Reviews by johanlefourbe

My first contact with this movie was actually rather weird. Indeed, when I was a teenager, I used to smoke weed from time to time with my buddies and one of them would put this movie on when we were at his place. Back then, I had no idea who the hell was Akira Kurosawa and I thought it was just rather surrealist flick with some psychedelic qualities. Fast-forward a few years later, back then I was just discovering how great movies could be, Kurosawa was quickly becoming one of my all-time favorite directors so it was really time to re-watch the damned thing. Back then, it seems that this time Kurosawa wanted to make something more contemplative than his usual work and it partially worked. That’s always the same problem with this kind of movies with different segments, some of them were pretty good but some of them were not so impressive. Still, it was something quite original and it was visually pretty neat. To conclude, even though it was probably not one of the best movies delivered by Akira Kurosawa, I thought it was still a decent watch and I think it is worth a look, especially if you are interested in this great Japanese director. 

I have noticed that this movie has a rather lame reputation. Indeed, according to Imdb, it is in fact the worst movie ever directed by Robert Altman, even worse than ‘Prêt-à-Porter’ or ‘Popeye’. Well, I have to admit it, it has been a while since I have seen this flick and maybe I should check it out again at some point but I thought it was not bad at all. Indeed, I even enjoyed the damned thing. I mean, sure, as pointed out by Roger Ebert, Richard Gere was probably the least convincing gynecologist ever put on the screen but I think he was not bad here. Above all, there was a very interesting female cast involved (Helen Hunt, Farrah Fawcett, Laura Dern, Tara Reid, Kate Hudson, Liv Tyler).  Eventually, it was all rather fluffy and, according to some, even rather misogynist, but, in my opinion, it was supposed to make fun of the so-called difficult life of all these rich white women and I though it worked fairly well. To conclude, even though it was definitely not one of the best movies delivered by Robert Altman, I thought it was still a decent watch and I think it is worth a look, especially if you are interested in this great American director. 

To be honest, I wonder how I actually ended up watching this movie but I think it was because the critic in the TV mag was pretty good. Anyway, even though I didn’t really expect it, it turned out to be a major milestone in my movie watching. Indeed, back then, I was much younger, I had never seen anything like this before and I was seriously blown away by the whole thing. I think that the first thing that impressed me with this movie was its visual aspect. Basically, it deals with art and painting and it is probably the movie which  made the best connection with the painting art I have ever seen. Furthermore, there was also a mesmerizing surrealist vibe with this movie and even though the plot and the characters were rather murky, it was one of the most spellbinding movies I have ever seen. Concerning Peter Greenaway, it was his breakthrough feature film, it would be also his first movie I managed to watch and I became right away a big fan of his work. To conclude, even though it might be a acquired taste, I thought this movie was just fascinating to behold and I think it is definitely worth a look, especially if you are interesting in experimental movies. 

I already saw this movie but since it was such a long time ago and since it was available on Netflix, I thought I might as well check it out again. Like most of the kids growing up in France, I saw many animated features starring Astérix and Obélix. I especially loved ‘Astérix et Cléopâtre’ which I must have seen maybe 100 times back in those days. Anyway, coming back to our main feature, this one was particularly interesting as it was a completely original story, unlike all other Astérix movies which were based upon one of the many Astérix comic-books, at least, until then. It would be also the last movie directed by the actual creators, René Goscinny and Albert Uderzo. Anyway, this movie was basically some kind of parody of the twelve labors of Hercules which seemed to be a great idea for these characters. However, even though most of it was indeed rather fun, it was also rather episodic, I’m afraid. Furthermore, since Obélix is always under the influence of the magic potion and since Astérix is often using some magic potion as well (which is basically some kind of doping), there was no real competition and there was therefore never anything really at stake at any moment. However, pretty much like Tarantino did with ‘Inglourious Basterds’, they actually did rewrite history with the ending by letting the characters actually beat Julius Caesar which was even more surprising since it never happened in the comic-books. Anyway, to conclude, even if it was probably not a masterpiece, it was still a decent watch, it is one of the best Astérix animated features in my opinion and it is definitely worth a look, especially if you like the genre.  

Can you believe that this movie was, at some point, the highest grossing sports comedy of all time? For some reasons, I didn’t manage to watch it completely the first time around so I had to watch it all over again but, surprisingly, it became almost watchable the 2nd time around. Still, as usual with Sandler, it was rather worthless though. Basically, it turned out to be some kind of mix between ‘Happy Gilmore’ and ‘Forrest Gump’ and, obviously, this mix was terribly misguided and rather offensive. I mean, I have never been a fan of  ‘Forrest Gump’ in the first place but, to turn it into some crass comedy like this one was just terrible. As usual, Sandler played his typical cringe-inducing character but, this time, it was even worse since he was playing some kind of mentally impaired man and it was just painful to behold. Concerning Kathy Bates, she delivered a decent performance but her character was just not entertaining at all either. Eventually, the only thing that worked for me in this movie was Fairuza Balk. Indeed, her character was not bad at all and Balk must have been the only believable love interest I had ever seen in a Adam Sandler feature. To conclude, I really didn’t like this movie at all and I don’t think it is worth a look whatsoever, except if you are really a fan of the genre.