Reviews
Crimes of Passion (2005)
Buckle Your Seat Belts You are In For A Ride!
This is a slick roller coaster ride of a crime drama. because of the many, many, plot twists it's hard to summarize this movie without giving away something so all I can say is that this movie starts with a plan for a married man along with a beautiful co-worker of his to defraud his employers out of millions of dollars and ends up with blackmail and murder. All of this is common in movies like this, but what isn't so common is that in Crimes of Passion, while you may think you have everything worked out but at the finale you never know who is going to walk away alive.
I gave it seven stars out of ten only because there was maybe one or two plot twists too many; those last two being just a little too improbable to really set well. At the end all I could only say was, "Oh, good grief!" Like all roller coaster rides, this one left me dizzy at end, but it kept me watching nonetheless.
Superman Returns (2006)
I'm Glad He's Back But He Needed A Better Movie
What a film! I had put off seeing Superman Returns both in the theaters then on DVD for a while, out of no particular reason. I guess i just wasn't as interested as I was in seeing other films like the last X-Men film, or Fantastic Four earlier.
So now that I have seen it I find myself straddling the fence between liking the film and being disappointed. It is so very well done but it's not your typical superhero film. I won't give away vital plot points, so I'll just say that while the movie is very good, there's too little hard action and too much heartfelt emotional scenes that sort of negate each other to make only a good film instead of a spectacular or great film.
Silent Hill (2006)
Much Over-Hyped Movie About Nothing
This movie is being touted as the best thing since sliced bread, unfortunately, the people who are saying this movie is so great are all the people who have played the video game. For us who have never heard of the video game before, this movie is a sloppy horror film that has its moments, but doesn't make a silent hill worth of sense (pardon the pun).
A woman's daughter has problem sleeping and she mentions "Silent Hill" in her sleep, so rather than put her daughter in a hospital or some place where she can get help, she takes her kid to the place in the girl's dreams-- a bizarre town that supposedly had a coal fire some years before but seems to be a suburb of hell where all manner of weird and dangerous creatures run amok.
The woman had been followed by a somewhat deranged lady cop who-- for no real apparent reason-- decides to follow this woman into hell, uh, into the town of Silent Hill. The husband is also accompanied by another cop into the same town, but neither wife and husband or pair of cops meet each other and for some unexplained reason, one side of the town seems totally different from the other side.
This movie goes on-- and on-- and on-- for a long while, with a lot monstrous and gruesome things happen, but we're never given any explanation for anything much, and when we do get a kind of explanation about witches and trying to save the town, well that's more confusing than anything.
I won't give away the ending, but I will say that it's not the kind that will make you say, "Wow!" but the kind that will make you say, "Huh? What the hell just happened?"
Perhaps this movie makes more sense to the video gamers, but a film maker has an obligation to make movies that are clear to every one,and this movie sure isn't it. It's interesting to watch, once, but I can't say it's really enjoyable so I only give it four stars.
Nightwaves (2003)
This Plot Sure Isn't new
This movie is just a "high-tech" version of Alfred Hitchcock's classic movie, Rear Window. But instead of a man seeing a murder being committed while looking through a telescope, Shelby Naylor (played by Sherilyn Fenn) while using her dead husband's radio scanner hears a husband and wife fighting with each other over a cell phone, and of course, shortly thereafter the woman is found dead. And like Jimmy Stewart in the classic film, Naylor's life is in danger after she reports what she hears to the police.
If this wasn't such a recycled plot, the movie might have been much better as Sherilyn Fenn is a talented actress. But I couldn't give this movie more than a 5 out ten stars for only being so-so. With such a basic plot you pretty much know what's going to happen, so it becomes how well the actors do their jobs along the way, which is nothing spectacular.
K-9000 (1990)
Not Bad A Movie
This is a movie about a cop by the name of Monroe and a talking dog. Just the premise alone is enough for a low rating, but I give this movie six stars out of ten because despite its flaws-- things like the ridiculous voice the dog "speaks" in and the cop shooting his gun at the bad guy about fifteen times without stopping to reload, and the sloppy editing where one minute the bad guy has inexplicably ran down a hallway but the next instant he's seen hovering over our hero-- this silly movie isn't too bad to watch. It's nice to see a movie where some of the usual cop clichés are turned upside down; in this case, the police captain makes rude remarks to Monroe, but instead of hating of him, it's because the captain actually likes Monroe instead. And there are funny moments like when Monroe makes a phone call, using equipment built into the dog to make the call.
I'm not saying this movie couldn't have been better, but as it is, this movie is a nice little comedy that works in spite of the minor flaws. It would have been nice if this was made for direct to video, or was out on DVD, but since it isn't you'll just have to look for it to be on TV or cable sometime. You'll enjoy it when you can find it.
Altered States (1980)
One Of The Best Sci-Fi Movies, Ever!
Altered States is a visually stunning movie, a tour de force as they say, that is more thought-provoking than even 2001: A Space Odyssey. William Hurt in his first movie debut plays Dr. Eddie Jessup, a man who has been influenced by his father's death by cancer. As such Eddie is driven to find what he thinks is the true meaning of life.
First he does so by using a floatation tank formerly used for sleep studies, but when the "ultimate truth" still eludes him, he seeks out and tries a drug used by Indians to elicit their first memories. Still not getting the answers he seeks, Eddie begins to combine the two only to discover that some of his hallucinations are becoming all too real and are getting out of control.
He is going beyond mass and energy, his body regressing to earlier physical states. At one point Eddie becomes an "ape man" is found wandering the Boston Zoo after one his trips. But his friends are still skeptical, while his wife (played by beautiful Blair Brown) is becoming terrified that Eddie really did regress hi body back to some primitive form.
To prove that he is telling the truth, Eddie tries for one more experiment that starts slowly but suddenly takes a unique turn as Jessup's body regresses way too far back. I won't spoil the ending, but it is far more stunning than anything even Kubrick could do. But I will say for some of those that don't quite know what's going on, Eddie has discovered the power of the mind and it is through that power-- call it psychokinesis-- that he destroys the laboratory with and maybe even regresses himself back to his beginnings. Eddie discovers the Ultimate Truth and it nearly destroys him. It is his thoughts and fears that damn him, yet it is also his will to live that ultimately saves him in the end; his will made flesh in one of the most mind-blowing endings ever made.
I just love this movie! It's too bad Paddy Chayefsky couldn't see how much infinitely better Ken Russell had made his script than the dry, dull, book the movie was based on.
Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea (1961)
A Beautifully Filmed Movie
I had ordered Voyage to The Bottom of The Sea on DVD and at 3:00 in the morning I found myself watching it. Okay, the idea of the Van Allen radiation belt catching on fire is silly, but it's just the premise for a really good sci-fi adventure film that I wish I could've seen in the theaters on a wide screen. But the rich colors on the DVD and Dolby sound is a good substitute for the real thing.
In looking at it, I can't help but compare the movie with the series that followed as there are some of the actors from the movie who ended up in the show. Seeing this Lee Crane constantly arguing and second-guessing Admiral Nelson is a little disturbing, yet the movie inspired one of the best sci-fi series of the '60s. And the movie itself, like Fantastic Voyage, shows great creativity. Irwin Allen is always being underestimated by people with 60 second attention spans, but this movie shows how much of a creative artist that Allen was.
I gladly give this movie 8/10
Lost in Space (1965)
One Of The Best Sci-Fi Shows Ever!
There are a lot of people who gripe about how the show set out to be dead serious and later became corrupted by the "camp craze" that started with the Batman show. But I like this series from beginning to end, with my only regret being that the show didn't get properly wrapped up at the end.
I like this show because you could see the love Will Robison felt for his father and unlike the dysfunctional television families of today, John Robison had great love for his son; and the bond between John and Maureen was also unshakable. This was a warm and caring family, and I liked that more then some of the silly plots.
That's not to say that I didn't like the plots: often they were silly and made me laugh-- probably when they were trying to be serious, and made more so by the limited budgets and special effects of the '60s. But if you made the same show today, using the most expensive CGI effects, the new show would not have the same warmth and charm, and it would die within a season. It's so sad that writers today don't know anything about what a family should be. Look at the recent movie; see how the producer's '90s view had a troubled Will Robinson, and a self-centered Penny, along with a soulless John Robinson who had all the charm of a brick.
I am glad that Lost In Space is on DVD as well as video and that people can see a great classic television show. So what, there were giant talking carrots! It was one of several funny episodes that I wouldn't miss it for anything in the world. There were some that stank, too, and I wouldn't miss those either. It was overall, a great series. And without Lost In Space, there would not have been a Star Trek. People forget that, too.
I give my respects to the late, great, Jonathan Harris. Doctor Smith, I'll miss you...
The Rich Man's Wife (1996)
Really Not A Bad Movie
I started watching The Rich Man's Wife, even though the title alone would suggest a crappy, soap-ish kind of movie. But I was pleasantly surprised with this murder mystery, although in flashbacks we see that there's not much of a mystery as to who was killing who.
What I liked was the way Halley Berry's character's handled herself in such a strong, almost "Ripley" like way; not some simpering, whimpering victim. She shoots the "bad guy" with a precision that professional marksmen would envy. It's a good movie, right up to the ending, then along comes that final twist-- the one plot twist too many-- that shot the whole movie to hell for me. Had the last five minutes not happened, for it me it would have been almost perfect movie, so I give this movie 5/10.
Battlestar Galactica (2003)
Remakes Never Succeed!
When I first heard about them making a new Battlestar Galactica I thought about all the other remakes-- The new Outer Limits, the new Twilight Zone, the new Dark Shadows, the new live-action Tick, the new Land of the Lost, and the list goes on-- I was pretty sure I was going to be disappointed. And when I saw the movie, I was really disappointed. While some of the original BG episodes were hokey due to Dirk Benedict hamming it up, there was nothing really wrong with the concept.
There were many elements that could have been updated for the 90s and beyond, but what was done was to change virtually everything just for the sake of change. There is no charm to this movie nor to the series, no warmth, and no humor. While it may be just perfect for the people who are growing up in such a crappy age where good writing is at a premium and "quality" is a function of what kind of special effects a show can come up with, but for the fans of the original series and even such classics as Star Trek and Lost In Space, newer shows like Babylon 5, this is a waste of time because there is really no substance to this movie.
And of course, it's a big disappointment to see that those distinctive Cylon ships, and even the Cylons themselves have been changed. It's about as bad as suddenly learning the Doctor (of Doctor Who) is half-human!
Some people will watch a car accident or a train wreck and find it entertaining, but if your standards are much higher than that, avoid this movie and rent the original movie. You'll be much happier!
Strange Days at Blake Holsey High (2002)
This Is a Great Show And Needs To Be Out On DVD!
There are a lot of "kiddies shows" that are so obviously for kids, but Strange Days at Blake Holsey High, or as it's more appropriately titled, Wormhole High, is not just for kids but for us grown folks as well.
At the heart of this show we see evidence that there is a conspiracy of sorts going on, but we don't know for sure it's with who or why, but each week we see more of the puzzle as Blake Holsey's Science Club learn about science the hard way. Nothing like becoming very small or disappearing into the past or the future, to get someone to remember their science lessons. The writing for this show is sharp and sophisticated, making this show a little like the old Dark Shadows soap opera with it's surprising plot twists and bizarre happenings that can only happen when you build a boarding school on top of a failed science experiment.
I would really love to see this show either on video or on DVD so it would free of the annoying graphics that the networks feel they need to clutter up the screen with each week, and with the cryptic secret messages the janitor makes for each show, it would be easier to make sense of the whole series when you can go back to previous episodes and catch all of those small clues. But until then, I'll just have to keep looking at the re-runs I taped. :-)
The Tick (2001)
Bad. Veree baaaad!
I loved the Tick-- the cartoon version of the tick. So I waited anxiously for the live-action series to come out. But when it did, it was a severe disappointment. The only thing I liked about it was the way the Tick's antennae moved, but that's all.
I don't know who I would cast as the Tick, but Patrick Warburton was the last one I would pick with his ultra-so-laid-back delivery that is nothing like Townsend Coleman's energetic delivery that made the cartoon so interesting, and so funny. It's inconceivable to think that Warburton could say the Tick's "Spoon!" with any kind of passion.
And for contractual reasons characters like Batmanuel and Captain Liberty were there to be second-rate (at best) replacements for Die Fledermaus and American Maid, while the Sewer Urchin is forgotten all together. Despite the show being "live action," it was barely animated in an acting sense and especially in an action sense. Like Warburton's last show, Steinfeld, this show was a lot of talk and about not much of anything. Seeing how Arthur handles a pretty admiring fan was just too painful to watch.
I could sum up this series as being deadly boring, and nobody wanted it to get better than I did. The Tick's creator, Ben Edlund stopped writing the cartoons because he was out of creative ideas. This new series only shows that Edlund's writer's block, sadly, wasn't over.
The Outer Limits (1995)
A Sad Commentary On Our Times
When I was growing up, the two great sources of what for me was "real" science fiction was the Twilight Zone and the Outer Limits. Some of those episodes just creeped me out, and years later, they still do. While the Twilight Zone occasionally had morals to its stories, the Outer Limits stories were more often an exercise in fear and terror, bereft of any moral.
This was because the stories created by the chief writer of the Outer Limits was going through psychological problems of his own, and the stories that he wrote came to him in his car as he drove along. Had his psychologist been more successful, the earlier Outer Limits would probably be like the dribble that is the new Outer Limits today.
Some how all the terror has been leached away and what we see are a series of predictable episodes that have ham-fisted morals that fit right in with the cynical '90s. There are only a few basic themes in the new version, and all the rest is just a predictable variation of "virus destroys all but a few people," "Mankind is bad and must be dealt with" (by alien or androids-- it changes each week), "Don't watch out or what you create may end up controlling you," and a few other limited themes. There was nothing really new here.
And to make the series all the more depressing was that nobody ever on. The good guy/hero thinks he does but no! -- he dies, everybody dies, and then there's the moral. It's '90s cynicism that's just there to hammer down dull, and downbeat episodes where almost nobody ever comes out alive and happy.
While 90 per cent of the episodes are a waste of time, there are a few good ones; you just have to sit and wade through all of the crappy ones to find a good one. For good science fiction, go and buy the videos or DVDs of the original series; those will either terrify you or give you things to think about. Unlike with the new series where you've seen a few, you pretty much have seen them all, with the originals they are all uniquely different from the others.
The Rift (1990)
It's One Part Good And Three Parts Bad.
The Rift is a "high-art" concept that combines the movie Aliens with Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea and you get... well, you get a film that's worse than any old Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea episode, that's for sure.
There are some truly creepy moments in thismfilm, but those are buried by many shoddy special effects, badly stereotyped characters like the frightened Hispanic cook and the overly cocky, leering and jiving Black guy; and lastly a really weak ending that's supposed to be like the one at the end of Alien but doesn't quite measure up to anything like Alien.
And to add to this sorry mix, Ray Wise's character is supposed to be like the Ash character in Alien, but while his character is human in this film Wise's acting is no less robotic as he goes through the film with his little secret "sly" smiles to show that he's not who or what he's supposed to be.
But despite all of it's flaws, it's not too bad of a sci-fi/horror film. It just could have used one, maybe two more script revisions to have polished it up.