Reviews

An excellent period piece set in post WWII small town Pennsylvania. This is an unvarnished look at working class life among the "ethnics" and sexual dysfunction. The production values are fantastic. This movie really captures what it was like then including a passing shot of a large coal burning locomotive. The interiors are drab and worn with peeling paint in some scenes. The directorial style is similar to that of Michael Cimino in The Deer Hunter and Heaven's Gate.

The producers probably wondered why the excellent script and performances didn't garner at least Oscar nominations. It was nominated as Best Foreign Film for the French Cesar award.

This is a wonderful movie. Big sets, huge scale, a great cast, good acting, and a very well written musical score. It is not the usual Hollywood compromise. Get the Netflix UR director's cut. That's the best version available. Avoid the watered down, compromised, R version which is a travesty created to please the censors.

I have bad news for the prudies who don't like this movie because of its extreme sex, violence, and sensuality. The movie is accurate. This is how it was in Rome at that time. Go read the contemporary histories in Latin. I have. If anything the film downplays the reality of Rome during Caligula's reign.

The people who agreed to be in this movie, knowing full well that the project was VERY controversial, provide world class and Oscar level acting for the most part. The script is very good and largely based on histories of the time which are in the Vatican library.

Watch it twice. The first time you are going to be blown away by the sex, violence, and action. The second time you can see the acting. If you are a good Christian, cross yourself and run the other way. This film isn't for prudes.

Given the wonderful quality of Head In The Clouds I don't know how I never heard of it until I stumbled over it on the Netflix web page and decided to rent it.

This is a major movie. It is an emotionally powerful movie. It has a huge scope both in time and space, historical accuracy, an excellent, and at times complex, script, outstanding performances by all concerned, great direction, and superb cinematography. I loved it and I cried at the end.

Charlize Theron was fantastic as Gilda. I have known people such as the character she played and she had it just right. With her body language she told us she was rich, talented, cynical, very loyal to her real friends, and in the end so very brave. Her voice is such that sometimes I think she is channeling Theresa Russell.

Stuart Townsend played his part of a quiet underclass Belfast Irishman, Guy, perfectly. Some reviewers were disappointed that his performance wasn't stronger. Hey, Rambo wouldn't have survived long as a British operative in Nazi occupied Paris. Townsend triumphs in subtlety and his character narrates some of the story.

Penelope Cruz was perfect as Mia, who had been physically injured by Fascists in Spain when they came to take her brother away, presumably to be executed given that the time immediately preceded the Spanish Civil War of the 1930's.

Thomas Kretschmann is brilliant as Frans Bietrich, the personification of Nazi evil: educated, urbane, thoughtful, and completely ruthless when torturing and murdering.

The repartee among the three friends, Gilda, Mia, and Guy, during the prewar period is very realistic. I've participated in similar conversations. There are several back referencing jokes. You have to pay attention. In addition we see the best presentation of a three way sexual relationship I've ever seen on film. These three people love each other and this is beautifully communicated.

World War II was a cataclysm that shook the world. The free peoples were fighting for the life of their civilizations against what was one of the most evil regimes to ever exist through all of history, the German Third Reich. The story starts well before WWII and we are shown the good life of a wealthy young woman and her friends in Paris. We are then taken to the Spanish Civil War and on into WWII. The things portrayed in this movie HAPPENED although maybe not exactly as in the story shown; however, similar things are well documented as occurring during WWII. If one doesn't have much knowledge of the history of that period the story may seem far fetched. It isn't. For all I know the story is factual even though there is the usual statement at the end about it all being fiction.

More about Kretschmann: Toward the end of the movie there is a scene in which his character is supervising the torture of a young woman member of the French Resistance. The torturers are using the near drowning method, waterboarding is what the CIA calls it today. He is seated with his back to his underlings and gives the order to immerse her, then plays with a loose thread on his shirt cuff while timing the immersion. He fiddles with his cuff links. He is clearly bored. Just another day at the office. When he decides she isn't going to talk he gives the order to put her under and and never orders her to be raised. I have heard it phrased: "The banality of evil". Kretschmann and Duigan bring it off to perfection.

This is a must see movie. It will stick with you. Parts of it will come back to haunt you for at least several days. As I said before, this is powerful stuff.

Don't waste your time. I wish I'd used that two hours to do something else.

Clive Cussler must have asked that his name be removed after seeing this atrocity. Wonderful cast, incredible special effects, all wasted on a ludicrous script. The chase scenes went on and on and on. The fight scenes went on and on and on. Both were obviously extended ad nauseam because the story was so weak. With a competent script writer it coulda been a blockbuster. Another disaster was the out of place alleged theme music. For the kind of money they spent making this movie they could have spent a little more and had a decent theme - or could they? Movie theme composers work from what they see on the screen and in this case that would have induced nausea.

Note: Obviously lacking was chemistry between Cruz and McConaughey.

This film is so film noir that it's difficult to see. There is more black than color in most shots. Most of the time it's difficult to figure out what is supposed to be happening. Sam Elliot is brilliant as usual but his time was wasted in this one given given the really crummy cinematography and editing. While the come on for this movie is sexual explicitness the version I saw, which was distributed in Canada, had none. About all the film could muster was in that department was some rather tame S & M and sounds of sex. That's sounds - not view of. I felt ripped off after buying the DVD for an extremely reasonable amount of money, i.e. cheap. With the exception of Elliot's performance watching this movie is a waste of time.