Ed's Review Dot Com

Movie Rentals Releasing Tuesday 22, 2011

• Megamind
• Get Low
• Fish Tank (British)
• Mesrine: Part 1 Killer Instinct (French)

Greetings movie fans — Well, by now the awards season is upon us. My original opinion was that “The Kings Speech” was not going to win best picture, but as time goes by, it seems more and more likely, so maybe I would have to change my prediction on that one! As I look forward to Oscar night (or more correctly Oscar afternoon here in L.A., it makes me remember how many horrible films have won “Best Picture”. It seems that Hollywood seems to pick a movie that is a critical and popular bomb and makes it into Best Picture. Some of the classsics over the years that I watched and did not get, or actually hated have been Best Picture. My number one was “The Deer Hunter (1971)“. I watched this film and hated it, and never seen nor heard of it since. Have you ever seen it on TV? Granted that was a bad year and there wasn’t a lot of competition. (Coming Home, Heaven Can Wait, Midnight Express, An Unmarried Woman.) But still, I bought into the hype and went to see it and came away feeling like I had been cheated! What was the point of this movie? Chariots of Fire (1981) was simply unwatchable. Was this one of the most boring movies in history or what? I mean this beat out Raiders of the Lost Ark, On Golden Pond, and Reds!!! Last year’s “The Hurt Locker wasn’t a terrible movie, but the hype was way over the top. It was not really that good, and certainly wasn’t better than most of the other nominees. The year before that we got “Slum Dog Millionaire” which was also a joke of a “best picture”, especially up against “The Curious Case of Benjamin Button, Frost/Nixon, Milk, etc.”

So why does the academy pick so many weird Best Pictures. I think it’s really an insider thing, and there are politics going on within the ranks inside the industry. I think last year it was not nearly enough to just ignore James Cameron, but they had to give it to his ex-wife to smack him down again and create a bogus “Year of the Woman”. Anyway, occasionally a picture that ought to win, actually wins, but it’s amazing how many bad films get the win over far better eventual losers. I used to joke that if a movie won “Best Picture” it was a sure sign to avoid it at all costs. Probably not fair to say that, but sometimes it seems that way. Enjoy! Ed of Edsreview.com

Focus Features, Goldcrest Post Production London, Greenlit Rights

George Clooney, Violante Placido, Thekla Reuten, Paolo Bonacelli, Johan Leysen, Irina Bjorklund, Filippo Timi, Lars Hjelm

Jack (Clooney) is a hired assassin who is on assignement in Sweeden when things go badly. He vows to his contact that the next one will be his last assignment. He is sent to a small town in Italy, out in the country, and holes up waiting for a new assignment and looking for some rest and relaxation. He makes friends with a parish priest (Paolo Bonacelli) and a local prostitute Clara (Violante Placido) until his contact Mathilde (Thekla Reuten) shows up to give his assignment of constructing a very special weapon for her. He may think he’s relaxing though, but he may be in a lot more trouble than he thinks.

This is not a James Bond spy thriller. This is much more like a foreign film. It’s very slow and peaceful and spends a lot of time developing the characters. We get to spend a lot of time watching Jack building and preparing the weapon which gives us a lot of time to see what kind of man he is and what he thinks. The relationship with the prostitute who he comes to really care for is also very slow developing. There must be a connection with the priest and Jack as well, but we’re slowly told what the story is. But to say that it’s a slow moving film with slowly developing characters is not a bad thing. Its just that you don’t want to rent this expecting fast pace chases and crashes and explosions. This is very meticulous and is more about the story than the action. However it’s a very cleverly crafted character study of Jack’s situation and George Clooney is really good in this role. He’s excellent. The other characters are pretty good as well. I enjoyed this in a way, but after watching “Red” just before it, it seems painfully slow to develop. When it was over I looked back and said, “Well that was really different, but it wasn’t bad.” If you like movies strong on character, you’ll probably enjoy this.

EdG – EdsReview Dot Com – A Movie Review Blog

Mandalay Vision, Saint Aire Production, 10th Hole Productions

Julianne Moore, Annette Bening, Mark Ruffalo, Mia Wasikowska, Josh Hutcherson, Yaya DaCosta, Kunal Sharma, Eddie Hassell, Zosia Mamet, Joaquin Garrido, Robecca Lawrence

Nic and Jules (Annette Bening and Julianne Moore) are committed in a loving, but certainly strained, relationship.  Each was artificially inseminated and they had two children, a boy and a girl.  Nic is a doctor and s very controlling and demanding whereas Jules is kind of happy to have someone in charge as she is very insecure, and has struggled with her brand new career as a landscaper.  In the past she has failed at most jobs and spent most of the time as a stay at home mom.  The children Joni (Mia Wasikowska) and Laser (Josh Hutherson) are teens, Joni is 18 and Laser is 15.   Laser very much wants to know who their sperm donor father is, but you must be 18 to inquire and if the donor refuses it is kept secret.  Laser begs Joni to request the name.   The father is Paul (Mark Ruffalo) a co-op farmer and a restaurant owner, though he has always shirked any kind of responsibility.  Reluctantly Joni agrees to try to contact him for her brother.  They meet, but both Paul and Laser want to try to build some kind of bond, so they start to bring Paul into the family bit by bit.  The mom’s agree, for Laser’s sake, but it gets uncomfortable as he gets more and more involved.  Paul hires Jules to landscape his yard, and the two spend much more time in the bedroom than actually working on the yard.  This triggers Nic’s jealousy and as things progress it really gets out of control for everyone.

This is a strange film.  I cannot say I was completely blown away by it, neither did I hate it.  Sort of like a syncopated rhythm, it keeps you off balance all the time and you always feel you’re a little too close to the edge of the cliff and about to fall all the time.  If I were to describe it, like Stephen Wright once said,  “You know that feeling when you’re leaning back on your chair and it goes a little too far and you feel like you’re going to fall but you catch yourself at the last second???  Well I feel like that all the time.”   That’s the feeling this movie gives.  It’s nice that Jules has feelings for Paul, but what the heck?  Everyone is pretty creepy and a little off.  Eventually though, most of the chaos gets resolved, and all in all it’s not a bad movie.  It’s just not hitting on all cylinders and missing the mark a little bit.  For example, the love scenes between Jules and Paul are not extremely graphic, but it feels really uncomfortable watching it, and I found myself looking away, feeling almost embarrassed for the actress.  Also, there seemed to be something going on between Paul and his daughter Joni, but that is too creepy to even think about.  It’s only hinted, but it also causes you to feel uncomfortable.  Perhaps that’s what the director is going for, an uncomfortable and unflinching look at real life without any filters.

EdG – EdsReview Dot Com – A Movie Review Blog

Iselin-Tenney Productions

William Joyce, Heather Hewitt, Beey Hyatt Linton, Dan Stapleton, Walter Coy, Robert Stanton

Tom Harris (William Joyce) is a famous writer. But he’s gotten sidetracked chasing pretty girls and is rather behind on his next book. His publisher shows up and offers him the best of both worlds, a trip to the tropical Voodoo Island to study the natives there. An awful typhoon sunk the poor ships of the men of the island while they were out fishing, so the island is filled with 5 women to every man!. But there is a scientist living on the island studying the snake venom which may cure the worlds diseases. But in truth, he’s turning the natives into flesh eating zombies and bulding a zombie army. What a place for an idea for a new story.

This is a black and white very low budget horror film from 1964 originally titled “Zombies” but about 6 years later bought up for re-release as a double feature with “I Drink Your Blood” so it was retitled “I Eat Your Skin” so that the title would fit in with the 2nd feature. However no one really eats any skin here, and the makeup is awful as is the transformation from man to monster!

This is typical 60’s horror film schlock. It’s not as bad as many of the genre, but it’s not that great either. The acting is fairly bad, and the score doesn’t fit very well, but this is a 1960’s drive-in movie feature, and if you’re fan of those kinds of bad B Movies, I have seen many, many worse than this one. Every now and then I have to throw something extremely unusual in my queue to break the boredom, and this was a fabulous change of pace. This was also picked up by Elvira for her “Elvira’s Movie Macabre” series so occasionally you may find this in the 99 cent bin at the local dollar store or drug store. It’s a very good example of the kinds of movies we used to watch on Saturday Night’s Chiller Theater, or at the double feature at the drive-in and it hold up pretty well as an example of the genre. This is not Hollywood of the 21st Century. But again, if you’re interested, this is an excellent example of this type of film, far better than most of the monster films. I enjoyed it.

Note: Classic scene to watch for near the end. The guys swim out to a small boat which is mysteriously out in the lake. There is a guard with a huge rifle. They pull the guy in the water, grab his rifle and hit him with it repeatedly, then toss the rifle away in the lake. Then they climb in the boat, and the guy grabs a flare gun. Dialog: “What are you going to do with a flare gun?” “I don’t know but it’s better than nothing.” Dude, you just tossed a rifle into the lake, moron!

EdG – EdsReview Dot Com – A Movie Review Blog

Theodore Thomas Productions

Walt Disney, Janet Lansburgh, Juan Carlos González, Mariúza Barroso Salomão, Marcelo Niño, Virgilio Roig, John Canemaker, Diane Miller, Blaine Gibson, Harriett Wolcott, JB Kaufman

Walt and El Grupo is one of a series of documentaries released by the Disney Company. Walt had a fairytale existence, literally, when Snow White hit it big in the theaters and suddenly he had money in the bank. Walt did what he typically did, and put the money into good use by building the fabulous Walt Disney Studios in Burbank. But this left Walt in serious debt when WWII hit and the European market dried up. Then a gang of union men decided that Walt would unionize the studio. Walt really felt that he had provided a wonderful new studio for his family of workers to turn out fabulous animation. Walt wanted to put it to a vote, but they struck him instead. Walt was pretty hurt that they would do this and went into a deep depression. The government then approached him and asked him to take a government paid excursion to South America to build good will. Walt declined as he said he is not a handshake and smile kid of guy and is not very good at it. So they offered him a chance to go down and take a group of people with him and setup temporary animation studios and gather material to make a film, guaranteed by the government. This gave Walt a chance to get away while his lawyers dealt with the strike and gave us two fabulous films, Saludos Amigos and The Three Amigos. This story is about the people who went with Walt and their adventures in visiting countries and gathering ideas for the films.

This is a fabulous film for people who are interested in the documentation of what happened to the studios at the time Walt came closest to losing everything, or for anyone who is a Disney fan, as it gives us a lot of insight into Walt, the man, who was a frail and easily hurt as the rest of us. It gives us a good view into the early days of the studios. I enjoyed it, but it is not nearly as interesting or grabbing as “The Boys: The Sherman Brothers Story” I did watch this on Netflix Watch Instantly. The quality was very good.

EdG – EdsReview Dot Com – A Movie Review Blog