DaViD´82

Like good old Futurama! But just for the first two to three minutes. After that, not very good, but still sufficiently funny, with a lot of puns. But the “scoundrels" part sends this movie straight to the grave next to Tolkien, which means that not just he, but also Futurama itself, will turn in their graves. Instead of the usual intelligent situation humor, here they play at “parodies" of disaster movies. A short, lame and old gag stretched out to fill a third of the movie. So you must excuse me, but I just don’t intend to laugh at anything like that.

I wouldn't be angry at all if it was a bit shorter, but the spark between Shirley and Clint is so strong that it's surprisingly enough for a good experience in itself. And that is even without a proper plot. And with a traditionally brilliant Morricone.

Current as anything; unclichéd, miles away from the regular movie perspective on terrorism. Nothing here is black or white. Maybe only the actors. This is a mix of the concepts of Sleeper Cell and The Believer. It’s low-key, worrying, rich in opinion, needlessly unsimplistic, down-to-earth and convincing, unfolds at a really relaxed tempo and due to that in places it’s almost un-movie-like. In spite (or perhaps because) of that my enthusiasm for it knew no bounds. At least in the first half, then after all it falls into the “one man against everybody else" genre rut. But it’s still excellent right up until the closing ten minutes. All of the above applies too, but in a completely opposite stance. I would have welcomed this with open arms in a Hollywood blockbuster, but in this case I feel like sending the person responsible to a work camp in Yemen. For life.

The only problem about this otherwise splendid action movie is that it just isn’t a Bond movie; not one bit. Which might piss double-o-seven fans off a little, but in view of the fact that I not a particular aficionado of the character, nothing stopped me from having a great time. For the first time since From Russia with Love. What Marc Forster gets away with in this commercial blockbuster is not only endearing, but often admirable. The action scenes are ingenious and fantastically edited together. And what’s the best thing about the twenty-second Bond movie? Well, I maybe repeating myself, but the simple fact that this isn’t a Bond movie, but “just" a gripping, honest-to-god action thriller, at last with an interesting, non-two-dimensional hero with a face like a pissed gorilla in a suit.

My favorite Allen movie of all. Three times cleverer than Einstein after reading the entire Encyclopedia Britannica, five times more efficient than the most productive Communist worker exceeding his quotas, ten times funnier than any number of the most humorous embarrassing moments in your life and a hundred times more thought through than the most dastardly of Baldrick’s plans. It’s just my darling.

It isn’t the best or funniest Woody, but it’s Allen just how I like him: thoughtful, truthful, apt and with just the right amount of wit and endearingly skeptical cynicism (as strange as that sounds). The fairy tale about the Statue of Liberty and women should be carved in stone.

A boring, calculated movie that turns an amazingly powerful life story about a stubborn journalist into a “Hollywood-style" pleasant biographical movie where everything is white (everything around Veronica), black (the Irish underworld and villains) or simply blackmailing on gut level (kids playing amongst syringes, oh, isn’t that awful, vicar). In terms of workmanship solid, but what good is that if the only real asset is, unsurprisingly, the Cate Blanchett and Ciarán Hinds duo. And they give more like their regular acting performances, rather than excelling especially. I would like to see the same story, preferably with the same cast, in an HBO production.

The Coen’s announce a return to cynical waters. That definitely is good news. But the bad news is, that they are returning to waters that they have already peed into countless times. And this time with an almost non-existent screenplay. But in terms of acting, this is right up my street. And paradoxically it makes it better, because everybody is acting their life out, even though they have nothing really to act. Bizarre.

What good is an outstanding ensemble and material of genius to Morávek, when he chooses inappropriate stylization and everything goes up shit creek? Forcing all the characters to perform on a theatrical, booming level full of over-done grimaces and gestures is simply out of place. This means that instead of the audience getting any closer to the characters, they remain on an impersonal level of grimacing figures on a wooden stage spitting onto the front three rows. All honor to the exceptions. I would never have said that someone could approach the Karamazovs in a way that meant that I wouldn’t understand the characters. And, even worse, wouldn’t give a damn about them. While in other productions the same characters speak from the heart and I love them. Maybe this is purely a feeling I have due to my adoration of competing productions, but this simply got on my nerves. Which is a shame, because I found Morávek’s “Hus" very convincing.

Which was better, the camerawork or the music? The wild child Jean-Pierre Cargola or François Truffaut? And did Truffaut do a better job at the typewriter, in front of the camera or behind it? I don’t know and I don’t care. It’s enough for me this all resulted in a film whose only drawback is that it’s too short, and ends just as everything was going so well. Which may well be good, but on the other hand I was a little disappointed. I would like a few hours extra in the “almost documentary" company of Madame Guerin and those two rascals.