Change Your Image
Frank-80
Reviews
XIII: The Conspiracy (2008)
Terrible
XIII: The Conspiracy appears to get off to a decent start, but as the film unrolls it quickly unravels. The action slows down, and boring, repetitive, nonsensical babbling quickly takes over. Unfortunately, nothing is said that makes any sense - just confusing hogwash about politicians, spies, an emerging election and amnesia. The amnesiac was the luckiest of the cast. At least he had a justification for not knowing what was going on. Instead of the discussions between the actors and actresses delineating the preceding action, and setting up the next round of fisticuffs, explosions, and torture, they do nothing but randomly bump the film in a different, unexplained direction. This serves only to give the actors, who randomly pop in and out, just some time to create a new situation or two that only adds to the confusion. Wherever this dog is barking, there must be a better movie playing at a theater within walking distance. Take the walk. Or if you're on your sofa, stretch for the controls and flip the TV dial randomly and you'll come up with a better choice. This is one of the worst movies I have ever seen.
I Am Not a Freak (1987)
Never judge a book by its cover!
This film is a fascinating look at some people afflicted with congenital deformities of an extreme nature. Their ability to live with their aberrations while remaining socially involved and upbeat is truly inspirational. While their predecessors were often seen in so called "freak shows" that were part of various exhibitions from Coney Island to traveling circuses, these performers were actually the more fortunate ones in an era of little tolerance for those who were different from the accepted norm. Many became famous and extremely wealthy, such as Tom Thumb (Charles Sherwood Stratton), who worked for many years with P.T. Barnum. Outstanding film; highly recommended.
Our Fathers (2005)
Outstanding achievement
If only I could write a spoiler. That would imply that the final outcome of this the greatest of all scandals to rock the Catholic Church was known. But it is not, and the filmmakers do not pretend they know. They simply present in an honest, unflinching manner, the struggles of one group of victims in one city as they emerge from their own dark closets to seek justice for the pedophilia inflicted upon them by the men they most deeply trusted, their priests. This was a venture that took great courage. These were blue collar workers who had to first buck the macho culture in which they lived to do what they believed was the right thing to do. That was not easy. They received more mockery than plaudits as they sought understanding and healing. Cardinal Bernard Law is presented in a more compassionate light than I thought he deserved. He after all could have ended it all many years ago had he acted decisively in ferreting out and removing evil men like Geoghan and Shanley. Instead, he moved them around from parish to parish, enabling them to continue their perversions on new and unsuspecting victims. The Cardinal and his lawyers were so powerful in their hierarchical world and held the media so completely under their spell, that initially a disbelieving Boston Globe reporter suggests a spin that the bishop could use to modulate his responsibility into a more acceptable justification. She was anxious to set aside honest reporting for the more important act of helping the Cardinal. I saw superb acting, brilliant direction and hard hitting dialogue, but no vengeful lashing out. This was a fair and balanced presentation, with the viewer left to ponder and decide. The film ripped a hole through the surface of this horror exposing the incredible cover-up for all to see, but still maintained its balance. It is left to others to more fully plumb the depths of this scandal. This is a must see film for all, Catholics and non-Catholics alike, as pedophilia is not the exclusive domain of the Catholic Church.
Barn Red (2004)
Sappy, cliché ridden mess
There is a lot wrong with this movie, but the aspect that I found most appalling was the producer / director / writer's insistence on compressing the magnificent rolling countryside of Northern Michigan into a confined, claustrophobic play. Where are the acres of cherry trees, the breath taking sudden views of Lake Michigan as one crests a tree studded hill, the grandeur of the fall foliage? Except for a splash of red here and there on the farm in dispute, this film could have been shot in downtown Detroit. The viewer is taken from one confining location to another without ever traveling the byways of this magnificent piece of God's country. Except for Ernest Borgnine, the actors are unknown and should remain so. They all resemble wooden mannequins portraying stereotypical characters. The most annoying of them is the so - called developer trying to turn paradise into a ghetto. He is played in such an unbelievably farcical manner that the serious issue of preserving America's beautiful land is reduced to a cartoon-ish dimension. I live here and I did not recognize the area. Forget this one.
Plain Truth (2004)
weak, contrived, unconvincing
I'm tempted to call this "Mariska trapped in a hunk of Swiss cheese" but this confused mess of a movie has a lot more holes than that. It's so weak and contrived that even the exceptional acting talents of Mariska Hargitay can't save it. Every time a plot twist was needed the accused simply told another lie and off we went in a new and contrived direction. The depiction of Amish life is cartoonish. One would think that the writers would know better than to have the accused calling her parents "mom and dad". And white buttons on shirts? There's a lot more but to delve any deeper might give away what little plot there is, so I'll simply recommend avoiding this film altogether.
La vita è bella (1997)
This movie is an insult to anyone who has experienced the real holocaust, not this contrived, farcical version.
Words escape me! Perhaps ludicrous, contrived, insulting come close. There is nothing factual about the depiction of the holocaust in this ridiculous, totally unbelievable mess. Death camps were not nasty places where people toted weights around, got a little dirty but remained shaven, were able to keep their sons not only hidden but alive and well despite a starvation diet, had access to records, phonographs and loud speakers, could basically move about at will and suffer little more than the inconveniences of a run down boarding house. This movie claims the camp where our heroes sojourn is a death camp, (not one of the thousands of concentration camps that were located throughout Nazi occupied territories) complete with gas chambers and ovens. There were only six death camps, all in Poland, and all were dedicated, absolutely dedicated, to the dehumanization unto hideous death of their inmates. Slow agonizing demise from Zyklon B was the easy part; twenty minutes of choking, while clawing at your throat and eyes and it was over. The devastating removal of every vestige of humanity through constant beatings, lack of sleep, lack of food and water, lack of any semblance of medical care, torments that ate away at body and spirit over endless days, was the intolerable part. No one ever spoke to a guard without being shot on the spot. Guido would not have been taken around a bend to be killed, he would have been shot, or beaten to death, or hanged, publically to display for the other prisoners both his impotence and the Nazi's total control over life itself. It is absolutely impossible for a boy to have been hidden for a day much less weeks in a death camp. To depict this living hell as a Stalag full of Schultz's, largely ignoring at least one of the inmates, who gets to clean up and wait tables, with his son, no less, is an insult to every person who has been touched by the real horror of the holocaust. This would have been a great propaganda film for Goebbels to have shown to the Red Cross to show how humane the Nazis really were. If this was meant to work as some laugh-your-way-through-life's-troubles allegory, then a vehicle more appropriate than the greatest genocide ever perpetrated by man against man should have been chosen as the vehicle. As it stands this movie is a travesty.
The Thin Red Line (1998)
More time is spent with inane psycho-babble than in honoring the brave men who fought and died in winning one of the most important battles of the Pacific Theater.
The brave men who fought and died to retake Guadalcanal and stop the Japanese advance in the South Pacific are dishonored by this mess of a movie that is more interested in inane voice-over psycho-babble than in a true depiction of their incredible sacrifice. It is all the more tragic because the battle scenes are among the best I have ever seen in a war movie. The camera snakes along through the underbrush at eye level to the soldiers,creating a terrifying realism as these men seek out a well hidden enemy. The movie begins nowhere,and,after the ridge is taken,goes nowhere. Guadalcanal was not a jungle paradise filled with multi-colored parrots and happy, dancing natives. Where are the malaria-carrying mosquitoes and the incessantly swarming bugs? The director is trying to spin some allegory about soldiers trampling an otherwise perfect Eden; he is not trying to present an accurate depiction of a monumental World War II struggle. Flash backs to better times in the States are repetitious and not informative; numerous cutaways to bits of jungle beauty are distracting. Both serve to further slow down a story that creeps along for an overlong three hours. With nothing further to say, the story meanders another needless forty-five minutes, then abruptly ends. Very disappointing.