Reviews by johanlefourbe

Since I really loved ‘Bowling for Columbine’, I was really eager to check Michael Moore’s following directing effort. From a box-office point of view, this movie was a huge success. Indeed, it was the first ever documentary to cross the $100 million mark in the United States (it might still be the most successful documentary ever made but I’m not really sure about this). In fact, this tremendous success was in fact one of the main issues with this flick. Indeed, ever since ‘Bowling for Columbine’ became such a huge critical success (completely deserved in my opinion), Michael Moore pretty much became a superstar and a brend and that’s more the reason why the US audience rushed to see this flick. Of course, they were interested by the topic but if some obscure director would have made it, would it have been so successful? I highly doubt it. I mean, it remains an interesting flick with some very intriguing ideas and theories but it was less sharp than ‘Bowling…’ and, like I just pointed out before, Michael Moore put to much focus on himself. Sure, he is quite smart and often quite funny but he should focus more on the topic at hand. Still, even though I don’t think it was great, I still think it was pretty good though and it is worth a look, especially if you are interested in Michael Moore’s work.

Ever since ‘Toy Story’ became a critical and financial success, CGI animation has been an ever expanding market. Nowadays, you have two giants, ‘Pixar’ and ‘Dreamworks’, but behind those two , you can find a multitude of smaller studios trying their hands at this popular genre. One of them is Blue Sky which is probably the 3rd on the podium, just behind the two giants, above all thanks to the Ice Age franchise. Personally, I really liked ‘Ice Age’ and I was really curious to see Chris Wedge’s following directing effort. Eventually, I went to see it with my wife and my step-kids in the movie theater and I thought it was actually pretty good. Indeed, it really looked gorgeous, much more than ‘Ice Age’ which had a rather minimalistic animation style. Here, there were many impressive details and they created all these amazing daft robots. Furthermore, there were also some impressive action scenes (the best one being the travel through the city with Rodney and Fender). The only issue was that the story was a little too pedestrian but I thought it was still entertaining enough. Unfortunately, it wasn’t a smashing success at the box-office, especially compared to the huge numbers reached by the Ice Age franchise so this flick has always been rather underrated. To conclude, even though it is not really amazing, I think it is actually a pretty good animated feature and it is definitely worth a look, especially if you like the genre.

Ever since I have seen ‘Exotica’, I have been a fan of Atom Egoyan and I have tried to follow his work ever since even though I didn’t watch many of his movies. Lately, Egoyan seems to be going through a difficult period creatively speaking since all his recent movies (‘The Captive’, ‘Devil’s Knot’ and ‘Chloe’) received some really poor reviews. Anyway, after ‘Exotica’, I have missed ‘The Sweet Hereafter’ which is quite a shame since it seems to be his best movie so far, but I manage to see his following effort which was very well received at the time. To be honest, even though I thought it was indeed a decent flick, I had a hard time to actually connect with the whole thing and I can’t say I was really blown away by this movie. I mean, Bob Hoskins was really good and probably gave one of his best performances of his career and Elaine Cassidy who played the title character did a good job as well but, I don’t know, somehow, I had a hard time to connect with these characters and what they were going through. To conclude, even though I thought it was slightly underwhelming, it remains intriguing and I think it is worth a look, especially if you are interested in Atom Egoyan’s work.

I remember it very well, I saw this movie when it was released and I was just about 15-16 years old. Back then, there was quite a controversy about this directing debut by Larry Clark, who was at the time famous as a photographer. Even though this flick was critically acclaimed, I was personally not completely convinced by the whole thing. I mean, I did like Clark’s directing and the acting from the very young teenagers with no acting experience was quite impressive but, somehow, the whole thing rubbed me in the wrong way. It is not that I was shocked by the content, not really, it is more that, being myself a teenager at the time, I thought that the whole thing was actually really pretentious and gave a really one-sided view about teenagers in this subculture. There was such a lack of nuance, it was rather annoying and, in my opinion, it was above all due to the fact that it was Clark’s debut. Therefore, I enjoyed more his later work like the even more controversial ‘Ken Park’ and I really loved ‘Bully’, by far his best directing effort in my opinion, because Clark seemed to be much in control instead of only slapping you in your face with some controversial teenager behiavor. To conclude, in spite of its flaws, I have to admit it, it remains an intriguing feature and it is worth a look, especially if you like the genre.

I have already seen this movie but, since it was a while back and since it was available on Netflix, I was quite eager to check it out again. Well, I was surprised by how little I actually remembered it but I still loved this movie though, even after all these years. I have to admit that, even though I always admired the Monty Python’s work, I actually always struggled with their humor (for example, it took me seriously decades to finally appreciate ‘The Holy Grail’) but this movie was the exception though. Indeed, right away, I really loved this comedy and, for once, I was able to completely connect with the Monty Python’s humor. In fact, in my opinion, I would go as far as saying that it is one of the best comedies ever made. To be honest, after this re-watch, I have to admit that I was not as blown away as before but I still think that the concept was pretty awesome though. Indeed, even though I’m not a religious man, I always thought that religion is a fascinating subject and I have never seen a comedy who managed to tackle this subject so successfully. Basically, there is actually nothing wrong about believing in God or a higher power. However, there is something intrinsically ridiculous about all religions and these guys played around beautifully with this idea in this movie. The other thing that I enjoyed was the way they displayed that the people living when Jesus Christ was around were just people like us, living their lives the best way they could and doing stupid stuff like we all do on a daily basis. Finally, so many jokes were really hilarious. Of course, not all of them were great but most of them were just spot on. Anyway, to conclude, it is a great comedy, a classic, and it is definitely worth a look, especially if you like the genre.

Honestly, I wasn’t expecting much from this flick but, for some rather morbide reasons, I still wanted to check if it was as bad as it looked. Well, it definitely lived up to its poor reputation, that’s for sure. Indeed, it is basically a complete disaster and it is very rare to see a movie failing on every single level. For example, take the story, it is a terrible far-fetched mess which barely makes any sense and, if you try to analize it afterwards, it is even more pathetic. Concerning Lindsay Lohan, what can I say? Even though she is supposed to play 2 different characters (one real and one supposedly imaginary), there is not one single difference between any of them so her performance was far from being convincing. Even the striptease scenes were some of the most underwhelming I have ever seen but you can argue that, in real life, striptease acts actually might as well look quite ugly and boring (in ‘Striptease’, another awful movie, at least, Demi Moore looked terrific and displayed some really impressive lap dances). The only redeeming feature about this flick is that it has become somehow some metaphore about where Lindsay Lohan stood at the time. On one hand, she was still this cute talented ingenous Disney actress (not for long though) but, on the other hand, she was also this wild chain-smoking coke-snorting promiscuous party girl and this movie actually mirrored this ambiguous behavior. To conclude, it is the worst movie starring Lindsay Lohan (which is, considering her awful track-record, quite an accomplisment) and it is not worth a look whatsoever.

I remember it very well, this flick was in fact the first movie I saw involving Freddy Krueger. At the time, I have was just about 14 years old, I was really curious about this franchise and I went to see this flick in the movie theater, with my sister if I recall it correctly. Honestly, I was actually quite impressed at the time. I mean, it's not that it was really scary but I thought that the whole meta concept was really far out and there was definitely something spellbinding about it. Eventually, I have re-watched the damned thing almost 20 years later and, to be honest, it didn’t grow old very well, I'm afraid. Indeed, it is pretty obvious that Wes Craven still didn’t have a huge budget so the whole thing looked rather cheap and cheesy and they could have done more with this very interesting concept (which was in fact something common to all the installments involving Freddy Krueger as a matter of fact) but I still thoroughly enjoyed it and it is by far one of the best installments in this franchise which had become pretty pathetic at the time. Eventually, even though I’m not a huge fan of this franchise, I really have a weak spot for this movie and I think it is definitely worth a look, especially if you like the genre.

Honestly, I never liked Margaret Thatcher. I would go even further by saying that she pretty much embodied the political ideas I despised. Still, it doesn’t mean a movie about her should be uninteresting. In the contrary, she is basically the only woman who managed to have such an impact on British political history, hell, in world political history. Unfortunately, the whole thing was poorly structured and misguided from the start which is hardly surprising when since they thought it was a good idea to hire the director of ‘Mamma Mia!’. Indeed, who cares that she was some lonely senile lady at the end of her life? I mean, we will pretty much all end up like this and I thought it was really unfair to portray one of the toughest women that ever lived in such disposition. Same thing about her husband, Jim Broadbent gave once again a really solid performance but they spent just way too much time dwelling on their relationship. They were dealing with a political leader who shaped, for good or bad, Great Britain’s identity, that’s what we wanted to see and, instead, they just quickly told us what happened like some bullet points which was really disappointing. Fortunately, Meryl Streep was just brilliant, as usual, and it is thanks to her that the whole thing was watchable but, without her, it would have been a big waste of time. To conclude, I still think it is worth a look but, with such potential, it could have been much better.

Honestly, it is a rather difficult movie to judge. Indeed, the animation is probably not the best you have seen (apparently, they had such a low budget that Bakshi didn't even use pencil tests so that's hardly surprising) and its artistical merit is rather dubious. Still, even though it might not be a masterpiece, I still believe it is a groundbreaking feature. Indeed, even if I have seen by now around 5000 movies, I have never seem something similar before or after. Indeed, a mainstream animated picture is hugely time consuming (especially 40 years ago when everything was hand-drawn) and costs a lot so the producers have always been focusing on some safe family features to minimize the risks. At least, Ralph Bakshi dared to take some risks and he was rewarded by the box-office as this movie was a huge success. Eventually, he would have much more problem in the the 80's and the 90's ('Cool World' was a massive flop at the time) and the guy is pretty much retired nowadays. As I mentioned before, the plot is not really great and it is definitely an acquired taste but I thought it was quite fun. To conclude, I think it is quite a milestone and it is a worth a look, especially if you like the genre.

It is one of those movies I have been planning to re-watch for so many years but, somehow, it never happened. Basically, I remember it very well, when it was released it was a massive critical success and it became by far the most heralded movie directed by John Dhal who was at the time a modern master of film noir (see also ‘Kill me again’ and ‘Red Rock West’) so I was really eager to check it out. Unfortunately, I thought it was actually a little bit underwhelming. I mean, sure, Linda Fiorrentino who gave here her breakthrough performance and basically carried the whole movie on her shoulders, was really good as the typical femme fatale and, as usual, the directing by John Dhal was really solid and he has created a very nice mood. Still, somehow, I had a hard time to care about the story but maybe I was just too young to really appreciate the whole thing so there is a possibility that a re-watch might change my opinion. To conclude, even though it didn’t really blow me away, it is still a solid neo-noir feature and it is definitely worth a look, especially if you like the genre.