Reviews by johanlefourbe

Can you believe that I have seen every single movie starring Eddie Murphy?!? Fortunately, I didn’t pay to watch any of them, I just saw them on TV for free but, even so, it felt like a huge waste of time after all. So, from all his movies, this one probably had one of the worst concepts and it was indeed a box office and critical failure when it was released. To be honest, even though it might sound surprising, I actually thought it was in fact not bad at all and, in my case, it was one of the very few movies starring Eddie Murphy which I found at least a little bit entertaining. I mean, even though Murphy was playing the lead, I didn’t care much for his character who was in fact rather lame and completely unbelievable. In fact,  it was Jeff Goldblum who really saved his movie for me. Indeed, even though the material was rather lame, I thought he was actually really good and very often quite hilarious. Anyway, to conclude, there is a fair chance that my rating might be way too high for this movie, it is indeed a rather average flick but I still think it is worth a look though, if only for Jeff Goldum.

To be honest, I’m not sure how I actually ended up watching this flick. I guess it was because there were a couple of interesting actors involved but it was definitely an obscure feature. Since I had never heard of this flick before, I didn't really know what to expect from the damned thing but, eventually, I thought it was actually pretty decent. I mean, obviously, it was nothing original and, usually, I don’t care for such thrillers as they always use the same old gimmicks. However, here, somehow, I thought that the story was fairly entertaining and the characters were interesting enough. Basically, it is a rather subtle movie and most of it worked very well. Above all, it was nice to see Edward Burns finally working in a nice movie for once. Indeed, I always had a weak spot for this actor but, to be honest, most of his recent movies have been some major garbage (‘27 dresses’, ‘A sound of thunder’, ‘One Missed Call, ‘Echelon Conspiracy’, ...). To conclude, maybe I was a little bit generous with my rating here but I thought it was a decent watch and it is definitely worth a look, especially if you want to see something watchable starring Edward Burns.

To be honest, I wasn’t really expecting much from this flick but since it was starring Arnold Schwarzenegger, I thought I might as well check it out. In fact, I remember it quite well, for some reasons, at the end of the 90’s, with the end of the millennium coming up, the studio were trying to exploit the idea that , in 2000, it could be the end of the world with movies such as ‘Armageddon’, ‘Deep Impact’ and this one. Well, from the whole bunch, this movie was definitely the weakest one, I’m afraid. Honestly, I wasn't really impressed by Schwarzenegger in this flick but, at least, I though that Gabriel Byrne and Kevin Pollak had some good moments but it was certainly not enough to make this really entertaining. I still think that the whole thing had some potential but eventually, it was just a very lame movie. The main issue with this kind of features, in my opinion, is that they try to make you believe that they are all really dark and edgy but, at the end of the day, it is a just an average action movie with fewer lights on. To conclude, I didn’t care at all for this movie and I don’t think it is really worth a look.

To be honest, when I first heard about this movie, the whole concept didn’t appeal to me at all but since it was actually quite successful at the box-office, I thought I should check it out after all. Eventually, even though I wasn’t exactly a huge fan of the whole thing, I have to admit that it was pretty entertaining and I definitely had a good time watching this. Above all, I thought that Heath Ledger was very charismatic and Paul Bettany was pretty funny and, together, they made a very nice duo. Concerning the modern music in the soundtrack, it didn’t bother me but I didn’t really care for it either. In my opinion, it was a rather pointless attempt to give some edge to such a medieval story. Concerning the actors involved, it is rather sad that it didn’t turn out very well after all for any of them. Obviously, while Heath Ledger was supposed to become one of the greatest actors of his generation, he eventually tragically died 7 years later. The always charming Shannyn Sossamon, in her first part here, was hailed at the time as the next-hit girl but she disappeared very quickly and she shows up nowadays only in some really obscure movies. Finally, concerning Paul Bettany, he was another really talented actor who never really managed to fulfill the great expectations I had in him (he still managed to get married with Jennifer Connelly, arguably one of the most gorgeous women in the world). Anyway, coming back to our main feature, at the end of the day, I don’t believe it was something exceptional but it was a well done and harmless action flick and I think it is definitely worth a look.

Honestly, I wasn’t expecting much from this flick but since it was starring Sylvester Stallone, I thought I might as well give it a try. Back then, Stallone’s career was going through a major dip but he would finally manage to make an impressive come-back 4 years later with ‘Rocky Balboa’. First of all, I have to admit that I was very surprised by the impressive cast involved (Sylvester Stallone, Kris Kristofferson, Jeffrey Wright, Tom Berenger, Stephen Lang, Robert Patrick, Sean Patrick Flanery, Dina Meyer, Polly Walker). Unfortunately, the story was rather weak, I’m afraid. Indeed, the whole concept of a rehab clinic specializing in treating law enforcement officials was rather far-fetched and the whole thing never remotely managed to convince me at any point. As a result, the movie was just rather underwhelming and it was basically another rather hopeless thriller with a really convoluted plot. I mean, come on, when you movie has such lame titles like ‘D-Tox’ or ‘Eye See You’, you should know you are already in trouble. To conclude, I thought it was pretty weak and I don’t think it is really worth a look, except maybe if you are a die-hard fan of Sylvester Stallone. 

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. To be honest, since it was a Luc Besson production, I didn’t expect much from it it but, at least , I have to admit it, every single scene involving Michel Muller was pure gold and Jean Reno did deliver a decent performance.  However, these Japanese chick was so just f*cking annoying.... As a matter of fact, I don’t think she was in fact the worst issue with this flick. Indeed, what really bothered me the most that the whole thing was just full of terrible cliches about Japanese people. To make things worse, even though the action was taking place in Japan, everybody was apparently able to speak some  perfect French there. To conclude, even though I have seen worse, I thought the whole thing was just very weak movie and it is not really worth a look.

After his impressive directing debut ‘Control’, there was a really good buzz about his next directing effort, especially since it was starring George Clooney. Eventually, I have even seen the damned thing in the movie theater and even though this movie didn’t get much love, I thought it was actually pretty good. Indeed, first of all, just like with ‘Control’, the whole thing was really beautifully shot, I also enjoyed  the great mood created here and George Clooney was, as usual, very good here. Unfortunately, to be honest, there was nothing much really going on during the whole movie. Indeed, not only there was no action scenes whatsoever, there were also a very few dialogues as well. At the end of the day, you either love this approach (Roger Ebert thought it was really amazing) or it bores you to death (what happened to most of the viewers, I’m afraid). In my case, I was in between those two groups as I was able to appreciate but it didn’t completely work for me. At the end of the day, it seemed that it provided too much mood and nice visuals instead of some actual substance. Still, to conclude, even though it was maybe not a real masterpiece, I thought it was still pretty good and it is definitely worth a look, especially if you like the genre.