Reviews by johanlefourbe

Basically, it is one of those obscure movies you end up watching because there are a couple of nice actors in it, even though you have no clue if it is worth it or not. And indeed, there was a nice cast (Jeanne Moreau, Claire Danes, Jude Law, James Van Der Beek, Julia Stiles, Robert Sean Leonard) and they all delivered some solid performances. It is a rather sensitive drama with some interesting characters but it never really reaches its potential. There are some interesting ideas about how teenagers must deal with their feelings and how someone should deal with their family's past and legacy but, like I said before, the whole thing remains too gentle and/or too shallow to really create some fascination. The same year, Claire Danes would show up in 'Romeo + Juliet' and fall into the eye of the mainstream audience and for Jude Law, it would come a year later with 'Gattaca'. It was also a great pleasure to see Jeanne Moreau, such a great actress for already 6 decades, displaying her skills and, obviously, at the different level than the rest of the cast. To conclude, in spite of its flaws, it still remains a decent drama and it is definitely worth a look, especially if you like the genre.

Honestly, I have a hard time remembering how I ended up watching this flick. I think I found a very cheap DVD but it is not really important. Anyway, I must admit I don’t get often the opportunity to watch a Spanish movie so it was a nice watch. Eventually, the story was not bad at all, even though it tries to be too much clever for its own good. I above all enjoyed the cast. Indeed, even though I never been a fan of her work, I thought that Penélope Cruz was pretty good. It was also funny to see Victoria Abril because she is (or was) pretty famous in France and she showed up in many French movies so it is always kind of weird for me to see her in a Spanish productions. Together, Cruze and Abril had some good chemistry and they made a good catfight. Above all, I thought that Gael Garcia Bernal was, as usual, pretty awesome and just hilarious as Jack Davenport, Hell’s manager (yeah, seriously). Unfortunately, like I said before, even though the story was pretty original, dealing with angels, heaven and hell, it was still too weak and convoluted for my taste. Still, personally, I enjoyed most of it and it is definitely worth a look, especially if you are interested in Spanish movies.

I have always been interested in Jane Campion’s work so I was really eager to check her last movie. Well, to be honest, even though I enjoyed this flick, I can’t say it was really amazing though. Indeed, the plot was pretty much standard for a costume drama (a young man and woman are passionately in love but he doesn’t have any money to marry her and, on top of that, he gets pretty sick…). It was really cliché and I can’t tell you how many times I have seen movies with a similar plot. Furthermore, I wasn’t really convinced by Abbie Cornish. I mean, she looked really pretty and her performance was not bad at all but there was not a single moment during which I really believed she was this character, living in that place during that particular time period. For me, she was still a modern girl from our time, not this character. Still, in spite of these flaws, I really liked this movie anyway. Above all, I thought the directing was really exquisite and pretty much flawless. Indeed, the way it was shot, the composition of those shots, the pacing, it was just amazing and quite mesmerizing to watch. From this perspective, it is probably one of the best costume dramas I have seen. Furthermore, even if I mentioned before that the story was not really original, it was still a fascinating love story full of passion and I really believed in this romantic relationship. Finally, even though I wasn’t so sure about Abbie Cornish, the rest of the cast was really spot on and gave some very solid performances. To conclude, even though it is not a masterpiece, it remains a very well made costume drama and it is definitely worth a look, especially if you like the genre.

I wasn’t sure what to expect from this flick but I thought the title was pretty badass so I was rather curious about it. Eventually, I must admit I was pleasantly surprised. For a directing debut, I must admit that Mario Van Peebles did a pretty good job. It was also a financial success and became the highest grossing independent feature of 1991 and it also launched the acting career of Ice T (ok, maybe that wasn’t such a good thing but whatever...). Anyway, I thought it was a really solid gangster feature. It might not be really original but I liked how relentless, dark and violent the whole thing was. Of course, I have no idea if it was realistic or not but it felt pretty genuine. There was also a very solid cast (Wesley Snipes, Ice-T, Chris Rock, Mario Van Peebles, Michael Michele, Judd Nelson, Vanessa Williams) with a badass Wesley Snipes. It was also impressive to see Chris Rock giving a very convincing performance as a crack addict. It is actually too bad that he nowadays only shows up in comedies when he is actually quite talented. To conclude, I thought it was a good gangster flick, one of the best in its genre actually , and it is definitely worth a look, especially if you like this kind of movies.

Even though it was a huge flop, I was still curious about this flick. Unfortunately, I must admit it, it was indeed pretty bad, as a matter of fact, it was even worse than I expected. I mean, even though ‘Dances with Wolves’ was a decent movie, I never thought it was really amazing and I was never convinced by Kevin Costner’s directing skills. This movie made it clear I was right. I mean, it is very very long, it even takes Costner 1 hour to finally became the famous ‘Postman’…. Furthermore, I always had a weak spot for post-apocalyptic features but this one must be the least convincing one I have ever seen. I mean, there wasn’t a single moment when I believed in the time and place portrayed. Even though it was supposed to take place in the future, it looked more like a Western, but not a good one. The tonality was also all over the place. I mean, Costner took the same approach as for ‘Dances with Wolves’, in the sense, that you had the good guys on one side and the bad guys on the other, but even though it was not brilliant in ‘Dances…’, it did work, but here, with this genre, it required a much more subtle approach, at least, that’s my opinion. I could point out many other odd things like how the Postman gave guns to some children who just butcher their opponent or how he makes a woman pregnant and, conveniently, her husband gets killed by the bad guys later on. Awkward, awkward,… and it goes on and on like this for 3 hours. Basically, it is a terrible mess and I’m not surprised it was such a flop. Fortunately, Kevin Costner would redeem himself as a director with ‘Open Range’ which turned out to be his best directing effort and is criminally underrated and barely seen. To conclude, this movie was pretty bad, ‘Dances with Wolves’ seems indeed like a masterpiece compared to it, and it is definitely not worth a look.

I already saw this movie but, since it was a while back and since I had it on Blu-ray, I thought I might as well check it out again. Well, what a blast! Seriously, I didn’t expect to enjoy it so much with a second re-watch. Indeed, the first time around, I actually made sure I watched every single Star Trek movies before watching this reboot. At the time, I was actually a little bit worried that this approach would ruin this viewing for me but it was just the opposite. Indeed, if you are familiar with this franchise and those characters, I'm pretty sure it is actually even more enjoyable. I thought it was mind-blowing to see how much effort they took to create such recognizable and believable younger version of those beloved characters. Eventually, the end-result was indeed a reboot but, not only, as it basically started a new timeline making sure that everything that happened before was still acknowledged and not completely obliterated. Basically, after all these years, more than a decade before the MCU gave it a try (and rather failed), this franchise already dabbled into the multiverse concept and the end-result was actually surprisingly satisfying. One thing I really dreaded while watching these older Star Trek movies was how really cheesy the whole thing looked, even the installments made in the 90's. Not this time though. Indeed, J.J. Abrams had a big  budget and it was really obvious on the screen and, as a result, there were some massive action scenes and the special effects were finally really neat. To be honest, like all the other Star Trek movies, the story was still terribly convoluted and many things barely made sense (the time-travelling, the black holes, the way Kirk ends up being Captain,...). Still, it was by far the best Star Trek movie ever made, I had so much fun watching this and, now, I can’t wait to watch again ‘Star Trek Into Darkness’ and ‘Star Trek Beyond’.

Since I'm a huge fan of 'The Nightmare before Christmas', I definitely had high expectations for this one and I was really eager to check it out. Eventually, I thought it was pretty good but I'm afraid it was still nothing amazing. I mean, the whole thing did look gorgeous, absolutely, but I thought that the story was nothing really spellbinding. I mean, I loved the story in 'The Nightmare before Christmas', I thought it was really spellbinding, and the characteres were really fun and interesting, whereas, this time, I didn't care much about the plot or the characters involved. Basically, it was entertaining enough but it felt really just like any other standard Burton story, and I was missing something and expecting more from it. Still, it remains a gorgeous stop-motion feature and it is definitely worth a look, especially if you like the genre or if you are interested in Tim Burton's work.

To be honest, I wasn’t sure what to expect from this flick but since it is a huge classic (at least, in France), I was really eager to check it out. This movie features a (very) young Catherine Deneuve and her less famous sister, Francoise Dorleac. Dorleac also had a promising career, she even worked with Roman Polanski in ‘Cul-de-sac’ and Francois Truffaut in ‘La Peau douce’. Unfortunately, she tragically died in a car accident at 25 years old. Anyway, I thought it was pretty awesome to see Catherine Deneuve at such a young age. Indeed, she is a terrific actress and she was already awesome back then, the more movies I watch with her, the more she fascinates me. But what about the movie itself ? Well, it was pretty good, with some nice songs but, to be honest, it was obviously not my thing. I mean, there was barely any plot and, as usual with musicals, the whole thing turned out to be terribly fluffy. I know, it is supposed to be that way but I always find it rather tedious. Still, it is a fun and very well made musical and  Deneuve and her sister were terribly charming, and it is definitely worth a look, especially if you like the genre.

Larry Clark is not really a famous director here in Listal but I find his work as a director really interesting. Originally, he was an acclaimed photographer and directors such as Gus Van Sant and Martin Scorsese have stated that they were influenced by Clark's early photography. I must admit that I didn’t like much his directing debut, ‘Kids’ though. I mean, it was a very interesting flick, no doubt, but it was too much focused on being controversial and the characters portrayed were borderline caricatural. Eventually, it took me many years to see his following directing effort. Like ‘Kids’, I thought it was not bad but still nothing mind-blowing though. Even though it is still pretty dark and gloomy, compared to his other movies (‘Kids’, ‘Bully’, ‘Ken Park’), it is actually his most conventional movie so far and maybe that’s why I was a little bit disappointed. I mean, it is not bad at all but it remains a rather standard drug related feature. Still, like most of the movies made by Larry Clark, I really liked the dark tone and James Woods was just awesome as usual. To conclude, like ‘Kids’, even though it is not really satisfying, it is still worth a look, especially if you like the genre.

Finally… I’m almost there… Indeed, I spent a good chunk of this year watching everything single Star Trek movie. Anyway, since this movie was a flop and some of my dearest Listal friends told me not to watch it, I wasn’t expecting much from it, but honestly, I don’t think it was so bad at all. One thing that really bothered me with those Star Trek flicks is that they all looked terribly cheesy, even the movies made in the 90’s (the only exception was ‘Star Trek: First Contact’). This movie was no different, I’m afraid. It started with an awesome view of Romulus but that was it and we were back into cheesy SF… Still, even though the story was as usual rather convoluted and under-written, there were many things I enjoyed. I mean, the confrontation between Jean-Luc Picard and his evil clone was pretty neat and it featured a solid performance by a very young Tom Hardy (yeah, the same guy that made his breakthrough 10 years later with ‘Inception’ and ‘The Dark Knight Rises’). I also liked the scene where Picard decides to get a full frontal collision with another spaceship , even though the outcome was honestly rather pointless. To conclude, even though it is far from being one of the best Star Trek vehicles, I found it was not one of the worst either and it is actually worth a look, especially if you like the genre.