Reviews

Very hard to believe anyone READ THIS script (supposedly on the hot "black list" of desirable scripts in 2010!) and thought... "yeah, let's spend $$$ to make this". There is not enough material here for a mildly amusing Saturday Night Live SKIT of 5-6 minutes...and certainly not a 98 minute movie.

So much goes wrong here, it's hard to list. Unfunny, slow, long, none of the jokes land... if you want to parody something, usually you have to love it in some way. It's not parody if you just dunk on something you loathe & despise. The scriptwriter and director here clearly didn't love or like the real Bob Ross, or even have a sense of humor about his work -- they outright held his work AND HIM in total contempt.

Worse, they can't do math. The real Ross was born in 1943 and died in 1995 at only 52 (cancer). The show started in 1983 and ended in 1994, just months before he passed. So it only ran 11 years! And well AFTER the 1970s which are referenced constantly here. Ross was already 40 when it started! Not a teenage hippie!

He was also a married man (admittedly 3 times) and had kids. Not a bachelor having sex with random women at work in a tricked-out 70s van. So do the math here: Ross would be 80 today. Big duh, people -- of course a show from the early 80s would feature dated painting styles. It was FORTY YEARS AGO.

And if "Carl Nargle" started his painting show in the 70s (*soundtrack, which has some fun choices, is all 70s hits)... and if it IS today (cellphones, Juicy Couture, etc.)... how can he still be in his 40s? Including his same age ex-girlfriend and his boss?

It makes no sense to set the film in the 70s, or jump around in time... where are people getting all the antique cars? The vintage VCRs and TV sets? The retro furnishings? Burlington VT is a modern, even hipster city -- not some remote rural backwater.

The real Ross was a big success, who earned millions -- not a loser flunky pretending it is 1970 and making $46,000 a year. He licensed books & painting supplies, and made a fortune.

This doesn't work as parody about Ross, nor about humble generic paintings that ordinary folks might like to produce -- nor about public TV (which could well do with a scathing parody!) -- it's just limp, unfunny and has a sneering, snotty tone making fun of Ross's body of artwork in general and senior citizen audiences in particular.

Bob Ross never had a serious competitor, let alone one who was MIXED RACE and LESBIAN... hello? Can someone spell "Panderverse"?

A grating, pathetic waste of everyone's time. Owen Wilson, otherwise a decent comic actor, should be ashamed of himself.

What in holy heck is this thing? At 3.5 hours, it is far longer than the classic Shakespeare play... almost twice the length of famous film adaptations of the same... made as a 3 or 4 part "mini-series" for probably a cable station... filmed on location in Italy or nearby, pretty castles... but in all other respects, like someone who had never read or seen "Romeo & Juliet" but who was asked to write a new script, with new dialogue entirely.

Shakespeare IS Shakespeare BECAUSE of the language and characters and plots... otherwise, he often adapted older stories. There are older versions of R&J and similar "star crossed lover" stories in other cultures. You can certainly write something like that... you can reinterpret Shakespeare! It has been done brilliantly before.

As a Shakespeare buff since my teens... I have seen hundreds of performances of most of his plays, and none more than R&J (his most famous and beloved play)... there are endless variations, including in modern settings, with the main characters of other races....set in an array of time periods from Renaissance to contemporary...but they all stick mostly to the PLOT and use at least SOME of the language. It takes some balls of steel to think you can write better DIALOGUE than the Bard of Avon!

There was a similar problem in the 2013 R&J with Hailee Steinfeld as Juliet... they rewrote dialogue, truncated scenes, and did odd things like make Romeo into a Michelangelo-like sculptor. But nothing on the level of THIS 2014 production! Literally every single word is rewritten in dull, pedantic modern lingo... the plot rearranged... set in winter (when the original is clearly in summer)... dragged out for months (when the original takes place over a few days)... and to my bewilderment, a host of entirely invented CHARACTERS... Juliet's "forgotten older sister" URSULA? Romeo's hitherto unknown little brother "Bob"? (His best friend Benvolio has taken a powder, for some reason.) Tybalt is now madly in love with Juliet, his first cousin. There is no Rosaline to have been Romeo's first love. The Capulet ball is not a masked dance, that Romeo and his pals "crash"... just an ordinary party. Oh and its CHRISTMAS!

They also entirely give up on casting the characters as authentic teenagers (as first done by Zeffirelli in 1968...50 years earlier!) and Juliet/Romeo here are solidly in their late 20s... attractive, but not the near-children of the play. Shakespeare made Juliet 13 FOR A REASON, to emphasize her hotheadedness and extreme youth. If she is a matronly adult woman... not much zing there.

Not only is every word of dialogue rewritten... not merely edited down or simplified for a modern audience's ears... rewritten as if it was a very dumb soap opera on the Hallmark channel. And drawn out endlessly to fill THREE AND A HALF FREAKIN' HOURS. By half way, you would be willing to stab the couple yourself just to get them to shut up.

Some years back, Baz Lurhman did an exciting reinterpretation of R&J (1996, Claire Danes, Leo DiCaprio) that took all sorts of inventive twists with the play & dialogue, wild musical numbers... turned swords into guns... but out of a pure love of the play and the Shakespearean language. It made the play young and exciting again.

Here, a total lack of respect for ANYTHING makes this teleplay unendurable and a waste of everyone's time.... they might as well have called this "Fred, His Girlfriend Julie & some random invented members of their Family... URSULA! And BOB!"...

If your life has any meaning, or if you care in the least for classic literature or Shakespeare or even common sense... keep this far away from you. You will never get those 3.5 hours back.

I may have watched an episode or two back in 1999 and not since, and then this popped up on my free antenna tv channel, to be shown in continuous rotation until (I guess) viewers get sick of this dated, 24 year old show. I only remember it vaguely, because of the lead actress, Melina Kanakaredes.

Yeah, yeah, I know 24 years is a long time and it is very dated. But holy cow, this was terrible -- just saw the pilot -- yet it ran for five seasons! And this before streaming and on demand. It is painfully unrealistic, and though I am no expert on Providence RI...it is pretty obviously not filmed there (except for a few establishment shots at the beginning) and nobody has a distinctive RI accent.

The main premise is rubbish, first off. Providence is a fairly good sized city of 200K with more in the 'burbs, yet there is not one single hospital or cosmetic surgery clinic that would employ one of the nation's TOP plastic surgeons? She'd take a 50% pay cut? Why? Because her boyfriend cheated on her, and turns out he was gay? (this scene is stupid and embarrassing). So she returns to her childhood home with live with her family?

Her mother, seemingly healthy (but a smoker) drops dead at her sister's wedding? So they cancel the wedding entirely? And she never marries her baby's dad? WHY? They could have been married quietly and privately the next day, at a JP's office or something.

Also: though Kanakaredes is lovely... given her name and classic Greek looks and the high Greek population in this region... why didn't they make the family Greek-American? Vs. Generic white bread? This seems like a no-brainer and might have added a touch of authenticity to an other lame "warm-edy" (a family-type situation comedy but with lots of emotional teary stuff).

Just absolutely artificial, like biting into a promising pastry and instead of good flavor, you get harsh fake taste -- overly sugary and cloying. Corny, trite, inauthentic, a missed opportunity to show an interesting region of the US.

Also badly dated, without the intrinsic quality that lets people enjoy some series for decades. Just don't bother.

Confusing horror/suspense flick (not gory though, and no nudity)... starring Juliet Lewis and the late William Hurt... in what feels like a variation on "The Tenant" plus "Rear Window" (Polanksi & Hitchcock, not bad role models for a variation)... only 1/10th as good and filled with confusing misdirection and details that make no sense.

Lewis, only about 25 here (1999) and Hurt (49) are dreadfully mismatched. I mean, I know rich geezers would often like to date ingenues, but at least the HUGE age difference should be a talking point in the film; she looks like his daughter! This is icky!

It makes perfect sense that a young woman would want to experience life in NYC (in a very cool, huge rent-controlled apartment that she lucks into when her aunt dies)! Vs. Moving in with old Mr. Dullsville in Westchester.

The filmmakers don't take this whole film seriously because one supporting character is named "Martha Stewart" (!!!) and another "Alice Cooper" (!!!). Give me a break! If the filmmakers don't take it seriously, we won't either. (though it is always nice seeing Shelley Duval in anything!)

The plot is filled with logic bombs. (Lotsa spoilers here, folks.) Hurt eventually turns out to be the baddie, something telegraphed from afar but only revealed in the last few seconds... but why kill her aunt, if he didn't want "Jane" to move in with him? Why co-opt the downstairs neighbor, the nut with all the foam peanuts? (Btw: how the hell do you get literally millions of foam peanuts into an apartment and then not have them spill out the door constantly, as we see happen anyhow??? This would be like 1000 huge boxes of 'em.)

How do you get mice, both wild & domesticated ones, to run UP into a neighbor's apartment (but not down or anywhere else in the whole building?) How do you get MAGGOtS to crawl up that far? They can't be trained! How do you arrange to break thick terra-cotta tiles on Jane's floor ON DEMAND, as if by a mysterious power? Floors are thick, have big joists! Tiles like that need to be hammer to even get them up! This is not possible from the ceiling below.

Also: how did either villain get the hole in the floor (again, through beams & joists & plaster & hardwood flooring) to DISAPPEAR on command?

If you keep a dead body in the tub, long enough to be consumed by maggots... trust me, not only would everyone in the building now have blowflies... the smell would knock you off your feet and people would smell it even next door (and call police!) and if an old lady doesn't come out of her apartment for months, yes you can call police or the landlord to get inside. You'd also smell this much decomposition from the outside door. (Don't ask how I know this.)

Why drag in the whole portcullis thing?, when it has nothing to do with anything in the story, which turns out to be a stupid setup by Hurt's character to get "Jane" to move in with him. It is a red herring to suggest there is anything here about the supernatural or hieroglyphs or Ancient Egyptian burials.

Oh, and stamping on a floor (again, thick beams and joists) with BARE feet won't case a huge cement plaque to fall off the wall and conveniently hit the villain on the head. (And in the same vein: poor Jane gets not one but TWO really severe head injuries, plus falls down a huge flight of stairs... with apparently zero injuries, as if two direct blows to the HEAD is "no big deal" (in fact it is very big deal, probably land you in the hospital -- needing an MRI -- you can have a brain bleed and DIE from this!)

Guys: if you want your girlfriend to give up her cool rent-controlled apartment in the Big City... take my advice, and show up with flowers and a diamond engagement ring and get down on your knee and propose. A lot easier than trying to stage some kind of crazy disjointed plan to "scare her" into moving in with you! DUH!

Conclusion: don't bother... this went straight to video in 1999 without a theatrical release, and with several major actors... what does that tell you?

What happened to the brilliant young director Steve Soderbergh? He hasn't done anything significant in years -- maybe since Traffic? Ocean's 11? Sex Lies and Videotape??? That's years ago. The promise of his early career is not fulfilled. I mean seriously -- the Magic Mike trilogy?

Here we have "Kimi", which is sort of rip-off of existing films like "Her" and "Jexi".... or even the very old "The Net". There is no new insight or revelations about the wisdom of having these nifty little voice-operated devices doing our chores, or how it might affect us. (It is also quite blind to the fact such devices -- in real life, Alexa and Siri -- actually spy on our activities and report our shopping habits back to Big Tech!)

If Soderberg was going for something like Francis Ford Coppola's early, brilliant masterpiece "The Conversation" (which this alludes to far more than "Rear Window", as it was about someone using tech of that era who overhears what he thinks is a murder)... he has fallen very short of the mark. First off, the technology isn't new or very interesting in 2022. Second, the theme of the tech-enabled shut-in not only isn't new, it was done better in "The Net" (Sandra Bullock) and that was in 1995 -- 27 freakin' years ago! Today, there is nothing remarkable or prescient about talking devices, the internet, smartphones that track your whereabouts or anything else in this film.

The whole bit with the nail gun is straight out of "Pacific Heights" (1992) -- 32 freakin' years ago! Basically this is just a limp, uninspired, totally not suspenseful, totally not scary rehash of very tired tropes.

It doesn't help that with only one major character -- Angela played by Zoe Kravitz -- that character had better be strong and memorable. Unfortunately... there is just not enough here, except Angela is "troubled" in some way ("neurodivergent", perhaps? The go-to diagnosis of every millennial and Gen Z?) and has agoraphobia bad enough she'll let a tooth abscess. Kravitz is stunningly beautiful, but none of her work has impressed me. She is badly hampered here with a bright blue fright wig, cut in a dutch-boy bowl -- WHAT was Soderbergh thinking here? I know brightly colored hair is in style, but I've never seen a ratty, frizzed dutch-boy cut like this on ANYONE before. It's so horrifying, you can't take your eyes off it (in a bad way).

When Kravitz kills her stalkers and find peace with her phobias, her transformation is signaled by the fact that... now her hair is PINK and she's wearing a dress. How traditionally feminine. (FACE PALM).

I'd also like to call out the ridiculous set. Angela is supposed to be about 24 and works at home reviewing customer's translation problems with "KIMI" (Alexa in disguise). That is a pretty low-level computer job, not requiring coding or software expertise. It would pay OK, but not remotely enough for what is shown to be a 4000 square foot, multi-room LOFT in Seattle with luxury amenities. At the end, we are treated to a 3-D walkthrough of the place -- exactly like the walkthroughs that realtors use to sell high-end property. (FACE PALM). Hello! Is this a movie or an ad?

On top of that, zero snappy dialog -- a romance so soggy, I can't remember what the boyfriend looked like -- zero suspense -- nothing to say about tech, the pandemic, or Work-From-Home jobs. I fell asleep twice while viewing this on DVD. Thank god, the DVD was free from the public library.

1974 sentimental tear jerker starring Art Carney as an old geezer traveling across country with his cat, Tonto. Yes, Tonto dies -- has to! -- it's some kind of requirement in sentimental films that pets die. (See: The Yearling, Old Yeller, Marley & Me, Turner & Hooch and countless others.)

This turned up on late night TV recently and I recognized it instantly at a glance and stayed to watch. I first saw this in a theatre in '74, when I was but a lass of 18 (do the math). I've probably caught it on TV once or twice in the 48 years (GULP!) since then. So I was a kid when I saw it originally and now I am ... a decade older than Art Carney was he filmed this.

Carney was merely 56, and in heavy makeup, but he does an excellent job of coming across as an older man (though perhaps 65 vs. 72). He seems suspiciously fit and healthy for 72, but of course... he's a charmer. Probably not Oscar material (though he won!) except on sentiment for The Honeymooners and a long career (against Jack Nicholson! Chinatown!) but hey, OK.

Of course to an 18 year old... 56 is as old as 72 and vice versa.

It's a sweet, if long and slow movie. I see parallels here with a 1994 film, called "The Straight Story" featuring the late Richard Farnsworth (who was authentically 80-something). Both are tales of elderly men undergoing a "hejira" -- a spiritual and physical journey -- in the last chapter of their lives.

This film is perhaps a bit too filled with contrivances; the cat can't go on an airplane? (not even true today in the era of Homeland Security!) in a carrier? More likely you wouldn't be able to take a cat on a BUS. And all the people Harry meets seem so contrived: a widow at the end offers him a free room in her apartment plus free Jewish cooking (she's not terrified of a strange homeless man she meets on the beach? He's not afraid of a senile nutty woman with no boundaries? Santa Monica is affordable? Boy, 50 years HAVE gone by!) He also seems to find a new, younger incarnation of his beloved Tonto.

A harmless film, with some sweetness to it and a lot of good actors in small supporting roles... but not very deep about the realities of old age and infirmity, as Harry is, of course, a 56 year old in the GUISE of a 72 year old. A well liked, well reviewed film in its day and of course that Oscar win for the legendary Art Carney.

Conclusion: if you have nothing better to do, or want to wax sentimental about the 70s, when a senior on an SS check and nothing more could afford to live in $$$$$ Santa Monica near the ocean.

This is a classic film of the 60s, one that absolutely defines that era. I was only a kid then, but old enough to experience it in "real time" vs. Retro nostalgia. This film, and others like it, that featured young people (early boomers or even war babies) who reject "society" and "materialism" were HUGE at the time, and spoke deeply to audiences and critics. If you are too young to have lived through that era, or haven't studied it... you may entirely miss this nuance, which I think many of the reviews here have.

The big "thing" here is not Ben having an affair or eloping with Elaine after ONE fairly bad date... it is Ben, as a child of privilege and wealth, rejecting all that it stands for ....and instead choosing some presumably less materialistic future. Of course, neither he or nor we have a clue what that is (but we can make some rough guesses from the life of author Charles Webb -- academia -- being a hippie? The novel only says "Ben wants to live amongst the common people", i.e., the working class proletariat presumably).

The other big "thing" is that director Mike Nichols -- himself Jewish -- decided to change Ben Braddock from a golden-haired WASP into a Jewish nebbish, by casting the arch-nebbish, the then-newbie actor Dustin Hoffman (*and by this one role, made him a superstar!) as Ben. (I'm Jewish myself, and can see this CLEARLY, so no anti-Semitism here. I like both Nichols AND Hoffman in general.) This is a pretty radical change, though the overall plot and dialogue have barely been altered from the novel. But because it trades on our existing beliefs about Jews and Jewish assimilation (especially in LA, the heart of the film industry) and our expectations.... it greatly changes our interpretation of the story. Nichols thought briefly about casting a young Robert Redford, who actually fits the novel's Ben Braddock perfectly, but decided "he was too handsome". (Later, in "Rumor Has It", a much older Ben Braddock is played by a dishy Kevin Costner!)

SO.... now the story becomes not about a WASP in the late 50s/early 60s (sort of Mad Men/JFK era) but about a Jewish-American guy in the hippie era of the LATE 60s. A TOTALLY different milieu and that means the message and meaning are now totally altered. (On top of that, you can't escape the idea that Nichols is, at least to some degree, making the film about HIMSELF, a Jew in LA in the 50s/60s.)

Another factor is the music; the tunes here by the amazing Simon & Garfunkel, working at their absolute peak, just cannot be underestimated. I believe the album broke first, and it was mega popular and on the radio all the time -- one of the best loved albums of the 60s! -- and is unalterably linked with the film (and vice versa). Are a few tunes used too often? Absolutely, but that is also like saying "A Hard Day's Night has too much Beatle's music in it". I mean, for cripes sake, the music here is EPIC! And it utterly defines a period and a generation.

And yet another thing: yeah, I also don't like films or books where one character stalks or intimidates a woman into dating/sleeping with/or marrying him. It IS creepy, it IS #metoo. But it was also a powerful romantic trope in fiction and film, even today and especially then. The audiences of 1967 would have eaten this up with a spoon and asked for more. Most 1960s viewers saw Ben and Elaine as a young, hip, wonderful "rebel couple" from the new hippie "Youthquake" generation, who will "change things" and have real love based on non-materialism (presumably they know they won't get anything from their rich parents, since they have "rebelled" and ruined the wedding). 1960s audiences didn't "read" this as creepy, stalkerish, immature or doomed to fail.

But I did, even seeing it just a couple of years later as a teenager. I interpreted the ending as showing that -- having "rebelled" and given their rich parents "the finger" -- Ben and Elaine have NO IDEA what to do, barely know one another and their relationship (based on so little in common and not even having slept together once) is doomed to fail. Once Elaine encounters real poverty -- once Ben has to take a menial job -- once there is an unplanned pregnancy -- reality will set in and they will DESPISE one another. (Also: BIGAMY! Elaine is LEGALLY married to Carl! Though one assumes poor Carl can have it annulled swiftly.)

And on top of all THAT... LOL... honestly ladies: how squicky would it BE, to marry or even sleep with a man who had been your MOTHER'S lover? Who had sexual intercourse with YOUR MOM? Who would be comparing you in bed, to HER in bed? How could you EVER EVER get that image out of your mind?

Just some random thoughts, more than 50 years on now. Still and all, the film has great period resonance and style -- amazing music! -- some terrific star making performances -- Anne Bancroft was a national treasure and this is her most iconic role (though hopefully TODAY we can see a 35 year old Anne as vital, sexy and gorgeous, and not some aging hag!!!!). The dialog is witty and the whole film just encapsulates an major era in our history at its peak. To understand the late 60s, you just have to see this view; it is part of the zeitgeist if nothing else.

Recommended.

This is a variant on the "house shopping" fake-reality TV shows that proliferate on cable... this dating from 2008-2010 (which goes a long way to explain why stated rents are laughably low!) and filmed in Toronto, Canada. Most of these are from Canada and this baffles me. Why? Surely Americans can produce these shows. I think we INVENTED the fake reality real-estate show. Not fully explaining to US audiences that "this is from another, however-similar-looking country with different pricing!" is No. 1 huge fakery.

No. 2 is that none of these shows are real. Investigations have proven that the couples have already bought or rented, and they are simply ACTORS playing a role. Some are not even in the market. The uber-chirpy host takes them to 3 -- always THREE -- rentals or houses and then the couples choose one (or sometimes NONE!) for what often appear to be weird or arbitrary reasons.

In the episode I saw, a young interracial couple was shown 3 rather nice apartments (cheap by 2021 rents!) and the woman's response? "My cat won't like the view in this one". Would anybody really say this? And if they DID, how mature are they? Cats like light and movement, they are not so interested in views. (I have four cats!) They spend most of the day sleeping. It is pure idiocy to make this about the CAT'S view! When you can't even tell if they like something or not!

On top of that, almost anyone knows that the most attractive and affordable apartments almost never ACCEPT PETS. Especially a cat. Cats pee and spray on carpet and walls and ruin them! Yet the couple is not stymied at all by this. They go from place to place, complaining bitterly that the ceilings are too low (they want 10-12', and sadly most normal places are 8-9'!!!) -- they expect a designer kitchen and a full en-suite laundry -- for about $1000 ($750 in US dollars!!!). Plus permission to keep a cat (and provide the cat with VIEWS!).

AND THAT IS NOT ENOUGH. The host shows them computer sketches of how she will "remodel" their APARTMENT (rental!) with things like paint, wallpaper, appliances, light fixtures, shelving, even new flooring. NO WAY JOSE! I was a property manager for 14 years. This never happens. Landlords absolutely do NOT want this done, usually forbid it and will evict you if you do it. They want all units to look the same -- bland white walls, beige carpet. (They buy that carpet by a dozen rolls, so all suites are the same and damage can easily be patched or replaced!). There is no landlord on earth -- as this in episode -- who will simply "give you" fancy new Pergo flooring because the woman "doesn't like carpet". Or let you paint the living room CHARTREUSE GREEN (neon)!!!

On top of that.... somehow the couple "negotiates" the price down $100 a month AND gets all new FURNITURE that costs a month's rent (didn't they already have furniture?) AND the capper is the man gets down on one knee and PROPOSES in front of the CAMERA!!!! Seriously? This just happened? Wasn't staged or anything? They wanted a TV host to witness this private moment? And she had flowers and champagne on hand? COME ON! This was 100% staged and no surprise to anyone. The furniture, the flooring -- that was the SHOW, not the landlord. All pre-arranged.

Nothing here bore the slightest resemblance to reality, nor any real estate market on earth -- if this is TORONTO, it is unrealistic even for 2008-2010 in terms of pricing and ability to remodel and have a cat. I have to seriously doubt any of this is real. Even the couple could just be acting students from the university.

Shows like this are trash that make old-school soap operas look like Shakespeare. It's an insult to anyone who ever had to look for a rental or house to buy, making a difficult process look simplistic and easy, suggesting landlords will lower the rent and then let you paint your suite CHARTREUSE.

On top of that, it encourages the worst sort of prima donna behavior -- the woman here, turning her nose up at a perfectly ordinary apartment bathroom, saying "Oh, I can't have a RETRO bathroom ... I want glamor!" or "9 foot ceilings are not high enough for me!" (she's about 5'1"!!!).

Horrible stuff, can't change the channel fast enough. Also: this type of show DATES horribly -- prices are already more than a decade out of date, meaning the info on that as well as supply, are utterly useless.

Please do not believe ANY positive ratings here. Only one is honest enough to admit he is one of the producers -- the rest are obvious shill reviews.

This is a blatantly incompetent, amateur production that looks like it was made by high schoolers, and not even college kids. The plot makes no sense; the most you can say is the supernatural aspects plus ridiculous plot twists (gangster goes straight, for love -- heroine is the sister of the famous dead pop star she worships) resemble superficially that of Mexican soap operas.

Completely unfunny jokes, stock characters, zero acting skills -- young singer "Lisa" is probably the producer or director's girlfriend, pathetically hoping for a "break" -- whole idea of "Lorena" taken from the late Tex-Mex singer Selena in a very sleazy way -- honestly the film is one "cringe" after another.

Special effects are so poorly done, you'd think a little kid had put it together on his iPhone. If anyone involved here think this film will act as their "resume" for a real career....uh no. Likely you folks have tipped your hand by having several characters with trust funds. The audience therefore knows where YOU got funding for this pitiful mess.

Conclusion: total CRINGE. Burn all copies. Do not watch under any circumstances!

So keep that in mind if you rent this for the kid in your family (I did, despite ample warnings in online reviews, for my 3.5 year old grandson).

How lame is this film? well, it starts with a longish prologue showing a very tall and awkward teenage boy in high school...he is gawky and a clumsy, hits his head on things and towers a head above the other kids...standing out in the most miserable teenage way imaginable. The comparison is to....a Great Dane vs. other dogs, apparently.

BUT...it would make vastly more sense if the comparison was to the lead character, dad Phil Winslow as he is played by mega-tall actor Lee Pace (6'5" here on IMDb)....so it's actually the dad who was the awkward overly tall & clumsy kid back in high school? or not? Winslow's height is never alluded to even one time! there's no speculation from any characters that maybe an extra-tall guy bought an extra-big dog BECAUSE he has height issues? How can something this blitheringly obvious -- very tall, oversized pet owner with enormous dog! -- be alluded to THIS obviously (the prologue isn't germane to the plot AT ALL otherwise!) and then dropped like a hot rock?

In the long-running Sunday cartoon "Marmaduke"...the humor for decades has come from the obvious hilarity of a truly oversized dog taking up way too much space and not realizing he's 4 times the size of a regular dog (and not a human either!). The Sunday cartoon never had the need to make Marmaduke speak English or fart (!) or even have romantic relationships with smaller dogs (what the HECK?). If you added in an OWNER who was also tall, big and clumsy, I think you'd have ample real-life humor and wouldn't have to strain THIS HARD to invent pathetic mashups of various breeds of talking dogs, dog poop, farting, etc.

Instead, its all low-quality CGI where dogs "move their mouths and talk" and where they are apparently allowed to run around the city freely without leash laws or consequences, have "dog parties" and romantic "doggy dates". No, it's not funny for adults or teens, though maybe very small children will just enjoy watching talking dogs. YMMV.

This film also pushes really poor values. The Winslow family moves for dad's job -- at an organic dog food company, as the ad exec -- and implies that doing so puts them in the multi-millionaire class! say what? LOL, I doubt it pays anything like that! they go from a modest rural house in "Kansas" (*treated for the film as if it was Somalia or North Korea in terms of undesirability) to what seems to be MALIBU -- a gorgeous vast mansion with a pool and also ON THE OCEAN directly -- that's $10 million at least, folks. No way the entire value of an organic dog food company would pay for that, let alone one worker.

Later when Phil Winslow quits that job, in frustration at "selling out"....no mention is made of the vast cost of the home, and the family all agrees they want to stay in Southern California and not move home, with zero consideration that nobody in the household at the point has a job! don't worry, Phil gets hired back (groan). Zero consequences, not even a dab at reality.

If all this is not bad enough, there's no way possible that 30 year old Lee Pace (Phil) or 33 year old Judy Greer (Debbie, his wife) are remotely old enough to have a 15-16 year old daughter. Did they conceive her in high school? like...10th grade? They are a good 10 years TOO YOUNG to have a teenager in high school! why not simply give them the two younger children? nothing about the teenage daughter is interesting or relevant to the story! (except maybe a few bikini shots, but why would toddlers care about THAT?)

Just an utter waste of time and some considerable talent -- Bill Macy, good god! why? WHY? -- if you must rent a talking dog film, get Scooby Doo or something similar. This is a career low-point for everybody involved here.

I don't like dumping on small low budget indie films by first time directors, because everybody has to start somewhere and not everyone is a Spielberg. But this is pretty lame. First viewing, I fell asleep during "Revolt", so I gave it another shot. So many problems, but what's the first and biggest in all such endeavors? THE SCRIPT. Someone needed to go over this with a red pencil BEFORE money got spent.

Let's start with the name: "Revolt"? it's not even about a revolution. And the word "Resist" is used all through the film to symbolize the human struggle to survive an alien invasion! A quick parsing of IMDb shows both names have been used multiple times in various films, so why "Revolt"? It makes no sense. Plus, it helps nothing that the cover art makes it look like a third-rate Xbox game and not a movie, and whoever did the art, must have created it BEFORE they knew who the lead was....because it doesn't resemble him at all. (Lee Pace was a last minute replacement for the original lead Alex Russell.)

Then the plot, such as it is -- a rehash of every alien invasion film since "Terminator" -- I can't even list every one -- definitely most of all this wants to be "DIstrict 9", which was also filmed in South Africa (here, subbing for Kenya). But also War of the Worlds and Battle Los Angeles and The Darkest Hours....probably more I can't remember this minute. The special effect where people go "poof!" and explode is way overused. The alien robots look just like other ones in every sci fil film of the last 20 years. CGI has sadly made it all too easy to pop this into movies; so easy they have it on ordinary TV shows. Nothing original here at all.

Plot? A US special forces solider stationed in Kenya during a world invasion by aliens (huh? is the US occupying Kenya? did it ever?) is injured and wakes up in a Kenya prison cell with his memory gone. Good news though! the cell next door houses a gorgeous French doctor played by Berenice Marlohe -- an actual former Bond girl! I mean, what the luck! could have been another guy -- or a 55 year old female doctor -- or a 14 year old girl. But no, it's a gorgeous super-hottie! The gimmick is the soldier can't remember his name. (SPOILER ALERT: I sat through this out of grim determination to find out his real name, because I thought it was a clue that would wrap up the action. I'm saving you that effort. It's never revealed. He remembers everything at the end, even his childhood address -- why would that be on his t-shirt anyhow? -- but sticks with the name "Bo" that the hottie girl gave him. Huh?)

The two of them wander around, encountering both aliens and rebels. At some point, they improbably find a cool 1950s RED convertible in perfect condition which has GASOLINE IN IT -- in the middle of Kenya, during an alien invasion? and drive around in it. I mean, it's not conspicuous or anything! RED! then the aliens grab Ms. Marlohe and she's never seen again. Despite not so much as a sidelong glance or even a kiss, the film decides they were about to fall in love (??? again, what if she was 55 or 14? pretty convenient she's smokin' hot, isn't it?) The end of the movie is a sentimental montage about how fantastic she was. I guess he feels bad he didn't even manage to cop a feel.

This movie is a waste of time for the talented Lee Pace, who's done vastly better work over the years and probably by now deserves a cool leading man role. This wasn't it, going direct to video after languishing for 3 years. He's miscast as a Jason Bourne type (guy who forgets his name and why he's here, but still retains mad military fighting skills and reflexes). I wonder why they didn't make HIM the doctor and HER the US soldier! or make him the photographer/journalist? Pace has a gentle, puppy-dog face that just doesn't convince me that he's a stone cold military killer.

I am also reminded that in the original "Terminator" -- the ur-movie for this kind of "run from the CGI alien robot!" franchise -- what makes THAT film stand out and still be the gold standard after 35 years, is the LOVE story between Sarah O'Connor and Kyle Reese (Linda Hamilton and Michael Biehn, in terrific & unforgettable parts). It's their tenderness contrasting with the cold monstrous cyborg that lifts that classic film above all the rest. All this time, and newbie directors/writers STILL DON'T GET IT.

This show, which started out so promising, and Kaling so irreverent, ended up running out of gas already by this, the late third season. Why? the writers and Kaling (who was the big boss, hence the show's NAME -- HER project, not the characters or subject!) had to hook up Mindy with one of her co-characters. This assortive mating stuff in TV series is super-boring and predictable -- where most of the characters end up with their co-workers or best friends. It's lazy writing. BTW:when this was first prodcast in January 2015, Kaling herself (hence her character) was only 34! what's the big rush?

Anyways, I've been rewatching the show on DVD -- remembering it as all looser and funnier than it comes across on a second viewing. Think of the Seinfield show -- now 25 years old or more! -- I can watch an old episode and every bit of is still hilarious and point-on. The Mindy Project already feels dated, slow, DESPERATE and unfunny. The characters on Seinfeld were in this age range -- mid-30s+ -- but cool with it. Mindy always feels desperate.

I comment on this particular episode only because it was the last one before I pulled the plug and said "OK, I'm done" and it was actually a bit better than the rest, because Kaling snagged Lee Pace as the guest star -- and cast him basically as his character from "Halt and Catch Fire", which was running simultaneously on the air as this broadcast. That's a very funny IDEA that goes nowhere, which is a shame. The premise is he is now a rich & famous tech guru and still crushing on Mindy for the last 12 years....Kaling has an astonishing ego, to even imagine this. Supposedly they lost their virginity to one another, at age 24 (!!!). Not impossible, but good grief, it would have been 2003 in real time. Her character -- boy crazy and desperate -- waited until her third year in MEDICAL SCHOOL to get laid? It did make me think that H&CF would have been better reimagined as a movie comedy instead of a dead serious cable series that went on for six interminable years.

Anyways, any real attempt at funny here is crushed dead by Kaling's ego and inability to step things back. I hope she is not this obsessive and shallow in real life. It's way less funny than she thinks it is. This series has no legs; it will never be the kind of show people want to see in 20 years as it is neither universal nor does it capture the "zeitgeist" of the 2010s.

Seriously, this is just worst of the worst decorating shows. I went to check it out here, and was gobsmacked to see that it has run for at least 10 seasons! from 2003-2012!

It's sad and fake. Clearly pretty Tanya Memme has no creds in design whatsoever -- she's a model/actress (who resembles closely Jill Hennesey of "Law & Order" fame) -- she's clearly here to provide "hotness" and wear tight skimpy clothes that are wildly inappropriate for someone supposedly painting or staining furniture!

Roger Hazard: what the HECK? this guy cannot really be a designer nor interior decorator. I think he claims to be a "staging expert". (Neither "actor" has the slightest credentials.) He looks like a body builder. He is so out of his depth here, I have to wonder if he's the producer's formerly unemployed cousin or something. The two of them are just plain embarrassing.

The episodes are being rerun on a new TV station in my area, with nothing that told me how old they are (17 years ago? yikes!) but sorry, nothing in 2003 nor in 2020 justifies the awful stuff they do to people's poor innocent houses.

Most of these houses suffer from nothing worse than lack of tidying-up (re: Marie Kondo), a good cleaning plus carpet steaming and putting personal items away in boxes while the house is being shown by realtors. Instead....Tanya and Roger move in, making lame jokes and acting "cute".

In one horrific episode....Roger compels a homeowner to allow him to paint her perfectly OK (if dull) bungalow's interior with bright ORANGE paint....NOT KIDDING! when was that EVER in style? it violates a well-known realtor's "rule" to paint things neutral, so you don't put buyers off. (You are trying to SELL after all, and not decorating a new home to your own taste.) So Roger paints this entire, very small house neon orange -- not one accent wall -- the whole bleepin' house: living room, dining room, kitchen AND a very large family room with a 2 story ceiling. I've never seen anything so awful in my life. Whoever buys that house (if anyone does -- the show overlaps the 2008-2013 housing/foreclosure crisis in a deeply troubling way -- meaning many of these folks were likely very desperate to sell and may have been FORECLOSED ON due to Roger's heinous decorating "advice"!!!!) probably had a huge expense to repaint every room, meaning they paid UNDER market value for sure.

The next show had him....painting someone else's living room bright orange. Another one: bright green and another bright blue. These are colors designed to make buyers run screaming.

But the worst, fakest part: the show starts with buyers who are supposedly looking at the home during an open house, and secretly videotapes them saying really awful hurtful things -- not about the HOUSE itself, but about the family's furniture and knick-knacks! how dumb and mean is that? no buyer thinks they are buying the FURNITURE or decor! Most buyers accept they will have to do a bit of painting.

THEN in the fakest bit of all, the buyers supposedly come back AFTER and now rave about Roger's "designs" -- neon orange walls in every room, awful "craft art" and cheap curtains that look like sheets, and (bizarrely) new bed linens. (Do these buyers think they get the BED LINENS?) What home buyers come back a second time? NOBODY, that's who! the only way the show could do this would be to pay or bribe them somehow (and they must be paid for being filmed!). So this is 100% faked for the show. That is dishonest and even fraudulent.

If that's not enough...at the end of EVERY show, Tanya says the same thing" "for sure, the buyers will get an offer ANY DAY now!" -- never once saying if the house really sold, or for what price, or if the decor helped or hurt. They spend an average of $1400 (of the owner's money? or the show's? they don't say!!!) which is frankly totally wasted on crap that likely harms the final selling price.

I'd give $5 to know how many of these botched abortions of redecorating resulted in a foreclosure in the worst housing market in 75 years. Yet this show went on and on .... was it really popular? or just very cheap to produce? who was the audience? HGTV and its clones have devolved into self-parody and useless, low-information garbage.

If you do watch, it's only laugh at the obscenely awful decorating "advice" here.

This is an obvious "con artist and victim who turns on him" plot -- done far better in "House of Games" with Joe Mantegna, years ago.

It drags in a whole Nazi theme, which is unnecessary and overly complicated, and reminds me ONCE AGAIN that it's gotten too late to have these "secret Nazi" plots or themes. WWII is now 75 years ago! anyone old enough to be an adult then, is dead or in their 90s. (My dad was a late entry into the war, being born in 1926. If alive today in 2020, he'd be 94! a person that age can barely walk, and let alone carry out a complex con artist job!)

The film weakly tries to get around this by claiming "it's happening in 2009!" which isn't much help -- just means that 92 year old is 82. Still not a lot of 82 year olds capable of stuff like pushing a much younger man in front of a speeding train!!!

The other problem is that both actors are ridiculously hale and hearty, and Helen Mirren (who is gorgeous here) was only about 71 or 72 when it was filmed, and could easily pass for her 60s.

The cons are far too complex to work out in real life. And I found a GIANT flaw in the plot (don't know if the book has this problem as well, I have only seen the film).

In the beginning, we see con artist Roy (McKellan) scouting personal ads, looking for an elderly rich widow to scam. BUT....later we find out that not only is Betty (Helen Mirren) doing the same....she is ACTIVELY looking for Roy and only Roy, to get revenge on him for raping her during WWII. WOW! talk about finding a needle in a haystack! and after 65 years! who would even imagine the man you were after is still alive? or that you could identify him? you couldn't go by looks! he'd already changed his name and nationality! (which she had no way to know -- logically, "Lily" should be looking for "HANS TAUB", and any records search would show Hans died in 1947 or so).

It is just NOT POSSIBLE that Betty/Lily could know that Roy/Hans switched identities with a dead British soldier...in 1947! It is NOT POSSIBLE she could know his NEW name or what he looked like! Or that he was not still in Berlin! It would be an utterly ridiculous search and what if it turned up that Hans was dead? or married and living peacefully for 65 years with a wife? how could she know he'd be SINGLE and in the UK? and looking on dating websites?

So was it just a fluke? that out of hundreds of millions of people in Germany, Britain, the EU....the ONE GUY who raped her in 1943 is not only IN LONDON....but also on the same online dating website? That's an insane amount of coincidence! and THEN finding that out, and having the presence of mind to instantly know that "yes, this is the man who destroyed my family and my life" AND formulate an insanely complex plan to con him out of all his money -- that involves her son-in-law (why not her SON? so they could work in a gay angle?) and renting/furnishing a remote rural house? and living with the man she hates this much for MONTHS ON END?

Just implausible on every level, so the final "reveals" and "revenge" carry no weight at all....no satisfaction....even make you feel a bit bad for Roy, who is so weak he gets the stuffings beaten out of him by an OLD LADY! and ends up in nursing home, paralyzed & dead broke....while making you feel no sympathy for Betty, who turns out is not just a wealthy widow, but crazy megabucks rich (she apparently lives in Downtown Abbey! not kidding!). Why would someone that staggeringly wealthy (tens of millions of pounds, honestly!) not just hire thugs or detectives to do the dirty work? why do it yourself and risk getting hurt or worse?

>> face palm <<

Can't recommend, unless you want to watch two old pros at work for a few hours.

You won't have much trouble avoiding this, of course. It is an obscure indie film from 2005 that I doubt was released in theatres at all. (It was at the Toronto Film Festival). Director Adam Rapp is a theatrical director with only 3 film credits including this (quelle surprise).

Took 15 years to get "direct to DVD" and even then only because Will Ferrel and Zooey Deschanel are in the cast, along with a subdued Ed Harris who I thought for quite a while was Bruce Dern (rocking stringy old man white hair).

LOL, I also spend most of the film thinking it was retro, and set in the past, because I didn't realize it was MADE 15 YEARS AGO....so that's why Zooey Deschanel (who is 40 now) looks totally amazing. It's not makeup or lighting! it's being only 24 years old.

Awful, pretentious, downbeat, sad sack stuff complete with emo music. That alone wouldn't be so bad, but in the first 15 minutes, emo girl Zooey DROWNS her beloved (and utterly adorable) kitten in a gym bag when she drops it in the river. Why? the kitten was sick (FeLV) with a treatable condition. She could have A. taken it to a shelter, B. had it put to sleep or C. treated it -- FeLV is a chronic but treatable condition with a 70% survival rate. But no....it seemed logical to her (or the director/writer) to brutally kill the kitten in horrific painful way with no emotion or guilt, and it is never referenced again in the film....as if it were the story equivalent of her slamming her fingers in a drawer or shooting up cocaine. Ho hum.

I can't excuse that, even in a 15 yr old boring indie film that nobody ever saw. Shame on the ENTIRE CAST AND CREW, director and anyone else who found this acceptable in ANY WAY! (NOTE: the actual kitten was not harmed and someone in the crew adopted him.)

I should not have to watch that at all, and I am sorry I let the movie run to its boring useless conclusion.

Unless you are the most extreme Zooey or Will Ferrell fan, I would avoid this like the plague.

Why was there ANY need to remake this film? there is an existing, quite wonderful 1966 film made by legendary French director Francois Truffaut. It more or less sticks to the story, while expanding it with several interesting ideas for a movie (an inherently different medium!) -- for example, both Clarice (grown up in the film!) and Mildred Montag are played by 60s icon Julie Christie. This kind of thing is visually fascinating and compelling! or the unique titles -- no writing! it's all SPOKEN.

I might add, in the 1960s -- up until 2001: A Space Odyssey -- there wasn't much sci fi at all. And what there was, it was not "space operas" with light sabers. it was thoughtful, intellectual stuff -- "451" -- the original "Planet of the Apes", etc.

The 1966 film is one of my absolute favorites. It was especially unusual and provocative in its time. However, I have no objection to a serious remake.

THIS film (2018) is an abomination. Every copy should be...well, burned. I give one star SOLELY for the great Michael Shannon, who happily chews the scenery as Fire Chief Beatty. Nothing else is even tolerable. Michael B. Jordan is floundering in the role. The special effects are all the (today!) low budget, very dark CGI where you can hardly see anything. All the costumes, sets, cars even! are circa 2018 -- though it is supposed to be generations in the future -- at least 35 years, if not more. This is very lazy filmmaking.

The director admitted in an interview, that he had no idea to do with story once Fire Chief Beatty's character is killed -- in the BOOK, Montag kills the Chief (and presumably the Chief actually wants to die). So all the actual STORY about Montag's escape -- travel to the remote farm with the "living books" -- BECOMING a living book -- is tossed in the trash. The ending of THIS film version is more or less the exact OPPOSITE of everything Bradbury wrote!

If this were not enough, the director and scriptwriter assume "they know so much better than RAY BRADBURY" about what is interesting or relevant that they get rid of Montag's wife....entirely dumb down Clarice (whose still grown up, as in the 60s film, but has nothing to do here)....don't explain how she influenced Montag to change....have everyone KNOW HOW TO READ and the presence of lots of writing and books (how do people learn to read if all books are banned?) and say that the BIBLE and a couple of other books are available (!!!)....clearly forgot that Montag's book is THE BIBLE (David Copperfield in the Truffaut film)....and invent some B.S. about "the Omnis" which is every book and work of art encoded on a strand of DNA ... IN A CROW!!!! (which Montag releases and no idea where it goes....Canada??? there are books and learning in Canada? but NOT the US? do the filmmakers think this is Hulu's The Handmaid's Tale? >> face palm <<).

That may be a story, but it is NOT the story of "Fahrenheit 451", which for generations is read by every middle schooler. It's some totally made-up, inferior crap without any of the beauty of Bradbury's writing or ideas, or the brilliant imagination of Francois Truffaut.

Nothing in this film makes much sense, including the "twist" you can see a mile away. I rented it because it has both Noomi Rapace (Girl with Dragon Tattoo) and Yvonne Stavhoski (Handmaid's Tale) plus Luke Evans (Dracula)....but not only were they wasted, confusingly this is set in Australia. Are ANY of these folks Australian? (Rapace is Swedish! they try to explain this away but...it doesn't explain NOBODY having an Aussie accent!)

The twist is that you think through most of it that Rapace (Lizzie) is crazy, having had a mental breakdown when her infant daughter died in a maternity hospital fire. But no...she's sane and the baby really was stolen by Stavhovski's character. This is telegraphed from a mile off.

Among the many, many problems...Lizzie keeps saying the child (Lola) LOOKS like her when it doesn't at ALL...the child looks like Stavhovski! Rapace is dark and unusual looking for a Swede, almost gypsy-like. Not likely she would have a blonde, angelic child. They should have used something like a birthmark or picked a child who really looked like Rapace -- and NOT like the adoptive family!

I can't speak for Australia but in the US ... maternity hospitals are super careful to put IDs on infants and moms, so they can match them up. (A more common and likely thing is simply that babies are "switched"!) They'd never just "take the mom's word that this was her baby" -- after a horrific fire!

The film doesn't even touch on how messed up everyone's lives are at the end, either. Stavhovski is probably headed for jail and a big lawsuit (they are clearly very rich!)....maybe divorce, too. Her two kids are now super-messed up and the poor little girl now has to learn to accept a whole new family of TOTAL STRANGERS she has never met before! Nobody is going to be happy! yet it is presented a total solution to everybody's APPALLING problems....divorce, insanity, joblessness, lack of trust, etc.

In the real world: people get a court order for a DNA test. Done and done. (And it is not so hard to find out what hospital a baby is born at -- you can pull a copy of the birth certificate!)

STNG could be very good, or mediocre and lame. You could never tell! The first couple seasons were very dry and "politically correct" but the show improved in the 3rd, 4th and 5th seasons.

This 5th season episode (October 1991!) is one of my favorites. It's held up to repeated viewings and I just saw it yesterday evening. For one thing....years before the internet and smartphones, it predicted the obsessive mind control of gaming and devices. I have often thought about this in the years since, and would see games that "rewarded" players with little "atta-boys" and sparkly images as a "prize" and how studies proved these kinds of rewards "massage" the pleasure centers of the brain! and I'd think "damn, Star Trek NG did an episode on this!"

Mostly STNG did very little in this vein -- real sci fi, that predicts or explores social phenomena. It was mostly militaristic types of stories. This episode could almost be a stand-alone for a Twilight Zone or Black Mirror-type of show.

Even better: it's Ashley Judd's as guest star! and her first professional role ever. What a coup! she is only about 22 or 23 (and looks effectively like her late teens) and she's terrific -- she just commands the screen. (How many other Trek guest stars WENT ON to have major A-list acting careers? I can't think of any!) She's beautiful, not as eye candy but a serious character and romantic interest for Wesley. (It seems implied she will be a "regular" but then, dropped like a hot rock -- I imagine she had far better offers than a small recurring role on STNG.) They actually give her a lot of backstory and even some attractive clothing to wear.

I normally am in the "Loathe Wesley Club" but this is probably the only episode I can stand him in. For starters, he's been gone a while here -- a year I think -- and he's clearly matured. He has a real action part, and a real romance with a charming leading lady. He doesn't come off QUITE as obnoxiously "genius-y".

It's almost a shame Judd could not have continued, at least for a while, as a major character. Despite many female roles, STNG never really had any one "breakout" female star who was memorable or iconic in any way -- like Uhura or even Seven of Nine. I think "Robin Leffler" could have been it, probably due to Judd's sheer star power and acting chops ... but it was never meant to be, I guess.

Beyond that, enjoy this episode for some real sci fi chops -- interesting allusions to "Invasion of the Bodysnatchers" -- real predictive ideas! One of my favorites of this series, despite an awkward ending where everything is wrapped up much too fast and all the characters are sort of "oh well, they took over our minds easily with a game...no big problem, huh."

Though I am umpteen times the age of the protagonist here....probably nobody knows more about "being unpopular in 8th grade" than I did. So while the intention here is good, the film just flounders. I don't think a male director/writer can possibly really know about a girl's experiences. I wonder why he did not focus on the awkward BOY here instead.

First off -- and I read the rapturous professional reviews, 99% positive on Rotten Tomatoes (just a hair off of "Lady Bird" for cripes sake!) -- this structure here makes no sense. We only learn AT THE END, that Kayla's dad is divorced from her mom. That means her mom is ALIVE!!! I was sure from everything prior her mom was DEAD, and she was a grieving girl -- and that the happiness in her 6th grade "time capsule" video was because her mom was ALIVE back then. Obvious but .... nope. He's divorced, and we have no inkling if this was when Kayla was 2 years old or 12 years old. Where is her mom? NOBODY KNOWS OR CARES. She's alive but has ZERO interaction with the girl -- the dad doesn't even call her to ask advice about their desperately unhappy, depressed daughter!

So is the mom an opioid addict? run off with another man? locked in a mental hospital? NOBODY KNOWS OR CARES. Kayla never refers to the loss of her mom, yet isn't it THIS that is making her depressed? not her acne or lack of social skills? wouldn't your MOM, another woman, be the one you ask for advice about clothes, hair, makeup, boys? So the dad has NO GIRLFRIEND, all these years of parenting alone? Kayla has never seen a therapist about the obvious pain of NOT HAVING HER MOTHER around? No aunt? no grandmothers?

Can Bo Burnham be SO DENSE he does not realize any of this? this is a classic "dead mom" story, like so many sitcoms, where mom is eliminated because it suits the storyline and yet nobody is bothered, or grieved or notices! (NOTE: the superiority of "Lady Bird" is precisely because she does have a mom, and her relationship WITH her mom is at the very crux of the storyline. And true also of the superior film "Edge of Seventeen".)

Another painful flaw: any girl who looked like Kayla in today's world (2017-2018) would be focused on her weight and dieting. Though not obese by any means, she is clearly 20+ lbs overweight. (I wonder if the actress gained some lbs for the part.) She has bulges, and a big pot belly. Such a girl would NEVER EVER show up at a pool party, except maybe under a big cover-up. She'd be in anguish over her lack of fashionable skinniness. Yet does Kayla mention dieting or her weight for one second? Nope. (Does she ever consider that her lack of stylish clothes or makeup acumen are maybe because SHE HAS NO MOTHER to consult? Nope.)

Also: having run this gantlet (see my first sentence), the refuge of most such girls is a close, intense friendship with one or more OTHER awkward unpopular girls. Yet Kayla has zero girlfriends -- zero. (At the end, she makes friends or a boyfriend with the awkward unpopular BOY she meets at the pool party.) She doesn't even approach a girl like herself. Is her school literally made up of all cute popular (rude) girls plus Kayla, the ONE outsider? REALLY? no other fat, awkward, pimply girls with braces or something? NOT ONE?

Lastly: in a way this is a horror movie, about truly awful dependency young people have on their phones. Pretty or popular, homely or fat...NOBODY should be living life through a phone, constantly taking pictures of one's self or making videos about one's self! letting kids do this borders on child abuse. Yet so many viewing this movie do not seem to see any of these things.

Troubling.

Watched some episodes recently -- turned out to be the Season 9 finale. Boy, that show lost steam and they should have pulled the plug maybe around Season 5. It is a rare show that can stay funny and relevant any longer than that.

Drew Carey got "show biz-itis" by maybe Season 5 or 6 anyways -- lost weight, changed his hair and look, got Lasik, etc. I think he really lost touch with his Cleveland past. I should mention, I grew up in Cleveland and therefore, know what parts of the show are authentic and which are fake-y. Let's just say, Drew Carey has been a Hollywood guy a lot longer than he ever was a Clevelander -- he has a few memories, I guess, but they are out of touch.

1990s Cleveland -- I worked downtown then -- was NOT mired in the 1950s and full of Polish bars. (It has some, but less than you would think based on the show.) The Halle Co. department store ("Winfred-Louder" in the show) went out of business in the very early 80s. By 2004, Cleveland had lost EVERY downtown department store, just like most cities. Therefore, Drew's "job" makes little sense.

The real Drew Carey lived in Old Brooklyn, on Cleveland's west side.....so it is very odd they choose to represent his house with one on the EAST side in Cleveland Heights, an extremely different milieu (younger, more liberal, a lot of college students, etc.). Having seen both homes, the one pictured looks NOTHING like the real house the real Carey lived in (and bought with his first series' paycheck apparently and remodeled!). In fact, in an odd twist of fate....I worked with the woman who owned the house shown on the series. I was in it many times, even the day her husband painted the window frames hot pink (and I told him "you are ruining the value of the house!" -- making me about the wrongest person in human history). In fact, the house was CHOSEN for the crazy hot pink trim! and the money from the rights to the images of the house paid off the mortgage for my coworker (several times over).

Interestingly....the real interior of the house is nothing like the show's set, not even close. It has a big front porch you can see clearly in the photos, which you have to walk through to get in the front door, but you never see the characters doing so. ALSO, when they show the back of the house....it is beige and not navy blue with hot pink trim as the front is (???). So is the garage. The real house has a backyard slanted so severely, you can hardly stand on it, let alone put a pool table. Since the real house has nothing to do with the set....it just comes back to the crazy hot pink trim. That paint paid for itself 10,000 times over!

Anyhow: the show stopped being fresh and got really repetitive, and by the end, dropped many of the classic characters. Drew, Oswald, Lewis go from about age 35 to 45 and nothing ever changes. I also felt the show was negative and downbeat about Cleveland at the very time it was having a sort of Renaissance downtown and in the Flats. The sad fact is that a lot of people all over the US and abroad have formed their OPINION of Cleveland from THIS TV show and little else (how many other TV shows have ever been set here?), and probably actually believed a lot of it was factual and not fantasy.

In conclusion: funny enough at first, then went stale and downhill long before someone mercifully pulled the plug. Enough episodes to run endlessly in syndication, unfortunately.

I get to see films late, because I can't afford theatres anymore and nor do I have cable. So I literally just saw this wildly praised 2017 film -- the highest rated film ever on Rotten Tomatoes! good lord! You'd think it was a unique masterpiece of some kind. Instead it is a very ordinary coming of age film, very similar (not as good IMHO) as last year's "Edge of Seventeen" with Hailie Steinberg. It also resembles very much the old 90s series "My So-Called Life" with Claire Danes who resembles Saorise Ronan here a lot, down to the kool-aid red hair and jerky boyfriend. You can even go back to stuff like Molly Ringwald (also red hair...what's with that?) in "Sixteen Candles" and "Pretty in Pink" in the 80s.

If you've seen the clips from "Lady Bird" on TV -- where she throws herself out of a moving car (hello! and only breaks her arm? not a concussion or DEAD?) -- or where she & her mom (an excellent Laurie Metcalf) bond over finding a cool vintage dress at the local thrift store -- you've seen the funniest, cutest parts anyhow. The rest is filler.

The strangest thing IMHO is that director/screenwriter Greta Gerwig INSISTS the story is NOT autobiographical....even though A. she grew up in Sacramento and B. is almost the exact age of Lady Bird AND went to Catholic high school and C. her mother is also a nurse and her father is also a computer programmer and D. she got into a pricey NYC college. If you want to write something that is NOT autobiographical, the for gosh sakes -- change a few things! make the mother a school teacher or a florist. Make the dad a barber. Send the protagonist to public school (there is nothing critical to the plot about Catholicism and Gerwig is not a Catholic, despite attending Catholic school). Set it in Fresno or Ojai or Oxnard. Or in Ohio or Michigan or Tennessee -- kids there also want to escape to "the Big Apple". (BTW: for folks who never lived in CA...Sacramento is a mere 90 minute drive from San Francisco, a large sophisticated city with many fine colleges including Berkeley next door. You could go on a Greyhound bus if you wanted!)

Except for a "montage" at the end of various sights that are presumably popular Sacramento spots....there is not one thing in the story to place it there, except that characters refer to the city. It could have been set ANYWHERE. The point is a teenager who scorns her hometown. That is so common amongst teens everywhere! (and most do not grow out of it the second week of freshman year at college).

As Lady Bird applies to and GETS INTO a selective NYC college -- despite her high school guidance counselor laughing her butt off at the very idea! as she has mediocre grades at best -- the cost of this is brushed off lightly and her parents are shown REMORTGAGING THEIR HOME! yeah, so her college debts of $200+ can destroy her poor parent's retirement -- or put Lady Bird into six figure NON DISCHARGEABLE lifetime debt -- to major in "Theater Arts" -- and then graduate 4 years later in 2007 just in time for the Great Recession! of course....99.99% of real "Lady Birds" do not end up as the muse of famous Noah Baumbach and with a fab Hollywood career and incredible industry contacts!

Very disappointing and disjointed TV series -- I guess it was a summer fill-in a couple of years back. No surprise it was not renewed for a 2nd season.

If I'd tried to follow on TV as broadcast, I would have dropped out by the 2nd episode, as things were already getting ridiculous....but with DVD sets, it is all too tempting to just keep going. "I'll watch only ONE MORE episode..."

Anyways: after finishing this, I felt exploited. The storyline is full of inconsistencies, and feels like something that was just made up on the spot by desperate screenwriters, trying to come up with something "shocking" or "MORE shocking" in every episode. There is not internal logic to it -- by the end, more than half of the characters are killers, serial killers or accomplices of a serial killer. The ending is especially annoying, as it is not deserved and gauzy (everyone not outright killed, is now happy and has a cute baby!). Also, the show drops a lot of "fact bombs" by the end -- things we were deliberately deceived about.

The really interesting ideas touched on -- can a child of 9 be a budding monster and future serial killer? can the tendency to be a murderer be inherited (especially if your mom, both your grandfathers, your grandmother and a few aunts/uncles are killers!)??? But this is all dumped, in favor of addle-brained plot developments, and ridiculous scenarios, and people who just don't act like real human beings.

It's all set in a monstrously lavish house, decorated like a showcase home -- in the first episode, a canny PR person can't even find a room in the home to shoot an interview, because it is so lavish as to be off-putting to voters -- I don't know if this was a real house or a set, but it is claustrophobic and only serves to make the very rich family at the center of the plot unsympathetic yuppies.

It helps not at all that one major character (yup, a murderer!) is running for mayor of BOSTON -- hardly a small town -- but spends all her time trying to track down various serial killers of her family & others, so that she spends close to zero time on her campaign (yet wins!) -- while having a lesbian affair with her black campaign manager -- how many trendy PC points do you get for THAT? Her father AND mother were killed by serial killers (but not before her father is NAMED wrongly as a serial killer for most of the episodes!) and this doesn't hurt her campaign, nor that her one brothers is a crackhead junkie and her other brother ALSO is a murderer (but don't worry, she got him off without jail time!).

If all that is not bad enough to deter you....this vastly rich, powerful political family in BOSTON lack any Boston accents whatsoever. The Kennedy's all had Boston accents, so how could they ALL grow up in Boston and yet sound like they came from Columbus, Ohio? (The only character with a genuine accent is the female police officer, which only serves to make it more glaring for the others.)

Oh, and NOBODY for 12 episodes has a problem with the chief police investigator on a huge serial murder case, with bodies all around piling up....is the BROTHER in law of the suspects (oh yeah and black, while they are all white) and NOBODY has a problem with this. (In real life, his presence would make prosecution impossible, so he'd be tossed off the case instantly.)

Those are only the highlights of a very bad viewing experience. It makes you feel totally ripped off for having sat through it. So many of these long series -- 12 episodes or MORE, some running for YEARS -- tell stories that could easily and BETTER be told in ONE two hour movie -- or at most, a 3 episode "mini series". What ever happened to mini-series? today, a silly murder mystery requires as much time to unfold its story, as "War & Peace" or GWTW! and that is just absurd, and almost punitive towards viewers. It needs to stop!

In conclusion: not recommended.

Caught this on late night TV -- can it be almost 25 years ago? wow. Most of the folks here have gone to amazing careers, and need no introduction -- Baldwin, Kidman, Pullman, scriptwriter Sorkin.

But this is a terribly written movie -- handsomely produced -- finest actors -- but ultimately feels like a manipulative rip-off. I am not sure I processed that back in '93, because I knew less about both fertility treatments and the legal system.

For starters: "Jeb Hill" (Baldwin) is an absolutely top surgeon at an MA hospital, but is willing to operate on his GIRLFRIEND, rendering her both sterile and MENOPAUSAL (!!!) by removing both of her ovaries -- for a lousy $20 million? Hello? the actor was 34 here, so presumably his character is roughly this age -- a surgeon at the BEGINNING of a brilliant, 35 plus year career -- and who would throw it AWAY for a lousy $20 million?

Wait a sec. But it isn't $20 million. $20 mil is the SETTLEMENT, meaning Kidman's lawyers skim a minimum of 30% off the top, and more likely 40%. Let's go with 30% though. Now it is only $14 million. And the two con artists would presumably be splitting it -- they are not even married -- so that's a lousy $7 million each. (In reality, this would have gone to trial -- Dr. Hill's remarks were off the record, and he would have retracted them -- and that would have probably meant way less even than this.)

$7 million? to give up your CAREER, which presumably Hill loves and is brilliant at-- to retire in his early 30s? A thoracic surgeon probably earned close to half a million a YEAR back then -- over just 20 years that is $10 million by itself.

And Kidman was willing to go through SURGICAL MENOPAUSE to get her $7 million? with all of the risks, discomforts, etc. of early menopause? The script keeps saying "children" but she never wanted kids (*because we all know that mean bee-yotches in movies are not maternal and hate kids). But did she want the OTHER risks and miseries of menopause? or the side effects of taking estrogen pills for the next 20 years? HOT FLASHES? hair loss, weight gain, dry skin, sexual side effects?

Are you kidding me? If a woman HAD $7 million, she'd probably gladly pay every penny to be able to NOT go through early menopause!

It is as if the scriptwriters had no idea what really happens to women to lose their ovaries. They did not do even the most minimal research.

Today, this would be even greater hooey, since it would be easy to have tested the aborted fetus to determine if it was Bill Pullman's biological child, which would have blown the whole lawsuit apart. The plot line with him accused of rape feels manipulative.

Also the end with the whole "blind child they think has seen everything" -- unbelievably hokey and "convenient". The whole script is just stupid & manipulative.

Only bright spot is a small role by the legendary Anne Bancroft -- giving everyone here a master's class in art of real acting (as Kidman's drunk, hostile mother). Though whoever thought that dark, ethnic looking Bancroft could be the mom of pale, lanky redhead Kidman doesn't know much about genetics as well. And what abusive DRUNK cares if they drink single malt scotch? Do the writers here know that a single malt costs about 10 times what a bottle of cheap whiskey costs? No drunk would make that cost/benefit analysis and decide to drink the hoity-toity stuff.

A film that was never very good and has aged badly. Only interesting to see Kidman (a tremendous natural beauty here at 25) and Alec Baldwin (a super-hottie in his day) when young. Baldwin especially has matured into an hilarious comedian, once he aged past his hottie stage.

Only worth viewing again for Bancroft's terrific scene, which is only about 4 minutes out of the whole film.

Really just a terrible movie. And its been done SO many times in the past -- someone mentioned "The Hand That Rocks the Cradle" but I just saw a black variation on this last year (can't recall the title, very boring) with a rich black couple who hire a surrogate. This is virtually the same film with a white cast!

I call these "evil BEE-yotch" films. There is always a nice woman, and then an evil woman who is jealous and wants the nice woman's "life" (which is always wealthy beyond belief). The husband is a passive dupe. Sometimes he cheats with the evil BEE-yotch, but not always -- not here, even though Nicky Whelan is far prettier and younger than Gina Gershon.

The only thing that could pass for a twist is that the Whelan BEE-yotch character is a lesbian. But that hardly raises an eyebrow today.

Aside from how derivative this is...they can't even get the details correct. There are numerous logic errors in the film. In the first scenes, Katie (Welan in a brunette wig) is seemingly an abused new mother, trying to runaway with her baby, when her husband comes home -- there is an altercation and she kills him with a convenient kitchen knife.

BUT...later in the film, we learn she is really their EGG DONOR, who managed to find their identities, track them down -- and is STEALING the baby -- and she has just murdered the babies real mother upstairs in the tub. Then she kills the husband. She has to have left DNA and fingerprints all over the darned house, but NOBODY -- police, FBI -- is searching for her! ha! she's fooled them! she has COLORED CONTACT LENSES! (BTW: nobody is searching for a kidnapped newborn baby? are you kidding me?)

At the end, an emergency room doctor tells Nick Cage that his wife (Gershon) -- ALSO stabbed by Whelan! in an identical incident! -- "didn't make it". He weeps. Everyone weeps. Katie (Whelan) is nowhere around, she's giving birth. Later, it turns out Gershon is not even INJURED from a huge knife plunged into her ABDOMEN (!!!). She's alive, to the shock of Katie (Whelan) who intended to kill her, and steal her husband and new baby. But...why on earth would the ER doctor have told Cage that his wife was dead? when she was FINE??? The only reason was to FOOL the audience! with totally false info!

We see Katie go into the hospital -- she is also injured slightly -- and they are just putting a bandage on her and it's a DAY after Gershon supposed DIED. Yet they are just putting a bandage on her wound? for the first time? then she's suddenly in labor, even though earlier we were told "she has three more weeks". She is put UNDER for a C-section (why???) -- totally knocked out -- which is NOT how c-sections are normally done. (They are done with spinal blocks and most women are completely awake & alert through the procedure.)

THEN we see her wake up, not even in the recovery room -- she's alone somewhere -- and they go down to the nursery to see the new baby. She is so FINE after a C-SECTION -- which is major surgery, cutting your abdominal muscles -- that she can get out of her wheelchair and run around. Note: most women can barely walk after a C-section and it takes 6 weeks for a complete recovery.

Did none of these people ever have a baby? yeesh. On top of that, we see Cage, Gershon, their new baby, their existing 5 year old daughter -- AND KATIE'S DAUGHTER!!!! -- all together in bed. Supposedly they get to KEEP Katie's daughter, even though the child was never theirs -- belonged to another (murdered) couple -- the child is entirely unrelated to either Cage OR Gershon (though a half sibling to their own daughter).

On what planet would they have gotten custody? That child had a family, even if her parents were murdered -- aunts, uncles, grandparents -- who would be desperately searching for her! Even if Cage's family wished to adopt her, it would be a lengthy process and no guarantee they would win custody. (Even if the murderous mother, Whelan, were in jail -- it would not sever her parental rights and the child would likely go into foster care.)

Mistakes like these are utterly thoughtless, showing NOBODY involved gave this the most minimal attention -- just slapped together lazily the tritest elements of this genre.

Gershon and Whelan do decent work, to be fair. Cage sleepwalks. He and poor Faye Dunaway look just awful -- hello folks? there is high def film now! you can't hide the wrinkles! -- and their presence is just sad.

Lastly: why oh why do these films always have to be set in the most obscenely lavish mega-mansions? This one is so over the top, it made me think of the "Versailles" palace from the film "The Queen of Versailles". It is just exhaustingly large and opulent. Even a pair of doctors would not likely have a house like this. Don't people in ordinary colonials and bungalows also have problems with infertility? The set is just a total distraction from the plot or characters, such as they are.

An empty shell of a movie. Avoid.

And how many times has it been made and remade? I'm probably more familiar overall with the TV series version, with Jack Krugman and Tony Randall, which by necessity had to broaden the story and pump up the minor supporting characters. There's even 1-2 FEMALE versions.

But the original has more lives than a cat -- several FILM versions, plus countless stage productions since the 1960s.

I've never completely got what is supposedly so funny about it, except some universal battle between sloppy folks and neat freaks.

Just caught some of it on late-night TV, and one thing -- nit picky, but it drove me nuts (my inner Felix Ungar?) -- is when Felix is cooking dinner for Oscar and two ditsy Pidgeon sisters.

The whole thing is predicated on Oscar coming home "late" -- by about 30 minutes -- and Felix's meatloaf is "ruined". In fact, we see it later as a flaming charcoal briquette....why not turn the heat OFF?

This is the kind of departure from reality that makes me crazy in films. Meatloaf is about the easiest, most relaxed food on earth. It keeps for HOURS -- even DAYS -- once cooked, you can eat it COLD (it's delicious -- try it some time!). You can cook it and reheat it, and if anything, the flavor is even better having mellowed.

There is no way, not even for a nut like Felix, that a meatloaf would have to be served instantly or "go bad". For starters: after cooking, the meat must "rest" for 20 minutes or so.

On top of that: when he goes shopping....and the whole premise is they are eating at home to "save money"...Felix goes to the butcher and orders FOUR POUNDS of freshly ground beef. Good lordy! Neil Simon clearly never cooked a meatloaf in his life, nor even bothered to look up a recipe! FOUR POUNDS! that would make enough meatloaf for a dozen people, with leftovers.

Meatloaf is a classic Depression-era recipe intended to STRETCH a very small amount of ground meat - with fillers, bread crumbs, chopped veggies, beaten eggs, etc. -- so that a pound of meat or LESS could feed a family. A meatloaf that was "all beef" would be greasy, heavy and terrible.

It makes no sense for two "broke bachelor's" trying to save money on a dinner date, to buy FOUR POUNDS of ground beef (even at 1967 prices). Even considering how eccentric Felix is - - how OCD -- the way he's cooking this, and acting like a meatloaf is a fragile soufflé, just makes zero sense.

NOTE: as a broke young woman years ago, I used to be able to concoct a full sized -- and delicious! -- meatloaf from one scant HALF POUND of ground beef, bolstered with a lot of add-ins like bread crumbs and beaten egg, and a few secret ingredients. I will happily supply that recipe -- Lily"s Famous Meatloaf" on request to anyone interested!