More Film Reviews

Mama Mia! / 1 Star

Animals caught in steel leg-hold traps have been known to gnaw off their own limbs in order to escape. Fortunately, I have a remote control.


Dr Horrible’s Sing-Along Blog / 10 Stars

This is the best musical I’ve ever seen. Or heard, for that matter. It’s hilariously funny. It’s dramatic. The people involved are able to act and sing. The songs are top-notch, musically and lyrically. The characters are well-developed, fully fleshed-out entities, not mere puppets who go through the motions between excruciating song-and-dance numbers. There is a real story here, and not just some flimsy device to move from one song to another. It’s so good, you almost forget that it’s a musical. Sadly, only a (relatively) small number of Joss Whedon fans have ever heard of it, while the almost indescribably bad Mama Mia! released the same year has become the highest grossing musical of all time. That’s really horrible.


Battlefield Earth / 2 Stars

The only nice thing I have to say about this is that it isn’t quite as bad as Mama Mia!


Liar Liar! / 5 Stars

I was disappointed in this, as I was expecting a biography of Glen Beck. Turns out it’s a silly Hollywood comedy. It’s not terrible. It’s not phenomenal. Some of it is funny. Some of it would be funny, if you were less intelligent than you are. That’s the truth, for whatever that’s worth.

(The Glen Beck biography is Lying Sack of Shit. My mistake.)


Precious,

based on the novel Push by Sapphire / 9 Stars

This was great, but since when do film titles include their own credits? Seriously: who asked whether or not it was based on a novel? Who asked the title of that novel? Who asked the name of the author? What the hell happened to her last name? Does she know that her first name isn’t really a name but is actually a rock?

I’d never heard of Sapphire before, but that shiny precious stone wrote one heck of a story. If you are not emotionally involved, then you may well have a heart of stone yourself. There are some highly disturbing scenes, but it never quite crosses over to unwatchably depressing pathos. Deftly handled comic relief prevents the audience from succumbing to total despair, without detracting from the seriousness of the underlying social issues this film (based on the novel Push by Sapphire) addresses. A precious (based on the Latin, pretium, price, by ancient Romans) film indeed.


The Hurt Locker / 8 Stars

War is hell, but if you live in hell for long enough, it starts to feel like home. This would be my tag-line for this film, if they let me have that job. There’s obviously a good reason they gave that job to someone else. That person came up with “You know when you’re in it.” This is why I don’t write movie tag lines. That’s so much better than mine. I want that job, though.

This is a new kind of war movie for a new kind of war. Traditionally, war movies have followed a standard formula. The bad guys shoot at the good guys, and the good guys shoot back. The good guys shoot last. Now there’s nobody to shoot at. That’s the problem with these new-fangled wars that these kids today have come up with. The bad guys no longer line up politely to be shot. Instead they have these roadside bombs that blow people to little pieces. And there are courageous / crazy guys who defuse those bombs. I definitely, definitely do not want that job.

(Keep me posted if any tag-line writing positions open up though.)


Eddie Izzard: Definite Article / 6.5 Stars

Izzard is a visual comedian, and not just because he’s a transvestite and it’s sort of funny to see a man in a dress and mascara. You fail to notice this after about five minutes and he rarely brings it up. But I had this on while I was working, so I could hear the jokes but could not see them, and most of the punchlines consisted of funny faces and strategic physiognomic manipulation for comedic effect. It relied so much on visual, physical comedy that it bordered on mime, but without inspiring a desire to strangle anyone. Izzard actually played Charlie Chaplin in a movie, so it makes sense that he might gravitate to non-verbal humor. And much of his humor also assumes that you have some intelligence and education. So I think you’ll get a big kick out of this provided you are neither blind nor a member of the “tea-party.”


Persepolis / 8 Stars

Anything that enrages religious fundamentalists is going to get a thumbs-up from me. Two of them. And, while we’re waving symbolic digits around, a couple of middle fingers aimed at the fundamentalists. I can’t help but immensely admire, Marjane Satrapi, who wrote a graphic novel based on her own experiences in the oppressive Iranian regime, and then turned it into this excellent, eye-opening film. The Iranian government and Islamic clerics in other countries weren’t nearly as impressed as I was. This is probably because they are useless bags of vile reeking scum. Also: not everyone likes animation as much as I do. But I’m guessing it was the vile scum bit that accounts for our differing interpretations. In terms of message and theme, this was absolutely amazing. And the animation style, though not too fancy (I’ve become spoiled rotten by the big budget magic of Pixar), perfectly fits the mood of the story. My only complaint concerned pacing, and an occasional lack of forward narrative momentum. This weakens an otherwise stunning achievement, though it remains profoundly moving. Also: every time someone rents it, an Islamic fundamentalist somewhere starts sobbing so hard that he almost forgets to oppress women. You should move it to the top of your queue.


The Wrestler / 8.5 Stars

Mickey Rourke is gigantic. I remember when he was a regular actor, and he could play regular roles. But he can’t anymore. He can only play professional wrestlers, indestructible superheroes, or possibly a major land mass. But he’s still an excellent, albeit gargantuan actor and he put a full nelson on my emotions and pinned them flat here. I really cared about that big galoot up there. But like I said, he’s just too gimongous now to take on the vast majority of roles, which is a tragic waste of talent. So I’m really hoping that someone will do a major motion picture all about geography, because I think he’d be perfect as South America.