DaViD´82

An indie movie that just oozes with cheapness. Not that it necessarily matters. But then the creators would have to be holding a good screenplay in their hands. Which they don’t and, according to what is said and what happens in the course of the movie, I sincerely don’t believe that they had a screenplay at all. The jokes don’t work, the dialogs are painful for your ears, the actors are shamefully unconvincing and the whole thing just fizzles out. The worst thing about it is Gavin Claxton’s dogged efforts at replicating the modern, tough British School in Guy Ritchie style. It’s not funny, it’s just ridiculous. The entire storyline inside the house is pure hell. On the other hand, the scenes with Martin Freeman work as well as they can in this situation, so thanks to the restrained running time, you can live with it. If the above are sufficient “positives", then give The All Together a try. You might not regret it. Might not.

An unrepeatable cast, an experienced director and very good screenplay based on a remarkable book - this all promised a refreshing and mainly an extremely high quality spectacle. Which in the end it isn’t. The acting in The Shipping News is perfect, well-directed and nicely written... But it runs on all cylinders only during the introduction and then it falls into the old rut of other similar movies. Unarguably, this is a higher than average quality picture. But it had the potential to achieve a quality considerably higher than in the end result. Which is a huge shame.

In this small British movie, Ron Weasl... oh, sorry, Rupert Grint proves that he can do other things than just grin into the camera. A movie like dozens of the same. Driving Lessons neither stands out among them nor does it sink below their level. It is simply average in all respects, although I must admit that I found it quite cute.

One room and twelve white men from different walks of life, with different personalities and each with absolutely different origins. Their twelve different perspectives on one court case. Truth isn’t the issue here. It’s about whether the evidence is convincing enough to find somebody guilty on the basis of it, and send him to the gallows. Perfect dialogs, actors and rising tension in the atmosphere. But mainly the screenplay. Twelve Angry Men isn’t just one of many good court movies; it is one of the very best. A feature film debut not equaled by many.

Absurd genius or idiocy unbounded? Hard to say, but David Lynch’s work can hardly surprise anybody anymore. Three actors in costume, an apartment, a long static shot, atmospheric music, frenetic laughter from the audience, a minimum of dialogs and a couple of sounds in the background. And that's all. The main thing is, though, that this is more “entertaining" than most regular comedy shows. And Naomi Watts is especially delicious here.

An unimaginative, mundane B-movie where the best acting performance is from a pack of dogs who you can’t help rooting for in their commendable efforts to eat the bothersome main characters. Even their barking contains more thought than the dialogs full of lines like “They were playing at being God!". The biggest problem is that it has not the slightest hint of atmosphere. If it were at least funny and the viewer weren’t just laughing at the expense of the creators, then this would have been just about acceptable. But not even this can be said of The Breed; this is simply ninety minutes of boredom.

August 1997, Virginia Beach. Dead young killer whales beached. Without any apparent external injuries, but inside their bodies were completely minced up and broken. How did they die and who killed them and could this be avoided next time? Is this the work of men or does the solution to the mystery lie elsewhere? Time is of the essence, because dead whales are piling up. The excellent idea to make a documentary about this case is made even better by the fact that it is filmed like an episode of CSI. The build up in tension is better than in the vast majority of thrillers. Yes, Dolphin Murders is an original piece, but primarily a quality, unusual documentary.

A foursome of mutated, phosphorous green turtles named after artists, who are great at kung fu. Along with them we get a rat (also mutated), a sexy reporter (unmutated), tons of pizza (mostly unmutated) and against them masses of mutants (mutated) and evil creatures (mostly mutated). It all takes place in and under New York. Unbelievable trash that however was a cult for a generation and a reason for being in front of the TV every early evening on Tuesdays, “whatever happens". Nostalgia is very strong in this case, but I have to admit it still has guilty pleasure qualities and even years later, I still find these turtles entertaining.

The renowned passing of the hat from the left hand to right. Unforgettable? Well, no, but in historical terms a very valuable second of film material that contains a deeper message than most feature movies. Perhaps it’s enough just to notice that the hat is thrown from the right hand to the left. What did the author want to say by that? Is it something about his political allegiance or something completely different?

This slant on Lewis Carrol’s classic work, deformed by Švankmajer’s surrealism, proved to be the best possible. Its all-round flawless genius that will probably remain sorely unappreciated in the Czech Republic, while abroad, especially in Japan, it is praised to the heavens. And they are quite right because this is Švankmajer’s best work of all. Five * for the unforgettable rabbit alone.