Reviews

A clumsily titled original Sherlock Holmes mystery by the folks who made the far superior Hound of the Baskervilles two years earlier. There isn't anything particularly wrong with this one, there just isn't very much exciting about it. Rupert Everett's Holmes is a tall glass of lukewarm tea. It's too bad they couldn't get Richard Roxburgh to come back. A lot of people disliked his performance, but I thought it was quite good, and I appreciated his high energy approach, especially after seeing Everett in this one. Roxburgh has way more 'it.' This film is bolstered (and largely carried by) Ian Hart's excellent turn as Dr. Watson. Also in the cast are the always terrific Jonathan Hyde, Rachel Hurd-Wood, and Michael Fassbender, who gets a lot of juice out of his role as a valet. Neil Dudgeon, as Lestrade, does the same thing that we've seen 50 other actors do. There's never any real mystery here as to who's committing the murders and how; in fact, the whole film feels like a police procedural -- Holmes using the telephone, chain smoking cigarettes, doing most of his casework from Scotland Yard HQ (!) and lecturing everyone on the importance of fingerprints. The locations, sets, and costumes look good, though some large scenes feel cramped in the available space. Worth watching once, but on the whole it's a Holmes film that ranks somewhere in the (lower) middle of the pack.

No recreation of the Sir Hugo legend, a fair haired Holmes, an acerbic Watson, a fast-and-loose adaptation, a CGI hound -- this had all the makings of a disaster, but somehow it works. First of all, Richard Roxburgh may not be a Holmes for the Ages, whatever that means, but he's bloody good. His mental energy and focus on his quarry, his wisecracking delivery, and that VOICE! Credit where credit is due, he did a fine job. Much better than Rupert Everett's whispery Holmes in the second installment. Ian Hart is fine as Watson, if a bit too much of a blustery hot head, and he more than holds up the middle portion of the film. The supporting cast is good to the point of silliness: Matt Day's Sir Henry is spot on and John Nettles' turn as Dr. Mortimer is absolutely brilliant. This character is seldom more than a third fiddle in film adaptations of THOTB, but Nettles works wonders with it. However: Richard E. Grant as Stapleton is the stuff that dreams are made of. What an incredible performance. Watch him grinning at the dinner table -- the dog is a tool; STAPLETON is the hound of the Baskervilles. That dude is a werewolf, people. Terrific, terrific acting. The hound looks ridiculous via the (non)magic of CGI and some poorly conceived changes take away, but on the whole it's a lot of (dark, dark, bloody) fun.

Ranking this one a point above Rathbone and Brett's versions. Taken as a whole, it's just a little better. Ian Richardson was a splendid Holmes. It's too bad he didn't get to do more of these than just THOTB and TSOF. Donald Churchill is fine as Watson, though David Healy in Sign of Four opposite Richardson is better. Production values are very good, especially for TV, and the supporting cast has gold in it. Martin Shaw is wonderful as Sir Henry, a full-fledged cowboy in this interpretation, and Nicholas Clay is a particularly nasty Stapleton (and Sir Hugo). The scene of Sir Hugo in the swamp with his captive -- well, let's just say you won't be sorry to see him get eaten by a devil dog. Which brings up the hound, one of the main reasons I like this version. The title character looks better here than in just about any previous version. For once, they stick with the novel and make it a spectral dog than glows wildly with fire in the night, and they make it look good. Though he didn't get to do many Holmes films, Richardson did make the series Murder Rooms, based on Dr. Joseph Bell, Doyle's professor who inspired the Holmes character. Check those out after you watch this.

As a lifelong Holmes fan, I was very much looking forward to this film and I was by no means disappointed. It's just excellent on so many levels. Can't wait for the sequel! GREAT STUFF: Robert Downey, Jr., Jude Law, Mark Strong, indeed the entire cast did a wonderful job. Watson's bulldog. The FIGHTS. The GUNS. All the design work (sets, costumes, etc.). The dockside explosion sequence. All the playing around with time(Here's what's going to happen/let me explain what just happened). Hans Zimmer's score is terrific as well. There's just a lot to enjoy here. Robert Downey, Jr. continues his amazing comeback, although it's something more than that. He was never as big as he is now, with so many terrific artistic and commercial successes under his belt in past five years. (Good night and Good Luck, Zodiac, Tropic Thunder vs. Iron Man, Sherlock Holmes, Iron Man 2) Good for him. Bring on the SEQUEL!

The cover of the DVD said, "Everything action fans could want!" "Great!" I thought. "Just what I'm in the mood for. An action movie called 'The Bank Job' starring Jason Statham." But as the film wore on, I became increasingly perplexed. There was no action. Just long sequences of guys drilling through concrete and making dumb mistakes intercut with many, many scenes of naked writhing bodies. Naked bodies in water, naked bodies in brothels, naked bodies in films within the film...and then I realized my error -- I was thinking "action" as in, "Blam! Blam! Crash! BOOM!" And they were saying "action" as in "Wakka-Chikka, Wakka-Chikka." Aha! That explains why in this entire movie, I saw 2 Smith and Wessons and (apologies to Steve Martin) 57 tits.

"Action" fans (nudge-nudge, wink-wink, say no more)will love this movie. The rest of us will be disappointed and bored. Statham and David Suchet do good work in it, so 4 stars.

Temple of Doom is awesome. Yes, awesome. It suffers by comparison with Raiders of the Lost Ark, and, hey, what doesn't? Willie is annoying? That's the idea. He can't meet the same girl every time. Short Round is dead weight? You have to admit, sometimes he's funny. Honestly, I don't know how much more we could realistically want from a summer adventure film. Suave nightclub scene erupting into machine gun fight? Car chase through crowded streets? Plane crash? Waterfall? Evil cultists ripping people's hearts out? Mine car chase? Flooded tunnel? Rope bridge? Check, it's all here.

The McGuffin is a little underdeveloped (so were the letters of transit in Casablanca), Indy's hat doesn't always look as good as it does in the other three movies (especially Raiders and Crystal Skull), and all the cliffhangers are stolen from Zorro's Fighting Legion (steal from the best, babe). Whoopty-doo. It's a whip-crackin' good time.

At last we get another Indiana Jones film! But can we enjoy it?

First of all, you have to get on board with the notion that the film makers have brought the character into the realm of 50s B movie sci-fi films, like Them, The Thing, and The Day the Earth Stood Still. There's still a lot of serial action, but with a heavy dose of sci-fi this time.

There are far more shots to make you roll your eyes in disbelief than in previous installments (like the Tarzan thing, the tree ride and the triple waterfall), but those flaws don't kill the movie - just the last 30 minutes of the movie. The new characters are very good, and Ford proves he's still got it and could do another one of these movies, too.

It's the least of the series thus far, but that only means the series has produced a 10, two 8's, and a 6. And that ain't chopped liver.

Superlatives fail. What to say? Paragon? Pinnacle? Zenith? I surrender. This review isn't meant to convince anyone that Raiders is a good movie, or a great movie, or an immortal movie in film history, b/c I believe that to be an established fact. Twenty-seven years after I first saw it on the big screen in Murray, KY, in the summer of 1981, it has lost nothing of its greatness. This is a review about WHY it is SO GREAT. Why it defined the summer blockbuster forever after, why it spawned so many (inferior) wanna-be franchises, why even its own sequels, done by the same creative team, don't measure up and can't measure up. Don't get me wrong - they are wonderful films, enormous fun and far superior to anything else made in the same vein. But Raiders stands alone, the Everest of summer action adventure. Why?

#1 - THE DIRECTOR One of the best directors in film history. Spielberg, a lover of classic Hollywood films, was the perfect director for this project. He's also a director who could go toe to toe with Wyler, Hitchcock, Lang, etc.

#2 - THE ACTORS The casting of actors who were virtual throwbacks to golden age Hollywood stars. Ford/Bogart, Allen/Bacall, Freeman/Rathbone and Lacey/Lorre were perfect fits and brought more to the table than just their performances, by evoking the greats of yesteryear.

#3 - THE STUNTS The celebration of serials. The legacy of Republic serials and their amazing stunt team (Yakima Cannutt, etc.) is homaged like nowhere else in Raiders. The idea to take B-movie serial pacing and cliffhanger stuntwork and make an A movie out of it was genius. Thank you, George. Indeed, one reason for Raiders' greatness is that it took all the best bits and left little for any of the other films. Swing over pit, collapsing temple, boulder tunnel, automatic spikes and darts, (that's just the first five minutes), burning building, fistfight with multiple opponents, poison, snake pit, fight around propellers, horse to truck transfer with Cannutt's signature travel under the wagon -- any of the great serial cliffhanger death traps not done here were done in the second film. What's left?

#4 - THE MACGUFFIN The Ark of the Covenant is THE BEST MacGuffin in adventure film history. Better than the Maltese Falcon, better than the Holy Grail, better than anything. Thank you, Philip Kaufman. I hope you got paid a lot for giving George the idea. No one had done it before, and I don't think anyone will be able to do it again. Let's face it, the Maltese Falcon is just a valuable statue. The Holy Grail is a medieval legend that doesn't even appear in the Bible. But the ARK - it's got the bona fides.

#5 - THE SCRIPT The character development, dialogue, pacing -- everything is spot on. Beautifully laid out by another creative artist who understands and loves classic Hollywood -- Lawrence Kasdan. He did his best work here, and it shows. Keeping it a period piece set in the 1930s with Nazis for villains only makes it work even better. The flavor is just right. Note for those writing scripts: Larry has shown you the way. More than three good guys is TOO MANY. We don't have time or emotional energy to invest in more than Indy, Marion and Sallah. (Tolkein split up the Fellowship for the same reason.) "More characters" is not the answer.

#6 - THE EFFECTS Old school photographic effects combined with practical effects. It's still the way to go. We don't like digital. If we want that, we'll go play a video game. Practical effects look fake 10% of the time and digital effects look fake 90% of the time. You do the math. Digital is good for solving the same problems mattes and rear projection used to solve. It's good for erasing C stands and stunt safety wires. Not for creating characters. You need actors for that. This is why the Hulk movies have flopped. It's why Gollum succeeded - b/c so much of Gollum was Andy Serkis. The effects in Raiders are old school taken to a new level of excellence. There is sweat involved, and not sweating over a mouse and keyboard.

#7 - THE WRINKLES Raiders was shot quick and dirty. Sometimes, as a result, there are continuity errors. You can see the phone pole sticking out of the bottom of the truck. Marion's shots with the headpiece don't match. If the Staff of Ra is five feet tall, Indy is three and a half feet tall. AND I LOVE IT. Here's why - It's a real movie made by real artists. When a movie is so over-produced and tinkered with that it feels plastic, I hate it. I'm the same way with music. Here comes a guitar solo, but actually it's been built up in seven layers in the studio, each one with a different filter. At this point we're so far away from the guy and the guitar, I don't have a sense of who he is or what his art is about. Unlike a lot of later films, Raiders wasn't made in a Petrie dish. And that makes it fun. Thank God.

For these and other reasons, I hold this movie to be one of the top ten Greatest of All Time. Not even the people who made it knew it would be what it turned out to be. That doesn't mean we should give up on action/adventure films, b/c they just aren't going to get any better. It just means we have a high standard, and hooray for those movies that come close to it. And when we experience the disappointment of the ones that try and fail, remember -- --we'll always have Tanis.

NT2 contains some of what made NT1 so much fun, but is missing some key elements.

**BEYOND THIS THERE BE SPOILERS**

First, I got plot questions: Why doesn't Booth know how to decode his own coded letter when he even has the key? Why is the KGC subplot dropped from the film after the first half hour? Why doesn't Ben Gates have any cred with the powers that be after finding the world's biggest treasure in the first movie? He still has to sneak around and break into everything. (answer - so Riley can be a character in the movie) Why does his ex-girlfriend have the huge mansion? She didn't buy it, and they weren't married. And after all the jumping through hoops, why is Thomas Gates listed in Booth's diary as "mastermind?" If they explained, I missed it, and that explanation was what the whole thing was supposedly about. I guess these are minor.

What I really miss from part one is the appreciation of history. The most interesting characters in the film (Lincoln, Booth, Albert Pike, Queen Victoria) are little more than passing thoughts here. Nothing as grand as those opening montages in NT1, showing the origin of the treasure, the legend, the only surviving clue, etc. There is a scene of the Lincoln assassination, and it's one of the best things in the film. For two minutes.

There is also a very good car chase and a good deathtrap before the final discovery which was borrowed from the Republic serial Manhunt in the African Jungle, IIRC.

The performances are uniformly good, except maybe for Diane Kruger, whose German accent is much more noticeable than in the first installment. (I know, she looks good, so that cancels it out.)

Speaking of looking good, Cage's hair stylist has failed him royally on this one and should never be hired by him again. It's only three years since the last installment and he looks like 10 years before the mast/5 miles of bad road. Bad cut, bad color. He is a major movie star, people, can you help the man out for heaven's sake?

Still, the movie is fun and funny, fast paced and clean, and worth the price of admission if you're looking for some escapist fun.

Thomas Middleton and William Rowley's "The Changeling" is one of the best of the Jacobean plays. This adaptation does us a favor by removing a tiresome subplot set in a madhouse and focusing on the central story of Beatrice-Joanna and DeFlores. Engrossing, grotesque and often downright icky, this production pulls no punches. The actors are very good and do a great job of treating the Jacobean text in a naturalistic way — not too much "Shakespearean" posturing here. Also terrific are the costumes and props, especially the rarely seen Spanish navaja folding knife that Hoskins' character uses for his dirty work. (These knives are supposedly the inspiration for the Bowie knife and date all the way back to the 1600s, so they are perfectly correct for this play.) The Changeling is available thru the educational media website Films for the Humanities at films.org for the obscene price of $150. Borrow it from a library and you'll enjoy it.

Just watched this on DVD. Along with 12 Mile Road, this is some of Selleck's best recent work. He supposedly has a new TNT western in development based on L'Amour but I haven't heard anything about it for 2 years. Stone Cold is an adaptation of Robert Parker's new series about character Jesse Stone. Stone, as played by Selleck, is a very appealing character and I hope Tom will make a few more telefilms based on this series. Well done thriller in the old Columbo mold of "we know who the killer is, how will the cops catch him/her?" A few surprises along the way, some good Parkeresque dialogue, Selleck in an appealing performance with excellent support (especially Mimi Rogers) and a few crowd pleasing scenes, ie the arrest in the high school bathroom and the subsequent rhubarb in the police station. What more could you ask? (A sequel to Quigley Down Under? A feature film of Magnum PI? Okay, but what else?) Great TV night flick.

If you are a fan of Zorro, Indiana Jones, or action in general this is a must-see. Directed by Republic's ace team of William Witney and John English, and starring Reed Hadley as Don Diego/Zorro, this serial delivers! I won't bore you with the plot (who cares? less talking, more fighting); what really matters here is Hadley's superb interpretation of the character/s and the stunt work of Dale van Sickel and Yakima Canutt.

***STUNT SPOILERS FOLLOW ***

You can see the influence this film had on Lucas and Spielberg -- Zorro gets caught in the original version of the Star Wars trash compactor in one chapter, trapped on a rope bridge a'la Temple of Doom in another, does a Raiders horse-to-coach transfer and even flees through a tunnel while the baddies knock over a huge water tank and flood the tunnel behind him, exactly as Mola Ram does to Indy in Temple of Doom. In addition to all this, the whip action is great as Zorro disarms villains, swings to safety, etc. with his trusty lash. Most of the sword work is fair to lame, except for chapter one, which features a terrific sword brawl in a cantina choreographed by sword/stunt legend Ralph Faulkner, who makes a rare screen appearance as the evil Rodriguez. This was the first serial I ever saw, on Matinée at the Bijou when I was a kid and I have been hooked on them ever since.

Zorro's Fighting Legion delivers "Z" goods!