It's back!  The movie-rating item!  Have you seen any movies lately,
 either in the theatre or on home video?  This is where you can let
 others know which ones you liked and which ones are losers.   

                            HOW TO RATE 'EM
  
                     A : You're lookin' at a classic.
                     B : Excellent, don't miss it.
                     C : Okay film to watch while snuggled up in
                         jammies, resting on the couch, with
                         a cat who doesn't expect much from film.
                     D : As above (C) but you're also half asleep.
                     E : Also known as Turkey.  The director should
                         pay us for watching it.

186 responses total.

"A Brief History of Time": B  This is not the film I was expecting,
which was mostly a Cosmos type documentary dealing the with substance
of Hawking's book.  Instead, it's a glimse into the history of the man,
the evolution of genius.  Wonderful film.

"Gas, Food, Lodging": B  Meg, this one reminded me a whole lot of
another film, set in small-town desert, of which I can't recall the 
name.  Women helping each other come to terms with the boundaries of
their lives.  Help?  Anyhow, both were quite good.

"Home Alone 2" - C  A clone of the original, but with a more improbable 
                    set-up and plot.  Plus, a lot more violent.  The 
                    kids seemed to enjoy it, though.  The only bright 
                    spot was the actress who played the pigeon lady. Small
                    part, but she did a nice job.

"A Few Good Men" - A-  Good all around, but the last half-dozen lines of 
                       dialogue were kind of cliched and forced.

(Re #1:  You may be thinking of "Baghdad Cafe".)

(Item 16 in winter agora is now item 52 in arts.)

(Yah, the one you are thinking of Mary is Baghdad Cafe)

   "Far and Away" - B.  A realistic at life in the US around the turn
of the century.  If you're of Irish decent, see it.

 this item is now #53 arts by requwa   request of Mrs. Remmers.

Ack, Mr. Reuter, I fear we now have two copies of this item
in Arts.  It's good but it's not that good.  

(Jim evidently linked the item to Arts without noticing that I'd already
done so.  I've killed the extra link.)

 that's what you get when you e-mail ALL the f-w's in a conf.

"Aladdin" A+  The most hilarious movie of all time.  Cuts across the generation
gap to attract everybody.  What does Disney do now that they've hit 3 home runs
in a row?

i hear they're planning to animate _heaven's gate_.

(Heh.  That could be 3 strikes all by itself...)

re #11: Equal enthusiasm for "Aladdin," although I fear they've dated
themselves somewhat with Robin Williams timely (albeit hilarious)
impersonations and impressions.  (I'm not sure I'd call it a "classic",
either).

re #2: Are you sure you want to rate a movie that became "cliched
and forced" as a classic?

(that's why I gave it an A*minus*.  :)  )

Aladdin:  A     Excellent Disney Instant-Classic.  Animation was cool.
A Few Good Men:  A-    Nicholson plays a fantasically sinister colonel in
the Marines.  Cruise isn't bad, Demi Moore was just a whiney babe that kep
following Cruise around.  She needed to loosen up and not be so uptight.

Recommend both.  If you go to the early show for Aladdin, you can get early
show prices for AFGM if you pre-pay your tickets.  This is at the
Showcase.

Toys:  A-/B+.  I don't know why people keep dissing this film, it's
one of the funniest, weirdest movies I've seen in a long time.  Robin
Williams describes it as "Willy Wonka meets Dr. Strangelove", and I'd
say that's very accurate.  And any movie with music from Enya, Tori
Amos, and Thomas Dolby is worth seeing for that alone.  >8)

2001: A Space Odyssey-- B  a little too bizarre and a lot too slow for
many folks.  Way ahead of its time in terms of special effects.  Somewhat
diminished by Arthur C. Clarke's continued attempts to further explain
and expound on the story and a weak sequel (weak, in part, because it
was so conventional.
  
Damnational Alley-- E  A complete waste of time.  20th Century Fox came
out with Star Wars and Damnation Alley in the same year and the execs
were sure that DA was going to be the hit.  Shows you what good an MBA is.
   
Lethal Weapon-- C  Fantastic film until the useless, pointless fight at
the end.  Even the post motorcycle crash Gary Busey wouldn't be stupid
enough to look for the fight at the end.
   
Raiders of the Lost Ark-- A  You know Indy is going to win, but the play
is the thing.  Marion's screaming can be a bit trying at times.
   
The Silence of the Lambs-- A/B  A neary perfect adaptation of a book to
screen.  The topic matter is most disturbing, but not nearly as disturbing
as the audience cheering Hannibal as the film closes...

I don't understand :16...would you have been happier if Moore's character
+had+ given Cruise's a blowjob?

Missed my point.  She just didn't contribute much to the movie other than
whining and in general being non-constructive.  Now Cruise was a jerk, too,
but Demi Moore can do more than that part gave her.

Anyone seen "Enchanted April"?

Basic Instinct: A-.  I'm *still* not sure who it was who did each
murder.

You never will be.  The movie was written to leave at least
one hole in every possible theory.

 Trespass: Overall, a B (C if you're a suburbanite, A if you're a young
urbanite).  The movie should have subtitles for most caucasians & Uncle-Toms.

This response has been erased.

I saw "Toys" and *loved* it.  Someone took a big chance on this
one and put out something 180 degrees from the usual Hollywood
formula stuff.  The plot is pure and simple, much like a Seuss
tale, and the visuals are outstanding.  And that soundtrack! 

The dialogue will endure and I suspect this film will garner more
and more acclaim as time goes by. It gets a big B+.  See it on 
a big screen with big sound.

 Aladdin:  B        OK Story, decent villain, voice acting OK, but the 
voices chosen didn't match the songs their characters were supposedly
singing very well.  The animation was good as long as it stuck to the
cartooney Disney stuff, but the computer animation was quite jarring 
and didn't match the Disney animation style well at all.  The best part
of the film was the anthropomorphic characterization of the flying 
carpet, which was unfortunately a much more endearing and interesting 
character than any of the leads.  On second thought, make it a B-

 X:  A-       I'm not a big Spike Lee fan and I came into this film with
a negative impression based on statements Lee has made about the film and
my perception of his attitude about it, though I was still interested in
seeing it.  Most of my problems with the film were the results of Lee's
self-indulgence, the foremost being (a) the role of Shorty, which Lee
created (or exaggerated) to give himself screen time and (b) the style
of the first (pre-prison) section of the film, complete with musical
numbers (make-work for Lee's choreographer (his sister?)?)  My biggest
problem with the film, though was the latitude Lee took in presenting the 
facts.  I really despised that about JFK and I don't find it any more
attractive in "X" (perhaps it's less attractive..  part of the romance
surrounding the whole Kennedy thing is the uncertainty about what really
happened..  Malcolm X's story is interesting for completely different
reasons.)  Lee seems to have just made things up to add impact to a story
that already carries a powerful impact and to suit his own political 
agenda (the most glaring examples of this are Malcolm's father's death
at the hands of the Klan (denied by his family) and the sinister CIA (?)
figures near the movie's end -- Lee just couldn't resist blaming white
racism, even if it meant including material of questionable veracity to
do it.  I also would've preferred a film that spent less time on the 
pre-prison Malcolm -- much of the material in this part of the film was
necessary for character development but some of it should have been cut.
I'm tempted to believe that Lee didn't cut it because he wanted Malcolm
X to get as much (or more) film time as John F. Kennedy, which is not a 
good reason for him to have sacrificed the pacing of his film and turned
it into a 200 minute monster that seems to have scared away the very
audience he wanted most to see it.

 Toys:  B/B-     I'm sick of Robin Williams and I've never liked 
Barry Levinson (director) so I'm not sure why I went to see this film.
I'm still sorting out how I feel about it -- it's one of the more 
bizarre films I've seen in a while.  Some of the characters were out
of place, particularly the love interest, and the film could have used
a more sinister/threatening villain, but overall I enjoyed the film.
Lots of cool stuff to look at even if the plot was trite to begin with
and poorly handled in parts..  High point of the film for me:  LL Cool J's
character.

     High Sierra: a solid B.  I saw this one on video the other night and
thoroughly enjoyed it, even though it was somewhat dated.

X is a film I'm about to see (rsn) but I also remember the 
real-time controversy (geeze, an I that "old?"). The hooplah
has died down to the point that I'm willing to venture out
to see the flick. 
  
BUT!
  
mcnally, the proportion of time, in reality, seems (by your 
description anyway) to fit the film-time proportion of the
before and after "Mecca." I'm not willing to (apriori) sacrifice
the proportions for the sake of a movie. From your description it
seems as if Lee DID keep the proportions in perspective. As for the
"fact" that X did or did not "physically attend" a Mecca "session,"

is (from my perspective anyway) not the same as a "mental
attendance" of said session. 
  
He changed.
 
That is what is critical, not dissimilar (in effect) from Saul
"changing" to Paul on the "road to Damascus," for what it's worth.

  that wasn't one of the things that I was disputing..

Ahhhhh, not the Mecca bit, the screen-time and what should have been
cut. I was intending (but drifted) to just wonder about the
proportions of time before/after and got myself off onto another
topic, sorry.

"Body of Evidence" fetches a D.  Another flick in the Lifestyles of 
the Rich and Horny genre, with a big budget, good cast, and brain-dead
script.  A fairly boring, ball-biting blonde (Madonna), gets 
together with her attorney (Willem Dafoe) who has given up intelligence
for Lent.  I think they were trying to make another "Black Widow".  What
they got's not even a close call.  Rent "Body Heat" and see how it's
really done.

    "Pets or Meat"  **  -- A disappointment for someone who is
expecting something with as much substance as "Roger and Me".
It rambles somewhat pointlessly, especially at the beginning.
Has its funny moments, though (poor Frankenmuth!). 

    "Feed"  *** or **** if you're a political junkie.  See
why George Bush really lost.  This is great humor of the
"Candid Camera" sort, off-the-record clips from the 
New Hampshire primary (and later).

(There's an interesting article in this month's Esquire about Michael
Moore, the creator of "Pets or Meat.")

 where can I buy "feed"?

  <heh>

Re:#21  Ah yes, #Enchanted April, a charmer, a sleeper and a lovely movie.
Marvelous visuals, terrific character development, and left me uplifted.
Definitely a contender for Best Foreign Film.

        My wife and I saw the following movies and enjoyed both a great deal:
"Aladdin" and "A Few Good Men".

Ok, aladdin I would give a A+ because it was hilarious to me.

toys I would give a b+ because it thought it was wierd but loosy acting of the
general.

something special was c- I thought it was going to be good because leonard
maltin give it a *** but it was not *** it was c- because the story was kind of
dump.

I also saw shoot the moon which was on cable last night at 3:15am

It was voilent and cursing was bad but if you forget the cursing then it was
about a c+  fawlty towers was good A- because of john cleese made it good.

- Backtalk version 1.3.30 - Copyright 1996-2006, Jan Wolter and Steve Weiss