Garden State (2004)

Synopsis: Young man returns home for his mother's funeral after a long absence. 

Appraisal: This film tries to blend drama and comedy, but fails on both accounts. The characters and situations do not ring true; on the other hand, it is not really funny either. Adding to that, it has some embarrassing scenes, the shouting at the quarry being one of them; another is when 'Sam' (one of the most obnoxious characters ever in a film) does "something original", an all time low in celluloid history. Give yourself a break and skip this one. 

Rating: 24

Le fils (2002)

English Title: The Son. 

Synopsis: A master carpenter takes in a new pupil; they are linked through a past event. The master knows about the link between the two; the pupil doesn't. 

Appraisal: The developments of the plot are predictable enough, once the aforementioned past event is revealed to the audience; the viewer's interest is sustained, if only barely, mainly due to some fine psychological characterizations. Shot mostly in excrutiating shouldercam, showing close view of the lead's back of the neck, it is unsuitable to motion-sick persons. 

Rating: 49

The Voice of the Violin (1915)

Synopsis: Two brothers, one good and the other evil, compete for the attention of a young woman, apparently their stepsister. But the father does not know his sons...
Appraisal: This little drama is actually also a piece of advertising for the Edison Laboratories. It is reasonably well staged, but otherwise forgettable.

Sumerki zhenskoi dushi (1913)

English title: Twilight of a Woman's Soul.
Synopsis: A rich woman ends up harmed by a pauper she tries to help, and long term consequences ensue from that.
Appraisal: The early films' elliptic fashion of showing sex has, in this one, the effect of not allowing one to know the exact extent of some crucial events in the development of the plot.
This film has a careful mise-en-scène, the acting is fine, the frame composition is well made, and the cinematography is also good. The story has implausible elements, but keeps your interest.
For me the most interesting side of the film is a look into the way that the upper class regarded itself and the lower one. The rich in this film are shown as basically good people that try to help the poor. The poor are shown as lechers and crooks, and ultimately undeserving of the charity of the rich. Remember that this is pre-revolution Russia, and that this worldview had its days counted.
Post Comment: I have just read an article about this film's director, and it seems that his later films show a radically different, more critical, view of the upper class, so this one must be an exception.

Carnages (2002)

English Title: Carnage. 

Synopsis: Several stories: a bullfighter is injured and the bull is killed, a child draws animals bigger than people, a taxidermist lives with his mother, a couple is about to have babies, a teacher finds out about her mother's secret past, an aspiring actress takes on odd jobs, an ice skater wants to kill himself. The stories are linked somehow, and each part of the dead bull ends up in one of the stories. 

Appraisal: None of the stories is particularly interesting, and neither is their interrelation. Give yourself a break and skip this one. 

Rating: 22

Non ti muovere (2004)

English Title: Don't Move.
Synopsis: During his wait while a surgery is performed on his daughter, a man recalls his simultaneous involvement with two women prior to the birth of the same daughter.
Appraisal: It has a few good moments and an interesting character (Italia), but most of the time it is not much above routine television drama. Its development is predictable and not very satisfactory.
Rating: 45

The Terminal (2004)

Synopsis: A tourist arriving in the United States learns that there has been a revolution in his country. Due to that, he can neither enter the U.S. territory nor return to his country, becoming a prisoner in the airport. Appraisal: This is formulaic filmmaking at its worst. While intended as a critique of the supremacy of bureaucracy over the individual, nothing could be more bureaucratic (and less individualistic) than this film's screenwriting and directing. It looked like a bad TV-series episode stretched to over 2 hours' length. Give yourself a break and skip this movie. Rating: 25 (note: I raised its rating to 38 upon second (partial) viewing. It definitely isn't as bad as I perceived it the first time I saw it.)

A Jitney Elopement (1915)

Synopsis: A guy impersonates his girlfriend's parentally imposed fiancé; later they get involved in an automobile chase.
Appraisal: There is nothing really remarkable about the film; if you are not too demanding there is enough of a plot in the beginning to catch the attention; and halfway to the end it becomes more action-oriented, which may also entertain you on some primitive level.

In the Park (1915)

This is the umpteenth comedy from that era featuring a park, some thieves, some couples, a cop, and a lake. Well, I guess they had to make a living.

The Champion (1915)

Synopsis: A down and out fellow becomes a boxer quite unexpectedly.
Appraisal: This comedy has a sort of energetical quality that makes it watchable despite its silly plot. When I watch this kind of film I cannot help wondering whether its audience at the time of its release was composed mostly of adults or of children. Most of the gags seem appropriate to children, but I suspect that, like in our own era, the average viewer was a little infantilized.

A Night Out (1915/I)

Synopsis: Initially, a pair of drunkards at a restaurant provoke a patron. One of the drunkards is meaner and abuses his meeker partner all the time. Later he goes to a hotel to spend the night and gets involved with the wife of the guy that had chased him off of the restaurant.
Appraisal: Dull and overstretched.

Le straordinarissime avventure di Saturnino Farandola (1914)

These 'Extraordinary Adventures' are intended to be in the Jules Verne style, and the film even has one of Verne's characters in it. It is not very remarkable but I suppose it could please children, though of course the only children that could be interested in it have grown up and are now very old or dead. If you turn your critical judgement off, I guess you could go through it painlessly, as I have. It is pacy enough and the visuals are at times quite pretty. Camerawork is also rather advanced for its time. The weak point of the movie is the plot, which is uninvolving and does not make sense much of the time.