DaViD´82

Like the book, the picture is rather “naive" and rather than quality, we get solid craftsmanship instead. Thanks to the flatness of the characters, the actors have very little acting to do, which is highlighted by it being rather garrulous and so the entire movie relies on vocal performances. Although this could easily be cut down a good few minutes, in the end it is watchable without great damage to your health. But the only actually positive side of the whole Code is Zimmer’s soundtrack, which makes even the most boring dialog scene seem as if it is something fundamentally important for the story. The creators tended toward the secrecy storyline, which is therefore given the most space and so only a fraction of the movie is devoted to cracking the code and this becomes just a necessary evil with no power behind it, which is a great shame. OST score: 4/5

Had such a routine and uninteresting dull popcorn affair come as an adaptation of another comic, it could have been a relative success, but as a continuation of the franchise started by Singer, it is a huge flop, though watchable.

A boring TV production, the tiresome duplicating (ahem, actually dualistic) pace kills the otherwise interesting and topical theme.

An incredible uneven series. Most similar series keep some kind of quality bar with episodes that sometimes are better than others, but Mission: Impossible goes from one extreme to the other, one episode is great and the next one is something close to deserving a Boo!.

A solid average which proves that Reynolds still knows how to make a movie. But if the Scott brothers invested a little more (and if one of them had filmed the thing), it could have turned out somewhat better. The screenplay lacks any mythological elements and attempts to give a realistic perspective. Which is all very nice, but not completely appropriate, because as a result the whole Tristan and Isolde story ends up swimming in the dime-a-dozen waters of something we have seen a hundred times over.

This commercial variation of Brazil is rather pleasantly surprising in the end. And although this is a very simplified insight, it isn’t at all dumb. Almost no action, very TV standard in visual terms, the actors have thankless roles (especially poor John Hurt, but who else could have given such a great performance?). And it is even more surprising in that it works rather well overall. The greatest positives are the main vocal performance by Hugo Weaving, the soundtrack and the pretty daring act of grafting of the story onto the contemporary political situation with thoughts that are currently not in fashion. At least in commercial America. What brings this picture down is that it doesn’t manage to create a convincing atmosphere of a nation under a dictatorship which would make the term “big brother" a reality. In the end, V stays in the realm of an entertaining Hollywood spectacle.

A picture that immediately captures you with its great visuals and then with its powerful story. It gradually turns into a good example of a Lynch-style movie where you have no idea where you stand, who is who, etc. The excellent cast just goes to enhance the overall impression. But unlike movies by David Lynch, Stay has a clear message... And that it where its downfall lies. The message luckily isn’t served up absolutely word for word, but it doesn’t leave much room for the viewer to make up his own mind. I can shake the feeling that, if it weren’t for the final scene, this movie could have been a beautiful experience overflowing with “dreamy" magic, despite being incomprehensible. This way it remains just a showcase for Forster and, in a way, a trick on the viewer, because the cheapest explanation is always correct. In the end, this is just an over-combined variation on Jacob’s Ladder.

Verbinski drifted away from blockbuster waters to a strange picture about another “loser" suffering a middle-age crisis. It isn’t at all original; mainly it lacks any common theme to make the separate scenes, which are good in themselves, make sense when put together. Although this is no American Beauty, it has a pleasantly melancholic air to it and thanks to Cage and Cane it is certainly worth watching. Primarily for Cage, this and Lord of War signals a return to quality acting performances. Too bad that its potential is exploited very little; it should have cut much deeper...

Luckily Spike Lee hasn’t drowned in commercial waters and managed to film a very pleasant and intelligent picture that he worked some moments from his previous works into. The screenplay starts off with an excellent idea, which makes it all the more surprising that in the end it is the screenplay that is the weakest aspect of this movie, because it isn’t enough for over two hours of running time. Luckily this isn’t completely obvious when you are watching, thanks to Spike, the absolutely perfect casting and a very successful balancing on a knife’s edge between thriller and comedy. Overall, very good, but for me The Negotiator remains the “king" of this type of movie.

The first season is a mediocre affair in all respects. Wooden actors, an obvious and predictable story and “poetic" dialogs about nothing - these are just some of the aspects that manage to spoil the mood. Instead of exploiting the considerable potential that the book this is based on has, the story highlights the less interesting aspects, ignoring the interesting bits; it follows just a few of the four thousand, four hundred in a sub-standard variation on The X-Files, that is even more bogged down with “American values". Despite everything, it has some points of interest and can be watched without risking great harm to your health. But then season two comes along, and there is a clear increase in quality in all respects. Nothing too drastic, but a slow and sure improvement, step by step, and by the end of season two it becomes clearly above-average, nicely filling the gap left by The X-Files (or at least its weaker seasons). If it goes on like that, one day The 4400 could be a really good series. But at this rate, it still has a long, long way to go.