Reviews by johanlefourbe

Since I kept hearing some great things about this movie and since it was directed by Alfonso Curaon, easily one of the best directors at work nowadays, I was really eager to check this movie and I definitely had some rather high expectations. Well, eventually, I’m afraid the whole thing turned out to to be rather disappointing. I mean, sure, it was rather well done and the girl playing the main character was really cute but I really had a hard time to care about this tale. In fact, I didn’t know it was based on the very famous book of the same name and, even though it is a very popular tale, it always bored me (maybe I watched too much the Japanese cartoon ‘Princess Sara’ when I was a kid). Indeed, it is all really cheesy and full of clichés and since this adaptation was really faithful, I thought it was also rather tedious, I’m afraid. Eventually, as a follow-up, Cuaron would once again adapt a very famous book, ‘Great Expectations’, and even though it didn’t get much love when it was released, I actually enjoyed it more than this movie. Anyway, coming back to our main feature, even though I thought it was rather underwhelming, it was still a decent watch and it is definitely worth a look, especially if you are interested in Alfonso Curaon’s work. 

I already saw this movie, in fact, I even saw it in the movie theater when it was released, but since it was a while back and since it was available on Netflix, I thought I might as well check it out again. In fact, the first time around, I was actually rather disappointed by the damned thing. Obviously, I wasn't expecting a masterpiece but after reading Roger Ebert's review (the guy actually gave it a 4 stars review), I became really curious and I was expecting something very good. However, I seriously couldn’t see what was so great about it. Well, after all these years, with some much lower expectations, I was much more able to enjoy the damned thing. Indeed, it is actually a very well made action flick and I'm surprised that Philip Noyce never became a major action director but maybe the guy didn’t want to be pigeonholed into a specific genre. Furthermore, Angelina Jolie, probably the biggest female movie star at the time, was just so charismatic and gave such an intense performance. I still think that she could have used 5 or 6 extra kilos of muscles but she was still really good nonetheless. Indeed, even if the story was sometimes rather preposterous, she always sold it very well. Another thing that I enjoyed was the fact that, nowadays, too many blockbusters have a ridiculous running time around 150 mins which is so annoying and I really did appreciate that, back then, this action flick was lasting less than 100 mins which was perfect for this material. Eventually, since it was some perfect material for a franchise and since it was a box-office success, they made right away some plan for releasing a sequel but, after many years, it never happened and, to be honest, I’m not sure that anyone would really care at this point. Anyway, to conclude, even though it was nothing really ground-breaking, thanks to Angelina Jolie’s charisma and some really solid action scenes, it is actually worth a look.

I already saw this movie but since I had it on DVD, I was quite eager to check it out again. Obviously, since I'm a huge fan of Martin Scorsese's work, I was really eager to check the damned thing. To be be honest, I actually think that his movies starring Leonardo DiCaprio are actually a little bit overrated, especially if you compare them to the masterpieces Scorsese delivered earlier in his career but I have to admit that, together, they made some really good movies and this one was a perfect example. Indeed, they gave us here some awesome directing and acting, especially by Leonardo DiCaprio who seemed to have a great year considering the fact that 'Inception' was released not so long after. I also loved the mood and the plot was quite spellbinding to watch, at least, until the end. Indeed, unfortunately, like any other thriller dealing with some mystery, they had to give us an explanation but, like most of the movies in this genre, the end was actually rather weak. Indeed, while the rest of the movie completely made sense, this ending was in my opinion seriously unbeliveable and really difficult to swallow. Eventually, it’s a movie that really works only once in my opinion. Anyway, even if it wasn't flawless, it was still a very good movie, the whole thing was just really entertaining and it is definitely worth a look, especially if you are interested in Martin Scorsese's work.