Reviews by johanlefourbe

I already saw this movie but since it was ages ago, I thought I might as well check it out again. Back then, after his breakthrough performance in ‘Thelma & Louise’, Brad Pitt was groomed to become the next classic Hollywood star with his heartthrob good looks and, in the process, he ended up making such movies for a while. Well, coming back to our main feature, even though it was my cup of tea at all, I have to admit it was not bad though. Indeed, it was actually rather well made and there was a solid cast involved (Brad Pitt, Anthony Hopkins, Aidan Quinn, Julia Ormond, Henry Thomas). However, I still had a hard time to really care about the damned thing though. Basically, they went for an epic romance and, I guess, it is all a matter of taste, and if you are really into such fluffy romance, you will probably love the damned thing but, as far as I was concerned, it was pretty much a soap opera mixed up the Western genre. Concerning Brad Pitt’s acting skills, to be honest, it was obvious that he still needed more practice and, except for looking really dashing, he didn’t do anything really impressive in the acting department for this movie. Furthermore, even though Julia Ormond never looked more lovely, her character did hook up with the 3 brothers through the course of this movie which did pretty much ruin this whole family in the process (killing herself probably didn’t help either) so I had a hard time to really root for her. Anyway, to conclude, even though I’m not a huge fan, I have to admit that it is still a decent romantic feature with an epic scope and it is worth a look, especially if you like the genre.

To be honest, it has been a while since I saw this flick. I remember it very well though, it was released more than 20 years ago and, back in those days, there was a lot of hype about the so-called Virtual Reality revolution and this movie was the only one which really tried to do something with this concept. In fact, it made some waves because they tried to link this flick to Stephen King who actually sued them because, except for the title, the whole thing had actually nothing to do with his own story. Anyway, about the damned thing, even though it could have been something, the makers went really over-the-top with this VR concept and delivered a rather bonkers  story with some special effects that didn’t grow old very well. Coming back to Virtual Reality thing, in spite the fact that many claimed that it would revolutionize our lives, this fad disappeared fairly quickly after a few years.  In fact, I have noticed that once again, in 2015, they are again talking about Virtual Reality as if it was the next best thing and I wonder if it will really become something this time around. Anyway, coming back to our main feature, even though the concept really had some potential, the whole thing was rather half-baked and I don’t think it is really worth a look. 

To be honest, it has been a while since I have seen this flick and I should definitely re-watch it at some point. Apparently, with 'Gangs of New York', it was another pet-project that Martin Scorsese struggled to make since the 70's. Anyway, even though I'm an atheist, I always thought that religion was and still is a fascinating subject so I was really eager to check this movie, despite its rather controversial reputation. Eventually, I thought it was a really interesting movie and I  especially enjoyed the fact that Jesus was portrayed as a human-being for once. At the end of the day, in spite of a few controversial things, it remains actually pretty faithful and, if you are rather open-minded about christianity and religion in general, there won’t be anything really shocking about this flick for you. More than 15 years later, Mel Gibson would come up with his own controversial take on Jesus with ‘The Passion of the Christ’ and even though it was a huge commercial success, it didn't really convince me and I actually prefer this version. To conclude, even though I don’t think it belongs to Martin Scorsese's best features, it was still a decent watch and it is definitely worth a look, especially if you are interested in this subject or in  Martin Scorsese's work.

I already saw this movie but since it was ages ago, I was really eager to check it out again. In fact, the first time I saw the damned thing, it was at school when I was a teenager. Basically, like anyone else, I got to watch some movies with my teachers but, most of these attempts were rather disastrous. Indeed, instead of making us watch such modern classics like ‘Pulp Fiction’ or ‘Fight Club’, they would make us watch some old movies which were usually very poorly received. For example, one teacher made us watch ‘Johnny Got His Gun’ and even though it is in fact a great classic, can you imagine watching this with a classroom filled with 30 brainless teenagers? However, there was this one English teacher who actually did manage to show us some very old flicks and, surprisingly, those old classics turned out to be really interesting and entertaining. This movie turned out to be the best of the bunch. Indeed, for each class, we would watch like 15-20 minutes and then we would have a discussion about what actually happened and what could happen next. Eventually, the damned thing was so spellbinding that we would still talk about it even after the class during the break. On top of that, Gene Tierney was easily one of the best femmes fatal I had ever seen. To conclude, it is one of my favorite film noir and it is definitely worth a look, especially if you like the genre.  

To be honest, it has been a while since I saw this flick. In fact, if I recall it correctly, I even saw the damned thing in the movie theater when it was released and, after all these years, I wonder why I actually decided to see this flick at the time. My best guess is either because Tim Roth was playing the lead or because it was directed by Giuseppe Tornatore , and, 10 years after ‘Nuovo cinema Paradiso’, I was curious to see his latest directing effort. Anyway, even though it is a rather obscure feature and it is completely forgotten nowadays, I thought it was a decent watch. What I did like the most was the subtle combination of a realistic period drama with an almost whimsical fairy-tale. Indeed, it is obviously fairly unrealistic to believe that someone might spend his whole life in a ship and, yet, there was still something quite fascinating about this tale. You might wonder if Tim Roth was the best choice to play the lead character but I thought that he delivered a solid performance. To conclude, even though it wasn’t really a masterpiece, I actually enjoyed the damned thing and I think it is worth a look, especially if you like the genre.         

Can you imagine a movie released nowadays starring Matt Damon, Will Smith and Charlize Theron? I bet there would be some buzz about it. Well, it actually already happened more than 10 years ago but, at the time, nobody seemed to care, it was barely seen at the time and, for Will Smith who was becoming the biggest star at the box-office at the time, it was his first commercial failure. Personally, since I always had a weak spot for Robert Redford’s work as a director, I was quite eager to check it out. Eventually, I thought it was a decent watch but the mix of a straightforward golf story with some fantasy elements never really worked in my opinion. In fact, many thought that the whole Bagger Vance character was a big stereotype and this gimmick was even considered rather racially insensitive. Personally, this character didn’t bother me above all because Will Smith gave a decent performance and I think it was nice that he was trying something else than his usual blockbusters. To conclude, even though it didn’t completely work, I thought it was still fairly entertaining and I think it is worth a look, especially if you like the genre.