Reviews by johanlefourbe

A few weeks ago, I already saw ‘Die Büchse der Pandora’ and since Louise Brooks really blew me away at the time, I was quite eager to see this other movie she also made in 1929. It’s only afterwards that I discovered that both movies had the same director (G. W. Pabst). It’s interesting because I think that the two movies had a completely different vibe. I do think that ‘Pandora’ had a stronger story and a stronger character for Brooks but ‘Diary’ was however narratively less disjointed. Still, even though both movies were entertaining, I think that they were rather messy though. For example, in this case, it took me forever to figure out that Frieda was not Thymian’s mother but actually her aunt. It was also rather bewildering that Meinert was not fired and kicked out from their house when they found out that he was actually the father of Thymian’s newborn child. Finally, there was also the fact that the Count Osdorff killed himself after being married for maybe 10 mins with the main character. However, this movie will not be remembered for its story or its directing, it will be remembered because of Louise Brooks. Indeed, her performance was once again so intriguing and, after Maria Falconetti, she must be hands down the best silent movie actress I have ever seen. The interesting thing is that she did look exactly the same as she did in ‘Die Büchse der Pandora’ but, expect that they both did end up in the prostitution, the two character were so different though. Above all, in both cases, Brooks was quite spellbinding to behold. Anyway, to conclude, in spite of its flaws, it was still pretty good and it is definitely worth a look, if only to see Louise Brooks shine one more time. 

I wasn’t really sure what to expect from this flick but since there was a decent cast involved, I thought I might as well check it out. Well, after playing Clark Kent’s parents in a few movies, Kevin Costner and Diane Lane had the opportunity to portray another couple here and they had once again so much chemistry together. Eventually, they were definitely the biggest asset in this movie but, to be honest, I don’t think the concept really worked though or, at least, the approach they chose to handle this story didn’t work. Indeed, their situation was sad, they had lost their son and they basically lost also their grand-son but these things just happen in life. Sure, her ex-daughter-in-law probably made a mistake to marry with Donnie Weboy but she was a grown-up woman, it was her choice and I don’t think that her ex-in-laws had any business interfering or, even worse, hatching up a plan to retrieve their grand-son. Eventually, the only way it could have worked was if they would have gone for something more ambiguous, more subtle. Unfortunately, instead, they kept hammering the fact that they were seemingly the best grand-parents in the world and that they were doing the ‘right thing’ which was never convincing, at least, not to me. Of course, from the moment they started to chase Donnie Weboy and his family, I wondered immediately if it would all end up in some bloodbath because that’s how Hollywood movies work. However, at some point, after a violent confrontation with the Weboy’s with a really dramatic conclusion, it seemed for a minute that they finally started to understand how foolish and misguided their whole plan was from the very beginning and, if it would have been the conclusion, it would have been a darker but solid ending. Unfortunately, they obviously couldn’t let it go (pun intended) and ended up in some massive carnage which was so predictable and obviously rather disappointing. Anyway, to conclude, even if the story never really worked for me, I have do admit that it was still worth a look but only because Lane and Costner were such a charming couple together.

To be honest, I wasn’t really sure what to expect from this flick but since it did sound intriguing, I thought I might as well check it out. Well, it turned out to be a fascinating story with some very strong characters. On top of that, who would have expected that Wonder Woman came from such a complex background? I had also no idea that the Wonder Woman comic-books were at first so kinky and subversive and it made the character so much more intriguing than she actually was, at least to me. In fact, it was apparently a known fact that William Moulton Marston did indeed live with 2 different women and had children with both of them but there was no record that they actually engaged in some kind of threesome like it was displayed in this movie. However, I think it made these 2 women and the whole agreement between the 3 of them even more intriguing. The main issue I had was probably the lack of context. I mean, to start this kind of relationship(s) today would be definitely challenging but they did it back in the 20’s until the end of the 40’s. Unfortunately, you never get a good idea of how bold and groundbreaking this choice actually was and, instead, they went for some romantic approach which was maybe easy to swallow but I think it did shortchange these characters and how complex they were on a psychological level. Furthermore, they spend too much time on this threesome and not enough on the creation of Wonder Woman as it came late during the 3rd act and I wish they did spend more time on this as well. Anyway, to conclude, even if it was maybe not a masterpiece, it was still pretty good though and it is definitely worth a look, especially if you are interested in this genre. 

To be honest, I wasn’t expecting much from this flick but, since it was starring Bruce Willis, I thought I might as well check it out. Unfortunately, from all these awful direct-to-VOD garbage Willis has done towards the end of his career, it was probably one of the worst I have seen so far, I’m afraid. Seriously, pretty much nothing worked with the damned thing and my mind was wandering off every 2 mins but I’m pretty sure that I didn’t miss anything important. It was probably the cheapest and weakest story I have seen so far in this genre. I mean, it started with a really pathetic shoot-out, then the bad guys escaped to some farm and one cop (who didn’t have a cellphone to call for back-up for some reason) chased them and, well, it was pretty much it. Indeed, the whole thing was basically some kind of really pathetic cat-and-mouse game between these thugs and this cop who was helped out by a local ‘farmer’ (possibly the least convincing farmer I have ever seen). Another issue was how terrible the cast was this time around, even worse than usual. It was also pretty weird that the 3 ladies involved all had some really botched plastic surgery which was so distracting, probably even more than their abysmal acting abilities. It was even more bewildering to discover afterwards that one of these ladies was actually Donna D'Errico who was barely recognizable (and, frankly, rather ugly) with all this misguided plastic surgery done on her face. Concerning Bruce Willis, well, it is actually difficult to judge his work because you can be sure that the guy was already struggling with aphasia at the time. Basically, even though he seemed to have more screen time than usual, he was barely acting at all and looked confused most of the time which was actually rather heartbreaking to see. Anyway, to conclude, the damned thing was a big waste of time and you should definitely avoid it. 

Recently, I have been focusing on older movies and since this one seemed to have a decent reputation and since it was available on YouTube, I thought I might as well check it out. I have to admit that I had never heard of Ralph Steiner before but he was back then apparently a pioneer in experimental movies in the US. Eventually, this movie was actually his directorial debut and it would have quite an impact when it was released. Anyway, how much you will enjoy this movie will depend a lot on how much you like such abstract features. Well, I have always had a weak spot for the genre and, as far as I was concerned, the whole thing was quite beautiful and even rather mesmerizing to behold. At first, he gave us some rather basic shots of running water, which might seem too ordinary, but it actually worked for me and I think there was something rather soothing about these images. However, it became increasingly abstract and, at some point, what you were looking at was something really different than just water and the effect was quite otherworldly. Anyway, to conclude, the damned thing turned out to be quite fascinating and it is worth a look, especially if you are interested in such experimental features. 

To be honest, I wasn’t really sure what to expect from this flick but since it was the last movie directed by that Sergei Eisenstein I haven’t seen so far, I was quite eager to check it out. Well, it is probably his most obscure movie, it was also his last propaganda film as he would then focus after on historical epics for the rest of his career. Eventually, what was mostly interesting in this movie was that he focused this time only on the peasants living in the Soviet Union. Anyway, after watching all his movies, I came to the conclusion that they are so vastly different from your usual narrative features and it makes them therefore rather tricky to judge because you can’t really compare them to anything else that you have seen before and this movie was not an exception. Even if you might have some issues with the fact that it completely distorted what happened in Russia, I still think it is fascinating how Eisenstein pushed the propaganda genre to such heights that it became some kind of weird Art form. Indeed, there is no denying that some shots were quite beautiful, even though I’m not a huge fan of his excessive use of close-ups but even these shots were quite evocative. Eventually, they made some attempts to build up some kind of narrative (above all, you keep seeing this woman called Marfa) but, to be honest, the end-result did feel seriously disjointed. I mean, except for Marfa, it was rather difficult to keep track on who was who exactly and what was actually exactly going on. Finally, even though I’m well aware of all the atrocities that took place during the Soviet rule in Russia, I still think it was a beautiful theory and I actually think that this movie, as an utopian concept, was inspiring. Anyway, to conclude, even though it is definitely an acquired taste, I think it was actually pretty good and it is actually worth a look, especially if you are interested in Eisenstein’s work. 

About 10 years ago, I joined a film club and this movie was one of the few that they had watched without me so I was quite eager to check it out. Well, to be honest, even if was not bad at all, it wasn’t really much more than that though. I mean, the directing was fine, at least, it was better than your average Dutch production, and the two leads (Ton Kas and René van 't Hof) definitely delivered some solid performances. Unfortunately, the whole thing felt rather empty though. Indeed, for a very long time, you just see these two men who seemed to be lost each their own way hanging out together for no clear reason whatsoever and how much you will enjoy all this will depend on how much you like this typical Dutch brand of dry absurdist humor (Alex van Warmerdam is probably the champion in this genre). Well, even though I have always respected the genre, I have to admit that I have never been a huge fan though. The weird thing with this movie was that they completely changed the approach during the last act. Indeed, at some point, Fred found out completely randomly the identity of this mysterious man and, from this point on, the movie completely changed. After that, so many things did happen (for example, they went through some kind of fake wedding) and this change of pace was just quite jarring. By the way, even though I noticed that the actress who played Trudy was really lovely, it was only afterwards that I discovered that she was actually played by [Link removed - login to see] and it was rather strange that I didn’t recognize her right away. Anyway, to conclude, even though it didn’t really work for me, I have to admit that was still a decent watch though and I think it is worth a look but probably only if you really like such little quirky Dutch movies. 

Since this movie had some really abysmal ratings on IMDb, I had some low expectations but, since it was available on Netflix, I thought I might as well check it out anyway. Well, eventually, even though it was definitely rather weak, there is no way this movie deserved such a low rating (2.6). Indeed, the topic was maybe not original but it was interesting, the directing was decent enough and, above all, there was a solid cast involved (Kelvin Harrison Jr., Charlie Plummer, John Corbett, Jonathan Majors, Robin Givens, Amber Heard, Terrence Howard) so I wonder from where this hatred came from. Anyway, I have to admit that the damned thing still didn’t really work though. First of all, the concept of 3 disgruntled young men hanging aimlessly in the hood was not a bad idea but it was nothing new and it had already been done so many times before and, above all, much better than in this movie. For some reason, it did remind me of ‘La haine’, a huge French classic in this genre and, when if you would compare both movies, it then becomes pretty obvious what went wrong here. Indeed, the whole point was to show these guys hanging around which was the main focus. However, it should have been also the only focus but it was definitely not the case here and the whole thing felt so disjointed as a result. Indeed, instead, they gave each young man in this trio such a complex sub-plot that they could have ditched the 2 other guys and focus only on one of them. To make things worse, with barely 80 mins, there was obviously no enough time to develop any of this so it all felt really half-baked and it all barely made sense as well. For example, who was John Corbett’s character and what was exactly his relationship with Jesse? Same thing with Amber Heard (who was pretty bad here, by the way), who was she and what was exactly her relationship with Nicky? Anyway, to conclude, even if the IMDb users were really harsh on this movie, I have to admit that it was still not really worth a look and you should probably avoid it. 

I wasn’t really sure what to expect from this flick but, since I have a weak spot for Virginie Efira, I thought I might as well check it out. We have all heard about these (true) stories about some men having 2 families at the same time over several decades. Well, this movie basically tackled the idea of how it would be if a woman would actually choose this ‘lifestyle’. Of course, for a woman, you have the issues of getting pregnant and giving birth so, in this case, half of the movie was some kind of mystery during which you wonder how the main character did end up in this situation. To be honest, I’m not sure that the explanation did make sense. I think I was above all bothered by the fact that, out of nowhere, this little girl somehow managed to figure this all out by herself which was, frankly, rather ridiculous. Indeed, kids don’t have some kind of magical instinct, they get attached to whoever takes care of them and even more to those who are kind to them and I can’t imagine how traumatizing this ‘arrangement’ could have been for her and the way they ‘solved’ this in this movie was actually rather pathetic and unconvincing. There was also the fact that, considering how old Ninon was, they had been apparently doing this for several years already which just seemed unthinkable and even grotesque. So, the concept was at first intriguing but it became rather shaky when it became clear what was actually going on. However, what really worked was Efira though. Indeed, she impressed me once again playing such a complex character who was pretty messed up and, yet, she was always so convincing and quite spellbinding to behold. Anyway, to conclude, in spite of its flaws, it was still a decent watch and I think it is worth a look, especially if you like the genre.