dibot Blog

Director Mary Harron ("The Notorious Bettie Page") brings style to Brett Easton Ellis's novel of 1980s yuppie serial killer Patrick Bateman (Christian Bale, "Rescue Dawn"). The color scheme, the way people and places blend together so it becomes more and more difficult to find anything original, add to the emptiness I felt while reading the book. Bale is perfectly normal as he rattles off facts and reviews of pop bands while preparing to kill, and crazed as he compares business cards.

It's hard to say anything about this film that hasn't been said. Yes, it's a satire. Yes, it's startlingly violent. But I'm drawn to it because it always leaves me thinking.

Blood and Chocolate is just pure entertainment. Based on a young adult book, the plot follows a young female werewolf who has a destiny. Of course, she falls in love with a human. And her furry family gets pissed. An actress who I'm really starting to enjoy, Agnes Bruckner ("Peaceful Warrior") stars. I liked how the werewolf transformations were handled. The people jumped, then glowed, and suddenly, a wolf appeared. A good way to do it if you can't handle full morphing effects. This movie is from the producers of Underworld, so it's more style than substance. But still entertaining.

Lucky # Slevin just tries way too hard to be clever. With all the big names in this movie, it must have looked really good on paper. Because it just fell flat on the screen. I thought, maybe, that it was just poor Josh Hartnett ("The Black Dahlia"), whom I love, not being able to hold his own with the big wigs. But then the scene with Morgan Freeman ("Evan Almighty") and Ben Kingsley ("You Kill Me") couldn't even rouse me from my stupor. The movie looks slick. The dialogue is supposedly catchy. And Bruce Willis ("Live Free or Die Hard") always rocks. But this movie just drags. Avoid it.