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Soupçons (2004)
you could end up in jail for many reasons other than murder
This documentary is more about what can go wrong for anyone caught in the wrong place at the wrong time. It manages to achieve this despite whatever you think of the accused guilt or innocence.
First on the list of failings is with an incompetent defense lawyers who failed in so many of their actions it had me shaking my head in disbelief throughout. One example being that they allowed Peterson's sexual proclivities to play such a part in the prosecution's pure speculation of motive. Another example of allowing exhuming a body to be examined by the same set of people who stand to lose face if the exploration draws nothing conclusive .. is more incompetence.
And then just when you thought that on balance there may have been enough "beyond reasonable doubt" evidence .. we learn that and incompetent and corrupt investigator was involved. If this is not "definite" reasonable doubt, i am a monkey's uncle. And the fact hat the defense team didn't uncover this in the original trial is yet another example of incompetence.
It doesn't matter that he may have done it. Any amount of half reasonable defense and half fair homicide investigation should have delivered a not-guilty. And the moral of this story is that it can happen even to an innocent person. That person could be you.
Last Stop Larrimah (2023)
A fabulous true story but direction falls a little short
An intriguing docuseries whodunnit from a tiny township will keep you glued for its entirety.
However, i found that i was searching for a bit more context throughout. For example, the individuals were interviewed at various points in time and in various locations .. but it was not made clear when and where. Nor was it explained the economics of the place, particularly since some of the friction came from selling pies. Perhaps this was done on purpose to keep the audience guessing right to the end.
I couldn't help but pull up the google and find out more about Larrimah the town .. only to note that the population around the time, as reported by census, was 47 people. The latest estimate (as of 2023) has it at 10 .. so maybe the harping on 11-to-10 drop is a bit of stretching the truth to get a great story.
Overall a great watch - you get to see a really remote town - coincidentally on the same stretch of highway that the British tourist Peter Falconio was murdered in 2001 (and also with plenty of controversy about how he died)
Ripley (2024)
great visuals and suspense spoiled by misdirected main actors
This is a lovely rendition of the story of Tom Ripley. The B&W fits well, and there are many Hitchcock inspired suspenseful scenes that make this a series well-worth watching.
But its not perfect. Its biggest flaw is in the characters. Starting at Tom, who looks 20+ years older than the storyline implies. But a worse misstep in the directing is that he is emotionless, even when he is meant to be pretending. It is difficult to see how he could have charmed his victim in any way. Then there is Dickie, the playboy who is about as fun as a wet sponge. He is even out-done by his lifeless girlfriend, Maggie.
There is also one other "character" that is very drab - the village where Tom first arrived. It is virtually empty. However, i am not sure it works against the series - it was obviously done on purpose, as it does give us an uneasy feeling.
V for Vendetta (2005)
A little uneven, but OMG rewatching it in 2023 is chilling
After experiencing recent governments atificially creating a virus, then colluding with big pharma lies, the totalitarian takeover of our freedoms, the tories destroying the united kingdom ... this movie cuts too close to the bone.
If only i paid more attention when it came out in 2005 ... I would have stopped listening to mainstream media a long time ago.
How interesting that increasingly we are seeing governments banning the use of the mask. Canada as an example bans all masks in unlawful protests and carries a sentence of up to 10-years in jail.
Politics aside, the movie climaxes in some great fireworks set to Tchaikovsky's masterpiece .. with history this time being rewritten as the modern Guy Fawkes succeeds in his mission.
The Ballad of Buster Scruggs (2018)
ah the Coens .. they disgust me .. yet I can't look away
Watching the Coens is like looking forward to a great meal at a nice restaurant .. only to be served a delicious sauce .. but no meat.
The cinematography is always stunningly good .. (that's the sauce).
But then, just like most other Coen movies, you scratch your head looking for the substance. There is little if any there.
Coens are a one-trick pony. Their themes center on low lifes from Nowhere, USA, who indulge in some form of skullduggery, only to be foiled by an unfortunate event. The vignettes in this film each don't exactly follow this formula, but together it is unmistakably that one shallow outline.
And just like almost all their movies, the ending is unsatisfying. The Coens don't know how to bring a story to a climax. They all conclude in a fizz of nothing.
You just ate a nothingburger. But the sauce was great, tho.
The Missing (2014)
minor spoiler: well-crafted suspense in s1
season 1 was very enjoyable. it is more of a what-happened than a who- dunnit.
only criticism is in the way the last episode explained the past. it's via a confession, which is lame to start with. but worse: in the leading episodes we are presented with lots of clues, but we realise after the confession that the clues (although consistent with what happened) could not have helped anyone work out what happened. they were like red-herrings because no human could have reached the conclusion with those clues.
still its worth watching. the last few minutes were stunningly good.
The Martian (2015)
overall enjoyable .. although i kept thinking how much better it could have easily been
The premise had all the ingredients for a great movie. Unfortunately Scott only did a C+ job with it.
What was good in the movie was Matt Damon. His was the standout performance and is the sole reason for coming away with a somewhat positive rating. Just about all his scenes (except the last bullshit rendezvous) had me interested.
What was bad was plenty: Every other character was uninspiring. The schmaltzy ending was nauseating and unnecessary. There was too much scientifically impossible stuff (just as unnecessary). And the slingshot "breakthrough" that a 20-year old geek had was an insult to the basic laws of physics that have been in play since space travel began.
What I really missed was having a longer, slower "tour" of Mars and the space between our planets. This part of it felt overlooked.
We could have had something quite profound, but it was ruined by pandering to the lowest-common Hollywood film-goer. I guess deep-and- meaningful doesn't sell .. and we have the many moriferons out there to thank for it. Shame.
The Usual Suspects (1995)
only the ending satisfies
I can enjoy most movies even if I know the ending. I think it may also be true of most viewers - how else are you able to re-watch a film? That's because the journey is what matters.
This film is the exception to the rule - it has an enjoyable ending...but you won't like it if you know the conclusion. More importantly, however, is that most of the journey is drab.
If you can endure it to past the halfway mark you stand a chance of coming out the end with satisfaction in your face. It slowly improves from there but not overly so until close to the end.
Like when you need to vomit - its not good until the very end. Most viewers will forget the sub-par journey once they get there - but for me there was no excuse for the most important part - the journey
Breaking Bad: Felina (2013)
A finale like no other - a beautiful fable, a true celebration
I rate this as the finest of BB episodes. Yet its for all the reasons you probably have not yet read about.
Firstly, this episode is full of coincidence that is simply too hard to fathom. Starting for the way WW darts the NH cops, to finding keys in the cars sun-visor, to conning his way into an unprotected Schwatz residence, to finding a way to meet Skyler without the heavy DEA surveillance, to getting that crap Stevia into the right sachet at the right time, to being able to reverse park the fitted-out car, to getting the M60 to fire implausibly on-target, to getting Jesse to come out of his prison before Jack tried to kill Walt ... and that's just a sample.
So how can this possibly be the best episode? Take a closer look at Walt right throughout this .. he was almost "invisible" (his image suddenly pops up in many scenes in almost magical ways - eg at the Schwartz's, at Skyler's, at the café).. it was like this was a dream of what he would do in his finest hour. Although there are events that WW could not have known about, you could mount an argument that he imagined all this. I prefer to think of it as the writers' fantasy.
This episode was like a fable, full of whimsy and in celebration of the BB story. The real finale was Granite State, it becomes obvious when you watch this episode. Felina was a "going away party" ... and spectacularly done. It managed to achieve this yet look a bit like a standard finale for those amongst us who need it nice and simple, full of action ending in a blaze of glory.
BB is like that - full of different ways to look at every moment - to me the finale took this series into the stratosphere. Phenomenal work by the new king of TV!
Hereafter (2010)
a beautiful love story
A little uneven, some parts could-have-been this and that, yet rates highly 8/10.
Many reviews are stuck on the significance of the afterlife aspects of this movie. I found it incidental, a simple setting that allowed intersecting stories about loss and love to be told.
The most moving love story was that of the twins for each other and the mother. It was prominent throughout the running time and it was beautiful to watch and see unfold.
There was the typical boy-gets-girl ending, yet it was also unique in the way it all came together. They never met until moments before the climax - yet it was very uplifting.
A lot of unconventional film making in this, and I really liked it for that. Not the least of which was the stunning opening. You will never look at news stories about devastation of tsunamis in far-off-lands the same way again. You are brought right into it - and you feel every moment.
The best way to appreciate the movie is to set aside trying to work out any special meaning to life after death ... there is none, or at least this film didn't attempt to say anything profound about it. Don't get hung up about what the movie did with the afterlife. It was a fictitious setting ... much the same as a typical science fiction movie. What matters in this movie are the three stories neatly coming together, and in its subtle stirring of love within us.
A Serious Man (2009)
clever modern take on Job by the Coens - alas, still a typical Coens
Not sure why this movie has "comedy" in its classification - it is nothing of the sort. It is simply a cleverly-written adaptation of the Book of Job.
Every sentence in the movie has a link to another. It is remarkably well-crafted story. You may find it a little difficult to appreciate its intricacies if you have never heard of Job (on the other hand, if you have studied Job, you may find it a little unoriginal).
My take is the Coens have created a good screenplay. There is a lot meaning in every word and it stands head and shoulders above most of their other banality (which are mostly stories of dim-witted low-lifes from smalltown-USA attempting some form of theft and falling fowl of unlucky circumstances).
Yet, despite this positive, there is still a missing ingredient. Typical of all their work, the movie lacks substance and fulfillment. You watch this movie from a distance without ever getting emotionally involved.
All Coen movies have no heart and leave me uninspired. This was no exception.
The Game (1997)
non-stop mystery .. yet completely unsatisfying
This film is to the genre Mysteries what Raiders of the Lost Ark is to Action. From nearly the start, it is a slew of one mystery after another.
Unfortunately, it is also no good. The mysteries come one after the other with little if any explanation as to *why* stuff happens. We are meant to be thrilled by each tidbit on its own.
The one all-encompassing explanation comes at the end -- but we are expected to believe the many near-misses we experienced were all part of the design of the game. Yeah, right. Its a bit like the TV serial which decides to escape from a corner they have painted themselves in by revealing at the start of the next season that the previous season was just a dream.
The Reader (2008)
the real message got lost in a poorly executed last third
This movie was faultless for the first two thirds. It lost its focus at the end and it felt like the opportunity to finish as a masterpiece was lost.
Because of this, the most important message in the story seems to have passed most viewers by. It was being played out in the court scenes when we learn that (perhaps due to ignorance or lack of education) the prison guard was unable to recognize that it was more important to save lives instead of performing her job. Of course, this was not some sort of excuse being offered ... but what was unfolding before our eyes was that the (highly educated law student) kid was in that courtroom performing effectively the same crime.
By not speaking up when he should have, Michael Berg misjudged how to act as a human. His actions not just improperly sentenced Hanna Schmitz, but allowed some real criminals to go free. The irony in this situation was pure genius. Of course, the genius was in the book - the movie did a good job of bringing it to the non-readers.
We get to learn that the author of the original book believed the Holocaust was not just the fault of the Nazis .. rather the whole of the German people were to blame, perhaps a societal structure with an inherent inability to be moral or to assume responsibility for their actions. We see Hanna as a metaphor for the old Germany and Michael that of the new.
It was a real pity the movie floundered around in the last third or so, and diluted this, and other, powerful messages. Nonetheless, it is still a movie you must watch. What a shame it didn't quite hit the home run that it deserved.
Inside Man (2006)
A fabulous romp!
This movie jumps out of the starting gate at full pace and keeps going all the way to the end. There are a few potholes, but in this case we don't care! It's a rare movie that can make us ignore these elements.
The suspense is peppered with just the right amount of understated humour. It even includes a morality play, plus a bit of the obligatory action (to keep the gun-blazing-addicts happy) ... but not too much, thank goodness. The director has the right balance of everything throughout, including the use of some interesting unconventional visual and audio techniques.
I normally don't like Denzel as an actor -- he is way too smarmy -- but this movie doesn't need him to be overly serious, and it suits him well. The outstanding performance, however, comes from the veteran Christopher Plummer ... perfectly cast!
Two thumbs up and congratulations to Spike Lee for this innovative return to form.
Broadchurch (2013)
maintains your focus during every single minute
This is a superbly executed 8-part whodunit series. It will grip your attention right from the start and it will not let up until the end.
This is not just a murder mystery - the creators have also made you totally involved as most of us will be able to relate strongly with the characters and their situation.
I could never have imagined a series to come along so quickly and challenge Breaking Bad as the best TV ever -- this one probably has done it. Although it is impossible to imagine how a followup series can be created, don't let that stop you from becoming totally immersed in these 8 episodes.
If there is one flaw - it is that it was easy for some viewers to see by episode 3 who most likely did it (because the director overplayed his hand with the way the culprit was being portrayed). But it is only minor, as your attention is able to be maintained in trying to work out how and why -- as well as discovering everybody else's dirty laundry.
The pace is perfect, the cinematography beautiful, and the music hits all the right notes.
Inception (2010)
Nolan at his worst
Christopher Nolan burst to stardom with the stunningly good, low-budget Memento. Since then, his hubris has got the better of him, and the more money he has to spend on movies the worse they become.
Inception is all splash - yet positively awful. It is classic blockbuster in the sense that all critics were bought off with its excessive promotional budget. How every single critic gave this rubbish maximum ratings can only be explained by a bribe (do the math: as an example, a $20M budget to buy off all of ~500 critics is about $40,000 per reviewer. The difference between a 2-star and a 4-star rating will guarantee to translate to much more than $20M).
All huge-budget blockbusters are the same. This one has reached the zenith of promotional ingenuity.
The movie is not complex as many dodos would believe. It is boringly slow and attempts to be convoluted just so you can be duped into thinking it is deep and meaningful.
The best part of the film is the last 10 seconds - the only true suspense happens in these few moments.
Ironically I got pleasure from seeing my partner fall asleep during the last hour : at the end of the movie I was very curious to know if she remembered her dream ...
Searching for Sugar Man (2012)
shamelessly promotes "never let the truth get in the way of a good story"
An enjoyable film overall. However, as a self-promoted "documentary", it falls short in quite a few key areas:
* it perpetuates the myth that after the release of his 2nd album in 1971 he received no recognition and effectively retired from performing. The film selectively omits the facts that he was very popular in Australia throughout the 70's and toured there in 1979 and 1981. He was equally popular in New Zealand and other African countries.
* in Australia an album entitled "Alive" was released shortly after his last tour. This title suggests that many people(and I would imagine it includes the touring party) must have known South Africans believed he was dead .. and the film does not explain how such a mystery of his death could have survived for 17-odd years after the release of this album
* the "documentary" fails to explain how copies of the album were actually made and distributed after Sussex folded. It takes time to describe a "follow-the-money" strategy employed by a musicologist ... but really does not properly describe the findings. Perhaps the truth would have diluted the story in the film?
* the film tells us Rodriguez, after six concerts in South Africa, went back to virtual obscurity. In fact, he toured extensively abroad in the 2000's, including many returns to Australia.
* we learn nothing of the mothers of his daughters, including anything of his relationship with them. For an artist who has composed many breathtakingly beautiful love songs, this omission is most remarkable for a "documentary"
Despite this I still enjoyed it ... thanks mostly to the inclusion of Rodriguez's hypnotic music and voice.