Reviews by johanlefourbe

Even though this movie didn’t turn out to be a huge critical success, since I’m a big fan of Clint Eastwood, I was really eager to check it out. Eventually, who would have expected the man with no name to deliver a movie about psychics? Anyway, Eastwood had a pretty good cast involved, Matt Damon gave, as usual, a pretty good performance and the directing was seriously really strong, especially during the opening scene which was dealing with a tsunami. Unfortunately, even if the story was quite intriguing, in fact, they should have focused on one of these 3 stories, instead of developing those 3 story-lines at the same time. Indeed, each one could or should have been a fully-fleshed tale and it would have worked better that way. Still, even though I have always been rather skeptical about psychics in general, this movie gave an interesting view on the subject. To conclude, even though the whole thing was flawed and even though it might be considered as a minor effort from this director, I still think it was an intriguing and well made fantastic drama and it is definitely worth a look, especially if you are interested in Clint Eastwood's work.

To be honest, it is a rather obscure movie but since I have always been a big fan of the great Philip Seymour Hoffman, I was really eager to check it out. On top of that, it was dealing with a fascinating subject, compulsive gambling, and, even though this movie doesn’t seem to have a stellar reputation, I think it might be the best movie  I have seen dealing with this subject. Seriously, I'm so amazed that this movie is not better known. Anyway, Hoffman definitely gave one of his best performances here and the whole thing was just merciless in showing the ordeal of those gamblers. I mean, even when the main character seems to have won enough to get out of trouble, he goes on with gambling until he loses everything ... and he eventually loses more than 10 million dollars !!!! Indeed, eventually, those gamblers never really care about winning or losing, they just want to play as long as they have some money, regardless of the consequences.  Eventually, I thought it was a rather depressing but also fascinating study about human psychology. To conclude, it is a real shame that nobody seemed to have heard about this movie, I thought it was really good and it is definitely worth a look, especially if you are interested in Philip Seymour Hoffman's work.

Even though it seemed to be a rather obscure movie, since I have a weak spot for Cate Blanchett, I was still eager to check it out. Well, eventually, even though it turned out to be a decent watch, I have to admit that I actually had a hard time to care about the damned thing. Basically, it was another tale about the French resistance and while it was not bad, it was nothing original and, to be honest, rather stereotypical. Indeed, the French people was constantly portrayed as either some brave resistance fighters or some worthless collaborators but  I'm afraid the reality was a little more complex than that and this approach was justly seriously tedious. Furthermore, even though Cate Blanchett delivered a solid performance, it was rather difficult to judge if she was really good or not. Indeed, she was supposed to portray a British spy in France but these French guys didn't look or sound French at all (indeed, except for a few words, they all spoke English throughout the whole thing). Anyway, to conclude, even though it was a rather flawed, it was still a decent WWII story and I think it is worth a look, especially if you like the genre.

Nowadays, I have Netflix and Popcorn and not only I have since then an endless selection of movies to choose from but, as a result, I have become slightly more picky regarding the movies I watch. Before, I used to watch pretty much anything as long as it was starring one or two actors I was interested in and, as a result, I would sometimes end up watching some really obscure features. This movie was a perfect example. Obviously, I didn’t expect much from this movie but, somehow, I still ended up watchin the damned thing. In fact, the funniest thing about this movie is that, literally just minutes before I was going to watch it, I got a message from one of my dearest listal friends warning me as, and I quote, it is 'one of the most inane movies ever made'. Eventually, I'm afraid this message was the only funny thing concerning this really weak family feature and my buddy was just right. Apparently, there seems to be some kind rule saying that every major action star has to star at least once in a comedy but, except maybe for Schwarzenegger, the end result has always been dreadful and this movie was definitely not an exception. Indeed, the premise was just completely predictable and not entertaining whatsoever and, even worse, Vin Diesel, who has never been really the most skilled actor in the world, didn't have any feeling for comedy. Anyway, to conclude, the whole thing was indeed inane, boring and rather embarassing to watch and it is not worth a look whatsoever.

I already saw this movie but since I just brought a brand new awesome TV, I thought I might as well rewatch it. Back then, the first time around, like everyone else, I was prepping for 'The Avengers' so I definitely had to watch this flick. I have to admit that I was at first positively surprised by the damned thing. Indeed, I really enjoyed the tone of the first part and it was pretty neat to see a super-hero flick taking place in the 40's for once. Furthemore, the whole thing looked really good and I was rather impressed by how they managed to make Chris Evans look really small and it did look really convincing. Furthermore, they took their time to establish Steve Rogers's  personality and it worked rather well, thanks to a solid performance by Chris Evans. So, I did enjoy the first half but, unfortunately, I wasn't really convinced by the rest of the movie. Eventually, the biggest issue was mainly with the plot which was basically some rather disposable succession of generic action scenes. At least, I have to admit that Red Skull was a pretty cool villain and the Nazis have always been the most dependable bad guys. However, just like with ‘Thor’, rewatching this movie 10 years later with the knowledge of all what would happen to this character, I have to admit that it was much more rewarding than I expected. That’s the funny thing, the most recent MCU efforts might have been much bigger but they also have become seriously formulaic while all these Phase one movies, with the notable exception of ‘Iron Man 2’, feel so much fresher and satisfying. Anyway, to conclude, even though it was maybe not a complete home-run, it was still a seriously entertaining super-hero flick and it is definitely worth a look, especially if you like the genre.

About 13 years after the first serie started, they decided to finally make a feature length movie of this mythical TV-show. I have to admit that I have never seen this show but since it is one of the longest running movie franchises ever made, I was quite eager to check it out. First of all, to be honest,  the damned thing was rather long and slow (it is actually the longest movie of the whole franchise, at least, when I saw this movie) and there was no action scenes whatosever but it was not really surprising since the whole thing took place mostly on the Enterprise. In fact, the lack of action was actually made on purpose to contrast with 'Star Wars' which was filled with action stuff. Furthermore, the acting was also rather weak and wooden, especially by William Shatner who was sometimes borderline ridiculous. Still, there was some fascinating stuff as well. First of all, even though the whole ting looked sometimes rather cheesy, there were also some really impressive scenes, visually speaking, and I enjoyed the fact that they tried to make something rather cerebral instead of something action oriented. Furthermore, I also enjoyed all those characters working as a crew and this concept obviously became the blue print for so many TV-shows and SF movies that came afterwards. To conclude, even though it was definitely flawed, it was still quite entertaining and it is definitely worth a look, especially if you like the genre.