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Grex > Cinema > #21: The Summer Movie Critique Item |  |
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| 25 new of 290 responses total. |
md
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response 21 of 290:
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Jun 28 13:27 UTC 1998 |
DeCappacino was supposed to be a joke. The actor's name is spelled
"DiCaprio" and the coffee drink is spelled "capuccino," so if you
want to make fun of the Titanic star's name, as who does not, you
should spell it "DiCapuccino."
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omni
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response 22 of 290:
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Jun 28 16:39 UTC 1998 |
The version I saw was made either in 1996, or 1997. Anyhow it was good, and
I really enjoyed it. DiCaprio was the right person for Romeo.
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mary
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response 23 of 290:
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Jun 28 16:42 UTC 1998 |
"Fallen" is a fun rental. It's a has one trick that it kind of
runs into the ground, but it's a clever trick.
"Scream 2" is the most boring parts of "Scream" stretched into
a very long reprise.
"Wings of the Dove" is excellent. I really wish I'd made it
to the theatre to see it. The female characters are real,
interesting, and believable. How unusual.
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beeswing
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response 24 of 290:
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Jun 28 17:37 UTC 1998 |
It may not be in video stores, but the independent foreign film "La Belle
Epoque" is wonderful. It came out years ago, and it may still be seen on
satellite TV. I can't even recall the plot entirely but it involves a young
soldier and what happens when he encounters a family with four young and
somewhat horny daughters. It sounds cheesy but it isn't, and it's all done
tastefully.
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md
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response 25 of 290:
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Jun 28 21:29 UTC 1998 |
OUT OF SIGHT (B+) -- This is one of those movies that sucks a
certain type of viewer in by making him or her feel privy to all
sorts of "hip" underworld lore. As phony as can be, in that one
way. (The author of the book and the makers of this movie all have
records of doing this.) But apart from that, it's a well-made
movie, with more lovable rogues than I've ever seen together in one
place, and one new-ish actress, Jennifer Lopez, who is worth the
price of admission all by herself. The movie makes the cleverest
use of flashbacks I've ever seen (if you discount the "backwards"
episode of Seinfeld, which consisted *entirely* of flashbacks).
Ms. Lopez has been doing cosmetics commercials lately, and her face
graces the current issue of Mirabella, but she is certainly best
known for her role as Selena in the movie of that name. (Another
successful avoidance of the word "eponymous." I'm going for the
record!) She is said to be recording a CD. She is definitely the
Next Big Thing, at this point. Time will tell.
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maeve
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response 26 of 290:
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Jun 29 04:54 UTC 1998 |
the Zepherelli version of romeo and juliet can be distunguished by the bizarre
parti-coloured hose, adn teh morning-after scene which is identical to the
morning-after scene in monty python's Life of Brian, (line to remember ''E's
not a prophet, 'e's a very naughty boy!'
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atticus
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response 27 of 290:
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Jun 29 18:33 UTC 1998 |
(re #15: I like Airplane too. But I found the Naked Gun series to
be better than Airplane. It is one series where sequels have been as
good as the original.)
re #25: I guess I am a 'certain' type of viewer since I enjoyed "Get
Shorty" :-) I like Elmore Leonard's novels in general -- "Out of Sight"
was one exception. So I am not planning to watch the movie.
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hhsrat
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response 28 of 290:
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Jul 4 02:19 UTC 1998 |
Has anyone seen a movie in one of the new theatres at Showcase? How are
the sightlines? Was it too loud? I need opinions (well, not actually
need, just highly desire)
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rcurl
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response 29 of 290:
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Jul 4 04:26 UTC 1998 |
Can't tell any difference from the old theatres (one sample) - and they
are all always too loud (IMO).
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remmers
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response 30 of 290:
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Jul 4 13:11 UTC 1998 |
Hm. I find the new auditoriums to be quite different from the old
ones. They have stadium-style seating, which means it's virtually
impossible for your view to be blocked by the person in front of
you, even if they're 6'6" tall. (Being of moderate height, I really
like stadium-style seating.) The screens are huge. The sound is
louder than in the older auditoriums. Whether it's too loud is a
matter of opinion, I guess.
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otter
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response 31 of 290:
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Jul 5 19:29 UTC 1998 |
Went to a movie theater last night for the first time in many moons. First
thing I noticed was that it was *way* too loud. This from one who grew up at
Deep Purple, Black Sabbath, AC/DC, and Judas Priest concerts.
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danr
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response 32 of 290:
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Jul 5 23:33 UTC 1998 |
I agree. Movies would be more enjoyable for me if they would turn the
sound down a notch or two.
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tpryan
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response 33 of 290:
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Jul 6 01:36 UTC 1998 |
I need to remind myself to get to Borders to buy Carl Sagan's
Contact, now at consumer market price.
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omni
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response 34 of 290:
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Jul 6 08:34 UTC 1998 |
Why not go down to Dawn Treader and get it used. DT is 1/2 block from
Borders and saves money besides.
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md
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response 35 of 290:
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Jul 6 11:47 UTC 1998 |
Two recent rentals:
AMISTAD (C-) -- Mutiny on a slave ship, trial of the (19th) century,
directed by Spielberg -- why isn't this the most spellbinding movie
I've ever seen? Instead, it's flabby, fuzzy, momentum-free. I don't
understand how it could have happened. *I* could sit down at one of
those editor machine thingies and make Amistad a better movie. I
should rate it "P" for "pisses me off."
DECONSTRUCTING HARRY (C) -- Director James Cameron tries *way* too
hard to establish his "hip" credentials in this film about a messed-up
writer and the lives he's messed up in turn. It's shallow and dull
from the word go, with two or three fairly good scenes barely
redeeming it. Cameron's best scene involves Kirstie Alley as a
clinical psychologist who flies into a jealous rage right before
her next patient: she keeps excusing herself and then storming off
camera where we and her patient hear her screaming obscenities at
her lover. Cameron's biggest failure is casting nebbishy comic
Woody Allen as the antihero writer. We're supposed to believe that
this creepy little man attracts women like Elizabeth Shue and Amy
Irving? One love scene with Allen and Shue actually made my skin
crawl. Wait . . . um, actually, Deconstructing Harry wasn't directed
by James Cameron after all. Someone was pulling my leg. It was
directed by Woody Allen, and I'd like to change the rating to a
solid "A." It's a fabulous funny witty sophisticated film, and my
impression as I was watching it, that I was slowly traveling through
the inside of a tomato hornworm that had been parasitized by wasp
larvae, was no doubt exactly what angstmeister Allen intended.
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krj
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response 36 of 290:
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Jul 6 17:08 UTC 1998 |
Leslie and I made our first trip to the overhauled Showcase Theatre
complex last Friday. What is it now, something like 20 screens?
We found the new lobby a considerable improvement over the old
cattle-corral lobby, but much of our good feeling turned to
irritation when we were told brusquely that our theatre was not yet
ready for seating -- seven minutes before the advertised start time.
We were in one of the old theatres, and there was an annoying buzz
in the soundtrack throughout the show. Argh.
The movie was DEEP IMPACT. There were some problems with it as a
movie, and the pacing was very, very slow, but my internal 12-year-old
science fiction fan really loved a lot about this movie.
Highlights were the space travel scenes -- it's been a long time since
I've seen anyone attempt to do realistic space travel, and the
landscape of the comet was pretty nifty. I also really appreciated
the depiction of the American Government's move into martial law,
and people's reactions to it, in the face of the disaster.
Robert Duvall was the class of the cast as the old astronaut hero;
Morgan Freeman was a pleasure to watch, as always, as the President.
Tea Leoni seemed over her head as the journalist who accidentally
uncovers the story.
Recommended if you read a lot of 1950's era SF as a youngster.
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remmers
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response 37 of 290:
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Jul 7 01:18 UTC 1998 |
Re #35: I would REALLY REALLY REALLY like to see the Woody Allen
version of "Titanic".
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md
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response 38 of 290:
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Jul 7 12:09 UTC 1998 |
TITANIC (A++) - This is Peter Weir's greatest film to date, even greater
than Last Wave at Hanging Ten. In it, Weir uses the "unsinkable"
Titanic as a symbol of our technological hubris. It's the Year 2000
problem writ large, a looming iceberg of doom toward which we sail in
our "advanced" systems, unaware of the devastating, yet well-deserved,
comeuppance that lies just ahead. God, I love scolding the yuppies.
You know, the ones you see driving around in their Navigators and Range
Rovers talking on their stupid cell phones, the ones who vote Republican
and wouldn't know real cinematic art if it came up to them on the street
and knocked them to the ground and started kicking their smug hateful
faces over and over and over again until they were nothing but deformed
bloody masses of . . . um, where was I? Oh yes: Titanic is a fable for
our time, re-telling the age-old story of love crushed by the forces of
convention and the hypocrisy of society. Particularly resonant is the
subtext of Nature, represented by the iceberg, showing that she has
always been and will always be supremely indifferent to our pride and
our vanity. Yet at the same time, the iceberg symbolizes the hostility
of conventional society toward anything original or unusual or
independent or creative or caring or hip or knowing or, you know, like
*me*.
Leonardo DiCaprio might be male, but he looks like a lesbian. A
brilliant stroke of casting on Weir's part. Kate Winslett, as Rose,
the woman who learns to spit in the smug hateful face of upper-class
American society, is that rarest of rarities: a fully-developed female
character. One minor problem with Weir's vision is that the most
contemptible characters in Titanic, the ones we desperately need to look
down on and feel superior to, are in fact the well-to-do first-class
passengers. How can we be expected to feel superior to such people,
when we know perfectly well that they would have looked down on *us*
if we'd been there? Being reminded of our own steerage backgrounds,
being shown a parade of rich people who would have excluded us for the
pretentious middlebrow nobodies we are, is not why we go to see Weir's
films. Maybe he'll do better by us next time. Show us a bunch of
idiots in a bar staring at a TV set, something like that.
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bruin
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response 39 of 290:
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Jul 7 12:51 UTC 1998 |
RE #37 I would like to hear "Weird Al" Yankovic do a parody of Celine
Dion's "My Heart Will Go On."
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katie
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response 40 of 290:
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Jul 7 16:39 UTC 1998 |
I saw Les Miserables at the Dollar-Fifties. I enjoyed it immensely.
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bmoran
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response 41 of 290:
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Jul 8 05:04 UTC 1998 |
Re:38 I've got tears in my eyes, I can't see the screen. More! More!
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maeve
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response 42 of 290:
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Jul 8 23:55 UTC 1998 |
<says a little prayer to the irony gods> for those of us who can;t peg your
facial expression from your post, was that sarcastic or not?(to md)
Titanic was rather good, they did the actual non-love bits *really* well,
especially the snking parts..and ohhhh the costumes, <drool> yes, I do intend
to have a drafted pattern to one by the time the summer is over..
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md
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response 43 of 290:
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Jul 9 00:25 UTC 1998 |
Sarcastic. Actually, it was James Cameron, not Peter Weir, who
directed Titanic. Huge difference. Cameron is a run-of-the-
mill director who specializes in sequels of horror movies.
Titanic is nothing better than what you'd expect from someone like
that. Flat characters, wandering plot, kick-ass effects. Sorry
for the misunderstanding. I don't know why Titanic got such
great reviews and broke all those box office records. What
*I'm* waiting for is the new Merchant-Ivory film, BASEketball.
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garima
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response 44 of 290:
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Jul 9 03:50 UTC 1998 |
SMILA'S SENSE OF SNOW - rented it recently. It was the best film that
I have seen in a while. Very original. You don't see movies that are
set arctic snow very often. And I really liked the main character
Smila - serious, tough, pushy, opinionated and knows it when she wants
a man. Very deliberate.
L.A. CONFIDENTIAL - sucked. Didn't care for it much. I dislike blondie-what's
-her-name...er...Alec Baldwin's wife....er....you-know-who-...er...
(I must have blanked her name out of my mind, she was in "Nine and a half
weeks" which also sucked). The movie was boring.
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kittie
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response 45 of 290:
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Jul 9 06:57 UTC 1998 |
I saw Starship Troopers and I thought it was yucky :/
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