Reviews

Low budget films can flop if they start too slow, but this one has some pace. The story was very intelligent, not overly complicated. The plot was simple, believable and no obvious holes. The directing was very good, give Mr. Travis a real budget :). The acting was average to decent, except the wife (Wallander), who's expressions at times left me confused to irritated. Maybe that's what she was going for.

The best part of the movie is the concept and plot. I'm a fan of IT as well as lo-tech, and who doesn't think about what you would do if things went sour. This has it all, and watching it you might learn a few things. It really makes you think.

Not wasted time at all, I was pleasantly surprised and would watch it again if friends ask.

Why are they pushing me to get horny for a 16 year old? What the heck was that movie about? Why is ALL the physics so wrong? You can stand a fall from space but not (relatively) minor temperature or pressure fluctuations? You are light as a feather until you transform, when you can break asphalt with your footsteps? ALL the dialog is that rapid fire whining, typical of a Woody Allen movie. Most of all, when the action was happening, who was the bad guys and who was the good guys? If only you had let a Japanese writer do the story, maybe it would have made some sense. In a movie geared around action, the action was incomprehensible in the second half of the movie. Please, please, no sequel.

The movie starts out with its most intelligent joke, and goes downhill from there (pun intended). After that there's lots of potty humor and sexual situations. The beautiful women were the best part of the movie. Swear-word puns are not meant to be central idea jokes, but they try it here. The battle between the two groups in the local town (richies and poories) is an old tried and true setup, so how could it go wrong? Well, there is no reason to envy the "richies" nor any reason to feel sorry for the poories, so we can forget the central plot. The situational humor is all toilet or sexual aimed at teenagers, but only garners giggles, no true belly-laughs.

The only thing that salvages the comedy for this movie is the character humor, with the blind man providing some rehashed, but seldom used setups, and the black bar owner providing the formulaic "street" or "hood" humor.

OK, forget the jokes, there has to be some killer snowboarding shots since this was a commercial enterprise. Unfortunately, there was only 4 seconds of backdrop action that might be inspiring. The rest was all "B" grade tricks or worse. The big moment, where the main character rides "the goat", a man-killer ski run, did provide one shot where a small avalanche eats the stuntman. This was the best of the boarding in this movie. Any serious snowboarding fan will be disappointed with the quality of the stunts in the movie.

As for the technical aspects of the movie, the soundtrack was average, which surprises, as those snowboarding documentaries are regularly filled with quality tunes. You can catch a lot of editing mistakes and even though it was shot on a ski mountain, the majority of "scenery" shots failed to convey any sense of true size.

Overall, it MIGHT be worth watching if you have managed to turn your brain completely off and you like silicon breasts. Even then, you wont remember a thing from this one two days later.

Snowboarding is still waiting for it's definitive comedy, you'd do better to watch a snowboarding documentary for sure.

This movie was a lot better than I thought it would be. This film was killed by critics who were obviously expecting a lot more. Expecting not much at all because of those reviews, it became apparent this movie deserved far better. Every joke was great, the setup and executions were flawless. Dave Thomas' character was very strong, not the idiocy I expected. The main cast of new interns all did a quality job, and I'm looking forward to seeing them all in the future in other endeavors. There was some very intelligent sketching going on. It peaks near a moment when an intern must inform a family of failed operation resulting in death. This joke was long, drawn out and agonizingly funny in a Fawlty Towers sort of way. Then it instantly shifts back to low-brow slapstick. This can be disconcerting for some, but they throw so many jokes at you so fast, you quickly get right into their groove. This is polished comedy brought to you by the masters of the craft.

What wasn't so great was the movie part. They spent the whole budget on the cast, because the set and the costumes all looked "C" grade, maybe even porn movie bad. Dan Akroyd as the partying hospital administrator had me thinking he was skimming hospital funds, right from the beginning, but that is not the case. His character needed just a few lines of justification for his lifestyle and it would be easier to identify with. Matt Frewer's character was interesting, but bordering on unbelievable. They probably cut his believability in favor of outrageousness.

If you are a fan of modern National Lampoon movies, then you should see this one, it's much better. This isn't a "Classic", but it's a great movie to put on when you've brought friends home after a night at the pub.

Who are all these people who rate this movie so highly? You don't have to watch a lot of love story movies to know this one is just average for the genre. The premise is, you get a second chance to spend your last day together with your love, what do you do? Why not ask your lover, and then do it? Now drag it out for 90 minutes of movie time. So many pointless scenes that could have been replaced with scenes of substance that involve the story or premise, instead of just space filler. The acting was OK, Jennifer did a competent job but Paul Nichols could have used a little more emotional reaction. He just kept staring into her face with odd looks of endearment, but when you see those tears, he's hardly convincing. Love stories are great when you truly believe they are in love. The story here waddled between trying to make you believe their love, and trying to make you believe their actions based on the premise. The supporting cast were all props, of no interest.

This movie does fit into the better half of the love story / date movies, but is far from a "must see". It might make you ask your significant other what they would do if they knew it was their last day, but you'll forget the movie soon enough.

One of the first comments in the movie becomes the corner post of the irony of urban life. Paul states "I feel sorry for those Bulgarians.." while living in conditions that are as bad as anywhere. The actors did a great job, and you feel hungry and cold and angst with them. If the director's intention was to get viewers to feel empathy for the main characters, it works well.

The setting, the boy's hometown neighborhood, provides links to the boys' past and some later conversation gives an indication how their state of affairs came to be. The pace is a bit slow, but dramatic rather than boring. Making movies about junkies, it's easy to be dramatic and provide impact, this one does well. Not as graphic as it could have been, but definitely satisfying. Entertaining and quite sobering, probably a good watch for any 14yr old urban male as an education of consequences.

This movie has a plot line and story written for 10-14 year olds. Its perfect for them, and it could be a great family movie. Unfortunately the language is adult for no reason at all, and sporadically at best. There's no sex, and one scene of a very phony looking joint that was hardly needed to the story. They should have edited out the "R" parts and advertised it as a family movie. Its oriented that way.

Most of the actors were competent, no one really shined. You have trouble believing the 20yr old "foxy" reverend, but it's a nice twist. The soundtrack is pretty bland, as is the lip-syncing at the end of the movie. Its a movie with no market, too tame and sterilized for adults, but too adult for kids.

You follow a a person through their life highlighting the moments when they are concerned/talking about sex. After they have sex, you follow their partner until that person's next encounter, and so on. 7 or 8 people in all, seeing their sex life from their perspective. A lot of viewpoints, perspectives and situations.

Its an enjoyable romp :) through these lives, frame-worked by time spent with the beginning and ending character "lorna", who makes the movie. The story and situations themselves lacked imagination. The dialog was smart, maybe the best part. The score was nice listening and went well with the brisk pace. Overall it was kind of stale. Cute and lame.

Nothing special about this movie. A great theme got sacrificed by a mediocre, almost yawnable script. A woman who sees and speaks with a young version of Elvis daily, also indirectly causes the death of any Elvis impersonator she meets. So, off to Vegas for the Elvis convention! This could have been so funny, but it's not. The manner of the mishaps was timely but unimaginative.

There main plot was a traditional destiny of romance, both actors doing fine. The dialogue was terrible, hardly anything to laugh at. Lots of great (tragic?) Elvis impersonators though. If you have ever wanted to take out some aggression on those costumed clowns, this movie gives you a tiny taste.

The production qualities of this film are obviously tailor made for TV. The hard edges of the descent into the depths of gambling addiction have all been smoothed off. That's not to say the situations and predicaments are unrealistic. There's no brutal violence, but some hard core language. No sex, substance abuse or slimy cohorts either.

All the characters seem like upstanding citizens, including the restaurateur/loan shark. It feels like a New York story that got moved to the mid-west. Jewish and Italian characters throughout. It's a fairly fast-paced film that takes place over the course of less than a week. Very linear, with no sub-plots other than a marriage that crumbles suddenly when the wife discovers how bad his addiction has become.

Maybe the best part is the lack of a fairy-tale ending. No winning the "big one" and paying off debts and starting new. Instead there's a more realistic ending of a promise to never gamble again, and an agreement that separation might be the best thing. For that, it beats almost every Hollywood gambling movie. No getting off scott-free, but not everyone has to die either.

Watchable, and believable, but nothing special. More of a drama than an action film.

Hollywood has made more than a few movies where two character somehow swap lives for a time and have to adjust. This is one of the best of the genre.

The main characters who end up swapping lives are both 20's, male and have lost their fathers. They differ by being on opposite sides of the legal system, if not societal life altogether. Its almost like two universes only slightly different. Similar people in both doing similar things, but the main character's lives couldn't be more different. The binding similarity between the two universes, was an oath a similar character takes towards the main characters' respective fathers. Of course the "action" universe, where he's in the midst of a very criminal life, is flashier and gets more development, and rightfully so.

This story was just told so well. Its been polished and fine tuned and has excellent pace. Just when you've about had it with a whiny mother, the character has too. Everyone was very realistic. There were some nice little details, all print and writing was backwards in the "action" universe, helping guide you through scenes. You have to watch carefully to and absorb what is happening. Try predicting what's next and you'll just be surprised, not by shock, but from genius. The violence is very limited, mostly ketchup on sweaters, no great car chases, just one car blowup. This is not Hollywood.

Watch it again and you get more from it. The ending had a nice surprise, but the movie didn't need saving by a big ending. How this movie hasn't gotten more press is a shame. Everyone involved in this project deserves congratulations.

This movie grabs you right from the beginning with its audio/visual bombardment that keeps your eyes and ears at maximum capacity. This doesn't last all the way through, there's interspersed moments of artistic pause. Those frozen moment scenes looked like a master's canvas come to motion, if not life. Don't blink.

The plot of the movie revolves around a battle of life and death, with the love story subplot on the main character. As many scripts set in Japan do, they revolve the drama around "honor" and whatever twisted concept the characters have of it. Often "honor" demands that everyone dies. A lot of people die, but the violence is pretty good, more conceptual than graphic, and it delivers its intended impact well. But it eventually gets over the top, and you start wondering if anyone is going to live.

There's more than a few plot-holes, and they are big enough to drive a Honda through. You get the idea they shot reels of film and thought about how to piece it together afterward. People do things for impossible reasons, and unlikely motivations (twisted sense of honor becomes a generic excuse). To their credit, with such a twisted plot piecing together scenes, they don't make the mistake of turning the plot on a dime anywhere, so you won't get lost. You know who the bad guys are (3 different groups!) and who the good guys are (the hero, his immediate family, and all innocents), and you know who it's going to come down to in the end.

To anyone who watches this with subtitles, blame the incoherent reasons behind character's actions on bad subtitle translations.... and it becomes a better than average movie, even good. Turn out the lights and crank the volume. Sci-Fi fans, this is a don't miss.

Nice budget on the movie. The soundtrack was one of the best parts. The plot rolls along looking like a bad copy of a Bogart movie. Even the cheesy bad cop/good cop was included. The difference between this movie and something for HBO or some other pay per view movie was the cops and some polish on the special effects. Don't you hate seeing blood without bleeding, closeup shots of scar-less red faces was kind of goofy. The infatuation for red-heads was interesting, having suffered first-hand their treachery it seemed like an interesting theme. My biggest bitch was it was just too stupid. The things the lead character did, the ongoing chasing of the suspected killer, they would fight, then leave, then he'd hunt him down again so they could fight, then he leaves, then he does it all over again. The intelligence of the plot is questionable, although the last 5 minutes almost makes up for it. This movie fits in anyones "straight to DVD" collection, worth watching, even if only to see how much movie $75 000 buys. But when voting for the collective movie database, its only average, deserving a 6.