Cachorro (2004)

English title: Bear Cub.
Synopsis: A child is left by his mother at the care of his homosexual uncle when she goes on a trip to India; she is arrested there and a conflict arises between said uncle and the child's grandmother for his custody.
Appraisal: Drama which has been mysteriously classified by some as a comedy yet hasn't got the least vestige of humor in it, and which tackles a multiplicity of interrelated subjects in a uniformly balanced, instructive, and boring manner.
Rating: 30

Le fusil à lunette (1972)

Synopsis (SPOILERS): World War II. A snow field. An allied soldier is looking through the telescopic lens of his rifle and spots a German soldier. The German soldier sees a cat and gets distracted trying to attract the cat. The allied soldier watches the scene and then shoots the German soldier, killing him. Then he tries to attract the cat unto him and gets shot too.
Appraisal: Interesting 15-minute movie.

Peindre ou faire l'amour (2005)

English title: To Paint or Make Love.
Synopsis: A middle aged couple gets to know a younger couple and their relationship gets deeper than imagined at first.
Appraisal: In certain crucial aspects, this is unlike anything I have ever watched, aside from so-called pornography, in that there is no lasting conflict and things evolve to harmony. Most other films follow one of two patterns: either there is a conflict that is solved or not, or (which is considerably rarer) it has no conflict and things advance inexorably towards a catastrophe. For an example of the latter category, take The Wicker Man (1st version). The thing is, Peindre... could be viewed as pornography after all - of the softcore kind, but pornography all the same. It deals with partner exchanges between couples, or, as it is commonly called, swinging. It has a long set-up during which there is little sex, yet from the beginning there can be no doubt about where it is heading. The plot is firmly entrenched in the bourgeois milieu, and it is clearly a film for the bourgeois; certain details, such as when they decide they are not going to sell the house after all, make it clear that these people have no financial concerns of any kind, which may be a little off-putting to members of the audience who live on any kind of budget.
Rating: 49

Gomgashtei dar Aragh (2002)

English title: Marooned in Iraq.
Synopsis: In the aftermath of the Iran-Iraq conflict, an old Kurdish musician living in Iran decides to go to Iraq in search of his ex-wife who appears to be requesting his help. He summons his two sons to accompany him in that journey.
Appraisal: Amateurish filmmaking which still may interest some for providing a glimpse into a not so well known culture and also for the beautiful scenery. The plot is simple in its general terms yet complicated in some of its details (the old man had been abandoned by his wife when singing became forbidden to women in Iran; his sons know the truth about his divorce, but, in an attempt to convince them to participate in the quest for her, he tells them that the divorce was a lie to preserve the honor of the family and that, in fact, she is still his wife) and incomprehensible in others - a matchmaker was being harassed by a thug for having given a woman whom he coveted to another man; said matchmaker is buried up to his neck in the ground by the musicians, apparently because he was trying to prevent the wedding (is that really it? why? the subtitles mention that the father didn't give his permission; if that is so it could only be the groom's). No one that I have read seems to have gotten this, yet no one seems to care either. There is a conspicuous double standard when it comes to films made by ethnic minorities or obscure countries; they are praised in spite of their blatant shortcomings, in a sort of tacit affirmative action destined to encourage these poor communities to participate in the global film market. It would be better if critics were more honest about it. Or, what do I know, maybe they really liked it.
Rating: 30

Gordos e Magros (1977)

Synopsis: A rich, obese and spoiled man causes a tumult during a party his parents are throwing, then leaves and meets a hunger artist whom he decides to transform into a media circus. There are flashbacks to both men's early days.
Appraisal: At times it is hilarious, but it never really soars as social commentary on Brazil's economic disparities, due to its lack of focus and preferred emphasis on being noisy and frenetic; also, it feels too much like a party among close friends who are having more fun than us viewers. The main actor carries the film with a vigorous and clever performance. For Brazilians it is probably required viewing, as there aren't so many watchable films made in this country.
Rating: 43

X-Men: The Last Stand (2006)

Synopsis: The mutant community is shaken with the news of a drug that has been developed to revert mutant individuals to normal ones. Meanwhile Jean is revealed to be alive, but her dark side has emerged and threatens to take over her personality. Magneto plans to destroy the facility where the drug is being manufactured, along with a mutant subject who is being used by the researchers at the facility.
Appraisal: I don't know exactly why, but this installment of the series was the most endurable one to me. I think the whole series is overrated, and really more suitable to adolescents than to adults. I think it was Jorge Luis Borges who once said "In cinema we are all readers of Mme. Delly"; he was right of course, but the phrase should be updated for modern days to "In cinema we are all readers of Stan Lee". Yet the film is not so bad, and I wasn't too bored either with its action scenes filled with special effects or with its addressing of the theme of minorities and how society deals with them (and vice versa).
Rating: 50

Jarhead (2005)

Synopsis: Swoff has enlisted in the Marines but is not cut out for military life. He participates in the Gulf War.
Appraisal: I don't have much to say about this movie. It is interesting, shows realistic details about a recent war, has some moderately funny moments; it is not a great movie, it's not strong enough, either because some of the situations depicted are somewhat banal or have been shown in too many previous movies or because the characters were not sufficiently fleshed out. In any case, it's a decent watch.
Rating: 60

El abrazo partido (2004)

English title: Lost Embrace.
Synopsis: The film is set in a shopping gallery in Argentina. Ariel's father took off to Israel when he was a baby. Now an adult in a country immersed in a crisis, Ariel is planning to emigrate to Poland, the land of his ancestors. Meanwhile, his brother Joseph, the owner of a small commerce company, has some financial disputes with an ex-associate which will be settled by a race between Joseph's assistant Ramón and the ex-associate's assistant.
Appraisal: Shoddily filmed - its trademark is the fast zooming in and out - dramedy which lacks an aesthetic vision, or even some script refinement that would render its characters, or its final plot twist, significant or even moderately convincing. That being said, some performances are competent (e.g. the mother), and some scenes achieve some degree of naturalism which is to be valued.
Rating: 32

Private (2004/I)

Synopsis: A Palestinian family has its house invaded by Israeli soldiers, and is confined to the living room.
Appraisal: Drama with obvious metaphorical pretensions (house = land) that is quite tedious to watch, not to mention dangerously simplifying in political terms.
Rating: 29

Sei mong se jun (2004)

English title: Ab-normal Beauty.
Synopsis: A young female photographer develops an obsesssion towards death. Then she receives some weird photos by mail.
Appraisal: Badly written and apparently hastily put together, yet endurable horror thriller.
Rating: 34

Æon Flux (2005)

Synopsis: In the future, the survivors of a terrible epidemics live isolated in a city surrounded by walls; they live under a dictatorship whose head is the scientist who invented the vaccine against that deadly virus. Aeon Flux is a female member of the resistance and has been assigned to attempt against the life of the scientist-dictator.
Appraisal: I am a great admirer of the leading actress of this film; she, and the good-tasted production design, are the only (feeble) reasons to watch this otherwise vacuous futuristic thriller. One note: whoever says that this is a feminist movie should be reminded that it was written by two males, based on a graphic novel created by another male, and production designed by yet another male.
Rating: 12

The Origins of Scientific Cinematography: Early Applications (1993)

The last installment in this documentary series is also the one that contains the most repulsive imagery (medically related), and should be avoided by squeamish viewers. It subsequently shows some more attractive scenes, of primitive cultures.

The Origins of Scientific Cinematography: Technical Developments Around the Turn of the Century (1992)

Here, he shows the work of some lesser known pioneers.

Dark Angel (1990)

Alternative title: I Come in Peace.
Synopsis: An alien comes to Earth with the purpose of extracting a powerful drug from human beings' bodies. He is chased by an alien cop and also by an earthling one.
Appraisal: Watchable sci-fi action thriller, with lots of fire blasts and some explosions. That being said, the dialogue is poor, and the film is not especially remarkable let alone memorable.
Rating: 35

Le promeneur du champ de Mars (2005)

English title: The Last Mitterrand.
Synopsis: A young writer is commissioned to record the memories and opinions of a dying statesman for future publication.
Appraisal: This is quite a poor set-up for a movie; it has a good performance by Bouquet and is not hard to watch,but it's just an old guy talking about his past, and a young guy with relationship problems (and this subplot is even more tedious than the main one).
Rating: 35

The Origins of Scientific Cinematography: The Pioneers (1990)

Documentary about the precursors of cinema. The works of Janssen, Muybridge and Marey are shown. It is very informative.

The Great Outdoors (1988)

Synopsis: A family's vacation by the lake is disturbed by the arrival of their annoying in-laws.
Appraisal: Not very good; although the set-up is interesting and it has two great comedians leading the show (and a good cast to complement them), the actual development is uninspired and by-the-book. Note: the subtitles available on the web contain funny dialogue between the skunks that I presume should be shown on the screen, but TNT didn't show any.
Rating: 41

Was geschah wirklich zwischen den Bildern? (1986)

English titles: Film Before Film; Film Before Film: What Really Happened Between the Images?
Description: It shows several devices that preceded cinema in the task of displaying moving images.
Appraisal: Interesting documentary, but it lacks a historic perspective; some of the devices have no historical importance in the path that led to cinema; that doesn't make them uninsteresting, of course, but it seems that more of the film is devoted to them than to true film pioneers; for example, Edison gets only a mention to his name in the end - no information on his contributions is given. Perhaps this should be examined as the first of a series; the problem is that I haven't seen any of its successors, and do not know what is in them.
Rating: 58

Crocodile Dundee in Los Angeles (2001)

Synopsis: CD's wife gets a job in LA, and he comes with her and their kid. There he helps uncover the illegal acts of a film producing company.
Appraisal: Anodyne.
Rating: 33

La métamorphose du papillon (1904)

I watched it online, and it bore the title "Métamorphoses du papillon". I am supposing it is the same film.

Le bourreau turc (1904)

English titles: The Terrible Turkish Executioner; Decapitation in Turkey.
Synopsis: An executioner cuts four heads at once; later, they reunite with their bodies and cut the executioner in two, at the waist.
Appraisal: Interesting.

L'errore del policeman (c1910)

Synopsis (spoilers!): A woman's husband goes out on a trip but misses his train. Another man takes the opportunity to court the woman, but is rejected by her. The woman's daughter has a fiancé who is a cop; he is asked to expell the unwanted suitor from the house. Meanwhile the husband enters the house, returning from his aborted trip. The policeman thinks that he is the suitor and throws him out of the house. Meanwhile the suitor is hiding. The husband reenters his house hiding inside a clothes' trunk. He is threatened to be expelled again but his wife comes in time to straighten things out.
Appraisal: Unremarkable yet watchable.
Note: This is a French film whose French title is apparently unknown.

Tom Pouce suit une femme (1910)

English title: Tom Thumb in Love.
Synopsis: A dwarf courts a tall woman and is rejected by her.
Appraisal: Not so good.

Elevage d'animaux de menagerie (c1910)

Just scenes of animals - walruses (one of them can't get out of the water because its limb keeps slipping out of the ice border), bears, lions, etc. - either in a zoo or in a place where they are being raised for going to a zoo (is there such a thing?).

Escamotage d'une dame au théâtre Robert Houdin (1896)

English title: The Conjuring of a Woman at the House of Robert Houdin; The Vanishing Lady.
This is my second viewing. I am in no mood for writing a synopsis of this film. The English title was mistranslated from "Escamotage d'une dame chez Robert-Houdin", which is the French title that appears in some (all?) copies, the translation error being of course that "chez Robert-Houdin" means at the theater which bears the name of the famous magician, not at his house.

Electrocuting an Elephant (1903)

The title says it all. This is my second viewing.

La poule aux oeufs d'or (1905)

Synopsis: A man wins a hen in a lottery. He finds out that it lays eggs which contain gold coins. In the henhouse some fairies appear and generate a pile of magical eggs. He and his wife are now rich and move to a castle. They hide their valuable eggs in the cellar, and the hen in a cage in the living room. Two thieves come and steal the eggs. Pressed by creditors, the husband kills the hen in the hope of finding gold in it. There is nothing inside and thus he is poor again.
Appraisal: Entertaining.

Fantasia (1909)

Synopsis: Go to the link provided in the review before the last one, and see the plot for the film "Les lunatiques". He is actually providing the plot of "Fantasia" and not "Les lunatiques", which is another film.
Appraisal: Technically interesting, and mildly entertaining.

El hotel eléctrico (1908)

English title: The Electric Hotel.
This concerns a hotel where things move by themselves. It is my second viewing. For more information go to the link featured on the review before this one. My appraisal is: entertaining.

Satan s'amuse (1907)

English title: Satan's Amusement.
Synopsis: I saw it yesterday, and already cannot recall the details of its plot, so look here.
Appraisal: Not bad.

Sculpture moderne (1908)

Synopsis: First, a woman holds a sculpture in her hands which shows some people; as she covers and uncovers it, the people change their position. Then she shows a frame containing those people in a figure (or photography); again, as she covers it and uncovers it, the people change their position. Next, she holds a bulk of clay that sculpts itself into some shape; first a shoe, then a crocodile, and so on.
Appraisal: Interesting display of animation technique, quite competent for its time.

Nicolás el tonto (c1908)

Synopsis: At an inn, a mysterious lodger arrives (it is suggested that he is the devil himself). He performs magic feats with his sword, such as setting a table without actually touching anything. A clumsy employee at the inn is envious of these magical powers, and so gets up at night and steals the sword. When he attempts to employ it, however, things go terribly wrong and the objects around him - like dishes and rugs - rebel and make a mess. The lodger awakens and notices his sword is missing. He finally encounters it and witnesses the disasters provoked by the employee.
Appraisal: Within its limited pretensions, this fantastic comedy succeeds at entertaining.
NOTE: The original French title of this movie remains unknown to me. In the web, there are some sites - none of them of French language - that report it as being "L'épée du spirite", and the year as 1909. I consider this information to be very unreliable; the French word 'spirite' means a person that follows the doctrine of spiritism, and this obviously is not the case here. Browsing through the titles which IMDb credit to de Chomón, the most promising one seems to be "Le chevalier mystère (1908)", but I could not ascertain that it is the right title, since there isn't a synopsis available for it.

Le pêcheur de perles (1904)

English title: Down in the Deep or The Pearl Fisherman.
Synopsis: A man has a vision of several women while on the seashore; responding to their call, he dives into the ocean and reaches the bottom. He walks on the bottom of the ocean until he is told to enter a giant seashell and lay there. He does it and a big pearl necklace appears next to him while he is enclosed there. He is then released and goes back to the surface. He gives the necklace to his wife, who wears it. Immediately their clothes are replaced by expensive ones. They are then led to a magical place where they witness a spectacle of light and color.
Appraisal: Entertaining and visually imaginative and pleasant.

Métempsycose (1907)

English title: Metempsychosis.
Synopsis: A statue of a woman's head is placed on a support; it morphs into a live head. A woman has butterfly wings whose graphic pattern keeps changing. A gigantic rose produces babies from within it. Etc.
Appraisal: Visually pleasing, as de Chomón's films usually are, and not much more than that.

Le théâtre de Bob (1906)

English title: Bob's Electric Theater.
Synopsis: Some kids are spending some idle time when one of them comes up with the idea of staging a puppet show. Then we are shown two puppets on a small stage, engaged in various sorts of interactions, among which fencing is the most prominent one. The action is organized in acts, as in a play. In the last act the puppets are changed, and we see a guy that performs some gymnastics.
Appraisal: Impressive technique for the time at which it was made. Quite entertaining and lively.

La boîte à cigares (1907)

English title: The Cigar Box.
Synopsis: A strange cabin produces a man from its inside by turning one of its doors around its center. The man makes a gesture and all the doors turn, producing six young women standing at each door. The women descend from the cabin and leave. Then the man produces two valets from thin air; they also leave. He then commands the doors to tumble out of the cabin, revealing its interior: there are six giant cigars in it. He takes a rifle and shoots each cigar, lighting it in the process. Then each cigar is transformed into a woman. Etc.
Appraisal: Slightly entertaining, though not really innovative or remarkable.

L'écrin du rajah (1906)

Synopsis: In the rajah's palace, gifts are being brought, expensive jewels, which are put inside a chest. The chest disappears, causing general panic. A search is conducted in the porch and they see a man mounted on a flying dragon, carrying the chest with him. The rajah and his old servant go out in search for the bandit's hideaway place. They finally find it: it is a cave in a mountain. They invade it and kill the bandit. When they open the chest, instead of the jewels, they see a woman emerge from it. At the woman's command, several dancers appear out of nowhere and start dancing. They return to the palace and there the dancers do one more dance; the jewels reappear and are distributed among the dancers.
Appraisal: This early film has nice visuals: the sets are elaborate and grandiose and the costumes are beautifully hand-colored. The tricks are simple.

In the Cut (2003)

Synopsis: A teacher is questioned by a cop concerning a brutal murder which happened on her neighborhood. This cop has a tattoo which she saw on a guy at the day of the murder; he was having sex with a woman. Other suspects are: her student who is obsessed with a serial killer; her ex-boyfriend who is feeling and behaving strangely. She has a half-sister who works at a strip club.
Appraisal: If I had the habit of watching softcore pornography, I surely would have seen dozen of other films with very similar structure and plot as this one. Of course they probably wouldn't have a director as talented as this one. There is little she can do to make up for the triteness of the material at hand, though.
Rating: 35

Dogtown and Z-Boys (2001)

Description: Documentary about skateboarding.
Appraisal: Watchable documentary, though I don't really know what it has to do with me.
Rating: 50

Le grand voyage (2004)

Synopsis: An old man living in France wants to go to Mecca but won't fly and can't drive a car, so he forces his young son to drive him there.
Appraisal: It suffers from excessive dullness. There are episodic instances of narrative liveliness, but they are not enough to save the film. The film falls in the old cliché of having the initially reluctant son reassess his position, and confess to having learned a lot in the trip; yet it is not clear to the viewer exactly what he is supposed to have learned that is so significant and profound.
NOTE: there is a very obscure plot point for which some clarification can be found in the IMDb message board, under the title "Money in the sock...".
Rating: 35

The Pope of Greenwich Village (1984)

Synopsis: Charlie keeps getting in trouble because of his irresponsible cousin Paulie; after they lose their jobs in a restaurant because of Paulie, the latter comes up with the idea of robbing a safe with the assistance from an older man who used to be a safecracker. What Paulie doesn't tell them is that the money in the safe is mafia money for bribing cops.
Appraisal: This is my second viewing. Consistently entertaining, and with excellent performances by Rourke and McMillan (Roberts is fine too, but overacts a little), and good smaller performances by everyone else. Maybe it is a bit uneven, with some banality interspersed with the good stuff, but it stands a second watch pretty well.
Rating: 66 (down from 69)

Around the World in 80 Days (2004)

Synopsis: Phileas Fogg, a scientist and inventor, bets that he will circumnavigate the globe in no more than 80 days. His valet, a Chinese man who is being sought by the police for a bank robbery - he was actually recovering a statue who had been stolen from his village and which was supposed to protect it - goes along with him. Later on, a beautiful French girl who is a struggling painter and speaks perfect English joins them too, despite Mr. Fogg's reluctance.
Appraisal: Mediocre adventure that should probably please children. The premise is based on a 1873 novel by Jules Verne. The theme of a stolen object which has to be recovered for the benefit of a community was used in Ong-bak (2003).
Rating: 34

Entreatos (2004)

Description: Documentary showing the presidential campaign of 2002 in Brazil, focusing only on candidate da Silva, the winner of that election and now president on his second term, whose private moments are shown here.
Appraisal: While its theme and characters are bound to arouse some interest, its actual contents actually might cause just as much tedium. It's very well filmed though, and is probably important as a historical document for future generations.
Rating: 38

National Security (2003)

Synopsis (mild spoilers): A policeman witnesses his partner get killed while trying to stop some thieves in a warehouse. A police academy reject is stopped by said police officer while trying to get his keys from inside his own car. During the incident, a bee intervenes, provoking a scene that is mistakenly regarded as the policeman spanking the detainee. In consequence of that, the policeman is sentenced to prison and expelled from the force. Upon release he employs himself as a security guard, and while tracking his former parter's killers he runs into the guy from the bee incident, who is also working as a security guard. They both team up to try to foil a gang who stole a very expensive material and is trying to sell it.
Appraisal: It relies upon a well known formula - two guys who are enemies but who must cope with each other and eventually become friends - but has a quite elaborate plot. There is some entertaining material and the film is not hard to watch, but much of the verbal humor is misguided, addressing the racial tensions in America in a frivolous or absurd manner.
Rating: 46

Enduring Love (2004)

Synopsis: A man dies from falling from a balloon, after several other men who were trying to keep the balloon down by hanging from it let go of it. One of the surviving men develops a crush for another one of them and starts stalking him relentlessly.
Appraisal: A rare case of a film of which I have read the novel on which it is based. From what I recall, it is a perfectly faithful adaptation. The criticism I make is valid for book and film alike. First, there is the fact that this is actually two unrelated short stories very poorly amalgamated into a novel. Second, while the first short story ("the balloon accident") is rather good, both in literary and in cinematic terms, the second one ("the stalker") is definitely weak in several aspects; the character of the stalker is not given much depth or consistency; the film practically uses it to focus on the stalked man's reactions, and is not very good at that; add to it that there is yet another subplot about the dead man's widow, which is there just to add to the book's size and to the film's length, and you have a film with individual sparks of intelligence scattered through it, that don't make for a solid whole.
Rating: 48

Wallace & Gromit in The Curse of the Were-Rabbit (2005)

Synopsis: Wallace and Gromit are humane rabbit catchers. Wallace develops a contraption that instills in the rabbits' minds the repulsion to carrots. At the same time, a huge monster starts destroying the vegetables in the neighborhood, jeopardizing the annual contest promoted by Lady Tottington. The lady's suitor takes the opportunity to impose his brutal approach to the problem, which consists in hunting the beast down and killing it.
Appraisal: A pale shadow of the brilliant early shorts, although it still has the captivating characters and the care for neat visuals and animation. The spark of originality is mostly gone though.
Rating: 46