November 9, 2009
I’m such a sucker for classic film noir and this movie does not disappoint. The story starts off fairly normal enough, but as the plot thickens it becomes a bit stranger. It turns into some strange metaphor for the fear of the atom bomb that was felt at the time. I liked that it had that weird twist. Everything else was great. The mystery kept your interested and the quick lines made you think about every line of dialogue. Obviously if you’re a fan of film noir this is a must see.
November 9, 2009
All of the technical aspects of this film were great. There were some great shots and very good work with lighting. The actors and the dialogue were also great. But in the end the movie just fell short. I wasn’t very impressed with the rather simple story. I liked a lot of the individual scenes but they just didn’t come together to form a plot that I really cared about. The dialogue was great though and even though it might have been a little over the top it was such good literary work that it can be forgiven.
November 9, 2009
The phrase “the journey matters more than the destination” definitely describes this book. I found myself gripped by the story and always curious where things were doing. Various anecdotes from the characters flowed together naturally and always had some sort of deeper meaning. The ending was very fitting and I won’t say that it left a lot to be desired, but I definitely felt like there were a lot of unanswered questions. But that didn’t surprise me in context of the book. And I find that I’m not even desiring the answers to these questions, but not in a bad way. It’s kind of like accepting that everything in life won’t be spelled out for you and sometimes things are better left unknown. I don’t think there’s anyone who wouldn’t enjoy this book as long as you are willing to deal with a slower story that takes time to develop. I personally think most stories told could slow down a bit, so a slower moving plot did not bother me in the least.
November 9, 2009
This is the sophomore attempt from Rian Johnson and I am not disappointed with it. I liked Brick a lot so have been looking forward to seeing more from his for some time. This movie has just the right about of indie quirkiness and humor. It may have certain similarities with Wes Anderson’s movies but it really does stand on its own. It manages to have really memorable characters and a story that makes you care about them. The movie never takes itself too seriously but still manages to be poignant and engaging.
November 9, 2009
There really isn’t much story to this one. Basically Broly comes landed on Earth after being blown up, and needs to be killed again. I do like older Gohan, when he isn’t acting like an idiot, so that’s cool. And Goten and Trunks are fun but get tiresome as they usually do. More comedy then in the previous movies, but that has more to do with the overall tone of the series at this point then before. The fight scenes, especially when Gohan is fighting, are good though.
November 7, 2009
This was just an okay movie. I had read “The Death of Superman” as a kid but had never followed up on it to find out how they brought him back. So I’m not sure how faithful this is. But it seemed like it was too me. I do applaud that they left a good amount of the violence in the movie, warranting a PG-13 rating. Not that the violence is necessary but I would have figured they would fold from studio pressure to censor the movie a bit more. I guess the movie is good if you like Superman, but you’re not missing much. It’s not terrible or anything, just wasn’t special.
November 7, 2009
This was a great movie. It drew a good amount from Fritz Lang’s 1927 classic, but in no way was it a remake. Stylistically the city was very similar and it touched on the class struggle theme but other than that it was a completely different movie. And it worked great. The art style and music were great which complemented each other perfectly. The story was touching and had a lot of undertones to it. It is a great example of how well anime can work.
November 7, 2009
This is probably one of the best Dragon Ball Z movies they made. The story is rather thing but it is completely made up for in the action sequences. The comedy was a bit cheesy at times and could have been toned down. But everything created after Mr. Satan was introduced had much more slapstick comedy. Thankfully, he wasn’t in the movie very much since I can always do without him. But aside from that, I do remember this movie blowing my mind when I was younger watching an insanely poor quality .rm of it. I’m not nearly as impressed now, but I will always get entertainment from this movie simply because of those nostalgic reasons.
November 1, 2009
This was one of my favorite Dragon Ball Z movies. It has great fight scenes and a somewhat decent story. It’s another movie that doesn’t really fit into the shows timeline, but it’s okay in this case because it’s somewhat close. Vegeta was a little uncharacteristic being so scared and whiney for some reason. It was really poorly written, as he would never act like that. But other than that, the movie is a good balance of classic Dragon Ball Z stuff.
November 1, 2009
The original anime movie didn’t have much story to it, but it made up for it in thick atmosphere and impressive visuals. This movie tried to maintain a bit of atmosphere, but the helpless girl character they added ruined so many scenes. I don’t understand while they felt the need to add a female character that the main character would have fallen in love with if she were male. I guess you can’t have a movie without a love story, even if it’s some platonic love thing. They also added a lot more “history” to the situation. Meaning rather than having a never-ending horde of bad guys to take care of, there was a one main villain. I don’t mind changes to the story, but these weren’t intelligent changes, they were just throwing cliches into the mix to hopefully reach a broader audience. The result was just a pretty bad movie.
