Reviews by johanlefourbe

Back in 2003, Scarlett Johansson had her breakthrough performance with ‘Lost in Translation’ (which I actually found slightly underwhelming but I should give it another shot though) but she is also showed up in this flick which seems to be rather forgotten nowadays. Personally, I wasn’t sure what to expect from this movie but I was positively surprised. The first thing I enjoyed is that the makers didn’t make it ambiguous like ‘The Last King of Scotland’ which was very manipulative in making the viewers believe that it was a true story which it wasn’t (I’m still pissed off about this in fact). Indeed, right from the start, it was obvious the whole thing was a big fantasy about what might have or not have happened when Vermeer painted his most famous painting. As a result, you get a very interesting study about class struggle, about the artistic process and about a possible romance which was never consumed. So, there was some good stuff, the movie also looked really good but it was missing something to become really remarkable. I don’t know, maybe the whole thing was a little too dry for my taste. Still, even though it might not be a masterpiece, it is still a pretty good flick and it is definitely worth a look, especially if you like the genre.

I always had a weak spot for Scandinave movies and Susanne Bier must be one of the best Danish directors at work nowadays so I was definitely eager to check this movie, especially since it won the Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film of the Year. Eventually, Bier delivered once again a very strong drama and probaby one of her best movies so far. Once again, her directing was quite beautiful and she managed to get some very good performances from her cast, especially from those two boys who were both quite impressive. Indeed, the relationship between those teenagers was the best thing in this flick, how they were both messed up for some reasons, how they bond with each other and how they got into some massive trouble together. To be honest, the other storylines didn’t work very well though. For example, as it was justly pointed out by Roger Ebert, the whole African section, which was solid on its own with some rather unsettling and heartbreaking moments, didn’t fit very well with the rest. That’s the whole issue, it was actually too good to be a side-plot, they could have developed a whole story around this Swedish doctor working in Africa. Still, even though it wasn’t flawless, I really enjoyed this flick and it is definitely worth a look, especially if you like the genre.

After hearing so many great things about this flick, I was really eager to check it out. Indeed, with this movie, Denzel Washington managed to win the Academy award for the Best Actor in a Leading Role which was the crowning of a stellar career. With this in mind, I thought it would be a great movie and I had some rather huge expectations. Unfortunately, I thought the whole thing was slightly underwhelming. I mean, it is a solid flick, no doubt about it, and Denzel Washington, who was finally playing something else than his usual righteous guys, was just terrific. The mood was also very well done and they even managed to shot on location in some of the most infamous neighborhoods of Los Angeles. So, what was my problem with this flick? The main issue was with the timeline which was rather unbelievable in my opinion. Indeed, you are supposed to believe that everything that happens is supposed to take place in one single day. I mean, seriously?!? If it would have been spread other 3 days or a whole week, it would have been fine but to put all this in one day was just rather preposterous. To make things worse and even more gimmicky, all this happened in the very first day of the rookie cop played by Ethan Hawke. Again, seriously?!? I’m pretty sure that most cops won’t see so much action in her first 10 years in the police force so that was also rather unbelievable. To conclude, even though I think it is seriously overrated, it remains a decent watch and it is still definitely worth a look, if only to see Denzel Washington’s amazing performance.

It is again one of those movies that I wanted to see for many years for some rather obscure reasons. I guess it had to with the fact that Mike Figgis had released before ‘Leaving Las Vegas’ which was a terrific movie and by far his best directing effort. Eventually, I thought it was a decent flick with a very nice mood and some decent performances by a nice cast (Wesley Snipes, Nastassja Kinski, Kyle MacLachlan, Ming-Na Wen, Robert Downey Jr., Thomas Haden Church, Saffron Burrows). Indeed, there was a time when Wesley Snipes was actually a dramatic actor, and not a bad one, and it is a pity he decided to focus on his underwhelming action flicks (most of them turned out to be direct-to-DVD releases eventually). Coming back to our main feature, I really liked the chemistry he had with Nastassja Kinski but the rest of the movie was not really strong I’m afraid. For example, there was a strong performance by Robert Downey Jr. (who was a total mess at the time by way) but it felt rather like a distraction. To conclude, even though it is far from being a strong feature, I still think it is a decent drama and I think it is worth a look, especially if you are interested in Mike Figgis’ work.

Since it was at least a decade since I saw this flick for the last time, I thought it was definitely time for a re-watch. Honestly, I always had some rather mixed feelings about this one. First of all, I have to make myself clear : it is a really good movie but I don't think it is flawless though. Obviously, as usual with Kubrick, the directing was absolutely amazing and the acting was completely off the charts. However, the combining of the 2 parts (the training and the actual war) just didn't really work for me. I mean, the first part was just amazing, on the same level of some of the best work provided by this great master but the second part was decent but honestly rather underwhelming, especially after the emotional roller-coaster provided by the boot camp. Basically, it is a random succession of war scenes with no real plot (there are even two scenes involving Vietnamese prostitutes) but, in just an hour, you don’t really get the time to involve yourself in the conflict and, compared to ‘Platoon’ which spends its whole running time in Vietnam, this part was never really spellbinding in my opinion. Still, it remains a really good flick and it is definitely worth a look, especially if you are interested in Stanley Kubrick’s work.

I have always been interested in Nick Cassavetes’ work so I was quite eager to check this flick. At the time, it was his first mainstream feature  and it was starring Denzel Washington which made the whole thing even more intriguing. Eventually, there was definitely something interesting about this plot which was really timely and topical and Denzel Washington gave as usual a very solid performance. There was also a decent cast (Laura Harring, Anne Heche, James Woods, Eddie Griffin, Robert Duvall, Ray Liotta) but, unfortunately, I wasn’t really convinced by the whole thing. Indeed, I thought it was terribly manipulative and the ending which was really over-the-top was rather stupid and borderline offensive. The point is that, most of the film was actually quite plausible and something similar could happen for real but, with the ending, it became really preposterous which was rather underwhelming. Eventually, 2 years later, Nick Cassavetes would come up with ‘The Notebook’ which is so far his most successful movie (apparently, Cassavetes considers in fact ‘The Notebook’ to be his worst directing effort which is rather surprising). To conclude, in spite of its flaws, it remains an intriguing drama and I think it is worth a look, especially if you are interested in Nick Cassavetes’ work.

Since it is such a classic, I was quite eager to check it out. On top of that, it was directed by Fred Zinnemann, a director I have enjoyed even more after each movie, so I had some rather high expectations. Eventually, I thought it was pretty good, even if it is in fact the weakest movie directed by Zinnemann that I have seen so far. The point is that the cast was indeed quite impressive (Burt Lancaster, Montgomery Clift, Deborah Kerr, Frank Sinatra, Ernest Borgnine, Jack Warden) and the story was not bad but that was in fact the issue, it was not bad but nothing really amazing in my opinion. Apparently, the book from which it was adapted was a best seller at the time and it was much darker and displayed a rather negative view on the army. Indeed, the night club was in fact a brothel and the hostesses were prostitutes. It was also much more violent especially when displaying the treatment in the stockade and there was lot of profanity. Honestly, this sounds much more compelling to me but, at the time, there was a strict censorship and the movie was still a big success. It was also rather funny to discover that ‘Pearl Harbor’ pretty much took its whole plot from here. Anyway, to conclude, even though I thought it was slightly disappointing, it remains a solid drama and it is worth a look, especially if you like the genre.

Back then, when it was released, it was a huge critical success and many called it the best movie of the year so, with this in mind, I was really eager to check it out. To be honest, the whole thing was at first misleading. Indeed, I thought the movie was above all about this couple who were divorcing and I thought, somehow, that the movie would deal above all with the woman because she was the one who wanted this separation. In fact, the separation wasn’t the most dramatic event that took place, but an accident involving a pregnant woman who worked for the husband who might have been responsible for her miscarriage. This turn of event was actually quite compelling to watch. Indeed, it was quite a masterstroke from the director that even though I, and many viewers I guess, have very little knowledge of the Iranian culture and, still, I could really identify with most of the characters and I was able to understand most of the struggles they were facing. And that’s the other amazing thing about this flick is that you don’t only identify with the main character, you are able to understand all the other characters involved in the story and their motivations which was something quite unique and remarkable. After watching this flick, I was thinking about ‘Not without my daughter’, an American feature taking place in Iran which gave a terrible view on this people who seemed to be able only to shout at each other like some animals. Here, you can see that they are just like us, flawed, complex and facing some struggles everyday like everyone else. Anyway, to conclude, it was indeed a very good drama and it is definitely worth a look.

Thomas McCarthy, another actor turned director, seems to belong to the kind of directors who makes some movies which are very well reviewed but which don’t get much an audience, at least, that’s how I see it. This time, he made another indie drama starring the always dependable Paul Giamatti and even though it was pretty good, it was still not quite remarkable which is pretty much the same feeling I got from ‘The Visitor’. However, there is one thing I really enjoy in McCarthy’s work and it is the way he manages to create some really compelling characters. In this case, the main character is not a really a bad person, he is just a guy who happens to be a in a tight spot, gets an opportunity and makes a decision. Obviously, what he does is morally questionable but that’s how human beings work, we see an opportunity, we seize it and afterwards we convince us somehow that it was not so bad after all. To make things more interesting, they threw in a lost teenager and that was once again a very interesting character, maybe too nice to be true but still. Somehow, they decided to mix this family drama with a rather generic sport formula and while it was fairly entertaining, it was still really pedestrian and predictable. It didn’t help either that the sport in question was wrestling which must be one of the dullest sports I have ever seen. Still, in spite of its flaws, it remains a decent drama and it is worth a look, especially if you like the genre.

Since I really loved ‘Hunger’ and ’12 Years a Slave’, obviously, I had to watch the movie Steve McQueen directed in between and, indeed, I was really eager to check it out. Once again, McQueen really impressed me and it is not very often that you come across a director who managed to deliver so much quality with just 3 movies. I simply can’t wait to see what he will do next. The only thing I’m worried is that the whole dreariness of his tales might become a gimmick at some point if he keeps throwing at us such dark and relentless dramas. Anyway, this time, he gave us a rather painful portrait of a man driven by his obsession and how his life constantly revolves around this obsession and nothing else. Since I’m a rather obsessive person (the most obvious would be my compulsive movie watching with more than 5000 movies watched and around 3800 reviews written on this website), it was rather confronting and I could definitely relate with him in the way that, even though his constant search for sex gives him a purpose, it also makes him emotionless and completely unable to connect or socialize with other human beings. At least, junkies or alcoholists usually have an active (albeit sick) social life but the main character here choses not to have such a social life, probaby because of the shame he constantly feels. Once again, Michael Fassbender who is obviously one of the greatest actors of his generation gave a fearless performance and it is really astonishing that he wasn’t even nominated at the Academy awards. To conclude, as usual with McQueen, it was a rather tough watch but it is still a riveting drama and it is definitely worth a look.