Posted in: Disc Reviews by David Annandale on February 22nd, 2004
Synopsis
Meg Ryan plays Manhattan English teacher Frankie Avery. When parts of a dismemberedyoung woman are found in her back garden, Ryan is questioned by Detective Mark Ruffalo.Ruffalo asks Ryan out, and before long they’re at it hot and heavy. But the day of the murder,Ryan was in the same bar as the victim, and witnessed, in the shadows, a man being fellated.That man had the same tattoo as Ruffalo, and Ryan begins to fear that her new lover is, at best,a liar. At worst...
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Posted in: Disc Reviews by Archive Authors on February 22nd, 2004
The Stupids are a family with, as you can guess, a below-average intelligence. I think this might be due to inbreeding. The plot is fairly simple, more a series of vignettes: the family gets into some mess because of a mistake they make, and then get out of it in some silly manner. It sort of comes together in the end, but that's how the whole movie goes.
The Stupids is a kid's movie, and it was made with that exact audience in mind. It's not really there to entertain adults and...
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Archive Authors on February 22nd, 2004
The third and hopefully final entry in the American Pie series, American Wedding keeps with the sweet charms and gross out comedy of the first two movies, but can’t live up to the humor of the original or its sequel. Average Joe Jim, (Jason Biggs) and former band geek Michelle, (Alyson Hannigan) are now engaged to be wed and must decide whether raucous Stifler (Seann William Scott) should be invited to the wedding. Shenanigans ensue involving a night out at a gay club, a bachelor party, pleasing the in-laws, and pubi...
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Archive Authors on February 17th, 2004
Ah….Armand Assante…what happened to your career. You were so brilliant in Sidney Lumet’s Q & A (rent it, people). I guess things happen. You have bills to pay. A family to raise.
Consequence is a made for cable HBO film. The opening voice-over, in classic film noir tradition, sets the table for a lurid crime melodrama. Unfortunately, Assante’s awkward southern accent makes the voice over, like the film itself, a bit off putting. The story involves a dentist (Armand Assante) who decides...
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Archive Authors on February 16th, 2004
I generally don’t care for those hour long Teen Sci-Fi Romantic Dramas that are so prevalent on the WB. They all just seem a little too “I’m 18, and I’m mad at my parents” for my tastes. While there’s no doubt that Roswell certainly has a measure of that teen angst, there is just enough X Files included, too. Most of the melodrama in this show is tied in with the sci-fi aspects of the story, which makes the show not only watchable, but a bit of a guilty pleasure.
The basic premise of this show...
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Archive Authors on February 15th, 2004
“I’ll Be There” is different from most romantic comedies in that the main relationship is between a father and his daughter….wait a minute, that didn’t come out quite right.
The story revolves around Paul Kerr, an aging rock star who ends up in a hospital following a drunken ride on a motorcycle inside his own mansion. There is a concern that he may have thoughts of taking his own life. And then to top it off Paul learns about a daughter that he sired during a relationship that he had with a groupie 16 ye...
Posted in: Disc Reviews by David Annandale on February 15th, 2004
Synopsis
Years ago, a tormented teen at Rogers High School committed suicide after stabbing a younggirl to death, or so the story goes. In the present, the jocks on the football team are slipping intocomas after having visions of the ghost of the teen. The put-upon goths and geeks at the schoolare summoning the ghost of Abel Frye and cursing the bullies. Or so it seems. Called in toinvestigate is the Veritas Team, a mom-and-pop-and-two-teenagers outfit whose job is toinvestigate pos...
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Archive Authors on February 15th, 2004
A number of great films have come out of Ireland over the past decade (or so). A few titles that come to mind are In the name of the Father (1993), My Left Foot (1989), In America (2002), The Boxer (1997), and definitely The Commitments (1991). The one factor that differentiates The Commitments from the rest of these great films is that it centers around music rather then turmoil (whether it be personal, family, or country turmoil). The Commitments is a great tale t...
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Archive Authors on February 15th, 2004
Synopsis
Danny (Greg Kinnear) and his wife Jennifer (Lauren Holly) are a happily married couple. They have reached the point in their marriage that they are now ready to start a family. The only problem is that for whatever reason, they are unable to conceive. Jennifer goes to her physician for a work up and is found to be healthy and able to conceive. Therefore she concludes that the couple problems are due to Danny. She tricks Danny into going a fertilization clinic to be examined. It turns out tha...
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Archive Authors on February 14th, 2004
If Sofia Coppola hasn’t redeemed herself from the whole The Godfather, Part III debacle by now, then it simply can’t be done. Lost in Translation is a beautiful film, the likes of which are rarely seen on this side of the Atlantic. (Of course, to be fair, the film was filmed entirely on location in Tokyo.)
Shot on a shoestring budget, Coppola has definitely made a mountain out of a molehill with this film, taking her small story of two ships that cross in the night, and making that night as br...
