eric brochu › Quick & Dirty: Movie Reviews

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Hard Candy (2005) 2/5
2007-06-12 00:35

This horror-psycho-thriller is hard to watch, sometimes because it's so intense, and sometimes because it's so damned stagey that it reminded me of Tape, a movie I hated. I'm still not sure if it's a film about revenge and victimization dressed up with extreme violence, or an extreme violence film paying lip service to victimization and its consequences. To be honest, I'm not sure which I'd prefer.
2007-06-12
0.3
Prince of Darkness (1987) 2/5
2007-05-31 11:28

For some reason, John Carpenter's movies are more fun to think about than to watch. This one could have been awesome -- a group of scientists and theologians investigate a mysterious artifact that may contain Satan. Or is it an alien? Or some kind of time traveller? And it's pretty slick and well-made, considering the low budget. But ultimately, it's manages to be both iconic and vaguely unsatisfying. Just like Assault on Precinct 13 and Big Trouble in Little China. And Escape from new York. And They Live. And so on.
2007-05-31
0.3
2046 (2004) 2/5
2007-03-22 15:36

I really wanted to like this movie. I know a lot of people did, or claim to. It's beautifully shot and features various beautiful women in beautiful, chic dresses living in a beautifully shabby hotel in 1960s Hong Kong. It's a good-looking movie. But it lost me. It's just so taken up with its own elegant, oblique, art-house-romance view of the world, that I could never get past the artificiality of the characters and the story. The constant droning narration and pointless, ponderous sci-fi elements didn't help either. However, Christopher Doyle's gorgeous cinematography makes the movie worth watching, for a while, at least.
2007-03-22
0.3
Fils, Le (2002) 2/5
2007-03-08 22:14

The Son. Yet another overrated European film in the self-consciously "artistic" style of the past ten years or so -- lots of hand-held cameras and drab location shots. This one follows a character who is (intentionally) a complete cypher. "Follows" is really the word -- a good third of the film is spent staring at the back of his head while he walks around. The whole thing is deliberately difficult and opaque, but all the showy, high-mindedness contempt for style can't disguise the fact that the situation and characters are utterly implausible and the film really doesn't seem to have anything at all to say about them.
2007-03-08
0.3
Snakes on a Plane (2006) 2/5
2006-08-30 10:13

Manufactured Hollywood camp that somehow manages to make me question Sam Jackson's coolness. Still, it's a lot more entertaining than Superman Returns.
2006-08-30
0.3
Superman Returns (2006) 2/5
2006-07-29 09:53

Superman is not a terribly interesting superhero, but did the whole movie really have to be so bland? A monosyllabic Superman rescues a complete non-entity Lois Lane and her mouth-breathing kid. Even Kevin Spacey's Lex Luthor is dishwater-dull.
2006-07-29
0.3
Shock Waves (1977) 1.5/5
2010-10-07 08:35

2010-10-07
0.3
Transformers (2007) 1.5/5
2008-03-29 13:39

2008-03-29
0.3
The Bonfire of the Vanities (1990) 1.5/5
2008-01-08 19:58

I don't think there's a single performance or scene that rings true, but by God, they sure want to impress you with how much it all cost. I recently read the terrific book The Devil's Candy, about the making of this film, so I kind of had to see it, but it really is a slog.
2008-01-08
0.3
The Black Dahlia (2006) 1.5/5
2007-02-11 01:43

A runaway bulldozer of a movie, colliding into campy performances and sending plot points flying right out of the film. The the third act is a head-on collision with crazy town, and everything turns out to somehow be the fault of some incidental characters we know and care nothing about. For a few brief moments, it's so stupid and over-the-top it's better than good. But mostly, it's just bad.
2007-02-11
0.3
The Beach (2000/I) 1.5/5
2006-10-15 23:42

Actually, I spent most of the movie's runtime getting caught up on xkcd, so I'll let the IMDB's Titanic_Fanatic25 sum it up thusly: "whats your favorite scene of the beach?? mine is when him && Françoise are in the waterr && start making outt. veryy hot. he looks extremely good in that movie. [[especially in that part]] she is one lucky chick, dudee." Yes, yes, I'm a horrible snob.
2006-10-15
0.3
Renaissance (2006) 1.5/5
2006-10-08 00:39

Beautiful, but stupid. Really, really stupid. Will the dedicated maverick cop be forced to turn in his badge but vow to stay on the case? Will the megacorp president who talks about bettering the world turn out to be... pure evil? Will the cop and the 'bad girl' fight at first and then fall for each other? If you can't guess the answer, welcome to your very first movie.
2006-10-08
0.3
Talladega Nights: The Ballad of Ricky Bobby (2006) 1.5/5
2006-08-14 09:05

What the hell was the line of reasoning that lead me to believe this movie wouldn't suck ass?
2006-08-14
0.3
Hide and Seek (1999) 1/5
2011-01-02 12:27

2011-01-02
0.3
Blood Freak (1972) 1/5
2009-10-10 21:33

2009-10-10
0.3
Independence Day (1996) 1/5
2009-06-26 06:44

So after actually rather enjoying seeing things get smashed in Cloverfield, I thought maybe it was time to finally see Independence Day. I was wrong. There is never a time to see Independence Day.
2009-06-26
0.3
Troll 2 (1990) 1/5
2009-04-29 11:06

2009-04-29
0.3
Bamboozled (2000) 1/5
2008-04-13 13:45

2008-04-13
0.3
Gamera vs Gyaos (1967) 1/5
2008-02-16 21:04

Godzilla, at least in his first couple of films, is iconic and even poetic -- capital-N Nature in all its awesome fury, reminding the folks of badly-dubbed Japan that they and all their tiny, easily-crushable buildings are as insects by comparison. His fellow giant monster Gamera, however, is a bizarre, jet-powered flying turtle who likes to let creepy kids ride on his back. Here he battles a giant bird that can shoot lasers from its mouth. Gamera, you suck.
2008-02-16
0.3
Revolver (2005/I) 1/5
2007-12-25 23:48

Luc Besson, Guy Ritchie and Ray Liotta have all seemed a little crazy for the last, say, decade or so. Apparently, putting them all together was like a perfect storm of batshit-insane. Nothing I say can possibly prepare you for the schizoid, pretentious, Kabbalah-fueled mess of a gangster film that is Revolver. You must see it. If for nothing else than the endless scenes of Ray Liotta in his underwear under black lights, weeping and telling the voices in his head to fear him -- voices which, incidentally, are there for no fucking reason whatsoever!
2007-12-25
0.3
Fire Maidens from Outer Space (1956) 1/5
2007-11-25 23:45

2007-11-25
0.3
This Film Is Not Yet Rated (2006) 1/5
2007-07-06 09:48

How can a film with its head stuck so far up its own ass find the room to spend 94 minutes sucking Hollywood's dick? This film is an "expose" of the US MPAA ratings board as made by Kirby Dick, who clearly sees himself as a kind of Hollywood Hipster Asshole version of Michael Moore. Unfortunately, while he's as smug and hypocritical as Moore, he's nowhere near as talented a filmmaker, and all his banner waving about artistic freedom and censorship (the word is repeated roughly 800 times despite the fact the board doesn't censor movies) just comes off as the whiniest type of agitprop. A board member, we are told "lives in this multi-million dollar house" and is a Republican -- this, with a complete lack of irony, following a denunciation of the Hollywood blacklisting of the 1950s. But even a hack like Kirby Dick knows that you can't have a doc with just talking heads, so he hires a team of private investigators to follow ratings board members and go through their garbage. Because apparently, sometimes artistic freedom requires stalking people to teach them a lesson -- certainly, it's no worse than what the MPAA does. Oh, wait: it is. You fucking asshole.
2007-07-06
0.3
The Girl from Monday (2005) 1/5
2006-11-08 13:31

Ever since I saw Trust (still one of my top five films of all time) over ten years ago, I've eagerly followed Hal Hartley's career. But No Such Thing felt like Hal Hartley-lite, and this just feels like the work of an imposter. It has the Hartley tropes, but they're mushy, flavorless and decidedly lacking in nutritional value. And where No Such Thing lifted from La belle et la bête, this one is so derivative of The Man Who Fell to Earth that I just felt kind of embarassed for both Hartley and Nick Roeg.
2006-11-08
0.3
Zombie Lake (1981) 0.5/5
2010-10-07 08:35

2010-10-07
0.3

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