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The Dirty Dozen: The Fatal Mission (1988)
Entertaining but not memorable.
It's difficult to rate this movie. I watched after reading the reviews and it seems that many people didn't like it.
The original movie "The Dirty Dozen" was released in 1967. This sequel was attempted 21 years later (1988) with less money and less stars. Lee Marvin died in 1987. Charles Bronson was 67 at the time and didn't participate. Telly Savalas was 66.
The original movie was produced by Robert Aldrich. The 1988 sequel by Mel Swope who is known for Fame and Miami Vice.
This movie takes the same ingredients without bringing in any element of originality. The net result is an average war movie. I found that the second part was much better than the first but eventually the whole thing is weak.
For a war movie, you need a lot of FX to create credible scenery, explosions and historical reconstitution.
Entertaining but not memorable.
Columbo: Ashes to Ashes (1998)
Disappointing - Probably worst episode ever
I was disappointed by this episode. It doesn't look like Columbo but a sort of cheap imitation.
The first 15 minutes are promising; really. The killer managed to commit almost a perfect crime and I expected to see a highly interesting confrontation between himself and the famous inspector.
However, the recipe didn't work. Massive holes are left in the scenario. Some details are brought forward but they have nothing to do with the crime itself. Columbo gives the feeling from minute one that he knows that the death was an homicide. He kept heavily insisting if the witnesses heard the victim screaming or not while he has no valid reason to do so at this stage.
At the end, the crime is not demonstrated at all but the killer gives himself away!
Also, as many other reviewers reported, there was a lot of lame attempts to introduce humour.
Deux hommes dans la ville (1973)
Lame, slow, boring...
Without even checking, I knew from the first 20 minutes that the movie is from the post-1968 era in France. At the time, they tried to build a case against death penalty and raise awareness on the issues faced by ex-cons trying to return to normal life. The intention is good but the concept didn't age very well. First of all, there is no death penalty in France any more and presenting the convicts as "victims" is not perceived as a reasonable position today. Giovanni makes one character say: "we must destroy all prisons and the problem is solved". Just this quote gives you the spirit of the whole movie.
For the rest, nothing really happens. At times, the camera work reminds me of romantic movies for 16-year old girls: slow motion, love music, people playing, jiggling, happiness in their faces, hugging in slow motion again... I mean, really??
The voice-over is irritating. They use it too much along the movie. So rather than showing what's happening, they actually tell it.
Parole de flic (1985)
Didn't age very well
This movie tries to pull a string of a genre that was already dead and gone. French cinema was very good on that topic during the sixties and seventies. But in 1985, the French cop - crime - drama genre produced mostly poor quality movies that didn't age very well. If you want to see the top of the genre, watch The Sicilian Clan (1969).
In Cop's Honour the scenario is very flat and predictable. A group of not well defined extremists opens fire on young people. There is also a scene where what it seems black immigrants are also shoot at. During this spree, they kill Delon character daughter.
It creates a pattern of "justifiable violence" as the ex-cop returns to France and starts killing the murderers one by one.
This is a boring movie which reminds me some sequels of Bronson's "Death Wish" with even less redeeming qualities.