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segesta65
Reviews
Criminal: France (2019)
Good but not as good as it thinks it is
The concept of a 42 minute play in an interrogation room is simple and clever but doesn't allow for decent twists. And as an American it's interesting how useless a European attorney is.
Specific to episode 3: it was ironic they chose a native French guy to be the murderous homophobe, when in France today all of the gay bashing is from a... certain religious minority.
Stranger Things (2016)
News flash to millennials: the USSR was our enemy
I liked Season 3. Many reviewers here seem to think that Russia/USSR was just another country, and that Stranger Things is picking on them or something. But no: the Soviets were our enemy. They were the bad guys. So their portrayal, though cartoonish, makes perfect sense.
Us (2019)
Yeah, no. Not that good
After Get Out I thought Jordan Peele might be the new Hitchcock. Now I think he is merely the new M Night Shyamalan. And that's not a compliment.
Slow moving, clever, full of holes, great acting, and frustrating.
Why did the Tethered seek revenge on their twins and not the unnamed people who did the cloning? Why did she marry that stupid oaf in the first place?
Gomorrah (2014)
Great storytelling if not a great story
The cinema verite look of this show is amazing, but with the sickly green lighting to make everything appear unnatural and ill.
The storyline is the usual organized crime tale of loyalty and betrayal, etc etc but done very well. The Neapolitan dialect is tough to understand though, even for us that speak Italian!
Quicksand (2019)
Better not commit mass murder, you might get 14 whole years
All the positive and negative reviews are accurate: unlikable characters, baffling political correctness, too long. But also very well acted, an interesting story, and worth watching.
1922 (2017)
Wait, Thomas Jane?
From Boogie Nights? Wow.
The accent is all wrong but the performances are excellent. Should have been 20 minutes shorter.
Collateral (2018)
I hate men, Israel, immigration law, and Christianity... so I loved it
Not a bad murder mystery story, and the actors are great. But it was apparently written by a Labour Party summer intern-the politics are almost comically Progressive. That distracted from an otherwise pretty good story.
Spoiler: Note that only 3 UK women died in action in Afghanistan. Though a tragedy, it makes the assassin's trauma a bit far fetched.
Requiem (2018)
7 stars minus 2 for the haircut
Yes, I said it. The star's hairstyle was distractingly awful, I just kept staring at those trendy purposely uneven bangs for 8 hours.
Otherwise the show is pretty good, not great. Standard BBC-on-Netflix fare.
Safe (2018)
Hardy Boys meets Guiding Light
Another Coben show where professionals never go to work, nobody makes decisions like a normal person would, and everyone has time to investigate the neighborhood crimes. Addictive but not very good.
Luke Cage (2016)
Season 2 is a snooze
I wanted kick ass crime fighting, not this slooow moving soap opera. Good acting, dull story.
Black Mirror (2011)
Overrated but not terrible
The Twilight Zone had episodes of charm and sweetness beneath the weirdness. Black Mirror is just relentlessly grim, and not in a great way. I get it: technology is alienating. Yawn
Jessica Jones (2015)
Sloooow
Season 1 was five episodes of story stretched into an entire season. And none of the characters is particularly likeable. Meh
The Ghost Writer (2010)
Already seems outdated because of its politics
If you can get past the weak setup (that is more to satisfy Polanski's anti-American, anti-Bush feelings than to bolster the story), it's a pretty good movie.
But the "war criminal" angle never sold me. Aren't the CIA agents the war criminals? Or, aren't the terrorists the war criminals? Not the British PM. The silly anti-Bush premise seems very outdated just a few months after this movie's release, given that Bush's successor (whom Polanski likely supports vigorously) has carried on the same policies.
But enough politics. The look of the movie is great, the bleakness sets the tone and the location of the PM's house makes it somewhat Hitchcock-like.
The American (2010)
Proving the new Ebert Rule: if it stinks, he loves it
I expected George Clooney + Italy + beautiful women + guns = awesome, but somehow they figured out a way to make it = lousy.
"Characterization" is not silently sitting in harshly lit coffee bars, or assembling guns alone, or making small talk and deep looks with an improbably superhot prostitute. Hemingway could be monosyllabic but powerful. This movie is just illiterate.
Ebert's review talks about how the wrong person calls him Mr. Butterfly, and somehow that is evidence of the haunting perfect beauty of this film. Um, no; very character knows either about his tattoo or his respect for the endangered CGI Abruzzese butterflies. I guess even Mr. Ebert couldn't sit through this twice to get the details right.
Therefore, as an American, I want to apologize and explain to all non-Americans here on IMDb that "The American" is far more pretentious, dull, and tiresome than any actual American. That Yogi Bear movie has to be better than this wreck.