Reviews by johanlefourbe

Since I always had a weak spot for Hugh Grant, I was quite eager to check this movie. Basically, ever since the massive success of ‘Four Weddings and a Funeral’, Hugh Grant became a big star and the king of the romantic-comedy. Indeed, most of his following movies would be in this genre and he would be basically always playing the same character but since the guy is so charismatic, it never really bothered me (on the other hand, 20 years later, this gimmick doesn’t really work anymore and the recent ‘The Rewrite’ was terribly underwhelming). Coming back to our main feature, it came out a year after ‘Four Weddings…’ and even though it wasn’t so great, I think it was fairly entertaining. First of all, it has to be one of the cutest titles ever conceived but it was some direct evidence that the whole thing would be rather generic and pedestrian. Still, Grant was pretty much at the top of his game at the time and he had some fine chemistry with the lovely Tara Fitzgerald. To conclude, I thought it was a decent watch and I think it is worth a look, especially if you like the genre.

In fact, I saw this movie in the movie theater when it was released. To be honest, I wonder how I actually ended up watching the damned thing but I guess it was because there were several directors I admired that were involved (Alejandro G. Iñárritu, Ken Loach, Mira Nair, Sean Penn). On top of that, if I recall it correctly, it was one of the first movies I saw in the movie theater when I moved to the Netherlands and I assumed I wouldn’t need to read the subtitles (it took me a couple of years to master the Dutch language and when I just arrived, my Dutch was not so great, I’m afraid). It turned out to be a miscalculation from my side since the movie was not only in French and English but also in some other languages like Arabic and Japanese. Still, I thought it was indeed an interesting movie. I mean, as usual with this kind of anthology features, the segments were not all really amazing but it was still pretty impressive to see this movie just a year after this terrible tragedy took place. To conclude, even if it was nothing really groundbreaking, I thought it was a decent watch and I think it is definitely worth a look.

To be honest, this movie was not really on my radar for a long time but since it won the Best Picture Academy Award, I was quite eager to check out the damned thing. Well, eventually, I thought it was a pretty good story, with some solid directing and a very strong cast (Michael Keaton, Mark Ruffalo, Rachel McAdams, Liev Schreiber, Stanley Tucci, Billy Crudup).  The realistic approach worked fine as well and it was really neat that they didn’t add any sub-plots about the romantic or family lives of the involved reporters. And, yet, somehow, the whole thing didn’t really blow me away. I mean, I do have a weak spot for the genre and I really loved ‘All the President's Men’ which was obviously an inspiration for this movie but, in this case, even though it was an interesting story, it never really grabbed me. That’s the tricky thing with such thrillers, right from the beginning, you actually know how it will end so the makers have to manage to find some other way to entertain or grab the interest of the viewers. In this case, since they took such a realistic approach, nothing really surprising or spectacular happens ever during this movie. Still, to conclude, even though it didn’t completely win me over, it was still a solid feature and it is definitely worth a look, especially if you like the genre. 

Even though this movie was a commercial and critical flop, since I really loved ‘Ted’,  I still wanted to check it out. Unfortunately, I’m afraid the whole thing really deserved its poor reputation as it turned out to be rather underwhelming. On paper, it did sound promising to have Seth MacFarlane working on a Western this time but it just didn’t really work, I’m afraid. For some reason, they decided to mix this Western setting with a typical romantic-comedy plot which was odd but not necessarily a bad idea. Basically, it started to go south as soon as the main character started to speak with some modern English and it then strongly reminded me of ‘Your Highness’ and even though the end-result was not as lame as  for ‘Your Highness’, it was not much better, I’m afraid. Furthermore, most of the jokes were rather pathetic and you should know you’re in trouble when half of your jokes are about farting (which was obviously a nod to ‘Blazing Saddles’, the most famous Western comedy ever made). I did like the idea that there was nothing actually really cool about the Frontier, that it was a terrible time and place to live but this concept was rather poorly developed. To conclude, I was seriously disappointed by the whole thing and I don’t think it is really worth a look. 

Basically, it is another really obscure French feature and I seriously wonder how I actually ended up watching the damned thing. My best guess is that it was on TV and since it sounded intriguing, I thought I might as well check it out. Anyway, eventually, even though it was nothing really groundbreaking, there was still something quite mesmerizing about this movie.  First of all, I thought Sophie Guillemin was just really gorgeous, perfect for this part, and I really understood that the main character would fall for her and even obsess about her. Concerning Guillemin , eventually, she would play a similar but smaller role 2 years later in ‘Harry, un ami qui vous veut du bien’ but she would then pretty much vanish which is really too bad since she really had some potential. Concerning Charles Berling, I always had a weak spot for this actor who has always been rather underrated in my opinion and he was also pretty much pitch-perfect here. Eventually, it is rather tricky to really care about a movie literally called ‘The Boredom’ but I thought  it was actually pretty neat. To conclude, even though it was nothing really amazing, it was still a decent mix between thriller and drama and I think it is worth a look, especially if you are interested in French movies. 

To be honest, it has been a while since I have seen this flick and maybe I should re-watch it at some point. In fact, if I recall it correctly, I actually saw the damned thing in the movie theater when it was released. Indeed, back in those days, after I saw ‘Paris, Texas’, I became a huge fan of this director and I went to see a couple of his movies in the movie theater. Anyway, like most of the movies released by this director in the last 20 years (except for his documentaries), it was really poorly received but I thought it was actually pretty good. In the very same year, Bill Pullman would show up in another thriller, ‘Lost Highway’ directed David Lynch, and even though this one was also seriously obscure and difficult to follow, I thought it worked slightly better, at least, as far as I’m concerned. I don’t know, I thought there was something quite fascinating already about the title and even though the story was seriously murky, I thought it was fairly entertaining. Anyway, to conclude, even though it was definitely not a masterpiece, I thought it was a decent watch and I think it is worth a look, especially if you are interested in Wim Wenders’s work. 

I wasn’t really sure what to expect from this flick but since I always had a weak spot for Lasse Hallstrom’s work, I was quite eager to check it out. On top of that, there was a top cast involved (Kevin Spacey, Julianne Moore, Judi Dench, Cate Blanchett, Pete Postlethwaite, Scott Glenn, Rhys Ifans) so it really sounded promising. This movie followed up ‘Chocolat’ which was a critical success but, to be honest, I always had a hard time to care for this movie and I actually preferred this flick which didn’t get much love when it was released. I mean, I have to admit it, the story was either too far-fetched or too dull to become really amazing but, this tale  was not bad at all and, in contrary to ‘Chocolat’, the tone was much more consistent in my opinion. Furthermore, it was shot on location in Newfoundland, it looked pretty neat and, even though the story was not really strong, the characters were still interesting thanks to the fine actors involved.  To conclude, in spite of its flaws and even though it was nothing really amazing, I thought it was still a decent watch and I think it is worth a look, especially if you are interested in Lasse Hallstrom’s work.