jimbell's film blog - Archive

The Last Shot

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The Last Shot (2004)

The Last Shot is an unfunny comedy about an anti-mob investigator who pretends to produce a movie in order to catch some small-time mobsters who control the trucking company delivering sets and so on to the movie site. Second rate and not funny.

Posted Saturday, May 05, 2007 12:28 AM by JimBell | with 0 comments

Mulholland Drive

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Mulholland Dr. (2001)

Mulholland Drive is a David Lynch dream. Now, David is not interested in my dreams. Why should I be interested in his? Although Naomi Watts gives a brilliant performance as the young woman who goes from Deep River, Ontario to corrupt Hollywood, the story makes no sense. With movies as with poetry, you must decide a fundamental: Should the poem or the movie make sense? Although it is politically incorrect to generalize, I’ll bet that people who are extremely divergent tend to go into movie making or movie critiquing more than they go into accounting or auditing. Consequently, quite a few movie critics say that this movie makes no sense and they love it. Although I found it fascinating to watch, I think it is irresponsible writing and directing to make a movie that makes no sense.

Posted Saturday, May 05, 2007 12:26 AM by JimBell | with 0 comments

Quick change

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Quick Change (1990)

Quick Change is a Bill Murray comedy from 1990 which is replete with comic situations but is not funny. Murray’s dry, dry, dry humour does not work in this absurd situation: clown (Murray) robs bank and he, his girl friend (Geena Davis), and his best buddy get royally lost in the attempted get away.

Posted Saturday, May 05, 2007 12:24 AM by JimBell | with 0 comments

Goldfinger

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Goldfinger (1964)

Although I’d seen the majority of the James Bond films a long time ago, I’d missed Goldfinger (1964). Although I appreciated the slow, more natural pace of the film, and although I appreciated being able to hear the dialogue, I really objected to the phoney sexism at the heart of the film. Bond is neither a strong man nor a great martial arts fighter. Nor, in this movie, is he particularly clever—he is held captive for a good chunk of the film. His two talents are booze and broads. While we only get whiffs of his alcohol expertise, we see him have instant seductive powers on a variety of women who are one-dimensional bimbos. I expected to watch the movie for some brainless entertainment, but this went too far.

Posted Saturday, May 05, 2007 12:22 AM by JimBell | with 0 comments

Napoleon Dynamite

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Napoleon Dynamite (2004)

Napoleon Dynamite—I don’t get it. I laughed once in the entire MTV-sponsored movie. It is the story of a twelfth-grade guy in Idaho who is a loser. As his 32-year old brother spends all day on chat lines and his Uncle tries to sell breast enlargers (natural, organic, of course) door to door, Napoleon backs his new-found loser acquaintance Pedro for high school president. I made the mistake of watching the entire movie again with the Director’s and lead actor’s commentary. Ready? During the clever credits at the first, they talked about whose hands we were seeing putting the names in view—three different people did them because the main guy’s hands were considered too gross but yet all the hands had to look relatively the same. Got it? As we meet Napoleon, this amazing loser, with no father (unexplained), no mother (unexplained), no friends, and no self-confidence, the actor who played him (J. Heder) waxes on about how his real-life wife thinks he keeps his mouth open too much, probably breathing through it, sort of like Napoleon. Awesome. Then they start pointing out the important things in each scene. When Napoleon, all alone, conducts a disappointing phone call, someone says, “See those two pictures on the wall in the background? Those are exactly like we had on the wall in the 90s when I was growing up.” Another guy: “But did the set designer set the telephone so high on the wall?” Response: “No. We had to use a different house for the interior shots than for the exterior shots, and that is where the people had their phone.” Response: “Awesome.” After about an hour of this, they had not yet mentioned the best actor or actress in the film: The young, squat girl who was the love interest of both Napoleon and his Hispanic friend. She had so many difficult lines and awkward scenes, and she played them flawlessly. By now, it made sense to me that they did not mention her. Oh, they pointed out “That’s my brother in the foreground dancing with the girl with the puffy white sleeves.” And as the climactic scene approached, they talked about “Did you play that kind of ball when you were in high school? Yes?” “How do you keep score?” “When the ball wraps around, stupid!” “Oh, I didn’t know—I played four-square.” “Oh, I was good at, like, four-square.” Got it?

Posted Saturday, May 05, 2007 12:20 AM by JimBell | with 0 comments

The Hard Word

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The Hard Word (2002)

Why would anyone want to make The Hard Word, an Australian imitation of a B-grade American bank robber movie, poorly done?

Posted Saturday, May 05, 2007 12:18 AM by JimBell | with 0 comments

JimBell Blog

The Last Shot

Mulholland Drive

Quick change

Goldfinger

Napoleon Dynamite

The Hard Word

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