Ed's Review Dot Com

Parallel Media, Flipzide Studios, HS Film,

Adrien Brody, Sean Marquette, Matt Bush, Colin Hanks, Adhir Kalyan, Mykelti Williamson, Michael Chiklis, Curtis Armstrong, Cody Longo, Luis Chávez, Max Van Ville, Mary Birdsong, Julia Ling, Camille Mana, Brett Kelly, George Back, Joseph Julian Soria, Kevin Yon

Henry Burke (Matt Bush) has it! He’s the school valedictorian by just a few hundredths of a point, but he’s got it. But a random drug test at the same time as Henry takes his very first hit of pot risks his scholarship and his future. The school pothead Travis (Sean Marquette) feels guilty for getting him into this, so he helps him devise a scheme to spike the brownies at the bake sale so the entire school will fail and eliminate the problem. Of course everything goes wrong and things get worse and worse as one lie piles up upon another until it’s all about to come crashing down by the principal who suspects and the police who are anxious to bust the case.

I hated this movie. Adrian Brody showed up looking shaggy and unkempt as the big time drug dealer, mostly to have a “big name” on the marquee. He truly could have (and maybe did) mail in his part as there was nothing for him to do here but mumble and try to look menacing. The school principal is the biggest a**hole principal since “Ferris Bueller’s Day Off”, but he’s not funny in the least. There’s just not much going on here. They twist the story around to offer some gratuitous nudity that does nothing to offer anything to the story, and I have to say that girl with the tattoos scares the hell out of me! They try to pull off some kind of Cheech and Chong thing, or maybe more like Jay and Silent Bob, but it just doesn’t work. The whole thing is just really stupid and there’s no action, suspense, comedy, or real story. Even Sebastian (Adhir Kalyan), who is pretty funny as Timmy in Rules of Engagement, is dull here as the rival for Valedictorian who is trying to bust these guys, but just can’t seem to pull it off. The whole thing is a mess and I don’t recommend it. I wanted to enjoy it, but the further it dragged on, the worse it got.

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Accelerator Films, Great Southern Land Entertainment, RMB Productions,

Tabrett Bethell, Andy Whitfield, Freya Stafford, Clare Bowen, Sophie Lowe, Boris Brkic, Marshall Napier, Elizabeth Alexander, Marcel Bracks, Adrienne Pickering

Christmas Eve, 1971, and Cameron (Andy Whitfield) and his wife, Beth (Tabrett Bethell) are driving through backwoods Australia. A reckless driver runs them off the road and the car is damaged, so they decide to stay in a creepy old cheap motel. It’s late at night, and Beth is very pregnant and almost due for delivery. During the night Cameron gets hungry and there’s no food at the motel, so he heads off down the road looking for something to eat. The Sky Dragon, a Chinese restaurant in town is closed and there’s nothing else around, but on the way back Cameron runs out of gas. When he gets back to the motel, Beth is gone, so he reports it to the police. Beth has been abducted by a mysterious clinic run in an old run down closed factory building. Beth wakes up with a scar, the baby is missing, and she finds out four other women are in the same situation in this blood and guts horror slasher film.

This is an unusual story. The premise is rather unique, and there is a good bit of suspense. But the movie is so full of holes and the actors in the film are not really too good. It’s a bit scary, but the storyline is pretty weak and the acting is weak, and there’s not a whole lot going for this film. It’s a bit unique because it’s an Australian movie, so it does have that going for it. This is a late night cable film, or one that is readily available to watch on-demand, so it’s a decent late late show if your looking for something to watch when nothing else is on. But I can’t recommend renting this film, and taking up a spot in your queue for this is a waste. There is a lot better stuff around, trust me.

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GNK Productions, Haut et Court, The Match Factory,

Miranda July, Hamish Linklater, David Warshofsky, Isabella Acres, Joe Putterlik, Angela Trimbur, Mary Passeri, Kathleen Gati, Clement von Franckenstein, Tonita Castro

Sophie (Miranda July) and Jason (Hamish Linklater) are a modern couple connected to the internet. Sophie teaches dance classes for little kids, and Jason is computer tech support from their apartment. But when they find a stray cat named Paw-Paw, they take her to the vet only to find out that the cat is very sick and needs treatment for one month. After that Paw-Paw will be coming home and their lives will suddenly have some responsibility. Realizing that their lives will change forever, they determine to take the 30 days before Paw-Paw comes home, to live life to the fullest. Unplugging from the internet and going outside tests their boundaries and their lives together and puts their relationship in jeopardy.

This is an indie film, and intended to be heavy art. I found it really annoying and boring as hell. I realize the characters are not supposed to be likable, and they are not supposed to be realistic. But the whole point of this movie is lost on me. Not only are they ridiculous, but I didn’t really care about them. Then the depressing ending didn’t depress me. I figured it was all probably for the best considering what a**holes these two were in the first place. Then I found that Ms July wrote it, starred in it, directed it, and we all know how wonderfully it worked out for Eddie Murphy when he tried to do everything. I think Norbett may have ruined his career!

Trying to find something positive to say about this movie, I tried listening to the laugh track…..I mean commentary track after watching this mess to see if maybe there was something I was just missing. At least the commentary track featured writer Miranda July, director Miranda July, and movie star Miranda July, so we had 3 viewpoints on it, but they were decided in agreement that there was nothing much going on. It was all about Me, Myself, and I, and lots of I did this, and I though this, and I decided to do this. Then part way into the commentary I heard the words “I am Berkeley” and at that point I turned it of and said out loud, “Well that explains it”. Not “I’m from Berkeley” or “I went to Berkeley”, but “I am Berkeley”. I thought, “Yes you are”.

So this is not a film that appeals to me. I enjoy films that make you think about things (See my review of Melancholia for a artsy film that I really enjoyed). But this is a narcissistic pile of junk with no redeeming qualities that I can see. Oh, and the film is narrated by Paw-Paw the cat in one of the most awful voices I’ve ever heard. But at least they hired a wonderful voice artist for the part that goes screeching throughout the entire film. No other than Miranda July.

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Studio Canal, Karla Films, Paradis Films,

Gary Oldman, Kathy Burke, Benedict Cumberbatch, David Dencik, Colin Firth, Stephen Graham, Tom Hardy, Ciarán Hinds, John Hurt, Toby Jones, Konstantin Khabensky, Svetlana Khodchenkova, Simon McBurney, Mark Strong

This story of the Cold War tells the story of George Smiley (Gary Oldman), a retired agent(due to a failed operation in Hungary), back into work to uncover a Soviet spy within MI6. Due to the failure in Hungary and what has happened since there are 4 senior agents who are suspect, and it’s tough to pin down who has sold out.

This film is a remake of a 1979 TV Miniseries starring Alec Guiness in the role played by Gary Oldman (Smiley). It was a much longer production, and this one probably suffered in the cutting room, trying to get it down to just over two hours. Even though I have not seen the original, I was really unimpressed with this film. It has its fans, that’s for sure. Some people love long slow drawn out spy melodramas, very short on any action, and very cerebral. I think if you’re like this, you’d be more satisfied with the book, however. Not only is the film very deadpan and extremely slow (Dare I say boring?), but a lot of it is left resolved, never explained, and just plain missing any info on it at all. This is one of those films where fans sit around discussing why this happened, and what that means.

For me, I was basically bored silly for two hours, and didn’t really care if they found the mole or not. After all, Reagan’s going to get them to tear down the wall, and the Soviet’s days were numbered anyway.
Not to dis a most likely fascinating book, the film was a disappointment. I didn’t really get into it, and was not happy with the ending in the least. I’d say skip it.

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Indigo Film, Medusa Film, Mercurio Cinematografica,

Kseniya Rappoport, Filippo Timi, Antonia Truppo, Gaetano Bruno, Fausto Russo Alesi, Michele Di Mauro, Lucia Poli, Edoardo La Scala

Guido (Filippo Timi) is a former cop and trying the speed dating scene. He meets a Slovenian immigrant Sonia (Ksenia Rappoport) who is a maid at a local hotel. The two fall for each other and it turns into a passionate affair until something terrible happens to Sonia and her past comes back to haunt her. What follows is a dark and twisty story, part real, and part unreal, that leads us into a convoluted mess of an existence.

This film is a foreign film, in Italian actually, with subtitles. There are so many twists and turns that you have to follow closely to catch the direction changes as they come along. I watched this on NetFlix Watch Instantly, and I don’t know if I’m the only one, but my PC speakers seem to work fine for everything else, but typically NetFlix films are very soft. The sound just doesn’t come through. Watching DVD’s and streaming videos are fine, but NetFlix films have had this problem before. My attempts to follow the subtitles without musical and sound effects queues made me lose a lot of the story. Then it was so complicated that I found it very hard to keep up. The whole thing seem contrived to me, and took twists and turns just to confuse the story. I wasn’t impressed with the actors or the script, and the story seemed unnecessarily complex. I was tempted to turn it off multiple times, but stuck through it to the end and was very disappointed with the surprise ending. Not much redeeming quality here, and I don’t recommend this one!

EdG – EdsReview Dot Com – A Movie Review Blog