered me about this film is the smug arrogance of the selfish father as he refuses to allow his daughters to grow up and become women, instead he has forced them to remain in some sort of bizarre perpetual adolescence, denying them even the chance at finding love and fame. The tragedy of this film is that they never even lived and instead became shriveled old women living with regret, you can see it on their faces. And to top it all off, the man who ruined their lives is honored with a magnificent dinner fit for a king. This is a well-crafted film about a dysfunctional family containing a horrible message about obedience.

As if her strange face isn't punishment enough, her character is self-centered and shallow, and lacking in any amount of depth whatsoever. When she's finally raking in the cash you don't feel good for her, as you might for any character that you can, you know, sympathize with. Her husband doesn't seem like that bad of a guy but she treats him like garbage at the end...why? He literally did nothing to deserve that. Bebe Rexha is laughable as some kind of cyber genius, I'm typing it and I still don't believe it. And the film focuses way, way, way too much on the loss prevention officer and his bowel movements, he dragged down every scene he appeared in.

You've seen this all before a million times. Sandra Oh is better than this. An hour into this film and nothing happens, it's not scary, thoughtful, poignant, dramatic, or engaging. Who did they make this for? Who wrote it? Why is it so boring? If you were involved in the production of this film, can you not even just try to make at least one exciting scene? Or avoid being predictable? Once you get to Sandra Oh's long, complicated bee speech, you'll realize that you could have been watching something else all that time. I wish the angry uncle had stayed around, he would have added some much-needed life to the story.

Is this the unedited version? Scenes go on far, far longer than they should, filled with pointless conversations, people lying in bed, people staring at their phones, people staring off into space, people in elevators, people at lunch, every single one of these scenes does nothing to provide any amount of context whatsoever. Oh my gosh, a five minute elevator scene showing everyone staring silently forward, it's a masterpiece, bravo. On top of all that, both parents are cartoonishly cold towards their son, if they had put any amount of believability in their behavior, the film might have had more meaning. How did the kid get to be twelve years old with such awful parents? That's what's called a plot hole, the only slightly interesting thing about this dreadfully dull film.

If you're fond of wistful expressions this film is packed with them. In every scene you're guaranteed at least one five-minute wistful expression from one of the main characters. These wordless and vague closeups of faces linger for much longer than you thought possible, until it's a delightful dip into the bluish past filled with wartime atrocities, nudity, SS costumes, and a strange relationship that pushes boundaries until it's back to the present day and its gallery of giant wistful expressions. It goes on and on like this: present/past/present/past, long after you've become bored with the formula. Charlotte Rampling is nevertheless terrific, but Dirk Bogarde as a former SS officer isn't the slightest bit believable.

Maybe I'm just cynical but as you watch the film you can tell how each scene is going to play out. There are no surprises in the storyline, everything happens exactly as you expect it to. I disagree with those who praise the lead actress's performance, she was terrible and not very convincing, I guess because it's not that difficult to play an alcoholic, everything is slurring and exaggerations and compromised motor skills, there's no depth to her performance which is especially glaring when she sobers up. The only skilled actors in here are Stephen Root and Allison Janney, and they both get precious little screen time.

Why is Jeff Daniels hanging upside down? Oh boy, he's in trouble. It was 1986 and I was walking past the theater and saw the poster with Melanie Griffith and thought, now this looks like fun. I regretted seeing the film then and I regretted rewatching it just recently, time has not improved it. The same man who brought us the brilliant Silence of the Lambs also brought us this chaotic mess that doesn't know what it wants to be. Is it supposed to be funny or dramatic, because it's actually neither, it's cringe comedy, a director throwing everything at the wall to see what sticks, and none of it lands. Ray Liotta is marvelous, they should have edited the film as a thriller and toned down the focus on Griffith's annoying wrecking ball persona, and made Daniels less of a dweeb, I know he's capable of depth because I've seen him in roles where he really pulls it off. Instead we get this mish mash of ideas that never go anywhere. I feel the same way about Married to the Mob, which is marginally better, perhaps these were just practice films before Demme knocked it out of the park with Silence of the Lambs.

I didn't connect with this film at all, despite Nicholson's considerable acting talent. The scenes in his office where he's interacting with clients seem pretty corny, it's quite a stretch to imagine that any rich person would lower themselves to be in his presence, if his character were smart he would realize this from the beginning. The subplot about the water didn't make any sense to me. In a scene intended to be dramatic, the slapping scene with Faye Dunaway looks like something from the Three Stooges. On top of all this, the film moves very slowly, and not in a satisfying way. John Huston has all the subtlety of Yosemite Sam, his performance is jarring. Difficult to understand all the ten-star reviews of this film, unless it's being judged on the presence of the old cars and clothes.

I've been around for a long time now and I've seen a lot of films, I never heard of this one. I'm watching it right now and Paula Prentiss is the most unlikeable female character in any film I've ever seen, it's quite remarkable. Maybe the character was written this way, but if so, why? She's simply horrible, the perfect example of toxic femininity. The characters keep saying each other's names over and over again. They're constantly eating, sitting down to eat, drinking tea, coffee, then back to sitting down and eating again. Then it's breakfast. Then lots and lots of talking that doesn't accomplish anything or advance the plot, all while Paula Prentiss rolls her eyes for the millionth time and sneers "Valnikov" over and over. Scenes that should be funny are as humorous as a tomb. It isn't funny enough to be a comedy and not dramatic enough to be a drama. Why in the world does this film exist?