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MOVIE GUIDE: P
Palindromes (2005, Todd Solondz)
A 12 year-old girl wants to have a baby, goes and gets herself pregnant, and then is forced by her idealist parents to get an abortion. And that's just the beginning of this insightful, horrifying, funny, moving rampage of a movie. The protagonist is played by eight different people at different points in the film, some young and some old, some white and some black, one not even female. But the result is not off-putting, nor is it some work of distant experimentation. It's truly a must-see for anyone who isn't easily offended or shocked, and it probably ought to be even for those who are. (A-)
REVIEW / DVD review / LISTED: rated / best of year / MENTIONED: amazon ordering
Panic Room (2002, David Fincher)
Fincher shies away from catharsis in this bland pseudo-REAR WINDOW thriller that offers several good characters but lacks a coherent or enjoyable storyline and is not nearly as suspenseful as it thinks it is. Though technically proficient, it's quite a disappointment. (C)
RELATED: Zodiac review / MENTIONED: shit at imdb / typeface discussion
The Paradine Case (1947, Alfred Hitchcock)
The hems and haws of Gregory Peck as a lawyer in a good marriage but smitten with his latest client, rich and apathetic Mrs. Paradine, who apparently offed her husband. Hitchcock in strangely pessimistic, aimless mode, his own wild ambitions for the project offset by intrusions on the part of David O. Selznick (this, significantly, was the last film that Hitchcock did not produce himself). In the truncated form in which it now exists, the film is interesting but no gem. (B-)
REVIEW / DVD review / RELATED: Suspicion & Topaz reviews / Jamaica Inn review / running out of Hitchcock / MENTIONED: can't get a copy / Witness for the Prosecution review / aborted Hitchcock festival / Lady in the Water review / Chocolate War DVD announcement / Portrait of Jennie review
Parenthood (1989, Ron Howard)
Howard throws together a cunningly perceptive and moving comedy; it could easily be sappy beyond forgiveness, but it's enlivened with just the right kind of spark by its wide-ranging cast. If it is idealism, it's beautiful idealism and ranks as one of the best crowd-pleasers of the '80s. (A)
The Parent Trap (1961, David Swift)
This dismal Disney comedy about a couple of inspiring lookalikes has a premise that betrays the promise of its title: the bringing together of two annoying people by their wacky kids. A squeaky clean bore. (C-)
The Parent Trap (1998, Nancy Myers)
Several years prior to her ascension to big-tits stardom, Lindsay Lohan puts in quite excellent performance(s) here as the duplicate kids trying to play matchmaker. Far more charming than the original film, but still rather worn out. (C+)
Paris, Texas (1984, Wim Wenders)
Stunningly beautiful film about a three-piece family scattered across the continent, gradually working toward reforming themselves. Unfortunately, the movie is far longer than it needs to be and ventures down a number of unnecessary corridors. Trim some of the fat (of which there is a great amount) and you have a classic. (B+)
REVIEW / LISTED: rated / RELATED: Days of Heaven review / MENTIONED: review to come / Dodsworth review / notes on the 2006 top ten
The Party (1968, Blake Edwards)
A film that seems to move ultimately beyond the screen, this Peter Sellers comedy approaches its own reality, a real-time exploration of how he gradually destroys a high-class California party. One of the best times I've had watching anything, frankly. (A)
REVIEW / top ten of the week / LISTED: best of year / rated
The Passion of Joan of Arc (1928, Carl Theodor Dreyer)
The cinema has very seldom approached this level of rhapsodical beauty, and it has never managed this kind of otherworldly menace. Deceptively straightforward account of Joan's trial ventures into all manner of fascinating psychological territories, feels like a documentary, with its use of closeups and paper sets keeping it thoroughly minimal and disturbing. There is no other movie like it. (A)
REVIEW / DVD review / MENTIONED: aborted silent films essay / Marjorie spots vandalism / Scenes from a Marriage review / Birth of a Nation review
Paths of Glory (1957, Stanley Kubrick)
Though I admit it seemed even more vital and badass to me as a teenager, this ferocious antiwar classic should give pause to anyone who argues that Kubrick was the "cold, heartless" filmmaker; by the end it has reached an emotional level almost unmatched in American film. (A)
REVIEW + DVD review / RELATED: Barry Lyndon review / The Killing DVD / MENTIONED: Platoon review
Patriot Games (1992, Philip Noyce)
Jack Ryan's family comes under attack by blah blah blah. Sequel to THE HUNT FOR RED OCTOBER is less professional, slightly more interesting. (C)
Patton (1970, Franklin J. Schaffner)
ARF! ARF! ARF! ARF! ARF! arf arf arf arf... arf? (C)
REVIEW / LISTED: rated / MENTIONED: still need to see
PCU (1994, Hart Bochner)
Very 1994 movie about a college taken over by the PC mob, only to be infiltrated by George Clinton! Great idea wasted. (D+)
The People vs. Larry Flynt (1996, Milos Forman)
Larry Flynt is not the great and fascinating man that he and Forman seem to think he is, but he has made some excellent points in his life and he does figure in a somewhat entertaining biopic, which serves more to muddy up the more interesting factors of its story than to illuminate them, leading to a half-baked and deeply unsatisfying trifle. As Flynt's wife, Courtney Love is very good, as is Edward Norton as his long-suffering lawyer. But a movie opposing censorship shouldn't be this bland. (C+)
REVIEW / LISTED: rated / disappointments / MENTIONED: Crimes & Misdemeanors review / year in movies
Peter Pan (1953, Clyde Geronimi & Hamilton Luske)
After failing at the box office with ALICE IN WONDERLAND, the Disney studio created its most conventional feature to date, and also its least inspiring. The Pan story is a fairly anemic one to begin with, and the Disney retelling is straightforward to the point of monotony. Even the songs are weak. It fortunately made money, leading to the far superior LADY AND THE TRAMP -- the first Disney feature since DUMBO to achieve great commercial success without compromising the studio's creativity. (C+)
MENTIONED: Barry Lyndon review
Pete's Dragon (1977, Don Chaffey)
Disney at death's door in the late '70s, doing anything to get out of its rut, ending up with a childish, condescending kiddie film with cloying animated characters and poor writing and acting -- everything that Disney himself wanted to avoid. Halfhearted attempt at Magic misses the target again. (C-)
Pet Sematary (1989, Mary Lambert)
Aggressive, contemptuous horror film from Stephen King's novel has a threadbare plot and many awful preformances, replete with a ridiculous visual textbook imitation of German expressionism, in full color and featuring children getting tormented by dead animals and barking directors. (D+)
Petulia (1968, Richard Lester)
Mournful drama from Lester shares the nonlinear storytelling with his best-known films but is an entirely different kind of movie, the story of a doomed affair between easily manipulated dreamer Julie Christie and aging surgeon George C. Scott. Both performances are extraordinary, the cinematic aplomb staggering, and the whole production seems to ache with unrequited emotion. Stunning. (A-)
REVIEW / LISTED: review
The Phantom Tollbooth (1969, Chuck Jones & David Monahan)
Aside from THE 5,000 FINGERS OF DR. T, possibly the most lamentably overlooked children's film ever made. Jones' one full-on feature film brings Norman Juster's book to vibrant, imaginative life. Despite the year of production, this is wonderfully weird without being "psychedelic." The songs are pretty kickin', too, particularly the one about noise. (A)
MENTIONED: James & the Giant Peach review / LISTED: most wanted on DVD
Phase IV (1974, Saul Bass)
Yikes! Premier title designer Bass' loony attempt at a sci-fi feature -- regarding ants, of all things -- is recommended on the basis of its visual invention but really lacks any kind of storytelling drive that the film requires and might have had in other hands. (C+)
Philadelphia (1993, Jonathan Demme)
Demme's strange, extremely subjective signature approach did wonders for the psycho-killer genre in THE SILENCE OF THE LAMBS, but he falls flat in his attempt to apply it to a Social Message movie featuring Tom Hanks as an AIDS victim. This sickeningly idealistic movie lacks every kind of real dimension and is far more a screed than a movie, copping to cliché more times than can be counted. It's just a big "For Your Consideration" ad, really. (C-)
MENTIONED: Purple Rose of Cairo review / Peter Gabriel videos / Saving Private Ryan review
The Philadelphia Story (1940, George Cukor)
Unspeakably dull film of Philip Barry's play wastes one of the great casts of all time -- Kate Hepburn, Jimmy Stewart, and Cary Grant -- in a pile of stagebound speeches and cornball comedy. If you must adapt a play, do something to make it a movie. (C-)
LISTED: rated / MENTIONED: Bringing Up Baby short review / Reds review / His Girl Friday review / Arsenic & Old Lace DVD / 1000th post / Anatomy of a Murder DVD
Phone Booth (2002, Joel Schumacher)
Bewildering mishmash of thriller stereotypes puts Colin Farrell in a phone booth, because there's his wife who doesn't know that he's got the eye for Katie Holmes, but the guy who's going to be shooting at him doesn't know him, and there are these hookers, and... forget it. Schumacher tries damned hard, admittedly, to make this make sense, but it just doesn't, and his faux-Truffaut "tricks" with superimposed "real time" boxes and other such nonsense are almost as annoying as the fast cutting and endless close ups and slowmo tricks other "stylish" films of the day have employed. If this is 21st century Hitchcock, we are in deep shit indeed. (D+)
MENTIONED: Collateral review
Pi (1998, Darren Aronofsky)
A lovely film, really, about a computer geek's obsession with Pi and how it apparently means something with regard to Higher Beings trying to communicate with him. Neat semi-remake of 2001: A SPACE ODYSSEY is fun, sometimes oddly amusing, and really only takes a couple of poor sidetrips. (B+)
REVIEW / LISTED: rated / RELATED: Requiem for a Dream review
The Pianist (2002, Roman Polanski)
Of course, it some capacity it repeats points other movies have gone over a hundred times with equal or better skill. But once this film kicks in truly as the story of pianist Wladyslaw Szpilman -- whose skills are depicted with considerable reverence by Adrien Brody in the film's most stunning sequence -- rather than the tragedies around him, it becomes a shattering, life-affirming masterpiece. And best of all, it's determinedly unsentimental. (A-)
REVIEW / LISTED: rated
The Piano (1993, Jane Campion)
Holly Hunter is devastating in an absoring story of a mute woman caught in an arranged marriage in New Zealand but finding herself hot for the weirdo down the street, Harvey Keitel. Aside from an unfortunate (but brief) detour near the finale, this is a winner, full of great drama, endearing weirdness, and hot sex. (A-)
REVIEW / LISTED: rated / best of year / MENTIONED: reaction
Pink Floyd: The Wall (1982, Alan Parker)
Like the music it's based on, this film is stultifying and obvious, just another reminder of what bored rock stars push us into if we let them. (D+)
MENTIONED: park photos
The Pink Panther (1964, Blake Edwards)
Classy, feverish escapism features proto-yuppies living the hedonistic life at a ski resort in Stockholm, where womanizing polyamorous diamond thief the Phantom is pursued by the inept Inspector Closeau. Peter Sellers and David Niven are brilliant, but the performance of the picture is that of Robert Wagner as the Phantom's conniving nephew. Masterfully filmed with many of the most perfect comic setpieces ever put together, and the music, of course, is extraordinary. Very different from the sequels but just as hilarious. (A)
REVIEW / DVD box review / new boxset / awful box / RELATED: Days of Wine and Roses review / Victor/Victoria DVD review / The Party review / MENTIONED: Great Expectations & Catch Me If You Can reviews / action figure / Michael Barrier / check on it / comments about remake / it had better be tonight / review of cartoon set / shitty DVD case / Get Smart DVD
The Pink Panther Strikes Again (1976, Blake Edwards)
One of the best Pink Panther sequels is the first to really go for broke on the insanity, with Sellers' boss Herbert Lom losing his mind and preparing to enact revenge on the universe! Bizarre and exquisite, this is messy but delightful entertainment. (B+)
RELATED: Return of the Pink Panther review
Pinocchio (1940, Ben Sharpsteen)
Disney's greatest animated feature is a cinematic masterpiece telling the classic story of the wooden doll desperate to become "a real boy." Full of incredible characters and often astonishing emotional range, with several sequences guaranteed to stir the deepest (and most forbidden) of psychological secrets. Stunning in every way. (A+)
short review / some thoughts + Hollywood Cartoons (Michael Barrier) / RELATED: Bambi bought on impulse / Joe Grant obit / Dumbo DVD review / Disney collecting / Mary Poppins DVD review / Cinderella DVD review / MENTIONED: Yellow Submarine DVD / Incredibles predictions / rant about animation / Time's 100 greatest films / rare DVDs / AI: Artificial Intelligence review / Close Encounters review / summer movie preview / new AFI list / Watership Down review
Pirates (1986, Roman Polanski)
As the title would suggest, this is a movie designed to serve a very specific purpose, and pirates it does indeed deliver, but as a movie it's a sad, flaccid bust. (C-)
RELATED: The Pianist review
Pit and the Pendulum (1961, Roger Corman)
Cheerfully repugnant horror movie full of dazzlingly scary images and deliriously fun performances has little to do with Poe's short story but does do great things with its central idea. Richard Matheson's script explores Vincent Price's guilt about his father's involvement in the Inquisition. There's a surprise at the end, and the biggest creepout of all in the final shot! A prime example of the genre at its best. (A)
MENTIONED: The Ring review / scary movies
A Place in the Sun (1951, George Stevens)
Bizarre and deliciously multifaceted American film based on Dreiser's An American Tragedy (and an obvious forerunner to Woody Allen's MATCH POINT) features unusually naked romance, raw suspense, and in general, a shatteringly intense emotional level. A haunting Montgomery Clift is torn between homey, sweet, pregnant Shelley Winters and glam queen Elizabeth Taylor. Brilliantly shot and performed; fabulous through and through. (A-)
REVIEW / LISTED: rated / MENTIONED: still need to see
The Plague Dogs (1982, Martin Rosen)
In this very adult cartoon, a pair of dogs escape from a animal-testing lab and wander the English countryside looking for undefined escape. Rosen's followup to WATERSHIP DOWN, also based on a Richard Adams novel, is just as technically flawless and well-directed, but the story is repetitious, the dialogue shrill and extraneous, the character animation annoying in its precision. As an argument for animal rights, however, it's a firecracker, and chillingly frank in its violence and portrait of oppression. Recommended despite its issues. (B)
REVIEW / LISTED: rated / RELATED: Watership Down nightmares / Watership Down review
Planes, Trains & Automobiles (1987, John Hughes)
Two brilliant performers -- Steve Martin and John Candy -- coast through a frequently entertaining but often maddening epic comedy of sorts about a man trying desperately to get home for Thanksgiving, trailed at every turn by inhumanely annoying drifter Candy. There are scenes of comedic perfection, but the pathos is ill-advised. (B)
MENTIONED: 100 bands assessed
Planet of the Apes (1968, Franklin J. Schaffner)
Reasonably smart sci-fi classic throws Charlton Heston in with a bunch of apes, watches what happens along with the rest of us. A bit silly, but great fun. (B)
MENTIONED: Burton's Charlie & the Chocolate Factory / Mark Evanier on movie endings / Cape Fear review
Plan 9 from Outer Space (1959, Edward D. Wood Jr.)
It is not an explosion of glorious bad taste on the level of MANOS: THE HANDS OF FATE, but this does stand as truly one of the best accidentally wonderful movies in history. Wood, of course, has all the right ideas about what his films should do but no clue how any of those ideas apply to the craft itself, which is what makes his work so charming. Perhaps no one in Hollywood has ever been so earnest, and the result is a kind of distressing, warm honesty to his work that gives it a strange layer of sincere appeal. But yeah, it's awful. Can you prove it didn't happen? (B)
Platoon (1986, Oliver Stone)
Acclaimed, colorful, vaguely homoerotic Vietnam movie is basically the antithesis of FULL METAL JACKET. Though it's consistently entertaining, it's also a mass of stereotyped, secondhand emotion, has little to do with the realities of war, and cops a more than sizable chunk from PATHS OF GLORY. Willem Dafoe is wonderful, but he's gone all too soon. (C+)
REVIEW / LISTED: rated / MENTIONED: King Kong (1933) review / typeface discussion
Play It Again, Sam (1972, Herbert Ross)
Much charm in this adaptation of Woody Allen's play that feels like one of his own films (although it would be several years before he would adopt this kind of realism). Woody is an obsessive Bogart fan whose best friends, a married couple, are trying to hook him up with an appropriate dame. Unfortunately, he has fallen for the wife. Allen and Diane Keaton offer excellent performances in a restrained but immensely likable comedy. (A-)
MENTIONED: The Front review / Secret Lives of Dentists review / Mike Nelson's Cracked article
Pleasantville (1998, Gary Ross)
Technically marvelous and quite sharp comedy/satire about a '90s teenager whose idyllic view of '50s existence is disrupted when his TV set, thanks to Don Knotts, sucks him along with his sister into his favorite old sitcom. It's eventually as treacly as the shows it's making fun of, but the dazzling use of color and exquisite performances by Joan Allen and Jeff Daniels (and William H. Macy as the ultimate wronged male) make up for that. (A-)
MENTIONED: Woody Allen IMDB comments / Big DVD
Pocahontas (1995, Mike Gabriel & Eric Goldberg)
The Disney of Eisner and Katzenberg offers its most sickeningly PC statement to date with this pandering, insincere telling of the John Smith-Pocahontas legend, created with a bloated sense of style, dull revisionism, and the worst "comedy" ever seen from the studio's feature animation unit. The dramatic "power" is no less insulting and there have been more convincing characters in Don Bluth films. A total disgrace. (D-)
RELATED: Joe Grant obit
Police Academy (1984, Hugh Wilson)
Horrendous low-concept '80s comedy with Steve Guttenberg somehow spawned an armload of sequels, but this is the lowest ebb of moviemaking for sure, all excess and aggression and not an ounce of humanaity. Full of jokes that exist only to pronounce their own vulgarity, so of course the British seem to like it. (D)
Pollyanna (1960, David Swift)
Don't tell me you couldn't make this work, because you can really make almost anything work, especially when you have the resources of the Disney studio at hand. But this is entirely lazy work by people who felt they wouldn't be judged harshly for it. It's not too late. (C-)
Poltergeist (1982, Tobe Hooper)
Steven Spielberg was heavily involved in this likable but benign horror flick, and it shows in the persuasively vivid characterization of the family members. Unfortunately, that doesn't help much in making the film scarier or more convincing, just more pleasant to sit through. Anyway, it's worth a look. (B-)
MENTIONED: The Exorcist review / Lady in the Water review
Popeye (1980, Robert Altman)
You just have to wonder how the hell this happened. (D-)
Portrait of Jennie (1948, Willaim Dieterle)
Joseph Cotten grows intoxicated by a girl he meets who does not seem to actually exist except in his mind and paintings; grand statements and sweeping love ensue. Batshit Selznick production is either the most over-the-top romantic film ever made or the most off-the-rails document of filmmaking insanity that exists. Artful and commercial excess combine for a bewildering, unmissable experience. (B+)
REVIEW / LISTED: rated / MENTIONED: Jocelyn Alfred Hitchcock Presents / Before Sunrise + Sunset review
The Poseidon Adventure (1972, Ronald Neame)
Big cruel joke of a movie from the Irwin Allen universe about a cruise ship turned upside down. As escapism, it is crude but acceptable, but its technique is amateurish, its unwelcome attempts at humanity crushing and offensive, with every performance shrill and infuriating save that of Jack Albertson. Gene Hackman and Shelley Winters are both wasted. (C-)
MENTIONED: remake / 2006 movie preview
The Postman (1997, Kevin Costner)
Costner's second film as director is far better than his first, DANCES WITH WOLVES, but still reflects an astounding level of excess on the part of its egomaniacal director and star. Three hours are thrown away -- in a symbolic gesture of the money burned on this bilge -- with an inane story about the post-apocalyptic U.S., various sections livened up by the presence of what appears to be a postal worker. Costner is a self-absorbed child, but even a good director couldn't have done much with this material. (D+)
Powder (1995, Victor Salva)
Alleged child molester Salva creeps the world out (with Jeff Goldbum in tow) for a story about an albino kid with Incredible Powers dealing with love and alienation in high school. Fake, insipid, insulting, offensive, this is entirely free of worth and function. (D)
Prancer (1989, John Hancock)
Shockingly dull children's film about one of Santa's reindeer showing up in a girl's backyard, or so she believes. If your kids fall for this, they'll fall for anything. (D+)
Predator (1987, John McTiernan)
Mindless sledgehammer thriller with no story, poor acting. (D+)
RELATED: Die Hard review
The Premature Burial (1962, Roger Corman)
Ray Milland is awful in one of the most tired and faceless of Corman's Poe adaptations, involving a man's fear of the titled ailment. Entertaining and short but a bit of a cheat. (B-)
The Prestige (2006, Christopher Nolan)
A gift from the gods of cool, this Nolan nonsense about magicians whose career-life conflict reaches staggering heights has as much fun with its premise as is possible, going one better than the concurrent THE ILLUSIONIST. The twists and turns are fairly routine, but Nolan's presentation is full of spark. (A-)
REVIEW / top ten of the week / LISTED: best of year / rated / MENTIONED: The Illusionist review / fall movie preview
Presumed Innocent (1990, Alan J. Pakula)
Another tits & cash film from Pakula, this one with one-note Harrison Ford charged with the murder of a lawyer he fucked. Those who enjoyed Scott Turow's popular book will go for this, but with this film's sense of style now so terribly dated I doubt it can have much attraction today, especially at its dramatic length. (C)
Pretty in Pink (1986, Howard Deutch)
One of John Hughes' best scripts explores the budding relationship -- with many false starts -- between a lower-class girl and a rich boy in high school. Though it's identifiably fake, it tries harder for a ring of truth than almost any other teen comedy of the '80s. Harry Dean Stanton is phenomenal as the girl's father; unfortunately, the entire film is knocked out of alignment by the presence of obnoxious Jon Cryer as a leeching "friend" named Duckie. If you survive the film without wanting to murder him, you're better than me. (B+)
REVIEW / MENTIONED: wuzzon #6
Pretty Woman (1990, Garry Marshall)
Ugly, hate-filled drivel about a hooker's Genuine Love for Richard Gere is the usual Pygmalion shit, this time with two almost intolerable performances driving it. Julia Roberts reaches heights of banality heretofore unknown to mankind. I wanted both lead characters to be hit by trucks. Spoiler: they aren't. (D-)
MENTIONED: wuzzon #2
The Princess Bride (1987, Rob Reiner)
Intelligent and rapid-fire hilarious fantasy about a separated couple dealing with a limitless supply of hazards -- including Christopher Guest -- in an attempt to reunite. Full of boundless energy, swashbuckling action, and irresistible charm, this is an all-time classic with only one false moment, a needless stand-up routine from Billy Crystal placed arbitrarily in the middle of the movie. Aside from that, this is the kind of flick you wait for. (A)
DVD review / RELATED: Misery review / MENTIONED: Christmas presents
Princess Mononoke (1997, Hayao Miyazaki)
Weird, elaborate animated fantasy is a triple threat to those who can't tolerate anime, fantasy, and incomprehensible storyline. At least it's shorter than LORD OF THE RINGS. (C-)
REVIEW / LISTED: rated
The Principal (1987, Christopher Cain)
James Belushi does his best in the title role in a remarkably stupid movie about an inner city high school and what happens when the local gang gets a taste for the new prinicipal's blood. The clichés of this genre are set in stone to such an extent that not one scene in the movie hasn't been seen before in BLACKBOARD JUNGLE or any given one of the hundreds of B-movies about problem teens. Formulatic writing at its most basic. (D+)
MENTIONED: Blackboard Jungle review / Shut Up! And Let the Lady Teach
The Private Eyes (1980, Lang Elliott)
Don Knotts plays the straight man to boisterous Tim Conway in frivolous but enjoyable comedy set in the Biltmore House, with the pair investigating a murder. You've seen it a million times before, but it's still fun, especially with these performers. (B+)
RELATED: Don Knotts obit
Private Parts (1997, Betty Thomas)
Howard Stern does a suspiciously good job of playing himself in this fun remembrance of his early career. Likable but thoroughly innocuous, its appeal goes far beyond Stern's usual audience but won't prepare them for what his charmless humor is really like. (B)
Problem Child (1990, Dennis Dugan)
Much energy is wasted in this sappy, violent, maddeningly stupid supposed kids' comedy that makes the HOME ALONE films seem suddenly classy. John Ritter panders as put-upon adoptive father to aggressive bad seed. Trash like this proves that the studios have no respect whatsoever for children. (D-)
Problem Child 2 (1991, Brian Levant)
It would not seem possible that a sequel could be any worse than the original, but this is a movie so murderously horrible it could humiliate a college-aged perv. If I believed in such profiling (and I don't), I would say that this has created more serial murderers than "Doom," Marilyn Manson, and NATURAL BORN KILLERS put together. (F)
The Producers (1968, Mel Brooks)
Still one of the most endearing comedies ever made, Brooks' directorial debut is a passionately mounted, rousing success, and one of the most fun movies to watch with someone who's never seen it, just to see the discomfort rise. An unsuccessful producer of plays conspires to create a show that is bound to flop so he can collect on the funding; the result is the unforgettable "Springtime for Hitler" and some of the most divinely crafted comic scenes you'll ever see. Zero Mostel is great, but Gene Wilder anchors the movie. (A+)
DVD review / RELATED: Mel Brooks Collection DVD review / MENTIONED: Little Miss Sunshine review / Get Smart arrival / Life Is Beautiful review
The Professional (1994, Luc Besson)
The occasional glimmers of subversion and passion that show up in this reflective thriller, featuring Natalie Portman as a young girl who wants to be and/or fuck a hitman, aren't worth all the routine action-movie boredom you have to dig through to get at them. (B-)
REVIEW / LISTED: rated
Psycho (1960, Alfred Hitchcock)
They don't make movies more exciting than this one, throwing us fully into a quick-paced world of sinister people, inviting murderers, and that certain sinking feeling. A masterpiece not just in terms of its visual finesse and low-budget realism -- it virtually began the modern horror genre -- but particularly in regard to its dialogue; Joseph Stefano's script is magnificent. Somewhat uncharacteristic of Hitchcock, it's nonetheless probably his most famous movie. (A+)
published essay on shower scene / announcement of essay publication / Ken Mogg mentions me! / DVD review / Hitchcock's masterpieces / defense of Hitchcock #1 / defense of Hitchcock #2 / skerry book / RELATED: Rebecca review / Sabotage review / I Confess review / Jamaica Inn review / Vertigo thoughts / Hitchcock remakes / MENTIONED: Sisters review / Charlie & the Chocolate Factory pre-release rant 1 / Minority Report review / Manhattan review / Double Indemnity review / Time's 100 greatest films / Barry Lyndon review / War of the Worlds review / Charlie & the Chocolate Factory review / Night of the Hunter & Cape Fear reviews / Elephant review / Kong trailers / Dressed to Kill DVD review / 2006 movie preview / Twilight Zone CG / Targets review / Deliverance book review / Straw Dogs review / Diabolique review / Misery review / Lady in the Water review / Joseph Stefano obit / Children of Men review / 1000th post / Hitchcock Clue / Zodiac review / Tideland review / Donnie Darko review / Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon review / Oldboy review / Breach review
Psycho (1998, Gus Van Sant)
If I do a shot by shot remake of GOOD WILL HUNTING, is that paying tribute or is that ripping off and stealing the work of others? Van Sant's unforgivably offensive rape of the power of film is a fuck-you to everything right and good about the first hundred years of cinema. It is an insult to originality, an insult to Hitchcock, an insult to any modern filmmaker who takes his work seriously. Or at least, it would be an insult if anyone gave a shit what Gus Van Sant thinks. Except for some losers at Cannes, no one does, thank god. (F)
RELATED: Elephant review / MENTIONED: Charlie & the Chocolate Factory pre-release rant 1 / Hitchcock remakes
Psycho II (1983, Richard Franklin)
I cannot disagree with the legions of others who've commented that this film is better than it has any right to be; in fact, for the first hour or so it's so entertaining you keep spinning your head around to make sure no one else is watching you enjoy it. And compared to, say, JAWS 2, this is inoffensive all the way. But even outside of a general questioning of Franklin's motives, the film's thoroughly insulting conclusion gives the lie to any claim this might have to being a worthy sequel. And at its best, the film has none of the grace and wisdom of the original. (C-)
MENTIONED: Hitchcock remakes & sequels
Psycho III (1986, Anthony Perkins)
Perkins takes Shatner's classic "if you can't beat them" approach to dealing with typecasting by directing himself in a retread of his most famous role. This is a commercial but amateurish slasher film at best, a contemptible stain on a classic at worst. But compared to the Gus Van Sant remake of the original or to the dreadful TV movie BATES MOTEL, this is a tribute to the Master as honorable as that nonexistent Oscar. (Incidentally, PSYCHO IV, also made for TV, is good for a laugh and probably more fun than either of the sequels.) (D+)
MENTIONED: Hitchcock remakes & sequels
P.T. 109 (1963, Leslie Martinson)
Young John F. Kennedy does stuff, is hero. (C-)
Pulp Fiction (1994, Quentin Tarantino)
Tarantino's cut-and-paste job of a sensory overload joins the mob of films drenched in anonymous style and no substance led by STAR WARS and LAWRENCE OF ARABIA. If you could take every bit of every movie I've seen that has made me want to gag and put them all in the same place, this is fairly close to what the result would be. It's sheer torture and unbearably smarmy, like trying to have a conversation with an overzealous video store clerk. Wait a minute... (F)
RELATED: Kill Bill Vol. 1 review / MENTIONED: Lost Weekend review / Time's 100 greatest films / self promotion / The Professional review
Punch Drunk Love (2002, Paul Thomas Anderson)
Whether it's the irritating soundtrack, the irritating Adam Sandler (and he's supposedly good in this!), the irritating lack of a script, the irritating lack of a story, or the more than irritating and nearly intolerable pretension, something about PUNCH DRUNK LOVE pushes it over the MAGNOLIA edge into a world of syrupy imitation-indie sludge. Superficial, boring, pretty to look at (as is its leading lady, Emily Watson), and incredibly forgettable, this is the definition of waste. PTA makes nearly all of his peers look great. (D+)
MENTIONED: Reds review / Nashville review
The Purple Rose of Cairo (1985, Woody Allen)
One of Allen's most widely beloved films is actually one of his most cloying and insincere. It is the tale of a lonely girl who is joined in the Depression by a favorite movie character who literally jumps out of the screen and grabs her. Though it sounds good on paper, there just isn't much more to it, and any film that is meant as a testament to the healing power of its medium should probably be a lot less calculated than this. Generally Woody's personality oozes from everything in his movies. It's nowhere in this one, and that's the problem. (B)
REVIEW / LISTED: rated / RELATED: Broadway Danny Rose review / Match Point review / Scoop review / Radio Days review / MENTIONED: Time's 100 greatest films / Sabotage analysis / Singin' in the Rain review
Pygmalion (1938, Anthony Asquith & Leslie Howard)
The directors do, to their credit, bring some visual life to bits and pieces of this miserable story, but George Bernard Shaw's play remains ill-spirited and irritatingly smug. The movie is hardly any better. (D)
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