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Reviews
Out of Time (2003)
Good stuff!
Maybe it's because I'm from Florida, but I think we have a great state for noir movies. BODY HEAT, WILD THINGS, and I know I've seen others. So as this sexy sweaty movie moved from an arousing opening into its serious first act, and then on into a fun twisty midsection, I could only smile, knowing that my home state had once again provided them Hollywood slicksters with yet another money-making guilty pleasure. Sure you could poke holes (I'm not too sure the badguys' scheme would hold water, and the movie maybe a little too subtle for its own good in suggesting how they did it), but a good time is provided, and that's all we want. Denzel is great as always, the comic relief sidekick is actually funny, the way-too-sexy female police detective actually seems smart enough to be a match for our hero (so often, these roles are one-dimensional window dressing), and Dean Cain lands with Bruce Willis and Keanu Reeves on the short list of actors who can take stereotypical wife-beating supporting roles and make them something interesting. Add to that, great locales, a funky score, and good local casting, and we have ourselves a nice steaming pot of kick-ass Florida noir. Downside... that ending. Of course, I would never discuss the ending to a thriller, but damn! All through the movie we've been given a hero who seemed pretty clever and resourceful walking into an action-movie showdown when he should've just gone to his fellow cops with all the information he had by then. Still, this movie builds up enough goodwill that we can overlook a cliched finale and recommend it online to people we don't know.
Basic (2003)
3/4 of a good movie
It's usually forgivable if an otherwise good movie drops the ball in its third act, the primary exception being mystery/thrillers. If the entire point of a movie is figuring out what happened, then, yes, a bad ending can tank the movie. And boy does this happen in BASIC.
It should be a foolproof formula for a movie. John Travolta is a cocky Army interrogator, Connie Nielsen is his sexy but fully competent sidekick/antagonist, and Sam Jackson is the fanatic Special Forces drill instructor who may or may not have been killed by his own men for being just a little too psycho. Throw in Giovanni Ribisi as the homosexual, shot-full-of-holes, sole-surviving member of Sam's troop, and it looks like we should have some entertaining acting, at least. The guy who made DIE HARD is directing, and there's a big hurricane and jungle warfare! How could this be bad?
OK, so Connie has a really bad (and totally unnecessary) Southern accent. That's part of the fun! For about an hour and ten minutes (I can't say for sure because I didn't need to look at my watch thru most of this movie) the movie clicks: snappy dialogue, great tech credits, and a twisty-turny plot which never twists anywhere we expect, nor does it ever feel too implausible.
Then a big TWIST comes! OK, I didn't see that coming! Good job, I bet the movie's over. Nope, more twists, these are kinda of dull and blah. What? More twists? These just don't make sense!
WILD THINGS had this many twists, but that movie was intended as a big tease from frame one. We knew that movie wasn't serious, so the twisty finale (which still made sense!) was fun. This movie takes place in something close to the real world, so the implausible-to-impossible twists feel hopelessly out-of-place.
Too bad. This could have been great.
Carnival of Souls (1962)
A very scary film that relies on good plot, atmosphere, creepy music, and no gore.
This film did what few horror/supernatural movies have done to me and I have seen many of this genre. About 3/4 of the way through the film, I realized what was happening to the main character. I was not only surprised but actually horrified. I must have unconsciously identified with the character because, for a moment, it seemed as though it was happening to me. As in "The Sixth Sense", there are hints along the way that point to what is occurring, but they are subtle. The use of the abandoned Great Salt Lake dance pavilion added much to the film's unsettling mood or atmosphere. I can't recommend this film too highly.
Fighting Man of the Plains (1949)
This is one of my favorite Randolph Scott films partly because of the setting in the Civil War and cow town periods of Kansas' history and the plot which concerns a man's efforts to atone for his actions as
Although I only saw this film once (when it was released 50 years ago), it is one of my favorite Randolph Scott westerns. The combination of a turbulent setting (Quantrill's murderous raid on Lawrenceville, Kansas, and post Civil War Kansas ) and the main character's efforts to atone for his wartime actions by keeping the peace in a violence prone Kansas cow town rank it even with or better than Scott's later films directed by the acclaimed director, Budd Boetticher.