sim_roberts Reviews

30 Rock: I Do Do (2010) Season 4, Episode 22

Disappointing

[1/10 · 31 May 2010]

I've watched every episode of 30 Rock and this is easily the worst. No one watches every episode of a show over 5 seasons without loving it - I think 30 Rock is very funny.

But this - labored beginning, a forced and unfunny meet-cute in the middle, and increasingly frantic toward the end as the actors tried to compensate for the paucity of the material - is just awful.

This episode even included the "joke" where the viewer is thinks he's listening to background music but, in fact, it's someone playing music just off screen. Eventually the character on screen turns and says "Will you shut up!" (or words to that effect). Too hackneyed for Blazing Saddles but OK for 30 Rock? What next "walk this way"?

What I like about 30 Rock is the way they subvert your expectations – they know what joke you're expecting so they throw in a twist. Not this time – everything was by the numbers.

And Matt Damon – really? Surely the worst, most pointless cameo since Natasha Henstridge on South Park. Watching him trying to be wacky was a bit like watching the Queen krump: entertaining in an excruciating watch-through-your-fingers sort of way.

The actors realized that the material was weak and tied to compensate with their delivery. Eventually, in sheer desperation the episode finished with Tracey doing a topless duck-walk across the screen.

Thanks for the effort guys but nothing could stop me noticing that this episode was a complete stinker.

Jindabyne (2006)

Brilliant premise beautifully filmed somehow results in an awful film

[1/10 · 18 April 2009]

This film promises so much - the premise raises all sorts of interesting issues - I was captivated...initially. Somehow the film becomes a sort of Billy Jack for the noughties.

The director is clever enough to put his messages in the mouths of likable country types but they are unmistakably the words of odious, self-obsessed, antidepressant addicted bores. These characters don't exist in Jindabyne or any country town.

It's didactic in a way that makes you feel as if you're being preached at for 90 minutes but that's not the worst of it. Nothing rings true. The characters are just ciphers.

The final fifteen minutes would have been unforgivable if they appeared in a student film.

Proof (1991)

Clever, subtle and intelligent

[10/10 · 27 March 2008]

This is my favourite Australian film and one of the best films to come out of any country.

Was (blind) Martin's mother lying when she described an unremarkable scene at the bottom of the garden when he was a child? "Why would I lie to you?" she asks, "because you can" he replies. It's an incredibly simple premise but it forms the basis for a wonderfully subtle and engaging film.

Because of his vulnerability, Martin creates an emotional carapace to protect himself. He takes photos as "proof" and asks sighted people to describe them to him.

When he suffers a real, as opposed to imagined, betrayal he learns the freedom of forgiveness and can finally begin to trust.

The final short scene is perhaps the best end to a film ever - wordlessly summing up the entire 90 minutes that precedes it.

Rambo (2008)

No filler - a pure joy!

[10/10 · 13 March 2008]

If you're old enough to remember the Rambo films of the 80's this will give you a warm nostalgic inner glow. But it's much more violent and visceral than the old films.

It's fantastic (in every sense of that word) - best action movie and best comedy of the year. The film establishes that the baddies are REALLY bad early - so bad that they deserve to be killed in gruesome ways - that's where Rambo comes in. No time wasted devising plans - a short scene establishing what sort of characters he is taking along for the ride (a grizzly ex-SAS guy and a friendly young sniper) then straight to the action - body parts flying everywhere - and you, the audience cheering Rambo along (in spite of yourself) while he turns the baddies into lunch-meat.

Nice!