judgewashington

I watched this over a period of two nights and was completely enthralled by the first half of the film. I should have stopped when I was ahead. The second half is ponderously dull, overly long, and filled with confusion. The biggest offender is Felicity Jones, who eventually shows up as Adrien Brody's shrewish wife and brings the picture to a halt. She supposed to be an invalid who's been damaged by the war, and yet she looks like a healthy model wearing an old lady wig and dabbed with a touch of old-age makeup....in a wheelchair! It's ridiculous. To make matters worse, as time goes on, she doesn't age a bit...in fact, she appears younger and healthier in each progressive scene. She drags down this so-so picture that could have been so much better if an hour had been edited out and her part completely recast.

Done on the cheap with bad acting, non-existent production values, lousy photography, and a confusing plot. It's difficult to say which looks more worn.... Vegas or Pamela Anderson. To see her without makeup throughout most of the film is to understand why she's relied upon her looks rather than her acting skills for her career. She's hardly Helen Mirren. Jamie Lee Curtis is grotesque as a garish, vulgar ex-showgirl, adding to the dreariness. There's also a slim, underexplained story about Pamela Anderson having a neglected, resentful daughter that is just padding for an anemic plot. Even though it's a short movie, it seems interminably long. The camerawork is jittery and amateurish, looking like the whole thing was filmed on someone's iPhone, with the edges of the screen perpetually out of focus. Other than Dave Bautista's sensitive performance, this is a really bad movie.

Outer Range---or is that Outer Limits?---is one of the most laughable and convoluted series that you'll ever see. It wants to be a Western/Sci Fi/Mystery combo and it's just plain silly while passing as profound. You'd better take notes or you'll never figure out the plot, if indeed there really is one. Josh Brolin does such a bad imitation of Jeff Bridges---both "JBs"---that you'll swear that watching The Old Man, or perhaps Crazy Heart. And don't even ask about happens in that Big Hole in the field or what it symbolizes---if the writers knew (and apparently they don't) they're not going to explain it to you. Making it through the first season of this turkey was excruciating, and something that I don't intend on continuing.