nodoubt2221 Reviews

300 (2006)

an excellent film with humor and wit

[10/10 · 10 March 2007]

everything was visually stimulating and excellent. the roars of glory and honor from king leonides was convincing, and all the scenes from lena headey were strong and captivating. all the actors in the film were perfect for their roles and everything fit in right. the audience reacted well to the film, with laughs and cheering, especially with a lot of scenes with the queen, all her scenes were remarkably strong. there were some moments however that were comic and were not really meant to be. there were a lot of politics and other subplots that were interesting, so it was not only constantly focused on fighting scenes, which would have been fruitless to some level. before i saw the film i thought, how long can you keep showing fight scenes until you run out of time and substance? however, everything was handled well, from the great opening scene to the end. the surprising part of the film was that there was irony, humor, and wit. instead of a barbaric, raw, and mindless film (sort of like sin city) this film proved to have much more meaning and substance. king leonides tried to do what was best for his people, and fight endlessly with his small force. he fought for freedom and honor and everything that everyone hopes to protect. also the narrative was interesting and clever, and it actually did recount many things such as hubris and other small Greek anecdotes. there was a lot of subtle humor that many caught, and many lines were well written, witty and worked well throughout the film. the whole movie really made you live in it, and really made the audience riled up.

in the end, you really just wanted to be a spartan.

Hannibal Rising (2007)

pretty good except misses some important concepts

[10/10 · 17 February 2007]

THIS DOESN'T CONTAIN MOVIE SPOILERS BUT PARTS OF THE NOVEL THAT WERE DIFFERENT

the movie overall was excellent, though i expected more and i enjoyed it very much. however, hannibal lecter was not given enough depth. in the novel, there was more character depth to hannibal. in the movie it doesn't give hannibal many lines, i felt there were more things that lecter could have said. also it didn't portray his studies and intelligence very well. in the novel hannibal exchanges many haikus with lady murasaki, showing his composed and intellectual side, and his love and admiration for murasaki better, however, it was completely cut out. just a few haiku exchanges would have portrayed that. i went with a few friends, and one of them had not seen any of the lecter movies and said to me "oh, was he supposed to be intellectual and philosophical or something?" throughout the movie he just seems a bit cold with less humanity than the novel intended.

also after he kills his last victim of the film, in the novel hannibal is investigated and released because of his studies, however, in the film the french assume he is dead and he moves on. however, it would be better for future films, if there are some, because it would leave some mark in the future, that people could look back at his record and find that he had some hidden psychotic problems. also the investigation scene would have been very interesting.

the first two killings were well done and was interesting. the movie overall is nothing like the other three and should not be expected to be like them at all. red dragon did after all have a different feel from silence, however, this movie is far from similar to the others. there is not mystery around a murder and etc., here everything is revealed for us to absorb.

ulliel gave a really wonderful performance, especially towards the end when he starts transforming into the cruel hannibal. his psychotic acting is really well done.

Haven (2001 TV Movie)

an excellent eye opener

[10/10 · 10 July 2006]

i always knew that America carried anti-semitic views, but i never knew that it was very strong within our own government that Jewish refugees were not even allowed to marry. it's hard to say that this movie was syrupy or overdone considering it was based on a true story. funny how it worked it out well for Hollywood, it's a shame it wasn't taken to the big theaters and was just a TV movie. nonetheless, it was an excellent film that revealed the war at home, the fight for refugees, and America's own hidden agenda. everyone knows now that many nations knew about Hitler's plans and ignored it, but this movie shows how much more we hid. i hope that everyone gets to see this movie for not only was the plot great, but that acting was well done. all the actors contributed very well. it surprised me much that i never heard about refugee camps during WWII, not even in my history class.

Seoul Train (2004)

great film

[10/10 · 22 October 2005]

This documentary was excellent, though it could have been better, it was the most organized and interesting document that has been created on behalf of the refugee system in North Korea (Children of the Secret State was even better). Jim Butterworth finally brought the topic of North Korean refugees to America and tried to make the invisible people visible. i can only hope that this film will help spread the word about the north Korean refugees who are ignored by the world, and by all states. even the American government and the UN ignores them. another excellent document was Children of the Secret State, which actually spoke with several refugees, showed the plight of the refugees in China, and showed even more rare North Korean footage. Seoul train could have given a more detailed account on the statistics and such, and could have talked about the starvation issue in North Korea and showed more of the suffering of those refugees in China.