Ivan Reitman directs Bill Murray, Dan Aykroyd and Harold Ramis in this supernatural comedy sequel where a possessed painting of a medieval necromancer sets his sights on Dana Barrett’s baby son.
A lot of people look down their noses at this sequel for being cravenly, indefatigably more of the same. Like, c’mon, who didn’t want more Ghostbusters?! More of the comraderie and genuine banter. More of the spectral SFX that inventively convince. More of the unlikely heroics. This delivers it all in a neat, undemanding package. Sure, if you scratch at the surface it isn’t the smash victory of the original blockbuster. Sigourney Weaver does a lot of narrative propulsion, Bill Murray clearly wants more scenes where he is the sole focus thus splitting the gang into those who fight ghosts and those who schmooze about in their own unrelated bits… And do we ever find out how that pink slime got under New York in the first place? But these are quibbles when you get a funky, off the wall, utterly quotable night in with a cast you have pre-installed affection for. Plus the spooky bits look amazing, truly better than anything else produced in Hollywood horror before and after. I actually wanted to get the image above to be Janosz’s disturbing hallway walk. A throwaway moment of terror where a minor character’s eyes explode into uncanny beams of possessed light. If only all cash-ins could be this loyal and satisfying. “We’re the best… we’re the beautiful… we’re the only… GHOSTBUSTERS!”
Dario Argento directs Irene Miracle, Leigh McCloskey and Eleonora Giorgi in this sorta sequel to Suspiria set in New York.
Not the best giallo in the world. Basically a series of Final Destination style curse deaths but viewed through Argento’s vivid lighting, otherworldly set design and manic score. That makes this often random mess sound better than it is. The mystery is nearly always impenetrable, and the most shocking moments of violence are either just too surreal or nauseating. The rat attack set piece involving a walking on water hamburger cook has to be seen to believed but best forgotten once experienced. A master of horror goes slightly tone death modulating his histrionic house style. Seen as that, in Inferno we have a forgivable curio.
Sidney Poitier directs Gene Wilder, Richard Pryor and JoBeth Williams in this crime comedy where two tenderfoot theatre nerds find themselves in a state penitentiary for a bank robbery they didn’t commit.
The lucrative alliance of Pryor and Wilder is one of the best things to happen to blockbuster comedy. They had cracking chemistry, matching each other onscreen in commitment and love-ability. Just seeing them paired on a quad poster together promises great things, big yucks. Shame that they never actually found a project that took this concrete foundation as a starting block to build up to greatness rather than a fallback to deliver a so-so product. Stir Crazy, like any and all of their packages, is unfocused and often unfunny. The script lacks jokes, the plot is all over the shop… Hell, the movie gives up on the prison setting 10 minutes after they arrive and impatiently sets it sights on moving the whole cast off to a rodeo finale. We have a late in the day romantic interest shoehorned in long, long after we haven’t noticed the lack of such a device. And as for the resolution… I’m pretty certain even most Hollywood comedies’ version of the how the real world works doesn’t tally with the swiftly achieved “happy ending”. But you do get street wise Pryor and bundle of neuroses Wilder larking about. Even when the lines and the situation fail them, they are magic. In an alternative universe that value would be mined for a series of ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ classics rather than a handful of now slightly baffling box office smashes.
Jason Reitman directs Hugh Jackman, Vera Farmiga and J.K. Simmons in political true story following Gary Hart, a presidential hopeful, who polled strongly in the 1980s until his extra marital activities were revealed by the press.
Hugh Jackman is fine in the central role convincing both as a man who could be the next Kennedy and sadly was like a Kennedy, just very much in the wrong decade. Reitman continues to direct films that are mature, politically astute and inhabit their subcultures fully. This one just never comes to life though. Just when the drama appears to be building up a head of steam… everyone just gives up. Roll credits. Frustrating…
Luchino Visconti directs Helmut Berger, Romy Schneider and Silvana Mangano in this biopic about the life and death of King Ludwig II of Bavaria, an eccentric ruler eventually dethroned for his tastes and passions.
Grand, decadent, often ornately beautiful but deathly boring. Goes on forever, interminably, with very rare flashes of tangible drama.
John Cassavetes directs Ben Carruthers, Lelia Goldoni and Hugh Hurd in this indie drama about three black siblings navigating the Beat Generation in New York.
You could say this is the film that gave birth to American Independent cinema. A melodrama made far out of the Hollywood studio system that focussed on milieu and character rather than genre and plot. It is scrappy by today’s standards. And I’m not sure the voice it gives its black ensemble is particularly authentic. Better watched as a museum piece than as a relevant or artistically exciting piece of cinema.
Clint Eastwood directs Kevin Costner, himself and Laura Dern in this 60s set road drama about a fugitive who kidnaps a young Jehovah’s Witness, and treats the boy to some of the freedom and fathering he feels they have both missed out on.
I must have watched A Perfect World over a dozen times as a teenager. I owned it on VHS. And then when my video collection gave way to moving out of my family home and the ascension of DVD, it just got lost in the shuffle. It went from being a cherished regular in my viewing habits one decade, to being nothing but a fond memory for the last two. You always worry such a film won’t live up to immature nostalgia… might prove to be a rose tinted dud. No such problem here.
This is a film as macho and as sensitive, as richly composed and gently entertaining as Clint’s Unforgiven or Mystic River. He’s a deceptively unfussy director, at home with a simple joke as he is with allowing his actors to inhabit parts without monologues or grand standing. The great thing about a Clint directed movie is, no matter how dark the subject matter or important the themes, he shoots it like a western or cop drama, populates it with solid talent. You could show one of his better slow, thoughtful dramas to your Dirty Harry loving grandpops and he could access the old school pleasures therein. You could let your most pretentious arthouse loving friend in on a viewing, and they’d struggle not to see the same morally ambiguous exploration of humanity and society as a Bergman or a Tarkovsky would lend their drier, more high faultin’ fare.
Costner, here, benefits the most. The star at his career peak delivers a layered performance as a bad man with good in him, even if his severe judgment of others is often intimidatingly off. You never fear or doubt his protection of the child caught up in his escape, yet you can’t help but think his kindness to him either betrays a suppressed infantilism in the brutal man or a desire to gift the child with the fathering he craved before he went off the rails. What makes good fathering is the thesis of the film. Costner’s Butch’s Dad was a ne’er do well. Clint’s authorarian Ranger Red thought the state farm would straighten the young Butch out and get him away from his father’s bad habits. Young Philip’s father is long gone and his life is dictated by his mother’s strict beliefs. A grandfather who takes the runaways in for a night is callously violent to his grandson who he looks after… Costner responds with murderous threat in the film’s most nail bitingly intense sequence. America is about to lose its innocence as their current paternal figure, President John F Kennedy, is fated to be shot and killed in the very state and very month our tale is set in.
Clint doesn’t offer easy answers… by his measure no alternative to a good, loving father is offered. Much affection and respect passes between Philip and Butch, and as much as we enjoy seeing their mismatched relationship flourish, you can always see the bad example our protagonist sets our cloistered boy. Clint presents a view on parenting that is down on interference, down on corporal punishment and down on religious prescribed morality. Kids need love and space to work on who they are. A very libertarian attitude.
The only flaw that holds A Perfect World back from a perfect score is the final stand-off. Though gripping and in keeping with the pace of the whole relaxed road movie project… it just outstays its welcome. Even if it drags a fair bit, the slow drip rhythm at the very least matches our investment not to see the conclusion suddenly rushed or stunted.
9
My Top 10 Kevin Costner Movies
1.Dances With Wolves (1990) 2. Field Of Dreams (1989) 3. The Untouchables (1987) 4. JFK (1991) 5. Open Range (2003) 6. A Perfect World (1993) 7. Bull Durham (1988) 8. Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves (1991) 9. 13 Days (2000) 10. Hatfields & McCoys (2012)
William Wyler directs Audrey Hepburn, Peter O’Toole and Eli Wallach in this romantic caper where a hobbying art forger’s daughter employs a strange fellow she finds robbing her mansion to recover an incriminating work of fakery from a museum.
The stars have fizzing chemistry, Hepburn’s Givenchy wardrobe is divine and the daft plot keeps them in near constant proximity to take full advantage of these strengths. A sugary lark, powered by well-matched stars and picture postcard perfect Paris location work.
Jon S. Baird directs John C. Reilly, Steve Coogan and Nina Arianda in this biopic looking at the legendary slapstick comedy duo as they slum it through a final tour of UK.
Sweet, funny but mechanical in its manipulations. Reilly is fantastic as Babe, the make-up pleasingly lacks that rubbery obviousness of Oldman’s Churchill last year. Coogan isn’t quite as convincing as Stan Laurel but hits the right note when he is mimicking the on-stage comedy persona. Both wives (Arianda and Shirley Henderson) prove vital to us understanding their personalities and get as many laughs themselves. The film itself is generally unchallenging, a mid afternoon love letter to comedy icons you already adore. Soooo… the reality of their final days together are a little grimmer, less triumphant. You don’t mind them getting a happier ending when they still continue to spread so much joy with their brilliant cinematic legacy. But equally the imagined conflict that arises between them seems in bad taste. If there was real life resentment between the pair it was uncharacteristic to the personalities they, and even this film, presented. So to lob it like a hand grenade into the third act for a bit of tension feels like a betrayal. Especially one as fluffy and undemanding as this is in the main. At its best though, Stan and Ollie makes you hanker to open up that L&H boxset and get your Laughing Gravy on again.
