Š-DR-INTERMEZZO -2

12/10/2011 17:17 par tellurikwaves

Š-DR-INTERMEZZO

09/10/2011 20:32 par tellurikwaves

Š-DR- Films Mewdiks -12

17/10/2014 01:48 par tellurikwaves

*

*

Cinema 101: How *Not* To Make a Screwball Comedy

Author: TJ McCarthy from United States
28 April 2009
 

*** This review may contain spoilers ***

A lot of the negative reviews here concentrate on the historical accuracy of this film. OK, it had about as much to do with the actual NFL as your average war movie has to do with an actual war, or a Western has to do with the true "old west". So, I think we should give them an artistic license pass on that one.

The problem here is, the director (Clooney) apparently thinks that making a screwball comedy means a) do stupid things, b) mug for the camera, and c) take stupid scenes full of mugging and stretch them out way too long. Screwball comedies need a fast pace, not necessarily frenetic, but moving briskly along at all times. Here, things drag, and drag, and drag. After you watch this movie, it will make you appreciate how brilliant Mack Sennett was when he pretty much pioneered the genre with his Keystone Cops. After 90 years, you would think that directors would have studied the old masters and learned a thing or two, maybe even improved on things a bit. But no, it's as if someone had watched an automobile pioneer build a Duesenberg, and nearly a century later, paid homage and "improved" on the concept by cobbling together a child's wagon with square wheels.

I've enjoyed several of Clooney's movies, I consider him a gifted actor. But very few actors can competently direct themselves; Clint Eastwood notably took a while to get the hang of it. Clooney is clearly at the bottom of a very steep slope. The movie becomes more watchable during the very few times he is out of the frame, but when he's in the picture, he makes himself the centre of attention. In the fight scenes, his mugging is so obnoxious you wish somebody would thump him for real.

If you are making a screwball comedy and want some romance thrown in, you need to develop some chemistry between the male and female leads. Clooney and Zellweger have all the chemistry of pair of dumpsters sitting in a parking lot. No spark, no sizzle, not even a post-mortem twitch. Zellweger, who has also turned out some pretty good movies, must have traded her botox injections for oak tannin, giving a stunningly wooden performance. She might just have pulled off the "tough broad in a man's world" act if just once, while trying to out-testosterone the guys, she had looked into the camera with a little half-smile and twinkle in her eye. But no, she kept her jockstrap cinched up tight to the very end.

Of course, the biggest sin here is that the movie simply isn't funny. Doing stupid things is not the same as slapstick. Doing stupid things very inventively, like the Stooges, or very athletically, like Buster Keaton, can be hilarious. But otherwise it's boring and, well, stupid. I think I got one good laugh out of the entire movie.

Avoid this one. I saw it for free on cable, and still wanted my money back.

2 out of 4 people found the following review useful:

Longest 2 hours of my life

Author: Corinna_Bella from Australia
6 May 2009

I was surprised to see the very generous rating on IMDb. This honestly is the worst film i have watched in my entire life. It was so slow and lifeless that i actually started making up other stories in my head to help make the time pass faster.

Im not a high maintenance film watcher - ill happily sit through the most basic Rom com to an espionage film with constant twists and turns, to ... well you get the picture. My tastes are well rounded and easy to please.

Renee looked like she had just sucked on a lemon in every scene. Her accent was terrible and acting worse. Im a huge fan of Bridget Jones and its tongue in cheek humour and her good portrait of the character so had some expectations (not particularly high) of how this movie would be. It didn't even deliver on those moderate expectations.

If you have nothing to do this afternoon i suggest you save your $10 and watch paint dry or something equally more exciting than sitting through this film

2 out of 5 people found the following review useful:

Give this a wide berth

Author: paul (micewillplay) from Wales UK
10 June 2009

This movie is absolutely awful. I suffered over an hour of this brain numbing rubbish thinking to myself it will get better. well guess what..it didn't!!! Even if you see this free of charge don't take it! It's like water torture. The acting is... well what acting is all I can say. I have given it one out of ten out of pure sympathy. Is it me or is George Clooney completely overrated, admittedly he has made one or two good movies but on a whole. I bought this movie as I like sports movies especially ones with a decent storyline, so you can imagine how disappointing it was to find out what a mistake I had made. I have seen the scathing reviews for Radio (Cuba Gooding Jr)but that looks like an academy winner compared to Leatherheads.

11 out of 23 people found the following review useful:

Painfully Tedious

Author: mcjohnnyb from United States
5 April 2008

Let me preface this by going on record, I am a huge George Clooney fan, and I love John Krasinski in 'The Office'. Well, I was and I did.

This was the world's worst hang nail and it took 113 minutes to rip it off. The stupefying boredom was interrupted only by my frequent efforts to read my watch and estimate when it would be over.

Every funny scene was in the previews. All three of them. There was no real story, no character development, and the script was just plain bad. I've had a colonoscopy that was more enjoyable.

The title should have been SuperDuper Bad. This movie is a lock for a Razzie. It should get a whole slough of Razzies. I want my money back.

5 out of 10 people found the following review useful:

Just a waste of time, a major disappointment

Author: mikebesant from United Kingdom
15 April 2008

I went to the cinema with high expectations of seeing something a little different from the normal fare. An old fashioned screwball comedy with a stellar cast. What a major disappointment. What a waste of talent. This movie was just tedious. nothing interesting happened. The cast really looked like that they were working hard to make something of the non-plot and comedic script which forgot the comedy. This was a real shame. On the plus side the movie looked great with atmospheric colours and the crowd scenes looked sensational. It also benefited from an excellent soundtrack. But I did not care for any of the characters. Clearly when this was being pitched there was a contrived effort to intertwine several stories creating tension and humour with the potential for love conquering all. At the end of the day, this was a mess. Without wishing to sound like some professional "out of new ideas", they should have spent some more time and money on the script and a little less on the impressive, but ultimately wasted, special effects. Go spend Your money on something else.

6 out of 12 people found the following review useful:

I didn't like it at all...

Author: FireFL5 from United States
13 April 2008

Normally I so enjoy the actors in this movie...could not believe how bad it was. What a disappointment!The comedy was so slapstick and the story line so predictable....not to mention the acting just wasn't that good. Two of the three stars played their "typical" roles ...while the others were respectable performances. The historical time was well referenced...that is the most positive thing I can say about this film. We almost walked out it was so boring. I didn't hear any positive comments at the end from anyone else in the audience either. We were almost out the door when the "wedding" scene came up on the screen. I am afraid many will not see it as they will be in a hurry to get out the door. Like I said...we were very disappointed in the film...and to be honest....George C....since he was the director and star. I know he would understand since he played quarterback in a lot of the film...they get the glory if you win and the negatives if you lose. I am afraid he lost with this film!

8 out of 16 people found the following review useful:

Dreadful from start to finish

Author: robertallenandersonjr from United States
22 April 2008

Leatherheads was a very boring movie from the very beginning. I had a hard time staying in the theatre for the whole movie. This is a movie where you mostly hate it or love it and I strongly didn't like it. I thought the acting was very good and they were fun to watch for older people. I guess I mostly didn't like it because I am younger. It was just way to slow moving and never picked up. The messages were saying its okay to cheat and lie. George Clooney was just a cheater the whole movie when he played football and never changed. The whole movie had like about three laughs. The laughs they did have were small. I mostly didn't like how it took place in the 1920's. It was very real and shows you how football really started. The romance was very confusing and pretty boring. Everyone in this movie was very selfish and wanted everything for themselves. The story was pretty much not even about football. It revolved around war and other stuff. One more thing is that the whole movie was all sarcasm. So if you like sarcasm you will probably like this movie. Overall this movie was very boring and a waste of money.

9 out of 18 people found the following review useful:

I sat there like a stone ...

Author: DSStarsiak from United States
11 April 2008

I thought this movie was going to be good. It absolutely wasn't, despite the Oscar-winning lead actors. I may have laughed once, and I never heard anybody else in the theater laughing. Renee Zellweger's pancake make-up was very unbecoming. Everybody seems to be trying so hard in this movie, running around in imitation of slapstick but not pulling it off. I think perhaps the movie must've sounded good in development, but something got lost in translation. Were the roaring 20's really like this? I think not. Everything seems a tad artificial. Randy Newman's score was annoying. The film is in sepia tones, just like every other movie that takes place in the 20's or 30's. There's just not that much originality here.

2 out of 5 people found the following review useful:

George belongs behind the camera

Author: govendsa from South Africa
26 December 2008

I thought I give this movie a try for no apparent reason other than the video store didn't have any nice movies left. I'm not a fan of George Clooney or Rene Zellweger but I decided to give it a shot and now would like a refund. I tried sitting through the first 15 minutes but was so bored that I opted to do housework instead and I hate housework. There's no chemistry between any of the cast. George is looking his age, what almost in his fifties and so is Rene. She doesn't look all that good. I think this movie would have being better if George played a talent scout instead of one of the players. He just didn't fit the role. Rene was miscast. John was about okay. As usual there's absolutely NO chemistry between Clooney and the leading lady. The man should really consider staying behind the camera and maybe even getting some lessons on directing but he should really quit acting and leave it to the fresh and upcoming actors like Chace Crawford, Shia Labeouf and start acting his age and stop wishing that he was in the league of his other co-stars like Pitt, Damon etc.

7 out of 15 people found the following review useful:

Leatherheads-Reel Geezers

Author: hfgirl from United States
6 April 2008

Check out the two octogenarians who review Leatherheads. These guys are old-school Hollywood and a hit on YouTube. They always give an insightful and fun review. They have movie comparisons that are really interesting and they have a banter back and forth that is endlessly entertaining. They know movies, collectively they have been in the biz for practically a century. Lorenzo is a well-known screenwriter and Marcia is a famous producer. All of their insight on movies always leaves you with something to think about. See what they think about Clooney's latest...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2-W7evBEArs

Š-DR-Films Mewdiks -11

17/10/2014 01:03 par tellurikwaves

Me suis franchement barbé durant ce film...

*

*

Negative portrayal of both NYC teachers and inner-city students

Author: amygrrl77 from United States
25 August 2006
 

As a NYC public school teacher and a black woman, I know not where to begin with the faults of this film. It is yet another portrayal of the great white emancipator who sacrifices himself to teach the poor colored children of the inner city. He disregards the civil rights curriculum provided him by a black principal in favor of his own agenda. In each of the teaching scenes, he is presented as the fountain of knowledge, giving the children all they need to know about the world. He discusses change with them, nay, revolution, but the students themselves are never depicted as empowered. With exception to Shareeka Epps, who is probably changed for the worse, the children are pawns in his power play to "change the world."

This brings me to the relationship between Gosling and Epps. She has but one positive black adult in her life (her, of course, overworked and underpaid single-parent mother) and yet she is most affected by a junkie, white male teacher, who adopts a "black-cent" and coaches girls' basketball. She, in essence, becomes his mammy, caring for him and nursing him even after he calls her -- a 13-yr. old -- a "bitch" and grinds on her during a school dance. The "mammy" itself makes an appearance in her drug-dealer, pseudo-big brother's home and its significance is never explained to her, perhaps because the writers themselves don't understand it. Or maybe they do, and "Half-Nelson" is their ode to it.

All in all, this film perpetuates the theory that liberal white teachers are doing children of color favors by "sacrificing their ideals" (as stated in the "Story" section of the official website) to teach in inner-city schools. It is riddled with inaccuracies about teaching in NYC, i.e. his being alone in a school; teachers are NEVER left alone in schools, particularly after school events. It also perpetuates the theory that inner-city children are surrounded by exclusively negative influences, from family members to neighbors, and are waiting for someone to step in and rescue them from themselves.

Critics who believe this film is inspirational need to examine themselves and what they really think about their relationships with and responsibilities to blacks.

17 out of 29 people found the following review useful:

i walked out, and i was not alone.

Author: richardcharlesandrews from United Kingdom
26 April 2007

All the hype surrounding this film has yet again come from the USA. All the 10/10 reviews on this site are from Americans. What is wrong with you people? How could ANYONE find this entertainment? America, STOP! making these dreadful, pointless, boring, pretentious films. There must be one American person who thought this film was a joke? I honestly thought it was a pi**-take? In fact Iam pretty sure it was. The characters were pathetic and the relationships totally unrealistic. Are we to believe a junkie could hold a job down as a teacher. Awful camera work (no its not cool and was not cool 5 years ago). Acting? What acting? Give me a break.

5 out of 9 people found the following review useful:

Much ado about nothing

Author: catsklgd1 from United States
22 August 2008

I don't know what these other people are smoking (inside joke), but clearly they are not thinking straight. This movie drags on and on and on and on and....

The dialogue is sparse, and rather poorly conceived. The bright light is the little black girl who delivers a truly gritty performance. Gosling is totally wasted, and appears perplexed throughout the film. I just don't get what all the fuss is about this movie.

Much ado about nothing. I'm sick to death of films that preach to their audience about the effects of the Vietnam war, Republican politics, etc. Weak people fail, and the central character in this film is just that...weak.

A really boring film...

Author: ICanNeverThinkOfAGoodUsername from United Kingdom
18 September 2014

This film looks interesting and it seems like it will be good. In reality it's an extremely boring film. There is no character development... You barely find anything out about the characters. As someone else mentioned what you know at the start is literally what you know at the end.

I wouldn't recommend this film because there is nothing to it. You gain nothing from watching this film. I expected something to happen but nothing did...

It's a long film which drags on and nothing happens. You would expect to see some sort of development - not with this film.

5 out of 12 people found the following review useful:

Pointless downer

Author: greenskate from United States
30 December 2008

*** This review may contain spoilers ***

Pointless.

If you liked Ironweed, Leaving Las Vegas, Candy, and Trainspotting, you'll love this pointless downer.

The lesson of this movie seems to be that it's all hopeless. Drug addiction will prevail and drug running will out.

If you're hoping that everything will turn out alright or something at least will improve, give this one a miss. This is one of those movies you get to the end of and feel like you're left hanging. "And the point of that wasssssssssss?"

It's just a downer.

37 out of 59 people found the following review useful:

half nelson needs t o be reexamined

Author: DjohnsonC-3 from United States
26 August 2006

*** This review may contain spoilers ***

I have been reading many reviews about this film for weeks so I was anxious to see it. I was hoping for something new.

There seems to be a very prominent but hard to overlook attraction by young, talented, new white filmmakers taking up the subjects of urban black and Latino lives as fodder for either liberal expression, societal outrage or possible fetishism. From "Maria Full of Grace", "GirlsTown", "Everyday People" (HBO), "Quinceanera" now "Half Nelson", we have story lines looking at underprivileged black and Latino folk through a prism that seems to be very similar. In these stories there is a little sadness, some anthropological observation, a fair amount of non judgmental characterizations and realism but as independent and daring as these films claimed to be, they are no better than watching "Dangerous Minds", a studio film of a few years ago. Don't get me wrong, I'm not mad at you. Most black filmmakers seem to be preoccupied these days with the three p's-Tyler Perry, Tyrese and taking the money so it's hard to complain when other filmmakers find the stories of black and Latino culture such a rich place to be.

So here comes "Half Nelson" as the latest in this stream. I really wanted to like this one but it falls into the same unfortunate traps as the others. I'm watching this film and seeing the absent of any black adult with any speaking part with a positive image for this young girl to benefit from. Ryan Gosling is a gifted and natural artist and Epps is quite good and real but the choices the writer and director make are choices that show where they are coming from. Dan brings in the light because the lives of the kids in his class are in the dark. With Epps' mom working so much are we to believe Epps is not loved? Hard to know. Her father is not around but apparently without a voice or point of view and dogged by her mother. Her brother is in prison but he doesn't seem to be evolved enough to realize that he must do differently when he gets out. And then there's Mackie's character, a good guy but he's selling product in the community. The man's a businessman but not quite the positive role model you'd like to have any kid look up to.

The polyglot nature of our world gives us all configurations of relationships in how people find family, opportunity and friendship but I never found what Dan is going through in his addiction particularly profound or revealing. Sure he's high half the time, sure he's aimless and passionate like a lot of aimless and educated young white and black folk who don't know what to do and how to affect change in this world but when you make a movie and lay your hero in a world he knows little about, give the world a little more credit. Switch the situation around. take out the drugs and go back thirty years and you have "To Sir with Love". The only difference, Poitier's character had a chip on his shoulder not a monkey on his back and the kids he was dealing with and Lulu's character particularly didn't want to take that chip off, she wanted to learn from him. I don't know what this 13 year old learns from Dan. Maybe she's learned how to take care of a guy who needs someone to take care of him, which really sets her up for an unfortunate job title in her future. We don't know what she dreams about for her future. We have no idea. She sure has not learned much about the civil rights movement in what is shown in the film. He is trying to impress on the kids to expand their minds in a semi Socratic educational style but these kids are sponges and a point of view from a teacher is not actually teaching. I want to know the filmmaker's point in making this film. I'm really curious. That's my two cents.

2 out of 2 people found the following review useful:

One to avoid

Author: georg-60 from United Kingdom
5 December 2011

Half Nelson is about a history teacher in an inner city NY school who is somehow ever so cool because he really engages children and all the other teachers are so hopeless that it can be no surprise that these kids are so disinterested in everything. If only we had more teachers like that. How does he do it ? Well, he makes history really interesting by talking about change, and big ideas clashing, and other hackneyed soundbites all the time but they never seem to learn any facts or events because this would be way too boring. He is also so cool that he has to walk around all day with a really bemused look on his face, you know, this look of the only sane person in a sea of fools. You also need to understand that when he is not heroically helping children, he is a drug addict and gets up to all sorts of things that are usually considered as not good for you. You will wonder how he can sustain this habit and his teaching at the same time, but I guess that this is actually the only part of the film that makes some sense because his lessons never look as if he has done any preparation for them, but that he rather makes them up as he goes along - lots of phoneyism and no substance. Now, he also gets to meet this really street wise black girl who really takes care of him although he offers her nothing much in return and there is no obvious explanation why she seems to like this idiot who is not even particularly nice to her. According to some other reviews of this film, they somehow seem to help each other but this is strange because nothing in their lives is going anywhere. If you like that sort of thing and films without plot, dialog, likable characters or anything of interest to speak of, then this film is for you, otherwise best to avoid.

6 out of 17 people found the following review useful:

Pointless

Author: djdiabolikal from United States
19 December 2007

*** This review may contain spoilers ***

This movie was completely pointless. It had no moral, no climax, no resolution, no anything. It was well acted, and I found myself interested in what would happen to the characters, only nothing does. They are really no different then they are at the start. All the classroom scenes are the same, it's like he takes 5 classes to make a simple point. Opposites, and how they push against each other to create change, is the supposed metaphor for this picture, except there is no pushing tension, and as far as I can tell nothing changes. I take that back the only thing that changes is that the teacher is unable to effect the girls life in a profound enough manner as to prevent her from becoming a drug dealer, oh wait he DIDN'T change her life. I think this movie is somehow meant to disturb us, like it's so hard to come to grips with the idea that all drug addicts aren't all black, and from the ghetto and broken homes. This movie is suppose to open you eyes to the truth that middle class white people can end up on drugs. WOW I never knew that was possible. The teacher and the girl had a good dynamic, but again there is now real suspense or tension to their relationship, there are slight hints that maybe people think the relationship is wrong, but nothing comes of it or the relationship. Every time you think something is going to get serious and the climax will come, the plot manages to just keep going in this straight boring line. I was like OK, here go when he confronted the drug dealer about the girl, but then the drug dealer, who is clearly a nice guy, offers him a drink. Probably the worst thing to me about this movie is how it seems to have a very liberal view on drugs. There is only one scene where the drugs he takes seems to have a negative impact on his life, when he goes to the other teachers house and almost rapes her, other than that the worst that happens is he talks about brainy topics to the dumb sluts he picks up at the bar. Then after all the non-suspense the movie just ends out of nowhere, probably the worst end to a movie I have ever seen. I only give this movie 2 stars because like I said, I do think the acting was pretty good.

4 out of 15 people found the following review useful:

watch out for the hand-held camera!

Author: jonnyss from United States
30 October 2006

after reading the reviews, i was eager to see this film, so i was quite disappointed when i had to walk out. after 45 minutes, mostly spent looking at my knees and peeking up occasionally, the nausea and headache became too great.

i understand that only about 30% of film-goers get seasick from hand-held cameras, but, hey, i suppose the other 70% will get a different impression of the film. some movies use a hand-held camera to follow a running character or to show the view out of a moving car. this film uses a shaky camera to watch a man sitting on a couch.

in addition the audio was rather difficult to understand in places, so when i was looking at my knees, i could not understand all the dialogue. sorry! i hear it's a good film if you're able to watch it.

11 out of 15 people found the following review useful:

Biggest Let Down of the Year

Author: Hint523 from USA
16 May 2007

Like The New World last year, this movie was the biggest let down of the year. Here's why:

First of all, the premise was intriguing, and I wanted to see this movie really badly. While watching it, I kept saying that it would get better soon, that the premise was still building. But as the clock ticked, nothing was happening. It's about a guy who's a teacher that snorts as well, and what he does. However, he just hangs around, and doesn't do anything. At the end a bit of a resolution happens, but it isn't really anything. While Shareeka Epps, the young actress in the film, looks like she has potential, she is given few lines and all she does is WATCH her teacher get worse and ask him to stop futilely.

Finally it ended and I knew I didn't enjoy. Then it took me a second: what is the title about? Nobody is named Nelson, nobody gets put in a Half Nelson, and it seems off. People claim it is a metaphor for the character's situation, which in my opinion makes no sense because all his problems are self inflicted. That doesn't make sense.

Skip this one, it's a let down, and a movie that didn't need to be made.

Š-DR-Films Mewdiks -10

17/10/2014 00:46 par tellurikwaves

*

*

The True Nature of Sacrifice

Author: Ali_Catterall from London, England
1 September 2006
 

*** This review may contain spoilers ***

Prior to this release, Neil LaBute had this to say about the 1973 original: "It's surprising how many people say it's their favorite soundtrack. I'm like, come on! You may not like the new one, but if that's your favorite soundtrack, I don't know if I *want* you to like my film."

Neil, a word. You might want to sit down for this too; as Lord Summerisle says, shocks are so much better absorbed with the knees bent. See, Neil, the thing about the original, is that Paul Giovanni's soundtrack is one of the most celebrated things about it. The filmmakers themselves consider it a virtual musical. Along with Richard and Danny Thompson, and Bert Jansch, it practically kick-started the 1970s Folk New Wave. To undermine it is akin to imagining Jaws without John Williams. Or The Buddy Holly Story without Buddy Holly. The result's one of the most breathtakingly arrogant, pointless remake of a British cult classic since Sly Stallone's Get Carter.

The original had apparently left Nicolas Cage "disturbed for about two weeks." So disturbed, during that fortnight's window, that he pitched the idea of re-imagining one of the most nuanced films about inter-faith struggle ever devised to a writer-director previously known for his wholly unsubtle depictions of male chauvinism. It's like some parlor game: what would you get if Sam Peckinpah took on Bambi? Or Gaspar "Irreversible" Noe remade Love, Actually?(Actually, I'd quite like to see that). Unfortunately, someone took this parlor game seriously: All LaBute's succeeded in doing is ripping out the original's guts while saddling it with his own gormless Sex War preoccupations.

After failing to rescue a little girl and her mum from a fatal car crash, Cage's highway patrolman spirals into a medicated torpor. Then he receives a letter from ex-fiancée Willow Woodward (this one trades on name-homages for kudos), now living on the private island community of Summersisle – that extra 's' stands for 'superfluous' – and wants Edward to help locate missing daughter Rowan.

Summersisle, it transpires, is a female-dominated joint, conceived as a haven for oppressed womenfolk and refugees from the Salem witch trials. Here, the matriarchs observe the Olde ways, and the few males are near-mute breed-mules. It's like Lilith Fair on a grand scale. Summersisle's main export is honey – a symbolic and literal headache for Edward, as he's allergic to bees. "Beekeepers!" cries Edward. "They seem to be everywhere on this island!" Well, that's probably because Summersisle's main export is honey.

While making his investigations, Edward overhears of an oncoming Mayday ritual called "the time of death and rebirth". He discovers the previous year's crop failed; nearly dies from bee stings; and eventually comes to the conclusion (a conclusion which admittedly couldn't be more obvious if the locals had tattooed a timetable of events on the back of his hands) that Rowan will be burnt alive in a pagan rite to ensure a bountiful harvest. He also meets the Queen Bee of the hive, Sister Summersisle (Burstyn), who has her own plans for him involving the eponymous Wicker Man: "The drone must die."

First, the good news: any concerns Cage would be airlifted from the Wicker Man's flaming jaws at the last minute by a fleet of black CIA helicopters can be laid to rest: he toast. That's about it for the good news. "This is a story whose chapters were carefully written" intones Burstyn with sublime irony. Though retaining the basic cat-and-mouse premise (and credits typography), what's left subjects the original to a scorched-earth policy.

Crucial to Shaffer's original screenplay was that his Christian copper, in accordance with ritual, came to the island of his own free will – and most importantly, was a virgin; the perfect sacrifice. In reducing matters to a sexual, as opposed to a religious power-struggle, LaBute presents the flimsiest of qualifiers for a harvest sacrifice. By the time Cage has worked out he was the bait, you honestly couldn't care less.

And Cage is one of the very worst things in this; a lumbering, drawling donkey – an arsewit whose tongue seems just slightly too big for his mouth. "Goddamit" he moans after he hallucinates a drowned Rowan, with all the mental torment of a man who's set his morning alarm clock half-an-hour too early. One hopes it's his character's frequent reliance on pills that has reduced him to this state – alternately fatigued, then full of preppy, overbearing vim. If so, it's a fine portrayal of an undistinguished IQ addled with anti-depressants. If not…it doesn't bear thinking about. As Willow, the saucer-eyed Beahan is similarly dreadful, presenting her lines as if in competition with Cage for the…most…half-hearted…delivery. While Burstyn entirely lacks the mercurial menace to convince. Who's afraid of Naomi Wolf?

Every element that made the original great – the lovingly detailed depictions of folk customs, the ingenious score, the dialogue (Lord Summerisle's majestic "You did it beautifully!" has been replaced with the rather less attractive "You did it excellently!" Whoah, dude!) – have been substituted for a meandering battle-of-the-sexes thriller with occasional crash-bang wallop. Namely, walloping women; this is a LaBute flick, after all. Cage's Sister Beech bashing is just one of the more embarrassing episodes; impotent little men will be hooting with glee at how them uppity hippie chicks finally got what was comin' to 'em, hyuk hyuk.

The closing coda sees the whole rotten mess collapsing under the weight of genre cliché: in a bar, two guys run into a couple of Summersisle maidens on shore leave, flirty-fishing for fresh martyrs. At the moment of their successful pick-up, you half expect the women to turn round and give an exaggerated wink and a thumbs up to the camera.

One more thing: keen credit watchers may have noticed that films sporting an unusually high producer count (anything up to 10) tend to be Not Much Cop. The Wicker Man has 18 producers in total.

469 out of 640 people found the following review useful:

The Worst Movie I've EVER Seen

Author: bshopdan from PA
1 September 2006

This movie is the biggest waste of nine dollars that I've spent in a very, very long time. If you knew how often I went to the movies you'd probably say, that's hard to imagine, but never-the-less, it's true! After seeing the trailer for this movie, I knew that I had to see it! If you're a fan of horror, mystery, and suspense, why wouldn't you? The trailer is nothing less than intriguing and exciting; unfortunately, the movie is none of these.

From the cinematography, to the script, to the acting, this movie is a complete flop. If you're reading this, planning to go to the movie expecting some thrills, mystery, action, horror, or anything other than a waste of an hour and forty-five minutes I'm afraid you are in for disappointment.

"Why is it so bad," you might be asking yourself. Let me tell you. The movie was neither mysterious nor suspenseful. Nothing about the movie made me the least bit "on edge," frightened, or curious. The script was at best laughable. There were numerous times throughout the film where the dialogue was just so ridiculous I began to write it off as comic relief only to find out a few seconds later that it wasn't. The acting was absolutely dreadful. I like Nicholas Cage but this was a miss. Without exception, every performance in this movie was incredibly below average. The cinematography was awful with not one moment of suspense or mystique. Finally, the story is completely transparent. You can see the end of this movie coming a mile away.

I am not usually a very harsh critic. Frankly, when I go to see a comedy I want to laugh and when I go to see a mystery/suspense/horror, I just want to be surprised. This movie was boring, poorly acted, poorly written, and an overwhelming disappointment. Do yourself a favor and go see something else.

433 out of 613 people found the following review useful:

The biggest waste of 2 hours of my life...

Author: himebishojo from United States
1 September 2006

The Wicker Man. I am so angry that I cannot write a proper comment about this movie.

The plot was ridiculous, thinly tied together, and altogether-just lame. Nicolas Cage...shame on you! I assumed that since you were in it, that it would be at least decent. It was not.

I felt like huge parts of the movie had been left on the cutting room floor, and even if it's complete-the movie was just outlandish and silly.

At the end you're left mouth agape, mind befuddled and good taste offended. I have never heard so many people leave a theater on opening day with so much hatred. People were complaining about it in small groups in the mall, four floors down from the theater near the entrance. It's that bad.

I heard it compared to : Glitter, American Werewolf in Paris and Gigli. My boyfriend was so mad he wouldn't even talk about it.

Grrrr!

358 out of 497 people found the following review useful:

Time that you will never get back.

Author: (mathesonmoore) from Canada
31 August 2006

Unfortunately, this movie does no credit whatsoever to the original. Nicholas Cage, fairly wooden as far as actors go, imbues the screen with a range of skill from, non-plussed to over the top. The supporting cast is no better.

The plot stays much the same as the original in terms of scene progression but is far worse. Not enough detail is given to allow the audience to by into what is being sold. It turns out it's just a bill of poor goods. Disbelief cannot be suspended, nor can a befit of a doubt be given. The only saving aspect of this film is that it is highly visual, as the medium requires, and whomever scouted the location should be commended.

There was much laughter in the audience and multiple boos, literally, at the end.

Disappointed! Wait for the original to come on television, pour a whiskey and enjoy.

294 out of 406 people found the following review useful:

Definitely pass on this movie

Author: xiaoyuboo from United States
1 September 2006

I haven't seen the original, but just wanted to drop a quick note to anyone who happens to scroll down this far: Wicker Man is the worst movie I've seen this year. Maybe even in two years. I wish I could ask the theater for my money back or turn back time to warn myself not to see it.

I'll give it two positive nods: The sarcasm of Cage's character at least got some laughs from me and the scenery of the island was beautiful. Sorry, that's it. Here come the jeers. The movie's plot is only propelled forward because other characters won't give Cage any straight answers--and he puts up with this!!! How this could go on for over an hour of my time(much less days in the movie) is beyond me.

Not to mention that the plot is full of holes. You leave the theater with enough unanswered questions to fill a library. How anyone could read this script and think, "Yes, people should pay $11 to see this shady outline of what a film should look like" is beyond me.

Do not go see this flick. Or even rent it on DVD.

253 out of 371 people found the following review useful:

One of the worst films I've ever seen

Author: kitty harvey from United Kingdom
1 September 2006

This has got to be one of the worst fillums I've ever seen and I've seen a few. It is slow, boring, amateurish - not even consistent within its own simplistic reading of the plot. The actors do not act. I can't blame them - they have been given a script of such utter banality all they can do is trudge through it with a pain behind their eyes which has nothing to do with the evil goings on in SummersIsle.

There is not one moment in this film that rings true - not an honest line nor a single instant where one is moved. The Nicholas Cage character is so badly drawn that one feels not a smidgeon of compassion for him through all his tribulations. I have no doubt that I was seeing a suffering man up there but it was Nicholas Cage fully aware of the fact that he was in the worst movie of his entire career.

201 out of 268 people found the following review useful:

Appalling

Author: simon-champion from United Kingdom
1 September 2006

*** This review may contain spoilers ***

How this film could miss so many of the fascinating, complex and mysterious aspects of the original story or the original movie is truly remarkable. An unbelievably thin and unengaging plot, ankle-deep characterisation/motivation and a really awful soundtrack (replacing tension with vast swathes of noise, replacing the arcane musical references of the original for digitised crashes and roars. Then there are the specific references to the original which are merely "plastered on" over the cracks... Dreadful. In a world where gormless, brain-dead Amerikan remakes of The Italian Job (a tear appears), Get Carter (sobs uncontrollably) and Alfie have desecrated our screens recently, this one takes the proverbial biscuit. Execrable nonsense. How Ellen Burstyn ever got involved is a wonder... Rubbish.

165 out of 238 people found the following review useful:

one of the years worst movies

Author: drummerofgash from United States
2 September 2006

what ever you do do not waste your time on this pointless. movie. A remake that did not need to be retold. Everyone coming out of the theater had the same comments. Worst movie I ever saw. Save your time and money!!!

Nicgolas Cage was biking down hills, swimming in murky water and rolling down hills while being attacked by bees but yet his suit was still perfectly pressed and shirt crisp white until the very last scene.

Although a good cast with Ellen Bernstein and Cage the acting was just as unbelievable as the movie itself. It is amazing how good actors can do such bad movies. Don't they get a copy of the script first. If you still have any interest at all in seeing the movie at the very least wait for it to come out on DVD.

119 out of 157 people found the following review useful:

Awful, barely coherent, vague rehash of an all-time classic

Author: the_unutterable from United Kingdom
1 September 2006

*** This review may contain spoilers ***

This film was terrible. OK, my favourite film is 'The Wicker Man' (1973), so I was always bound to be a little biased.

The plot rambles along, throwing out enough of the key elements of the original to make the term 'remake' highly dubious. (He's not a virgin, but IS allergic to bees. WOW!) So many things happen that make no sense and are unexplained, which I'm afraid Mr LaBute does not a horror movie make. (How are two people we clearly saw blown up in a car at the start alive and well at the end of the film?) Cage looks haggard and bewildered throughout, and his character is prone to calling out "Rowan!?" at the slightest noise. The 'nods' to the original are irritating as they come off as tacky rather than as intelligent homage. For example, certain incidents mirror the original (The girl falling out of a cupboard pretending to be dead when Woodward/Cage is searching the island) and several lines of dialogue are plucked straight from Anthony Schaffers original screenplay and shoehorned in.

I'm sure others will provide a better and more detailed analysis than this, I really can't be bothered to write any more about this film. It lacks any kind of substance. Throw it on the scrap heap with all the other remakes that have sullied the good names of the films they were 'based' on (in this case very loosely).

93 out of 133 people found the following review useful:

Neil Labute should have his member slathered in honey and laced with bees (Spolier Alert)....

Author: blakndn from United States
2 September 2006

Everyone else who has commented negatively about this film have done excellent analysis as to why this film is so bloody awful. I wasn't going to comment, but the film just bugs me so much, and the writer/director in particular. So I must toss in my hat to join the naysayers.

I saw the original "Wicker Man" and really loved the cornucopia of music, sensuality, paganism in a modern world, and the clash of theological beliefs. This said, I am not part of the crowd that thinks remakes of great movies shouldn't be done. For example, I liked the original 1950's "Invasion of the Body Snatchers", but equally enjoyed the 1978 remake. Both films can stand on their own. Another example is "The Thing". The original, as campy as it looks compared to today's standards, has a lot to be proud of in the 1982 remake with Kurt Russell (my all time favorite horror movie). So that small minority of people who like "The Wicker Man" re-make can not accuse me of dissing this piece of crap just because it's a re-make.

This film solidified for me Neil LaBute's sexism and misogynistic tendencies. It also made me wonder how executives, wanting to make a serious thriller, would green light a product that is so anti-female. There are too many scenes of Cage hitting women just because he's frustrated with them thwarting his investigation of a missing girl. would he react like this off the island in other cases where suspects aren't forthcoming? The original created a society in which men and women are equal participants in a Goddess based religion. The threat to the main character came from everyone, male and female. There was no sexual hierarchy.

The metaphor of bees, drones etc was a bit heavy handed and convenient ("The drone must die!"), especially when Cage's character has bee allergies. I kept wondering why the men on the island didn't fight back and use mere physicality to stop these women from treating them like grunts. These were not women with special supernatural powers, and half of them seemed to be pregnant, the other half old and fat, and the rest girls and thin blonde waifs, so if the men really wanted to escape they could do what most men do when they hate women. Physically dominate them. There didn't seem to be any guns or weapons beyond cutting tools to hold them if they were unhappy. But if they were content being drones, why make them unable to speak? They could be used as a threat to Cage because they will defend the community. They are drones because Neil LaBute seems to believe that a society ran by women would leave men castrated. (That movie was made already. "The Stepford Wives" anyone?) Classic symptoms from men who are afraid of what may happen if women got their sh*t together and were truly equal citizens.

The problem with the man-hating female society is that it makes uninteresting movie viewing and creates unintentional humor when Cage starts knocking women out. I belief LaBute should've left the society an egalitarian one, kept the sexuality and uninhibited lasciviousness, and pushed buttons of discomfort in regards to the children on that island. No one likes pedophiles or children to be sexually exploited. So how would a cop react if he saw lewd acts performed by adults with children around? There would be a logical mental leap that these children are abused, thus, an urgency created to save the missing child and get help for all the children. LaBute has said he created the fiancé and daughter story thread to give Cage's character an incentive to search. I don't think you need that. Any child abused will make an adult react to save them. The irony of course would be that the child Cage "saves" ultimately brings him death.

The dialogue was contrived and campy. The whole third act was hilarious. The audience I saw it with guffawed (and later booed at the end). I just thought the movie started off wrong when the letter arrived written in the fancy handwriting and all the flashbacks cutting into to show how wounded Cage is. We don't need that. Just show him arriving on the island for an investigation of a missing child. Most of us in America have seen "Law & Order" and other cop procedurals. We come into the movie as if we are Cage's partner solving a mystery.

So much potential...wasted. Neil LaBute, stick to talking head pictures for people who enjoy your male angst-ridden plays and flicks of that sort. Stay with your own company of men. Leave the thrillers for people who understand thrillers. Here is your jar of honey. I'll watch that.

Š-DR-Films Mewdiks -9

17/10/2014 00:32 par tellurikwaves

*

*

complete waste of time

Author: mark fraunhofer from New York, United States
6 June 2012
 

Normally any self respecting actor asks "Why?", not one of the actors in this complete waste of time asked this question once. They took the money and did what they were told, busy trying to look good while at it. This is a perfect example of a production that is about nothing but burning money. Starting with the writing, full of holes and completely unrealistic dialogue, but then good actors could fix that, these guys were in it only to get paid and made no effort whatsoever to raise the value of the production, so many times they just stood there waiting for the "Cut!". No one in this film believes in their character, it's all staged, shallow, unbelievable and stiff. I have many questions after watching this, all of them begin with "Why?" none of them is answered within. It's not enough to put things together by throwing money and names at it, this thing has no vision and doesn't create anything that would resemble a reality to submerse yourself in. Why would you waste your time watching this?

6 out of 11 people found the following review useful:

The dumbest script ever...an offense to our intelligence

Author: adelinne_p from Romania
6 February 2012

'nuff said in my summary! Although,I'd like to add something:Richard Gere-what were you thinking when you signed on to do this mess of a movie??? Stupid movie for people who were born yesterday and had never seen a Hollywood movie!I felt as if I were retarded watching this awful s...of a movie! Conclusion: please,don't waste your time and intelligence by watching this...1 hour and 38 minutes it can seem as 20 hours and 30 f... minutes!

I always had an admiration for Gere as an actor...just last night I saw 'Primal Fear' and was drawn into his performance...only to watch this mess the next day. I actually had confidence in this famous name,knowing about his past work.

Failed to hold our attention

Author: grandmastersik from Finland
27 July 2014

I watched this with a family member the other night and she was bored after 10 minutes. I figured that the pace would pick up and with the screenwriters' previous credits, had much higher hopes for it, but come the 30 minute mark, I was incredibly bored too.

Making a decent spy film, to me, seems to hinge on one - or a combination of - three things: great action, intelligent suspense and/or dramatic characters. The problem with this film is that the characters (or actors - take your pick) didn't bring us into their world and the action was clearly held back to play on the suspense, which, unfortunately, was pretty much void.

We're expected to believe that with all of today's crime scene nous and technology, nobody can tell the difference between a wire and knife cut, as the film's resident expert, Topher Grace, tells of how the killer doesn't cut from left-to-right, but upwards, and the reveal of Gere's real identity so early in seemed to make watching the remainder kind of pointless.

Maybe I missed something? Perhaps this big reveal was part of a mega twist near the end? Unfortunately, with 6 film channels to choose from, something this dull won't see two people in a room together reach the conclusion, and where I may go back later (having recorded it) to see if the film got any better, flicking over to the news on another station did prove vastly superior viewing.

36 out of 51 people found the following review useful:

This plot hole sums up the whole film.

Author: matt-lamellama from United Kingdom
17 January 2012

*** This review may contain spoilers ***

"Plot holes The logic by which Agent Geary "proves" that Shepherdson (Richard Gere) is Cassius is flawed. The "proof" is that Gere is in every crime scene photo, thus proving "Cassius comes back to the crime scene". But as Gere was in fact posing as investigating CIA agent, supposedly chasing Cassius, it was not only normal, but essential for him to go to all the crime scenes of Cassius' murders. "

This film is dumb. It has the budget and the actors but it can't make up for the dumb script. The actors performances were disappointing, probably because they couldn't bring themselves to believe and immerse themselves in such a lame plot.

22 out of 29 people found the following review useful:

Slow, clichéd, predictable, poorly executed

Author: Roger Foss from Norway
20 January 2012

*** This review may contain spoilers ***

Boy, how Richard Gere's career has dived since the days of American Gigolo and Internal Affairs. Yes, occasionally he shows up in a fairly good movie like Hachiko or Unfaithful, but then the superior performances are from other actors (Diane Lane, in that particular case).

This movie really shows the one-dimensional acting Gere does when given a poorly written script. Why he even bothers is mystifying.

Anyway, the movie is about Paul Sheperdson, a retired CIA agent played by Richard Gere, that once hunted down and killed 6 assassins of a group of 7. This was back in the 80s. He never got the last guy, and suddenly chose to retire.

Now 20 years later, he's asked to help track down the one who got away by working with a rookie FBI agent.

**Minor Spoiler alert** Early on, the film dispenses with mystery by revealing that Gere the retired CIA agent really is the escaped assassin himself. With that out of the way, the rest of the movie is about the rookie FBI agent getting closer and closer to finding out who the assassin is, and about Gere the assassin / CIA agent killing a few people here and there. **End Spoiler**

Of course, there is another twist towards the end. I won't say, but it feels contrived. Besides, by the time it comes you've long given up connecting to the characters, so who cares?

Problems: The major problems with this movie are: the script is poor, with gaping holes and poorly developed characters. There is absolutely no chance in hell you will ever care for any of the characters. The story is dull - you've seen it a thousand times before, and sometimes a thousand times better. The ex-spy / assassin theme doesn't resonate with anything on anybody's mind in our world, so nobody cares what happens in the movie at any point.

Direction: The film contains a few flashbacks to the 80s, where we get to see Richard Gere play Paul Sheperdson as a young agent. Except they FORGOT to make him look younger! For sure, Gere the actor looks incredible for his age (63, he's born in 1949) with his gray, full hair. But you wouldn't expect the CIA operative he plays to have the same hair color 20 years ago, would you?

The action sequences are not very exciting. Gere wielding his The acting is very bad. Topher Grace as the (supposedly brilliant) rookie FBI Agent is seriously miscast, while Richard Gere needs to ditch the action genre. Martin Sheen is there, and does an OK job I guess. No other characters will make any impression on you.

Conclusion: It doesn't suck completely, it just isn't worth your while and there are more exciting things to do.

5 out of 5 people found the following review useful:

A Very Disappointing Movie

Author: edshullivan from Canada Toronto Ontario
26 August 2013

I do enjoy a good action film with a CIA plot, however this film was filled with far too many disappointing performances. Most noticeably was the irritating musical score which I am sure was intended to keep us in suspense. Rather than keep me in suspense, I found the music's constant rise in volume the movies failed attempt to try and keep the audiences' interest from waning. Unfortunately it didn't work.

I am a big fan of Richard Gere's body of work and again I was very disappointed in his performance. "Richard, what were you thinking?"

Now let's talk about the plot. There is a Russian assassin known to the CIA by the name "Cassius". Two CIA agents the retired Paul Shepherdson (Richard Gere) who is un-retired by his former boss Tom Highland, (Martin Sheen), and a rookie CIA agent who has never been in the field Ben Geary (Topher Grace). Cassius is suspected to be dead, but when a U.S. senator is murdered the CIA believes the murder was committed by the phantom Russian assassin Cassius as evidenced by his trademark murder style of slashing the neck.

Ben Geary the rookie CIA agent wrote his thesis on Cassius and explains to his veteran partner Shepherdson that he knows everything there is to know about Cassius and the murder trademark of the senator's slashed throat is the work of Cassius, thus the two agents are assigned to find Cassius and eliminate him. Well.... this sounds like a reasonable plot to work with and one would think the next 90 minutes of action and suspense should be interesting. Unfortunately, not.

I watched the movie with my wife and we both kept looking at each other and questioning the sequence of events and the plausibility of a veteran CIA agent as Shepherdson (Gere) being such a terrible shot with a gun that he cannot shoot to kill a Russian spy who is only 15 to 20 feet in front of him. Also, for a rookie CIA agent Geary (Topher Grace) who wrote his thesis on the Russian spy Cassius, and is supposedly a genius on Cassius's Modus Operandi why he couldn't spot his new partner Shepherdson, in historical pictures of previous murder scenes in not one, not two, not three. but NUMEROUS murder scenes that the CIA investigated previously but were unsolved? Please!!!!

It is just one of those movies that you expect the story line and actors to be a lot more believable, and the musical score not to be the driver trying to entice a sense of urgency and endangerment.

This is not a movie with any value and I would compare it to the feeling you get with buying a knock off product of a name brand product. You get what you pay for, and I am sure Topher Grace's salary in his next feature film will be commensurate with his (lack of) box office draw for The Double. Save your money folks.

5 out of 7 people found the following review useful:

A Red Dragon Double

Author: thesar-2 from United States
26 February 2012

*** This review may contain spoilers ***

Well, at least The Double fulfilled my need for wanting to watch an international spy/suspense/thriller last night. Too bad it wasn't really that good of a one.

It's one of those movies that screams: "Wait for it…wait for it…waaaaait….BAM! There's our surprise! Not satisfied? We're gonna throw in another shocker…wait for it…" Mercifully, the most obvious revelation is revealed 20 minutes in, because nothing tips my chair like knowing what's coming in the first five minutes (like this movie) and having to wade through almost two hours of "twists/turns" to get to what we knew all along.

Believe it or not, this wasn't a direct to video release. Someone had enough faith in this film to release it to theatres in 2011, albeit limited, and someone further believed in it enough to market it hard on DVD. But, here's the problem: it's trying hard to be similar to Red Dragon. Only, that's not a movie I would like to imitate.

Let's see if the synopsis sounds vaguely familiar: Yet another EX-CIA agent – why is it always "This is my last job before retirement" or "You know I quit, I can't go back, I won't go back, well okay, here I come"? – is called back into the line of duty once a Senator gets killed with the same MO as a previously-thought-dead Soviet Super-Assassin Spy. Yet another pairing has to take place between that Ex-CIA agent and a yet another younger book-smart unwanted partner. Together, the yet another good-cop/bad-cop pair track the assassin known as "Cassius" when he could be closer than they think.

In all seriousness, it wasn't a downright terrible film. It was well shot, the acting wasn't great, but not atrocious and if you leave your brain at the door and forget about the 30+ movies this mimics, you might have a good time.

6 out of 10 people found the following review useful:

Ridiculous.

Author: tpaladino from United States
8 February 2012

I knew in the first ten minutes that this was a bad movie, bit I tried hard to make it through the end. I was unsuccessful.

It tries to be a cool spy flick, but completely fails on nearly every level. It's just done wrong. The dialog is hackneyed and unrealistic, as are the situations that the characters are put into. I just couldn't suspend my disbelief at any point long enough to get into the story.

Topher Grace is terrible in this. He's simply not believable as an FBI agent, even one that's a snotty know-it-all with a masters degree. Richard Gere and Martin Sheen tried their best to work with the material given, but to no avail.

Shame too, because other than Topher Grace, there's a solid cast and a half-decent premise. It's completely let down however by sub-par writing and consistently poor directorial choices.

Not worth watching, even on Netflix. There are plenty of WAY more interesting films in this genre to waste time with this turkey.

1 out of 1 people found the following review useful:

Sorry Richard but you're not convincing anyone

Author: newton_kerry from United Kingdom
26 July 2013

I was hoping for much more from this film Richard Greer usually plays his parts well but I think he isn't cut out as a grizzled retired CIA agents, he just lacks conviction. His character was straight out of any old movie with the same role except he was very bland and almost one dimensional.

His only saving grace was that he appears to have a soft side for his side kick Geary which later becomes clear the reason why.

The plot lacks pace especially cutting back and forth with flash backs that don't make sense, and to be honest I didn't think added anything to the telling of the story in fact I felt spoilt it to the point I predicted the ending with the exception of one twist.

The ending is surprising but doesn't really explain Geary's theory about Cassius. There are a lot of holes in the plot and the identity of Cassius is revealed early on, the question then is do you carry on to find out why he does what he does, or turn it off. I opted to carry on watching but only halfheartedly.

Shame I like Richard Greer but not convinced he's cut out play this particular role.

3 out of 5 people found the following review useful:

More like a high school production

Author: Ted Gottis from United States
29 April 2012

I am a Richard Gere fan and have high hopes for Topher Grace, but this film did neither of them justice.

The movie has a promising premise. Cold War Soviet spy on the move. Soon, however the staged scenarios and attempts at surprise fall so short they become comical. I had to laugh when Martin Sheen is buying coffee and is standing conspicuously to the left as if, yes, Richard Gere pops in the space on the right to a "startled" Martin Sheen. The whole movie was done the same way. You knew what was going to happen before it happened.

Without continuing to bash this film, I would ask Hollywood to give their viewers a little credit. Make the plot and sequence surprises actual surprises, not ones that are contrived and unbelievable. Remember, we want to believe.

Š-DR- Films Mewdikks -8

16/10/2014 22:19 par tellurikwaves

Une "comédie" new style de VERY BAD THINGS le talent en moins...Pénible

*

*

Genuinely one of the worst movies ever

Author: usmhot from Dublin, Ireland
1 December 2013
 

I use IMDb a lot for reviews and ratings as much as for info about the movies. In fact for years I've been using it as a non-member. It took this unbelievably awful movie to make me sign in and write my first review ever. There is nothing redeemable about this rubbish. The characters are awful, the acting horrendous, the directing abysmal, the plot ridiculous. This is supposed to be a modern, funky British slapstick with a good dollop of Australian blunt humour, but what it turns out to be is a pathetic, amateurish, cringe-worthy waste of film. Whatever you do, never watch this movie. Every copy needs to be wiped and all records of it expunged.

20 out of 45 people found the following review useful:

Awful

Author: toni-229 from Australia
30 January 2012

Having been a major fan of Priscilla and of Death at a Funeral I had some high hopes (justified I think) so this film A Few Best Men was a total surprise. Not a good one unfortunately. Acting was ordinary or below par for most parts. The bride was especially forgettable. Gags not funny, I am afraid I did not laugh once. It seemed to be trying so hard to be another Death at a funeral - to use a wedding was lacking imagination. So bad I actually felt compelled to write my first ever review!

Apart from the Blue Mountain views there is little to recommend the film.

Overdone, not a shred of originality, dull, too long, I am not sure what else to say to fill the required 10 lines of review. You guys are great talents, please don't let this film be all you can deliver to us.

This film ended up being predictable, boring and disappointing. Very Disappointing

16 out of 41 people found the following review useful:

A few actors? A few good jokes? A few good anything? No.

Author: nickapopolis87 (nmrenwick@gmail.com) from Melbourne, Australia
3 February 2012

We should be ashamed of our film industry for turning out dreck like this. Poorly written, poorly acted, exploitative and just cringe-worthy. Every stereotype about Australia, men, women, gay and lesbians, the rich, the poor and everyone else was abused in this 'comedy'. I must put a disclaimer in that I walked out of this cinematic abortion after only 30 minutes. I have never done that. My hatred was compounded by the laughter from the everyone else in the cinema. Clearly this is a lowest common denominator movie and the clientèle had chosen wisely. I don't know why I am complaining, I knew it would be this bad. The ads made that clear, but there was nothing else showing that my friend and I hadn't seen. Oh I am mad! I am furious that this movie has made 2.5 million in its first week, yet J. Edgar, a truly masterful film, doesn't crack the top 10.

8 out of 36 people found the following review useful:

See in desperation only, or just don't

Author: bassrourke from Australia
26 January 2012

Two redeeming features of this vulgar, racist and awkward mess are the beautiful locations around the Blue mountains of New South Wales and national treasure Olivia Newton-John in a very different role. Don't be fooled though as the Xanadu & Grease superstar is simply having fun and we're invited. The stupid movie is not an Australian Hangover that the trailers may suggest, more a bad trip of a different kind. Xavier Samuel is a world away from his Twilight persona as a backpacker returning to London only to inform his idiotic mates he's proposed to Mia, an Aussie girl from a straight laced political family. So it's down under they go to drink themselves into oblivion. A wedding disaster movie with no decorum and even as a genre picture this does not make one laugh, rather cringe and look for the exit door. Not even the lovely Rebel Wilson, who can just appear and be funny is on screen enough to make me give this an extra star. Unless seeing a sheep being violated, twice is amusing to you, do not bother wasting your money on this rubbish.

9 out of 52 people found the following review useful:

A Bad Example of Humour for the Masses.

Author: chrisliz57 from Australia
4 December 2011

I hate it when a promo for a film depicts it as hilarious when there is hardly a trace of original humour to be seen.

This film is a "dog". It tries to capture the essence of 4 Weddings and a Funeral using many of the charismatic qualities that Death at a Funeral displayed so well and Failed.

Olivier Newton John really does look exceptional for a near 70 Year Old but surely here agent could allow her to finish her acting career on a high. Like Xanadu she has turned up in a "fizzer"; and she doesn't even do what she does best, sing, in this one.

Actually, perhaps I'm not qualified to discuss this film; I looked at my watch 50 minutes after the opening titles and with a relieved sigh from my wife decided it's inane dialogue and "try hard" slapstick humour was taking too much of my time. I left.

If you would be happy outlaying $$$ to see this co Australian & British product then try it for yourself. Don't say I didn't warn you !!

17 out of 35 people found the following review useful:

Just don't!

Author: demigod_2000 from Australia
8 February 2012

This film isn't worth watching it for free. The characters were bland, especially the four main guys who apart from some small gimmicky characterization were practically written the same. The few secondary cast members suffered even greater.

The jokes led no where. It was almost like watching a 2 hour sketch show with mediocre jokes. Things like having one of the mains look like Hitler, or getting stuck wearing a a bondage mask etc., were built up and then given a one minute pay off and then forgotten about for the rest of the film. It felt like the filmmakers were constantly stuffing some set of events in my face and saying, "See... hilarious, right?"

To make things worse, the entire film seemed like a love letter to Australia, as if to squeeze every piece of Australian nostalgia and cultural icons they could.

Olivia Newton-John's character was the only one to have any form of comedy to actually have a pay off and carry through. I'm actually left wondering why any of the profile actors in this film would have taken the job apart from a pay check.

Australian Film Industry; one step forward, three steps back.

1 out of 5 people found the following review useful:

A Few too Many Fools and a pale pink lady.

Author: richy1024 from United Kingdom
25 September 2012

British comedy does have its pros and cons. Comedy is characteristically used in British gangster movies to lighten the tone or provide an exchange between the characters to express some form of development. On other occasions we are fed with movies such as A Few Best Men, films that are moderately droll in areas but as an entire piece suffer from shoddy acting styles, poor value film making or commonly pitiable story telling. There also seems to be a few conspicuous technological blips where the words inelegantly do not match the movements of the orifice and the waves of sound are that drab, its pitch could have been recorded in a basement. The modern generation of filmmaking sees a vertical lack of comedy due to fact that filmmakers are duplicating what we've seen before or indisputably writers are finding it rather problematic to construct a comedy that we can all cackle at. Much of the hilarity can be rather humdrum as we can see how one circumstance merges into another.

Although the film feels hectic in places and wittingly hires three lead men to cause havoc on stage whilst the groom endeavours to keep his wedding in an orderly trend before his love-at-first sight wife and her senator father turn their backs on him, the film does lack a distinct amount of energy. The on-screen foursome have inadequately attempted to emulate The Hangover campaign with uncivilized comedy including snooping around and interfering with sheep, exhaling cocaine from a politician's counter and a best man's speech that is accompanied by sheer clumsiness as well as being rather unproductive in its tone.

Gone are the days of Kris Marshall carrying the torch for the ghastly television series My Family and Olivia Newton-John's classy performances at her peak, if any remark one would not have reflected the Grease's magnetism of the 'Pink Ladies' leading lady would have steered her towards such haggardness with a posture so puny in front of the camera that all she can rely on is a few bottles of the happy fluid to cart her through the entire tribulation. Did no one care to inform Dean Craig that writing drivel such as Death at a Funeral should not merit another monotonous and defenceless piece including four indolent and infantile shindig poopers? One minuet facet that may give spectators motivation to watch this film is if you find a little stimulus from seeing a fine old marriage cluttered in disarray regardless of how drab the sequence of events are.

6 out of 20 people found the following review useful:

waste of time if you want smart laughs

Author: peterfaure from Vancouver
20 March 2012

Well, I'll keep this review short and sweet

like many recent Australian and British movies, "A few best men" uses a pretty typical low-brow recipe from the British Isles:

stupid people spend the whole movie getting totally drunk, do even stupider things because of it, and they think it's actually funny or cool...

a recent movie about kids going to some place in Spain to get drunk in the sun (why they even bother traveling beats me), pretty much followed the same recipe.

if that's your idea of humor, great, but personally I think it's boring, meaningless, and something only an alcoholic could sympathize with or actually find funny (the hangover had the original twist of the guys reconstructing what they had done, and already felt tired and boring in the second, this one, and many recent British movies, don't even bother adding twists, drunk and stupid seems to be funny enough)

conclusion: if you enjoy humor that requires a minimum of brain cells, avoid it like the plague

Š-DR- Films Mewdikks -7

16/10/2014 22:03 par tellurikwaves

Not a hit, so run...

Author: Tony Bush from United Kingdom
25 December 2012
 

*** This review may contain spoilers ***

Loutish, unfunny and relatively tedious comedy thriller that is devoid of both comedy and thrills. You won't laugh, you won't smile and you probably will not ever be on the edge of your seat. It is relentlessly thick-eared, flat and monotone. The cast are tedious and plastic, lacking anything approaching personality and depth. The chases are bland, uninvolving and unspectacular and the plot is little more than a clichéd drone of cobbled together circumstances.

A dumb ex wheel-man in witness protection is supported by his dumb federal marshal and his dumb (though supposed to be intelligent) girlfriend. When dumb girlfriend gets a job as some sort of high-flying professor (yeah, I know, beggars belief) in LA dumb ex wheel-man decides to quit witness protection and drive her there in his tricked-out getaway car. Girlfriend's dumb ex-boyfriend rats dumb ex wheel-man out to his dumb ex partners in crime and they are on his tail to get revenge. Throw in a dumb gay traffic cop and his dumb female partner and have them all drive and cavort around on a dumb road trip to a dumb conclusion that includes a guest appearance by Beau Bridges as dumb ex wheel-man's dumb father and what you have ultimately is a movie that epitomises the concept of dumb.

Is there anything redeeming about it? Uh, no, not really. It's just...you've guessed it...dumb. Not a hit, so run.

17 out of 31 people found the following review useful:

Sit and Shun "Hit and Run!"

Author: zardoz-13 from United States
26 August 2012

*** This review may contain spoilers ***

Dax Shepard and his fiancée Kristen Bell co-star in the witless romantic comedy "Hit and Run" that Shepard wrote and co-directed with his pal George Palmer. Palmer and Shepard helmed the video short "Reunited" (2010) as well as the spoof documentary "Brother's Justice." The style of comedy that they espouse mingles dry humor with slapstick. The garrulous characters never cease making asses of themselves. This half-baked buffoonery about a goofy getaway driver in the Witness Relocation Program who shacks up with a brainiac, drop-dead gorgeous, community college professor delivers more run than hit. Nothing about this low-brow, tread-burning, crime melodrama will make you either smile or flinch. The grossest scene resembles something that Sasha Baron Cohen might have removed from one of his offensive comedies. Our hero and heroine are on the run when they check into a motel. They find a sex orgy in their room with participants who are old, fat, and ugly. This tasteless scene qualifies as so gratuitous that the MPAA probably had no choice but to slap "Hit and Run" with an R-rating for nudity. Shepard and Palmer aren't content to show this unsightly scene once but twice for maximum impact. Meantime, you'll lose count of the number of times that the F-word is uttered. The violence remains relatively mild by today's standards. A felon takes a slug in the back with a splash of blood for realism. A man is shown mercilessly slugging another. An assailant smashes our hero's nose with a golf club. Nevertheless, despite their lame-brained humor and lackluster car chases, Shepard and Palmer have assembled a first-class, straight-faced cast that contributes a modicum of hilarity to the antics. Bradley Cooper, Tom Arnold, Kristin Chenoweth, Michael Rosenbaum, and David Koechner run circles around our leads. "Hit and Run" amounts to one long, drawn-out, vehicular chase with no memorable stunts. The biggest stunt involves a dune buggy hurtling "Dukes of Hazard" style over several parked cars. Nothing about the driving will turn your knuckles white and make you gasp, but the automobiles look ultra-cool.

"Hit and Run" opens in a backwater California town named Milton with a community college. Basically, our heroine Annie Bean (Kristen Bell of "Forgetting Sarah Marshall") learns that she is about to be fired from her job as a community college professor. Happily, Annie's potty-mouthed boss, Debby (Kristin Chenoweth of "You, Again"), alerts her about an opening at UCLA where she can land her dream job as the head of a conflict-resolution department. The major drawback for our ambitious heroine is when her tattooed boyfriend, Charlie Bronson (Dax Sheppard of "When In Rome"), divulges his membership in Witness Relocation. Charlie is pretty much condemned to live an eternity in the sleepy little town of Milton because his former partners-in-crime want to track him down and terminate him with extreme prejudice. Eventually, Charlie changes his mind about Witness Protection and pulls the tarp off his jacked-up 1967 Lincoln Continental with suicide doors to usher Annie in style to Los Angeles. Annie's green-eyed, ex-boyfriend, Gil (Michael Rosenbaum of TV's "Smallville"), gets wind of Charlie's real identity and sends a message via Facebook to Charlie's number one nemesis. As it turns out, and Annie discovers later, Charlie is really Yul Perrkins. Charlie's father Clint Perrkins (Beau Bridges of "Max Payne") named him after legendary actor Yul Brynner of "The Magnificent Seven." Charlie hated the name Yul so much that he changed it to Charles Bronson. Mind you, Yul wasn't thinking about movie superstar Charles Bronson of "Death Wish" fame, but the notorious British inmate Charles Bronson who is known as the most violent man in British prisons. Naturally, Annie is appalled by these revelations. What she really isn't prepared for the gun-toting trio that come calling on them as they are about to leave for L.A. Alex Dmitri (Bradley Cooper of "The A-Team" in dreadlocks) hates Charlie because Charlie's testimony put him behind bars long enough for a Phillipino prison to rape him. Now, Alex yearns to kill Charlie as much his accomplices Neve Tatum (Joy Bryant of "Spider-Man 2") and Allen (Ryan Hansen of "Friday the 13th"). Predictably, our hero has a savior, bungling U.S. Marshal Randy Anderson (Tom Arnold of "Exit Wounds") who doesn't know where the brakes are on his car. Worse, he has to dodge the bullet that his own gun spits out at him.

"Hit and Run" contains elements of both "True Romance" and "Smokey and the Bandit." The romance between Annie and Charlie and their flight from the desperate villains recalls the predicament that the hero and heroine in "True Romance" confronted. Bradley Cooper's arch villain resembles the bad guy that Christian Slater opposed in "True Romance." The use of a series of careening car chases is the "Smokey and the Bandit" touch. Unfortunately, this low octane, pursuit potboiler conjures up little tension and delivers few thrills. Meantime, the conversations struggle to capture the spontaneous, off-the-cuff Tarantino dialogue. Instead, they wind up sounding nothing less than loquacious. You should sit and shun "Hit and Run."

14 out of 27 people found the following review useful:

Slow Painful Drag

Author: ajaymenon0 from India
4 September 2012

I tried hard to like this movie, cause I voluntarily took part in the arduous process of paying my money in hopes of this waste of celluloid to be a surprise good flick. But unfortunately, the movie drags and drags with sparse car chases. What fails here ?

1. Conversations to bore you to death:

Tarantino had the knack of putting in random conversations to build up to the scene which concludes a chapter in tightly packed script. Kevin Smith did that with his movies by riding along the movies with an engrossing topic of a conversation. This movie tries that. Fails miserably. Tries again...goes to over the top levels of face palm. Why? At some point it seemed like the actors were just asked to talk without a script. It was really painful.

2. Car Chase? Well thats it! :

There were probably two car chases in the movie which lacked every thing which a car chase should be. Plus the shaky cam thing is going way too far. Personally the whole car chases standards have been pushed way up by 'The French Connection' and 'Ronin'. Even 'Gone in 60 seconds' had some moments. This one fails to generate any sort of impact. There are no awe filled moments at all. It was worse than watching someone play a game of need for speed.

3. Whats with Tom Arnold?

Why was he even there in the movie? He was trying to be this fumbling idiot character. But he just grows more annoying by the minute. Some parts didn't even add up to anything. What the hell was with the bowling ball. Whats with him being gay on the app. What the hell was the point ?

4. Gay jokes:

The app to get hand jobs...the whole awkward discussion about being butt f**ked. Nothing...let me repeat...none of that was even the least bit funny.

Speaking of gay jokes though...the movie did kinda mentally sodomize me.

15 out of 29 people found the following review useful:

Miss and Run-Away...

Author: forbes-glen from Ireland
1 September 2012

There is no doubt in my mind this movie was miss-titled, it should have been called miss and run away. You know how the rest of this review is going to go.

Unfortunately I probably should explain the movies "plot". I feel kind of wrong having to write it down. Dax Shepard plays Charlie, a guy who's in the witness protection programme. His girlfriend, played by Kirsten Bell has been offered a job opportunity in LA. The trouble is, whoever Charlie ratted out to the cops, are in LA. Wanting the relationship to last Charlie decides to drive his girlfriend to LA. His girlfriends ex, played by the unrecognizable Michael Rosenbaum, gets wind and being the jealous type, contacts his brother, a cop, and finds Charlies' name before he came into the witness protection programme (seemingly, it's that easy!). Her ex contacts Alex Dimitri, played by Bradley Cooper but with tinted glasses and dreadlocks, by Facebook and is set on getting revenge on Charlie, who ratted him out.

What ensues is a chase movie but with dialogue. The kind of dialogue, I assume the idea was to make the characters more intelligent and deeper than they seem, finding themselves in funny situations, like entering an elderly orgy by accident, or having a discussion about the cons of using the term "fags". For me the movie was trying to be a Tarantino movie, quirky characters having quirky conversations and ending up in quirky situations, but it all falls very flat. The first problem is none of the characters are particularly likable. Charlie is a bit of a dick and Kirsten Bells' Annie is just annoying; seriously, you'd risk your life driving to LA for her?

The dialogue is pretty pointless and unfunny. It's far from being as funny and clever as it thinks it is. And it jumps in between characters abruptly without the audience being able to get their bearings about what the hell is going on. Tom Arnold appears as Charlies' incompetent police protection. If I was an officer in the Witness Protection Programme I think I'd write a strongly worded letter to the director, who turns out to be the lead, Dax Shepard, who happens to be Kirsten Bells' boyfriend. And they produced! Really Kirsten Bell, you can do better because I was wondering what you were doing in this. The same can be said for Bradley Cooper, and how Beau Bridges and Jason Bateman got talked into cameos, I'll never know. Perhaps Kirsten Bell was asked to appear in Arrested Development and she was owed a favour.

I'm really not trying to be mean, as I like Cooper and Bell as actors, and they can produce so much more. But I really thought the movie, with a running time of 100 mins, was 100 mins too long. I was happy to walk out at any time. The cars were kind of cool, but that's the only thing I liked about the movie. And it's pretty obvious it was made on a budget, most of the action taking place in the desert, and there seemed to be a lack of extras.

I don't know why you would have any reason to watch this movie, maybe, just maybe, if you're hung over some Sunday and there is absolutely nothing to watch. Even then, I'd avoid it if I can.

7 out of 14 people found the following review useful:

HIT AND RUN sucked! Plain and simple, as that.

Author: Carycomic from Torrington, CT, USA
27 August 2012

*** This review may contain spoilers ***

And, once again, the only reason I give such a box office mega-flop even one star is because IMDb requires it. Personally? I feel even that much is over-dignifying it!

During the first forty minutes, alone (after which, I unapologetically walked out), there were only two laughs provided. Both times, by Tom Arnold. And, not even his (quite often under-estimated) talent could save this one from totally boring me!

Add that to the fact that he and ex-Luthor Michael Rosenbaum were the only name actors recognizable to me, and you have a bigger turkey than Ashton Kutcher's DUDE, WHERE'S MY CAR? and Tom Hanks' LADY KILLERS, put together.

So, take my advice, folks. Don't go see this at the movies. Don't rent it when it comes out on DVD. Don't even it down-load it from the Internet! Because, yes, it is undeniably _that bad_!!!

10 out of 20 people found the following review useful:

Just plain BAD!

Author: timrrt from Amherst, NY
31 August 2012

This is the WORST movie ever made! The plot, the script, everything about this movie is just plain bad! The total lack of direction in this movie is astounding! This movie wants and tries to be many things but sadly it is just painful to watch. Scenes drag-on for what seems like forever.

Don't waste your time or money on this awful movie. The chase scenes are hum drum and boring! The acting is sub-par at best. 15 minutes into this movie I was ready to leave but I was at the drive-in and wanted to see the second feature more than this stinker.

I don't know who gave the go-ahead to make this movie but they really should have their head examined.

2 out of 3 people found the following review useful:

More of a crash and burn

Author: Thomas Aitken from New Zealand
13 February 2013

*** This review may contain spoilers ***

This film would have been more accurately titled if they'd called it 'The Dax Shepherd Show', because basically it's little more than a promotional vehicle for Dax Shepherd.

It felt like it wanted to be a Coen Brothers film, but couldn't quite pull it off, so instead, for most of its duration, this film plays out like an extended episode of a TV comedy drama.

The pacing is woeful in places. One of the car chase scenes, which should be one of the high points in any film, just aimlessly carries on for no apparent reason, and then comes to a rather dull ending.

It's hard to say why it didn't come off better, because all of the right ingredients were present, perhaps a more experienced scriptwriter and director could have pulled it off? It just felt like the film makers had no clear vision, just a series of concepts that they didn't know how to tie together as a cohesive whole.

10 out of 20 people found the following review useful:

Hit and Run? Skip and Delete!

Author: the_real_smile from Netherlands
3 February 2013

This movie is about a man who's in a witness protection program and has this soft whiny girl that can get a job in LA, 4 hours from their current village. During the ride to LA they are being chased by the criminals he witnessed against.

All sounds very, very exciting, but oh boy, the movie just does not deliver and is a bore to watch. Every minute you think, "THE ACTION MUST START IN A MINUTE", but that never happens. About 98% of the screen time the man and the women are talking, boring talk I might say. The remaining 2% there are some unrealistic fights, car chases, sadly also very, very boring.

And it is such a shame, because the cast is top notch, acting is good, camera work etc., it just doesn't deliver and never, ever gets exciting.

6 out of 13 people found the following review useful:

Just Run!

Author: m_antrim1 from United States
25 August 2012

Let me say at the outset that I am a Veronica Mars devotee and that the work by Dax I've seen thus far is above par, So, I'm not a hater by any means. I've also been a fan of Bradley Cooper since he emerged on the scene as the sap with a heart on 'Alias.'

This movie was horrible. It was billed by Dax and Kristen, as a car chase, testosterone-filled, etc., movie. Here's a clue from a car guy - a 'hot Lincoln??" Really??? Why not, I don't know, a hot ANYTHING ELSE??? Not only that, the execution of the car looked ridiculous.

Kristen - you are a great character actress. You're blowing it.

As for Tom Arnold's portrayal of a U.S. Marshall with the Witness Protection Program, well, stupid, lame, and unfunny is being kind. I just hope that none of you ever need the services of the U.S. Marshalls - they are actually a pretty competent agency and the Witness Protection Program is, by no means, a dumping program for idiots. I get the whole 'suspension of disbelief' thing when it comes to the arts, but this wasn't even close.

Bradley - The white guy as a dread-locked bad guy? Really?? I hope you made a lot of money, at least. Jeesh. And learn to shoot, for Christ's sake. Pulling the trigger a lot and missing everything you're shooting at isn't, well, funny, to a large segment of the population.

So, here's the final review. I'm in the theater bathroom taking care of business when a guy several urinals down exclaims for all to hear that was the biggest waste of money he's made this week, "And I waste a lot of money on a regular basis," he added.

4 out of 12 people found the following review useful:

don't waste your time

Author: shellster1 from Canada
25 August 2012

OK,i really had high hopes for this one. the trailer made it look so great. and hey, Bradley Cooper is in it, it has to be funny right? the first forty minutes of this movie were SO bad. really bad. nothing funny intertwined with bad acting and over use of the f word. such a weak story, that i felt there was not much to look forward to. as for the last half of the movie, i can't even tell you about because i walked out of the theatre...i wanted to get a complete refund for the twelve bucks i paid, but because i had gone to the late show, there was no staff at the ticket booth when i got out there. this movie is an example of why i would like to pay AFTER i see the show. hit and run is a total dud, i bet they wont even make their budget.

Š-DR-Films Mewdiks -6

16/10/2014 21:46 par tellurikwaves

s 1 of 2 scheduled reboots

Author: nvjs from United States
27 June 2012

Johnson must be a fan of Uwe Boll or the last thing he watched before taking on this project, was of Boll's. This crap resulted in a "reboot" which wasn't much better, and Daredevil which is also up for an overhaul. Not a good batting average. The "plot" for this movie was lackluster at best. The acting by Wes Bentley was horrid and I believe it's 50/50 director and actor's fault.Bentley obvious wasn't concerned about his performance or watched his dailies to adjust his "method" or "approach". Even worse is the awful grating of Ghost Rider's "voice". Sounds like Ghost Rider has a carton a day habit. Then there's Eva Mendes trying to make the best out of a bad project along with Cage. But this movie is just inexcusable for looking like a 20 million dollar flick with a supposed 80+ million budget. I think Johnson spent it all on Cage's hairpiece.

3 out of 5 people found the following review useful:

The critics are right

Author: pninson from Seattle, Washington
11 March 2007

*** This review may contain spoilers ***

This was one of the worst movies I've seen in a long time. The setup is OK (the "origin")but there's no follow-through. The movie is essentially plot less, and the villains are stick figures who are easily dispatched. Wes Bentley, burdened with some awful makeup and tricked up to look like a pasty-faced Elvis impersonator, is given little to do. He is never threatening and our hero (so to speak) has little trouble wrapping things up.

Ghost Rider tries to be funny, with some howlingly bad dialogue (I admit, I laughed most of the way through, which has to count for something), but it's never more than a caricature of itself. Even a comic book movie has to have something for the audience to identify with. Spider Man 2 was a strong picture largely because Alfred Molina's characterization of Doctor Octopus had a human dimension.

Yes, character and story matter even in "fun" pictures. There's little to enjoy here other than some visual effects, and that's not worth the price of a movie ticket. I was ready to leave an hour before it ended; it is that boring.

As for the adaptation, I'm not a purist, but there was nothing of what made the comic book exciting (at least in the first couple of years). Gary Friedrich and Mike Ploog, who created the character, put him in a situation in which he was struggling for redemption. There's no sense of any tension between good and evil in the movie; it's just Cage being doggedly Cage-ish and wisecracking his way through a limp, lifeless, by-the-numbers formula picture.

I'd rate this one at the bottom of the heap for the genre. I can forgive lapses in logic and corny dialogue, but just don't bore me. That's all I ask. Ghost Rider darned near put me to sleep.

4 out of 7 people found the following review useful:

Heartless

Author: Cheese Hoven from United Kingdom
18 December 2009

*** This review may contain spoilers ***

At various points during this movie, the trite villain Blackheart kills people in cold blood by pushing his icy fingers in their hearts. This frozen emptiness where the heart should be in a way sums up this dreadful adaptation. Blackheart murders many people in cold blood and we, the audience, are not supposed to feel anything about it. By far the worst instance of this is when (Ghost Rider) Johnny Blaze's best friend (and the one character in the whole film who is sympathetically drawn) is murdered in said fashion in front of GR. GR sheds no tears about him and he is never again even mentioned. His death and those of others has no other function but merely to show us the badness of Blackheart who would otherwise be a faintly comical white-faced Goth. This callousness extends elsewhere in the movie. At the start, Johnny Blaze's dad is killed by Mephistopheles after being on screen for what must be less than a minute in total and speaking about two sentences. Since we do not see the bond between father and son, the father's death, which is of cardinal importance to the storyline, is thus robbed of any emotional power beyond Johnny's melodramatic scream of "nooooooo"! Likewise perfunctory is the treatment of Johnny's girl, Roxanne, which in some ways is the most hilarious aspect of this unintentionally funny film. Having watched Johnny diligently carved "Johnny & Roxanne 4 ever" in a tree, she then informs him she has to leave him at her parents request. He objects and suggests they ride off together into the sunset. However, at the appointed time, and having become the devil's apprentice, he leaves her standing under the tree.

This frankly makes little sense, but worse is to come.

A year having passed but everyone having aged at least 20 years, she is now a TV reporter while Johnny is a stunt cyclist. An inept comedy sequence ensues with Johnny eventually getting a date. Alas, he finds himself turning to fire (Not surprising considering Nicholas Cage's wooden performance) and goes on his first Ghost ride, leaving her in the lurch yet again.

Roxanne turns up at his place the next day (somehow getting in-) and throws herself at him! He then reveals his is the emissary of Satan which has her leaving yet again.

An odd scene with Blaze being arrested and thus having to reluctantly fight prisoners is next. It is hilarious and I wonder if it is not some kind of tribute to a similar scene in the even more inept Death Wish 3 film?

Another ghost ride ensues with the usual clichés -swat teams, helicopters, etc. This is of course witnesses by Roxanne who realises at once that the flaming headed cyclist is actually her Johnny. Blackheart notices this and announces "now we know his weakness. Hmmmmm." a classic of movie badness.

I could go on. The script is so inept that you wonder if anyone actually read it. We are supposed to have a villain who has acquired a power so potent that it can literally bring about Hell on Earth yet Ghost Rider is able to defeat him ....

...by looking him in the eye!

4 out of 7 people found the following review useful:

One of the worst comic-adaptions ever

Author: sisko42 from Germany
8 July 2009

Watched it last evening on DVD. There's not much to say about this catastrophe. But know this: Bad Screenplay(poor dialogs that hurt your ears), a lot of unfavorable camera-angles(my father would do a better job with his old super8-cam), real bad directing(a lot of scenes are unintentional funny), and on top of this the worst performance of Nicolas Cage to this date(most of the time his face looks like somebody smashed his brain out. You think a stone would trick him). Unfortunately this Extended Cut makes this film not better, but extends the pain to watch. Ghost Rider rides with ease in my personal Top 20 of the worst movies of all time. You've been warned!

4 out of 7 people found the following review useful:

One of the Worst Superhero Films To Date...

Author: fearfulofspiders from United States
5 September 2008

*** This review may contain spoilers ***

Right up there with the Fantastic Four movies, Daredevil, and The Hulk, Ghost Rider is easily one of the worst superhero films to date.

From cheesy dialogue to an uninteresting superhero and villain, this film just does nothing for the audience... nothing.

As a superhero, our title character is arguably the most dull and uninteresting of all the Marvel icons. Ghost Rider, as a concept and as a whole, is l-a-m-e.

Nick Cage's performance is once again in that depressed monotone voice of his, as he sleepwalks through this role. Eva Mendez is equally terrible, as well as the unknown people in the background -- and especially the "villain".

The script is weak, and the direction rivals that of a Paul W.S. Anderson work of crap.

The music is one I'd stomp on the floor repeatedly for its uninspired sound and nonsensical composition.

All in all, this is at the bottom of the barrel as far as action/superhero/and origin stories go. Definitely skip out on seeing Ghost Rider.

6 out of 11 people found the following review useful:

Queasy Rider

Author: dunmore_ego from Los Angeles, California
1 August 2008

*** This review may contain spoilers ***

If there's another word for idiocy, I think that word is GHOST RIDER.

Sloppy editing, directionless direction and idiotic writing make this the number one feel-retarded movie of the year. And Nicolas Cage in eternal mourning-faced mode as the Ghost Rider doesn't help any. He is stunt biker, Johnny Blaze, employed by the devil (Peter Fonda, embarrassing himself) to stop the devil's son dominating the world. Oh yeh, and when he turns into Ghost Rider, his head turns into a flaming skull. For no reason other than it looks kinda cool.

Sam Elliott lends his balls-grit voice to the narration and appears as a supernatural gravedigger, but even that compounds the stupidity. His first lines narrate how every generation spawns a Ghost Rider, whose job is to collect souls sold to Satan. Okay, nice premise – now start confusing me… Seems the Wild West Ghost Rider (from the 1800s, I'm guessing) "outran the devil himself" because he didn't want to collect 1000 souls on one particularly meaty contract.

Where to start with the stupid questions, knowing there'll be stupid answers at the end of all of them? Is it within the Ghost Rider's capacity to discern how many souls the devil should be bagging? He's just an apprehender, a bounty hunter; it's like bequeathing that redneck moron Dog the Bounty Hunter or one of those Nazi cops from COPS jurisprudence and the ability to execute sentences on nothing but their own cognizance, when we all know they are merely apprehenders with zero powers or intelligence beyond clicking on cuffs.

So what about the Rules for Supernatural Beings? How fast can the devil run? And since the Ghost Rider is a supernatural being himself, how fast was HE actually running to outrun the devil? And was he galloping across desert plains, or in some other dimension? If in some other dimension, were they "running" physically - with feet touching the ground for traction, or in some invisible medium? Any answers from geekboys forthcoming?

Every single minute of GHOST RIDER raises more idiotic questions about supernatural rules. For example, the GHOST RIDER is a supernatural being, so when evil supernatural beings fight him (beings fashioned from earth, air, fire and water), why do they bother punching each other? They're not operating on the same rules we are in the physical plane – for cryin' out loud, when a truck runs into the Ghost Rider he is unharmed, so why does the being made of water even *think* that he could debilitate him by PUNCHING? Or hanging him by the neck with a chain?

Later, a supernatural being made of wind laughs when Ghost Rider tries to punch him, then he eats crow when the Rider whirls his whip around and somehow creates a vortex of fire that sucks the wind being into nothingness. Riiiiight…..

At one point, like some kind of superhero, Ghost Rider saves a girl from a pursesnatcher and then condemns the pursesnatcher to hell as if he had lied Amerika into a false Iraq war, causing the deaths of 100,000 people and consigning Amerika to a trillion-dollar debt which four generations would have to shoulder. It's the SUPERMAN conundrum: while he saves a cat in a tree, a million African children die for want of diverting a river to save their village. Get your priorities right, Bonehead!

Marvel really screwed the pooch with this D-Lister; Stan Lee didn't even bother making a cameo. The origin tale works gangbusters as a comicbook, but in this age of semi-realism in Marvel films (SPIDERMAN, X-MEN, PUNISHER), GHOST RIDER gasps for credibility with its insanely convoluted mythical storyline and rule-less landscape.

Frumpy Eva Mendez is Johnny Blaze's long-suffering romantic interest, Wes Bentley gives a pointless performance as the devil's son, and Donal Logue tries overacting to save the movie. Didn't work, but at least he's got some cheese for his demo reel.

I'm ashamed to call myself a Ghost Rider fan...

Author: Slevin Kelevra from United States
3 April 2014

The fear I have whenever I say "I'm a fan of Ghost Rider" stems from the thought that people who do not know the comics will think I'm a fan of these movies. This is one of the worst comic book movies of all time. Captain America with Reb Brown? No, bad but fun to watch. The Captain America movie from 1990? Close but... not the worst. The original Avengers movie from 1998? Easily 2nd place. No this Ghost Rider movie takes that title. Because we didn't expect those other movies to be any good. Ghost Rider on the other hand had every chance to be a good a movie. It's not hard to make a good Ghost Rider movie, your character is a flaming skull... that should be instant awesome but no this movie goes out of it's way to spit on the fans.

Before I tear this movie a new ***hole let me say what I like about it. The visuals were about the greatest part of the movie. They did capture Ghost Rider comics very well, because the concept art, props, characters and settings all came from the only department with people who actually work on comic books. Everyone else were a bunch of Hollywood snobs. So the Rider's bike, the Ghost Rider himself, the Phantom Rider (the original Ghost Rider that looked like a cowboy) and his demonic horse were all visually amazing.

That's it, even when they have something awesome they make sure to destroy it as fast as possible. I'll sum up the entire movie in one scene: The Ghost Rider and the Phantom Rider are about to head off to the final confrontation. The Phantom Rider says he's coming with Johnny Blaze and they take off together making one of the most visually awesome build ups to an ending. The Phantom Rider... A flaming skull under a cowboy hat riding atop a flaming demonic horse riding next to The Ghost Rider on his flaming demonic motorcycle. The level of awesome this is cannot be described... and what happens? Right before the battle they stop and the Phantom Rider says he can't go any further then just leaves?! That was his last transformation really? He couldn't wait till they got there then transform so he could actually help in the fight. They tease you into thinking a demonic cowboy with his signature flaming whip and hellfire revolver is going to team up with a demonic biker with his flaming chain... but no that scene would be too good for this movie. It would actually make the movie awesome, so they didn't want to do that. He just rides there and ****s off.

There's Ghost Rider in a nutshell. Visually building you up and then completely ruining it with stupidity. A massive disappointment, and I didn't even go into the fact that they completely destroyed the comic book lore and re-writing everything to fit their stupidity. If you say "Well the Phantom Rider only had a little more juice and he just wanted to ride there, they travel faster when they're transformed so if he didn't it would take forever" No no... no. Ghost Rider doesn't have juice, he's a demonic being under the control of the devil who breaks his control and thus serves under the body he is in, Johnny Blaze. There is no juice, power level, it's not a super power the Ghost Rider is a being. So the Ghost Rider can't be in two bodies at once, but I was willing to let that major screw up slide had they joined the two together in combat to team up. They did nothing, it was a trailer shot. You got tricked, they already had your money... screw you leave the movie early if you want we already got paid. And that is EXACTLY what they did, the proof is in the trailer for Ghost Rider Spirit of Vengeance. They trick you into thinking it's going to be a good movie leave you with nothing but pretty visuals.

Ghost Rider 2 Spirit of Vengeance turns out to be worse. The Ghost Rider with blue fire is a COMPLETELY different person, Johnny Blaze isn't the Ghost Rider with blue fire. He's the next Ghost Rider after Johnny Blaze and his name is Daniel. And they had a character named Danny to trick you even more. Spirit of Vengeance isn't the Ghost Rider either he's a villain in the comics. But according to the movie's story Johnny Blaze is still the Ghost Rider only now the Ghost Rider has blue fire cause he's the Spirit of Vengeance? That's like saying Superman is Lex Luthor, that's like taking The Joker and revealing it's been Batman all along! It's BULL**** They knew they were tricking you into thinking it was going to be a good movie, they knew we all thought Nicholas Cage was being replaced with a new Ghost Rider. I'm going to do the Rider justice and burn this decrepit movie and pee on it's ashes. Oh my god that reminded me Ghost Rider pees fire in the sequel.... AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH I HATE THESE MOVIES!

terrible.

Author: drkilljoy731
22 January 2014

*** This review may contain spoilers ***

I was forced to see this and the behest of a family member. I didn't think it would be very good but didn't think my eyes would be sodomized that hard. The acting especially of the bad guys is as hammy as a Smithfield ham. The visuals were pretty good for the time looked nice. The plot points are horrific I mean when I found out the main demon was the devils son I nearly died from the cliché. Especially when it was disclosed by the actor finishing a statement with the word father. It was as cheesy and stupid as it sounded. I would continue to beat this movie down but i don't want to remember it anymore. It may be irrational but i absolutely hate this movie and wish i could give it no stars ,and have it end up on the bottom 100 list.

1 out of 2 people found the following review useful:

Mark Steven Johnson: Please Stop Making Movies

Author: mike-downing-1 from United States
26 April 2012

Until now, I thought Daredevil was the worst movie I had ever seen. Then I watched Ghost Rider. The connection: Mark Steven Johnson wrote both screenplays. I'm angry because this guy keeps taking these comic books and ruining them on the big screen (compare Sam Raimi and Mark Steven Johnson and you'll understand my point).

I'm a professional writer with a life-long passion for comic books, and I can tell you that, when done properly, comic books are written tightly. They should keep you on the edge of your seat. Unfortunately, Ghost Rider is incredibly slow. It actually made me angry to see any semblance of good, tight writing ignored and replaced with stunts and special effects.

Ugh. Don't waste your time with this one. I hope Marvel and DC don't give this guy access to any other titles in the catalog.

Š-DR-Films Mewdiks -5

16/10/2014 11:16 par tellurikwaves

Passé un très mauvais moment en regardant ce film vraiment déprimant

*

*

Dull

Author: madge5913 from United States
25 May 2012
 

I have never written a review before but compelled to do so today - Thank goodness we got to watch this one for free. For those who loved it, bravo - you picked it apart and enjoyed the nuances of the plot and took it all to heart. But the movie is advertized as a romantic drama...there is absolutely no romance, very little build-up between the characters, except physical release. I didn't feel that there was much acting...the dialog was weak (what there was of it) and extremely hard to hear. The music was LOUD and the dialog was SO quiet...We turned up the volume as high as we could and could barely hear it - then the music BLARED at us. We moved to a second TV/DVD player and experienced the same thing - I always hate when movies do this. I get that the movie is about loss and learning to deal with it and trying to move on...but it is SO slow. It just drags along, and we kept waiting for the tension to build and it never did. We were both glad that we only wasted 90 minutes on this film.

1 out of 3 people found the following review useful:

BAD And BORING Movie

Author: johnlathrop
20 June 2013

This movie is a bore. Who wants to watch such a sad movie? The people systematically lose their senses and there is hardly any effort to find a cure. We as a people are better than this. We don't give up. I did like some of the actors, but the story line was terrible. What else can I say about this movie? Hmmmm… Nothing at all about this movie makes it worth seeing. The fact that I'm trying to fill this up with ten lines is proof how much I do not like this movie. I never realized that IMDb reviews had a minimum length which would tend to cause those not liking a movie to be so determined to meet the minimum length and the result would be reviews skewed to a more positive level.

20 out of 42 people found the following review useful:

Why

Author: Klaas de Vos
19 January 2012

*** This review may contain spoilers ***

Why ? That's the only thing I got out of this movie.

I've never had the urge to write a review about a movie, but seeing it getting such high votes I had to write this.

I just don't get it. The director had so many opportunities to give a blimp of hope at the end of the movie, but didn't.

So you spend 1.5 hours looking at people who's world is collapsing and then the movie is over. I just wonder what the, a-star, actors thought when they were asked for this film. I'm sure they asked: what is the story about ? And the the director would say: well we start with people loosing their smell, then their hearing and then they go deaf and blind and then THE END. Geez, that sounds like a great movie, please pick me !

Or is the fact that the director is English and therefore sophisticated and me as an American actor am just not smart enough to understand the deeper meaning of the film ? Whatever the reason they decided to join this movie, it was the wrong reason. They should have better used that time to spend with their loved ones in the real world instead of sending a non-hope film to the world.

Why people rate this movie high and claim it is about hope ?

It's not ! It's a depressing, ugly, movie.

14 out of 31 people found the following review useful:

wast of time

Author: stevefitchie from United Kingdom
19 February 2012

This is a terrible movie......Actually got to see this movie in the cinema for free and wanted to get up and walk out. Never in my life have i ever thought of walking out of a movie...Stuck it out hoping it would suddenly evolve into something half decent....Sadly it didn't. How Ewan Mcgregor and Eva Green got themselves involved in this project i just cant understand. i am a great fan of science fiction/fantasy/apocalyptic movie types ,even if there is a love theme running through the script, but this was just a complete waste of time and money.I wouldn't recommend this movie to anyone and i know personally i will never sit down to watch it again.I even heard other cinema goers on the night i seen it verbally abusing it as they left... thumbs down on this one people....

3 out of 15 people found the following review useful:

Worst film ever

Author: Pro Film Review from United Kingdom
18 November 2012

Yes nicely made with filming and cast all that but absolutely awful film With all the rest no logic no sense and disturbing , the writer must have tried so hard not to shoot himself making this make believe end of the world but seemingly wannabe we can do better even if we lost something original concept. Concept is dreadful and there is no moral of this story. Just very bad if you hate life go watch it. If you want to see her boob go see the film Yes nicely made with filming and cast all that but absolutely awful film With all the rest no logic no sense and disturbing , the writer must have tried so hard not to shoot himself making this make believe end of the world but seemingly wannabe we can do better even if we lost something original concept. Concept is dreadful and there is no moral of this story. Just very bad if you hate life go watch it. If you want to see her boob go see the film

36 out of 84 people found the following review useful:

Perfect Sense? Perfect Mince, more like!

Author: paulfcockburn from United Kingdom
17 June 2011

*** This review may contain spoilers ***

There's always a risk calling your film something like 'Perfect Sense'; because, sooner or later, someone's going to point at the Emperor's New Clothes and go: "Perfect mince, more like!" Especially in Glasgow.

Let's just say there's nothing perfect about this film; it's unintentionally funny; it utterly fails to make anything of its central location; it is embarrassingly pretentious; and it is horrendously scripted and acted. Except for a few small scenes, Ewan McGregor relies on his goofy smile to earn him audience sympathy, while Eva Green's one-note, we've-seen-it-all- before performance is just the wrong side of arrogance, like she feels she's superior to everyone else in the cast. I don't, for one minute, actually believe she's an epidemiologist.

The central conceit of the film is, of course, absolutely ridiculous -- an inexplicable epidemic is gradually depriving humanity of its senses, starting with smell and taste, then going straight for hearing and sight. (What happened to touch, one wonders?) This isn't, in itself, a problem, except that any suspension of disbelief is undermined by the film choosing to push this medical nonsense to the fore, rather than hide it behind some believable characterisation, recognisable plot or even some energetic hand-waving. Instead, we're left with a snail's-paced, condescending, sledge-hammer meditation on how we've all lost touch with each other. Or something like that.

The worst thing about this film isn't all the talent and money that went into its production; it's the question of what has gone wrong with David Mackenzie? Young Adam and Hallam Foe were startling and innovative cinematic works. Now it would seem he's had a narrative lobotomy. And whoever told him it would a good idea to strap his camera to a bicycle really should be shot. They invented steady cam for a reason.

29 out of 78 people found the following review useful:

Drama? Romance? Nope. Thriller, maybe...

Author: ArizWldcat from United States
27 January 2011

*** This review may contain spoilers ***

In the Sundance catalog, this was made to sound like a drama/romance. It was more like a psychological thriller; I'll admit up front, this is NOT the kind of movie I enjoy, so perhaps I am not the best person to review...however, here I go anyway. The story involves an epidemiologist (Eva Green) and a chef (Ewan McGregor) who, when we first meet them on screen, are both cold and distant. They do nothing in the film to change our image of them, and truly, I didn't see any chemistry between the two. Sure, there's a physical relationship, but apparently, they just get on each other's nerves and have sex.

Green's epidemiologist is apparently fighting a worldwide epidemic illness that causes people to lose their senses. First it's the sense smell, then taste...and then, well, you get the idea. Each episode of loss is preceded by emotional breakdowns (first grief, then anger, then more anger, then more anger...oh, and finally, a sense of peace...well thank goodness for that!) I know the director was going for horrific, but I found myself laughing when people started eating everything in sight. It was also quite repulsive to watch those scenes. I was thankful nausea didn't follow (at least on screen). Green's character apparently isn't very good at her job because she doesn't ever find out a single thing about the disease, just that everyone in the world is going to get it. Everyone's DOOMED.

Mercifully, the film was short. At the end, I supposed we were to come to the realization that the "perfect sense" is our sense of feeling/emotion. Yawn. McGregor performed well, as usual, but his performance did not make the movie worth seeing for me.

See also Rachel Gordon's review; she says what I was thinking but in a much better way than I did: http://www.filmcritic.com/reviews/2011/perfect-sense/ (if the link is broken, it's at filmcritic.com)

6 out of 12 people found the following review useful:

a generously subsidized high school project

Author: Boris Todorov (boris_todorov@hotmail.com) from Seoul, South Korea
26 August 2012

A disturbingly boring movie on a subject of such uncompromising grandeur one wonders whether the idea came from a fourteen-, or from a fifteen-year old kid. Because first, it is usually at the age of 14/15 that authors try to reveal the ultimate light of truth to humankind (as this project does), and it is again at that age that the longing to feel each other's bodies (the "perfect sense" as we realize at the end of the show after complete sensory darkness obliterates everything else) is most pungent and dismissive of anything else human experience might have brought. Dull musical score, slow motion, redundant scenes, predictable script, banal conclusion: all too well for an art school project, yet making us watching it for the sake of Green and McGregor makes me feel cheated.

14 out of 29 people found the following review useful:

Pathetic

Author: syanea
29 January 2012

*** This review may contain spoilers ***

It could have been a great movie, it certainly had some ingredients. The main plot could have been really interesting, but instead it decided to stick to the obscure side of it, skip the science or any sense. That's right it made no sense. Why oh why, would you end the movie Ike that, it had such potential and yet, it is ruined. It could have been a great movie, but instead it is depressing, obscure, unfinished, oh yeah and forget your sense of touch, that's not on his list for some reason... Really disturbing, really unfinished, safe your time for a good movie... I like the actors, but it still doesn't make up for a poor and unfinished storyline. No thank you, I would not recommend it to anyone.

3 out of 6 people found the following review useful:

It didn't make perfect sense; in fact, it made no sense at all

Author: bob-790-196018 from United States
11 January 2013

*** This review may contain spoilers ***

I have always been drawn to apocalyptic or end-of-the-world movies, but I did not find "Perfect Sense" meaningful or entertaining. For no particular reason, the entire population of the world loses its physical senses one by one, starting with smell and moving on ultimately to sight. We know it involves the entire population because there are smidgens of clips of people panicking in India, Africa, etc. Basically, however, the movie takes place in a few locations in Glasgow.

The scope of the film is even narrower than that, however, because the meat of the story is the relationship between two people, an epidemiologist and a chef, who discover each other, have lots of sex, have a falling out, and reconcile just as the last sense goes. They clutch each other as the movie fades to black and the voice-over tells us how precious love is, or words to that effect.

Though we are left to contemplate this vague message about love, instead I thought about the terror of finding oneself suddenly blind in a world where everyone else is going blind too. They say that in the country of the blind, the one-eyed man is king, but in a world where there is not so much as a single one-eyed person, the terror is unimaginable and no one can survive. A very depressing ending to the movie, particularly since you come away with no explanation for why these terrible things have happened.

Another reviewer has mentioned that the dialog in the picture was often too muted to understand. I found that to be true throughout.

There's nothing original or imaginative about dreaming up an apocalypse that can neither be explained nor interpreted symbolically, so that our experience of the film has some meaning.