Reviews

The series starts out like a welcome sequel in tone and style to The Bridge. Acting seems solid and the plotline is also promising. Then we start experiencing the glaring mistakes and strange holes in both plotline and the psyche of the main characters. The clearly psychopathic female killer is suddenly gripped by fear and panic when she finds out her accomplice is wanted by the police. Later she displays the classic "crazy eyes" everytime she is doing something sadistic. Watch just a few serial killer interviews or documentaries, and you'll understand that real, deeply psychopathic killers don't get gripped by panic or necessarily put on a "crazy face". In fact, their most chilling character trait is their LACK of an emotional response during stressful episodes. The killer is also in an abusive relationship where she is presented as the submissive party - which is completely out of character for a controlling, manipulative and sadistic psychopath. Unfortunately, the writers had to present her this way to surprise us with a plot twist (the fact that she is the brains behind the atrocities). Our heroic psychologist also points out that when the female killer is looking at the police officer during interrogation, she's bring truthful - while lying when looking down or to the side. Absolute nonsense, since compulsive liars actually often keep an even more intense eye contact when they are lying, simply to "sell" their lies more convincingly. The last two episodes are a mess. From illogical police activity (waiting outside the house of the last showdown instead of going in) and convenient fumbles (losing the killer while in costody) to keep the plot moving forward. It could have been a really good show with a surprising end - especially if they had done their homework and let the killer behave like an actual sadistic psychopath. But the writers were either lazy or uninformed, so we end up with a run-of-the-mill ending and a predictable plotline

I already wrote a review of The Blacklist, but after having watched half of season 6, I have to write an addendum; a warning if you will. Not only does Agent Keen's character become increasingly irksome and irratic, the worst part is that Megan Boone becomes a worse actress with each episode. I'm not sure how this is possible, as 5 seasons with the brilliant James Spader would have rubbed off positively on even the most incompetent amateur actor. But somehow Boone manages to become even less charismatic and even more boring. Begs the question why she even landed the part in the first place, as the height of her carreer should have been a walk-on on "The Bold & the Beautiful". I'm guessing it's a bit of wonderful nepotism at the hands of some related Hollywood boss. Bottom line: She is a horrific actress and makes sn otherwise entertaining show almost unwatchable.

The basic idea of this movie is pretty interesting: a family lives in some unnamed post-apocalyptic/parallel world where they have to stay silent at all times, or otherwise face immediate death from strange 4-legged carnivorous creatures that seem to have superhuman hearing. This point is driven home in the beginning of the movie when the family's youngest son chooses do disobey the father (Krasinsky) by not staying silent, and immediately pays the price. So far so good in terms of build-up. The rest of the movie is one long and painfully slow display of human stupidity at its finest.

A few minutes into to movie we (the audience) already know that the antagonist (the creatures) have exceptional hearing, but apparently cant smell anything or see very well. We know that the creatures go straight for any sound they pick up. We also know that the family has been living like this for over 400 days. With these facts in mind it's fair to assume that any relatively intelligent person or family would have figured out how to pretty easily capture and passify the creatures by now. But no. Instead we are invited to watch painstakingly slow scenes where Krasinski and Blunt are sad, frightened, confused or having problems with their bratty daughter, (who manages to be more annoying than both the kids from Jurassic Park combined). Oh, and they also choose to get Blunt pregnant and give birth to a screaming baby. Great choice considering their environment. To make things even more stupid they are keeping the newborn in a coffin-like construction and fitting the baby with a mask to mute the sound. Perfectly reasonable.

The movie is riddled with these silly slash stupid choices and behaviors (sack of potatoes/ nail in staircase scene, anyone?), so much so that I couldnt help rooting for the creatures.

I loved Krasinski in The Office and Blunt is normally great in her roles - but this movie is so poorly told and has such huge plotholes, that it's near unwatchable. The fact that it has received a 7.8 score on IMDB must either be attributed to the fact that there are amazingly few good movies out there, or that the PR company did a good job of pumping up the score.

If you want a "stay silent"-type thriller, watch "Don't breathe" instead. At least the premise is more coherent and it stays true to it's genre, unlike "A quiet place" which cant decide if it's a horror movie or an emotional porn flick.

It could have been great, but unless you can ignore this family's incredibly low IQ level, you'll have a hard time watching this.

Plain and simple: Don´t waste your money on this, but perhaps wait for some free Sunday afternoon matiné rerun while hung over. The dialogue is atrocious, the plot filled with holes large enough to run a semi-truck thru, and the acting laughable. Add to this, that there are so many scenes and details (and even the basic premise of the main character travelling to dangerous places to find their father) lifted from Indiana Jones that only very young people or those with amnesia will not see the plagiarism. You are MUCH better off watching the classic Indy flicks. Much better off. I don´t know what Hollywood is thinking, if there is even any thinking involved, but it seems they either underestimate their audience, or still make enough money by serving up this kind of lazy crap. It´s a pity considering the unused talent of Alicia Vikander and the budget available for both better CGI and a better script. So to recap: Don´t waste your money on this.

I was going to write a lengthy review, but watching the latest episodes I went from wanting to go into details to now just give others a heads-up before they invest too much time in this show. It starts out with a really promising and interesting premise; an unqualified and unwilling lower level politician becomes the POTUS after a terrorist attack that wipes out all of the US government. To spice things up it turns out that it was an inside job. But by whom? Why? And will they strike again, and if so; where and how? To top it off, it's starring Kiefer Sutherland, so surely there would be a dash of Jack Bauer action, corruption, twists and turns. I was hooked!

Fast forward to the last 4-5 episodes, and this promising show has been turned into a pile of embarrassing, politically correct, left-wing BS with more likeness to Dallas and Dynasty than a modern political drama/thriller. It's not even the typical Hollywood political narrative that irks me the most; it's the fact that the writing has become totally transparent, predictable and cringe-worthy. It comes across as unintelligent and tries to spoon-feed the audience at every opportunity, and instead of keeping us guessing, it now more looks like it's the script of a moderate leftist's wet political dream, including loads of "proud of being American" / "why can't we all just get along?" clichés in spades.

This show has all the ingredients it needs to be a great show. Unfortunately it feels like it's written by a focus group. Watch it if you're interested in a bland, non-involving "running in the background" show. Otherwise I suggest you re-watch old seasons of "24".

Do you enjoy getting a root canal? Do you like watching paint dry? Do you easily tear up hearing sappy dialogue tugging at your heartstrings? Do you feel your life is too action-packed and needs an injection of boredom? Do you loathe scientific accuracy? Do you like church organs and Matt Damon? If the answer to all of the above is a resounding "yes!", then Interstellar is the perfect movie for you!

Somewhere in the near future, the World is in dire straits and our food resources are quickly running out. We need a bold and brilliant idea to save the human race, and we need it NOW. So we call Matthew McConaoughoughuoaughey, who plays a cool, whispering, southern crop- dusting farmer (yeah, it's one of his more challenging roles) who apparently used to be an astronaut. No need to train him or do any tests of any sort - we just let him captain human kind's last hope and put him on a space ship the next day. Yup, no big black plot holes there.

Apparently humanity is now able to navigate black holes - but are unable to create a robot that doesn't look like a ridiculous Tetris brick, and isn't as impractical as jumping out of a plane only wearing a cocktail dress. Also, we can't find solutions to an immediate and alarming famine that threatens to wipe out humanity - but we have the means to send people to far regions of space, have invented cryostasis and a bunch of other 23rd century gadgets. Oh, and don't bother trying to make sense of the whole premise, that the world is in dire need of help NOW - yet our top scientist sends humanity's last hope on a mission built on a false premise, that he knows will fail, and most likely will take many decades to complete. No. Just DON'T question that!

Just like the people back on Earth, you will grow about 90 years older watching this movie. It may sound a bit harsh, I know - but consider spending close to three hours listening to Matthew "Can I take my szszszshirt off?" McConaughey trying to be cool while lisping and vocal frying his way through space (yes, the way he has done the past 10 movies he made). While he's busy doing that, an amazingly inept and irksome Anne Hathaway makes it hard not to put your fist through the screen, or pull out the last strands of hair you have left. And just as I thought things couldn't possibly get any better; Matt Damon suddenly pops up as a "welcome" surprise. Thankfully, they didn't credit him on IMDb, so all of us who enjoy the incredible range of Mr. Damons two facial expressions had the pleasure of this amazing cameo "gift". Thank you SO much.

And the music? Nolan went for a quiet soundscape, so he asked Hans Zimmer to only score about 1/3 of the movie. So naturally, Zimmer filled that third with a church organ, mixed so perfectly that at times it's impossible to even hear the dialogue.

I have absolutely no idea why people find this movie praise-worthy. I honestly don't. I guess Nolan is the M. Night Shyamalan of the decade: Remember "6th sense"? Everybody praised that movie and the following few movies he created for being different, thought- provoking etc. Then came a slew of incomprehensible flicks, where all we got was building suspense, scary music and…well, that was basically it. Slowly the vast majority of former M. Night fans began to understand what others saw from the get-go: That you can only fool people into believing that what you're making is brilliant art for so long. After a while they will stop "interpreting" your work - and see it for what it is: Pretty much nothing. The Emperor's New Clothes all over again. But that's the thing; when served nonsense, some people will interpret their confusion as being in the presence of a great director. Others will call it they way they see it: non-sensical. Don't get me wrong; I like some of Nolan's work. I never understood Inception, and it left me cold - but at least the cinematography was beautiful. With his Batman movies he upped the ante of the whole superhero genre by combining great action with believable character development. Interstellar does none of that. Even the cinematography is bland, especially considering the possibilities and tools available to directors nowadays. I can think of nothing more mind-boggling than space travel, yet Nolan manages to completely underwhelm our visual sense with the imagery in this movie.

If you liked "Gravity", chances are you are going to love "Interstellar". If you happened to think "Gravity" was an absolute insult to anyone with an IQ over 90, or anyone who has seen more than two movies in their entire life - then "Interstellar" will be 3 very long hours. On the other hand, you can watch the movie while kicking your shin really hard against a coffee table. That might remove focus from the pain - of watching the movie. If you're into shrooms or meth, this movie will most likely make more sense to you - depending on how much you take.

I'm giving this movie 5 stars, mostly for comic value. Then I subtract 1 star because Anne Hathaway's character is so unfathomably inept, 1 star for McConaughey's annoying whistling lisp and perpetual difficulty making sense while trying to sound cool, and 1 star for the sheer presence of Matt Damon. Like a black hole, that guy can suck any and all life and believability out of any scene or movie without even trying. 2 stars. You're welcome.

PS: They all meet George Clooney's ghost at the end.

Like many in here already have pointed out, this show is cast, directed, filmed and edited brilliantly. I just went thru all 5 seasons in a very short time span, and this is definitely a show that has the rare ability of truly getting under your skin and really make you feel all sorts of emotions. This is what good television and movies can - and very few do it as well as SFU. Having said this, one emotion I could have been without is the growing annoyance. The irritation and frustration over an almost total lack of personal development in many of the characters. Sure, they are all brilliantly portrayed as real, 3-dimensional persons, but apart from me really missing a genuinely sane person in the show (the closest I think is Keith) just for the sake of contrast to all the F'd up personalities - I really miss someone growing tired of status quo, saying "no", acting instead of thinking etc. I know this very fact is one of the main reasons why I loved this show - I feel involved and actually FEEL something when this or that person does X or Y. But it gets to be too much in the end. OK, so most families have issues, but even in the most dysfunctional family there is a few persons who actually change, take a stand, get enough etc. Even considering that "people never change" and "we are all creatures of habit".

That lack of dynamics makes the show too Woody Allenish in the end. Too much talk and too little action. I actually ended up spending the last 6-7 episodes hoping someone would do something really drastic (and not just psychotic) - just to shake things up a bit.

The end sequence with everyone growing old was not only poorly executed, it was unnecessary. Seeing the actors with ridiculous aging make-up and nappy, grey hair didn't do justice to the rest of this show. Seeing Claire driving off to NY would have sufficed IMO - at least then it would have ended with someone making a dramatic change in her life.

Now I am a Dexter addict instead. Not as deep as SFU, but even more entertaining - and I must say Michael C Hall is now among my top 5 actors.