Reviews by Electrophorus Dragon

I don't usually feel compelled to write reviews of things I don't like, but after the 'hype' that surrounded this I felt compelled! This film is quite extraordinarily charmless and unfunny - I actually gave up on it after an hour (so it may conceivably be redeemed by the world's best ending, but I doubt it).

Michael Cera, so good in Juno, should have known better, as he could have spared tarnishing his CV. Where American Pie at least had some laughs with its dollops of crudity, this film seems to think it's good enough just to make as many crass references as possible and forgets that it might be nice to actually make it funny. South Park, Team America, Farrelly brothers movies etc remember you need to actually put some good gags, engaging characters and dialogue in the script, not just an endless stream of puerile rubbish.

Quite why some film mags gave this such good reviews is beyond me - it feels like a script cooked up in 10 minutes by bored kids trying to shock. Don't waste your time.

2hrs of gut wrenching, mind numbing, head melting boredom.
If you value two hours of your life then do not watch this film.
The only people I've found who actually watched this and say they liked it is people who thought Razorhead and films of that ilk was good cinema.
2 stars simply for the eye candy.
Go and paint the garden fence, you'll have way more fun, trust me!

The subject matter of Lolita naturally poses some problems for a director, but this adaptation has ultimately gone down as a victory for the censors. The original novel was almost entirely focused on the character of Humbert Humbert, his flamboyant obsession with a young girl and the increasingly ridiculous lengths he goes to in an effort to keep the object of his affections. The genius in Humbert's character was that despite the hopelessly immoral nature of his actions, the reader could always sympathise with the position he found himself in.

In the film this dimension is ultimately lost. James Mason makes an admirable attempt to play Humbert and Shelley Winters is perfect as the naive Charlotte, but divorced of its finest material the tale becomes a rather dry affair and were it not for the odd suggestive phrase now and then, you would be forgiven for thinking that Humbert was simply an overly conservative father figure. Worthy of mention is Peter Sellers who plays an amusing cameo-esque role, but it speaks volumes when the humour which was such a vital part of the novel is provided by a bit-part character (as Quilty was in the novel) and some rather absurd slapstick elements including a decidedly galling scene involving a fold out bed that could have come straight from Charlie Chaplin.

Overall, there are some good performances on display, but the film neither captures the genius of the novel nor does it provide any other motivation for the viewer to become engrossed in the plot.

Definitely the latter. The film was over-long, over-self conscious and predictable. While it definitely looks good, both main characters were two-dimensional (perhaps one in the case of Kidman) and not helped by dreadful dialogue. The sorry also lacked credibility. Long sexually complex nights broken up by Cruise turning up bright-eyed and bushy tailed for the high-powered day job. Or perhaps there is some profound underlying narrative I have missed?

Well it seems like I am in a minority of one in finding this film tedious in the extreme. No I am not a 'Hollywood movie fan' I have many films from all over the world, some amazing, some average and one or two that are poor. This is a very bleak film full of unrelenting rain and selfish, greedy people. Yes some of the shots are interesting but you can overdo the lingering shot and here I think it was used so often I just wanted the thing to end. The third disc was the best but it was not worth all those hours of my life. I'll go back to the Hungary I have experienced, beautiful, full of life and exciting, strangely, everything this film isn't!

I cannot for the life of me understand all the 5 star reviews. This film comprises a rediculously unbelieveable script populated with unbelieveable, 2-dimensional, cliched characters and executed with heavy, wooden performances. Is this what happens when artistic folk conspire to create "gritty" and "real" drama. The total running time of nearly two and a half hours makes this ham-fisted effort almost unwatchable.

Adolescence is a difficult time for any child. It does not matter where you grow up or in what era. The period between childhood and adulthood is fraught with awkwardness and insecurity. Francois Truffaut's "The 400 Blows" examines the life of one such child as he takes his first baby steps toward a new stage in his life.
Antoine Doinel (Jean-Pierre Leaud) is a young man who lives with his mother (Claire Maurier) and stepfather (Albert Remy) in Paris. He has his troubles but is not really a bad child - he is just a confused boy looking for adventure, attention, and guidance. However, a serious error in judgment leads Antoine to steal a typewriter and he is sent off to a juvenile detention home. He eventually escapes his confinement and heads for the beach. While staring out at the sea, Antoine tries to make some sense out of his life.

"The 400 Blows" is a restrained version of "Rebel Without A Cause" (1955). It deals with the problem of juvenile delinquency and the confusion of adolescence from a stark and minimalist perspective. There are no drag races or switchblade fights to sensationalize the proceedings. This is a film more concerned with personal introspection and the harsh realities of the real world. Yet, while there is a richness to the film's texture, "The 400 Blows" is a trying film to watch. It is a technically-sound film that will appeal to the film student but will not appeal to the casual viewer. Truffaut captures the nuances of everyday life so well that the film mimics life's routine nature to perfection. The end result is a viewing experience that becomes too monotonous to be enjoyable.

This film is a bore.

Stylistically, eight-and-a-half could be seen as a companion piece to - or even the flipside of - La Dolce Vita (Federico Fellini, 1960). But it doesn't contain as much substance and nor does it have as much of a story to tell. It is rather an empty exercise, redeemed in part by the excellent opening dream sequence, the late conversation with (I think) Claudia Cardinale about the inability of a certain character to either love or be loved - "he has given up hope" - and by the insightful comments of the writer/critic about the duty of the artist not to add to the mountain of superfluous media with which the world is already afflicted. But none of this is enough to either justify the film's length or to give it the substance which, I think, it lacks.

As in La Dolce Vita, the central character has lost his faith in the possibility of redemption as represented by the innocence and purity of a girl. In terms of Fellini's oeuvre, therefore, eight-and-a-half has little new to say, and little or nothing in it that cannot be better had from La Dolce Vita.

At a purely superficial level, even the sunglasses, the suits, the sports cars and the scooters were better in La Dolce Vita.

The fact that this film is still held in such high regard is surely one of the greatest mysteries in cinema.

For the record, I love the book. It would be easy, then, to dismiss my disliking of the film as being no more than that I preferred my own vision of the story upon reading it. Alas, my reasons for not liking the film go far beyond this.

Firstly, and perhaps most significantly, I do not like Malcolm McDowell's reading of Alex at all. I find him tacky, annoying and not in the least fearsome. To be fair, Burgess wrote the infuriatingly tacky lingo that Alex uses in his relentless narration throughout the film, but I don't remember him describing Alex as an annoying, whiney Northerner.

It is not just the performance of Alex's character that misses the mark for me. Almost everyone in the film seems to think they're in an episode of Monty Python. Yes, I know it's meant to be satirical, but it's more parodical than anything. We're not laughing with it, we're laughing at it. You could be forgiven for assuming that every actor here thinks they're in a stage production and that we won't understand their character unless they shout and overact their way through each scene.

The production design is possibly an even greater crime. Rather than looking futuristic, the whole film looks so stuck n the '60s that I can't help but be completely detached from the action. The colour is overwhelming and the lighting only serves to enhance the feeling that this is a cheap TV episode, not a "classic" Warner production.

Don't even get me started about the cheesy, electronic renderings of Beethoven that plague almost every scene. What on earth were they thinking? Surely they knew that by using "state-of-the-art" synthesisers they were condemning the film to be out of date within five years. To begin with the music is mildly amusing. Soon it becomes tedious. Then downright annoying, like everything else in the film.

Quite simply, I just cannot take this film seriously. It has no impact whatsoever. Part of the film's longevity in the minds of moviegoers is said to be the controversy and the powerful, disturbing tone of the movie. Frankly, I found Bambi more disturbing, and a damn sight less tedious.

On that note, let me not forget how long, slow paced and drawn out every single scene is. By the 90 minute mark the film has gone past boring into something completely new. Needless to say, when the film finally ends, you'll find yourself struggling to resist the urge to follow Alex in jumping straight out the nearest window.

Oh...woe is me. I don't know what to do. I don't know what to think. I don't know what to believe. I Don't know who to idolise. I'm feeling unconfident and uncomfortable about my feelings.

Just saved you 90 minutes of watching this.