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LoganCrews (2861 KP) rated Chocolat (2000) in Movies
Sep 21, 2020
Chocolate is like some ancient Mayan magic that cures bigotry delivered by globetrotting, all-knowing hooded messengers… or some shit? Lol idek just imagine taking any of this dumb shit seriously, couldn't be me. Spoof level of this sort of pure sap Oscar bait, like the full product of one of Kirk Lazarus' 𝘛𝘳𝘰𝘱𝘪𝘤 𝘛𝘩𝘶𝘯𝘥𝘦𝘳 trailers. Binoche is beyond annoying as one of those one-dimensional, overly-effervescent 'Mary Sue' (I shudder to even use that term after the Star Wars fanboys sucked it of all its meaning) types - I'm truthfully shocked they didn't cast Julia Roberts here lmao. Part unintentionally comical (Alfred Molina brutally murdering a chocolate assortment display with a letter opener), part irresistibly sweet - much like a confectionary itself (kudos to Dench and Depp), all brainless silliness (just have to wade through a lot of inauthentic syrup to get to the good stuff - which still ultimately isn't enough). Why was this genre of film ever an unironic fad? Still convinced the only reason this was made was for Peter Stormare to be able to successfully use every accent known to man in movies. So it's such a shame that with all this considered it ends up being just watchable.
LoganCrews (2861 KP) rated S1m0ne (2002) in Movies
Sep 21, 2020
The trifecta of flatness: a comedy with next to no laughs, a satire with no bite, and a drama without sufficient emotion. Yet another technophobic dud that fires on zero cylinders and has nothing to say - try to picture if 𝘏𝘦𝘳 was one of the (many) shittier "Black Mirror" episodes. Besides Rachel Roberts' perfectly realized, fittingly mysterious performance (which, of course, is underused) nothing else shines through here - has zero depth beyond a few performative quips and has that rush-through-everything-of-any-importance pacing + structure that I detest. Here we have what could have been a poignantly interesting film about a disenchanted director whose only authentic relationship is with a synthetic A.I. as well as a boiling satire about the state of celebrity, the objectification of women in entertainment, technology, etc. But instead we're left with such a rote, surface-level, come-and-go boilerplate narrative about this thinly-written 'failed director' trope having to hide an obviously fake woman from every idiot on the planet. Skimps out on where it counts, the brief spoof arthouse movies in these are more intelligent and watchable than the actual movie - which ironically feels as insincere and fakey as its central character. Also I miss Jay Mohr.
Awix (3310 KP) rated The World's End (2013) in Movies
May 22, 2018
Predictably smart and funny comedy-SF movie from the makers of Shaun of the Dead and Hot Fuzz; five old friends come back together on an ill-conceived pub crawl and find that revisiting past mistakes is less important than dealing with the alien forces apparently at work in their old home town.
The director claims this is SF in the British tradition of John Wyndham; to me it looks much more like an update (not quite a spoof) of Invasion of the Body Snatchers, set somewhere in the Home Counties. Terrific cast, some very good jokes; also some rather impressive action sequences. Not quite in the same vein as Shaun of the Dead, as this movie has some quite dark emotional threads running through it, with themes of regret and guilt and coming to terms with getting older.
I have to say that while I loved this film, I am of the same generation as the main characters and can fully sympathise with their various situations; younger people of my acquaintance couldn't quite see the point of the film. Almost certainly an age thing - whether your response to the track listing of the soundtrack is 'Wow, non-stop classics!' or 'Eww, dad rock' (or even 'Never heard of any of this') will probably be a good indicator as to whether you'll like the actual movie or not.
The director claims this is SF in the British tradition of John Wyndham; to me it looks much more like an update (not quite a spoof) of Invasion of the Body Snatchers, set somewhere in the Home Counties. Terrific cast, some very good jokes; also some rather impressive action sequences. Not quite in the same vein as Shaun of the Dead, as this movie has some quite dark emotional threads running through it, with themes of regret and guilt and coming to terms with getting older.
I have to say that while I loved this film, I am of the same generation as the main characters and can fully sympathise with their various situations; younger people of my acquaintance couldn't quite see the point of the film. Almost certainly an age thing - whether your response to the track listing of the soundtrack is 'Wow, non-stop classics!' or 'Eww, dad rock' (or even 'Never heard of any of this') will probably be a good indicator as to whether you'll like the actual movie or not.
Bricksy: Unauthorized Underground Brick Street Art
Book
From Jeff Friesen, award-winning photographer and author of United States of LEGO(R), comes a...
Round the Horne: 17 Episodes of the Groundbreaking BBC Radio Comedy: 4: Complete Series
Kenneth Horne, Kenneth Williams and Barry Took
Book
Kenneth Horne, Kenneth Williams, Betty Marsden and Hugh Paddick star in 17 episodes of the anarchic...
Round the Horne: March 1965 - June 1965: Complete Series One
Marty Feldman, Kenneth Horne, Kenneth Williams and Barry Took
Book
Kenneth Horne, Kenneth Williams, Betty Marsden and Hugh Paddick star in 16 episodes of the anarchic...
Raccoon - Anonymous Client for Onion Tor Browser
Utilities
App
Private and anonymous internet browsing through Tor. Access rich-medias anonymously (Video streams,...
Mark @ Carstairs Considers (2379 KP) rated The Spirit in Question in Books
Oct 3, 2018
Murder in the Haunted Theater
Lila has been talked into working on a play that her university is putting on this semester. The play is Puzzled: The Musical written by Tolliver Ingersoll, a fellow professor at Stonedale University, and it's being directed by Jean Claude Lestronge, who is visiting the college for the semester. Putting the play on is proving to be a struggle, but things get more interesting when someone is shot during a planned blackout. That's when Lila starts to hear some stories about the history of this particular theater. Could that have something to do with what is currently happening? Or is there a more modern motive for murder?
There is a lot happening in this book, and at times, the plot appears to ramble as a result. The murder definitely takes a back seat to some of the other things going on, but I never found myself getting board since everything was entertaining. And the various bits and pieces do begin to tie together the further we get into the book. Because we get so many new characters, we don't see much of most of the series regulars, but the new characters are all developed enough to make us care about the outcome, and Lila continues to be a strong lead. And the play! I was laughing at the little bits we did learn about it over the course of the book. Heck, the song titles alone are great. It looks like a fun spoof of the mystery genre that I would go see if I could.
There is a lot happening in this book, and at times, the plot appears to ramble as a result. The murder definitely takes a back seat to some of the other things going on, but I never found myself getting board since everything was entertaining. And the various bits and pieces do begin to tie together the further we get into the book. Because we get so many new characters, we don't see much of most of the series regulars, but the new characters are all developed enough to make us care about the outcome, and Lila continues to be a strong lead. And the play! I was laughing at the little bits we did learn about it over the course of the book. Heck, the song titles alone are great. It looks like a fun spoof of the mystery genre that I would go see if I could.
Bob Mann (459 KP) rated Johnny English Strikes Again (2018) in Movies
Sep 28, 2021
Spy spoof caper that’s only passably amusing.
It’s a HILARIOUS concept. It’s Bond but not as we know it: a suave, sophisticated, well-dressed hero but someone who’s a complete klutz when it comes to the spy business. Rowan Atkinson is perfect in the role: because when he plays his face ”straight” he IS strangely good-looking and certainly pulls off the air of confidence, intelligence and sophistication well.
So it was that 2003’s Johnny English was a refreshing novelty. Roll forwards 15 years (via 2011’s “Johnny English Reborn”) and the concoction needs… you know… actual JOKES.
For “Johnny English Strikes Again” is unfortunately a pretty lame affair.
The Plot
Johnny English (Atkinson) is retired from MI7 and living life as a Geography teacher at a public school. Aside from teaching them about sheep farming in Australia and magma, English delights in teaching his young pupils the tricks of the spy trade: “You’re looking particularly beautiful tonight”, with a twinkle and a vodka martini in hand. “You’re looking particularly beautiful tonight” repeats the class.
But the quiet life of English is about to end, since a cyber-attack has exposed all of MI7’s current agents and the Prime Minister (Emma Thompson) needs to re-hire a retired agent who is currently ‘off the grid’. But noone – friend or foe – is safe when the bumbling English and his faithful helper Bough (Ben Miller) go back into the field.
The Turns
As UK comedy professionals, Atkinson and Miller deliver their English/Bough schtick serviceably enough. The brilliant Emma Thompson though is woefully underused as a straight-woman, being asked to do little more than an exasperated Theresa May impersonation.
If you need a sexy and sophisticated femme fatale for a Bond spoof, what better than a real ex-Bond girl? So the extremely sexy and sophisticated Olga Kurylenko (Camille from “Quantum of Solace”) plays Ophelia Bhuletova, which sounds much funnier when pronounced by Atkinson. And a very good job she does too.
The Review
To emphasise the positive for a moment, the film is suitably glossy, which are table stakes for a spy caper like this or Austin Powers.
But the script by William Davies (who did the previous Johnny Englishes, but nothing much since “Reborn”) doesn’t deliver any real laugh-out-loud moments. My hopes were raised when the “pensioner interviews” happened and Charles Dance, Edward Fox and Michael Gambon turned up. Great, I thought… having the old timers play off Atkinson will be fun. But unfortunately they were nothing but cameos and (although one of the film’s comedy highlights) they came and went in the blink of an eye.
Elsewhere the film relied too much on a few running jokes: ostensibly the need for health and safety in MI7, where guns are rather frowned upon, given their potential to caused injury or worse. A ‘virtual reality’ training mission also delivers smiles but outstays its welcome.
The film is a first-time feature for TV-comedy director David Kerr.
Final thoughts
There are films which are wildly offensive. There are films that are just plain bad. This is neither: it is as Douglas Adams might have described it as “Mostly Harmless”. But to get any more than the rating I have given it, a comedy film has to make me laugh and this one failed miserably. It’s a watchable TV film for a rainy afternoon, but not worth heading out to the cinema to watch.
So it was that 2003’s Johnny English was a refreshing novelty. Roll forwards 15 years (via 2011’s “Johnny English Reborn”) and the concoction needs… you know… actual JOKES.
For “Johnny English Strikes Again” is unfortunately a pretty lame affair.
The Plot
Johnny English (Atkinson) is retired from MI7 and living life as a Geography teacher at a public school. Aside from teaching them about sheep farming in Australia and magma, English delights in teaching his young pupils the tricks of the spy trade: “You’re looking particularly beautiful tonight”, with a twinkle and a vodka martini in hand. “You’re looking particularly beautiful tonight” repeats the class.
But the quiet life of English is about to end, since a cyber-attack has exposed all of MI7’s current agents and the Prime Minister (Emma Thompson) needs to re-hire a retired agent who is currently ‘off the grid’. But noone – friend or foe – is safe when the bumbling English and his faithful helper Bough (Ben Miller) go back into the field.
The Turns
As UK comedy professionals, Atkinson and Miller deliver their English/Bough schtick serviceably enough. The brilliant Emma Thompson though is woefully underused as a straight-woman, being asked to do little more than an exasperated Theresa May impersonation.
If you need a sexy and sophisticated femme fatale for a Bond spoof, what better than a real ex-Bond girl? So the extremely sexy and sophisticated Olga Kurylenko (Camille from “Quantum of Solace”) plays Ophelia Bhuletova, which sounds much funnier when pronounced by Atkinson. And a very good job she does too.
The Review
To emphasise the positive for a moment, the film is suitably glossy, which are table stakes for a spy caper like this or Austin Powers.
But the script by William Davies (who did the previous Johnny Englishes, but nothing much since “Reborn”) doesn’t deliver any real laugh-out-loud moments. My hopes were raised when the “pensioner interviews” happened and Charles Dance, Edward Fox and Michael Gambon turned up. Great, I thought… having the old timers play off Atkinson will be fun. But unfortunately they were nothing but cameos and (although one of the film’s comedy highlights) they came and went in the blink of an eye.
Elsewhere the film relied too much on a few running jokes: ostensibly the need for health and safety in MI7, where guns are rather frowned upon, given their potential to caused injury or worse. A ‘virtual reality’ training mission also delivers smiles but outstays its welcome.
The film is a first-time feature for TV-comedy director David Kerr.
Final thoughts
There are films which are wildly offensive. There are films that are just plain bad. This is neither: it is as Douglas Adams might have described it as “Mostly Harmless”. But to get any more than the rating I have given it, a comedy film has to make me laugh and this one failed miserably. It’s a watchable TV film for a rainy afternoon, but not worth heading out to the cinema to watch.