Reviews by johanlefourbe

Since I kept hearing some pretty good things about W.C. Fields, I was quite eager to check his movies. Well, this is only the 2^nd movie I have seen involving the legendary comedian but, to be honest, it seems that the guy played pretty much the same character in all his movies. On the other hand, I have to admit that I was rather tired and distracted when I watched the damned thing but, to be honest, the story and the characters involved were not really strong. In fact, almost half of the duration was some kind of Vaudeville act involving the Great McGonigle and his troupe but I thought it was only mildly entertaining. However, it was absolutely quite awesome when W.C. Fields or the Great McGonigle did his juggling act. Indeed, I always loved this kind of circus acts and I have to admit that I was actually quite blown away by Fields’s skills. I also think it displayed that, even though the Great McGonigle was a hustler, a loser, a cheat, he was also a real artist after all and I think it was pretty neat. Anyway, even if the plot was hardly inspiring, there is no doubt that Fields was the real deal and the guy was always entertaining. Another thing that I enjoyed was the final scene. Indeed, even though it might not seem much, I thought it was really awesome because it made me realized that the character Dr. Aldous Smith in ‘La ballade des Dalton’ (a rather obscure French animated feature which I saw 100’s times when I was a kid) was actually based on W.C. Fields which was really cool. Anyway, to conclude, even though it didn’t really impress me that much, it was still a decent watch though and it is definitely worth a look, especially if you like the genre. 

To be honest, I wasn’t really sure what to expect from this flick but since it was available on Netflix, I thought I might as well check it out. Well, even if it seemed to be another uninspired and forgettable Netflix production, I think the damned thing actually had some potential. Indeed, above all, the relationship between Mélanie Laurent’s and Adèle Exarchopoulos’s characters was just so well developed, they were so cool, they were together quite spellbinding to behold. Surprisingly, Manon Bresch was also quite charismatic and they made a really neat trio together, even if it would have better worked if her character would have been introduced from the start. I also enjoyed the feminist vibe so the whole thing could have been a neat French variation on ‘Charlie’s Angels’. Unfortunately, pretty much nothing else did work in this movie though. Indeed, even though the concept was not bad, the whole thing was just so unfocused, the tone was so uneven and the action scenes were never impressive so the end-result did feel terribly flat. Eventually, it seemed that Laurent did spend a lot of time to finetune the connection between Carole and Alex which was great but she also apparently neglected pretty much everything else which was just too bad. Concerning [Link removed - login to see][Link removed - login to see], it had been a while since I saw the legendary French actress but I’m afraid that she was rather weak here. Indeed, it seemed that she tried to emulate Marlon Brando who was mumbling and sleepwalking as well through all his last performances. Anyway, to conclude, I think I was quite generous with my rating here but I just loved this group of cool chicks and, only therefore, I think it is worth a look but there is no doubt that it could or should have been much better. 

To be honest, I wasn’t expecting much from this flick but since it was starring Emma Roberts and since it was available on Netflix, I thought I might as well check it out. Well, unfortunately, as expected, it turned out to be a cheap romantic comedy with a rather weak concept. I still think that Emma Roberts and Hayden Christensen were quite cute and they had a decent chemistry together but they both seemed to be terribly miscast. First of all,  Christensen is 10 years older than Roberts and obviously looked much older than her but, above all, there was the fact that none of them has an Italian background at all. Coming back on the cheap aspect of the whole thing, even though it was taking place in ‘Little Italy’, for some reason, it was taking place in an Italian neighborhood in… Toronto, of all places. Seriously, there wasn’t a single moment during which I was conscious that it was taking place in this specific city because everything looked so bland. Concerning the rest of the movie, well, it was full of clichés and I wonder how pissed off Italians and Italian descendants would get if they watched the damned thing. At least, I was once again impressed by how lovely Emma Roberts was, I think she is 100’s times more attractive than her famous aunt ever was, but it’s such a pity and even a real shore to watch her in such underwhelming features. Concerning Hayden Christensen, even after the Star Wars debacle, I never had anything against the poor guy but he did spend most of his career playing in such B features. Anyway, to conclude, even if I have to admit that the damned thing was rather harmless, I still think it was pretty weak and I think you can pretty much avoid it, even if you have a weak spot for romantic comedies like I do. 

To be honest, this movie was not really a priority at all but my Nick, my step-son, was quite eager to check it out. On the other hand, like everyone else, we are both a little bit done with super-heroes features so it was pretty neat to see something completely different. In fact, even though I have watched movies for 30 years, it was actually the very first time I saw a musical in the movie theater. However, even though I have to admit that it was rather harmless, I thought it was also rather boring after all. Sure, the fact that I have never been a fan of musicals probably didn’t help but, seriously, there was not any song which was really memorable. The other thing that I missed was that Willy Wonka in Roald Dahl’s tale is a strange ominous character but, in this movie, even though it was a prequel, they never actually explained how he actually became this way which was rather frustrating. I mean, wasn’t it supposed to be the whole point of this movie? I have to admit that [Link removed - login to see][Link removed - login to see][Link removed - login to see] was pretty good and even a perfect choice to play Wonka but, in this prequel, the character turned out to be a quirky guy with a heart of gold but I wish they did display how this character evolved towards something definitely darker. Eventually, the only thing that I really liked was Hugh Grant who was just hilarious playing the only Oompa-Loompa involved. I know these characters have been quite famous over the years but I didn’t know they could be so funny. Anyway, to conclude, even if it it didn’t really work for me, I have to admit that it was still a decent watch and I think it is worth a look but probably only if you really like the genre. 

I have to admit that I was rather clueless about Harold Lloyd’s movies for so long and it has been pretty neat to finally discover his work recently. I have seen already a couple of his classic full-length features (‘The Kid Brother’ and ‘Safety Last!) and I thought I might as well watch one of his shorts as well. Well, it was fun, no doubt about it. However, even though it is inherent to the genre, it was just way too random for me. I mean, even though the story was supposed to be about a Boy in love with a Girl, in fact, he was above all busy with his car. There was also a really weird scene during which you get to see a junkie shooting up some drugs in the middle of the street and then the main character decided to steal his ‘drugs’ to shoot it up in his car (!). So, narratively, it wasn’t really strong but Harold Lloyd was such an entertaining and charismatic, it was just so much fun to see him doing all kind of crazy stunts and slapstick. Anyway, to conclude, even if it didn’t really blow me way, the damned thing was still pretty good and it is definitely worth a look, especially if you like the genre.

I wasn’t really sure what to expect from this flick but since it was directed by Patrice Leconte and since it was available on Netflix, I thought I might as well check it out. Not so long ago, I did rewatch ‘Les bronzés’ and ‘Les bronzés font du ski’ and, after these two movies, Leconte kept working with Michel Blanc through a good portion of the 80’s. In fact, this movie did feel like some kind of spin-off because Blanc’s character seemed to be so similar to the one he played in ‘Les bronzés’. To be honest, I was afraid that it would get on my nerves to see this guy constantly whining and chasing every single woman that crossed his path. Sure, I understand that this character was supposed to be pathetic but I hardly thought it was really entertaining. However, the movie started to work as soon as Anémone got involved. Sure, she was also rather pathetic but her character was more balanced and, as result, Bernard became also more balanced and they made together a genuine and interesting couple. The fact that they didn’t end up together at the end and still cared deeply for each other was also a very nice surprise. However, even if it turned out to be better than I expected, it was still not really flawless though. Indeed, even if it was rather short, not even 90 mins, it was still too random, very often just too get some cheap laughs. The title was a perfect example. Indeed, it might seem clever if you speak French but, eventually, it really had nothing to do with the movie itself. Furthermore, for some reason, Bernard, who was 29 years old (which was actually Michel Blanc’s age at the time) but did look much older, got involved with a high-school girl who was maximum 18 years old which was obviously just creepy. On top of that, they didn’t even resolve this story line at the end so you might wonder why it was even included in the first place. Anyway, to conclude, in spite of it flaws, it was still a decent watch though and I think it is worth a look, at least, if you like the genre. 

I know that DreamWorks never reached the level of Pixar but it has been a real shore to watch their recent output because pretty much all their new movies have been just so underwhelming. As a result, I wasn’t expecting much from this flick but, since this sequel was available on Netflix, I thought I might as well check it out anyway. To be honest, I have to admit that I didn’t remember ‘Trolls’ at all, except that I knew that it didn’t impress me at all, so I have actually no idea if this sequel was actually an improvement or not. Well, I have to admit that there were a couple of surrealist moments which were interesting but we are here talking about 2 or 3 scenes only, everything else was just rather tedious to watch. One thing that really annoyed me though was the fact that, even though the message of this movie was supposedly that all the Trolls from all different music genres should respect each other and be nice to each other, at the end of the day, the bad guys were some hard-rockers which is such a stupid cliché… Seriously, it felt like I was back in the 90’s when heavy metal, hard-rock, and other similar music genres were somehow linked to Satanism. To make things worse, the argument that you shouldn’t expect much from a movie based on a toy, or in this case, a freaking doll, doesn’t work anymore since ‘Barbie’ displayed that you could definitely deliver something at least a little bit entertaining with such material. Anyway, to conclude, even if the damned thing was rather harmless, I still think it was pretty weak and, even if you have some young kids to entertain, there are so many much better animated features out there to watch with them. 

To be honest, I wasn’t really sure what to expect from this flick but, since there was a decent cast involved, I thought I might as well check it out anyway. The trouble during the production of this movie was quite notorious and it would make more waves than the movie itself. Indeed, it was shot around 2015-2016, then it was put on the shelves and, when it was finally time to release the damned thing in 2018, Kevin Spacey was suddenly accused of several sexual misconduct allegations. In contrary to ‘All the Money in the World’, they didn’t try to reshoot or alter any scenes involving Spacey and it was because of 2 reasons. First of all, they simply didn’t have the means to do it anything about it. Secondly, this movie was simply not worth the effort, I’m afraid. It’s too bad because I really have a weak spot for this kind of tales and, even though I had never heard of this true story before, it was really interesting and there was definitely some potential. Unfortunately, the end-result felt like a cheap version of ‘The Wolf of Wall Street’ and not much better than that. To make things worse, even though the cast involved was pretty neat (Ansel Elgort, Taron Egerton, Kevin Spacey, Emma Roberts, Jeremy Irvine, Suki Waterhouse, Judd Nelson, Rosanna Arquette, Cary Elwes), except for Kevin Spacey, they were all pretty weak after all. Indeed, even though Spacey might have been and maybe still is a terrible guy in private, he was always a fine actor though and I thought he was pretty good here. On the other hand, Ansel Elgort was unconvincing and even rather pathetic and I’m afraid that Taron Egerton was not really much better. I won’t even talk about all the other actors involved who were barely used and therefore completely wasted here. Anyway, to conclude, my rating was probably too generous here but I still think it is actually worth a look because it is such a good story but you should probably watch it only if you really like the genre. 

To be honest, I wasn’t really expecting much from this 3^rd instalment but, since it was directed by Steven Soderbergh, I thought I might as well check it out anyway. Well, to my surprise, I thought it was not so bad after all. Sure, the fact that I was expecting something rather weak probably did help a lot. Still, I think it worked better than the terribly disappointing ‘Magic Mike XXL’ (I’m really amazed by the fact that Indiewire actually called this sequel one of the best movies released in the 2010’s). Indeed, it was pretty cool that Mike Lane was going abroad this time around and the idea of him creating a high-end stripper show was even better. Salma Hayek was also a good choice to play Maxandra Mendoza and I really liked the chemistry that she had with Channing Tatum. Unfortunately, everything else going on in the private life of Maxandra was just so generic and tedious though. In a similar fashion, the struggle to run this show was also terribly underwhelming. Furthermore, even though they made a big fuss about it through the whole duration, the show at the end was nice but, to be honest, not really much more than that though. It’s too bad because the dancers involved were actually quite incredible. Still, some of the dances, especially the first one involving Channing Tatum and Salma Hayek, were really neat.  By the way, the idea of Mike Lane falling in love during the last instalment was not bad but this love story did feel rather half-baked, especially since it was obvious that it was not the point at all of his movie. Anyway, to conclude, even though it was nothing really amazing, I have to admit that it was actually a decent watch and I think it is worth a look, at least, if you like the genre. 

Even though I was rather clueless about Buster Keaton's movies for many years, I have been focusing on his work since a few years and, by now, I have already seen a dozen of his movies. The tricky thing is that I might have seen too many of them because, even though this one seems to have a really solid reputation, it didn’t really blow me away (I actually enjoyed much more ‘The Garage’ which was also starring Roscoe 'Fatty' Arbuckle). Still, it was quite a milestone in his career since it was his first movie without Roscoe 'Fatty' Arbuckle who pretty much launched his career. Concerning the movie itself, I have to admit that it was less random than his other shorts. Indeed, they gave us basically a freshly married couple during their first week after their wedding and I have to admit that the end-result was actually quite entertaining. The main attraction was some big house the newlyweds built himself within just a few days which was obviously a really misguided idea. On the other hand, this building was a perfect opportunity for some wild slapstick. Anyway, to conclude, the damned thing was pretty good and it is definitely worth a look, especially if you like the genre.