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The Big Boodle(1957)6/10
With Errol Flynn, Pedro Armendariz, and Gia Scala.
Errol is a card dealer, in a casino, in Cuba. During a stint he is passed some phoney pesos. From then on he gets deeper into trouble, with everyone. The police, Cuban villains and women.
A late entry in Flynn's career and while no masterpiece, it was watchable. Mainly due to my not being familiar with it. Errol looked a bit tired but this added a bit to his performance as the ' wtf is going on' character, at least at the outset, until he finds his bearing. Armendariz played his part well- pain in the arse but honest police chief. There were plenty of other shifty looking people that had nothing to do with the story,except to make you say ' I bt its him'.
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...The Boys from Brazil 6/10
I can't understand how anyone can give this film such a high rating ...
6 isn't high, it's above average watchable.
6 is a low mark for Boys from Brazil.
And it was definitely improved by the superb score.
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Invasion of the Body Snatchers (Philip Kaufman, 1978)
Along with the first adaptation from 1953 by Don Siegel (who has a cool cameo, along with Kevin McCarthy) still one of the best adaptations of Jack Finney's novel "The Body Snatchers". When I originally saw it as a kid, I enjoyed it as a creepy science-fiction movie, but nowadays, I find the commentary on social conformism much more interesting (and scarier.) Glad to finally have Denny Zeitlin's wonderful score on CD.
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Passages (2023)
Toxic narcissist Tomas (Tomas Freiburg) and his wayward cock tramps all over doormats named Martin (Ben Whishaw) and Agathe (Adèle Exarchopoulos) until they finally come to their senses and give him the heave-ho. Then Tomas takes a bike ride.
Underwhelming cheating spouse melodrama.
6/10
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The Specialist (Luis Llosa,1994) 5/10
Boy, they sure don’t make ‘em like that anymore. The movie practically revels in its glossy, over-the-top extravagance. Sylvester Stallone and Sharon Stone aren’t so much performing as posing, every other shot of Sharon Stone looks as if lifted out of Vogue Magazine, Cigarettes and cigars and expensive cars abound, and who better than James Woods to play a mean, ice-cold bad guy. He seems to have a ball. The plot is nonsensical and basically just serves as a backdrop for some cool action scenes and a ludicrous love scene between Stallone and Stone. Woods and Stallone play ex-colleagues who were once explosive experts at the CIA, but now work “freelance”, Woods for a gangster. Stallone is choosier when it comes to picking his jobs and prefers to blow up only people he finds morally objectionable, your friendly neighborhood executioner for hire, so to speak. In comes Stone, who wants to take revenge on Eric Roberts, because he and his gangster family are responsible for her family's death. Or maybe she’s actually working with Woods, who wants to get Stallone to come out of hiding and finish him off. The plot is actually quite complicated for a thriller of this kind, taking turns right and left so the characters have something to do, since there are not nearly as many action sequences as one would expect in a Stallone blockbuster from this time. That’s probably because by the mid 90s, the “tough guy action movie” had started to overstay its welcome, and stars like Schwarzenegger and Stallone were trying to branch out into other types of movies, so THE SPECIALIST mixed in a heavy dosis from classic noir film and obviously capitalized on Stone’s fresh fame from BASIC INSTINCT. John Barry’s elegant music elevates the whole affair from glossy to hyper-glossy.
But, say what you want, we had a lot of fun watching this movie. The same year Quentin Tarantino came out with his masterwork PULP FICTION, THE SPECIALIST was the “real deal”. This is purest “pulp fiction”: tough guys and sexy dames, a far fetched revenge plot, sleasy (and completely superfluous) sex scenes, explosions with lots of KABOOM!, and one liners. (Even the bomb timers come with one-liners here!)
Great stuff, you have to be in the mood for it for sure, it’s not so much a “good” movie, but it comes with the smell of another era, and for the running time of the movie, the 90s were alive again. Lot’s of fun if you go with the flow.
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Yes, the John Barry's score is very nice. The producers of the film obviously wanted something elegant and stylish, rather than a straightforward action/suspense score.
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Posted: |
Oct 11, 2023 - 12:20 AM
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By: |
Bob DiMucci
(Member)
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HOCUS POCUS (1993) – 7/10
I had previously only seen this film on broadcast TV, but I decided to take in one of the 30th Anniversary theatrical showings. It’s not as good as I remember it, but I bumped it up one point for its lively John Debney score (last released by Intrada in 2013).
In a lengthy prologue, three 17th-century witch sisters (Bette Midler. Sarah Jessica Parker, and Kathy Najimy) are hanged in Salem, Massachusetts after stealing the spirit of a young girl in order to maintain their youth. They also turned the girl’s teenage brother, “Thackery Binx” (Sean Murray), into a black cat. Flash forward to the present day, when teenager “Max” (Omri Katz), younger sister “Dani” (Thora Birch), and girlfriend “Allison” (Vinessa Shaw) accidentally reincarnate the witches on Halloween night by lighting a candle that burns with a black flame, found in an old, closed museum. The witches have until morning to conjure up the spell that will allow them to steal the spirit of Dani and the other young children in town. But our intrepid trio snatch the book of spells from the witches, and the chase is on, with the kids being helped by Binx the cat, who has been around all these years.
Screenwriters Mick Garris and Neil Cuthbert have set up a decent premise, but the humor is pretty much limited to the witches, with Bette Midler playing straight woman to the comic unruliness of her two sisters. There are a few gags when the witches confront modern life and technology, but not much is done with that idea.
Special effects are similarly limited (at least based on today’s standards)—the witches fly on their broomsticks and Midler shoots some lighting bolts out of her fingers. Nevertheless, HOCUS POCUS was Disney’s first foray into the digital era after purchasing two new computers and a proprietary software package for its existing in-house effects unit. Through Buena Vista Visual Effects (BVVE), Disney became the second major studio with in-house digital effects capabilities behind Sony Studios’ Imageworks. Among the effects created with the new digital technology was a six-layer digital composite which combined live-action footage of a house, a miniature of its upper floors and roof exploding, and three puppet witches shot against a blue screen, flying out across a matte painting of a moon and clouds which were set into motion digitally. Additional digital effects were created by the Rhythm & Hues company in Hollywood which created “Binx,” the talking cat. Rhythm & Hues achieved Binx by filming a real cat, digitally removing its head, and digitally cloning its fur for use in their 3D-model.
Kenny Ortega (NEWSIES) directed HOCUS POCUS. The film’s best scene occurs when the witches crash a big adult Halloween party and are mistaken for guests. They end up on stage with Parker and Najimy performing as backup singers as Midler belts out a rendition of "I Put a Spell on You.”
In another good scene, uncredited brother and sister Garry and Penny Marshall play a creepy husband and wife. Garry is dressed as Satan for Halloween, and the sisters mistake him for the real thing. Garry Marshall had previously directed Midler in BEACHES (1988).
The $28 million production had just OK grosses of $40 million domestically on its initial run. A 2020 re-release and now this 30th Anniversary re-issue have brought in another $6 million. For the re-releases, the sound has been upgraded from analog Dolby Stereo to Dolby Digital Atmos, which helps the enveloping music score considerably.
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The Mule(2018)7/10 ish
With the legend.
Finally saw this one, my first new Clint flick in ages. I wasn't remarkable but steadily enjoyable. Not a lot happens with little action. It just moseys along , like Cli t.
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Posted: |
Oct 12, 2023 - 10:44 PM
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By: |
Tall Guy
(Member)
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The Boys from Brazil 6/10...The score suited the film, with that deliberately banal waltz popping up all the time to underpin the tawdry aspirations of the bad guys. A good example of a score that works in the film but why in Ennio’s name would you choose to listen to it in isolation?
Hey, TG, you might think you're safe whilst abroad ... but if you play with fire you're likely to get burnt. I do, BTW, agree ... for me, a fan of JG, find this one of his least inspired (bottom quartile) ... i.e. it suited the film! 
Heh, by the time they track me down, I’ll be gone!
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"Finally saw this one, my first new Clint flick in ages. I wasn't remarkable but steadily enjoyable. Not a lot happens with little action. It just moseys along , like Cli t."
-------------------
Are you calling Clint Eastwood a bit of a fanny?
 there must hav been a bit of tippex on the screen, when I posted.
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Posted: |
Oct 15, 2023 - 2:18 PM
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By: |
Bob DiMucci
(Member)
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THE SALZBURG CONNECTION (1972) – 6/10
I could barely figure out who was working for which spy organization—the CIA, KGB, MI6, and others—in this confusing supposed thriller. This film’s MacGuffin, a list of Nazi agents and collaborators, hidden by the Nazis in an Austrian lake in 1945, is sought after by various interested parties during the Cold War. Some want to destroy the list to hide their past crimes, others want it to identify people now working for them who may be comprised by other countries if their pasts are used to blackmail them, others want to release the information to the world. And some, like American attorney “William Mathison” (Barry Newman), are just concerned because someone they have come to care about—in his case, “Anna Bryant” (Anna Karina), the widow of an Austrian photographer who was found dead soon after watching a man pull a heavy chest from the waters of Fintersee Lake—is now in danger because she may know where the list is.
Everyone in this picture is either surveilling someone, is being surveilled, or is being surveilled while surveilling someone else. This soon gets tedious, as we flip back and forth between the watchers and the watched. And even when the abductions begin and the bodies start dropping, the ennui doesn’t fade. Since we generally don’t find out what anyone’s motive is (or was) until after he is dead, its hard to decide whether we should be rooting for him or not. Our sympathies naturally go to Barry Newman, since he’s the star, and he’s not a professional spy (although he’s on speaking terms with at least one CIA agent). More importantly, he announces about half-way through the picture that he doesn’t really care who ends up with the list, which generally lines up with the feelings of the audience at that point.
The best things about the film are the on-location shooting in Salzburg, Austria, and the fact that the picture marked the American feature film debut of Austrian actor Klaus-Maria Brandauer.
Lee H. Katzin directed the 1972 film. The picture was the second and final film as a producer for Ingo Preminger, brother of Otto Preminger (the first was M*A*S*H). At the time of the film’s release, Variety reported that although Jerry Goldsmith and Bronislau Kaper initially appeared in Twentieth-Century Fox's credit sheets as composers, only Lionel Newman received screen credit with "Musical Supervision." However, some prints (like the one I watched) credit Kaper for music with Newman as conductor. Modern sources state that Kaper's score was discarded and replaced by Newman's. The film was the last scored by Kaper. Some posters of the film had stickers pasted over Kaper's name in the credits.
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Posted: |
Oct 19, 2023 - 11:20 PM
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By: |
Bob DiMucci
(Member)
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DUMB MONEY (2023) – 7/10
“Dumb money” is what Wall Street insiders call individual investors, as opposed to what the insiders are—the “smart money.” This film tells the story of the “dumb money” that in 2020-2021 decided to take on the Wall Street hedge funds that were shorting the stock of Gamestop, the video game retailer. The individual investors were led by Keith Gill, a lower middle-class guy working as a financial analyst out of Brockton, Massachusetts. During his off time, he regularly frequents the stock market subreddit r/WallStreetBets, posting his opinions on it via YouTube live streams under the name “Roaring Kitty.”
Gill concluded that Gamestop was undervalued, and the firms shorting the stock and betting that it would drop were wrong. He put his money where his mouth was, sinking nearly every spare dollar his family had into purchasing the stock. By airing his views on the stock, posting his portfolio online, and railing against the unfairness of the control over the market exerted by the big firms, Gill was able to convince thousands of other individuals to buy Gamestop as well, raising its price 100-fold in a very short time. This made many of the buyers rich (on paper anyway), and caused the hedge funds to lose billions (also on paper). The film follows about a half dozen of the individuals and hedge fund managers through their ups and downs during this volatile period.
As played by Paul Dano, Gill is a very low-key guy, almost to the point of somnambulism. Fortunately, the other characters are more lively, particularly Gill’s brother Kevin, played by Pete Davidson from Saturday Night Live. Davidson provides most of the humor in the film. Seth Rogen is also good as Gabe Plotkin, an increasingly frustrated fund manager. We see the individual investors—some nurses and college students—mainly as they look at their phones, watching their investment rise and fall, and registering the appropriate joy or dread.
In watching the film, I was reminded of the 2015 film THE BIG SHORT, which attempted to explain the roots of the 2008 financial/mortgage crisis. The big difference is that that film had a lot to try and explain, and it became increasingly complicated, even as it tried to simplify all of the financial maneuvering for the audience. What is happening in DUMB MONEY, however, is rather simple—one group of investors is selling a stock, betting that it will go down, and another is buying the stock, and by its actions is keeping the price up. Obviously, something has to give, but the ending is not clearly explained, as the “smart money” puts pressure on the social media platform r/WallStreetBets and the “commission-free” stock trading platform Robinhood to put the squeeze on the little guys. I was hoping for a more in-depth explanation of how this ended, but we have to settle for a number of text screens at the conclusion of the film, telling us what happened to each of the players, without learning the “how.” Still, if you are unfamiliar with the story, the film is a sometimes-amusing tale of the triumph of the underdog—at least for a while.
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