DaViD´82

A great, albeit extremely low-key version of the Beowulf saga. Unfortunately it is spoiled a little at the beginning by the storylines being rather inconsistent and somehow confused - and it isn’t helped by the rather slow pace. But if you can get used to these strange aspects (it helps being familiar with the original), there is nothing to reproach. The actors a well-suited to their roles, the production design is more than decent, the music isn’t the worst I have ever heard and the rugged Scandinavian landscape makes wonderful locations. Primarily it maintains the “European" poetry of the original saga in a way that Hollywood might well not be capable of.

In the wake of the more than solid part one, Jack Sparrow, excuse me, Captain Jack Sparrow doesn’t spoil his reputation, but nor does he improve it much. And in places this looks almost too much like a mundane feet-up blockbuster. Luckily the picture is stopped from sinking under the waters of the Caribbean (again) by Depp. Although the movie is tripped up significantly by the creators who try to include Jack in all possible situations. We get two really successful scenes (cannibal island and the sword-fight over the key to the treasure chest) filled with watchable stuffing, impressive production design and entertainment for the whole family, so the Buena Vista financial department will certainly be pleased. P.S. after watching again several years later: I liked it a lot better second time round. So much that most of my original objections no longer seemed to matter.

Seven stars for seven samurais. Oh, I can’t give that many, can I... So at least five of them. The still unsurpassed original which, unlike its more famous remake, loses only in not having a “star" amongst the baddies. Like Calvera in The Magnificent Seven. The western version also wins in terms of pace. In all other aspects, the Kurosawa version is better and since everybody is aware of the qualities of the American remake, I don’t have to sing the Samurais’ praises any further. Along with Red Beard and High and Low, this is Kurosawa’s best piece.

3.141592... Our school teacher claimed that math is fun - but, as Aronofsky proves here in this stylized rollercoaster ride, she was lying, because math can make you go completely psycho. A very Lynch-style movie and, whether or not it corresponds to your taste in movies, it will certainly leave a deep impression in you. Primarily thanks to the extraordinarily portrayed atmosphere of paranoia (or whatever that feeling is called). While the viewer experience isn’t so intense throughout the movie, you will be haunted by Pi for a long time after. Probably for as long as it takes you to say the entire value of π.

"A revolution? Seems to me the revolutions are all over the world. You know, they're like the crops." A picture with two extremely different halves. While the first half rides on an adventurous wave in The Good, The Bad and The Ugly style, the second half becomes rather serious all of a sudden. Almost as if Sergio was getting ready for Once Upon a Time in America. But both halves are just perfect, no doubt about that. But I can’t help myself feeling that they don’t go very well together. Otherwise, the classic elements of Leone’s pictures are here and again in masterful quality. From Morricone’s perfect music to the not so clear-cut characters of the protagonists. Coburn’s character’s flashbacks worked particularly well. The one with cuts to the scene by the wall, gradually increasing the tension, is absolute genius and significantly stands out against the rest of the movie (which you don’t often find in Leone’s movies). In comparison with Leone’s other movies, I would give this 4*, but in comparison with other movies, I can’t possibly give this any less than the full five stars. I’m not going to underrate this movie just because, in comparison to Leone, all other directors are nobodies.

Jodelle Ferland’s “one child show" who steals the entire movie, despite the excellent performances of all those involved. Tideland certainly isn’t a movie for everybody, or rather it suits the taste of only a minority of viewers who happen to be in the right mood to like it. If you are lucky enough and it suits you, then you definitely won’t mind that it basically isn’t about anything and it’s rather long-winded. The atmosphere will get to you and the whole movie then flows away like water under a bridge. It’s a really unusual experience and possibly the “sickest" movie seen at the movie theater for years (and perhaps ever). Gilliam still has it in him and particularly the camerawork is something that catches the eye and pleasantly surprises throughout the movie.

In terms of Woo’s Hong Kong movies, this is unusually mediocre, and should be ignored, while concentrating on his serious stuff. Although John Woo gets the comedy timing right, it doesn’t suit the serious story and so what we get is a humdrum hybrid. As always, this is held above water by the charisma of Chow Yun-Fat, but I probably don’t even have to remind anybody of that fact. The pleasant thing about this is that the central acting duo headed by the director doesn’t balk at making fun of his own greatest hits, although this has no positive influence on the movie as a whole.

An average film whose success was instrumental in the rise of South Korean cinema, so let's be grateful and enjoy its unremarkable grey mediocrity as an Asian copy of Michael Bay.

Aja is certainly not devoid of talent, but that makes it all the more incomprehensible why he's wasting it in a remake of a standard horror film, especially when it is an almost shot-by-shot remake.

A bonus short to The Ring 2, but much better than its feature-length sibling. In those 15 minutes or so there's an idea, a nice execution and an interesting connection between the first and second American remakes.