Reviews by johanlefourbe

Even though Charles Chaplin had been directing many movies as far back as 1914, I actually consider this movie his official directing debut since it was his first full length feature. Anyway, back then, when it was released it was obviously a tremendous critical and commercial success. Back in those days, Chaplin was already a big player thanks to the success of his marvelous short movies but with this new long format, he was clearly displaying his ambition to reach some new creative heights. In my opinion, he was still experimenting how far he could go with the Tramp so I don't think it was as good as his later work such as 'Modern Times' or 'The Great Dictator' but it doesn't change the fact that it was yet another enchanting movie with some hilarious bits but with some social consciousness as well. Jackie Coogan who played the title character was also pretty impressive and became in fact the first major child star in the movie business. To conclude, even though it might not be one of his best movies, it is still a great classic and it is definitely worth a look, especially if you are interested in Charles Chaplin’s work. 

Nowadays Pedro Almodovar is still considered as the most important Spanish director but, back in the 90’s, his specialty was some rather extravagant dramedies involving some rather colorful characters. This movie was basically one of them and, even though it was not bad at all, it wasn’t really one of his best. Penélope Cruz was not yet his muse back in those days and, at the time, it was Victoria Abril who seemed to inspire the Spanish master. Indeed, it was the 3^rd movie directed by Almodovar starring Victoria Abril (following ‘¡Átame!’ and ‘Tacones lejanos’) but, in my opinion,  it was the weakest they made. I mean,  pretty much like the rest of Almodovar’s work, it was rather over the top and the characters were borderline obnoxious. As a result,  I had a rather hard time to get into this story and to care about what the characters were going through. Still, he is and remains an artist since those movies have such a specific flavor and the guy basically created his own genre which is pretty remarkable. To conclude, even though it didn’t really work for me, it was still a decent watch and it is definitely worth a look, especially if you are interested in Almodovar’s work.

To be honest, it has been a while since I have watched this flick and maybe I should re-watch it again, at some point. Basically, when I was studying in college, I went studying for a year in Cambridge (I know, how fancy…) and I took part in this film class which was really awesome. The idea was to watch every week a movie, starring from the silent era moving forward towards the 90’s and we would then discuss the movie seen during the class. So, this flick was one selected by our teacher and, of course, I had some pretty huge expectations, especially since it was directed by the great Federico Fellini. Unfortunately, even though this movie has quite a stellar reputation, I didn’t like it much, I’m afraid. Basically, it was one of his whimsical tales, without much of a plot and this one was even downright psychedelic. Maybe I wasn’t in the right mood when I watched it but I had a rather hard time to see why it was supposed to be so great. To conclude, even though it didn’t really work for me, I still think it is worth a look though, especially if you are interested in Fellini’s work.

To be honest, it has been a while since I have watched this flick and maybe I should re-watch it again at some point. First of all, I have to confess, I’m a huge fan of Stanley Kubrick and, after watching movies for about 20 years, he is still easily my favorite director so I might not really be unbiased concerning this movie. I mean, come on, that's when the legend actually started and I get some goose bumps just by thinking about it. Of course, it is far from being perfect and even Stanley Kubrick himself thought that it was not really much better than a student movie (at least it was way better than the really dreadful ‘Fear and Desire'). Indeed, the great master was only 27 years old, completely inexperienced and barely had any budget but I thought it was still a decent film noir. Anyway, a year later, he would come up with ‘The Killing’, a classic, and pretty much everything else afterwards would be quite mind-blowing. To conclude, even though it is far from being a masterpiece, I still think it was a decent watch and it is definitely worth a look, especially if you are interested in Stanley Kubrick’s work.

It is another obscure movie that I had for ages on DVD so it was really time to watch the damned thing. I thought it sounded like an interesting story but if you would expect something like a fancy modern Indian Robin Hood story, I’m afraid you will be rather disappointing. Indeed, there was absolutely nothing glamorous about this tale which was terribly sad and heartbreaking. Basically, it was terribly bleak and violent and the main character was raped the first time when she was maybe 10 years old by her husband, then again and again throughout the whole thing, culminating with a massive gang-rape lasting 3 days during which a whole village seemed to be violating her. Unsurprisingly, this movie was criticized in India for his violence and his sexual content. On top of that, it gave a very bleak view on Indian society which seemed to treat women and lower castes as garbage. In fact,  something even weirder is that Phoolan Devi was released from prison the very same year that this movie was released and , according to her, the whole thing was really inaccurate. Anyway, to conclude, even though it might not have been a masterpiece, I thought it was quite intriguing and it is definitely worth a look, especially if you are interested in Indian movies.  

Honestly, it has been a while since I have watched this flick and maybe I should re-watch it again at some point. Basically, I was and still am a huge fan of ‘Les quatre cents coups’, the awesome directing debut by Truffaut. Right away, I became a huge fan of his work and I was really eager to see this flick which was considered as his second masterpiece. So, with this in mind, I had some rather huge expectations and, to be honest, I thought it was slightly disappointing. I don’t know, maybe I was too young at the time, but even though I thought it was fairly enjoyable, it didn’t really blow me away. I mean, sure, it was a decent romantic triangle and Jeanne Moreau, one of the greatest French actresses that ever lived, was quite fascinating to behold but, at the end of the day,  I never really cared for either Jules or Jim. Anyway, to conclude, even though it didn’t turn out to be one of my favorites movies, it was still a really good romantic feature, it is pretty much a classic and it is definitely worth a look, especially if you like the genre or if you are interested in François Truffaut’s work. 

Honestly, it has been a while since I have watched this flick and maybe I should re-watch it again at some point. Anyway, back in the 90’s, I was quite a fan of Ken Loach’s work so I was quite eager to check this movie, one of his very first. Indeed, it is usually considered a massive classic from the British cinema so I had some rather high expectations. Eventually, to be honest, even though I thought it was a decent watch, I can’t say I was really blown away by the whole thing. I don’t know, maybe I was just too young at the time to really appreciate it but I just couldn’t see what was so amazing about the damned thing. I mean, the directing was solid, as usual with this director, and I always loved the way he mixes a really realistic barren social environment with a captivating dramatic story. Furthermore, the young actor playing the lead character was also really good as well. And yet, this tale was slightly too generic and predictable to become really remarkable. Anyway, to conclude, even though it didn’t turn out to be one of my favorites movies, it was still pretty good and it is definitely worth a look, especially if you like the genre or if you are interested in Ken Loach’s work. 

Even though this flick didn’t turn out to be a massive box-office success when it was released, I actually think that it is rather underrated. Indeed, even though I have to admit I’m not a huge fan of action movies in general, I actually have a weak spot for this one.  Sure, the title was rather lame, Damon Wayans can be pretty annoying and Bruce Willis pretty much did another version of John McClane but I'm a sucker for those action flicks when Willis plays his typical washed-up cynical guy. I never knew that before but it was apparently a rather messed-up production with some major conflicts between producer Joel Silver, director Tony Scott and lead actor Bruce Willis. It was so bad that both Silver and Scott went on record saying that this movie was one of the worst experiences in their respective careers. As a result, the whole thing was heavily re-edited by the studio but, somehow, the end-result was still satisfying. Anyway, to conclude, even though it is definitely not a masterpiece whatsoever, I think it is still a good old R rated action flick, it is just plain entertaining and it is definitely worth a look, especially if you like the genre.