9/10 CHECK THIS MOVIE OUT....very "slept-on" as the hip-hop heads would say. it's the same director of French Connection, well I think it's a better film than French Connection to boot.... 4/10 badly conceived, stupidly contrived, and painful to watch, just an ugly movie. It gets a 4 cause it more or less kept me watching all the way through and the acting was good.
The Last King of Scotland: 7/10 This movie was at its best when it focused in on Whitaker's portrayal of Amin. I thought he did a fantastic job of getting across how unpredictable his regime was and I thought the movie did an excellent job of depicting Idi Amin as a charismatic dictator. On the other hand, I thought the movie suffered when it went away from him and things like undeveloped characters, unconvincing relationships, and a rushed ending stood out too much when Whitaker wasn't on the screen.
The Last King Of Scotland 8/10 Forest Whitaker's Oscar-winning performance= 10/10 Directed by Kevin MacDonald, Starring Forest Whitaker, James McAvoy, Kerry Washington, and Gillian Anderson. This movie is excellent and if not for Forest Whitaker, I would have rated it lower than a 8/10. It chornicles the relationship between a scottish doctor(McAvoy) who travels to Uganda and becomes King Idi Amin Dada (Whitaker). The movie is basically told from the Scotsman's point of view. I recommend it as a rental. Audition 9/10 Directed by Takashi Miike, starring Ryu Ishibashia, Eihi Shiina, Tetsu Sakawa, Jun Kunimira. http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0235198/ I had heard of this film after watching Miike's "Ichi The Killer" film, but I had never really gotten the opportunity to watch it until now. Miike is a talented director, and does a birlliant job with this film. The film may start slow for some, but I warn you, a train wreck is coming and it will hit hard. HIGHLY RECOMMENDED. True Grit 7/10 Directed by Henry Hathaway, Starring John Wayne, Glen Campbell, Kim Darby, Robert Duvall, and Dennis Hopper. John Wayne won a Best Actor Oscar in 1969 for his role as Marshall Reuben 'Rooster' Cogburn in this film. I watched this film with the hope of a meaningful role played by Wayne, but it seems true what I read about this film. I had read in a newspaper article about the movies getting remastered and re-released to celebrate the Duke's (John Wayne) 100th birthday. The writer wrote that the academy gave Wayne the oscar as a 'throw the old dog a bone' award, much like Martin Scorsese getting it for The Departed for 2006. Still, John Wayne did well, and has a number of great lines, and admittedly does a good job, although not Best Actor Oscar worthy by today's standards. Duvall is interesting as the protagonist character in this film. Recommended as a rental if you enjoy old time movies. This film is more a drama than an action film, although not without its action.
Fulltime Killer 9/10 Directed by Johnnie To, Ka-Fa Wai, starring Andy Lau, Takashi Sorimachi, and Kelly Lin. This is the kind of movie that makes me giddy and overjoyed that I am an foregin film fan. This movie is a gem of a action movie of chess moves between two contract killers. Takashi Sorimachi plays the quiet and calculated killer, while Andy Lau plays the flamboyant, cocky up-and comer who wants to be the 'top' dog assasin. I have personally never seen a more cocky character on film than the one Lau portrays. Fans of foregin film should not pass up the opportunity to see this film. It is one of the best films to come out of Hong Kong ever. Highly recommended and espeically if you enjoy gunplay and assasin chess games. HBO's The Wire Season One 11/10 Created by David Simon, starring Dominic West, Lance Reddick, Sonja Sohn, Idris Elba, Michael K. Williams, Andre Royo, Larry Gilliard Jr, and Wood Harris. I was so engaged from episode one that I ended up watching all 13 1-hour episodes in a matter of days. If you enjoy police drama, undercover work, office/chain-of-command poltics, murder, drug running/trafficking, and general chaos, this series is right up your alley. My favorite thing about this series is that it does not hold back on its story and brutal truth. The city of Baltimore's Westside drug culture is run by a durg lord, Avon Barksdale (Wood Harris Remember The Titans), and the Baltimore detective agency run by Lance Reddick is oon the 'wire' (Wiretaps on phones, pagers, bugs etc) to implicate target Avon Barksdale. This is more engrossing than any movie or TV show I have ever seen. It beats watching a 2-3 hour movie, simply because its story is told across 13 1-hour episodes. Highly recommended viewing, but not recommended if you get queasy from watching brutality, and general chaos in the streets.
Fifty Pills 0/10 I rented this thinking it would be funny. It is funny, but only in the snese that it is laughably bad. NOT RECOMMENDED. Johnny Was 8/10 Directed by Mark Hammond, starring Vinnie Jones, Samantha Mumba, Lennox Lewis, Patrick Bergin, Roger Daltrey, and Eriq La Salle. I had had my eye on this in the rental stores for a couple months. Why I didn't see it sooner, I don't know, maybe I was reluctant. This is a Irish made film, and it is really good. Everyone speaks in slang, whether it be reggae/Jamaican, Irish, British. All the accents blend togother amazingly well, which tells me it was written well. If you are not a veteran of British slang in movies, you may need to watch this a couple of times to understand some of the dialogue. If british slang bothers you, don't bother watching this film. Vinnie Jones (If this name isn't familiar to you, shame on you!! Lock, Stock, and Two Smoking Barrells, Snatch ) stars as Johnny. Johnny walked away from a terrorist bombing past and has been hiding out in a flat between a drug dealer (La Salle) and a pirate rasta radio DJ (Lewis) for 5 years. Everything is peachy until one day he is found by his old mate, Flynn (Played by Patrick Bergin) who has just escaped prison and is looking to reunite with his old fellers to do some more bombings and general chaos. Johnny is pulled back into his past and needs to get out once again. Lennox Lewis plays a really good character, a native Jamacian known as 'Ras' running a pirate radio station. Lewis, being 6'5 and a real-life boxer is commanding in this role. Eriq La Salle ( TV show ER) plays Julius, a drug pusher really well and with class. La Salle and Bergin engage in some really entertaining verbal quarrel. Recommended if you enjoy foregin movies from Eurpoe. Not recommended if you can't stand anything other than perfect spoken english.
Spiderman 3 7/10 It was a good movie, but there were too many villains at once in the movie (first Harry, then Sandman, then Venom, then Sandman and Venom together and Harry turns good...too much.) Plus, there wasn't enough of Venom. They barely showed him at all. Hopefully, he can somehow return in the next movie (if there is one). Fast and Furious: Tokyo Drift 4/10 It just wasn't a good movie. Plain and simple. It had no plot, and the race scenes were way too long. Not reccomended.
Pirates 3 - 9/10 My favorite of the trilogy. Even though the story line was twisted and confusing at first, when it all came together it was simply amazing. Also Keira Knightley is right up there with Jessica Alba in hotness IMO.
10/10 This movie is far better then I expected. Didn't even know it was based on a true story. Fight scenes are magnificent. Story which I was really surprised by was great as well. Like the Last Samurai.
The Fountain by Darren Aronofsky 9 or 10/10 I gotta watch it a few more times, but it was incredible. Even more than I expected from Aronofsky.
Rescue Me - Season 1 10/10 I've watched this season over and over again, I love it and the show. Hilarious and dramatic.
<div class="quote_poster">Swish Wrote</div><div class="quote_post"> 20/10 Simply amazing, my favorite movie ever.</div> Agree, its also my favorite. Scorsese = god.
GoodFellas>Fearless>Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind>8.0 All good recommendations. Knocked Up 6/10 I found it hard to get into this movie, all they did was smoke weed and crack little one liners. It had some moments, but I would wait for the rental.
The Missing 9/10 Directed by Ron Howard, starring Cate Blanchett, Aaron Eckhart, Evan Rachel Wood, Tommy Lee Jones and Val Kilmer. Based on a novel by Thomas Edison, The Long Ride and adapted for the screen by Ken Kaufman. Ron Howard is a master director and storyteller, espeically with historical dramasApollo 13, A Beautiful Mind, Cinderella Man. Most of the time he does historical films, but The Missing is a fiction story, but it is extremely plausible and a retelling of events that probably happened, based on actual kidnappings of young American women to be sold for slavery in Mexico. Cate Blanchett plays a doctor whose daughter, played by Evan Rachel Wood is kidnapped by rogue Apache indians to be sold in Mexico for slavery. Tommy Lee Jones plays Blanchett's enstranged father who helps Blanchett track the Apaches and get her daughter back. I have seen this movie a few times, and I never get bored of it. I love the western setting, the melancholy feel of the whole film. Highly recommended. Posse 4/10 Directed by Mario Van Peebles, starring Mario Van Peebles, Billy Zane, Stephen Baldwin, Tommy 'Tiny' Lister, Big Daddy Kane, Melvin Van Peebles, and Woody Strode. I rented this with some antipciation for a good western. Rather, it turned out to be pretty badly directed. The cast was nicely cast, but I just can't help the feeling that Mario Van Peebles should have left the directing to someone else more expereinced or more able. There are a few cool sequences where Van Peebles makes himself look badass as Jessie Lee, a black cowboy and ringleader of the 'Posse'. Maybe it was the predictabilty I felt as I watched it, maybe it was the absolutely cheesy acting, espeically on Billy Zane's part. Zane had a cheesy smile throughout the film, which seemed to imply he wasn't taking his role seriously, or Van Peebles poorly directed the whole thing. The only thing I really liked about this film was the way Woody Strode was used to introduce and finnish the film, although that was all of 5 minutes, give or take. Freedom Writers 9/10 Directed by Richard LaGravense, starring Hilary Swank. This is a film I believe EVERYONE should see. It is about inner city kids in Long Beach and their struggles, and how they overcame it all. It is based on a true story.
