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| Author |
Message |
| 25 new of 229 responses total. |
richard
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response 152 of 229:
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Feb 12 22:55 UTC 2000 |
New DVD recommendation-- "CITY LIGHTS"-- this is the new digitally
remastered dvd version of Charlie Chaplin's 1931 masterpiece. A print
taken from the best negative known to exsist-- with a new stereo recording
of the original Chaplin score. Looks and sounds just wonderful. This is
one of my alltime favorite movies, the story of the Little Tramp's
relationship with a beautiful blind flower girl, who mistakenly thinks
he's a millionaire. This is a movie thats both heartbreakingly sad and
hillariously funny at the same time. And has one of the most famous
final scenes of alltime, where the flower girl has regained her sight and
encounters the Tramp (a homeless vagrant) who made her sight possible, and
doesnt recognize him. Then holds his hand and suddenly does. They are
are staring at each other and you are left wondering what they are
thinking. Priceless!
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tpryan
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response 153 of 229:
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Feb 12 23:50 UTC 2000 |
That is one of three Charlie Chaplin films to come out on DVD,
just earlier this week.
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danr
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response 154 of 229:
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Feb 13 03:21 UTC 2000 |
I also enjoyed "The Big Lebowski."
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janc
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response 155 of 229:
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Feb 13 06:14 UTC 2000 |
"City Lights" used to strick me as one of the sadest films I'd ever
seen.
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jep
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response 156 of 229:
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Feb 14 16:00 UTC 2000 |
We took the kids to "The Tigger Movie" yesterday. It was John's first
movie in the theater. He's 3 1/2. It kept his attention for the entire
movie, which I didn't think was possible. That definitely says
something about the movie.
I'm not going to say a lot about the movie. It has the entire Winnie
the Pooh cast, and is a cute story. That's all you need to know before
you go. John loved it; he wanted to go again today. David (age 8 1/2)
also enjoyed it. Andrea and I liked it, but that's irrelevant; we
didn't go for us.
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richard
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response 157 of 229:
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Feb 14 16:16 UTC 2000 |
The City Lights DVD also has as an extra Chaplin's meticulously detailed
notes he wrote down prior to filming and during filming, showing just
how precisely detailed he was about each scene and each movement. It
took three years to do city lights, including a stretch of over a year
where he stopped production entirely because he couldnt figure out the
key scene where the blind flower girl mistakes the tramp for a millionaire.
You'd never see any director suspend filming over a year over one
scene these days!
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mary
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response 158 of 229:
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Feb 16 22:44 UTC 2000 |
I really enjoyed "Cider House Rules". It's true to the book
both in story and style - a gentle and quiet character study.
The ensemble cast does a brillant job of keeping it simple.
Jane Alexander has a smallish part. I really like her and
will see anything she graces.
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md
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response 159 of 229:
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Feb 17 02:42 UTC 2000 |
Roger Vadim, French movie director (And God
Created Woman, Barbarella) died recently at
the age of 70. He is known to have done it
with Brigitte Bardot, Jane Fonda and Catherine
Deneuve when they were young hotties, so as
much as I would like to say he's gone to his
reward, I think he's already used that up.
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bdh3
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response 160 of 229:
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Feb 17 04:40 UTC 2000 |
yeah.
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bdh3
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response 161 of 229:
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Feb 17 04:41 UTC 2000 |
The only ones he missed were Kate Jackson and Dani Delany
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omni
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response 162 of 229:
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Feb 17 08:11 UTC 2000 |
Let's hear it for the Sundance Channel. They repeated "The Big Liebowski"
so I could record it. It gets funnier with each viewing.
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remmers
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response 163 of 229:
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Feb 17 11:21 UTC 2000 |
Ann Arbor cable gets the Sundance Channel? Didn't know that.
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omni
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response 164 of 229:
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Feb 18 02:15 UTC 2000 |
They do on Digital Next TV from MedioNone. About the same price, but more
channels. We just went over to Digi and it's pretty cool. The only downer is
that I lost my scheduler.
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richard
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response 165 of 229:
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Feb 27 22:28 UTC 2000 |
dvd recommendation-- LONESOME DOVE-- you can have all eight hours of this
epic western miniseries on one disc! Based on the pulitzer prize winning
Larry McMurtry novel about a cattle drive from Texas to Montana. The best
thing about this is the wonderful performances, particularly the chemistry
between the leads, Robert DuVall and Tommy Lee Jones. Some say this is
the best performance of DuVall's career. well worth having!
Also, the DVD of universal's 1931 horror classic, Dracula (the original
starring Bela Lugosi) This comes complete with a wonderful new soundtrack
written by Philip Glass and recorded by the Kronos quartet! Its great
fund to play this and just listen to the music. Also you get as a bonus
the alternate Spanish version of the movie, which was shot on the same
sets at the same time (spanish version filmed at night, english version
during the day) The spanish version is regarded by some as even better.
Plus a documentary on the history of Dracula and the Dracula films and
lots of other stuff.
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mary
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response 166 of 229:
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Feb 27 23:03 UTC 2000 |
"Pitch Black" was much better than I expected. The eclipse sequence
was stunning. It worked a little too hard to up-end racial and gender
stereotypes, but it was fiction, after all.
"Wonder Boys" has one clever script. I'd say it was "Easy Rider"
30 years and an education later. Recommended. No cars blow-up
but a hood gets dented.
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mcnally
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response 167 of 229:
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Feb 27 23:24 UTC 2000 |
Snow Falling on Cedars -- (D)
If this movie had been a Fox special it might easily have been titled
"When Bad Directors Attack". Based on David Guterson's popular novel
about a murder trial involving a Japanese-American fisherman just after
WWII, "Snow Falling On Cedars" should've been a fairly safe bet --
adaptation of a bestselling novel, decent cast turning in decent
performances, attractive scenery and interesting setting (a small town
in an island off the coast of Washington State (one of the San Juans?))
Unfortunately, director Scott Hicks apparently decided to take all of
these elements of what should have been a modest success and throw them
into a blender. The resulting morass of flashbacks, cut-aways, and
poorly-edited montages is neither artistic nor appealing, just annoying.
*Extremely* annoying.
--
The World is Not Enough -- (D+)
I caught two movies at the bargain theater this weekend and this was the
second. After "Snow Falling on Cedars" I wasn't looking for anything
ambitious or involved, so a mindless dose of vehicle chases and explosions,
taken withouth any great expectations, seemed like a good idea. Nope!
The two thousandth feature-length James Bond film, TWinE managed to slide
in well under even my extremely low expectations for a Bond action film.
It's hard to criticise a Bond film..
Of course the plot was idiotic and full of holes.
Of course the characters were ludicrously one-dimensional.
And of course the physics of the action sequences were simply insulting
to any moderately thoughtful viewer.
These aren't flaws to be forgiven in a Bond film, they're apparently actual
necessary elements of the genre. You expect them. You might, in fact,
be scandalized if they weren't there.
In that sense, in fact, "The World is Not Enough" might actually be the
quintessential Bond film. The plot is *extra* idiotic, the characters
are especially one-dimensional, and a whole lotta things get 'blowed up
reeeal good,' often by scantily clad women.
Unfortunately, though many other Bond films have been enjoyable despite
these properties, "The World is Not Enough" is just too much.
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krj
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response 168 of 229:
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Feb 28 02:45 UTC 2000 |
Yeah, I didn't feel like working up a detailed criticism of it,
but I really did not like "The World Is Not Enough" very much.
I felt like it was a non-stop assault on my ears. There just wasn't
much of a sense of fun to it; in that respect it reminded me of
Timothy Dalton's second Bond film, "License to Kill," probably the only
Bond film I'm seen just once.
The one part of the film I liked was more screen time for Judi Densch,
who is the new 'M'.
Definitely a disappointment after the success of the previous film,
"Tomorrow Never Dies," with Hong Kong martial arts star Michelle Yeoh.
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flem
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response 169 of 229:
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Feb 28 04:35 UTC 2000 |
(Aside: I was in the movie store the other day and noticed "Grey
Owl", featuring Pierce Brosnan playing a white frontiersman, complete
with coonskin cap and fringed buckskin, who gets adopted into an Indian
tribe. I very nearly rented it, just to laugh myself silly at seeing
P.B. in buckskin. :)
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mcnally
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response 170 of 229:
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Feb 28 04:51 UTC 2000 |
It might've been worth it just to see how the movie would explain how
he kept himself supplied with styling mousse on the edge of the frontier..
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gypsi
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response 171 of 229:
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Feb 28 05:48 UTC 2000 |
<smirks> Nice one...
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drew
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response 172 of 229:
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Feb 29 03:08 UTC 2000 |
I still think the James Bond character is way overdue for shriveling up due
to old age. My god! He's been at it for almost 40 years!
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remmers
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response 173 of 229:
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Feb 29 13:28 UTC 2000 |
Trivia puzzle: Name all the actors who have played Bond in the movies.
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void
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response 174 of 229:
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Feb 29 14:28 UTC 2000 |
hmmm...george lazenby, sean connery, roger moore, timothy dalton,
pierce brosnan, and some american whose name i forget but who starred as
james "jimmy" bond in a 1959-ish made-for-tv serious production of
"casino royale." is that all of them?
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bruin
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response 175 of 229:
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Feb 29 14:37 UTC 2000 |
RE #175 I believe that "Jimmy" Bond was played by Woody Allen in "Casino
Royale." But I could be wrong on that.
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scott
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response 176 of 229:
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Feb 29 15:08 UTC 2000 |
"Casino Royale" is a trick refernce, though, since one of the plot lines was
that (to sow confusion) *all* agents would be named James Bond. So you'd have
to list a lot of actors and even a dog.
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