Anyone seen a good movie lately?

[rjs246]

I still want to see it. It made so many best of the year lists that I don't think I can pass it up. Plus seeing a mangled hairy bush could be entertaining.

[phattymatty]

the first hour wasn't bad, but then it just got a bit stupid.

i'm off to get drunk and watch basketball now.

[rjs246]

I hate you.

[mussa]

me too

[ice grillin you]

no good....



'V': D for Disappointing

Friday, March 17, 2006

As V in "V for Vendetta," Hugo Weaving is a stagy voice emanating from a hole in the polyurethane phiz clamped over his real mug. As a revolutionary dedicated to tearing down the state, he looks like a guy in a comic book. (Wait, he was a guy in a comic book.) That almost completely ruins the audience's ability to connect with his lonely mission, and the filmmakers know it, so they front-load the regime he despises to make up in hatred what they can't create in empathy. The Britain in question in some near future is a dystopian horror: It seems to have been taken over by a liberal's darkest fantasy of the conservative right -- a gay-hating, woman-fearing Taliban, puritanical and single-minded, determined to crush human enterprise, creativity and love at every stop.

First-time director James McTeigue tells the story (an adaptation of Alan Moore's graphic novel by Andy and Larry Wachowski, the brothers behind "The Matrix") not from V's point of view, but from that of Evey Hammond, played by the eternally underwhelming American actress Natalie Portman, behind a whisper of a Brit accent that comes and goes at random. Forlorn and mundane throughout, she's set upon in the beginning by a trio of thug/cop/rapists, when V steps out of the darkness and with a samurai's grace, magically disarms and discombobulates them.

That incident sets into motion a variety of plot strands, and it all builds to a celebratory reenactment of Guy Fawkes's deepest dream. We watch in rapt enthusiasm as Parliament goes up in an apocalyptic gush of flame.

"V for Vendetta" is a piece of pulp claptrap; it has no insights whatsoever into totalitarian psychology and always settles for the cheesiest kinds of demagoguery and harangue as its emblems of evil. They say they want a revolution? Then give us a revolution, one that's believable, frightening, heroic, coherent and not a teenagers' freaky power trip.

-- Stephen Hunter

[SD_Eagle5]

igy-- I was afraid of that. Audiences are so desperate for anything half decent critics will hype whatever they can to drum up some interest.

[ice grillin you]

thats true and i almost fell for it...luckily my boy SH saved me again

[mussa]

i have no interest in seeing V for Vendetta.

[MURP]

no good....



'V': D

always trying to pimp Vernon arnt ya.

[rjs246]

Stephen Hunter is a hack. Haven't seen this yet, but movie critics in general are the lowest form of human. To pompous to enjoy anything, to uncreative to create anything. Angry judging is their lot in life.

[ice grillin you]

that hack has won a pulitzer prize

the thing with movie reviewers is you find one that has the same tastes in movies as you do...much like if you asked a friend who liked the same kind of movies as you to give his opinion on a picture

stephen hunters tastes in movies are very very similar to mine...thus i use his reviews as a guide to what i wanna see and dont wanna see...him being a brilliant writer is the cherry on top

stephen hunter is my friend

[rjs246]

A hack, I say!

[rjs246]

But seriously, giving a movie critic an award for his job makes them infinitely worse. Rather than just reviewing movies they are given the impression that their opinions somehow make a difference as to whether th movie is actually good or not. Movie critics should be disqualified from any journalistic awards.

[ice grillin you]

hes not a movie critic he a writer who reviews movies...even if i hated movies id still read him...thats how good a writer he is

movie critics are no different than op/ed page writers

[rjs246]

movie critics are no different than op/ed page writers

Who also shouldn't be able to win pulitzers.