Reviews by johanlefourbe

After 'El laberinto del fauno', Guillermo del Toro suddenly became hugely popular among the mainstream audience and everybody seemed to be pretty excited to see his following feature, even more than when the first installment was released. Personally, I wasn’t sure about it (I wasn’t exactly blown away by the first installment) and eventually, I was right. I mean, pretty much like the first movie, I have to admit it, it was visually pretty impressive but the story was seriously not really inspiring. Sure, it was interesting and entertaining enough and some of the characters looked pretty bad-ass but I really had a hard time to care about the whole thing. Maybe I was bothered by all the romantic stuff, maybe the whole thing should have been darker, I don’t know. But I guess that's not the point here. Since then, there has been some never ending discussion about a possible 3rd installment but it seems unlikely that it will ever get made. Not only there is apparently some rights issue involved but also Del Toro seems to be one of the busiest directors in the world, even though he manages to make only 1 movie every 5 years. Anyway, even though the whole thing didn’t really convince me, it still looked really gorgeous, and only for this, it is definitely worth a look.

By now, I have seen almost all the films directed by Jim Sheridan (I’m only missing ‘The Field’). Nowadays, we don’t hear much from the guy and ever since he went to direct ‘Get Rich or Die Tryin'’, easily one of the weirdest career choices ever made by any director, his career was never the same afterwards and it has been more than a decade since he has released a critical hit. Eventually, if things don’t improve for him in the near future, he would be forever remembered as the one director who did manage to work no less than 3 times with the great Daniel Day-Lewis. From this trilogy, the movie was probably the least prestigious one but I still really liked it. Sure, the story was nothing really amazing but Daniel Day-Lewis was, as usual, pretty awesome. Indeed, the guy spent a staggering 3 years training as a boxer in preparation for this role and, as long as the movie was focusing on this character, it was quite spellbinding. Anyway, to conclude, even though it was definitely not a masterpiece, it was still a decent watch and it is definitely worth a look, especially if you are interested in Daniel Day-Lewis’s work.

I thought it would be good but it turned out to be much better than I expected. It is rather funny that when the rumor came out that David Fincher was making a movie about Facebook, many people started to actually trash him (you should have checked the boards on IMDB when they still existed). Indeed, it is pretty obvious that an average director would have made an average flick with this material but Fincher succeeded in making one of the best movies of the year. I mean, I don't even care about Facebook at all, I understand that many people really love it but I really don't care about this website whatsoever. I remember it perfectly, I went to see this movie with my wife in the movie theater and, after just 5 minutes, after the break-up between Jesse Eisenberg and Rooney Mara, I was already hooked. I seriously don't care if Mark Zuckerberg is actually a completely different person in real life, the Mark Zuckerberg they showed in this movie was just fascinating. Basically, the guy was a genius but he didn't look like most of your typical lead characters, physically and mentally. Furthermore, he was a disaster in the way he interacted with other people and this whole combination was just spellbinding to behold. So, the writing was quite impressive, but the directing was just as good and so was the acting as well. To conclude, in my opinion, it was yet another really strong directing effort from David Fincher and it is definitely worth a look.

I wasn’t really sure what to expect from this movie but I was really eager to check  it out, above all because there was a stellar cast involved. Eventually, even though it was not bad at all, to be honest,  it turned out to be a rather boring costume drama, even if it came from Ivory-Merchant, pretty much the all-star team in the genre. Obviously, the costumes and settings were all beautiful but I really had a hard time to care about this story. Furthermore, even though there was a really neat cast (Uma Thurman, Kate Beckinsale, Anjelica Huston, Nick Nolte), why on Earth didn’t they get an Italian actor to play this Italian character ?!? It was seriously distracting and I think it was a rather poor choice. A part from that, all the actors delivered a decent job, the whole thing looked quite gorgeous but, unfortunately, I always find it difficult to care for the supposedly fascinating romantic intrigues of the aristocracy. To conclude, even though it didn’t really work for me, it was still a decent watch and it is worth a look, especially if you like the genre or if you are interested in James Ivory's work.

[Link removed - login to see]Basically, there was a time when I would go to a video game shop (which is now closed) and I would buy there on a regular basis 5 DVDs for 5 euros and, sometimes, since I would be missing 1 DVD, I would pick up pretty much anything at random just to reach 5 movies. Anyway, following this amazing process, I ended up watching some rather obscure movies and this one was definitely one of them. In fact, the main reason I saw the damned thing was because Amanda Seyfried was involved but, eventually, she only had a rather small part. Anyway, something rather weird actually happened with this movie. Indeed, from the start, it all seemed rather hopeless and he whole thing was indeed pretty weak and but then, completely against my expectations, the end actually saved this movie from being a total disaster. It was really surprising since I don’t usually care at all for the usual twist endings at the end of your average thriller but this one actually worked for me. However, even if the ending turned out to be decent, the movie itself was still pretty damned average and I don’t think it is really worth a look. 

Since I have always been interested in Spike Lee’s work, I was really eager to check out this movie and it took me many years to finally get my hands on the damned thing. Unfortunately, the whole thing turned out to be a huge disappointment and while everyone seems to believe that the guy has lost his touch many years ago, it was the first time I started to believe that they could be actually right. I mean, sure, the directing was decent and there was a nice cast involved but the concept was so misguided, it was seriously rather cringe-inducing to behold. Indeed, the story was just really preposterous, combining some financial scandal drama/thriller with a comedy/drama about a guy having sex with some lesbians to make them pregnant... I mean, seriously?!? For all these years, Spike Lee has been fighting for the rights of African-Americans in order for them to be fairly represented in the entertainment business and, here, he came up with something borderline homophobic. To conclude, it was a rather weird movie and definitely not in a good way so I cannot possibly recommend it, even if you are like me interested in Spike Lee’s work.

After hearing so many bad things about ‘Twilight’, obviously, I had some really low expectations towards the damned thing but, surprisingly, I thought it was actually not bad at all. Sure, it was still nothing really amazing but I honestly think it was a decent watch. Unfortunately, I can’t say the same about this sequel. Indeed, while the first installment did develop some neat ideas, this sequel was just boring and not interesting at all. I mean, I still didn’t hate the damned thing and I don't think it is as bad as many people say but I can't say I enjoyed it either. The main issue, in m opinion, is that there was seriously nothing much going on during the whole thing. Indeed, I think that the relationship between Bella and Edward was, at first, rather interesting but, from this movie, they decided to focus on this romantic triangle involving Jacob as well which was just a terrible idea. The main problem with this idea is not only it was rather tedious but, above all, it goes on and on, and ends up eventually nowhere. To conclude, even though it is not as bad as everyone seems to think, it is still pretty damned average and not really worth a look.

To be honest, I had no idea what to expect from this flick and the main reason I wanted to check it out was because there were a couple of decent actors involved. Apparently, it is some kind of Australian cult-classic and it made a clean sweep with the Australian Film Institute awards (the local Oscars) in 2004 winning in all 13 film categories. Well, I have to admit it, I was so surprised by this flick. Indeed, who would have thought that Sam Worthington could act so well ?!? While watching this flick, he was actually reminding me of Russell Crowe, another Australian actor who can display, at the same time, some masculinity and some sensitivity as well. Concerning Abbie Cornish who played the main character here, she was also quite impressive. Eventually, there was not much going on story-wise but of course, it was not the point here. In my opinion, it was more about the mood which was just mesmerizing thanks to some really solid directing. To conclude, even though it is a rather obscure feature, I was really impressed by the damned thing and I think it is definitely worth a look, especially if you like the genre.