Reviews by johanlefourbe

Since I kept hearing some really good things about this movie, I was really eager to check it out. Well, to be honest, I actually ended up with pretty much the same feeling I had with ‘Get Out’ which was another massively heralded horror flick released last year. Indeed, with both movies, the directing and acting were both really solid, it was really entertaining but, somehow, it still didn’t really blow me though away. I mean, sure, the concept was pretty neat and it was really nice to see a really good movie dealing with mutes after the terribly underwhelming ‘Mute’ from Duncan Jones but, at the end of the day, it was still a gimmick after all. Indeed, even though the characters did their best to be as silent as possible and even though they went through some massive precautions to remain safe, you know that, at some point, one of them will make some noise because, otherwise, there wouldn’t be a story to tell and it made the whole thing rather predictable. Still, I have to admit that it was a bold move to make a horror movie with barely any (spoken) dialog and, just after I was done watching this flick, I was suddenly so aware of the sounds around me and the sounds I was making myself which was just really neat. Anyway, to conclude, even if I didn’t think that it was really a masterpiece, it was still a really solid horror movie and it is definitely worth a look, especially if you want to see something original. 

I really had no idea what to expect from this flick but since there was a decent cast involved, I thought I might as well check it out. First of all, it was pretty neat to see Paul Bettany playing the lead for once. Concerning the movie itself, it seemed to be another crime thriller about a top detective solving a murder case but it actually turned out to be about an actually rather average cop who completely f*cked-up an investigation with some dramatic consequences and this approach was quite refreshing. On top of that, the cast involved (Paul Bettany, Stephen Graham, Mark Strong, Brian Cox) gave some really solid performances. I also enjoyed the fact that they didn’t give so much information about Brian Cox character but you still could figure out that the guy was neither a great cop either and that his main method was mostly to frighten the suspects but also his collegues. Still, even though it turned out to be a decent watch, the whole thing was still too generic and predictable though. Indeed, basically, it was a variation on ‘Crime and Punishment’ but they didn’t add anything really new to the genre. Anyway, to conclude, even if it was nothing really groundbreaking, it was not bad at all and I think it is worth a look, especially if you like the genre.

I wasn’t really sure what to expect from this flick but since I have a weak spot for [Link removed - login to see][Link removed - login to see][Link removed - login to see], I thought I might as well check it out. Well, even though Jennifer Lawrence and Max Thieriot were actually not bad at all and had some pretty good chemistry together, pretty much nothing else did work in this flick. Indeed, it started out as a rather average and boring horror flick with a couple of poorly developed sub-plots but, during the third act, the whole thing completely fell apart. Indeed, they gave us 2 really pathetic twists which really ruined an already weak movie. The first twist involved the fact that the character played by Max Thieriot actually was abducting some random girls to take the place of his deceased sister. It was seriously idiotic because it gave the feeling that this town was actually right to act like some major bigots all the time towards this boy. The second twist was about the same character and it turned out that, after his sister died, he actually took her place and his parents handled him as if he was Carrie Anne himself through most of his youth and this turn was even more stupid. I mean, what happened all these years? Did really nobody notice that they switched their girl with a boy? She/he didn’t go to school at all? Didn’t they have any relatives/friends/neighbours wondering what the hell was going on in this family? So, at some point, the boy killed his parents but, then, again, what happened to him? Everydody was saying he was actually taking care by his aunt but how did they know this? Did this aunt exist at all? How was it supposed to work at all with the rest of this story? Anyway, to conclude, the whole thing was eventually a mess, I was actually rather generous with my rating and I don’t think it is really worth a look. 

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I wasn’t really sure what to expect from this movie but, somehow, I still ended up watching this flick. Well, I have to admit that I have never been a huge fan of Stephen King but it has been a while since I have seen such a pathetic adaptation of one of his books.  First of all, I thought it was pretty obvious that it was based on a short-story and the makers somehow really struggled to expand this tale. Indeed, at least half of the movie was about Linda Hamilton and her boyfriend driving around the countryside and then running around some ghost town. It was rather bewildering as they could have simply developed the background of these characters or, even better, tell us more about Isaac or about ‘He Who Walks Behind the Rows’. As a result, the damned thing was just so slow and boring and, to make things worse, all the children gave some rather poor performances. They also gave us some of the worst special effects I have ever seen. It’s too bad because the damned thing actually had some potential. Surprisingly, this rather weak flick became somehow a cult-classic and spawned no less than 7 sequels which were all just as poorly received as this first instalment was. Anyway, to conclude, I think I was actually rather generous with my rating here and I don’t think the damned thing is really worth a look.