Buzz (2005)

Description: Documentary about the life and career of screenwriter A.I. Bezzerides. For anyone who is interested in how pictures are made.

Supernova (2000/I)

Synopsis: A spaceship answers a distress call from a distant planet, and upon getting there they encounter a man who has found a strange object which has rejuvenating powers.

Appraisal: Science-fiction with some thematic resemblance with the film which I saw just prior to it. This one is watchable but no big deal, being preceded by many films with similar ideas.

Rating: 36

The Fountain (2006)

Synopsis: A medical researcher investigates cancer in the hope of finding a cure for his wife. Meanwhile, the latter writes a novel about the search for the mythical tree of life in pre-colombian Central America.

Appraisal: Worthless "epic" drama which is highly recommended for masochists. Along with this one, there has been a flurry of films about personal power released in 2006 (The Illusionist, Perfume), all of them very unhealthy. I wonder if I should worry.

Rating: 15

Ging chaat goo si 4: Ji gaan daan yam mo (1996)

Englisht title: Police Story 4: First Strike.

Synopsis: A Hong Kong cop gets involved in an international affair of illegal trading of nuclear weapons, in Ukraine and Australia.


Appraisal: Fairly entertaining spy comedy, with several top-notch action sequences and some well choreographed fights.

I watched a dubbed in Portuguese version.

Rating: 55

Nick of Time (1995)

Synopsis: A man is blackmailed into killing a politician, or else his daughter will be killed.

Appraisal: Very well filmed suspense story. It's really worthwhile to watch a movie in which every filmic resource is used to greatest effect, even though it is obvious that the plot per se, although not unmeritorious, has modest ambitions. 24 (the TV series) has the same central situation, in its first season (2001). Red Eye (2005) is a variation.

Rating: 56

The Killer Elite (1975)

Synopsis (mild spoilers): Two guys work for a private agency who protects important people and kills undesirable ones. One of their operatives receives a higher bid and switches sides; in the process, he shoots his best pal, wounding him seriously. The latter recovers from his injuries and is offered a job to protect a foreign politician; the job entails him the opportunity to get revenge on his ex-partner.

Appraisal: It is blatantly unrealistic in its layout (e.g. the hero and his sidekicks are totally unconvincing as an invincible team) and in the devices employed to drive the action (e.g. the politician's daughter who takes a stroll when there are killers on the prowl outside). There is a certain degree of enjoyability to it, though; the performances are good, the action sequences are well directed, etc. It is my second viewing, with the rating slightly raised.

Rating: 38 (up from 25)

The Golden Child (1986)

Synopsis: A superpowerful kid is kidnapped by an evil entity, who wants to destroy it. A guy in Los Angeles whose occupation is locating missing children is summoned by a woman linked to the magic kid to find him and rescue him.

Appraisal: The judeo-christian concept of a messiah is superimposed on the Tibetan buddhist culture to produce this comic adventure; it is well filmed and kind of entertaining, particularly so an interesting dream sequence; the humor is uneven, ranging from moderately funny to embarrassingly unfunny (the low point being perhaps the 'viva Nepal' scene at the airport).

Rating: 30

Hombre mirando al sudeste (1986)

English title: Man Facing Southeast.

Synopsis: A man appears in a psychiatric institution claiming to be from another planet.

Appraisal: The film sheds some light on the legend of Jesus, viewed in connection with the concept of mental sanity, both in its individual and collective forms. The analysis is correct but incomplete; it would take a brutally honest filmmaker to investigate this kind of phenomenon (I mean Messianism, not extraterrestrials) in a really powerful way. The premise was reused in K-PAX (2001), to even dismaler results.

Rating: 40

Nacho Libre (2006)

Synopsis: A Mexican friar dreams about becoming a professional wrestler.

Appraisal: The primitive humor is possibly suitable for children between 4 and 6. The cinematography and some of the production design are interesting.

Rating: 11

Sin City (2005)

Synopsis: Several stories involving crime and violence. A cop stops a maniac from raping an 11-year-old girl. An ugly man sleeps with a beautiful woman and she is killed while he is asleep. He goes after the killer, who is an extremely nimble fighter. A fugitive from the law chases a woman beater and his goons down to a part of town ruled by prostitutes.

Appraisal: This is a humoristic work in its textual aspect, of a shallow kind that does not preclude enjoyment. The grotesque situations and dialog are subordinated to arresting, rigorously stylized images, resulting in a film that precisely attains its tone and sticks to it. It is comic-book fun, cinematically translated, for the eternal adolescent male.

Rating: 67

Author! Author! (1982)

Synopsis: A playwright is left by his wife; she leaves her many children with him. He has also one of his own. He is beginning the production of his play.

Appraisal: The text, although a bit uneven, has some enjoyable moments and succeeds at showing some aspects of modern life like parenting and divorce, and the particulars of the profession of playwright. The direction is really perfect, ensuring that every actor, including the little ones, is very much at ease in every scene.

Rating: 50

Inland Empire (2006)

Appraisal (spoilers): After two viewings, I still haven't got the story right, that is if there really is one to start with. I have read dozens of theories, but I found none of them half satisfying. Therefore, I must judge this movie as a collage around some central ideas, in which strict logical and causal sense is not alway obeyed. The central themes, on a superficial analysis, seem to be Prostitution, Hollywood, Adultery, and Murder. The film's layout and structure seem to mimic the human mind, a notion previously used in The Shining (1980) (a scene of which is quoted in it) and As Deusas (1972). Several clues point to a two-way interaction, or even an exchange of roles, between real characters and imaginary ones, or maybe between dream and reality, as in Lewis Carroll's famous quandary in "Through the Looking Glass" in which he proposes that we might be somebody's dream, and wonders "what if he left off dreaming?".
Here are the clues:
--the announcer at the end of Marilyn Levens's show says: "where stars make dreams and dreams make stars"; notice how this apparently innocent sentence could be understood in a way that fits the strange theory of mutual interaction between Reality and Fiction.
-- when 'Kingsley' is explaining what happened in the Polish film he says "after the characters had been filming for some time". See? He doesn't say "after the actors had been filming", which would be the reasonable thing, but "after the characters had been filming", which is really odd. He goes on to say, in the same sentence, "they discovered something... inside the story. (...) The two leads were murdered!". Why "inside the story"? How can something "inside the story" affect the real world in any way? Now look at the whole sentence, all in one piece, and reordered: "the characters discovered that the leads were murdered, inside the story". Now, I am not sure what all this means, if anything; it could be that the characters are conscious entities, and suddenly the people who give them life (the leads) disappear; then what? ("what if he left off dreaming?"). And all this comes from the mouth of a character in IE, which is weird too.
-- The 'Phantom' character is looking for an "opening" and is seen both inside the OHIBT movie and outside of it. He is said to be able to disappear.

Well, these are consistent clues, but I'm still a long way from deciphering the dozens of riddles in this film. Anyway, the film succeeds partially at best, in my opinion; it is funny at times, and it establishes a mood that occasionally gets absorbing; it does, however, veer into self-indulgence and self-parody at quite a few occasions. It is unlikely that my opinion would be radically different had I deciphered all this apparent mess into a coherent plot or meaning of some sort; there is a level of obscurity beyond which Narrative Art ceases to be aesthetically efficient as such, and I suspect Inland Empire has crossed that line.

Rating: 47

Kippur (2000)

Synopsis: Israel, 1973, during the Yom Kippur war. Two guys go out seeking their outfit, riding in their old car. They are strayed from their purpose by an encounter with a medic, and eventually join a rescue team. They roam the battlefield in a helicopter, looking for wounded soldiers, whom they carry back to be treated.

Appraisal: The emphasis here is on realism, not shying away from repetitiveness and occasional static, uneventful shots. The dreariness of the events and landscape is accentuated. Dullness inevitably sets in, and the most intimate moments are perhaps the hardest to bear. Most critics appear to have seen a masterpiece; deserts are known to cause mirages.

(The copy I watched was dubbed in French.)

Rating: 38

Diner (1982)

Synopsis (spoilers): Several young guys and girls in Baltimore, 1959, and their little stories or simply their character traits, are depicted. Eddie is about to get married but he says he will only do it if his fiancée passes a test about football trivia. Boogie is a compulsive gambler who makes a bet he can't cover for; he also bets on his sex achievements towards his dates. Fenwick is immature and impredictable: he breaks window panes with his bare hand, plays pranks on his friends, lies down on Christ's manger in a stable, etc. Plus other minor characters and incidents.

Appraisal (spoilers): Most characters seem obsessed with popular culture -- one is a football fanatic; the other is a popular music collector and connoisseur who scolds his wife for disarraying his records; a very minor one has memorized all lines in a movie; and so on. It's probably good that the movie shows this phenomenon -- which today is possibly even more prevalent -- in what appears to be its beginnings; this, coupled with male bonding, forms a type of urban culture which the film evokes with affection not devoid of sharper comments about the low status imposed on women. Conflicts get resolved quite easily, but otherwise this film is competently crafted; to be sure, these are not characters I am crazy about, but it wasn't so bad spending some time with them.

Rating: 54

Perfume: The Story of a Murderer (2006)

Synopsis: In the 18th century, a man develops an obsession about smells, becoming a perfumer and also a murderer. (Based on the novel by Patrick Süskind, 1st edition 1985.)

Appraisal: Basically this film makes no sense, for obvious reasons, unless watched with Odorama. To make matters worse, the plot is ridiculous. That leaves us with only the most superficial aspects of a film, such as cinematography -- astounding, acting -- competent, production design, etc.

Rating: 22

Grbavica (2006)

Synopsis: In Bosnia after the war, a woman lives with her daughter. Trying to make ends meet by working as a waitress, she also has to face up to her daughter's rebeliousness and growing inquisitiveness about her father.

Appraisal: I didn't find the drama in itself especially compelling, although it is sufficiently absorbing; also, it resolves itself in a simple, perhaps even simplistic, way, resorting to an exterior element (a gun) as a means of producing some climactic tension. I liked the individual sequences, as they show a sufficient mastery of space and of the actors. Despite its up-to-date narrative style and social context, this is basically a melodrama in the old tradition of Stella Dallas or Imitation of Life.

Rating: 51

Honogurai mizu no soko kara (2002)

English titles: Dark Water; From the Depths of Dark Water.

Synopsis: A recently divorced mother moves with her 6 year-old daughter into an apartment. Strange things start to happen to them that seem to be connected with a girl that once lived in that building and went missing.

Appraisal: Interesting little horror movie, very atmospheric and well acted.

Rating: 63

Silent Hill (2006)

Synopsis: A mother looks for her daughter in a supernatural town. (Based on a Japanese video game series.)

Appraisal: The film is well acted; it is also technically irreprehensible. One problem with it is the plot, which is hugely uninteresting and ridiculous; also, the set-pieces simply aren't thrilling.

Rating: 27

Spies Like Us (1985)

Synopsis: Two spies are sent on a mission in Afghanistan, unaware that they are being used as decoys. The mission has to do with a Soviet intercontinental missile.

Appraisal: This film has some of the most awful comedy moments in movie history (the doctor impersonation, the doctors' endless introduction, the exam cheating, etc.); they are mostly concentrated in the first half of the movie. There is a slight improvement in the second half, where the film becomes watchable, but not much more than this. Chase's performance is very funny, even when he is doing unfunny stuff; Aykroyd's is equally good, although his character is not meant to be as funny.

Rating: 30

Neil Young: Heart of Gold (2006)

Description: A live performance by a pop singer and his band.

Appraisal: The first part of the movie consists of songs from his new album, mostly wimpy, infinitely repetitive melodies with lyrics I could not follow, and who cares. In the second part he turns to old hits, raising the musical level a bit, even though his performances are still poor. Watching this guy strain his vocal chords in tortured close-ups makes me think about the economic perversions that shaped the stardom system from the 60's onward. There used to be songwriters and there used to be singers; they were two separate entities that only very rarely combined into one person. It has always been clear, though, that being a singer is a much more rewarding job than being a songwriter, and at one moment all songwriters decided they would no longer hand their songs over to singers who would become famous at the former's expense (their thought, not mine). The fact that none of them writers could sing was not important, it soon became clear. And after they got famous, they needn't write good material either, they would continue to be loved and to sell, that's what fans are for. The star of this film gives himself away as to what this whole game is about, when he mentions a question made to him by his ranch's caretaker: "How could someone so young afford to buy such an expensive property?" So there you have it.

Rating: 13

Brás Cubas (1985)

Synopsis: The film tells, in the form of an autobiography written after the author is dead, the life of Brás Cubas, an ordinary upper-class guy living in Rio de Janeiro in the late 19th century. His first love, a prostitute; his college education in Portugal; his engagement to a politician's daughter, who eventually favored a more determined rival; his frustrated political ambitions; his love affair with his married ex-fiancée; his reencounter with his childhood friend Quincas Borba, the creator of the "humanitist" philosophical system.

Appraisal: Scarse on intelligent filmic ideas and probably insignificant to those who haven't read Machado de Assis's stupendous novel ("Posthumous Memoirs of Brás Cubas", 1st ed. 1881). And it is Cotrim, not Brás, who says "I don't want charity" during the inheritance division.

Rating: 25

Syriana (2005)

Synopsis: Several stories relate to a shady merger deal between two American oil companies. An Arabian emir's son favors a Chinese company over an American one for the drilling operations in his country. A professional killer is hired to kill him. Etc.

Appraisal: This film should be categorized as science-fiction given the fantastic turns taken by its plot. I guess it is nice that someone is approaching this kind of subject, even in such a simplistic manner. And it has some entertainment value.

Rating: 47

Slither (2006)

Synopsis: An alien organism falls into Earth and installs itself inside a man. From there he begins infecting other humans. He also has an enormous appetite for meat. That initial host's wife, plus some policemen and the town's mayor start investigating the problem and then set off to exterminate those malignant creatures.

Appraisal: There isn't a single molecule of invention in this film, all of it being recycled from earlier horror movies. The more explicit sources are Night of the Living Dead (entire sequences) and Shivers (one scene, as I remember). It is well acted, though.

Rating: 22

Corazón iluminado (1996)

English title: Foolish Heart.

Synopsis (spoilers from beginning to end): Juan is a young man living in Buenos Aires in the early Sixties. His father is a door-to-door salesman with a gambling addiction; he is training Juan to become a salesman as well. Juan's friends are involved with esoteric practices; one of them is an old photographer who invented a device that purportedly photographs the soul of a person. One day Juan meets Ana in his circle of friends and a mutual attraction arises between them, even though Ana is engaged to an older man. Ana and Juan start seeing each other and Juan learns that Ana suffers from severe psychiatric disorders, having previously been committed to an institution, and being now under constant medication. Juan's friends take a picture of themselves with the "soul catcher" and the place where Ana was supposed to appear in the photo has only a smear of intense brightness. Juan's father frowns upon Juan's relationship with Ana, and also upon Juan's aspirations to become a filmmaker. Ana and Juan have a fight and during their subsequent separation Ana gets involved with a pimp who enslaves her into prostitution. Juan rescues her and shelters her, but one day she vanishes; later he learns that she has been institutionalized again. Juan visits her and helps her escape. Together they elope from their families. On the run from the police, they check into a hotel, where they engage in the serial ingestion of Ana's sleeping pills. They are rescued and taken to a hospital; Ana is unconscious by then. After that, they don't meet again and Juan assumes (or is told, it is not clear) that Ana is dead. Many years later, Juan is a successful filmmaker living in California, and returns to Argentina because his father is ill. He seeks his old friends out and learns that Ana is alive. He meets a seductive woman in a church and follows her to a building where they have sex. In the following day he goes to the place where Ana lives and speaks with her through the intercom, but she refuses to see him and sends him away. He meets the seductive woman again on the beach, and a stranger takes a photo of them. He runs into that woman again at the hospital where his father was, and urges her to reveal who she really is but she runs away. When he sees her the next day in a pier, he stabs her to death. His father's condition worsens and he dies. Juan returns to Los Angeles, and, while on the plane, someone hands him an envelope with a photo inside. It's the picture that was taken on the beach with him and the seductive woman; instead of her face, all we see is a bright smear.

Appraisal: This is an emotionally gripping film. Babenco has an eye for composition and handles the individual scenes very well. Mendonça and Lopes steal the respective portions of film they are in and are responsible for much of the film's strength. The film explores the interesting concept of the mixed-up feelings that disturbed women arouse on some men; they are viewed in dual terms, both as suffering, fragile creatures and as mysterious seductresses. This is possibly akin to Cet obscur objet du désir, slightly. Otherwise, the film brings to mind certain aspects of Tender Is the Night. Mad Love (1995) is a closer relative, I think. The film is largely successful and is a rewarding experience for those who take it on its own lyrical, confessional terms.

Rating: 65

Idiocracy (2006)

Synopsis: A man and a woman are cryogenically frozen as part of an army experiment; they are due to be unfrozen in a year, but the project is cancelled and they are forgotten. They finally get unfrozen after 500 years. The world has become populated exclusively by idiots, due to the reproduction rate being negatively correlated to intelligence.

Appraisal: A vast array of excellent comic actors and actresses is this film's forte. The screenplay packs some interesting observations about the current state of affairs in some countries of the world, the U.S. obviously included. After some 30 or 40 minutes of film, maybe less, it has said everything it had to say, the remainder of it being just padding and repetition. The notion that the whole world has devolved in this manner is not really tenable; I think the problems depicted here are mostly U.S.-specific; after the Roman fall, a period of barbarism ensued, but the U.S. is not an empire of such widespread hegemony. Anyway, the film has more serious problems, one of them being lack of reference: since it doesn't have a single intelligent character, any stupidity that is said may be credited to that fact, rather than to its screenwriters' own shortcomings. Just to give an example, when the main character advises people to "read books" and other preventive actions, he is contradicting the film's basic premise that states that the problem is genetic, not educational; as I said, one can easily claim that this is due to that character's lack of intelligence, instead of the film's.

Rating: 47

Undertow (1949)

Synopsis: A man returns to his hometown after a long absence. He is fetching his long-time girlfriend whom he intends to marry against her uncle's will. He suddenly finds himself in a tight spot as he is framed for said uncle's murder.

Appraisal: Watchable thriller, which is mechanically structured around establishing sympathy early on (toward a random acquaintance the hero makes at a casino), then creating tension with the fact that the hero is already engaged, then restablishing the viewer's shattered hopes through the revelations of the plot. The ending is abrupt.

Rating: 35

Dallas 362 (2003)

Synopsis: Young man with inseparable friend gets often into barfights. His mom's boyfriend is a psychotherapist and agrees to treat him.

Appraisal: Psychological drama with a heist subplot which is not really believable (but that's a minor issue). As has been pointed out elsewhere, it borrows several plot elements from Good Will Hunting. It has some interesting ideas, but not many surprises nor memorable scenes, nor sequences, nor performances, except the leading one, which is admittedly remarkable.

Rating: 43

Separate Lies (2005)

Synopsis: A man is fatally hit by a car while riding his bicycle. This accident stirs the lives of a couple, exposing some lies and forcing those people into reevaluating things. (Based on the novel "A Way Through the Wood" by Nigel Balchin, 1st ed. 1951.)

Appraisal: This is a typical novelistic film. I suppose the defining line is the one which character James says to his maid: "We are all wreckers. Our lives are made with choices, and those choices inevitably hurt someone" (or something close to that). The film takes this as a theme and develops it within each character's story. It's all done with intelligence, and good performances from everyone; however, it's not very exciting, to be honest, and the last act seemed particularly unnecessary.

Rating: 59

Snakes on a Plane (2006)

Synopsis: A witness to a murder in Hawaii is convinced to testify in Los Angeles. The gangster who committed it fills the plane he is traveling in with snakes.

Appraisal: Crude entertainment.

Rating: 39

Hotel Rwanda (2004)

Synopsis: In 1994, in civil-war-ravaged Rwanda, a man saves the lives of thousands by sheltering them at the hotel at which he works as the manager.

Appraisal: While it is clear that international politics is not a simple theme, its subtheme of military intervention is specially complicated. This film, however, puts it in a light that makes it clear as water: people are dying, so someone must do something. To a background of external turmoil and conflict, we see a personal trajectory which is virtually free from those: this man does what he has to, and that's that. The film's plot is eventful, and flows in a crescendo of tension and pace; it probably will put some political awareness into some minds, but people who have some insight into the philosophy of spectacle will always wonder how much of it is conscience appeasing as opposed to awakening.

Rating: 61

The Woods (2006)

Synopsis: A girl is sent to a boarding school near a forest, and witnesses strange occurrences there. It may have to do with witchcraft.

Appraisal: Wow, this is really silly. Three great young actresses, though: Agnes Bruckner, Rachel Nichols, and Lauren Birkell. And some interesting camera angles and other assorted directorial tricks. The chromatic manipulations are unpleasant and don't add to the movie in any way. Apparently, the film bears some similarities with Suspiria (1977); I haven't seen that film, so I can't vouch for that information. An earlier precedent is undoubtedly a scene from Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs (1937).

Rating: 21

Quilombo (1984)

Synopsis (spoilers): In the 17th century, in Brazil, the black slaves who escaped from the farms established free communities in forest areas. The biggest of them was Palmares. Its first great leader was named Ganga Zumba. Later, another man, who had been kidnapped from the quilombo when he was a child and then raised by a priest, escapes again and returns to Palmares to be the successor of Ganga Zumba; he is given the name Zumbi. Ganga Zumba negotiates peace with the white men, and moves with those loyal to him to a new area established by the white men, where they would live in isolation; Zumbi and his followers remain at Palmares.

Appraisal: I disliked its stylistic approach, which mixed action and drama with lots of dancing and partying, apparently going for some exotic appeal; I particularly detested the insertion of songs, and very insipid ones at that. Other than that, the movie has a great story, which is told in a rather static way, yet is given some thrust by the vivaciousness of most of the acting.

Rating: 39

Stop! Or My Mom Will Shoot (1992)

Synopsis: A cop's mother comes to visit him and begins interfering with his personal life and with his work.

Appraisal: This is a brilliant joke, competently executed, but way too stretched to fit one and a half hour of film. The comicity gets diluted by its repetition; there is also too much time devoted to a romantic subplot.

Rating: 39

The Squaw Man (1914)

Synopsis: A man takes the blame for an embezzlement committed by his gambling-addicted brother. He flees England to the U.S. where he decides to go West. There he meets a Native-American woman .

Appraisal: A competent film within the range of its primitive grammar, which excludes practically all camera movement and of course sound. The story is filmically rendered in an intelligent way, so as to make it quite absorbing and suspenseful.

The Dying Gaul (2005)

Synopsis: A screenwriter gets involved with a studio executive and his wife.

Appraisal: This film conceals behind all its implausibilities an obnoxiousness that would be harder to endure were it not graced by inspired -- and close to miraculous, given the ultimate absurdity of their parts -- performances by Scott and Sarsgaard; Clarkson is fine too.

Rating: 27

Brothers of the Head (2005)

Synopsis: Two Siamese twins become rock stars. (Based on a novel by Brian Aldiss, 1st edition 1977.)

Appraisal: It's in the so-called faux-documentary style, ably done. There is a subplot about a third fetus which goes nowhere (is it more developed in the novel? it seems completely stupid...). The Ono-Lennon-McCartney affair is the basis for the Laura Ashworth subplot. Siamese twins have inspired a streak of recent films, this being the third one, as far as I know (Twin Falls Idaho and Stuck on You are the others). This theme adapts well to the rock-and-roll milieu, not just because the latter is a freak show, as the film's tagline implies, but primarily because the phenomenon of conjoined twins is fictionally construable as a metaphor for narcissism.

Rating: 54

Gone Fishin' (1997)

Synopsis: Two childhood friends go out every year fishing together on their vacation. This year they are competing in a tournament. The problem is that they are chronically disaster-prone. They cross paths with a criminal who marries widows and robs them (and has committed one murder). He steals their car and from then on the vacationing duo and the criminal will alternately chase each other.

Appraisal: I have watched this without subtitles and thus missed a few lines of dialog. It is a comedy of modest ambitions which delivers a bland yet congenial humor and some good performances (especially the central pair and the boat salesman).

Rating: 39

Mary (2005/I)

Synopsis: Several characters' personal dramas are shown, their point of intersection being a film about Jesus where the role of Mary Magdalen in early christianity is given more weight than it traditionally had been up to then. Marie, the actress who plays Mary in that film, is affected by her work in it, and becomes a religious woman. Anthony, the director, is quite enthusiastic about his work, and has fits of egocentrism. Ted, a TV interviewer, is conducting a series of programs about Jesus, and becomes interested in what happened with Marie; his work conflicts with his married life; his wife is pregnant and about to give birth.

Appraisal: A cursory viewing might lead one to believe that it is a collection of stories about characters without much relation among them, and that the theme of the film, which according to its title was meant to be Mary Magdalen, is actually -- perhaps due to an unplanned change, one could surmise -- the more general theme of faith, but addressed in a more or less nonsystematic way. When the film was almost over, however, I was amazed to discover that there is a wealth of meaning and consistency in it that is not outspoken. The film is actually about Mary Magdalen as a symbol for women's role in spirituality, and how it has been systematically erased from the official religion, and, even more, about how precisely their suffering of that suppression relates to that role through the doctrine of forgiveness and self-effacement in christianity. How is that manifested in the movie? I can cite two important instances: first, notice how Ted's wife continually withstands his neglect of her, and continually forgives him ("not seven, but seventy times seven", the Gospel tells us); second, in an emblematic scene, where Marie is called by phone into an interview with Anthony the director, a fact which arouses his wrath -- this clearly parallels the male monopoly of the Church, and the exclusion of the feminine voice. So, this film offers an analysis of the complex role of the sexes in Christendom, which ultimately determined the role of Christendom in the relationship between the sexes. But this film is also, on a perhaps deeper level, about the contradictory character of religions (and ultimately of any ideology). They are born out of the need for new ideas, yet they can only thrive by stifling all competing ideas, both older and newer ones. This is shown in the analysis of the Mary Magdalen issue, how the history of Christendom was made up to conform to a male-dominant worldview; it is also present in a background manner by the display of religious conflicts in the Middle East and in the United States. Whether the filmmaker has achieved a translation of his ideas into a compelling succession of images is something else again; I think he hasn't done such a terrible job in that department, yet I admit that the film is not as strong as its implicit conceptual complexity might suggest.

Rating: 54

My Summer of Love (2004)

Synopsis: An adolescent girl lives with her brother -- who is a religious fanatic -- in the English countryside. An upper-class girl spending her holidays in the vicinity befriends her.

Appraisal: The situations depicted here have a flavor of deja vu; it also has many dead, dull moments, even clocking in at less than one hour and a half. The drama being lived by the main character is not uninteresting in itself, of course, and the film manages to establish a certain amount of empathy for her. The sad thing is that the camerawork is shoddy, ridded in particular with an effect of changing the proximity of objects instantly, an annoying feature which was also present in El abrazo partido (2004).

Rating: 40

Miami Vice (2006)

Synopsis: Two Miami police agents go undercover as drug transporters for a big drug dealer. One of them falls in love with the dealer's girlfriend. One of the dealer's underlings suspects of him.

Appraisal: Run-of-the-mill thriller which emulates the aesthetics of commercials for menwear, cars, and perfume for men.

Rating: 39

Frankenstein Meets the Spacemonster (1965)

Alternate title spelling: Frankenstein Meets the Space Monster.

Synopsis: A robot astronaut is sent out on a space mission, yet is forced to abandon his ship when it is attacked by aliens who are visiting Earth in search of young women to repopulate their nuclear-war-devastated planet.

Appraisal: No-budget science-fiction, a good portion of which consists of stock footage. The whole thing is quite laughable, due in equal parts to a conscious tongue-in-cheek approach and to the complete inability in giving the least semblance of realism to any of it. Particularly puzzling is the insertion, at a few sequences, of lyrical pop tunes bearing no relation with the predominant mood of the movie.

Rating: 21

Os Paqueras (1969)

English title: The Girl Watchers.

Synopsis: The film narrates the adventures of two womanizer friends, a young one and a middle-aged one. Their friendship is jeopardized when the younger one meets a certain young woman and falls in love with her.

Appraisal (mild spoiler): In spite of the parading of gorgeous women and the chance of seeing glimpses of Rio de Janeiro in the late 60's, this film is mostly dull; some rare distinctive moments can be seen amid the predominantly unimaginative set-pieces, for instance at an interesting scene where a woman and her lover are taken under arrest for adultery (I wonder if this kind of arrest has ever occurred in real life in Brazil) and a crowd outside her building cheers them enthusiastically and boos the betrayed husband with equal enthusiasm; the scene is a faithful depiction of the peculiar kind of values held by a significative portion of the Brazilian population. The finale sequence at the beach when the older man meets the young couple is surprisingly well done, especially so when one considers how easy it would have been to spoil it.

Rating: 31

The Proposition (2005)

Synopsis: In nineteenth-century Australia, a sheriff captures two outlaw brothers suspected of being involved in a recent crime of rape and murder. They used to be part of a gang with another brother and some other men, but of late they had been living apart from the gang. The sheriff makes a proposition to the eldest of the captured brothers: he will set him and his younger brother free if he brings him his other brother, who lives in a hideout in the mountains; in the meantime, he will keep the youngest one in jail.

Appraisal: Long, static scenes with characters contemplating the unfathomable, alternated with sudden bursts of violence, and all that woven together by a flimsy plot, which echoes some elements from Joseph Conrad's Heart of Darkness, or, if one prefers, its more popular cinematic version Apocalypse Now (1979); in all these works, there is a savage country and a white man obsessed with "civilizing" it; there is also a man in search of another who has reputedly become a little unhinged (in this one, he "howls at the moon"). Here, however, the characters are underdeveloped and uninteresting, and the plot follows a linear and quite predictable path; the point of it all seems to be a comic-book aestheticism, as sterile as it is wearisome on the eye.

Rating: 41

The Tattered Dress (1957)

Synopsis: A famous lawyer is hired to defend a rich guy who shot a bartender for having allegedly assaulted his wife. The town's sheriff was a close friend of the deceased's.

Appraisal: It begins well and is well directed throughout, but as the plot unfolds several flaws become apparent, such as the sheriff's unconvincing motivation for his acts. It worsens even more in the last act, where we see a second trial which is totally ridiculous and absurd both in the lawyer's utterances and in the inexplicable verdict.

Rating: 34

Chik yeung tin si (2002)

English title: So Close.

Synopsis (spoilers): A female assassin, assisted by a sophisticated video surveillance scheme operated by her sister at their home, invades a huge company building and kills the company's president. The job was ordered by one of the company's top executives, who subsequently hires them to kill another top man in that company. An investigation is started after the first killing, led by a female cop. The assassin falls in love with a guy and decides to quit the profession; the other refuses to follow her sister's decision and decides to go solo, doing the killings herself.

Appraisal: The action is what sustains the interest here, and also the good looks of the two protagonists. Mildly creative choreographies and a fast pace disguise the abysmal inanity of the plot and dialogue (that is, its Portuguese-dubbed version, but I suppose not much was lost).

Rating: 35

Va, vis et deviens (2005)

English titles: Live and Become; Go, See, and Become.

Synopsis: In the mid-eighties, Israel recognized the Falashas in Ethiopia as legitimate Jews (the legend says that they descend from Solomon and Sheba), and set up a covert operation to transport them from Ethiopia to Israel, via Sudan. The film tells the story of a non-Falasha boy in a Sudanese refugee camp who joins the emigrants by passing as a Falasha and arrives in Israel where he is adopted by an Israeli family.

Appraisal: Horribly directed and totally inept in the enactment of plausible human behavior. Nevertheless, the story has an inherent appeal which is to a certain extent immune to its director.

Rating: 30

Frankie and Johnny (1966)

Synopsis: A riverboat singer has the gambling addiction, which considerably upsets his blonde sweetheart. He goes to a fortune teller and she tells him that only a red-headed woman will bring him luck. By a coincidence, the boat owner's red-head sweetheart of old times returns to the boat after a failed attempt at making it big on Broadway.

Appraisal: Quite agreeable and colorful, with nice musical numbers and a certain refinement into its screenplay. An acceptable pastime.

Rating: 51

Silvia Prieto (1999)

Synopsis (spoilers): Silvia works at a restaurant. She quits her job and gets another one of handing over soap samples to street passers-by. She befriends Brite, who is in this job too. Brite starts dating Marcelo, Silvia's ex-husband. Brite sets Silvia up with Gabriel, Brite's ex-husband. Silvia buys a canary. She asked for a silent one but gets a singing one instead. One day it stops singing and Silvia is upset about it. Garbuglia, another friend of Gabriel's, is dating Marta through a TV show. Gabriel gets arrested for smoking hemp. Brite gets pregnant. Gabriel is upset about his old nickname "lamp shade". Silvia is obsessed about the existence of namesakes of herself. She finds one out on the phonebook and calls her. They meet. She is displeased with sharing her name with others. One day she loses her purse containing all her documents. At the police station, when asked about her name she answers "Luisa Ciccone". This is the name she will use from then on.

Appraisal: It's similar in style to the TV sitcom "Seinfeld" except without interesting characters or anything funny, which is to say it's rather pointless.

Rating: 26

The Fan (1996)

Synopsis: A salesman is fired from his job. He is an ardent fan of baseball, and in particular of one specific player.

Appraisal: The first half succeeded at least in keeping me interested, but from then on it was all downhill. It seems to me that the main problem was that it didn't fulfill my expectations in terms of thrills and suspense, and its conclusion felt like an anticlimax; the fan's behavior gets more and more incoherent as the film advances and the film gets more and more boring.

Rating: 35

Minnâ-yatteruka! (1995)

English title: Getting Any?

Synopsis (mild spoiler): A man devises a thousand schemes for having sex but fails in all of them. He goes through many weird situations, culminating with his transformation into a Fly-man in a machine created by a scientist.

Appraisal: Humor made of gags whose style is reminiscent of Chuck Jones's cartoons, but more coarse and primitive. It brought me alternately to laughter and boredom; the rate at which either will happen to others depends on their level of expectation, personal preferences and familiarity with Japanese pop culture.

Rating: 33

Brasília 18% (2006)

Synopsis: A coroner is called from abroad to establish whether a dead woman's body is that of a missing Senate aide whose boyfriend is being accused of her murder. Other evidence points to a ring of corrupt politicians whose misdeeds said aide had witnessed.

Appraisal: This is an awful film from all angles it is analyzed. The plot hardly makes any sense(e.g. why is it that associating the dead body to the missing woman would be of so much value to the corrupt ones?), several characters' behaviors are completely absurd (e.g. one shady Senate employee tries to corrupt the coroner while inside a crowded airplane of all places; a prostitute witnesses a man pull a gun to the coroner and still cannot wipe a blissful expression from her face; this list could go on forever), the technological references are at least ten years outdated (e.g. the coroner asks for the "negatives"), sex is as gratuitous as in a pornographic movie -- no, I lie: it's more gratuitous -- but incomparably less explicit and exciting; etc. If this film's writer/director was trying to make one of the worst films of all times out of one of the most candent subjects in Brazil in all times, he has largely succeeded. This is so bad even "Mystery Science Theater 3000" would reject it.

Rating: 3

Tropa de Elite (2007)

English title: Elite Squad.

Synopsis: In Rio de Janeiro, the Military Police Special Operations Unit (BOPE) specializes in storming the hillside slums to fight drug trafficking; their priority is to capture the sophisticated guns used by the criminals. Captain Nascimento is a member of that unit and is looking to get out of field work, but to do that he must first find someone to replace him. Two Military Police cadets, the first one reckless and trigger-happy and the other one more intellectual and with aspirations to becoming a lawyer, are the main candidates for the position.

Appraisal: The screenplay of this film is well structured and well paced; roughly speaking, the first half is more about small incidents and the second half is more about big ones. The technique is unpolished, forgoing editing in favor of rapid panning among the characters -- it's slightly annoying. The acting is serviceable. The film has been called biased, which I'm not qualified to judge, and one-sided, which it necessarily is, and it's no worse for that. This film has convinced me that drugs will never be legalized, and that it is possible to keep the war against them going indefinitely; it is just a matter of raising the firepower to match that of the criminals --indefinitely.

Rating: 60

Im toten Winkel - Hitlers Sekretärin (2002)

English name: Blind Spot - Hitler's Secretary.

Description: Documentary. Hitler's secretary tells everything.

Appraisal: It's just a woman talking to a camera, with occasional shots of her watching herself speak on a TV. It's quite watchable due to the natural interest that this testimony presents and also to the interviewee's great memory and clarity of expression. Many of the events narrated by her would be dramatized with great fidelity in Der Untergang (2004).

Rating: 56

From Noon Till Three (1976)

Synopsis (spoilers): An outfit of bank robbers stops at an isolated mansion to request a horse, since one of theirs got wounded. The mansion's owner, a widow, says she hasn't got any, and when they hear noise coming from the stable, it's up to one of the guys to go there and check. He goes and finds out that the lady lied, but he gives her cover. Thus, being one horse short, one of the guys must stay behind while the others go and rob the bank. The same guy - Graham Dorsey - who went to check for the horse is the one who stays. The explanation for his lie is that he had a nightmare about the upcoming heist wherein they all ended up dead, so he figures he'd rather not go. While in the house with the widow, he seduces her by telling that he has been impotent since his wife died, and is thinking of killing himself. After an afternoon of lovemaking, they receive news from the town saying his partners have been captured and will be executed that afternoon. The widow urges him to go and rescue his friends, which he is not willing to do, so he pretends to accept the suggestion and just leaves. He runs into his persecutors but manages to shun them. He meets a traveling dentist and forces him to trade clothes with him and to give him his carriage. He stops to ask for information to an old woman, who goes inside and returns with a shotgun pointed at Dorsey. The police is called and he is arrested. The dentist happened to be a crook who took people's gold teeth and replaced them with inferior ones. Dorsey is sentenced to one year in prison. Meanwhile, back in town, the real dentist was shot by the sheriff's posse and, as he was wearing the widow's late husband's clothes, he is brought to her, who faints at the sight of him (she never sees his face so she thinks it is Dorsey). The town people surmise that she had an affair with the bandit, and she receives everybody's reprobation. She decides to make a public speech in front of everyone saying she loved Dorsey and is not ashamed of that. People are touched by her attitude and flock to her house to apologize for their behavior. A writer is brought along who offers to write her love story, to which she agrees. The book is a huge success, and she becomes famous, her mansion even becoming a tourist attraction. Meanwhile, Dorsey is released from prison and decides to go back to see his one-day lover. She did not recognize him at first, saying Dorsey was much taller and handsomer than the man standing in front of her. He only convinces her when he shows her his penis. She refuses to resume their relationship, saying that she now has an image to preserve, and even offers him money to keep the pretense that Dorsey is dead. Dorsey refuses and she kills herself. Dorsey flees the house and everywhere he goes he suffers people's mockery and disbelief regarding his identity. He engages in a fight with an ardent admirer of the literary Dorsey, whom he contradicts by stating that the real Dorsey (i.e. himself) was a coward and a liar. He is arrested and taken to a madhouse where he is welcomed by one of the inmates and finally accepted as Graham Dorsey.

Appraisal: A fable about how legends tend to overshadow reality. It is interesting, albeit more in a literary sense (it's based on a novel) than in a cinematic one; it is not particularly well directed, and in fact I did not see any sign of a director's hand in it. The film's biggest shortcoming is probably that the fame acquired by the characters doesn't seem very likely -- their story is not that appealing; another implausibility is the widow not recognizing Dorsey upon his return -- in one year, neither he nor her memory of him may have changed that much. But, given that it's intended as a sort of philosophical reflection about fame and the fabrication of heroes and other myths, these details are just means to an end and thus perhaps not of crucial importance.

Rating: 51

The Forgotten (2004)

Synopsis: A woman grieves over the loss of her son, but suddenly no one seems to acknowledge his previous existence.

Appraisal: Antiquated sci-fi drama, with the usual amount of loose ends. This poor film bears some thematic resemblance with Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind (2004), Total Recall (1990), and L'année dernière à Marienbad (1961); also Mirage (1965), tangentially. P.S.: Theo Panayides's review points out another -- and closer -- thematic precursor of this film: The Lady Vanishes (1938).

Rating: 11

Bonga, o Vagabundo (1971)

Synopsis: A bum befriends a rich guy. Then a beautiful girl. The rich guy is being pressured by his father to work and get a fiancée. There is also a gang of evil bikers.

Appraisal: The plot is quite banal, but the film is well directed and quite visually oriented at times. Its target audience are kids; the main character, in addition to being good-hearted, doesn't drink alcohol; on the other hand, he smokes a lot, and in one of the scenes we even see a small homeless kid smoking like there's nothing wrong with it. Different times, different values... The main influence is Chaplin's tramp of course, but a sober version of him -- as I was saying, different times... There may also be echoes of a film which I haven't seen, Hallelujah I'm a Bum; and certainly The Wild One, which I have.

Rating: 31

Trois places pour le 26 (1988)

English title: Three Places for the 26th.

Synopsis: A singer and actor returns to the city of his childhood and adolescence after 20 years of absence. He intends to produce an autobiographical musical play which will premier in that city. He meets his former lover and also a young aspiring actress/singer/dancer who asks him if she can watch the play's rehearsals.

Appraisal (spoilers): It's an agreeable film. It's hard for me to find something really bad about it; on the other hand, it is a little too slight for my taste; some of the choreographies are unremarkable while others are filmed too unimaginatively. What I found curious is the recurrence of the father/daughter incest theme in Demy, which appeared earlier in Peau d'âne (1970). Here, we see a totally different variety of it: no violence is present, only ignorance, exactly like in the ancient tale of Oedipus; unlike in that tale, however, here no tragedy ensues, only a small discomfort after the discovery.

Rating: 50

Driven (2001)

Synopsis: A young up-and-coming formula one pilot. His agent, who happens to be his brother, pushes him hard into giving his best. A veteran pilot is called in to be his team-mate and help him win. The competition is a cold-hearted man, many times world champion. Both competitors will fight for the love of a beautiful woman.

Appraisal: This obviously shows little regard for what goes on in real-life races; it's a fantasy made of archetypes and spectacular crashes. As such, it oscillates between the slightly exciting and the slightly boring.

Rating: 36

River Queen (2005)

Synopsis: In 1854, in New Zealand, an Irish woman has a son with a Maori man. Her lover dies shortly after that, and his father kidnaps her child. She is then offered a deal by which she will have her son back if she agrees to go to a distant village to heal its Maori chief. While she is there, a war breaks out between the English and the Maori.

Appraisal: This film is characterized by some crudeness in technique (brisk camera movements, for example) and in writing (an enormous amount of voice-over); it also has a penchant for kitschy accessories such as the new-age score, and the overuse of slow-motion. All these flaws permeate the film more or less uniformly from beginning to end. The characters are not endowed with much depth, which in this case is partially overcome by an emphasis on action. The film does improve in the second half, with quite complex battle sequences; the general course of the story acquires some complexity as well, and in general lines does not stray too much from the path of logic and coherence.

Rating: 45

The Dead Don't Die (1975) (TV)

Synopsis: Man tries to prove his brother was unjustly executed, and gets involved with zombies.

Appraisal: This film has plot problems, about which, if you don't mind spoilers, you can find more here. Aside from that, it's a mediocre mix of horror and detective story.

Rating: 31

50 First Dates (2004)

Synopsis: Henry doesn't like long-term relationships. He meets Lucy and falls for her. She has no short-term memory due to a brain lesion.

Appraisal: An interesting premise put to waste. The ending only makes sense if one has forgotten all that has happened previously, which ironically would require the condition of one of the main characters in the movie, only in a severer form. Some of the jokes are funny but most aren't, which isn't even the biggest problem with the film; that would be poor writing and the strategy of aiming low in order to gross high. My idea would be to have Henry at first take advantage of Lucy's condition and date her repeatedly until he was irreversibly in love; this would be a cul-de-sac for him given her condition; he would be forever miserable, which would be a form of poetic justice given his previous behavior. Then again, this approach would be at odds with the aforementioned strategy. After all, it is a date movie: gross jokes for him and sugar-coated romance for her.

Rating: 30

Left Behind (2000)

Synopsis (spoilers): The world faces a food shortage problem. A scientist named Rosenzweig has come up with a new agricultural technology which offers a solution. Concurrently, the world is taken aback by the sudden vanishing of millions of people for no apparent physical reason. In order to stop the chaos that threatens to take over the world, the United Nations appoint a new secretary-general, named Carpathia, who establishes an emergency government of UN delegates. He has power plans of his own which involve using Rosenzweig's technology to control the world's food supply. Carpathia is backed by two bankers which are planning to lead the UN to bankruptcy by executing its huge debt. Carpathia shoots the bankers point blank in the presence of all the UN delegates. A TV journalist investigates these events. Another character is a plane pilot whose wife and youngest son have vanished, leaving him only his daughter. He visits the church his wife used to attend, and over there he is shown a videotape wherein a preacher, now vanished, explains the vanishings in terms of supernatural eschatology. The pilot is convinced by it and starts taking religion seriously. A little later, the journalist becomes a convert too.

Appraisal: It is an interpretation and fictionalization of some biblical passages in Matthew 24 (or Luke 17), several epistles, and Revelation. The film's premise is insane enough, but it is also tremendously ill-conceived in its narrative proceedings. There is some basic dishonesty at the core of all films which propose a demented concept and have their own characters echo our very thoughts by remarking that it's all very insane. Secondly, there is a total absence of rules, which is a narrative no-no in my opinion since it makes anything possible; thus, an entire air fleet is wiped out and the only explanation is that something supernatural was at play; at another instance, a man commits a double murder and hypnotizes an entire audience into thinking he didn't actually do it. But worst of all is the ultimate rationale behind this kind of fiction, which is an unhealthy, obscurantist worldview.

Rating: 0

Mundo grúa (1999)

English title: Crane World.

Synopsis: An aging man, living alone and without a job, applies for a position as a crane operator. His son plays in a band.

Appraisal: It walks a thin line between realism and bleakness for its own sake. Some empathy is established toward the main character; he and the supporting ones have enough internal consistency to keep the movie interesting. I can't say that I enjoyed this film much, but it is a coherent piece of character-driven storytelling and that is something. The choice for a black-and-white cinematography (and mediocre at that) is unaccountable.

Rating: 50

Cinema, Aspirinas e Urubus (2005)

English titles: Movies, Aspirin and Vultures; Movies, Aspirins and Vultures.

Synopsis: In 1942, a German man roams the poverty-stricken Northeast of Brazil selling acetylsalicylic acid pills. He befriends a local.

Appraisal: This is a real drag of a movie, never getting anywhere, and doing so in a rather unappealing fashion. The characters' actions and dialog are right out of the Cliché Factory, with lots of room for civility lessons from the benign foreigner to the uneducated (yet with a good heart down deep) Brazilian. Brazil's middle class and its artistic exponents must be the people who care most about what foreign people think about them, even if these foreigners view Brazil simply in terms of their own personal interests. For the sake of fairness, let me point out that a few sequences show a glimpse of directorial talent, e.g. when the two guys are in the truck with a pretty young hitch-hiker, and there is a well orchestrated succession of glances amongst the three of them. But these are rare occasions and even then they could only interest mise-en-scene freaks. The sour cherry on top of this stale cinematic cake is the mandatory bleached cinematography - nowadays, it's either that or saturated, you take your pick.

Rating: 20

Beverly Hills Cop III (1994)

Synopsis: A detective from Detroit witnesses his boss get killed by bandits; the only clue points to a theme park in Los Angeles, so he goes over there to investigate.

Appraisal: This is arguably no more than a routine action comedy, but it is competently done and if you are in an undemanding mood it might keep you entertained for its duration.

Rating: 39

Family Tree (1999)

Synopsis: A small impoverished town has been chosen as the new site of a big plastics company; the plant's developer faces an obstacle: his own son, who opposes the construction of the plant because they would have to chop down a tree he is fond of; the kid garners the allegiance of an ex-football player.

Appraisal: Corny drama, which cops out of the implications of its plot's demagogy with a deus ex machina ending twist. As a bonus for masochists, you get some equally corny songs at a few sequences. What is somewhat astounding is how, despite all that, it still manages to harbor good performances by Forster, Judd and Robertson.

Rating: 15

Lição de Amor (1975)

English titles: Love Lesson; A Lesson in Love.

Synopsis: Brazil, the 1920's. A rich man hires a German governess to initiate his adolescent son sexually. Based on the novella "Amar, Verbo Intransitivo" by Mário de Andrade (1st ed. 1927).

Appraisal: Interesting film about the inner workings of the bourgeoisie of the early twentieth century. Sadly, though, I feel that its almost surgically detached style is quite in conflict with its sentimental, plaintive musical score. Hime is a good composer, but he and the film director should have strived for more consistent visions.

Rating: 53

Baixo Gávea (1986)

Synopsis: Two friends live together; they are both working on a play about Portuguese poets of the early 20th century, one directing it and the other as an actress. Clara, the director, is having successive unsuccessful relationships with men, whereas Ana, the actress, is facing similar problems, only with women.

Appraisal: This is above average for a Brazilian film, both directorially and in terms of performances; all the same, I found it a little too insubstantial and flimsy for my taste; I guess it's not to be dismissed, but I wouldn't go as far as saying it's not to be missed.

Rating: 48

Marjorie Morningstar (1958)

Synopsis: A young aspiring actress working on a summer camp falls in love with a songwriter working as a social director in the neighboring camp. He is older than she is. Based on a novel by Herman Wouk (1st ed. 1955).

Appraisal: Love story which aims at realism and psychological depth, examining the influence that family and social conventions have on the sex life of young females. I found it kind of dull on several occasions. Wood is fine, as always. The film's ending illustrates the old saying that "it's better to be an ant's head than an elephant's foot".

Rating: 48

The Spiral Road (1962)

Synopsis: In 1936, a young Dutch physician goes to the island of Java to work with lepers under the guidance of an old specialist. Based on the novel "Gods geuzen" by Jan de Hartog (1st ed. 1947).

Appraisal: Fairly adventurous and entertaining medical drama which delves into philosophical and psychological questions about faith. It is uniformly well acted.

Rating: 52

Nicholas' Gift (1998) (TV)

Synopsis: An American family in Italy is attacked by bandits.

Appraisal: Medical drama based on true events, and nothing special. Governments should make organ donation mandatory, thus sparing us this kind of mediocre film. If they have seen fit to rule our living habits, and forbid us to do things with our bodies which couldn't possibly concern them, such as use drugs, why on Earth need they be so scrupulous about putting our dead bodies to good use?

Rating: 39

In This World (2002)

Synopsis: Two Afghan men - an adult and a 16-year-old boy - leave their refugee camp in Pakistan on a journey by land to London.

Appraisal: My appreciation was somewhat damaged because of two small annoyances. (1) If the refugees' lives are so miserable, as was stated in the film, how come the kid had an uncle living outside the camp who apparently was rich enough to throw generous amounts of money to street performers? Why, I naively inquire, doesn't this so-called uncle help his nephew(s) in other ways than simply sending them abroad? (2) Were the film frames horizontally compressed due to the TV channel's incorrect handling, or was the film really shot like that? Aside from these nuisances, the film is watchable and has some value as an exposé; the authenticity of the location shooting is what makes it distinctive, I guess.

Rating: 48

Flandersui gae (2000)

English titles: Barking Dogs Never Bite; Flanders' Dog.

Synopsis: The lives of several characters living in a huge condominium intersect in connection with certain dogs living there.

Appraisal: Nice little comedy, with a refined screenplay and able direction; it is remarkably well scored too. This film is not as well known as the two subsequent ones by this filmmaker, and yet I prefer it to them.

Rating: 74 (10th position among 2000's best films)

Son of the Pink Panther (1993)

Synopsis: Two Arab nations have some sort of political quarrel, which causes one of them to kidnap the other one's princess. A police task force led by Commissioner Dreyfus is put in charge of the princess's rescue. Young inspector Gambrelli is placed as Dreyfus's assistant; he is a clumsy person, provoking many disastrous incidents.

Appraisal: Utterly unattractive comedy, whose very reason for existence would be put in doubt were it not regarded as the financially logical continuation of a very popular cinematic franchise. The box office results proved them wrong.

Rating: 16

O Homem da Capa Preta (1986)

English title: The Man in the Black Cape.

Synopsis: The film tells the political trajectory of a Brazilian populist politician, spanning approximately three decades up until 1964.

Appraisal: The story is interesting and the screenplay, in its broad lines, manages to successfully synthesize Cavalcanti's political career. Some specific sequences are almost good, such as the scene with the gun-lighter, and the TV recording session. Most of the film, however, is marred by its lousy direction; nearly every scene or sequence that exhibits some spacial dynamics or any complexity above a simple close-up is executed in a painfully amateurish way.

Rating: 31

Malibu's Most Wanted (2003)

Synopsis: A rich white boy has assimilated hip-hop African-American cultural values into his personality; his politician father hires African-American actors to fake his kidnapping, with the purpose of making him reassume his white heritage.

Appraisal: The main character is really funy; this is basically a one-joke movie, but it is not unpleasant.

Rating: 51

Che! (1969)

Synopsis: Che fights alongside Castro and his Cuban rebels against Batista. He is an internationalist as opposed to Castro's belief in "consolidating" the revolution domestically (mirroring the earlier opposition between Trotsky and Lenin in the Soviet Revolution). He goes to Bolivia in the hopes of starting a revolution that would spread throughout Latin America. He neglects the basic principles of guerrilla fighting, which he himself had laid out in a classic book, and pays the price with his own life.

Appraisal: Biopic that is short and to-the-point, and boasts good cinematography and a literate screenplay (by left-winger Richard Wilson - who allegedly repudiated the movie - among others). Sharif as the title character conveys his emotions and states of mind in a subtle yet powerful way; Palance delivers a delightful caricature of the real Castro (although - allegedly - he had opposed to this approach at first). From what I know from having watched documentaries respectively about Castro and Che himself, the film is mostly historically accurate, and I honestly don't think that its occasional inaccuracies harm the picture in a significant way. I watched it in a pan-and-scan version, so I am not able to judge the finer detail of the visual compositions and camerawork. Bottom line: not a great movie, but it does the job of telling a story in a reasonable manner.

Rating: 50

Radio (2003)

Synopsis: A football coach takes a retarded young man under his wing, arousing some hostility among certain members of his community.

Appraisal: The subject of idiocy is an unfriendly one, and so is probably that of charity, that is, how far should individual initiative go when it disturbs an established order of things. As a case study pertaining to those moral issues, or as a simple storytelling vehicle, the film is quite acceptable, displaying good footbal sequences withal.

Rating: 50

Kill Bill (2003 & 2004)

Synopsis: A woman seeks revenge after a massacre during her wedding rehearsal which leaves her in a comatose state.

Appraisal: Sound and fury signifying nothing. I have heard of style over substance, but here we don't even have that; it's rather a pastiche of styles devoid of substance. The insistence on severed limbs, gouged eyes and other assorted mutilations is puzzling. The film is practically an encyclopedia of accessory characteristics of cheap cinema of bygone eras (e.g. shrill synthesizer music during moments of suspense, hyperfast zooming in and out of the martial arts teacher, and so on). Come to think of it, everything in this film is derived from fetish, be it sexual or cinema-oriented. The problem is that none of the genuine emotions conveyed by the original sources are present here; you can see clearly the artificiality of it all. In fact, he is dealing here precisely with cinematic traits that can best (only?) be savored first-hand; context is important. What is touching, if anything, about those exploitation films of the 60's and 70's is their authenticity; unfortunately, it is inevitably lost in translation.

Rating: 28

Mission: Impossible III (2006)

Synopsis: Ethan must go back in the field in a rescue mission. It's all about a black market peddler who is planning to sell a device to a Middle Eastern country.

Appraisal: It's an "Alias" episode, stretched and with more spectacular action sequences.

Rating: 40

An Eye for an Eye (1981)

Synopsis: A cop witnesses his partner get killed when they are following a suspect. He subsequently waives his badge and gun. When said partner's journalist girlfriend is murdered, he decides to find the culprits by himself.

Appraisal: Derivative actioner; it takes some of the elements from Dirty Harry (1971) while reshaping the main character as a martial arts expert. When justice outside the law was the exclusive turf of superheroes it was harder for viewers to consider them as feasible models to follow. Thus, you wouldn't see people practicing flight for instance, whereas the martial arts gym business boomed after An Eye for an Eye. Anywhow, there is some amount of undemanding entertainment to be had from it; it is competently filmed, etc.

Rating: 34

The Babe (1992)

Synopsis: Seven year old George is put in a catholic boarding school by his father, because of his unruly behavior. Already as a boy he displays enormous baseball skills. One day a baseball manager sees him play and offers to adopt him in exchange for his release from the boarding school. He almost instantly becomes America's most successful and famous baseball player. He meets an aspiring actress who seems to like him. He develops an infatuation for a waitress who is fond of animals; he proposes to her. His lifestyle is excessive and undisciplined, and that causes him a series of troubles.

Appraisal: This film belongs to two categories which rarely stand very high in my esteem: the biopic and the sports movie. When a film manages to escape the reverential tone of the former and the dullness of the latter, it has gone as far as it can for me in those genres; this film does both. It manages to build a believable character, to whom we are sympathetic and whose fortunes and misfortunes never get tedious. The real events on which it is based were previously dramatized in The Babe Ruth Story (1948), which I haven't seen.

Rating: 57

It! The Terror from Beyond Space (1958)

Synopsis: An exploratory trip to Mars ends up with only one survivor. Another team is sent to rescue this man and send him to court-martial for the murder of the rest of his crew. He claims to be innocent and that some alien creature killed those persons. That creature enters the rescue ship and, during the trip back to Earth, continues its killing spree.

Appraisal: This is one of those films so demented that a certain surreal quality somehow transpires from them. To put it another way, the earnestness, conviction and energy with which its mechanical plot is conveyed gives it a certain amount of attractiveness despite its inherent silliness and the conspicuous poverty of its sets, costumes and effects. It was remade as Queen of Blood (1966), which I haven't seen; the concept of a monster in a spaceship was used again in Alien (1979).

Rating: 34

Me Myself I (1999)

Synopsis: A frustrated and lonely woman is hit by a car and then transported to an alternate reality where she meets her other self, who took different decisions earlier in life. She and this other self then exchange their respective lives. She is thus placed in a situation where she is married to a guy she had rejected in her original life thread, a decision she regretted; she also has three children to look after, in her new reality.

Appraisal: Not completely unentertaining existential comedy which is however fairly predictable; it is a variation on the dramatically-oriented Giulia e Giulia (1987); it is also (apparently) a female version of Mr. Destiny (1990), which I haven't seen - by the way, The Family Man (2000) is another film which owes its main plot ideas to that 1990 film. Earlier works which deal in similar "what if" issues are Peggy Sue Got Married (1986) and It's a Wonderful Life (1946). The "parallel lives" aspect was present also in La double vie de Véronique (1991), which is barely worth mentioning since it is so bad, and in a film I haven't seen, Passion of Mind (2000). And I have a vague notion of having also seen a TV show episode which had a resembling storyline; the show was perhaps "The Twilight Zone".

Rating: 38

A Prairie Home Companion (2006)

Synopsis: A live radio show has what is supposed to be its last performance before the new owners of the building tears it down.

Appraisal: Tame and uninspired musical drama. Some performances are good (note to self: watch anything Kline is in), others not quite (e.g. Tomlin); it is quite clear that there was no direction of actors in this movie (e.g. Lohan looks her ordinary, healthy self, not someone who writes poems about suicide). And about the Angel of Death - I guess they could come up with a less worn out cliché.

Rating: 43

A Glimpse of Hell (2001) (TV)

Synopsis: An explosion in an American battleship happens during an experimental shooting of the cannons. The Navy conducts an investigation during which it is attempted to produce a conclusion which is advantageous to the institution, regardless of the truth.

Appraisal: Unremarkable yet superficially competent dramatization of a real event occurred in 1989.

Rating: 38

Duplex (2003)

Synopsis: A newlywed couple buys a house but cannot evict the upstairs tenant, an old woman. She makes their lives hell after they move in.

Appraisal: A variation on The Ladykillers (1955), to which it pays homage through its male and female young protagonists' last names. The first half of the movie is enjoyable at its best and tolerable at its worst. The second half is tolerable at its best and offensive at its worst. The director of this movie, although he hasn't written it or any of his previous ones, exhibits some thematic recurrences which are not hard to detect. Throw Momma from the Train (1987), like this one, had an old lady which was loathsome and hard to kill. The War of the Roses (1989) also had indoors belligerence. Matilda (1996) depicted another kind of tyranny of the older against the younger. And Death to Smoochy (2002) had, as here, one character's relentless efforts to destroy another. Hitchcock references seem to be recurring as well: "Duplex" references "The Birds" at one scene, "Throw Momma from the Train" is a loose remake of "Strangers on a Train".

Rating: 46

Thank You for Smoking (2005)

Synopsis: A lobbyist for the tobacco industry is shown at his work and also in his interactions with his infant son. He starts a sexual relationship with a reporter who is making a story on him. Based on a novel by Christopher Buckley (1st ed. 1994).

Appraisal: Smart and witty, but somewhat lacking in really substantial contents; formally it is pedestrian, showing also a disturbing and unjustified penchant for extreme close-ups.

Rating: 58

Brick (2005)

Synopsis: A high school student's ex-girlfriend tells him she is in serious trouble but won't explain it except in the vaguest of terms. Some days later he finds her dead body. He sets up an investigation on his own.

Appraisal: A mimicry stunt which just does not have enough stamina to work on its own, without the heavy burden of cultural reference it carries. The dialogue is crisp to the point of affectation but the story plods along flatly. More or less similar things have been done before, as comedy though. Once, in the film Plain Clothes (1988), and I think the other one was a TV episode, but of which show? "Parker Lewis Can't Lose", probably.

Rating: 47

Eros (2004)

Synopsis (mild spoilers): (1) The Dangerous Thread of Things. A man and a woman are facing a crisis in their relationship. One day, he sees a younger woman and feels attracted to her. He seeks her out. (2) Equilibrium. An advertising creator has recurring dreams about a woman whom he cannot identify. In a psychoanalysis sesssion, he tries to get to the bottom of it. (3) The Hand. A bond develops between a prostitute and her tailor whom she masturbates when they first meet.

Appraisal: Of segment (1), the less said the better; it is embarrassing for all involved. Segments (2) and (3) are both small pieces of great cinema. Segment (2) is a gem of ingeniousness and quirky humor, a circular construction about dreams, featuring the funniest shrink you ever saw in a movie. Only superficial minds will find it unrelated to the title theme. Segment (3) is a tale imbued of strong lyricism and melancholy, thematically related to, and more dramatically accomplished and emotionally effective than In the Mood for Love, by the same filmmaker.

Rating: (1) The Dangerous Thread of Things: 1
(2) Equilibrium: 80 [so far, 2004's best film I saw]
(3) The Hand: 80 [so far, 2004's second best film I saw]

Transamerica (2005)

Synopsis: A transexual on the brink of having his sex-change operation unexpectedly finds out about a son from a casual sex encounter with a now dead former college friend.

Appraisal (spoilers): Road drama which has little dramatic strength due mostly to poorly written characters who have little depth and at times behave unconvincingly (possible lowest point: the boy trying to have sex with Bree). Every cliché of recent films is in this movie - the car-stealing hiker, the sexually abusing stepfather, etc. Not completely unwatchable, yet a sad reminder of the lowering writing standards of modern films.

Rating: 30

Terminator 2: Judgment Day (1991)

Synopsis: A robot is sent from the future to kill a boy who will become a resistance leader; another robot is sent to protect him.

Appraisal: Moderately entertaining actioner; I don't understand all the adoration toward it. This was my second viewing, and I liked it better this time around, but it still hasn't quite struck a chord in me.

Rating: 42 (up from 30)

La mujer de mi hermano (2005)

Synopsis: Married woman is not sexually satisfied and begins an affair with her husband's brother.

Appraisal: It is absolutely amazing how honest the producers of this film were, by naming the production company 'Shallow Entertainment', because that is a very accurate description of this film. There is a curious coincidental element which is present in this film and also in Capturing the Friedmans (2003), which was released a year after the novel on which La mujer de mi hermano is based came out. There is, however, an apparent difference in the way things happen, and a very big difference in the further development of the characters' history after that event, in the films I mentioned.

Rating: 45

The Matrix Revolutions (2003)

Synopsis: Neo heads to the City of the Machines; the Hammer returns to Zion, which meanwhile suffers a massive attack of Sentinels.

Appraisal: This is even more hopeless than the earlier installments; the plot does not make sense and the exhibition of complex computer-generated imagery seems to be the sole purpose of the film. If you cannot follow my earlier advice and ignore the whole series, stick to the first two films. The open-endedness will not be a big problem - you might even think of it as a philosophical requirement, somehow - and you will spare yourself witnessing the relinquishment of the last shred of dignity the series still possessed.

Rating: 28

The Matrix Reloaded (2003)

Synopsis: Humans are controlled by computers, who plug them into an illusory reality. A bunch of rebels try to reach the system kernel hoping to undo this state of oppression. They fail, because there must be a third extremely lucrative entry in this saga.

Appraisal: Second viewing, no dozing off this time, of this solemn sci-fi soap-opera whose highlight is a highly elaborate car chase in its latter half. Dump this boring trilogy for the similarly themed and more enjoyable eXistenZ (1999).

Rating: 39

The Damned (1963)

Synopsis: A government project involving children is taking place on an English coastal town. A middle-aged American in the company of a young woman stray themselves into the project site while on the run from the gang led by the young woman's brother.

Appraisal: The sci-fi aspect of it is silly and dated, and a historical reminder of how scared the world was at that time (the film was completed in 1961 and shelved for two years); it is nevertheless a quite enjoyable spectacle for its use of landscape, adequate script and professional acting. It famously anticipates A Clockwork Orange (1971) in some early scenes and, perhaps not as famously, borrows a plot element from Scarface (1932).

Rating: 58

I Capture the Castle (2003)

Based on a novel by Dodie Smith (1st ed, 1948).

Synopsis: Two sisters live in a castle with their father, who is a writer with a block, and their stepmother. They make the acquaintance of two American brothers who, it turns out, are the owners of the castle they live in. The older sister is desperate to get a rich husband.

Appraisal: While the text is somewhat banal, it has sufficiently well-defined characters to draw one's attention, and is well directed; also, the two leading ladies are quite lovely and play their parts well.

Rating: 48

Domino (2005)

Synopsis: A young woman with an upper middle class standing decides to be a bounty hunter. She and her team get involved in a scam involving the robbery of an armored car containing some Mafia money.

Appraisal: Adolescent trifle which abuses of camera gimmicks and image filters.

Rating: 39

American Dreamz (2006)

Synopsis: An Iraqi music-loving terrorist goes to America to live with his relatives; he ends up participating in a TV talent contest show; his main rival is a greedy unprincipled singer whose ex-boyfriend enlisted in the Army after she broke up with him. The U.S. president himself is one of the show's jurors.

Appraisal: Nice to watch due to the eventful and ingenious plot, and also due to the competent staging and acting. However, it's less funny and smart than it was supposed to be.

Rating: 52

Cautiva (2003)

English title: Captive.

Synopsis: In Argentina, an adolescent girl is told by a judge that blood tests indicate that she is really the daughter of a couple who was imprisoned during the dictatorship and then went missing. She was unrightfully given as a baby to the couple who raised her as a daughter. Now her biological grandmother requests her custody.

Appraisal: Exemplarily correct, extremely well directed, with a uniformly perfect cast, but, on the other hand, very predictable, and posing no challenge whatsoever for the viewer.

Rating: 52

The Break-Up (2006)

Synopsis: A couple separates but must go on sharing the same apartment for a period.

Appraisal: It has more elaboration than usual, with quirky secondary characters for example, but is ultimately contrived and predictable, with little to maintain the interest in the second half.

Rating: 41

Dirty Work (1998)

Synopsis (spoilers): Two friends start a company which provides revenge for a fee. They expect to make $50,000 which they intend to use for bribing a surgeon into moving a person to the top of the organ receiving queue. They get involved with a fraudulent real estate mogul who doesn't pay them for a job they did. It consisted of tearing down an apartment building. They team up with the former tenants in a plan to ruin said mogul. They finally receive the expected amount through blackmailing.

Appraisal: Apparently this film was met with some rejection which I suppose had to do with its somewhat immature sense of humor. Anyway, its script displays some amount of cleverness, and I actually found some of the stuff funny to some extent.

Note: The film's basic idea is obviously based on the lyrics to the song by Young/Young/Scott which is played in it and which was first released in 1976.

Rating: 44

Je vous aime (1980)

English title: I Love You All.

Synopsis: A woman invites her past lovers to a country house, and remembers each relationship.

Appraisal: This film is like a long joke without a punchline. For those who relish watching famous French stars go through different emotional states this may be attractive.

Rating: 15

The Terminal (2004)

Synopsis: A man visiting the U.S. is confined to an airport because his country suffers a military coup and its new government is not recognized by the U.S. 

Appraisal: This is my second viewing, but only partial this time; it was enough to ascertain that I had given it an excessively low grade. I still don't like it much but it has its moments. 

Rating: 38 (up from 25)

Sphere (1998)

Synopsis: A group of scientists is summoned to investigate a strange ship found in the bottom of the ocean.

Appraisal (spoilers): The theme of wishes coming true in a secluded place has been tackled with in Lem's Solaris (and in two films from that novel). The approach here is different, this film is a thriller. But the result is very lame throughout, really painful to watch, totally unsatisfying from the science-fiction angle, and ridiculous from the dramatic one.

Note: I watched most of it with Portuguese dubbing.

Rating: 10

Note: I watched it again on September 14, 2018. Read the new review here.

Chasers (1994)

Synopsis: A naval cadet is assigned to escort, with a grumpy officer, an attractive female prisoner to jail. She repeatedly tries to escape.

Appraisal: Strictly formulaic comedy which is not very sophisticated, yet provides some amount of entertainment.

Rating: 38

Free Zone (2005)

Synopsis: An American woman breaks up with her fiancé while in Israel, and, not having anybody to be with her at that moment, asks her cab driver to allow her to accompany her on a trip to Jordan where she (the driver) intends to collect a debt.

Appraisal: Half-assed concoction about three characters who are circumstantially brought together, and each of whom is in some sort of personal crisis; the metaphorical aspect is undeniable, each character standing for their respective country, but not especially enlightening regarding the Palestinian conflict. One excellent performance (the actress who plays 'Hana') does not save a film which suffers from poor concept and poor execution.

Rating: 21

Salinui chueok (2003)

English title: Memories of Murder.

Synopsis: In a small town, a serial killer and rapist is killing several women. A local detective tries to pin the murders on the village idiot, to no avail. A detective from the capital has come to help find the killer.

Appraisal: Derivative police drama, that is conducted with a certain amount of competence, but has not nearly enough qualities that would justify the buzz surrounding it.

Rating: 49

Primo Basílio (2007)

Synopsis: A married woman has an affair with her cousin and is then blackmailed by her maid. Based on a novel by Eça de Queirós (1st ed. 1878).

Appraisal: Stiffly and tritely staged and frequently ridiculous. It distinctly goes for the softcore porn aesthetics, which is quite at odds with the subjacent drama but will undoubtedly garner a few - correction: a lot! - more bucks at the box office. The plot, which was originally set in the 19th century in the source novel, doesn't adapt entirely well to the early 1960's.

Rating: 15

La raison du plus faible (2006)

Synopsis: Some long-time friends meet an ex-convict and one of them proposes him to help them rob the money from a steel factory.

Appraisal: Mediocre heist movie which is predominantly dull.

Rating: 32

3 Strikes (2000)

Synopsis: A second-time felon is about to be released on parole. A third conviction would mean a minimum of 25 years in prison. He asks a friend to pick him up on his release day but said friend cannot make it so he sends a third person, who is driving a stolen car. The police orders them to pull over, but the driver shoots at the cops instead. The protagonist escapes the crime scene but is videotaped. The police looks for him all over.

Appraisal: The plot doesn't make much sense (1. the police has no grounds to incriminate him; 2. he has no reason not to turn himself in; and a not worth mentioning etc.). The development is unimaginative and so is the sense of humor; the result is just barely watchable. Note: I have seen a mutilated version; apparently some nudity and sex scenes have been cut off, and all the curses and fuck-related words have been silenced.

Rating: 31

El bonaerense (2002)

Synopsis: A young locksmith is arrested for a robbery to which he unwittingly assisted. He is subsequently released under the condition that he moves to Buenos Aires and joins the police force.

Appraisal (spoilers): A lot of things doesn't make any sense to me in this film. The point of departure already raises serious doubts: a gang that calls a locksmith to open a safe for them? Never heard of this, aren't they afraid that the guy will tell on them? And then, the local police sends the guy to join the police in another town, but, again, what's the explanation for this? Later, when the guy complains that he isn't receiving any salary, his boss demands that he be patient; the boss subsequently talks to another employee and magically all is solved. What is going on? They didn't want to pay him or just forgot? And what about the scene where 'Polaco' is shot by 'Gallo' and 'Zapa' is wounded so that he will look like a hero? Is there a possible way of explaining it? Wouldn't you think that 'Gallo' would want the money for himself, being corrupt and all? He certainly wouldn't get the chance to do that after that whole set-up, as everyone would want to know where the money in the safe was. Anyway, am I the only one asking these questions? Apparently the kind of audience for this film is not the inquisitive one. On the plus side, the film has some competence in the merely directorial sense, with actors quite at ease in their roles and an atmosphere of corruption and doom being established with some success.

Rating: 35

License to Wed (2007)

Synopsis: A man and a woman decide to get married but their minister demands that they go through a course to see if they are fit to wed.

Appraisal: Uninspired and more than occasionally annoying. Good acting.

Rating: 11

Footloose (1984)

Synopsis: A boy comes to live in a small town where dancing is forbidden. He falls for the preacher's daughter. He will challenge local customs and try to promote a big prom ball.

Appraisal: This film suffers from the same problem of the town it creates: the dance numbers are few and far between. The screenplay is mediocre; the preacher's final change of stance comes too abruptly and implausibly. Nevertheless, there are some moments that make it moderately enjoyable (my choice for a highlight would be the highway scene where the girl stands with one foot on each car). The good acting also helps to make it watchable, but also creates a sense of bizarreness, as the actors take their roles so seriously you'd think you are watching a drama by Ingmar Bergman, instead of some silly teenage musical. Afterthought: the plot resembles those of ancient fairy tales (although I can't think of one exactly similar to it). An entire town suffers under the rule of a cruel tyrant who won't allow singing and dancing. The tyrant used to be nice but after a tragic loss became a cruel person. One day a young stranger comes and rebels against the tyrant's rules. He eventually frees the town, earns the love of the tyrant's beautiful daughter and even turns the tyrant into a nice person.

Rating: 41

Familia rodante (2004)

English title: Rolling Family.

Synopsis: An entire family travels in a trailer to attend a wedding.

Appraisal: In the technical department, I don't see any problem with it, and I concede that there is a certain competence for engineering sequences with many characters. But when it comes down to it, I don't see that there is a film in this underwhelming succession of trivialities. This film's basic situation is similar to the later Little Miss Sunshine, which is a much more enjoyable film.

Rating: 15

Heroes (1977)

Synopsis: A Vietnam War veteran is committed to a psychiatrical institution. He escapes. On his way to find some friends with whom he plans to start a business, he meets a young woman. The two get involved in several mishaps which, oddly, brings them together. They will help each other come to terms with some unresolved issues of their own.

Appraisal (mild spoiler): Apparently, this is an attempt at addressing the theme of combat-related post-traumatic stress via romance and adventure on the road. The approach seems contrived; there is slapstick, violence, a car race, but nothing - not even the revelation at the ending - is particularly memorable or inspired.

Rating: 23

The Last Sunset (1961)

Synopsis: A man employs himself as a gunman in charge of protecting a cow herd being moved from Mexico to Texas. Making the journey with him is another man who is a sheriff and has vowed to arrest him and hang him for murder. Both want the herd owner's wife.

Appraisal: The plot has several interesting points, but its development is mostly routine, with some painfully bad dialog interspersed here and there, especially when it tries to be "poetic".

Rating: 46

John and Mary (1969)

Synopsis: John and Mary go to bed on the same night they meet each other at a bar. The next day they stay together getting to know each other. They develop feelings for each other.

Appraisal: Not a good film, but I suppose it is representative of a certain moment in history when values were changing (or, more likely, when movies began incorporating social changes which had happened earlier into the mainstream aesthetics). I thought the writing was uninspired - his sudden rejection of her seems contrived and coming out of nowhere, for instance.

Rating: 36

Almost Famous (2000)

Synopsis: An adolescent boy starts writing about rock-and-roll for magazines and gets an assignment to do a story on a not-so-famous band while going on tour with it. He falls in love with a groupie who is in love with the lead guitarist. The boy's mother is full of strict rules and calls him on the phone all the time while he is away.

Appraisal: At last, a filmmaker that creates an interesting story out of the lives of rock-and-roll musicians and those that gravitate around them... not! Arguably a lesson in mise-en-scene (and editing and camerawork) precision but alas, those qualities alone do not save the film, which has a rather poor and conventional screenplay and adopts a moralizing, or romanticizing, tone every so often. It would probably get a higher grade if watched with the sound turned off.

Rating: 45

Note: I saw the longer version.

Oh! Soo-jung (2000)

English title: Virgin Stripped Bare by Her Bachelors.

Synopsis (spoilers): A man wants to have sex with his girlfriend, but she is a virgin and is afraid of it. They had met through a film director who seemed to have some interest in her too. The man is a rich gallery owner and the woman works for said director as, it appears, some sort of assistant (some sources say writer, but I don't agree). The film director is counting on the gallery owner to finance his movie but the latter backs away from it after the director doesn't return a camera he had borrowed and their friendship turns sour. There is a second woman who seems to be interested in the gallery owner, but I don't know what or who she is exactly. Possibly she is the one whose name he whispers in his girlfriend's ear? Whatever... The story is told twice, with slight variations both in contents and in viewpoint.

Appraisal (spoilers): The narrative has some formal elegance to it, and the characters, though moved by not always clear forces, have some internal consistence. Some interesting moments: the woman on the suspended car holds someone else's baby; the protagonist claims to have a good memory but repeatedly offers proof to the contrary (forgets his gloves on the bench, can't remember where he picked the chopsticks/napkins from); he describes how his brother met his wife when she was very young and jokes that "he raised a child and gobbled her up" (one of the women gets offended and leaves and his other friend tells him that she met his husband when she was in high school); he confesses his admiration for this same brother (whom he lives with). Everything is very understated and the connections between events is sometimes hard to figure out. I am not sure I like this filmmaker.

Rating: 50

Lost in Yonkers (1993)

Synopsis: Two kids must live with their grandmother while their father is away on business (their mother is dead). Besides the old woman - who is a tyrant - they meet their aunt - who is a daydreaming, good-hearted and slightly infantilized person - and their uncle - who is equally friendly and has connections with the underworld.

Appraisal: The text operates with somewhat predictable situations and conflicts, which are nevertheless fairly ably developed. The characters seem to have their roots in reality, albeit with strong simplifications which betray the text's theatrical origins.

Rating: 47

(Seen on August 23)

Kurtlar vadisi - Irak (2006)

English title: Valley of the Wolves: Iraq.

Synopsis (spoilers): In occupied Iraq, a Turkish detachment is humiliated by American soldiers under commanding officer Sam Marshall, and later one of its Turkish members threatens to blow up a hotel in case Marshall doesn't apologize. Concomitantly, a woman seeks revenge against Marshall because he ordered the interruption of her wedding by American soldiers, causing the death of several persons including a child in the process. One of the causes of conflict which is mentioned in the film is the evacuation of some hills the official reason for which is establishing a territory for the Kurds but the real reason being control of some oil reserves. The Iraqian government gives Saddam's piano as a gift to Marshall; the rebels rig it with bombs so it will explode and kill him.

Appraisal: It is basically a melodramatic personal vendetta story, marred by its stereotypes and one-sidedness, yet not totally worthless, since it exposes - albeit with obvious distortions - some aspects of the Iraqian geopolitics; in the very least it is endurable as a plain actioner.

Rating: 37

(Seen on August 21)

Winning (1969)

Synopsis: A Formula One pilot starts a relationship with a divorced woman who has an adolescent son. He devotes more time to his car than to her.

Appraisal: Although it is well directed - the environment of a racing stadium is captured with liveliness and the race scenes are competently filmed - I couldn't connect on a more than superficial level with the characters. Important note: I watched it on a pan-and-scan version, which probably detracted a lot from the viewing experience.

Rating: 40

(Seen on August 20)

Rio, 40 Graus (1955)

English title: Rio 100 Degrees F.

Synopsis: One day in the life of several characters. Some boys who live in a shantytown and sell peanuts for a living; a young woman who lives in that shantytown and gets engaged to a co-worker, arousing jealous feelings from a violent guy whom she rejected; a soccer player who is about to make his debut in a big game replacing an older player; a couple of young lovers who must deal with pregnancy; a young woman who is courted by a young fortune seeker and is also used by her corrupt father to seduce an influent politician; etc.

Appraisal: The freshness derived from its location shooting is one of the major assets of this movie. The shiftings between stories are nicely timed; the transitions are cleverly edited; the multiplicity of parallel plots dilutes their dramatic appeal, but the film works well as a social mosaic.

Rating: 55

(Seen on August 19)