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fharland
Reviews
Das weite Land (1960)
True Austrian culture, watch it, rather than read the play
Having read a previous comment by a German from Gelsenkirchen, I feel obligated to respond. I am a former assistant of Otto Preminger and started working at Max Reinhart's Joseftstadttheater. The language which has been restored in this production is true Austrian, (not a quaint slang or dialect), more so it is the language in which Schnitzler's play was originally written. If you would like to see the play in an interpretation, as it was originally intended by the author, consider this the most appropriate version I can think of. World class performances by a cast of true Viennese actors, whose tradition and culture has been lost meanwhile in the process of cultural globalization.
Down with Love (2003)
What were they thinking?
I saw this movie at the massively promoted Tribeca film festival and can't help wondering: What the hell, were they thinking? There we are in a virtual ghost town, 100 feet from the depressing crater of ground zero and this offensive retro-feel good piece of fluff is the first movie pushed into our faces. Trying to ride on the coat tales of Spencer Tracy visa Catherine Hepburn, or Hudson-Day yester-year romance comedies is a desperate attempt at making audiences feel that everything (was) is A-Okay. Well, it isn't and neither is this brainless, shameless exploit of sentimental feelings for good old times.
Chocolat (2000)
sentimental dribble
It is difficult to comprehend how so many talented and conscientious artists get together and come up with such contrived and dated dribble. Gratuitous violence, thinly disguised under pseudo-feminist political correctness pops up in a "backward" rural French village, where everybody speaks English with Swedish, British even US accents, without rhyme or reason. A Spanish, overly Catholic count(Molina) competes with river-Hippy pretty boy (Johnny Depp) for dominance over apple-cheeked, giggly chocolatiére Juliet Pinoche, the only credible bit of French spice in this awful Euro-pudding