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The Irishman (2019)
Tedious
I enjoyed the Sopranos and Goodfellas, multiple viewings of each, but this one was just tedious, and I really wanted to like it. It was like a first time director had taken the wheel - they spent 5 full minutes on dialogue confirming that there was a fish in the red car that Jimmy Hoffa rode in. The detail is completely irrelevant to the plot. I had a hard time believing the film got so much positive press. There are no likable characters, the sound track is in places just a depressing low drone, there is no real suspense, and all the characters are hard to keep track of. Most bizarre are the on screen titles telling us how just about everyone violently dies, and when, though that has not much to do with the plot either. I 'get' that this was intended to take some of the glamour away from the rotten people being depicted, but I'm not sure it worked. Might have been okay with some of the many, many pointless exchanges of dialogue trimmed or deleted.
Saving Private Ryan (1998)
Important film but not a great one
It's an important film, not a great one. It put World War II and its veterans back in the public eye in a big way that would be impossible to exaggerate. The story itself is childish fantasy and the plot holes are so big you can drive a Tiger tank through them. The contrived frontal assault on the radar station ruins it for me, since it comes out of nowhere and Miller acts irrationally for no other reason than the movie demands it. Steamboat Willie's return at the end, and the idea that Upham is somehow vindicated because he murders a prisoner of war is just too nonsensical. Even if we accept the silly notion that Willie happened to run into the same SS guys Miller was about to fight (who, incidentally, in reality didn't make it to Normandy until after the events of the movie) and decided he will just throw in with them as they launch a frontal assault on a defended town (instead of, I don't know, reporting to his own unit), we're supposed to, as the audience, hate on him for shooting Miller despite the fact that's his damn job? Sentimental schmalz with the over the top flag-waving book-ends. It's too bad, the combat sequences are among the most visceral, impactful, and realistic put to film. All in service of a corny B-movie plot with stock characters from central casting, most of which were too old (but especially Farina, Danson, Hanks and Sizemore).
De slag om de Schelde (2020)
High production values, but ahistorical and poorly written
It is a shame the writing on this film is so lacklustre as the production values are through the roof. The aerial scenes of the gliders are breathtaking (though a little crowded, as CGI artists tend to do). The uniforms and military equipment are for the most part good, and the cinematography is outstanding. The grey colour palette matches the film well and it is impossible to tell where CGI ends and the real world begins. It looks very much like someone took modern cameras back to 1944 Walcheren and photographed it. Each hospital room, living room, public building, flooded field, and the causeway itself is a flawless depiction of what the area must have looked like during the war.
As for the story...
Things occur throughout the film solely so the movie can happen. It's as if someone simply looked up some historical facts to hang the film on, but had no idea how militaries then or now actually worked. There is a scene where a resistance man tells two Dutch girls to get a map to the allies "or all will have been in vain." Amusingly, the map shown on screen is in fact an Allied map. There are surviving samples in Canadian archives, I've held one in my hands. A quick glance at the war diaries of the Canadian units involved in the actual Sloedam battle will reveal that the Allies knew all about the German defences.
The actual attacks over the causeway are compressed. The initial attack by the Black Watch is depicted in the film, the subsequent two attacks by the Calgary Highlanders, which forged the bridgehead, are not. Reinforcement by Le Regiment de Maisonneuve is similarly not depicted. In actuality the 52nd Lowland Division was ordered across the causeway after that, but refused, having found a place to cross the Sloe Channel by boat. That is sort of depicted in the film, but by the time they crossed in the actual event, the fighting at the German roadblocks on the west end of the Sloedam had long since been captured.
Other nonsense propels what little plot there is forward. A German officer comes to the house where a resistance boy lives. He doesn't search the house, but engages in some "affably evil" conversation with the boy's father. To what end? We never find out. In fact, no one seems to have any real motivations. None of the characters are fleshed out in the least.
Overall the movie is shot with lavish detail in the visuals, but the story is dull and there are no characters to care about. They just stumble from predicament to predicament and evoke similar scenes from batter movies. The evil German talking to the Dutch civilian? Tarantino did it better in I. B. The standoff (actually, about three of them) between a German and a Brit? Tarantino again. In a quirky Tarantino film it makes sense. Here, in a kitchen-sink drama, hard to say what they are supposed to prove.
Could have had something significant to say - about a lot of things - Canadian sacrifice or the plight of the Dutch, particularly those who found fascism appealing, or the British sense of duty. The film thinks it's talking about all this, but it's so poorly plotted and the dialogue is so stilted, you never lose the sense you're watching some screenwriter's sense of what the war might have been like.
Nine Lives (2016)
Not terrible
Inoffensive little title. I hadn't seen anything by Kevin Spacey since his ouster from Hollywood, and watched this on DVD in Feb 2023. Was nice to see him, he automatically brings some gravitas to the screen. Watched it with my neighbours, the teenage boy "spoiled" it in the first couple of minutes by telling me that Spacey becomes a cat but I pretty much guessed that had to be the thrust of the film just by looking at the title. Like other reviewers note, this ain't Shakespeare and there are definitely no real surprises, but it was a comforting and family friendly thing we could comfortably watch together. I thought it would be too much for me - we lost their 20-year old ragdoll just a day ago to kidney disease - but this was actually a nice diversion and got our minds off our grief. For 80 minutes their house that had suddenly become quiet and empty was once again brought to life. Watch this with the kids.
Im Westen nichts Neues (2022)
Visually Stunning, Fraudulently Titled and No Story To Speak Of
The cinematography of this film is breathtaking, from the winter landscapes (which make it seem a bit like a Terence Malick film) to the mud and blood of the Western Front. Never have dead men looked so much like actual corpses, as opposed to dressed up extras holding their breath.
Unfortunately, the visuals hide the fact the screenwriters really don't know what to do with the vivid characters they inherited from the source material. The dialogue is unrealistic and peppered with "war movie cliches" while doing nothing to make us care about any of these characters. The hero, Paul, finds a friend dead in the trenches about an hour in and while the actor does a good job of portraying his grief - we feel nothing of it since his "friend" had perhaps two lines of dialogue in total.
The bizarre departures from the source material are so frequent and extensive that they could have simply renamed the characters and put this out as an original story. But, of course, they wouldn't have had the name recognition that comes with the title. It seems rather crass and calculated given how unlike the book this is, with major characters left out, new ones introduced, and the film taking place between 1916 and 1918 with the last half of the film set in the final days of the war.
There isn't even a nod to where the title of the book (and the first two films) comes from.
Overall, part of a trend of modern film-makers to shred decent source material to make a buck and rely on the name recognition alone to do it.
Law & Order: Severance (2022)
Marginally better
Marginally better than the previous episodes in the re-boot. I think other reviewers need to realize that they probably shot the majority of these many months ago, so any comments and feedback from we viewers won't have an effect on any new episodes for quite some time. Which is too bad, I hope they see how many true blue fans have been left underwhelmed by the scripts and the acting, particularly the political overtones of the show.
This episode was a bit better - there were far fewer lectures on how the audience is "supposed" to feel about race and gender issues, and a little more attention paid to legal strategy. And for once the conclusion of the show is not completely in doubt. I actually liked the final exchange between Waterston and the ADA - a nice whiff of conflict that didn't seem completely manufactured. Although what preceded it certainly did - how many consecutive cases can the ADA insist on prosecuting rather than settling despite the weaknesses of his case, and then have it pay off? Hopefully a major comeuppance is in order for this character, and I hope it becomes a major plot point at least, and at best perhaps an actual character arc.
The detectives are unfortunately still one-note characters which is too bad as I really like both actors. Manheim is still unfortunately miscast but the writers aren't helping anyone. Everything seems forced, even down to the little "whaddya got" interplays that seem stilted. As noted above, there is probably nothing the creators can do about this for some time as these episodes were probably shot months ago but I hope they will finetune. I really want to see L&O as successful as its earlier incarnation. Maybe they need some better legal advisors? The actual cases so far continue the "ripped from the headlines" style, but it doesn't seem like the writers know what to do with the stories, other than lecture on social issues.
Law & Order: The Right Thing (2022)
Unsubtle and uninteresting
Wanted very badly for this revival to be as good as the original. The ingredients are there, with one exception. The writers. They don't see to have any actual legal experience, nor understanding of what made the original so good.
Law & Order: Free Speech (2022)
Worst episode of the new season, but that's a low bar
I was excited beyond words to hear that Law and Order was coming back, and gave the show the benefit of the doubt through the first four episodes. The writing was a little flat and the characters all seem tired with little chemistry between them. But the stories were ok and the idea of L&O appealed even if the actual program seemed to have lost its lustre.
This episode has convinced me you can't go home again. Stereotypical evil right wingers may have smacked of "ripped from the headlines" to the writers, but there wasn't a single surprise or twist in this one. None of this episode seemed like anything but dialogue written only to service the plot. McCoy gives the go ahead to try a legal leap of faith, but legal strategies that would be suicidal to actually try have become weekly occurences now.
The show needs some fresh writers who can draw characters as something else than just political talking points.
Hitler's Last Stand (2018)
Deserves to be better
They seem to have decent writing, access to world-class historians like David O'Keefe, and a budget for CGI. The reenactments, however, are horrifyingly bad. I feel for the extras who have been given not only the wrong types of uniform and equipment to work with, but absolutely no informed instructions on how to wear any of it convincingly. Firearms carries are abysmal and modelled after modern day police tactics rather than what soldiers were doing in the field in 1944. Many won't notice much of this, but for those in the know, the reenactments are unwatchable. And they deserve to have been the centrepiece.
We Go in at Dawn (2020)
Nice Try But Nothing to See Here
The film is technically put together well. The crane shot of the church for example sets this apart from the usual hand-held low budget film. The music meshes with the action also. But the action is mostly silly and the dialogue is trite. In order to increase the stakes they keep talking about the thousands, and millions, of lives on the line but it just comes across as dumb. The worst part of this is seeing people who have clearly never held a firearm in their life try to look like they're using them. No one has any idea of the recoil of any of the weapons they're pretending to shoot, and the flimsly special effects don't do anything else to hide the fact there isn't a single real gun in the entire film.
The acting was competent, particularly the male lead who does a creditable job. He deserves a better script.
The Greg Gutfeld Show (2015)
Refreshingly different
Yes, the skits are bad, but that is the point. They're delivered tongue-in-cheek, and no one on the panel is allowed to take themselves too seriously. Compare to Colbert's cringeworthy song and dance propaganda numbers. It's nice to see a conservative voice in the late night sphere. I also really like the format, with four guests per night, and an entire stable of personalities to occupy the other seats.
Free Guy (2021)
Fun but baffling
Ryan Reynolds obviously steals the show as the super-likable hero. All the acting is good except for the "heavy", though perhaps his continual mangling of pop culture references is a deliberate comment on his personality. The effects are obviously very good. Not so good are the constant and unnecessary blasphemes, foul language and vulgar sexual references which will go over the heads of the younger viewers and honestly add nothing to the film. In common with any other video game movie, you'll have to check your brain at the door. Given a room full of computer servers why would it occur to anyone - dumb villain or otherwise - to attack it with a hatchet rather than just, you know, cut the power. Many other similar questions, which shouldn't interfere to the fun on the screen as long as you remind yourself it doesn't matter. No real surprises or twists and of course the obligatory happy ending which you see coming before the film is even half over.
Snake Eyes: G.I. Joe Origins (2021)
Unnecessary retelling of a story that Rise of Cobra did well in just five minutes
I previewed The Rise of Cobra for my neighbour's young teenage son in anticipation of seeing SNAKE EYES. The original G. I. Joe film got a lot of negative reviews, but I loved it. As one of those young males who scooped up both the 3-3/4" toy line and the Marvel comic books, the film version was definitely coloured by nostalgia. I was pleased that the boy next door liked that film as much as I did. The action was constant, the plot mostly made sense, and there were all kinds of colourful characters with rich back story that was laid out in fast-paced scenes. I willingly overlooked the physical impossibility of it all (sinking icebergs, anyone?) with the same spirit GI:Joe fans wrote to Marvel Comics to exchange plothole explanations for No-Prizes.
Snake Eyes couldn't be a more different experience. There were long, plodding scenes - and if they had been exposition, it might not have been bad. But it wasn't even that - they were long soliloquys with platitudes about honor and loyalty and honesty. The crux of the film is Snake Eyes facing three challenges to join a Japanese 'clan'. But none of it makes any sense. You have a sword fight on a Los Angeles pier (why wouldn't they just bring guns - I mean, the whole job at the pier was as a gun smuggler), and a magic jewel and some death defying motorcycle stunts. You have low-rent copies of the Baroness and Scarlet from the G. I. Joe films. The actors they selected have no gravitas at all (Yeah, it would be hard to match Siena Miller's performance in the original.) And you have a little wokeness thrown in; the African member of the family, the super grandma in charge (patriarchy=evil, matriarchy=good).
Wanted badly to like this one, but it was mostly just an incoherent mess, certainly in contrast to the character's original development in the comic books, which was echoed in Rise of Cobra in a couple of succinct flashbacks. Those flashbacks were far more entertaining than this, unfortunately.
Positives are the lead actor's acting and some nice visuals, particularly of Japan.
Behind the Line: Escape to Dunkirk (2020)
Low-budget films don't HAVE to look like it - but this one does
Others have mentioned the writing, acting and plot. I'll add my comments about the production values. The British troops are wearing post-war equipment, which most people wouldn't notice or care about. But why on earth wouldn't they get the actors to at least mime the recoil of the rifles when they're shooting? Combined with the poor sound effects, it looks like they are playing Airsoft and there is no willing suspension of disbelief on the part of the viewer. The German uniforms were a joke, SS men wearing the black party uniform, others wearing odd mixtures of Army insignia on their helmets. Ten seconds of research would have permitted them to correct that. The civilian costuming was equally unconvincing, looks like the costumer went to a thrift shop in hopes of finding something "old looking."
Too much of this just pulls you out of the story. Besides, the war movie sports scene has been done so much better so many times already - soccer in Boys in Company C, soccer again in Victory with Sly Stallone and Max von Sydow, football in the M*A*S*H feature film.
First Man (2018)
Great visuals, lacks the drama of other treatments
Pretty much gets a 'meh' from me. The story has been told well in From the Earth to the Moon and the film Moonshot. The visuals are stunning, and I do like the (mostly) first person point of view which adds immediacy. Gemini missions never looked so dangerous and claustrophic, which is good. But the film-makers had a choice between covering new ground, and retreading the same ground the other films did, and didn't seem to come down firmly on either side. All the drama of the Apollo 11 landing was pretty much sucked out - yes, it's a foregone conclusion how it will end - but they really dumbed it down, to the film's detriment. Aldrin is reduced to a minor character - and not very sympathetically portrayed, though I'm okay with the latter. No doubt people found him abrasive. But we see none of the clashes that are famously portrayed in the other films (who gets out first, what should be said). Maybe that's the point of the film, we're not *supposed* to know anyone because Armstrong himself was so private and unengaged with those around him.
The one thing I thought this movie did better than the others was the actual first step on the moon. I thought From the Earth to the Moon did a slightly comical job, inadvertently, by panning the camera to Armstrong's midsection just as the music swelled. First Man gets this moment right, with a much different musical approach. The scenery looks absolutely real, and the crater that Armstrong flies over in order to land looks as terrifying as it is supposed to, something the other film's could only hint at through dialogue.
For those who have the transcript of the landing memorized, though, it's a bit too bad not to hear "413 is in" and much of the other famous dialogue - "drifting to the right a little", "picking up some dust."
Worth seeing for the visuals and the Gemini 8 portrayal but all in all seemed, to me, to be a bit shallow. We all know Armstrong bit his tongue bailing out of the LLTV, but this is one of the many details left out in order to streamline the film.
Oh, and the idiotic "where is the flag" controversy is completely unjustified. If you just have to see the Stars and Stripes, there's a very nice shot of Armstrong's kids hoisting the flag on their front lawn during a launch.
Tajemnica Westerplatte (2013)
No characters, no story, no point
I agree with the other reviewers who call this film "boring." It is possible to do a low budget war film that is compelling. You do that with characters you care about it. There are no characters in this one, just a bunch of guys in military uniforms. A couple of the characters are based on real life counter-parts. Unfortunately, they don't seem to act much like them. The movie is about a 7 day battle, but by day 2 the main characters are all wigging out, hallucinating, and doing things that don't make any sense. The extras were very poorly prepared for their scenes, most of them very conspicuously struggling to operate their weapons. Yet the soldiers they are portraying are Polish regulars - generally acknowledged to be among the world's best soldiers (even the Germans thought so). There is lots of moody music, and very poorly done special effects. Bolt action rifles send out bright coloured laser beams, in slow motion, I guess because the directors presume audiences are too stupid to know when people are getting shot at? The English subtitles are also poorly done and in some cases comical. Bad show all around.
X Company (2015)
Lazy script-writers and poor research make this "typically Canadian."
It is possible to do war fiction well in Canada - the CBC Dieppe mini-series (circa 1993) was reasonably well done with world-class actors and a mostly decent, if under-budgeted, script. But it seems X Company suffers from the same maladies as the worst of Canadian military television and film productions - a lack of advisors, or perhaps just the willingness to listen to them.
It is fashionable on the internet to pick at minor details, and military enthusiasts do it like no one else. I could forgive a few flaws as far as buttons and geegaws on uniforms, but there is very little occurring on screen that builds verisimilitude. From the officer using his Canadian Women's Army Corps signallers for advice (I get that he needs to be talking so the audience knows what he's thinking, but would an officer really be canvassing his radio operators for tactical and operational decisions?) And were SOE missions really monitored in "real time" via morse code, with wireless operators in the field in France asking for instructions from Ontario? Technically it may be possible, but the history books suggest this a fantasy, no less ridiculous than Dan Ackroyd's futuristic situation room in "Pearl Harbor", from which the Doolittle raiders - if you believe that movie - also reported back from Tokyo to the U.S. in real time.
Things were relatively more difficult to do in the 1940s. You couldn't get from Europe to Canada in the blink of an eye, it sometimes took days by plane, and usually many days by ship. Talking to people far away was always a struggle. These would be things to highlight in the show, not dismiss as inconvenient truths. We should admire agents of the SOE for their ability to operate without cell phones, instant text messaging, or constant contact with the real world. And film-makers should respect their real life stories enough to attempt to portray their actions honestly.
Always encouraging to see Canadian film-makers telling our stories, but hopefully this series improves the level of accuracy and believability.
Parkland (2013)
Excellent Depiction of Some Ancillary Characters, However Rushed
It was rumoured years ago that Tom Hanks wanted to do a mini-series based on the Kennedy Assassination, as a counter-point to Oliver Stone's film, "JFK", using Vincent Bugliosi's research as a guide. If anything, this film is a convincing argument for such a series - and perhaps is even a test-bed for such a project. The film seems to pack a lot of material in, and as noted by many others, the pacing feels off.
However, there is a great verisimilitude created by the inclusion of actual footage - in limited amounts - as well as the integration of the ground-breaking television coverage of the events of the day. The conclusion of the film is perhaps too subtle, but if one pays attention to what Cronkite is saying and relates it to the action on-screen, there is a very clever "conclusion" to the film that it seems some reviewers have missed. I saw this film in the same (opening) weekend as "Gravity" and ironically, the latter film is receiving rave reviews for the acting of its cast, despite not really having much of a story. In fact, "Gravity" is really not much more than a thematic notion about "rebirth" with two weakly drawn characters, while "Parkland" focuses on a group of real-life men and women who had to deal with a major historical catastrophe. I found the latter far more gripping, and compelling.
Some of the choices in "Parkland" were a bit odd, and comparing to the historical record as set out by the source material - Bugliosi - one sees some liberties taken for one presumes cinematic reasons. Other reviewers have pointed out some (i.e. Zapruder had initially locked his film in his safe, not clutched it to his bosom in Dealey Plaza). One wonders if we truly won't see an expanded version of this film, in mini-series form, with the many other characters explored. The actor chosen to portray Lee Harvey Oswald bore an uncanny resemblance and the effort seemed wasted given the tiny screen time given to that major historical figure. One could easily see some merit to an 8 or even 10 part treatment of various subjects, including Oswald's life in Russia, the assassination attempt on General Walker, the work of the Warren Commission, the rise of the conspiracy industry, Jack Ruby's last weekend of freedom, the Clay Shaw trial, etc. Many more interesting stories to tell from the perspective of the Bugliosi/Posner perspective.
Gravity (2013)
See it for the visuals, but the film is about theme rather than plot
One of my absolute favourite cinema experiences was seeing Magnificent Desolation in IMAX 3-D. Having had a long-time interest in Project Apollo, it was amazing to sit in the audience and feel like I was actually on the moon, or in the actual spacecraft involved with the lunar landings. Knowing that I was watching history come to life left me with a lump in my throat, a feeling I still get every time I put From The Earth To The Moon in my DVD player and replay Tom Hanks' 10-part mini-series, which I do on a regular basis.
The visuals of Gravity in 3-D are no less stunning, and other reviewers, professional and amateur, have spoken well to them, in particular the opening 17-minute shot which leaves one feeling as if they, too, are right there, on a mission over the Earth.
Unfortunately, the film quickly departs from logic. The director has admitted that science has taken a back-seat to story, and this understandable - even forgivable. I can understand a certain necessity to putting all the space stations and ships on the same orbital plane in order to tell a good story.
However, there is no story here either. The director basically has opted to provide a theme - "rebirth" - and has used a space setting in order to paint this theme for the audience in sometimes subtle, sometimes broad strokes. This may appeal to the artistically minded, it will certainly clash with those, like myself, who were drawn in by the rave reviews about the technical merits of the photography.
The characterization is minimal, and perhaps most disappointing given her usual brilliant performance, Bullock is used here as a 'damsel-in-distress'. We are led to believe she has been selected for astronaut training and employment as a mission specialist, but we don't get to see her in whatever element she was chosen for. Instead, we see her fumble through routine repairs, dropping tools, complaining about space-sickness, and ultimately screaming in fright, crying, confessing to the strains of single-parenthood, admitting she can't fly the re-entry modules, but managing to do so anyway, through blind luck. And thus she is "reborn".
And in case you don't "get it", she floats in an airlock in a fetal position, wrapped in an umbilical cord for long, pointless seconds, as Clooney's character drifts off into the void, incommunicado, as she ensures the audience buys into the "rebirth" theme, before floating down the tunnel to make contact.
It's not such a bad theme, but the actual space program is about so much more than blind luck and damsels in distress. I understand movies need to have peril and conflict - which can include inner conflict. The device here of having Clooney return was handled so abruptly, I simply assumed it was a bit of science the film-makers had simply gotten wrong, and the gasps and muttering of other audience members in the cinema suggested they felt the same way. It would have been much more satisfying to see astronauts behaving like actual astronauts, and not fretting about whether or not they had "learned how to pray" correctly.
There was nothing about any (both) of these characters that made me care about them, and the fact that Bullock's survived by pushing buttons like a chimp in a food experiment actually made me a bit angry.
Such excellent photography and visuals, and two brilliant actors, are wasted here on a non-story by a director who dwelled entirely on theme.
Avatar (2009)
Visually arresting, intellectually insulting
I think it is great that movies can be used to highlight current social issues, or even past ones - the plight of the Tuskegee airmen, for example, or the Holocaust. I don't even mind "heavy-handed" emotional overtones - i.e. the American flag in Saving Private Ryan used to bookend the movie. I'm a sucker for that stuff. But Avatar is not just overblown with heavy handed writing, it actually insults any number of categories of viewers.
If one listens to the commentary track of Valkyrie, for example, the writers mention that the obvious "villain" of the piece could not have been written as a villain. Hitler's public speeches were almost always about prosperity and peace, he never killed anyone personally, never signed an execution order, never visited a death camp, never witnessed a murder. And so in Valkyrie, you had a quality of which apparently Mr. Cameron is not possessed - subtlety. The only "mustachio-twirling" moment, as the writers called it, was when one of the teletype operators is told by his boss to cut off communications to the orchestrator of the coup against Hitler, and he makes a faint smile. That's it. That's the moment of villainy for the film. The rest is cloaked in ambiguity.
Avatar, of course, has scenery chewing galore, or would have if not for the excellent actors. Stephen Lang is well known to Civil War buffs is certainly no over-actor. But the writing does him no great service, ditto Giovanni Ribisi, another familiar face to war movie buffs from his service in SPR.
What is most insulting, though, is that Hollywood almost always dumps on religion out of ignorance up until the point it can serve a story in some hokey way. The only time religion is used to service a story is if some scientific grounds can be found to 'legitimize' it (in Star Wars, it was mitichlorians, whatever they are, and in this one, it is electromagnetic impulses connecting the trees). In Avatar, the people using technology are stupid and amoral ones and naturally are depicted as faithless. Catholics, Jews, Muslims all get short shrift in films because without some "scientific proof" for their religious beliefs, apparently faith alone is not enough. According to Cameron, you have to be able to literally talk to the trees and cute animals, or else religion just doesn't cut it.
But I also don't understand the movies in which we're supposed to root for cultures who reject modernization; the message was so heavy handed it just made me angry more than anything. Connect the dots - technology is bad, since evidently it ruined the Earth, and therefore we need to root for blue people who prefer to live in trees and sleep in hammocks without any of our creature comforts. Personally, I like living in a house and having a computer, and watching TV, and a spring mattress, and a gas-fired furnace, and a car with internal combustion engine to take me interesting places, and going to the movies and watching far-fetched stuff that people like Cameron dream up.
There might have been a good story in here somewhere if Cameron hadn't decided to beat us over the head with an environmental guilt-trip, with bad guys with razor thin motivations and no ambiguity whatsoever. Far more interesting themes would have been the notion that humans were there to sincerely help, or perhaps the notion that religion and faith are real and legitimate and meaningful without being able to 'prove' the existence of God through scientific means. Sometimes sworn enemies even believe in the same gods - talk about moral ambiguity. I can't buy into a notion that people who make multi-million dollar technology are always of necessity amoral idiots while people sleeping on rocks and eating raw hand-killed food are somehow geniuses with absolutely perfect moral centres. I guess that's why they call it fantasy. By the end, I was cheering for the guys in the helicopters, not because I approved of what they were doing, but because I wanted it to be over with that much more quickly. I simply wasn't buying it; I enjoyed the visual spectacle but the characterizations and motivations of the "villains" were about as compelling as Wile E. Coyote.
Dieppe (1993)
Very well done
This is a very well done TV movie; criticisms that it only features one of the units involved are not really valid. The movie chooses to focus on two levels; that of a single battalion (in this case the Royal Regiment of Canada from Toronto, not to be confused with the Royal Canadian Regiment), and also the highest levels of command. Those not familiar with the command structure of the Canadian Army in WW II may be briefly confused but will be able to pick out the chain of command by context clues.
Working within an obviously limited budget, this production goes above and beyond in presenting an interesting, and accurate if slightly fictionalized view of the politics behind Dieppe as well as the view of the Raid from the soldier's POV. Blue Beach is recreated in great detail. It is unfortunate the other parts of the raid were not recreated, but they weren't necessary for this telling.
Be sure and read Brian Loring-Villa's book in conjunction with this series.
DVD version has a fascinating 1962 documentary with interviews with many of the key players on the real raid. See also my review at amazon.com regarding the DVD for additional info.
The Valour and the Horror: In Desperate Battle: Normandy 1944 (1992)
WW II through the eyes of the 1960s
A truly bad "documentary", well discussed in the book The Valour and the Horror Revisited. Suffice to say here that the McKennas have chosed to unfairly depict the Canadian Army in Normandy as criminally incompetent while at the same time painting the soldiers as unwitting victims. Such distractions as historically inaccurate uniforms on the re-enactors who are given screen time, as well as the truly ridiculous recreation of the Verrierres Ridge assault using Canadian Forces personnel circa 1990, do nothing to add to the film. Anyone wanting to gain a true understanding of the events in Normandy is better off consulting the various histories by Stacey, Copp, Roy, et al. Notice also the focus on eastern Canadian regiments; perhaps a coincidence, but then again, western regiments didn't charge themselves to extinction the way the Black Watch did at Verrierres Ridge, either.
The truth is that Canadian generalship in Normandy is a more complex issue than this so-called documentary would suggest. Canadian soldiers by and large were inexperienced, but did the best they could with what they had. While the McKennas are certainly correct about Canadian tanks being inferior to German tanks, nothing is said about the doctrinal and economic issues which led to these tanks being employed - or the fact that the Canadians were using an artillery-based doctrine to rather good effect on the Continent. The McKennas, in other words, have explored certain elements of this period in a vacuum in order to present "evidence" of some type of conspiracy. Viewers are advised strongly to do further research.
Good interviews with veterans of the campaign are the only notable highlight in this seriously disappointing offering. Even the newsreel footage often did not match the narration; sharp eyed viewers will see footage of the Calgary Highlanders on parade while the Black Watch are being discussed.