Pitch to Hollywood studio stooge: “You see, I’ve got this idea to do a film about a real life event, except the film will only feature about ten minutes of the real life event, as a sort of ‘in’ to get the suckers to come and drop ten bucks. Meanwhile, what we’ll do is make a trite and pale copy of a 1940s film noir with a bunch of B-level actors uttering the most clichéd phrases left out of Edward G. Robinson film.”
Hollywood hack: “Sounds great. How much do you need? Will thirty, forty mill suffice?” The above is what is called a ‘dramatic re-enactment’ of what surely had to occur for Brian De Palma’s 2006 film, The Black Dahlia, to be made. There’s no other way that this horror show of a film could have gotten greenlighted, unless De Palma is a perv who skulks around studio offices at night, ...
Recent Movie Reviews
Movie Review: Edge of Darkness (2010) »
Critical Critic: General Disdain | Published on: February 2, 2010
Filed under: Drama, Thriller | 2 Comments
For those of you who, with bated breath, have been waiting years for Mel Gibson’s triumphant return to the movies, your wait has come to an end. He’s back, post 2006’s drunken anti-semantic rants, in the new crime thriller Edge of Darkness. For those of you who wished he would have just stayed in his basement spray painting swastikas on the wall, take solace in the fact that this movie isn’t exactly a top notch film and it doesn’t comfortably seat Gibson back at the A-list’s table.
Adapted to film by William Monahan and Andrew Bovell from the six episode BBC mini-series of the same name, Edge of Darkness delves into the slimy world of corporate greed, cover-ups and dirty politics. Finding himself mired in the thick of it all is Boston detective Thomas Craven (Gibson) in thanks to the murder of his daughter Emma (Bojana Novakovic) via ...
Movie Review: An Education (2009) »
Critical Critic: Caitlin Maggs | Published on: January 31, 2010
Filed under: Drama, Romance | 1 Comment
Providing the text-book example for any agitated parent in need of an aid for their rehearsed “don't talk to strangers” speech, the complex and life changing results for 16 year-old Jenny (acted by Carey Mulligan), after jumping into an older man's car on her way home on a rainy day, will surely be of use.
More than just a case of chalkboards and net-ball practice, An Education is a poignant story that will give all that it receives. Set in 1961, on the outbreak of Britain's swinging-sixties, the story follows a 16 year-old Oxford dreamer, who suddenly becomes caught up in a moral tug-of-war between two very different ways of living and two very different definitions of an “education”. Learning the value in books above covers, her moving transformation is something that many can draw emotional connections from. Enthralling from the onset, the dangers of cultural experimentation and teenage impulsion is, you'll ...
Movie Review: Revolutionary Road (2008) »
Critical Critic: Dan Schneider | Published on: January 31, 2010
Filed under: Drama, Romance | 2 Comments
Herein the primary definition of tragedy: A dramatic composition, often in verse, dealing with a serious or somber theme, typically that of a great person destined through a flaw of character or conflict with some overpowering force, as fate or society, to downfall or destruction. In many colloquial settings, the word is overused to describe anything bad that happens to anyone. An old man gets cancer and dies: a tragedy. A baby is struck ill with an incurable disease: a tragedy. A plumber is accidentally killed in an auto accident: a tragedy. But, definitionally, this simply is not so. If a great person falls, due to some great flaw in his character, then we are talking tragedy. The rise and fall of a despot could be tragedy. The rise and fall of a great artist, too. But the term has been so run into the ground that it is void
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Movie Review: Sherlock Holmes (2009) »
Critical Critic: General Disdain | Published on: January 28, 2010
Filed under: Action/Adventure, Crime, Mystery, Thriller | 2 Comments
Via my forced high school readings of a novel or two and landing on a movie during a bored late night channel surf, I'm not surprised I remember very little of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's creation Sherlock Holmes. Literally, the only things that come to mind are: He was a condescending bastard who smoked a pipe and wore a silly plaid hat with a matching half cape thingy. I suppose that was a long-winded way of saying I wasn't overly impressed with the famed detective and not so much in interested in his re-imaging in Sherlock Holmes. Of course with Guy Ritchie involved with the project, this wasn’t going to be anything your grandmother would recognize or approve of (that's a good thing by the way).
How right that preceding statement is. Sherlock Holmes is an unexpectedly fun action flick that showcases another side of the stodgy ...
