Reviews by johanlefourbe

For many people, this is the movie with which Robert Downey Jr. really made his comeback. The other interesting feature about this flick was the fact that it was Shane Black’s directing debut. Shane Black was once in the 90’s one of the most expensive screenwriters (he wrote among other things ‘Lethal Weapon’ at only 26 years old). Anyway, even though this movie was barely seen when it was released, it still managed to become a cult classic so I was really eager to check it out. Eventually, I thought it was indeed pretty good but I was still not completely blown away by the whole thing. First of all, Downey Jr. got (deservedly) a lot of credit for his performance in this picture but we shouldn’t forget Val Kilmer who was just as brilliant and, together, they made hands-down one of the best couples I have ever seen. Michelle Monaghan, in her break through performance, was really good as well. Furthermore, the dialogues were quite hilarious, something expected from Shane Black, and the intro was very strong. So, why wasn’t I completely sold? In my opinion, the story was pretty far-fetched. I mean, since it is a neo-noir, it is not surprising that the whole thing was far-fetched since a film noir is not about the plot but above all about the mood. Still, towards the end, when they started to explain the whole thing, not only was it difficult to follow but above all, I really had a hard time to care about the damned thing. Still, most of it was very entertaining and it remains a solid flick, no doubt about it. To conclude, even though I don’t think it is really that great, it remains a pretty good neo-noir feature and it is definitely worth a look, especially if you like the genre.

After watching 'Kick-ass' twice, I was still not sure what to make out of the whole thing but I still enjoyed most of it. Of course, since it quickly became a cult classic, it was pretty obvious that they would make a sequel but I was pretty sure it wouldn't be great, especially after the lukewarm reception. Eventually, it was not bad but certainly nothing brilliant. This time, they pretty much messed the tone. Indeed, at some points, it gets really serious and, a few minutes later, it becomes completely goofy. As a result, in the same movie, you have Chloe Grace Moretz who was almost playing in a drama and Jim Carrey who was completely over the top. In my opinion, they should have been dead on serious, making a really gloomy super-hero flick like 'The Dark Knight'. That would have been a nice surprise but I would have been probably the only one interested. Coming back to Jim Carrey, he did a decent job, as usual, but we barely got the time to get to know his character who was seriously underdeveloped. Moretz was really impressive and it was nice that her character was then 15 years old which felt less awkward than the 1st time around. I felt that Christopher Mintz-Plasse gave his best shot but he was never really convincing as super bad-guy. Eventually, there were some interesting ideas, there were some good laughs but the whole thing was really unbalanced. To conclude, I still think it remains a fun flick and it is worth a look, especially if you liked the previous installment but don't expect anything amazing.

There was a time when, my wife and I, would watch many series together. It was been a while now but it was pretty neat while it lasted. We mostly watched US productions but also a couple of Dutch TV shows and even though after 3 or 4 seaons, I stopped watching ‘Gooische Vrouwen’, we did watch all the episodes of ‘All Stars’. Honestly, I think that my wife enjoyed it more than I did but it was still a pretty solid and entertaining show, especially under Dutch standards. Anyway, before all this, there was actually a movie which was so successful that they decided to launch the TV show (pretty much like ‘Flodder’ which is really well known in the Netherlands when ‘Flodder’ is in fact pretty awful). Pretty much like the show, the movie was rather fun and it was nice to see that they managed to keep the same cast between the movie and the TV show with the notable exception of Danny de Munk who did just this movie. My favorite will always be Peter Paul Muller but the rest of the cast was quite nice as well (Danny de Munk, Daniel Boissevain, Thomas Acda, Isa Hoes, Ellen ten Damme, Daphne Deckers). Furthermore, the whole concept (some losers try to play some football/soccer in the week-ends but they just really suck) was quite brilliant and often hilarious. To conclude, even though it is actually nothing really mind-blowing, it remains a pretty good comedy and it is definitely worth a look, especially if you are interested in Dutch movies.

Marion Cotillard is probably the most successful French actress of the last 10, probably even 20 years. Hell, I mean, even a monster like Catherine Deneuve never managed to have such a varied international career. More recently you had Audrey Tautou or Juliette Binoche who both seemed on the verge of becoming pretty big on the international scene but it never really happened. I’m not saying that Cotillard is the best French actress (still, she is definitely one of the most intriguing) but her international career is just downright impressive. She has also always been pretty prolific in France and I always wonder how many of her fans have actually seen her previous work. Anyway, this movie is one of those French movies she made before her international breakthrough with ‘La Mome’ and I thought it was not bad at all. I even think I saw it back then in the theater but I’m not completely sure. Anyway, it is a decent romance feature starring Marion Cotillard and Guillaume Canet who are also an item in real life, although they got together 4 years after making this movie. To be honest, even though the story was intriguing, it was still a rather convoluted romance and many obstables where there just to create some momemtum but the leads were really charismatic and had obviously some great chemistry. To conclude, even though it is nothing really amazing, it remains a decent romantic feature and it is definitely worth a look, especially if you are interested in French movies.

Since it was the last movie directed by Guillermo del Toro which I hadn't seen yet, I was of course really eager to check it out. Later on, I also discovered that it was, at the time, the most expensive movie ever made in Mexico which is quite surprising since it was del Toro's first directing feature. Well, to be honest, like most of the movies made by this director, even though I thought it was quite intriguing, it never really blew me away though. Still, as usual, with del Toro, the whole thing looked really neat, especially the diabolical device itself. The story was also quite intriguing, some very dark tale mixing some vampire and zombie ingredients all together. However, some elements did bother me. Indeed, the pacing was pretty sluggish and, in my opinion, the characters were rather poorly developped. On top of that, the constant mix of Spanish and English languages was rather distracting (I did buy a very cheap 2nd hand dvd so maybe the dubbing might have been messed up). I don't know, it remains a very interesting feature but like all the other movies directed by del Toro, I never managed to really get into it. Anyway, to conclude, in spite of its flaws, it is still a really solid directing debut and it is definitely worth a look, especially if you are interested in Guillermo del Toro's work.

Even though I wasn't sure what to expect, since I have always been a fan of Kevin Smith, I still wanted to check it out. To be honest, I thought it was actually pretty good and I was above all impressed how Smith managed to make a feature so completely different in tone than his previous movies. Indeed, even Kevin Smith himself has admitted it, even though he might be a decent writer, he remains a rather limited director and if you don't agree, you should just check his filmography. So, I did like this flick, especially the first half was really intriguing with setting up these teenagers and this Christian cult. Unfortunately, I wasn't so sure about the 2nd half. Indeed, at some point, seemingly out of nowhere, some Federal agents got involved and within minutes the whole thing turned into a huge shoot-out which lasted forever. With a running time of barely 80 minutes, you shouldn't spend 20 minutes with people only shooting at each other. The wrap-up at the end with a briefing involving John Goodman was also rather underwhelming. Still, I enjoyed most of it and, in my opinion, in spite of its poor construction, it is a rather tense and realistic horror feature, 10 times better than most of the slasher flicks I have seen and way better than the current torture porn wave.

I came accross this movie a couple of times so I thought I should give it a try. Eventually, I wasn't disappointed. Indeed, fortunately, it goes beyond the whole gimmick of having some women robbing banks and it is actually a really solid heist feature. The first thing they did right was to clearly explain the motivations of the characters, the whole thing felt surprisingly realistic and after a while you can understand why those women were so pissed off at the world. There was also a nice cast (Jada Pinkett(not yet Smith), Vivica A. Fox and Queen Latifah) and they did a pretty good job. I also enjoyed the sense of community displayed in the sense that even though they lived in a tough neighbourdhood, they still could interact with some gangsters because they knew each other from childhood. It was also a nice touch that the cop could act as a prick but wasn't completely one dimensional and definitely showed some compassion. Of course, the whole thing was not really original and some stuff didn't really work (the scene during which they parodied 'The Godfather' was especially ridiculous) but I still enjoyed most of it. To conclude, it is a pretty good flick and it is definitely worth a look, especially if you like the genre.

Nowadays, DreamWorks is, after Pixar which is the undisputed Champion, the world leader in CGI animated pictures. However, at first they also made some hand-drawn animated features but, except for ‘The Prince of Egypt’, they all pretty much flopped. This feature was the last one they made in this style and they never looked back ever since. Honestly, I think it’s a shame that they dropped this animation technique and it is even more disheartening concerning Disney which had almost 80 years of legacy in this style. Anyway, even though this movie barely made any money, I don’t think it was that bad at all. Indeed, the animation was pretty nice and the story was quite entertaining. I thought it was quite neat to have a story about Sinbad and, apparently, they were planning to release 6 sequels, each movie featuring one of the 7 voyages of Sinbad, but since ‘The Road to El Dorado’ was already a disappointment at the box-office, they scratched this idea even before starting production. It shows how confident they were with the material. Anyway, in this genre, the classic tale, it never reaches the level of some classics made by Disney. To conclude, it is one of the many hand-drawn animated features that crashed and burned at the box-office while the CGI animated movies were emerging at a high velocity, but I think it is still worth a look, especially if you like the genre.

Honestly, I wasn't expecting much from this flick but since both Benicio Del Toro and Christopher Walken were involved, I thought I should give it a try. Unfortunately, even those two great guys couldn't save this tedious affair. I mean, they were both pretty good, as usual, especially Del Toro, but the story was just terribly underwhelming. I guess you could blame Alicia Silverstone who played one of her awful obnoxious girls. Back in those days, after the success of 'Clueless', Silverstone was hailed as the next 'It' girl and she even signed a $10,000,000 3-movie deal with Sony. Why on Earth they would think it was a good plan is really beyond me... Anyway, everything she did after 'Clueless', including this movie and 'Batman & Robin', pretty much flopped so she lost her status pretty quickly. Honestly, even though she wasn't really good in this, the worst was definitely the plot though. The amazing thing though is that each time Benicio Del Toro was on the screen, he managed to lift up the tedious material and there was something really interesting about the character he created. It is such a shame that, to the contrary to Christopher Walken who is basically a workaholic and would show up in basically anything, Del Toro doesn't make so many movies and even though he is always good, those movies are very often disappointing, pretty much like this one. To conclude, it is a rather weak feature and I don't think it is really worth a look.

I already saw this movie but since it was a while back and since I have it on DVD, I was quite eager to check it out again. Well, first of all, even though Ron Howard doesn’t really have a good reputation, I still have a weak spot for his movies. Eventually, in my opinion, this movie is a typical Ron Howard feature in the sense that it was quite entertaining, rather well made, but there was definitely something missing to make it really remarkable. Indeed, the set-up was pretty intriguing but the end-result was still rather bland. Back in those days, Mel Gibson was definitely on the A list and made more waves with his movies than with the antics in his private life. Rene Russo was also a very popular actress back then but, nowadays, she is pretty much retired which is too bad in my opinion. Like most of Howard’s features, there was a lot of good stuff here and, in my opinion, it was better than many average thrillers, but there was also an obvious refusal to be edgy in any way and the whole thing remained just way too conventional for my taste. Above all, I think that the main character should been more a cold-hearted rich SOB instead of one of these typical boring heroes played by Mel Gibson. Still, even though I tend to be rather critical about thrillers, I mostly enjoyed this one and I liked how they managed to build up the tension so it is definitely worth, especially if you like the genre.