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Reviews
Gone Are the Days (2018)
The great actring by the leads can't overcome the $11.49 budget & cliches
I really wanted to like this movie.
Henriksen & Berenger give very good, solid performances. However, aside from a very brief appearance by Danny Trejo, most of the other actors seem to be on loan from the Eldorado school of bad acting.
The story is a good old fashioned, slow burning western. But the supporting characters, more so than the leads, just seemed so clichéd (it might have been the bad acting, but I think even good actors wouldn't have helped their roles.)
None of the scenes 'in town' or on the train near the end - just nothing seemed authentic.
It's a shame because I suspect with more competent direction, a better supporting cast and cinematographer, this actually could have been a great film and character study.
Making History (2017)
It's a less bold knock off of Time Travelling Bong
Comedy Central already explored this exact premise with Time Travelling Bong. Whatever one's opinion of that brief show, it's clear that Comedy Central has a lot more freedom and they really pushed the limits of taste, with often better results.
For review purposes, let's pretend that Bong never existed.
Making History (MH) has some good concepts and clever writing. However, the delivery of some of the better dialogue is spoiled by truly horrific acting on the part of the sub-characters. Adam Pally, Leighton Meester & Yassir Lester handle themselves well enough, but something just seems lacking.
I wouldn't say it's a complete wash, it definitely has potential. So I'll keep giving it a chance in the hope that it gets better.
Yoga Hosers (2016)
What in the Hell did I just watch?????
If I ever meet Kevin Smith in person, I'm going to have to give him one of those insult loaded compliments "Hey Man, I'm a really big fan of your earlier work!"
What's bad about the film: Just look at any of the 40+ reviews, most of them hit it about right.
What's good about it: - Lily-Rose Depp & Harley Quinn Smith have a very natural repartee with one another and would really shine in a better film.
- Reprising his role from 'Tusks', Johnny Depp initially brings a little more flare to the character, but it does fizzle out after awhile.
The Penitent Man (2010)
Absolutely terrible 'film school' feel
I watched this on Amazon Prime due to Lance Henriksen and the many great reviews, which I now suspect were written by friends and family of the director/actors.
Whats Good about it? Lance Henriksen gives a steady, solid performance playing a haunted character who has had plenty of time to reflect on his actions. Stoic and delivers his lines with ease.
The time travel concept described, which originally laid out is more akin to being able to observe any point in prior history, and the devastating repercussions of such a discovery, is quite intriguing but not uniquely original (watch Twilight Zone/Outer Limits reboots from the nineties).
This is not a mind bender by any stretch, it is entirely predictable early on who all of these characters are in relation to one another (hard to go into much detail without some major spoilers) but anyone who is a time travel fan will know exactly what's coming.
The camera-work is hand-held quality in so many scenes, the sets are clearly on the level of 'Hey, I rented a virtual office space for the day, we'll just film it there' It's a complete amateur hour production. Some of the most horrific straight to DVD/SCYFI channel schlock have better production values.
Most importantly, Lathrop Walker is an embarrassingly bad actor in this outing, which is even more apparent as he tries to play off of the veteran Henriksen, and that's also consistent with his screen time with the other minor characters (Keegan & Roberts do their best with what they have to work with)
It contributes nothing new to the genre, and is too amateurish to be taken seriously.