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Reviews
Master and Commander: The Far Side of the World (2003)
Not an action movie, really a humanistic movie
The trailers for this movie were deceiving, but so are most. Its sad trailers have to put in almost every action scene they have just to get people's attention, but in this case action played very little in Master and Commander.
There are some very well done action scenes, but this was really a movie about life on a navy battleship in the early 1800's. It was interesting seeing, for what maybe was the first time, all the children who lived on the boat with the men (scary thought), and brought home the origin of the term, son-of-a-gun. (Look up the origin, it's interesting.) Even some of the officers were just teenagers.
But even as a human drama and a "this is how they used to live back then", the movie still came up short at time. This movie had greatly done cinematography, but the story itself was poorly told and dragged many times. (The excuse that that was how life was on ships sometimes is no excuse; you don't have to show 15 minutes of nothing happening to give people an idea that nothing is happening.)
Another shortcoming was that the director wasn't able to convey a sense of time lapse. One scene would cut to the next, and then they casually mention 3 weeks have gone by, but you never get a sense of that. But the arguments between the captain and the ship's doctor were good, most of the actors did a great job, and again there was very good camera work and the action sequences were done well.
I'd rate it a 7/10, but again, don't think this is an action movie.
The Matrix Revolutions (2003)
Bloated, not as intellectual as it tries to sound. (Great battle scene though).
This had to be one of the most painful movies I have ever sat through since "Q & A". I have never seen so many useless scenes and dialogues in I don't know how long. The convoluted story gets even worse than the second movie. There were more holes in the plot than in a colander. Even the one good part of the movie, and so typically it was the battle scene, had so many flaws it was ridiculous. Even movie patrons dressed in Matrix garb looked like they didn't want to be seen after the movie. I have always been respectful of the money people pay to see a movie... always considerate of people who might be enjoying what I think of as garbage.... yet, it was all I could do to not cry out like other people were doing during one particular scene in the movie, "Dammit, just die already". (I won't say who, and no, it wasn't Neo.)
Some people probably have speculated that the story ends with Neo (Mr. Anderson) waking up in the real world and realizing that the whole story was all just a dream. Well, I'll tell you right now, that's not how it ends. But believe me, nay, see for yourself, it would have probably been ten times more preferably to the ending it had.
And for everybody who says they don't understand what the characters are talking about in the movie, that the dialogue goes over their heads, listen to me... there is nothing to understand! There is a DISTINCT DIFFERANCE between genuine intellectual dialogue, and trying to sound smarter and more impressive than you really are.
Was it worth the price of the ticket? No! Will it be worth the price of the DVD? No! Will it be worth the price of the rental? Maybe. (The action scene at Zion was impressive.)
I would probably wait until the commercial television release, where hopefully it will be the "fat" of the movie that will be cut out and replaced by commercials. At least the commercials would be more entertaining.
The Last of the Mohicans (1992)
WARNING AGAINST THE DVD!
Many people have given the movie itself praise enough, so I will it to others to sing it's praises while I vent my one major criticism.
My criticism is with the DVD release of the movie. Like other people have said, the DVD "Director's Expanded Version" isn't enhanced, it's been hacked. There are a few scenes added that when you look at them, you know why they were edited out in the first place. But what's worse, some of the dialogue and music has been cut. Some good lines were taken out, and the music excerpt from Clannad's "I Will Find You" towards the end is missing. Plus, there is expanded dialogue to the speech made in the end that goes on to predict modern life with buildings and the plight of the faceless office worker- it's preachy and unrealistic.
The only reason I can see as to why they did this was a money making scheme- release a hacked up version of a movie that everyone loves on DVD, then when enough people have bought it and seen how messed up it is and clamor for the original theatrical release, they'll re-release the original version on DVD so people will have to buy it all over again.
My recommendation is to buy a legal copy of the original, unaltered widescreen version on VHS and copy it to DVD for yourself, in case they never release the "good" version on DVD.
The Manhattan Project (1986)
Those darn warmongering govies....
So let me get this straight. This teenager wants to expose this secret government laboratory... by building an atomic bomb with material he steals from the facility and taking it to a science fair. And he wants to expose this facility because... they didn't tell anyone they were a secret plutonium facility and thereby make themselves a target for espionage and theft?
So, as I said, his solution to the "warmongering" military authorities building atomic bombs is to build one himself. (And they're warmongering because they want to build atomic bombs because hostile countries with a doctrine of overthrowing countries to spread their political beliefs would do the same to the US if they could because they also have atomic bombs, right?) Then when the government officials learn that this kid has stolen weapons grade material and has built a bomb with it, they have to gall to take over his mom's house while she cries "What gives you the right?!"
Then, and get this, then, when he learns the government has found out he has stolen weapons grade material and built a bomb with it, and he threatens to set it off for no other logical reason anyone can think of other than not wanting to get thrown in jail for something HE did, everyone acts surprised when the government acts ready to kill him to stop him and everyone thinks that's just a terrible thing. No, wait, they want to kill him not just to stop him, but also to keep the facility a secret.... after a whole bunch of people already know what's going on.
And when the bomb almost goes off because this genius kid was too stupid to know what he was doing, he gets to walk away as a local hero because he built a bomb with weapons grade material that he stole from the facility and almost wiped out his friends, family, everyone in the town and surrounding areas including the mean government officials who were ready to kill him because he threatened to set off an atomic bomb with material he stole from the facility.
Riiiiigggghhhhhhtttt.........
Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl (2003)
Ok over all in spite of being a Bruckheimer film
Over all the movie ended up being ok, in spite of the fact it could have been great. But as anyone who's familiar with Jerry Bruckheimer movies knows, lots of scenes ended up being over dramatized, over humored, grossly contrived scenarios, a lot of style with very little substance, and generally for people with low intellect and attention spans.
But as someone else pointed out, it should at least be pretty fun for the kids. Johnny Depp's character, while over the top, was still pretty entertaining as a pirate who's got a screw loose, or one sandwich shy of a picnic (which in the movie seems to mean having effeminate mannerisms). All the other characters are mind numbingly cliched.
The real stars of the movie, of course, are the special effects. Spectacular transition effects done almost seamlessly. So gather of the kids and head on down to the matinee. If you're an adult, you might want to have a drink first and check your IQ at the door. Trust me; you'll have a better time.
Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines (2003)
Arnold's back.... again.
Arnold's Terminator comes back in time again to thwart Skynet's attempts to change the future... again. The first sequel, T2, had great special effects, but unfortunately that was all it had going for it. The premise was good, but the story execution was poor, the acting substandard, and was plagued by an annoying John Connor character who had you wishing he'd get killed even before the movie ended.
This third installment has great special effects and I think they even improved on some things. 1. It would have been better if they could have come up with something different in the story and still make it good, but that's pretty hard to do. So it seems like this time they didn't take themselves too seriously, and even poked fun at themselves in some ways. They rehash some of the previous movies one-liners, some with a twist ("She'll be bhack!"), and throw out some new ones. But they kept in check and didn't let it get lampoonish. 2. The totally liquid metal terminator of T2 made for some great special effects, but being totally liquid metal was stupid. Not taking into account the improbable physics involved, you had the feeling that if Arnold Schwarzenegger wasn't the hero, his butt would have been stomped way in the beginning of T2. This time, the evil terminator has a solid skeleton frame with a liquid metal skin, and that's a lot easier for the viewer to swallow. 3. The action is tremendous! And I think that's what they tried to spend most of their focus on, instead of getting to bogged down in a dramatic story that they had no hope of making work, as happened in T2. True, they had to do the obligatory dramatic scenes as the characters get to know each other and try to deal with their situation, but without too much time being spent on it. I think it was a wise choice.
The only really dumb part of the movie (and it was really stupid)was when the evil terminator supposedly infects several motor vehicles with a virus, enabling her to remote control them. I don't think you even have to be an auto mechanic to know just how impossible that is. It looked cool, but it was still massively stupid.
I won't give away the ending, (you can read other reviews for that)but it had a nice plot twist in the end. It didn't have that trademark James Cameron touch of making you think just when the movie is over, there's a finale waiting around the corner. The story could have been better, but I think the director did a pretty good job with what he had to work with. In the end, I was entertained.
Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets (2002)
Was this by the same director? Is this the same cast?
The cast of Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone did an excellent job; specifically the three children who stared in the movie. They almost looked like real kids being almost overwhelmed with real adventures that you and I could only dream of. And the director, Chris Columbus, did a pretty good job making an entertaining movie out of what was essentially a children's story with many contrived parts.
But The Chamber of Secrets almost looks like it was made by other people. The acting was stale in most parts, over baked in others. And the movie just lumbered along from scene to scene like it was directed by some novice. It's almost like they said, "We don't care for this particular story, so let's just get through it so we can get to the other movies." You can almost hear the characters thinking, "Ok, here we are in class again... Here we are at the quidditch match again... Here are the ghosts...again." And if that ending was just like the book, I think we could have forgiven Chris Columbus for taking some creative license to improve upon it, just like the LOTR: The Fellowship of the Ring was an improvement on the book (an rarity, for sure). Let's hope the cast and crew didn't spend all they had on the first movie with nothing left to give, because there're still 3 more to go.