Reviews

I am a lover of Capra movies. With those in the background this one is less credible and less to the point. It is painfully long and, unlike in the Capra films where the sentiment seems appropriate, here it just seems to be laid on with a trowel. Moreover, for 2001, the amnesia cliche is tired, especially when it switches on and off without other health complications. And the misidentification of the Carey character, supposedly driven by wishful thinking that extends to social hysteria, is not developed enough at the beginning to help the audience over the hump.

This film has a good cast and a clever premise. It is at its best in the first hour, when some insightful moments appear to be allowed and the situations are truly funny. After that, switch off and watch something else. Committee scripting, at its worst, takes over. It becomes sooo disappointing. In part because the second half is so dull and cliche-ridden the film is way too long. If we must have the romantic resolution, in this film please let us not lay it on with a trowel.

This is a very cleverly written romantic comedy and it is well directed and performed. It is now very old but the ideas, language and style seem to have dated surprisingly little. The only scene that drags for a modern audience is the one in the Montana frame house. The rest is sharp and very entertaining.

Historical inaccuracy is unnecessary in a story like this. There were true heros in abundance. Two US Army Air Force flyers did shoot down seven aircraft during the battle over Pearl Harbour and their names were Welch and Taylor. The former survived the war only to die as a test pilot for North American aircraft in the development of the F-100 Supersabre. They were true heros - the only ones to get to their aircraft on that Sunday morning and to successfully join the fray in the air. Yet their characters are trampled by the differently named heros of the film. On a second matter, it was good to see some representation of the Doolittle Raid, but other than Doolittle himself, there is no recognition for the truly brave men who participated.

After reading rave reviews of this film I was very disappointed. The first hour is hard work as it serves up numerous disparate characters with no clear plot line. The characters do become embroiled in the second half, however, and the story is then more engrossing. The short sequences and the quick changes of scene and circumstance, particularly in the first half, along with the overall filming style all flatter the audience for its intelligence. Yet what is there in this film that is intelligent? It offers no philosophical nor any sociological insight that is not better provided in other films. The only thing approaching insight is the wife's complaint in the central relationship that, when her husband has an affair the true betrayal is that he doesn't tell her about it. Nothing here that you won't find in a prime time sitcom or a thousand hollywood romances. But is it true or representative? I doubt it. The film proudly displays ethnic diversity amongst its characters. But there is no ethnic diversity in their attitudes to marital behaviour and loyalty. This is complete garbage. More Hollywood via a "cultural cringe" from a non-Hollywood film. Southern European attitudes, for example, were done much better in the Godfather series. All this said, the performances are strong. They tell us to take the story and the ideas seriously. But at that level the film is vacuous. A great disappointment.

It is a corruption of the market for film entertainment when a well-reputed cast is combined with a terrible script and direction to produce a dog such as this, which is then marketed on the strength of the cast. I rented the film because the storyline sounded funny and the cast is strong. What a huge mistake. I cannot understand why Gere, Hunt and Tilley agreed to participate. There is no appreciable plot, not a single character has any depth and the ensemble scenes just irritate the senses. Hunt is the only actor with presence in the film but her character is never properly developed.

This film is weakened by excessive zeal in tayloring it to its target demographic. The side-kick roles are especially stupid. But the principals are pretty good. I have seen more Prinze movies on airline flights than I would care to. His performance in this one is the best I have seen. And Forlani's role is also not badly written and played. She is beautiful as ever and seemingly adept at the accent. I just wish they had dressed her better, especially in better shoes. She is obviously uncomfortable in the walking scenes. But then, mine is not the target demographic!

This is well written and produced film. The plot is made difficult to convey on screen because of the complexity of the game yet it seems to work for both for those who know the language and those who don't. The roles of the principles are difficult and very well played. My only disappointment was that the Damon character is so unconnected, except to his girlfriend and a judge. Such a clean cut kid, at the outset studying law with apparent success and living in a very nice looking apartment in Manhattan would not be completely devoid of family connections. Otherwise a terrific film.

For me this film is unsuccessful in intermingling the issue of antisemitism with the coming of age of a relatively studious young woman. On one level the Jude Law character might be only marginally deeper than his disgustingly callow friends. He is attracted by the young woman's seriousness and relatively shy affection for him but this attraction is offset by her social conservatism. The depth of any antisemitism in him or amongst his silly friends is never explored. In the end the motivation of his character, and the point of the film, elude me. An interpretation that springs to mind is that gentiles do not feel the significance of the holocaust, that they trivialise it. Part of coming of age for jewish girls is therefore that they should (or simply do) experience failed love affairs with gentiles. The fact that these affairs fail for these reasons is somehow constructively educational for the girls. I truly hope this is not intended to be the message.

This has a nice story, with a socially responsible theme, and a romantic twist as the hero is swayed by his emotional tie to his first love. It would have made a very enjoyable film but for the direction. The story is told in short memory flashes that are so frequent and disjoint that a very high level of concentration is required to follow it. As ever, Max von Sydow is great as counsel for the defence. A major disappointment.

This film has the cleverest script of any I saw in a decade. I saw it with low expectations, expecting to experience an educational struggle through another story about people in sad situations, which include the burden of mental illness. Within five minutes I was gripped by it and not released until the end. The writing is just so good and the delivery by the two principals is superb. No fan of Helen Hunt in other roles I was amazed by her performance in this. Nicholson is in good form, and the role suits him, but she is just terrific. This one is a must see.

This film is based around the idea that the course of one's life can be made quite different following a small perterbation such as missing a train. The divergence that ensues is captured well, though the covergence at the end seems very strained and unnecessary. The dialogue is cleverly written. Elements of the plot seem to fail, however. The Lynch character is so pathetic as to be non-credible, as is his secondary affair. Hannah is good, and I particularly enjoyed his Scottish accent. Paltrow's female friend is good but one-dimensional. I would have given her a life! And, since this is a Paltrow vehicle, she is competent and her face pleasant to view as usual. Overall, a pleasant diversion.

This film is advertised as a clever romantic comedy. It is neither clever nor romantic and it is definitely not an effective comedy. The fortunes of the well meaning yet pathetic character, "Tom", oscillate from one extremely embarrassing disaster to another. The only saving graces are the competent performance by Toni Collete and the frequency with which we glimpse Paltrow's pleasant face. Overall, to be avoided!

I approached this film with low expectations but was very pleasantly surprised. It is very well done and it beats hands down the ballroom dancing movies of recent years, especially "Strictly Ballroom". While the music is nice and the dancing colourful, for me the movie is not about dancing. It is about the very Japanese institution that gives male office workers long commutes to work and free time after work for entertainment that does not involve their families. Here we have the man with the complete family and the large mortgage and a flagging zest for life. He is drawn to the attractive image of a young woman in a dance studio he passes during his commute and this leads him to try ballroom dancing. Also Japanese is the fact that the lecherous motives that initiated his new passion are made plain but somehow accepted, at least eventually, by family and audience. Attitudes to ballroom dancing, as conveyed in the film, are definitely non-Western, though the discipline and the music are clearly cultural imports to Japan. The cultural contrasts are thus intriguing. Even without the cultural insights, the colour, the dance and the enthusiasm of the players all make this a fun film to watch.

I like this movie for three reasons. First, it is a not-so-simple love story that is both entertaining and dramatic and therefore well scripted. Second, it is well cast - the players are suited to the parts and bring them off very well. Though I do cringe a little at Jack Lemon in his many roles, like this one, in which he "gets took". Third, it is a wonderful expose of commercial office life in the 1950s. Those massive floors full of clerical workers have disappeared today, replaced by computers, and gone with them is the hierarchical office culture of the period. My only reservation is that the male figures in senior management are completely nasty - straw men against whom to contrast the Lemmon character. Perhaps such people did tend to rise to the top of that populous corporate jungle. In all, though, one of the great films.

This is a very clever and intriguing film. It combines cynicism about the social order with a clever use of mathematical concepts and violent outcomes direct from someone's worst nightmare. I myself have had nightmares that reflect elements of this film's plot. For me, though, most intriguing is the idea that the Rubic's Cube in which the characters find themselves is neither the result of any centrally directed project nor of any conspiracy but instead the net result of a collection of myopic self-interested inputs - the pessimistic response to Adam Smith. I would have liked this theme to have been explored further. A little more on the ideas and a little less of the nightmare would have made the experience more rewarding for me.

This film carries all the wit that is expected from an Oscar Wilde play. The centrepiece of the plot is a politician's past indiscretion, and this is well handled and credible. The final plot twist depends on the compromising nature of a visit paid by a married woman to a bachelor's house. The horror of this does not carry through to the present and we are left wondering why it is taken so seriously. Rupert Everett and Cate Blanchett are both outstanding, their stage training shining through in the film. Minnie Driver seems miscast, however. Altogether, a clever and engaging film.

I rented this film recently, to watch with my 11 year old daughter. She loved it, but I found I enjoyed it more than I expected - enough to take a second look. This is neither a sweeping saga nor a deep philosophical film. It is a light romance set in the figure skating scene. But it is very taught and entertaining. The performances are strong with terrific chemistry built up between the leads and an outstanding supporting role by Roy Dotrice. I recommend this one strongly for those wishing to leave the screen smiling.

I saw this first on video, quite a long time after its release, though I had been intrigued at the time by early favourable reviews suggesting a deep and interesting message. It is surprisingly in the art-house genre, dark both visually and philisophically and quite disturbing. The visual darkness is obviously needed since much of the film is about an insomniac's often distorted recollections of his nocturnal activities. The performances and the effects are strong. My difficulty is with the message. If, as the lead character asserts, people in general will go a long way to avoid a fight, why are so many men attracted to the fight clubs? I had anticipated a message of the type that the modern world comprises a computer industry and many services industries and so it is a world for nerds and women, leaving little role for traditional male stereotypes. Instead, the film portrays no contrasts of this type. The men appear to be escaping from hum drum lives or some kind of shared fear. The only woman, whose contribution to the plot left me in the dark, is certainly not a stereotypical service worker. When the revolution came I was confused as to what it was all about. Was it, for the men involved, nothing more than "something more exciting to do"? I would have liked a clearer statement, even if it would have attracted more controversy.

I was very disappointed in this film. The enigma codes were in reality recovered by the British sailors in surface ships and I am not aware of any heroic American mission to recover them. For a start the construction of American heroes on this theme seemed wrong. Then the plot began to drag as all the old submarine war movie cliches were rerun - the tension between CO and XO, the destroyer-submarine combat, the depth charges, the leaking pipes and the frightened faces of cocooned men hundreds of feet below the surface. The representation of the technology also wrankled me. The rate at which charges are dropped by destroyers would make the close succession of explosions near the sub impossible. Moreover, the closeness of those explosions at 200m depth would definitely have imploded the hull. Generally, a load of garbage.

This is the MJ Fox film that I like the most. Sadly, it was never released on video here in Australia. The story is funny without degenerating into slapstick, the direction is very good and the casting is terrific. MJ Fox is MJ Fox, albeit better than usual and there is good counterpoint from the romantic lead Warner. But what wins for it are the wonderful supporting characters, all of which a played to a tee. I have not seen it for some time but I will never forget the characters of the old doctor (Hughes), the medical centre nurse (Byrde), the mayor (Stiers), the mechanic (Winkler), the quilt-sewing ladies of the welcoming committee, the suitor (Harelson), the Southern escapee (Fonda), the pig and the plastic surgeon (Hamilton). They steal the show and make the whole experience fun.

Having seen this for the second time recently I realised I had not commented. In my view this is a great film, based on a great story. In fact, in a rare instance, the film is better than the book, the writing style in which made it seem to drag. Not so the film. It has the usual grand themes of love, death and the futility of war but it interweaves these beautifully. In fact, the way the subplots unfold together is exceptional. The stories are tragic but pointed and very emotive. The performances, the settings and the cinematography are all very very good. This is not to be missed and it is one for the library.

I saw this film for the first time last September in the US. On the flight home I read the book. Last night I rented the film and looked at it again. Only the core idea is retained in the film. The book dealt rather clinically with the issues and the characters in it seemed hard edged and cartoonish, rather like those in the "War of the Roses" by the same author. Having seen the film again I now think I like its rendition much more, at least as entertainment. Despite its focus on grief and betrayal, the film offers a much softer, warmer story. The second time through I was not upset by the plot changes. The crime sub-plot seemed to work well and even "Dutch" and his lack of words even seemed credible. Ms Scott Thomas is excellent. Give this film a second chance!

I saw this film without having read reviews but having read a special on Mars in an issue of Scientific American. That issue mentioned the film and pointed out some of the problems with the physics in it. Unfortunately, its critique of the physics in the film was very incomplete. A Mars adventure with accurate science could have been great fun. Instead we have bad science meanly interspersed with very bad soap opera. And the ending! Why are screen writers so bad at constructing sci fi endings? I hate to say it but this aspect of the film descends to the level of the later Star Trek films. Truly a disappointment.

This is one of my favourite films of all time. It is cleverly written and very well performed. No fancy special effects, no unnecessary coarse language, no violence, just good timing and delivery. Highly recommended.