20151011: Horror Review--Wolfman

Name: The Wolfman (2010)
IMDb: The Wolfman

Genres: Horror, drama, thriller  Country of origin: USA

Cast: Benicio del Toro as Lawrence Talbot, Anthony Hopkins as Sir John Talbot, Hugo Weaving as Inspector Francis Abberline, Emily Blunt as Gwen Conliffe, Art Malik as Singh, Antony Sher as Dr Hoenneger.

Directed by: Joe Johnston.  Written by: Andrew Kevin Walker and David Self (screenplay).

The Three Acts:

The initial tableau: Lawrence's mother dies during his childhood in the village of Blackmoor.  This traumatizes him; his wealthy father sends him to an asylum, then exiles him to New York.  Years later, Gwen (Lawrence's brother's fiancee), finds him in New York and begs him to return to Blackmoor to aid in locating his missing brother.  Back in England, Lawrence learns that his brother is dead from mauling by an animal.  In this sad setting, Lawrence tries to renew his relationship with his estranged father, Sir John.  This works to some degree, but Lawrence himself is bitten.  He survives, which is unfortunate, as it turns out.

Delineation of conflicts: Inspector Abberline wants to confine Lawrence as a threat to society.   Reverend Fisk would like the unholy acts of the werewolf stopped. Dr Hoenneger wants to expose Lawrence to his professional colleagues as an insane man whose obsessions make him commit heinous acts, not some supernatural creature.  Lawrence wants to stop the effects the full moon has on him.  Gwen would like to help Lawrence, but it is not clear on just how to do that.  Sir John has his own issues with Lawrence.

Resolution:  Well, watch the film.  It's beautiful to behold, and horrible at the same time.  The ending has considerable strength.

One line summary: Even better than the superb The Wolf Man (1941).

Statistics:
  a. Cinematography: 10/10 Excellent filming and SFX for atmosphere and human reaction shots.

  b. Sound: 9/10 The dialog is clear, and the background music is fine for the situations.

  c. Acting: 9/10 Hopkins, del Toro, Malik, Weaving, and Sher were just great in their roles.

  d. Screenplay: 9/10 Wonderful.  The exposition of motivations was rather direct and clear.  The direction and the performances by the actors made the script come alive.

Final rating: 9/10

20151011: Drama Review--Sphere

Name: Sphere (1998)
IMDb: Sphere

Genres: Drama, Mystery, SciFi  Country of Origin: USA.

Cast: Dustin Hoffman as Norman Goodman, Sharon Stone as Beth Halperin, Samuel L. Jackson as Harry Adams, Liev Schreiber as Ted Fielding, Peter Coyote as Harold Barnes, Queen Latifah as Alice Fletcher.

Directed by: Barry Levinson.   Written by: Michael Crichton (novel), Kurt Wimmer (adaptation).

The Three Acts: 

Initial Tableau: Dr Goodman is being escorted out to sea to aid distressed survivors of an airplane crash.  On the way, he sees many naval vessels, which increases his curiosity.  Then he is put into isolation, after which he meets old friends: Dr Halperin (biology), Dr Adams (mathematics), Dr Fielding (astrophysics).  Along with Captain Barnes, they are taken to a facility 1000 feet below sea level.

Delineation of Conflicts:  The site the team is taken to was constructed to study a huge space ship discovered on the seafloor.  The people in the team were chosen to match a report that Norman wrote some ten years before.  Hence Beth, Harry, and Ted all blame Norman for anything that happens during their current predicament.  In his report, Norman had chosen people he knew well for each position in this 'first alien contact' team.  As the work progresses, Barnes has choice words for Norman as well.  Besides the human interactions stemming from past choices, the team has to face the enigma within the space ship, and do their best to survive its considerable power.

Resolution: Working through the puzzle is well worth the time.

One line summary: An intelligent first contact film.

Statistics: 

Cinematography: 10/10 Looks professional, which I seldom see.  The use of practical effects, plus the near absence of CGI helped greatly.

Sound: 8/10 Not much of an issue.  This is a movie executed through dialog, not mood music.

Acting: 10/10 The stellar cast delivered.

Screenplay: 8/10 Well done.  The second act might seem a tad long, but the short third act is well worth it.

Final Rating: 9/10

20151010: Comedy Review--Take Care

Name: Take Care (2014)
IMDb: link to IMDb

Genres: Comedy, Drama, Romance  Country of Origin: USA.

Cast: Leslie Bibb as Frannie, Thomas Sadoski as Devon, Elizabeth Rodriguez as Nurse Janet, Nadia Dajani as Fallon, Marin Ireland as Laila, Betty Gilpin as Jodi.

Written and directed by: Liz Tuccillo.

The Three Acts: 

Initial Tableau: Frannie has been in an auto accident.  She broke an arm and a leg. She gets incomplete help from her sister and friends.  After too much of that, she appeals to 'the devil'; that is, her ex, Devon.  Devon contracted cancer some years back, and Frannie had cared for him for two years until he was cured.  So she gives him a sufficient guilt trip...and he acquiesces.  His new girlfriend is not exactly understanding.

Delineation of Conflicts:  Frannie's friends do not trust Devon.  Devon wants to get rid of the guilt debt.  Devon's new girlfriend wants his fairly tenuous relationship with Frannie to end as soon as possible.  Devon's feelings of gratitude are a bit limited, but Frannie's sense of being owed (big time) is even larger than she thought, especially when she expounds on all the things she did for him.  Frannie and Devon get the opportunity to be honest with each other, which was not fun for them, but changes everything.  As time progresses, Devon spends more, rather than less, time with Frannie.  How is his new girlfriend going to take that?

Resolution: Well, watch the film.

One line summary: Frannie guilts her ex into caring for her post auto accident.

Statistics: 

Cinematography: 10/10 Looks professional, which I seldom see.

Sound: 7/10 Not much of an issue.  This is a movie executed through dialog, not mood music.

Acting: 5/10 I could have done without the actors who performed as Frannie's friends and sister. I liked Thomas Sadoski quite a bit.  Leslie Bibb's role was awkward and difficult.  She did the awkward part really well.

Screenplay: 5/10  I usually do not care for studies in awkwardness, and this is no exception.  Still, the film has a beginning, a middle, and an end.  The exposition of motivations was probably its strong point.  At least this one made some sense.

Final Rating: 6/10

20150908: Action Review--Alien Outpost

Name: Alien Outpost
IMDb: Alien Outpost main page

Genres: Action, SciFi, Thriller  Origins: UK, South Africa.   Release: 2014.

Cast: Joe Reegan as Omohundro, Adrian Paul as General Dane, Brandon Auret as Savino, Reily McClendon as Andros,  Douglas Tate as The Heavy, Rick Ravanello as Spears, Matthew Holmes as North, Sven Ruygrok as Frankie.

Directed by: Jabbar Raisani.  Written by: Blake Clifton, Jabbar Raisani.

The Three Acts: 

Initial Tableau: Earth has been invaded, somewhat successfully.  The United Space Defense Force (USDF, not much to do with the once United States) was formed to respond after most human governments were rendered useless. Strong counter-attacks by the USDF sent most of the aliens packing, but bastions of aliens remain.   USDF funding dropped after the departure of most of the aliens, and the further fall of the world economy.  However, a reduced number of aliens are still about and are still dangerous.  The USDF does what it can on a shoestring budget.  The main action of the film is set in territory once part of an Islamic nation, probably Pakistan or Afghanistan since the locals speak Pashto.  The year is 2033.

Delineation of Conflicts:  The USDF personnel have to fight the aliens in a high-tech (aliens) versus low-tech (USDF) setting.  The USDF has to deal with the often unfriendly locals in a low-tech versus no-tech setting.  The particular outpost where the action occurs has to deal with shortages of munitions, trained (or any) replacement troops, food, and weapons.  The support of the outpost from distant, better funded bases seems spotty at best.  Are the outposts and the bases even on the same team?

Who will 'win' the wars of attrition? Will it be the desert, the locals, the USDF, or the aliens?  Or will the USDF and the aliens lose to the patient desert?  Will there be any changes in alliances?

Resolution: Well, watch the film.

One line summary: Earth military vs stranded aliens.

Statistics: 

Cinematography: 5/10 This varies widely through the progress of the film.  Some of the CGI is well done; some is not.  The shaky cam footage is counter-productive as always.  The segments of traditional filming were reasonably well done.

Sound: 8/10 Usually good.

Acting: 7/10 Most of the players I have not seen perform before, but most of them did rather well.

Screenplay: 5/10 The elements of the film are not all that well put together.  This includes: CGI intervals, ex post facto troop interviews that were expertly shot, intertitles with expository text held onscreen for long periods, discussions among troops during ordinary times (cleaning guns, washing dishes, sleeping, and so on), and shaky cam action sequences.

Final Rating: 6/10

20150908: SciFi review--Infini

Name: Infini (2015)
IMDb: Infini main page

Genres: Horror presented as science fiction.

Cast: Daniel MacPherson as Whit Carmichael, Luke Ford as Chester Huntington, Grace Huang as Claire Grenich, Luke Hemsworth as Charlie Kent, Bren Foster as Morgan Jacklar, Harry Pavlidis as Harris Menzies, Dwaine Stevenson as Rex Mannings, Louisa Mignone as Philipa Boxen, Tess Haubrich as Lisa Carmichael, Kevin Copeland as Seet Johanson.

Written and Directed by: Shane Abbess.

The Three Acts:

The initial tableau: The film is set in the 23rd century, in some branch of our current timeline.  The greatest source of wealth is mining in interstellar space.  Travel is done by slipstreaming; that is, one encodes people as information, then sends the information via FTL transmission; at the destination, the information is decoded into people.  Some of the mining sites 'enjoy' high gravity and very noticeable time dilation relative to Earth.  One such site is struck by disaster.

An unexpected number of cascading failures forces a search and rescue team to search for any survivors, as well as a way to stop a scheduled payload from colliding with Earth.

Delineation of conflicts: Much of Earth's interstellar travel infrastructure has been destroyed.  Earth itself needs to be saved from a scheduled collision of terminal strength.  One of the unexpected failures that prompted the mission was a breakout of fast acting deadly plague.  How many of the team will survive, given that those infected all turn violent and do their best to kill anyone else?  Will anyone figure out the plague, if that is indeed what it is?

Resolution:  Well, watch the film.  This one has a fairly rousing conclusion.

One line summary: Horror presented as science fiction.

Statistics:
  a. Cinematography: 6/10 This is a mixed bag.  Much of the film is dark or sad-looking with a strongly depleted palette.  Other parts have sufficient light, good framing, nice focus, and reasonable set design. Here and there shaky cam showed its ugly head.

  b. Sound: 8/10 The dialog is clear, and the background music is fine for the situations.

  c. Acting: 7/10 Harry Pavlidis, Luke Ford, and Daniel MacPherson were rather good.  Most of the other actors were not on camera that much.

  d. Screenplay: 5/10 The central cliches are present; that is, of horror that is presented as science fiction.

Final rating: 6/10

20150907: Horror Review--The Pact II

The Pact II

1. Fundamentals.
1. Title: The Pact II
2. IMDb: Users rated this 4.3/10 (1,711 votes)
3. Rotten Tomatoes:
   25% of critics liked it of 8 critical reviews posted
   15% of viewers liked it from 227 viewer ratings
   Critics Consensus: No consensus yet.


4. Status: Released
5. Release date: 2014-09-05
6. Production Companies: Preferred Film & TV
7. Tagline: It's Starting Again...


8. Budget:  Budget estimate not available at review time.
9. Revenue: Revenue figures not available at review time.
10. Runtime: 96 minutes.
11. Genres: Mystery, Horror, Thriller


12. Written and directed by: Dallas Richard Hallam and Patrick Horvath.


13. Starring: Camilla Luddington as June Abbott, Caity Lotz as Annie Barlow, Scott Michael Foster as Officer Daniel Meyer, Haley Hudson as Stevie, Amy Pietz as Maggie Abbott, Patrick Fischler as FBI agent Terrence Ballard, Nicki Micheaux as Lt. Eileen Carver


14. TMDb overview: The sequel is set just weeks after Annie Barlow's deadly confrontation with the Judas Killer. In this elevated sequel, we meet June, a woman whose carefully constructed life is beginning to unravel due to lucid nightmares so awful they disturb her waking life.



2. The three acts.


1. Setting the initial tableau: June is an artist who illustrates the dark visions she has.  She is also a crime scene cleaner for hire.  The film opens to her scrubbing up the mess in Annie's apartment after the first film.  Some weeks later, there is a semi-copycat killing.  June's boyfriend is Officer Meyer from the local police force.  Early on, they squabble about June's spending time with her mother Maggie.  He tells her about the latest bloody crime, and the arrival of FBI agent Ballard.  He agrees to recommend her as the cleaner for this latest mess.


2. Delineation of conflicts:  Maggie has many needs, and expects daughter June to fulfill them, but she is not that good at notification in regards to scheduling.  June gets tired of her professional schedule being squeezed.  Officer Meyer thinks the FBI agent Ballard is a high-handed pain; Ballard thinks Daniel is a low level factotum.  June keeps venting her dark visions through illustration, and lets Ballard know her low opinion of him.  Ballard has plenty of demands for Lt Carver, but little to offer in return.
   
   Ballard delivers some information bombshells to June about her mother and her connection to the original crimes of the Judas Killer. This increases June's distress, and everyone's hard feelings in general.  As one might expect from such films, more bad things start to happen.
   
   As the second act deepens, the petty irritations are still there, but pale in comparison to the quest to identify and stop the murderer.  Is June the murderer, or perhaps Ballard?  Is the supernatural truly involved, or do we have odd behaviour due to stress?  Will it actually help to bring Annie and Stevie (both from the first film) back to consult?


3. Resolution: Well, watch the film.


3. Conclusions
1. One line summary: Murders continue in the sequel.
2. Three of ten.  Early on I thought 6/10, but the jump scares, shaky cam, the back biting, and the screenplay in general wore me down to 4/10.


4. Scores
1. Cinematography: 4/10 The film has the TV movie-of-the-week look.  This is not a compliment.  It has a few passages of shaky cam, which never fares well with me. 


2. Sound: 3/10 I can hear the actors, which is sometimes a good thing.  The background music does contribute some creepiness.  However, jump scares are what I consider cheap jack stupid tricks: the viewer is shocked by slamming into a sudden upward facing cliff of sound.  Worse yet, the residue of each such collision is that the protagonist looks like a weakling or a fool; neither of these makes me more interested in the film.


3. Acting: 4/10 I predict that this film will receive no award nominations for good acting.  None of the players were terribly bad, but the director did not get good performances either.


4. Screenplay: 2/10  On the one hand, there was nothing inventive or new.  On the other hand, there were plenty of cliches, irritation instead of suspense, unexplained phenomena, and unconcluded conversations.

20150906: Comedy Review--Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy

Name: The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy (2005)
IMDb: Hitchhiker's Guide main IMDb page

Genres: Comedy, Adventure, SciFi, Romance

Cast: Martin Freeman as Arthur Dent, Yasiin Bey (Mos Def) as Ford Prefect, Zooey Deschanel as Trillian, Sam Rockwell as Zaphod Beeblebrox, Anna Chancellor as Questular Rontok, John Malkovich as Humma Kavula, Alan Rickman as the voice of Marvin, Bill Nighy as Slartibartfast, Helen Mirren as voice of Deep Thought, Stephen Fry as Narrator.

Written by: Douglas Adams (novel); Douglas Adams and Karey Kirkpatrick (screenplay).
Directed by: Garth Jennings.

The Three Acts

1. The Initial Tableau: We start on Earth, where an ordinary fellow (Arthur Dent) soon discovers that his house is about to be demolished for the sake of a bypass.  His friend Ford Prefect drops by to inform him that Earth is about to be blown up.  While Arthur's house is completely demolished, Ford prepares him for leaving Earth.  During this short stint, Arthur tells Ford about his feeling of loss over Tricia McMillan, whom he had recently met.  However, she ran off with some fellow who claimed he had a spaceship.  Ford and Arthur barely escape before Earth is destroyed.

2. Delineation of Conflicts: The Vogons do indeed blow up the Earth.  Ford and Arthur are tortured by having to listen to Vogon poetry.  They are about to be executed because Arthur insulted the poetry written by the torturer.  By a massive coincidence (one of many), they are rescued by Zaphod Beeblebox, the president of the galaxy, and Trillian, who once called herself Tricia McMillan.  So, all is well, and the film ends, right?

Well, no. Arthur learns that Ford and Zaphod are old friends and also aliens from worlds other than Earth.  Ford is a writer who is doing research for a new edition of Hitchhiker's Guide.  Zaphod had stolen the one vastly expensive ship Heart of Gold whose engine is the improbability drive.  Rontok is after Zaphod for kidnapping the president (Zaphod; figure that one), and she sends the Vogons after him.  Zaphod has some unfinished business with Humma Kavula (his previous political opponent), which causes him to search out Deep Thought and ask for a particular gun that Humma demands.  While with Deep Thought, we get entangled with the quest for the question to life, the universe, and everything.  Deep Thought knows the answer (42), but not the question.  Zaphod, Arthur, and Trillian wrangle about why she left Earth (and Arthur) with Zaphod, and about who ordered Earth to be destroyed.  The clinically depressed robot Marvin laments all the pieces.

3. Resolution: Some issues are resolved in this film.  The book that spawned the film was only the first in a series, after all.  When Arthur meets Slartibartfast (played brilliantly by Bill Nighy), the third act takes off.  Slartibartfast works for a concern that builds planets.  Perhaps all this could be put back together, but will it?

One line summary: Slow start, strong finish.

Statistics
a. Cinematography: 10/10 Taken as a whole, this is a beautiful film.  Even the charts were a visual asset.

b. Sound: 8/10 The dialog is clear, and background sound added to the proceedings.

c. Acting: 8/10 Malkovich was brilliant in a small role, as were Rickman, Mirren, and Fry as voice actors.  Bill Nighy gave a wonderful performance.  I liked Ms Deschanel better than I usually do.  Mr Freeman played the character he usually plays, an ill-equipped ordinary being who somehow perseveres to see tough goals achieved.  So, he was a fine choice to play Arthur Dent.

d. Screenplay: 6/10 This is an odd duck.  The beginning was so slow it almost demanded yawns.  However, the building of context through the film led to a brilliant and dense comedic impact in the last 20 minutes.  The start, though, was so bad that the wife and I nearly abandoned the film to watch, well, anything else.  I am glad to have stuck with it, but would not watch it again.

Final Rating: 8/10

20150831: YA Review--Mortal Instruments: City of Bones

Name: The Mortal Instruments: City of Bones (2013)
IMDb: City of Bones

Genres: Fantasy, YA female,  coming of age, romance, comedy

Cast:  Lily Collins as Clary, Jamie Campbell Bower as Jace Wayland, Kevin Zegers as Alec Lightwood, Jemima West as Isabelle Lightwood, Robert Sheehan as Simon Lewis, Lena Heady as Jocelyn Fray, Jared Harris as Hodge Starkweather, Aiden Turner as Luke Garroway, Godfrey Gao as Magnus Bane, CCH Pounder as Dorothea, Jonathan Rhys Meyers as Valentine, Kevin Durand as Pangborn, Robert Maillet as Blackwell.

Directed by: Harald Zwart.  Written by: Cassandra Clare (book), Marlene King and Jessica Postigo (screenplay).

The Three Acts

The initial tableau: In New York City, young Clary starts having problems.  She sees people and things that others cannot.  She obsessively draws strange symbols in her room.  She gets in trouble with strangers at a club and sees impossible actions.  Her friend who is a young man is interested in her in a way that she is not interested in him.  To top it all off, unknown forces kidnap her mother and ransack the apartment where the two of them lived.

The delineation of conflicts:  Clary discovers that she is a Shadowhunter, a dying breed who have fantastic magical powers, but are fully mortal.  That is, they age normally and they die fairly easily. Shadowhunters fight and kill demons as best they can.  They get their magic from inheritance (parents were Shadowhunters) or transformation (drinking from the Cup of Raziel). Drinking from the Cup also confers the ability to write runes on one's body; these often yield magical assistance.

Their recruiting has been weak of late since two of the most powerful of their members  (Valentine and Jocelyn) have gone off the rails.  Valentine consorted with demons to gain their powers.  Jocelyn hid the Cup to keep it away from Valentine.  Valentine wants the Cup back, and goes to all sorts of foul actions to get it.  Clary needs to go from her 'mundane' (ordinary human) state to being the most powerful and inventive of all the Shadowhunters in order to stop Valentine.  She's shorted on time, since Valentine and his henchmen move things forward quickly.

Simon is in love with Clary, Clary is in love with Jace, Jace is in love with Clary, but Valentine convinces Jace that he is Clary's sister.  Oi.  Magnus and Alec might be attracted to one another, but there is so much going on.

The resolution:  Well, watch the movie.  Many things get resolved, but not all.

One line summary: Reasonable coming of age #fantasy.

Statistics: 

  a. Cinematography:  8/10 Good looking film.  There are plenty of SFX, but not the massive destruction type.  Rather, the up close and personal type of SFX, showing the unexpected.

  b. Sound:  7/10 Not a hindrance, but not much of a help, either.

  c. Acting:  7/10 I liked most of the performances, both from the young crew (particularly Collins, Bower, and West) and the older crew (especially Heady, Harris, Turner, Gao, and Pounder).  The triumvirate of villains (Valentine, Pangborn, and Blackwell) was a very effective block of trouble for the young heroes to overcome.

  d. Screenplay:  4/10 There seemed to me to be just too much going on.  I do not fault the actors, but rather the script/book.  For this film, we inherit structure from werewolf, vampire, and warlock lore.  We inherit structure from biblical warrior angel lore.  But wait!  There's more!  On top of all the rules and logic already involved, we have the invented Shadowhunters.  Much of their baggage is not all that well explained.  Where did the portal come from?  How did they get all that real estate?  How do they keep the real estate when there are so few of them, and none of them work, apparently.  Where did the underground group dealing with the dead come from?  How are they connected?  Anyway, much as I liked the film, I thought it was dreadfully short of reaching sufficiency on exposition.  Since there is likely no second film matching the books, explanations will likely remain lacking.

  e. Final Rating: Six of ten

Concluding remarks: This is the film version of a six book series written by Cassandra Clare; City of Bones is the first book of The Mortal Instruments series.  In 2014, Constantin Films, which owns the film rights to the series, decided not to make a film from the second book.  Rather, they are opting for a Mortal Instruments TV series  in 2015.

20150831: YA review--Beautiful Creatures

Name: Beautiful Creatures (2013)
IMDb: Beautiful Creatures main page

Genres: Fantasy, YA female, coming of age, romance, comedy

Cast: Alden Ehrenreich as Ethan Wate, Alice Englert as Lena Duchannes, Jeremy Irons as Macon Ravenwood, Viola Davis as Amma, Emma Thompson as Seraphine, Emmy Rossum as Ridley Duchannes, Thomas Mann as Link.

Directed by: Richard LaGravenese.  Written by: Richard LaGravenese (screenplay),  Kami Garcia and Margaret Stohl (book).

The Three Acts:

Initial tableau: Ethan lives in Gatlin, South Carolina and visits high school there.  He bemoans the fact that he has little prospect of leaving, and has applied to a number of colleges.  The town seems stuck in the past, particularly the Civil War.  His mother is dead; his father is next to catatonic. His welfare is looked after by himself (somewhat) and Amma (mostly).  One day a new girl arrives in his class, Lena Duchannes.  Her family founded the town some centuries ago, and still owns everything of importance in it.

The delineation of conflicts: Ethan wants to get to know Lena, which immediately creates separation between him and almost all of his former friends in town.  Ethan visits Lena at home, which creates immediate tension between him and her uncle, Macon Ravenwood.  The Ravenwood/Duchannes clan are gathering at the family compound to witness the coming of age birthday of Lena.

So far, this all seems rather ordinary.  The fantasy element is that all members of the Ravenwood family are casters; that is, beings who cast magical spells, often with considerable power.  At the sixteenth birthday, Ravenwood teenagers reach their full power as casters, and choose between the dark and the light sides of casting.  Lena would rather not be a dark caster like her mother Seraphina, but fate seems to have marked her to be such.  Ethan would like to be Lena's husband, but has the full opposition of everyone in Lena's family.  Amma would like to help Lena and Ethan to their best possible outcome.

Resolution:  Well, watch the film.  The resolution was brilliant in my opinion, but what do you think?

One line summary: Well done coming of age fantasy.

Statistics:

  a. Cinematography: 8/10 I thought the lighting and camera work were fine, and the limited use of CGI was good.  It was not world destruction style CGI; rather, just enough to support the story.

  b. Sound: 8/10

  c. Acting: 9/10 The veteran actors were excellent and the younger ones did well enough.

  d. Screenplay: 8/10 I've seen this film compared to Twilight, which is odd.  This film has good acting and a witty script.  I do not remember laughing while plowing through Twilight, but this one is much better.  I anticipated some of the outcome, but not all, and the route to get there was a fun ride.

  e. Final rating: eight of ten

20150830: Commentary on media ownership

A reply to 'disks are old hat, sorry.'  MOVIES and BOOKS WORLD, 20150830.

I would strongly agree with this, but as part of a larger question of ownership.

1. Kindle/Amazon.  When one pays for a book, one gets the virtual copy immediately, and one can start reading.  Cool?  Sure.  However, if Amazon gets in a huff with a title's author, the book can disappear from your Kindle just as quickly as it showed up.  If someone hacks your Amazon account, and does bad things posing as you, your Kindle inventory might just all disappear.

Do you own purchased Kindle content?  No, not at all.

2. MMO video games.  These days, one

  a. buys into the game for a certain one-time price

  b. pays a monthly charge to keep playing.

Your game client is refreshed at every logon.  If anything goes south on your account (hacking, false complaints, game server belch), then your client will not longer work.  Your privileges and database records are sealed off from you.  Only direct telephone contact plus authentication plus straightening things out will restore this.

Do you own such a game?  No, you do not. The days when one bought a disk, installed from the disk, and repaired/recovered from the disk are gone.

3. Upscale software tools for individual users.

Professional tools have long been sold on a subscription basis.  A corporation (individuals or small companies could not afford this) would pay a fixed purchase fee plus a monthly fee for technical support, documentation, training, and upgrades.  For example, at one corporation where I worked, the build/version control tool we used cost 100,000 USD per seat plus monthly fees.  It was a dynamite tool, though.

At the other end, one had consumer tools like Microsoft Office (Word, Excel, Access, etc) and Adobe image tools (Photoshop, Illustrator, Premiere, etc) that could be purchased on disk.  One owned these.  They could not be taken away. One could bite the bullet and actually own these.  Tech support and training might be extra, but were available at prices much less than the giant corporation tools.

In the years 2014/2015/2016, the private ownership by individuals of such products is being phased out.  Even individuals have to buy a subscription (monthly fee) to continue using the latest tools from MS and Adobe.  If one stops paying the fees, one is locked out.  There are no disks, there will be no functionality that you own.

So, ownership of such products will completely end in a few years.  The earlier versions that one owns on optical disks will eventually not work with current operating systems.

4. Movies.

Wow.  This is one of the last, if not the last, frontier of consumer ownership in media.  There are hundreds of millions of optical disks out there for movies and music.  So there is more inertia to keep it that way.  However, stuff changes.  Do we still use 8-tracks?  No.  Laserdiscs for movies?  Probably not.  Cassette tapes for music?  Not too likely.  Try buying a cassette player!  VHS tapes for movies?  Cringe!!  DVDs?  Passe, and they have such low resolution.  Blu-ray?  Hm, I would have to buy a 1080p monitor, a blu-ray player, and, well, all those damned disks, again.

When my wife and I saw that DVDs were outmoded, we started our transition to streaming rather than blu-ray.  We bought a 1080p monitor and an AppleTV.  At first we were mighty disappointed at the small amount of content that actually justified the move.  After a while, though, we got hooked on 1080p, and are continually disappointed at DVDs, VHS, and at least half of cable television.

About two years after that decision, we moved house, this time a compression move (downsizing?), and we had to trim our belongings. The 8-tracks left, as did the VHS tapes, some of the cassette tapes, and some of the DVDs.  We owned that media, and we still had players, but...the results are so disappointing!

Going forward, we did not want to invest heavily in anything that takes up space.  Further, blu-ray 1080p will be replaced in ~5 years by blu-ray 4k.  Do I want to buy a whole galaxy of 4k blu-ray disks?  No, I have space constraints.

5. Movies and ownership.

As opposed to Kindle, video games, and software tool packages, it seems there will still be a path to continued ownership of movies.  That is, owning

   a. VHS, DVD, blu-ray 1080p disks, plus owning an appropriate player that likely cannot be replaced or serviced
   b. blu-ray 4k disks plus player--for the best there is.

However, I'm not sure these routes will do all that well.

Smartphones and tablets do not have optical drives.  Yet one still sees movies on them through streaming services.  Phones and tablets are used quite a bit in watching films, despite the small screens, and neither device uses optical media.  These devices naturally cut into the market penetration of disks.

When I look forward with trepidation to replacing my Mac laptop, I see that my next one will not have an optical drive.  Personal computers will not play movies from disks without the purchase of an external optical disk reader.

Why would Apple make a decision like that about their Macintoshes?  Well, they would like to sell you content that resides on their servers.  Even better, they would like you to rent movies that reside on their servers.  If you want to see a film multiple times, you will need to rent it multiple times.

It's not just Apple.  Microsoft (see above), Adobe (see above), Amazon (their instant video), and Google (see Barry Ward's post) are all into streaming rentals, not selling optical disks.  This is one of the biggest reasons that disks are old hat for movies.

Then there is Netflix, which offers only rentals.  One pays subscription fees and gets on demand properties...but only when Netflix offers them.  You do not own them since you do not have disks for the properties.

So, the big media corporations are clearly moving toward the 'we own it, you never will' model with movies.  Amazon and Apple have some options for 'buying' media content, but these are somewhat difficult to trust.  Your 'owned' content resides on their servers somewhere.  Whenever I switch devices or have some OS update event, I often have to download the property again from the servers, which is a pain for HD content.  I imagine UHD will be much worse.  Also, if the corporation hosting your movie gets hacked, one might just not be able to reclaim your content.

6. Summary

Disks represent a cut in profits for large companies.  So they are doing their best to move forward the phasing out of disks, and the ownership of copies of films.

20150827: Drama Review--The Babadook

The Babadook

1. Fundamentals.
1. Title: The Babadook
2. IMDb: Users rated this 6.9/10 (79,570 votes)
3. Rotten Tomatoes:
   98% of critics liked it: 168 critical reviews liked it of 172.
   73% of viewers liked it based on 29,186 ratings
   Critics Consensus: The Babadook relies on real horror rather than cheap jump scares -- and boasts a heartfelt, genuinely moving story to boot.


4. Status: Released
5. Release date: 2014-05-22
6. Production Companies: South Australian Film Corporation, Screen Australia, Smoking Gun Productions, Causeway Films
7. Tagline: If it's in a word, or it's in a look, you can't get rid of the Babadook.


8. Budget:  2,000,000 USD
9. Revenue: 4,222,200 USD
10. Runtime: 93 minutes.
11. Genres: Drama, Thriller, Horror


12. Written and directed by: Jennifer Kent.


13. Starring: Essie Davis as Amelia, Noah Wiseman as Samuel, Daniel Henshall as Robbie, Tim Purcell as The Babadook, Hayley McElhinney as Claire, Cathy Adamek as Prue, Craig Behenna as Warren, Benjamin Winspear as Oskar, Chloe Hurn as Ruby, Tiffany Lyndall-Knight as Supermarket Mum


14. TMDb overview: A single mother, plagued by the violent death of her husband, battles with her son's fear of a monster lurking in the house, but soon discovers a sinister presence all around her.


2. Setup and Plot


1. Amelia's husband dies while she is pregnant with Samuel. Losing the husband is a huge traumatic spike, and raising the now unwanted child as a single parent is strong ongoing stress.  She does not impose practical boundaries on the child, who responds by pushing her well past the limit.  That is, she is a terrible parent, and the child makes her and everyone around them pay for that fact.


2. At age six, Samuel starts broadcasting his dislike of the way he is treated. His aberrant behaviours at school and around town invoke additional stressors to Amelia's already weakened mental state. When mother and son find a book with a pop-up character, they make the mistake of reading it together at night.  Their lives get worse by this simple foolish choice that could be revoked at any time.


3. Will Amelia heal herself and flush all this ridiculously obvious nonsensical cluster of lies?


3. Conclusions


1. This is a psychological drama where the protagonist refuses to resolve her own self-generated difficulties.  There was no character to identify with in the film.  As the film progressed to the ten minute mark, my empathic response to the self-destructive protagonist had already evaporated.  So, who cares?


2. Netflix classifies this hot mess as Thriller, Independent Thriller, Psychological Thriller.  At least they did not mark it as 'horror.'  Also, Thriller?  Really?  There is nothing thrilling (or even engaging) about this descent into the outer boundaries of stupidity.


3. The Movie Database (TMDb) calls it Drama (yes), Thriller (no), and Horror (no).  The film had no body horror, no serial killers, no gorefest.  The madness aspect was all fake, so the supposed supernatural elements were each and every one fake.  What aspect of horror is this misstep supposed to represent?


4. Rotten Tomatoes marked the genres as Drama, Horror, Mystery and Suspense.  There is no suspense here since there were no real threats involved.  The protagonist's pathology was set clearly during the first 45 seconds.  The mystery, I suppose, was whether she would decide to get well.  The other mystery is why RT rated this dog so highly.


5. There are so many dull stretches in this film. At times I thought I was watching Paranormal Activity without the jump scares. Also, watching full-screen, low resolution badly taped ancient television is just boring, whether or not the protagonist thinks she sees something in the childish images. There is nothing there, just the wandering consciousness of a sleep-deprived weakling who has given up on life.


6. One line summary: This film is 93 minutes of witnessing ongoing willful self-delusion.


7. Zero stars of five.  This is one of the worst films I have ever seen. Why it received sacred cow status is a mystery.


4. Scores
1. Cinematography: 0/10 Oh my, dark and evocative?  Well, no.


2. Sound: 0/10 Unfortunately, I could hear the dialog.


3. Acting: 0/10 I suppose most of the actors accomplished the tasks the director set them.   In that way, this film resembles some of Wes Anderson's horrible early works.  The actors did what the director wished, but that was just the problem.  The director's flawed vision trumped any and all of the actors' efforts, rendering the net effect of acting as zero, nada, zilch.


4. Screenplay: 0/10 There are no real threats, no real suspense, no real anything.  This film is 93 minutes of witnessing ongoing self-delusion.  I did like the line where the child says to a potential suitor that she won't let him have a birthday party and won't let him have a dad.  Of course he hates her, deeply, strongly, and forever.  This all could have been done in much less time.  Apparently the auteur director had already done that: Babadook was an expansion of Monster (2005), which clocks in at 10 minutes.

Babadook is an anagram for 'a bad book,' but 'a bad author' might have been better. As Amelia bragged to her friends in one passage, Amelia wrote the problematic book, and constructed it out of ordinary materials. Then she foisted it on her unsuspecting child.

20150802: Comedy Review--Three Night Stand

Three Night Stand

1. Fundamentals.
1. Title: Three Night Stand
2. IMDb: Users rated this 4.8/10 (477 votes)
3. Rotten Tomatoes:
   60% of critics liked it of 10 critical reviews posted
   36% liked it from 280 viewers' ratings
   Critics Consensus: no consensus yet


4. Status: Released
5. Release date: 2013-12-06
6. Production Companies: Vroom Productions, Banner House Productions
7. Tagline: Meet Carl. His wife. & the Love of his Life.


8. Budget:  1.2 million CAD
9. Revenue: Revenue figures not available at review time.
10. Runtime: 86 minutes.
11. Genres: Comedy, Drama


12. Written and directed by: Pat Kiely.


13. Starring: Sam Huntington as Carl, Meaghan Rath as Sue, Emmanuelle Chriqui as Robyn, Reagan Pasternak as Stacey, Jonathan Cherry as Doug, Dan Beirne as Aaron Berg


14. TMDb overview: A married couple's romantic weekend is turned upside down when the husband's ex-girlfriend, a woman he's secretly obsessed with, is running the ski lodge where they're staying.


2. Setup and Plot


1. Carl and Sue get ready for a weekend at a ski lodge.  Carl plans to get Sue a new ring, and for them to renew their vows.  When they arrive, they find that Carl's ex Robyn, who now calls herself Ryan, has bought the place and is running it.  Carl also hoped that during this weekend, he and Sue might iron out some turbulence in their relationship.  On top of that, Carl slips out now and then to telephone Stacey, his best friend and co-worker.  Stacey tries to help Carl as best she can, but has her husband Doug to contend with at the same time.


2. Worlds collide!


3. The rest of the film is about the consequences of the collision.


3. Conclusions
1. One line summary: Not worth the effort.


2. Three of ten


4. Scores
1. Cinematography: 6/10 Nothing to write home about.


2. Sound: 5/10 I could hear the dialog.  Sound was not an enhancement.


3. Acting: 4/10  I saw quite enough of Sam Huntington and Meaghan Rath in the television series Being Human (2011-2014).  The neural pathways are still thinking of their old relationship.  The action shows only lip service to any attraction between them.  This is OK, since there is no chemistry to speak of.  Although that fits into the setup of the script, it weakens engagement: why should I care about these two, the main characters, that is?


4. Screenplay: 2/10 Looks like the broad ratings are not too far off.  There is enough plot for about 15 minutes, but this gets stretched to 86.  There are not many laughs in this film.  The main situation that generates conflict is handled with the blunt instrument called Sam Huntington, so the script is rather lost to his blundering ways.
   
   If you hate women, you might like this film.  If you hate men, you might like this film. Both men and women are portrayed as being beneath worthless.  If you despise romance, you might like this film.  If you hate laughing, you might like this film.  There was no romance, but only callousness and cynicism.  I did not laugh while watching this movie.
   
   Since I do not fit into any of those categories, the picture had little appeal to me.

20150801: Thriller Review--American Psycho 2

American Psycho 2: All American Girl

1. Fundamentals.
1. Title: American Psycho 2: All American Girl
2. IMDb: Users rated this 3.9/10 (11,673 votes)
3. Rotten Tomatoes:
   Tomatometer: 11% based on 9 reviews
   18% of viewers liked it, based on 25,215ratings
   Critics Consensus:No consensus yet.


4. Status: Released
5. Release date: 2002-04-22
6. Production Companies: Lions Gate Films
7. Tagline: Angrier. Deadlier. Sexier.


8. Budget:  10,000,000 USD
9. Revenue: Revenue figures not available at review time.
10. Runtime: 88 minutes.
11. Genres: Horror, Thriller


12. Directed by: Morgan J. Freeman.  Written by: Alex Sanger, Karen Craig


13. Starring: Mila Kunis as Rachael, William Shatner as Starkman, Geraint Wyn Davies as Daniels, Robin Dunne as Brian, Lindy Booth as Cassandra, Charles Officer as Keith Lawson, Jenna Perry as Young Rachael, Michael Kremko as Patrick Bateman, Kim Poirier as Barbara, Boyd Banks as Jim


14. TMDb overview: Rachel is a criminology student hoping to land a position as a teacher's assistant for professor Robert Starkman. She's sure this position will pave the way to an FBI career, and she's willing to do anything to obtain it -- including killing her classmates. The school psychiatrist, Dr. Daniels, becomes aware that Rachel is insane, but Rachel is skilled at her dangerous game of death and identity theft.


2. Setup and Plot


1. There is a lot of voiceover toward the front end of the film, and voiceover later on.  This is usually a sign of not enough attention being paid to developing the screenplay.


2. Rachel has, for good reasons, more than a bit of a fixation on Patrick Bateman from the first American Psycho film.  When she reaches university, she wants to be the assistant of Robert Starkman, a former FBI profiler renowned for catching serial killers.  She wants to know everything he can possibly teach her.  The assistant position would also likely mean she would get a choice entry into training at Quantico.


3. She has some competition for the position, though.  What is the movie about?  It's about whether or not anyone catches up to the extraordinary methods that she used to eliminate the competition.


3. Conclusions
1. One line summary: Essentially a non-sequel despite the name.


2. Three stars of five.


4. Scores
1. Cinematography: 6/10 The visual quality of the version that Netflix screened was not all that good.  The usage of camera was all rather pedestrian as well.


2. Sound: 6/10 I could hear the dialog.  The sound mixing strongly favoured the background music over the spoken voices, however.  The choice of background music was not the film's strong point.


3. Acting: 6/10 American Psycho II, filmed just outside Toronto, made me appreciate the cast in American Psycho I just a bit more.  I like Canadian actors William Shatner (Star Trek), Robin Dunne (Sanctuary), Geraint Wyn Davies (Forever Knight), and Lindy Booth (The Librarians, Dawn of the Dead [2004]).  However, I like them in sci-fi television for the most part.  Their performances in a psychological thriller were a bit unexpected.  Davies and Shatner were fine, but the scenes with only Dunne and Kunis were not the best.  On the other hand, the scenes with only Davies and Kunis were engaging.


4. Screenplay: 5/10 The large percentage of voiceover was not a plus. The badly written dialog featuring Kunis or Dunne was quite off-putting.  Still, the film had a beginning, a middle, and an end, with reasonable connections from scene to scene.

20150731: Drama Review--American Psycho

American Psycho

image courtesy of The Movie Database

1. Fundamentals.
1. Title: American Psycho
2. IMDb: Users rated this 7.6/10 (312,703 votes)
3. Rotten Tomatoes:
   67% of critics liked it of 142 critical reviews posted
   85% of viewers liked it from 300,623 ratings
   Critics Consensus: If it falls short of the deadly satire of Bret Easton Ellis's novel, American Psycho still finds its own blend of horror and humor, thanks in part to a fittingly creepy performance by Christian Bale.


4. Status: Released
5. Release date: 2000-04-14
6. Production Companies: Lions Gate
7. Tagline: I think my mask of sanity is about to slip.


8. Budget:  7 million USD
9. Revenue: 34 million USD
10. Runtime: 102 minutes.
11. Genres: Crime, Drama


12. Directed by: Mary Harron.  Written by: Mary Harron, Guinevere Turner


13. Starring: Christian Bale as Patrick Bateman, Reese Witherspoon as Evelyn Williams, Justin Theroux as Timothy Bryce, Josh Lucas as Craig McDermott, Bill Sage as David Van Patten, Chloë Sevigny as Jean, Samantha Mathis as Courtney Rawlinson, Matt Ross as Luis Carruthers, Jared Leto as Paul Allen, Willem Dafoe as Det. Donald Kimball


14. TMDb overview: A wealthy New York investment banking executive hides his alternate psychopathic ego from his co-workers and friends as he escalates deeper into his illogical, gratuitous fantasies.


2. Setup and Plot


1. Patrick is the protagonist, Evelyn his fiancee, and Jean his secretary.  His drinking buddies are Timothy, Craig, and David.  Luis ('the dufus') and Courtney are seen together in public, but Patrick is having an affair with her, unknown to Luis.


2. Patrick is in the banking sector in New York City. He obtained his position in Mergers and Acquisitions via nepotism.


3. So, Patrick has a job, male friends/competitors, and female bedmates. The only flaw in this picture of overabundance, privilege, and recreational drug use is that Patrick is insane. Patrick keeps his homicidal urges fairly well under control toward the beginning of the film, but less and less and the film progresses.


4. The exposition style is what I call archipelago. The movie consists of islands of film taped together. There is no mainland; there are no bridges. There are only discrete pieces separated by whim and held in place by time order. Sort of.


5. Vignettes (islands), humourous: The touchstones where Patrick notices (to the audience) how much he and Paul Allen are alike.  The passages about one upmanship, be it business cards or restaurant reservations.  Patrick trying and failing to give a homeless man some help.


6. Vignettes, horrifying:  The Paul Allen goodbye sequence strained credulity too much. The Ed Gein story was a bit of a shock, even in contrast to the unyielding misogyny just preceding it.  There are many more.


3. Conclusions
1. One line summary: Great visuals undone by script and direction as well as inconsistent sound capture and editing.


2. Shorter summary: Exercise in self-delusion.


3. Five of ten


4. Scores
1. Cinematography: 10/10 Each scene is well thought out, and the shooting is wonderfully executed.


2. Sound: 7/10 The scenes with musical accompaniment are lush and rich; they have a feeling of depth.  Some of the quiet scenes involving only conversation are tinny, weak, thin, and disappointing.


3. Acting: 2/10 There were some fine actors in this motion picture.  All of them seemed to be doing what the director wanted. Bravo for their professionalism.  However, the director's vision was so worthless that the performances were of little note.  This is strongly parallel to some of the weaker Wes Anderson films, where the efforts of good actors were thrown away by the poor direction.


4. Screenplay: 2/10 The protagonist talks directly to the viewer.  This is bovine scatology. The entire film is about a delusional protagonist, so nothing is to be trusted in the plotlines, such as they are.  Just because some action is depicted on the screen does not mean that it happened outside the sour operations of this afflicted mind.  One might as well be suffering through Walter Mitty, except that the lead has bloody fantasies instead of Mitty's pleasant ones.
   
   So, since nothing of the exposition is to be trusted, what is the point of this vile mess?
   
   As one navigates through this maze of false threads, that is the central question. The hideous ending casts everything even deeper in doubt. The film is reminiscent of Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas (1998) which was heaped with praise since Terry Gilliam directed it. That does not change the fact that after watching the film, one wonders whether Depp's character did any of the actions shown on screen. In American Psycho, the disappointment was much stronger because the production values were so much higher. Whereas FLiLV looked sleazy, AP looked exquisite; interspersed with the shock segments, that is.  I expected some sort of value for having suffered through the recurring horrific images, the type one expects from a slasher film or a mild gorefest, but done by someone like Hitchcock.
   
   If American Psycho is considered as a collage, bits of the film were good for witty conversation or for commentary on the 1980s and the top 1 percent of the top 1 percent. The collage as a whole, though, is just an incoherent collection of high quality materials badly assembled.
   
   The last two minutes were almost interesting, but the rest of the film did not support the message. The effect as a whole is doubled: who cares? It is all delusion and of no point at all.

20150619: Drama Review--Beyond

Beyond

image courtesy of The Movie Database

1. Fundamentals.
1. Title: Beyond
2. IMDb: Users rated this 3.8/10 (471 votes)
3. Rotten Tomatoes:
   zero critics responded with ratings
   29% of viewers like it based on 103 ratings
   Critics Consensus: None yet.


4. Status: Released
5. Release date: 2014-04-25
6. Production Companies: Attercorp Productions, Bigview Media
7. Tagline: Survival is a Choice.


8. Budget:  Budget estimate not available at review time.
9. Revenue: Revenue figures not available at review time.
10. Runtime: 89 minutes.
11. Genres: Drama, Science Fiction, Romance


12. Written and directed by: Joseph Baker, Tom Large


13. Starring: Richard J. Danum as Cole, Gillian McGregor as Maya, Paul Brannigan as Michael, Kristian Hart as Keith Novac, Sid Phoenix as Prof. Rawlston Jennings, John Schwab as National Space Agency Spokesperson, George Dillon as Newsreader


14. TMDb overview: A suspenseful sci-fi journey tracking the turbulent relationship of Cole and Maya as they struggle to survive in a world where the human population has been left decimated after an extra-terrestrial attack.


2. Setup and Plot


1. What is believed to be an asteroid approaches Earth.  There is a bit of imprecision.  The experts cannot decide whether it will impact our planet even when it is visible in the night sky.  As the object gets closer, other possibilities show themselves.


2. The scene jumps back and forth from before the arrival, when the couple met, to the present, after the encounter, when most humans are dead.  The dialectic is awkward in execution and definitely off-putting.


3. As the film rolls on, will we ever see the encounter?  Will we ever see the end of the couple's complaining about each other?  Will anyone survive this situation?


3. Conclusions
1. This is psychological drama, not science fiction.  All of the narrative is false, if one is to believe the ending.
2. One line summary: I would not recommend this to a friend.
3. Three of ten


4. Scores
1. Cinematography: 5/10 Dark and gritty, to no particular point; a bit too much shaky cam.


2. Sound: 5/10 I can hear the dialog.  The reason for some of the musical interludes escapes me.


3. Acting: 4/10 For the majority of the film there are only two actors.  The pair seem listless and irritable, not under siege or in threat of their lives, not even hungry and dirty.


4. Screenplay: 2/10 The dialog is mostly boring, including the many tiffs; after hearing 'we need to talk' the first three times, the next dozen are irritating.  There are too many back and forth jumps in the timeline.  These two factors undermine any interest I had in the original concept.  In the post encounter/eradication era, there is not as much evidence of genocide as I would have expected.  Eliminating billions of humans would leave some traces, but many of the scenes are devoid of any signs of previous habitation.  The ending more or less throws away the rest of the film.  Another way of putting it is that the rest of the film provides next to no foundation for the ending.

20150610: Horror Review--Human Centipede 2

The Human Centipede 2 (Full Sequence)

1. Fundamentals.
1. Title: The Human Centipede 2 (Full Sequence)
2. IMDb:  3.9/10 from 22,780 viewers
3. Rotten Tomatoes:
   30% on the tomatometer, from 77 critics
   23% from 10,651 viewer ratings
   Critics Consensus: The Human Centipede II (Full Sequence) attempts to weave in social commentary but as the movie wears on, it loses its ability to repulse and shock and ends up obnoxious and annoying.


4. Status: Released
5. Release date: 2011-10-07
6. Production Companies: Six Entertainment
7. Tagline: 100% medically INaccurate.


8. Budget:  Budget estimate not available at review time.
9. Revenue: (US market) 141,877 USD. (International) unknown at time of review.
10. Runtime: 91 minutes.
11. Genres: Crime, Drama, Horror


12. Written and directed by: Tom Six.


13. Starring: Laurence R. Harvey as Martin, Ashlynn Yennie as Miss Yennie, Dominic Borrelli as Paul, Georgia Goodrick as Valerie, Maddi Black as Candy, Kandace Caine as Karrie, Lucas Hansen as Ian, Lee Nicholas Harris as Dick, Dan Burman as Greg, Daniel Jude Gennis as Tim


14. TMDb overview: Inspired by the fictional Dr. Heiter, disturbed loner Martin dreams of creating a 12-person centipede and sets out to realize his sick fantasy.


2. Setup and Plot


1. The protagonist Martin is quite short, morbidly obese, and seemingly without friends of any sort.  His job is as security at a dreary parking garage.  During his copious free time, he obsesses on the first Human Centipede film.  How is that for self-referential?


2. Martin's goal is to create a centipede from 12 people rather than 3.  The first big block of the film is about Martin's acquisition of enough live bodies. 


3. There is a parallel sideshow about his being sexually abused by his father, verbally abused by his mother (since father is in jail for the abuse), and his shrink's desire to bring him new abuse.  Sigh.  His mother tries to kill him herself.  She also sets the psychotic neighbor (biker with loud music, lives above them) on him; he beats the daylights out of Martin with boots and fists.  The list goes on well past these points.


4. A bit over halfway through the film, Martin meets Miss Yennie (the actress, not the character) from the first film.  There is a clash of worlds.  She expects to discuss a role in a new film.  She gets to see Martin's handiwork instead.


5. Does anyone get out alive?


3. Conclusions
1. One line summary: More gross than the original, but even less engrossing.
2. Two of ten.  One blackhole for screenplay.


4. Scores
1. Cinematography: 3/10 It's in greyscale ('black and white') which I do not care for in the least.  I like a few (Inside Llewyn Davis (2013) and Manhattan (1979)) greyscale films, but they have to be otherwise exceptionally good.  This film does not qualify.


2. Sound: 3/10 The background music supplies some creepiness, but not a lot.  The film is short on dialog (Martin speaks zero words during the movie), so sound is not a big contributor to quality.


3. Acting: 4/10  As in the first film, the protagonist was fairly good, but the other cast members were either not put to good effect or just not strong in acting.


4. Screenplay: 0/10 As a film about crushing the marginalised, this is fairly effective.  As an extreme horror film, this is a complete failure.  The endless use of the first film destroys any sense of engaging the viewers: it is all explicitly fakery.

20150609: Horror Review--Human Centipede 1

The Human Centipede (First Sequence)

1. Fundamentals.
1. Title: The Human Centipede (First Sequence)
2. IMDb: 4.5/10 from 50,184 viewer ratings
3. Rotten Tomatoes:
   49% (91 critics' ratings)
   26% liked it; 16,895 user ratings
   Critics Consensus: Grotesque, visceral, and (ahem) hard to swallow, this surgical horror does not quite earn its stripes because the gross-outs overwhelm and devalue everything else.


4. Status: Released
5. Release date: 2010-08-30
6. Production Companies: Six Entertainment
7. Tagline: Their flesh is his fantasy


8. Budget:  2,011,799 USD
9. Revenue: ticket sales, 181,467 USD (72%); international, 70,740 USD (28%)
10. Runtime: 92 minutes.
11. Genres: Horror


12. Written and directed by: Tom Six.


13. Starring: Dieter Laser as Dr. Heiter, Ashley C. Williams as Lindsay, Ashlynn Yennie as Jenny, Akihiro Kitamura as Katsuro, Andreas Leupold as Detective Kranz, Peter Blankenstein as Detective Voller


14. TMDb overview: During a stopover in Germany in the middle of a carefree road trip through Europe, two American girls find themselves alone at night when their car breaks down in the woods. Searching for help at a nearby villa, they are wooed into the clutches of a deranged retired surgeon who explains his mad scientific vision to his captives' utter horror. They are to be the subjects of his sick lifetime fantasy: to be the first to connect people, one to the next, and in doing so bring to life "the human centipede."


2. Setup and Plot


1. Dr. Heiter, an older man who is thin as a rail, drugs and abducts a truck driver.  Two young women (Lindsay and Jenny) on a road trip through Germany get a flat near his house.  Unfortunately, they accept his offer to get out of the rain.  He drugs them as well.


2. They awaken to find themselves secured (tied-up) in the surgeon's basement with the poor truck driver.  Dr Heiter furthers his explanation of his plans for them.  His renown more or less explains his artwork: he became famous by successfully separating conjoined twins.  After his retirement, he attempted an inverse experiment: joining three dogs together, end to end, so that they would have one digestive tract.  This failed, but Heiter wishes to try again, this time with humans. Sadly, Heiter did not investigate why the first experiment failed.


3. Heiter's plans go forward with some bumps in the road.  For instance, he is rather cavalier about leaving sit the vehicles of the people he has kidnapped, all near his home.


4. So, will Heiter succeed, or will the victims find a way to escape?


3. Conclusions


1. For longer, detailed descriptions of some plot problems with this script, try the user reviews on IMDb.  Several people were glad to list them out.


2. One line summary: Gross but not engrossing.


3. Two of ten; one black hole for screenplay.


4. Scores
1. Cinematography: 8/10 Well done; this is a good-looking film.  Some of the blood effects are non-convincing, but at least they did not look like CGI.


2. Sound: 8/10 The actors' words are easy enough to hear.  Of course,  many of them are in German and Japanese, so the subtitles were essential.  Mood music helped mildly.


3. Acting: 2/10 Well, they tried.  However, I do not think that this film will help the careers of any of the cast. 


4. Screenplay: 0/10 Fraught with logical problems and holes in the plot to the point where little if any of it made any sense.  Also, the subject matter was disgusting without being horrifying.  Suspense?  None.  Could one identify or empathise with any of the characters?  Not really; the whole mess was just too unbelievable.  

20150607: Horror Review--Taking of Deborah Logan

The Taking of Deborah Logan

1. Fundamentals.
1. Title: The Taking of Deborah Logan
2. IMDb: Users rated this 5.6/10 (5,435 votes)
3. Netflix: average of 3.5/5.0 (540,642 ratings)
4. Rotten Tomatoes:
   critics rating not found number of reviews too low
   47% liked it from 850 viewers ratings
   Critics Consensus: none yet


5. Status: Released
6. Release date: 2014-10-21
7. Production Companies: Millennium Films, Bad Hat Harry Productions
8. Tagline: Evil lives within you


9. Budget:  Budget estimate not available at review time.
10. Revenue: Revenue figures not available at review time.
11. Runtime: 90 minutes.
12. Genres: Horror, Thriller


13. Directed by: Adam Robitel; written by Adam Robitel, Gavin Heffernan


14. Starring: Jill Larson as Deborah Logan, Anne Ramsay as Sarah Logan, Michelle Ang as Mia Medina, Ryan Cutrona as Harris, Brett Gentile as Gavin, Jeremy DeCarlos as Luis, Anne Bedian as Dr. Nazir, Tonya Bludsworth as Sheriff Linda Tweed


15. TMDb overview: What starts as a poignant medical documentary about Deborah Logan's descent into Alzheimer's disease and her daughter's struggles as caregiver degenerates into a maddening portrayal of dementia at its most frightening, as hair-raising events begin to plague the family and crew and an unspeakable malevolence threatens to tear the very fabric of sanity from them all.


2. Setup and Plot


1. Mia, as part of her PhD thesis effort, arranges grant money to help Sarah Logan take care of her ailing mother Deborah.  The condition for Sarah to get the money (and save the farm) is that Mia has to complete a film.  The film is to document the sort of life that Deborah has because of her illness, and how Sarah is also affected.  Gavin and Luis are Mia's techies, who are put down immediately and repeatedly as sub-humans.  The representatives of medicine and law, Dr Nazir and Deputy Tweed, are both women.


2. The early part of the movie includes results of medical testing of Deborah, and brief discussions of aspects of the disease that we think we understand.  Some of the visual presentation here is fine.


3. Deborah's disease progresses more rapidly than expected.  The not so subtle horror cliches telegraph the general type of trouble to come.  Is there something other than physical disease at work here?


3. Conclusions
1. One line summary: Passable shaky cam possession story.
2. Two stars of five


4. Scores
1. Cinematography: 3/10 Most of the movie is shot in found footage style or shaky cam.  The plus three is for the visuals during the early discussion of Alzheimer's as a disease.  Most of the film is found footage level badness.


2. Sound: 5/10 Far better than the visuals.  On the other hand, I could have done without the use of overbearing noise to help produce jump scares.


3. Acting: 5/10 Jill Larson was the undisputed centre of the film, and she was rather good.  Then there was the rest of the cast. 


4. Screenplay: 2/10 The film was easy to disengage from, and the ending did not seem well connected to the rest of the film.