Change Your Image
billgrasha
Ratings
Most Recently Rated
Reviews
Das finstere Tal (2014)
Horrible Valley
I'd never seen an Oestern before, so I thought this might be worth watching. My mistake. Dark Valley is too kind a description. Dismal, dank, horrid would all be better descriptors. And I only watched for thirty minutes.
The best parts are the scenery and the homestead/village sets.
After that it is all downhill. Or should I say uphill? The opening narrative is whispered and pretty effectively canceled out by some dreary string music. That sets the tone for the rest of it. Everyone in Dark Valley seems to be a refugee from a Bergman film, and nearly all have laryngitis. Those that don't are effectively canceled out by hoof beats, wagon wheels, tableware, rustling straw, rain, etc., all of which were recorded at least 40 decibels higher than the voices. Not that the dialogue was anything original, but it would have been nice to hear more of it.
I never thought I would miss stage actors projecting their voices to the back corner of the second balcony. They could have used a few in this.
Kingsman: The Secret Service (2014)
Waste of Time
This film has so many flaws it is hard to know where to start. Let's just jump in with all the ham fisted homages to other spy franchises. Naming the dog J.B. just so they could rattle off three agents with those initials. The failed attempt to channel John Steed with lectures on being a "gentleman." When Steed did that sort of thing, you actually liked him. He understood that a "gentleman" was never insufferable. The clumsy shoe phone reference. Setting the whole Kingsman front in what appeared to be a Savile Row version of Del Florio's.
Despite the attempt to make the young lead a take on Luke Skywalker, he seemed more like a refugee from a boy band, perhaps more suited for "The Justin Bieber Story." The cheesy martini order. No explanation of how the widowed mother went from being the wife a Kingsman, to being the woman of some London low life.
All in all, more of a first person shooter video game than a movie. The tediously interminable gratuitous killings in the church. Belatedly asking for landing clearance when you are wheels down on final. The bad guy guards in the tunnel complex who were dressed like 21st century imperial storm troopers. Bringing in surface to air missiles to take out a parked aircraft. The conveniently narrow tunnel where our alleged hero could make like Jackie Chan. The ridiculous acid trip like exploding heads. And the very last hidden in the credits bit where it looked like the same pub morons who were thrashed by Galahad appeared to be lining up for another dose.
Survivor (2015)
A Good Cast Wasted
Where does one start? Let me just jump in. The heroine is supposed to be one of our best and brightest? And yet she is ignored by most of the embassy staff, except for the ambassador who eventually issues a shoot to kill order (to the Brits!)? This top grade agent escapes a bomb by a fluke and doesn't suspect the guy who missed the lunch outing that he set up? After she shoots him when he pulls a gun on her, she then comes out of a secluded spot dangling a gun so that the crowd can see her and take videos and stills? London is filthy with surveillance cams, yet she makes no attempt to alter her appearance. When she somehow catches up to the villain lining up a sniper shot on a rooftop, she puts one, count it, one bullet into him and then gets close enough to get assaulted. Sigh. A real agent would have invested three rounds.
The assassin has a name that sounds like it was assigned to him by Cisco Ramon. I kept waiting to see a scarlet streak through the streets of Manhattan and up the side of the building.
Back to the ambassador. Plum assignments are usually given to political donors. Yet we're supposed to believe that Amanda Waller...er, sorry, How to Get Away With Murder woman has been given this post?
Outcast (2014)
It has it's moments
I've grown extremely wary of anything with Nicolas Cage, but decided to give this a try. Fortunately, Nicolas is not in it the entire time, as I have not heard an English accent that good since Bus Pirates. I also didn't know that they had Grecian Formula back in those days.
The movie was pleasantly self aware. Look for the exchange between the fugitive heir to the throne and our hero who has just made an archery shot that not even Green Arrow or Robin Hood could have pulled off. The hero's answer alone is worth the price of admission. Also, the reply to the White Ghost's question of how did you find me is quite enjoyable.
It's not a great movie, but the costumes seem period correct, the weapons seem plausible, and the scenery is outstanding. And with the exception of one acceptable scene, there is no Kung Foolery.
Our World War (2014)
Disappointing
I wasn't surprised when this suffered from what I have come to call British sound, with several bits at unintelligible levels. What made me stop watching was the heavy metal music. Seriously, rock (bad rock, at that) in a period piece/historical drama? And then the Go Cam hooked to the courier for running selfies that made viewing an annoying experience. I thought I had flashed back to the old Invisible Man TV series. And then there was the absurd shooting practice scene where the machine gun crew couldn't hit a large stationary can, but the infantry squad all seemed to be distant relatives of the Sundance Kid. They all seemed to hit the target while it was sailing through the air.