Tommy's movie mini-reviews

• A Fish Called Wanda (1988) ****½
  I've watched this n times (where n >= 3) and it holds up well. Great acting and writing throughout. John Cleese says he likes it the most of all the films he's in; so do I.
  
  
• A History of Violence (2005) ****
  A little too, well, violent. But the stuff is right enough for ****. Enough to make me want to see more Cronenberg.
  
  
• A Simple Plan (1998) **½
  Mediocre treatment of potentially interesting issues.
  
  
• Advise and Consent (1962) ****
  A solid depiction of political treachery. Well done overall, although some of the wife-and-kids scenes are sappy.
  
  
• All About Eve (1950) **
  I got suckered in by glowing reviews. It was not to my taste in very much the ways I'd feared that a movie about theater life would be. Yes, the writing is clever, but it's all too precious. Feh.
  
  
• American Gangster (2007) ****
  Largely the right stuff. The DVD offers a choice of the released version and an extended version; I watched the latter.
  
  
• American History X (1998) **
  I like movies about difficult issues, but this one just oozed ugliness. Overwrought. I gave up partway through.
  
  
• American Violet (2008) ****
  Quite powerful at moments. Some sappiness, but not laid on too thick. Generally tastefully done--which makes all the difference.
  
  
• An American Crime (2007) ****
  Based on a true story. It's kind of amazing that someone made a movie about something so horrific. Not quite the right stuff, but it largely gets out of its own way and lets the story tell itself.
  
  
• Anatomy of a Murder (1959) ***½
  Many shades of gray, making for a (nicely) complex story. But I find bumbling-lawyer characters annoying to watch (even when they aren't James Stewart, and I find him annoying too).
  
  
• Au Revoir Les Enfants (1987) ***
  Tastefully made. I found it powerful at points but at other points just plain. Viewers with more patience (or more of a taste for stories about adolescents) will probably give it more stars than I did.
  
  
• Before the Devil Knows You're Dead (2007) ****½
  Masterful.
  
  
• Black Book [Zwartboek] (2006) ***
  Based on a true story, but takes too many liberties.
  
  
• Blood Simple (1984) ****
  Generally creditable writing, direction, and cinematography, but the film as a whole lacks the level of refinement that the Coen brothers achieved in (some of) their later work.
  
  
• Bound (1996) ***½
  Dopey at times, and over-the-top most of the time. Good cinematography though, and it held my interest after the girl-on-girl sex was out of the way.
  
  
• Boy A (2007) ****½
  Quite the powerful movie.
  
  
• Breaking and Entering (2007) **
  "The first third of the movie is intelligent and sets up an intriguing premise. Then the plot takes unconvincing and unlikely turns that result in an ending that feels false and forced..." from a review, and I concur.
  
  
• Cape Fear (1962) ****
  Good buildup of tension. Music by Bernard Herrmann.
  
  
• Citizen X (1995) ****½
  Tastefully and skillfully made. Fascinating on several levels, not least of which for the insight it gives into life in the USSR.
  
  
• Collateral (2004) ***
  A Michael Mann film I got after seeing The Insider. The good news: fine cinematography. The bad news: it's contrived as hell.
  
  
• Conspiracy (2001) ****
  Well written, acted, and photographed. A chilling story of how consent was enforced.
  
  
• Crash (2005) **½
  Overdone.
  
  
• Deliverance (1972) ****½
  A ballsy movie; e.g, the actors did all the action shots (no stunt doubles). Fine cinematography. And yes, interesting themes too.
  
  
• Devil in a Blue Dress (1995) ***
  The realistic parts are realistic and the stupid parts are stupid.
  
  
• Double Indemnity (1944) *****
  My first thought was, why give away so much of the story in the narration right at the start. I still have to wonder if the device of intercutting the story with the recording of the confession makes it a weaker film than it could have been if the story just played out. But why quibble when everything is so well done. And can I just say that Edward G. Robinson is awesome?
  
  
• Eastern Promises (2007) ***½
  A Cronenberg film I got after seeing A History of Violence. It has its strengths--although now after two such films, I've had enough of his brand of violence. Watchable, but not one I'd see again.
  
  
• Elevator to the Gallows (a.k.a. Frantic) [Ascenseur pour l'échafaud] (1958) ***½
  Good maybe ½ the time, otherwise tedious. Unrealistic attempted joint suicide scene. Miles Davis' score is occasionally apt--but only occasionally.
  
  
• Experiment in Terror (1962) ***½
  I see this as a bit of a wry caricature of film noir. The good guys drive white cars and the bad (or suspected) guys drive black ones. Striped light--a staple noir motif--is overplayed to amusing effect. Henri Mancini's score is delightfully sly. A few tense moments are tongue-in-cheek; some look sinister at first but turn out to be benign, others are just comic-book-like. I was entertained--it's generally the right stuff--but I have my doubts that it would hold up on multiple viewings.
  
  
• Fargo (1996) *****
  The right stuff. It's very funny at points but I would've liked it even if it had fewer humorous touches. The this-is-a-true-story prologue is a lie, which I resent--but I'll forgive them, this time. Just don't do it again, OK?
  
  
• Fateless [Sorstalanság] (2005) ****
  Honest and artistic. Fine cinematography. Marcell Nagy is outstanding in the main role. Warning: some parts are slow-paced by design, and portray the tedium of captivity.
  
  
• Good Night, and Good Luck (2005) ***
  Fine black and white cinematography, great performance by David Strathairn as Edward R. Murrow. But I found it to be a thin movie. The subject matter deserved more substantial treatment.
  
  
• Heat (1995) ***½
  172 minutes, which is somewhat longer than it needed to be. Generally competently made--but it's conventional material.
  
  
• Heist (2001) ****
  Great performance by Gene Hackman. Some reviewers find the writing dreadful and some find it playful and entertaining; I'm in the latter camp. It's farfetched and at times predictable, yes--but there are also some interesting flavors in the mix.
  
  
• High Sierra (1941) **
  Corny. I don't know what people who say this is one of Bogart's best are smoking. Has scenes filmed around Lone Pine.
  
  
• Howard's End (1992) **
  Some clever and interesting dialogue from time to time, but overall I am not interested in watching the precious lives and manners of the high society types who are the subjects of this story. I lasted about 40 minutes and gave up. Who knows, maybe it gets better later on.
  
  
• Illegal (1955) ***
  Silly, corny, and sappy--but the writing is good enough to make it watchable. Edward Platt (Chief from Get Smart) plays a District Attorney. DeForrest Kelley (Dr McCoy) is killed off in the first reel.
  
  
• In The Bedroom (2001) ***
  One hour's worth of movie dragged out to two hours. The end is striking but you have to endure a pile of tedium first.
  
  
• In The Line of Fire (1993) **
  I detested the writing and gave up after 25 minutes. A movie about Secret Service agents that is unrealistic at just about every turn is not my cup of tea.
  
  
• Inherit the Wind (1960) **½
  "Old Time Religion" and "Glory, Glory Halleluia" sung ad nauseam. Weakened by fictionalization (e.g., giving the teacher a sweetheart, and having the sweetheart be the preacher's daughter)-- as if the real-life story wasn't interesting or dramatic enough in its own right. Feh. Good performance by Spencer Tracy, though.
  
  
• Inside Man (2006) ***½
  Decent heist flick. Curious mixture: largely believable action but a farfetched premise.
  
  
• Insomnia (2002) ***
  Nothing special, and at times irksome.
  
  
• Judgment at Nuremberg (1961) ***½
  Thoughtful treatment of significant issues. Fine acting. But various points of style (sappy music, the same camera motions in scene after scene, ...) grated on me--and for three hours.
  
  
• Lantana (2001) ***½
  Good acting and some interesting themes, but the movie as a whole is nothing special. And what was the point in having the shrink write a book about her daughter, besides contriving a situation for her to give that speech early in the movie?
  
  
• Laura (1944) ***½
  Some absorbing moments and some tedious ones. Some interesting characters and some dull ones. Your first guess as to whodunit will be correct.
  
  
• Lone Star (1996) ***
  When the main character is involved in detective work that the audience can already see is potentially opening a Pandora's box, someone says to him (ostensibly about an encounter with a snake), "Gotta be careful where you go pokin'--who knows what you'll find." Well, duh.
  
  
• Michael Clayton (2007) ****
  Tastefully done. Fine performance by George Clooney. (N.B.: The copy shop twink is played by the son of the director/writer.)
  
  
• Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil (1997) ****½
  Largely the right stuff. I never read the book so I can't complain that the movie isn't as good.
  
  
• Miller's Crossing (1990) **½
  The violence is overwrought (risibly so in several machine-gun scenes) and the plot is overly complicated. I thought this had very little of the magic I prized in the other Coen brothers films I've seen. I like the greeting "what's the rumpus" though.
  
  
• Murder in the First (1995) ***
  At times grating, e.g. Christian Slater's rookie lawyer character is at times painful to watch. At times tedious, e.g. all the talk about baseball. And it's got a number of steadicam or shot-from-above sequences that try to be striking but are just annoying.
  
  
• Murder on the Orient Express (1974) ****
  Largely the right stuff. Great script and acting. Things that might annoy me in other movies (precious characters, contrivedness) were tolerable here because I liked the movie's tone and style so much. To see again.
  
  
• Network (1976) *
  Mark L. summed this up quite well as "A whole lot of nothing." I gave up partway through.
  
  
• Nine Queens [Nueve Reinas] (2000) ****
  Fun. Wry humor and good writing make it more than just another caper movie.
  
  
• No Country for Old Men (2007) *****
  The right stuff. Quality writing, acting, directing, and cinematography. Haunting. Lots of people really don't like this movie, though; customer reviews on Netflix complain about "no redemption" and an ending that is neither happy nor tidy. Well, life is like that.
  
  
• Notes on a Scandal (2006) ***
  I'm having a hard time describing what I didn't like about this one. I don't mind that it deals with taboo subjects, and the acting is generally good. But overall I found it just so-so.
  
  
• O Brother, Where Art Thou? (2000) **
  Not my style of silly comedy. I gave up after about a half hour. I suppose it's better if you like bluegrass music. The Coen brothers' skills are in evidence but did not carry the day.
  
  
• Out of Sight (1998) ***
  Fucking stupid romance, as hokey as the romance in Three Days of the Condor that the dialogue makes reference to. The rest of the movie is contrived as well. It's Soderbergh, so it's watchable--but great it's not.
  
  
• Out of the Past (1947) ****
  Solid film noir. Perhaps a couple too many plot twists for my taste, but well written/acted/photographed. And...! Scenes shot in Bridgeport, California, including several of the courthouse!
  
  
• Primal Fear (1996) ****
  Fine cinematography. Great performances by Richard Gere and Edward Norton. Some flaws, a few of which bugged me quite a bit; e.g., the DA ("Janet Venable") character is a bit overdone. And the romance between her and Gere is gratuitous. But the rest of the movie is strong enough to more than make up for its failings.
  
  
• Public Enemies (2009) **
  Too much time spent on scenes of waiting or gunfighting and not enough spent on developing the characters.
  
  
• Red Rock West (1993) ***½
  Good acting and cinematography. Starts out nicely understated but veers, unfortunately, into excess.
  
  
• Reversal of Fortune (1990) ***
  Just not all that skillfully done.
  
  
• Rififi [Du rififi chez les hommes] (1955) ***½
  Some parts dragged, but the good parts are quite good. Very effective use of silence in the heist sequence.
  
  
• Ripley's Game (2003) ****½
  Dark humor doesn't get much darker or funnier than this.
  
  
• Road to Perdition (2002) ****
  5-star cinematography, 3½-star story.
  
  
• Running on Empty (1988) **
  They show the prepubescent kid in his underwear but not River Phoenix. What's up with that. Seriously, though: mediocre screenplay.
  
  
• Salt (2010) **
  Dopey. Calling this "over the top" is not saying much, as the top is nowhere in sight. And I didn't care for the choppy editing in a lot of the action scenes.
  
  
• Scarface (1983) ***
  Watchable overall, fine writing/acting/cinematography at moments, but goes progressively farther over the top. Giorgio Moroder's synthesized score is to music as empty-calorie junk is to food.
  
  
• Seven (a.k.a. Se7en) (1995) **½
  Strange mixture of tasteful restraint (e.g., Morgan Freeman's character) and excess (the premise, all the crime scenes except the last, ... ). Brad Pitt's performance sucks (as do many of the lines the script gives him). The last scene plays out under a DC transmission line.
  
  
• Short Cuts (1993) *
  Sigh. Too many of the characters are dweebs, and the movie's tone is annoying. I gave up about 1/3 of the way through; not sure why I lasted even that long.
  
  
• Sorry, Wrong Number (1948) ***
  I'm not big on movies about fucked-up rich people. And this one's on the stupid-melodramatic side.
  
  
• Spanish Prisoner (1997) ****
  I found the first 2/3 or so to be absorbing, and any silliness and predictability forgiveable because it was so entertaining. The end was another story; it went progressively farther over the top. Even so, I wanna see this one again some time.
  
  
• State of Play (2009) ***
  Too often the wrong stuff. And at times the antithesis of less-is-more.
  
  
• Strayed [Les Egares] (2004) ****
  Poignant and thoughtful. Great ending (I'm partial to movies with powerful endings).
  
  
• Sunset Boulevard (1950) **½
  I liked the macabre aspects, and the Max character (Erich von Stroheim) is great--but the movie got more and more tedious as it went on. Norma is annoying to watch in exactly the ways that precious characters tend to be. Feh.
  
  
• The Asphalt Jungle (1950) ***
  So-so film noir.
  
  
• The Big Sleep (1946) **½
  Started out OK but I got so bored with it that ironing clothes seemed more fun. The good news: the clothes really needed ironing, and I might not have done it had the movie been more interesting.
  
  
• The Big Steal (1949) ***½
  Fun little (1:11) movie. Nice scenes in Mexico. I imagine it's even funnier if you understand all of the occasional Spanish language dialogue.
  
  
• The Bourne Identity (2002) **½
  Farfetched. The star outguns or outfights better-armed opponents on several occasions--and it's not like the rest of the movie is particularly believeable, either. The writing is often unimaginative, e.g. Conklin (Chris Cooper) has some painfully banal lines. And I like my thrillers straight, i.e. without a romance thrown in.
  
  
• The Brain From Planet Arous (1958) [any rating is beside the point]
  For those who can find low-budget sci-fi entertaining by virtue of how bad it is. A good brain/bad brain angle, a prominent canine role, alien lechery, primitive ominous music and even more primitive special effects-- you get the idea.
  
  
• The Constant Gardener (2005) **
  I was suckered in by good reviews. Stupid right from the get-go (the romance after the adversarial Q+A session is hokey). Not the right stuff. Simplistic morality (pharma is eeeeevil). And in case all that's not enough, it gets more contrived as it goes along.
  
  
• The Day of the Jackal (1973) ***½
  A competently-made thriller, but it's plain-jane material. Nice European location scenes.
  
  
• The Departed (2006) ***
  Kept my interest, but too graphically violent, too stupid-music-y, and too much just not the right stuff. And too contrived. Fucking Scorsese.
  
  
• The French Connection (1971) ***
  I don't care what people say--the car chase is not better than the one in Bullitt.
  
  
• The Fugitive (1993) ****
  Farfetched over and over, which normally poisons it for me--but this is a notch above most such films. Great performances by Harrison Ford and Tommy Lee Jones, and a good script and score make the difference. And it's got a train wreck.
  
  
• The Ghost Writer (2010) **
  Dopey.
  
  
• The Great Escape (1963) **
  "I find it artificial from the outset--from the point where a string of trucks arrives in the new prison compound and disgorges a crowd of swaggering bucks, non-descript British and American fellows, snarling rudely and pointedly casing the joint"--from a review, and I concur. It's hard to believe this is from the same John Sturges who directed Bad Day at Black Rock (which was tasteful).
  
  
• The Insider (1999) ****½
  Solid movie. I would've preferred more fidelity to the true story, but you can't have everything.
  
  
• The Man Who Wasn't There (2001) ***
  This starts out promising but descends into caricature that I suppose you can enjoy as parody but which I found just silly. The considerable talents of the Coen brothers are squandered in this film.
  
  
• The Pianist (2002) **
  A glowing review (at imdb.com) said "And never once are we reminded that we are watching a movie." I would say the exact opposite; the movie-ness of it bugged me at every turn. I know I'm in the minority (it's a well-received film). I gave up on it after a half hour. I appreciate the power of the story being told; my complaints are about the film's style, which was just not to my taste.
  
  
• The Red Circle [Le Cercle Rouge] (1970) ***½
  Decent heist/noir. Good cinematography. Dream sequence with a number of (real) reptiles. Plain-jane ending (bad guys die).
  
  
• The Silence of the Lambs (1991) ****
  Hard to know how many stars to give this one. Some aspects of it are outstanding and some are stupid and sensationalized. The writing and performance of the Hannibal Lecter character are first-rate.
  
  
• The Sixth Sense (1999) **
  Dopey. Amateurish writing. Haley Joel Osment did a fine job playing the role of the kid, but that alone does not make for a good movie.
  
  
• The Spy Who Came in from the Cold (1965) *****
  Masterful in so many ways. It drags a little early on when Leamas is taking on his assumed persona, but don't let that deter you from watching the last hour.
  
  
• The Stranger (1946) **½
  It sounded promising: film noir, Edward G. Robinson. But it's corny and farfetched, and with a heavy-handed WWII-colored tone that does not make for a film that ages well.
  
  
• The Three Burials of Melquiades Estrada (2005) ***
  Nice performance by Tommy Lee Jones, nice cinematography, but the humorous elements are often just silly. Who knows, maybe it's funnier if you're high.
  
  
• The Twilight Samurai (2002) ***
  Tasteful, but somehow didn't grab me.
  
  
• The Thin Blue Line (1988) ***½
  Powerful material and some good editing of interviews, but the reënactments are not tastefully done (the crime scene is shown way too many times). Interviews are shown without noting the speaker's name and position, a frustrating omission in some cases. The Philip Glass score was fitting for the sequence about hypnosis, but not elsewhere. This movie worked in that it was instrumental in Randall Adams' ultimate exoneration, and for that the makers of the film have my respect--but that's not what I'm rating it on here.
  
  
• The Winslow Boy (1999) ****
  Solid movie (well, based on a play, based on a true story). Good writing and good acting. Shows tasteful restraint at points where there was a hazard of corniness and/or sappiness. I often don't like movies about people who behave as formally as people did at the time and place this story is set in, so the fact that I liked this one is saying something.
  
  
• The Verdict (1982) ****
  Unrealistic at points, but a strong movie nonetheless.
  
  
• There Will Be Blood (2007) **½
  Starts off tasteful and interesting but goes off the rails.
  
  
• To Kill a Mockingbird (1962) ****½
  Slow at points but a solid movie.
  
  
• Traffic (2000) *****
  The right stuff, in spades. Soderbergh rocks. In the wrong hands, the tinting and atmospheric noises and ragged camerawork would have been annoying--but not here.
  
  
• Transsiberian (2008) **
  Dopey.
  
  
• 12 Angry Men (1957) ***½
  Good movie, but some characters are a bit overdone. The format of real-time presentation (in a closed room to boot) has its pros and cons.
  
  
• 25th Hour (2002) ****
  I liked it up until the end. Largely the right stuff, lots of good acting and writing, but the conclusion was irksome. Spike Lee is a bold enough director that I imagine many people will find some thing(s) problematic about his films. The good news is, he does a lot of things very well. The score is good except when it's sappy.
  
  
• Unforgiven (1992) ****½
  Solid movie. I didn't give it five stars only because my taste runs to more understatement and restraint. Yes, I'm stubborn that way.
  
  
• Up in the Air (2009) ***½
  Too much of a caricature for my taste. The folk-rock music is irksome. But a decent movie nonetheless.
  
  
• Where the Sidewalk Ends (1950) ****
  Creditable film noir. From a Netflix customer's review: "Ah, those were the good old days. Back then, a man could haul out and dispose of an inconvenient body without being worried that a dozen video cameras would catch him in the act."
  
  
• Witness for the Prosecution (1957) ****½
  Interesting, entertaining, well paced, well directed, well photographed. Fine performance by Charles Laughton.
  
  
• Zodiac (2007) ***
  OK, just not the right stuff.