Reviews

It's one of those movies you watch, expecting it to capture your imagination, and then it falls flat. Russell Crowe is too old for his love interest, who is supposed to be the same age. The bastard step-sister is left in limbo.

The thing that stood out to me was the love story between the precocious daughter and her alcoholic bodyguard. He became her big brother, coach and champion. When she is kidnapped, he moves heaven and earth to save her. Denzil Washington proves his chops as a great actor. Dakotoa Fanning is brilliant as a smart girl getting Denzil to love and respect her and vice versa. I think that relationship is the central pillar of the film and makes it so good.

Lots of violence, blood and mayhem. But they all deserved it :)

After enjoying Twice, we had high expectations for Chasing Rainbows since it had the same writer and director and some of the same actors. We did watch it to the end but ended up a little disappointed. The various plot lines are disjointed and do not converge into a coherent whole.

The protagonist, Scarlet, played by Natalie Neilson, finds out she was adopted after her adoptive parents are killed in a car crash. She heads off to Boston in search of her birth parents. She has a nasty run-in with three thugs. It shows she is resilient and resourceful, but that plot line adds little to the story.

Her birth mother is Roberta, a Swedish immigrant, who sings at a nightclub. She has the notes but concentrates too much on the notes and not enough on interpreting the lyrics. Scarlet tracks her down but does not immediately reveal that she is her birth daughter. Roberta's Swedish brother-in-law also tracks her down. They talk in Swedish so you need to turn on CC to understand what they were talking about. Please do.

The owner of the nightclub leads a criminal double life, being paid to do dirty work to keep the night club afloat.

The acting and cinematography are pretty good for an Indie movie. Worth a watch when you can't find much else. Don't expect Cabaret or Chicago.

Twice is a low key Indie movie that is so sweet and charming. The characters draw you into their lives and, once you get past the slow start, it moves along pretty well. Natalie Neilson as "Charis Cook" is an amnesiac with no memory of her past who wanders into a Vermont town with virtually nothing. She does a great job of hiding her condition while working in a second hand store. Eventually, her past life collides with her present life.

There is no sex, violence, nudity or cursing. Just a sweet movie that draws you into the characters and their interactions. Natalie Neilson is excellent as the central character and the rest of the cast does well. James Argiro plays a former music director and my wife got a kick out of his show biz photos. She'd worked with some of those stars back in the '70s.

I'll give it a high rating because it really kept us engaged, made us shed a few tears, and ended nicely.

Cinematography was fine, but a bit short of lighting in the beginning was backlit. But that's a minor compaint.

Canvas is inspired by the letters Van Gogh wrote to his younger brother. The movie starts with a woman receiving a cache of letters and then reading them to a comatose man lying in bed. This scene is in black and white.

The movie then switches to color and shifts to the beginning of the story.

Casey Chapman plays Stephan Ormand, an abstract artist struggling to find a theory to guide his work. Mackenzie Wiglesworth plays his live-in girlfriend and model, Christina.

Stephan is obsessive, compulsive, antisocial, and a failure. Christina is sparkling and bright and lights up the screen. Michael Peters plays Stephan's younger brother Thomas although he doesn't have much to do. He represents Van Gogh's younger brother. The letters were written by Stephan to Thomas.

Stephan is totally self-absorbed and often crazy and Chapman captures that. . At one point, he decides that words - whether written, spoken or seen on products - needed to be banished from their studio so he could focus on the visual alone. That leaves Christina having to guess the contents of cans of food because the labels had all been removed. Stephan is rarely a sympathetic character and Chapman's great acting makes sure of that. Christina supports Stephan and her bright personality and beauty brings sparkle to the screen. How she stays with Stephan for so long beggars the imagination. There is some male and female nudity and one disturbing scene before the movie shifts back to black and white. The ending leaves a lot to be desired.

The photography is very good and the direction stays on point. The trip north to the lake showed off some beautiful scenery but most of the rest of the movie was set indoors.

I can't say we enjoyed it as a romantic comedy. It was more about the struggles of a obsessive artist trying to gain recognition and failing, and his impact on those who loved him. In its way it reflects the life of Van Gogh, and it made us look up his biography. I'd suggest checking out Van Gogh's biography before watching the movie. The movie is not a biography of Van Gogh but his tortured life speaks to facets of the movie. Canvas is definitely worth watching.

The movie shifts between the contemporary Pippa Lee and her life as a child, a lost soul growing up, and a woman married to a much older but successful man. To say much more would introduce spoilers. Keanu Reeves shows his acting chops in a low key role. Robin Wright was so good and her younger doppelganger was too. Alan Arkin was great as the older man.

Worth watching because you care about the characters - great acting - and because it is a fine movie.

I'm a bird lover. I visit a pier on the Cuyahoga River and there has been a Lesser Scaup duck that has hung around there by himself for years. Sometimes a few Redhead Ducks show up and he paddles with them. But they don't stay long. We named this duck "Lester". So the idea of being attached to a wild duck appealed to me.. Add in music from Queen, one of the few rock bands I like, since my first love is classical opera.

I just liked the the way the duck kept the movie going. Nice movie making from NZ.

We liked this movie because it was funny and the characters made us laugh out loud. Some of it was over the top but not enough to detract from the overall comedy.

She senses her fiancé is not right for her and stalls. His fiancé has a heart attack when he proposes and dies. You can't blame her.

Enjoy!

This movie bears even less relationship to history than Amadeus. At least there was a Salieri. But that matters not. You get long passages from the Ninth and much more of his oeuvre. His copyist is a strong young woman working with an aging Beethoven, a cranky old man who lip reads and is deaf even as he composes his most famous symphony, the ninth. Well worth watching.

It's a slow start and you're expecting a formula rom com but the plot takes a twist that adds a whole new dimension. Jennifer Tilly steals the show and Monika Schnarre is 6' 1" of gorgeousness. Just a nice movie that ties up the knots in the end. Some snappy dialogue helps and you'll recognize it when Monika (the actress) responds to someone trying to ask her if she is gay.

The first thing a movie has to be is entertaining. This one kept us interested as plots unfolded, relationships strained and swords clashed. The cast seems to be populated with Woodwards. Is this mere coincidence or nepotism? Not that it matters. If you like Errol Flynn action and good acting, this might be your cup of tea, as the Brits might say.

Any movie you watch to the end gets a 7 in my book. Especially if it was a spoof of a retro 50's SF movie. Not great but enjoyable and not a waste of time.

We watched this right after "I Capture the Castle".

It had similar ingredients - quirky family dynamics - but it didn't take hold of us. About the only thread hanging it together was the railway and it was too slender a thread.

Acting was fine, filming was was fine, but a poor movie.,