Reviews by johanlefourbe

Peter O'Toole was a fascinating actor and the fact that he never won any acting Academy Awards is a proof how much those guys are sometimes really out of touch. I have to admit it though, it must have been really difficult to choose between Forest Withaker who gave a really strong performance in 'The Last King of Scotland' and O'Toole who was also really strong in this movie. Indeed, he was quite amazing and especially the first 20 minutes were just hilarious. Of course, the movie was about him meeting a very young girl and, for the rest of the movie, there was this debate about what you should think of him. Indeed, was he an old dirty pervert or just an old guy who should be entitled to have one last glimpse of female beauty? To be honest, even though this discussion was interesting, it wasn't as interesting as O'Toole's fascinating character. I understand that they wanted to spice up the whole thing but I thought that the study of an old man in his twilight days was interesting enough without all this stuff. Anyway, even if I wasn’t completely sold, I still liked this movie, it is actually one of the best movies about this subject and it is definitely worth a look.

Since I have a weak spot for John Carpenter’s movies, I definitely had to watch this flick at some point. Back then, Carpenter was at the top of his career and all the movies he directed at the time became some classics. This one came after 'Halloween' and before 'Escape from New York' and it must be his most spooky movie. According to Roger Ebert, the fog was a disappointing villain but I don't agree with him. Indeed, I thought it was very efficient and I always enjoyed it when, in a horror movie, the protagonists have to face a faceless and dehumanized enemy (see 'Cabin Fever' as well for example). Another thing I enjoyed was that Carpenter didn't waste any time with some sub-plots involving the characters, those stories are always pointless in my opinion. Instead, he focused on the fog and its effects and that was much appreciated. Of course, the acting was rather cheesy and the whole thing was nothing really amazing but it was still one of the most satisfying ghost movies I have seen and it still stands out pretty well 30 years later. Anyway, to conclude, I really enjoyed it and it is definitely worth a look, especially if you are interested in Carpenter's work.

Even though this movie seemed to have a decent reputation, I wasn't expecting much from the damned thing but since there was a really nice cast involved (Jennifer Love Hewitt, Lauren Ambrose, Peter Facinelli, Seth Green, Freddy Rodríguez, Donald Faison, Jaime Pressly, Jason Segel, Eric Balfour, Selma Blair, Jenna Elfman, Melissa Joan Hart, Breckin Meyer), I really had to watch it at some point. Unfortunately, it still ended up being rather  average and borign. Actually, it was only after watching this movie that I came to the conclusion that it was maybe a parody of the genre which could explain why all the characters were so over-the-top. The only character who stood up was the one portrayed by Lauren Ambrose. Indeed, she was the only one playing it straight and I thought she was much more interesting than all these obnoxious and boring stereotypes. I always thought that Ambrose was really impressive in 'Six Feet Under' and she really deserved some better material than this movie to showcase her talent. I mean, there were here and there some good ideas and the ending was rather sweet but that was about it, I'm afraid. Anyway, to conclude, it was a rather weak High-School comedy and it is not really worth a look, except maybe you are fan of this genre.