Delila's Reviews

Thanks Lila for another great review of a great movie

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Health is the greatest gift, contentment the greatest wealth, faithfulness the best relationship.
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Anonymous~ You are easy to please. I like that in a man.
Birdy~ look for more coincidences in seeing the same movies, because... well... I'm stalking you.
Spooky~ yay, another LiT fan!
susan~ I had heard vague references to other versions, so I really appreciate the 411! Thank you!
nebs~ omg your AV just broke me up! Thanks for the comment.

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Review: Cabin in the Woods 8/10

Francois Truffaut's love of filmmaking is the main character in this film about the movie industry. The film itself is enjoyable, but not terribly deep. It's the story of a film cast and crew, shooting a quaint little movie in 5 weeks. If you've never been around a set, this is a great introduction to the chaotic pressure people are generally under, both personally and professionally. It's also a bit of a castigation of the splashy immorality of the Hollywood lifestyle. (The french title translates to "The American Night". hmmm.) The story of the movie echos the story in the movie, in a fairly light-hearted treatment in both cases.

The cast is fun. It includes Jacqueline Bisset, Jean-Pierre Léaud (a frequent Truffaut choice), and Truffaut himself, as the director. This film is the ancestor of a long line of other movies-about-movies, and deserves a watch. It's well-performed and unsentimental, but it's no masterpiece.

I'm not too spoiled. Though I have my days.

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"This is that human freedom, which all boast that they possess, and which consists solely in the fact, that men are conscious of their own desire, but are ignorant of the causes whereby that desire has been determined." -Baruch Spinoza

Thanks for that little review, I don't remember seeing this film must keep my eye out for it.

If you haven't seen The Tick: The Entire Series, you haven't seen Funny, my friends. I accidentally ordered it last weekend from Netflix and have never been happier to have screwed up a really simple task. The title's inclusion of the phrase "the entire series" is an appropriately tick-ish ironic nod to the series' cancellation, a week after it's debut. Sad and puzzling, considering it was a critical success, a hit with the fans of the comic, and had me roaring with giggles.

Translating animation into live-action is not for the faint of heart. Fans were hopping mad when they learned The Tick's costume would reveal his entire face. Those fears were laid to rest with the one-two punch of the casting of Patrick Warburton (best known as Elaine's boyfriend "Putty" on Seinfeld), and the mechanical antennae on top of his head. The combination is actually more expressive than the comic, to hilarious result.

Produced by Barry Sonnenfeld (Get Shorty, Men In Black), the series packs the wit, the wackiness, and the word wizardry (I barely had to reach for that alliteration) of the cartoon, with the added bonus of campy acting at an olympian level by the suporting cast. Arthur (the super...moth) is played by David Burke, with Liz Vassey as Captain Liberty and Nestor Carbonnel as Batmanuel.

The cartoon series met a similarly frustrating demise, as tv execs deemed it to be "not reaching it's target audience". It wasn't: kids have no idea how funny that show was. I did though, dammit, and if you did too, I heartily recommend renting this 2-disc set on DVD. The Tick: The Entire Series rivals anything I've seen for comic-book-spoof-silly-social-satire kinda fun. If you somehow fail to find it hilarious, you still get to look at Liz Vassey, and let's face it: worse things have happened to you.

My husband loved this show

I agree totally with your review... why do the funniest shows always get cancelled the quickest? It's a funny world, huh?

thanks for the review...my husband also loved this show...as soon as he found out they were on dvd he ordered them...

The two Roberts, they both have great taste, they married 2 lovely Susans

That settles it... I am going to get myself a blue Tick costume for Halloween. Right after I return the Vicki Small Wonder costume I just bought.


I loved the Tick show.

Wonderful Review. Love it

EDIT: Im talking about your Angels in America review by the way

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Pumpkins scream in the DEAD of night!

My mom's reaction: "that was in-sane".... is reasonably apt. I found it very enjoyable, and god I love the cast, but the story gets a little lost in social commentary in the middle. It's very funny and borders on poignant and profound with observations about life and perception. There were, to be honest, moments when I felt I was watching a dramatization of the forums here and that was a bit surreal. Ideas take the fore and motivations are discussed very openly in the world of this film. I appreciate the level of intellectualism in it, but it needed a slightly better balance on the side of the story itself. There's a Kaufman-esque balance on the cerebral that I can really get into on an intellectual level, but film is a medium with the ability to get several balls in the air (intellectual, emotional, visual, aural, semiotic, etc etc) and director/co-writer David O. Russell didn't get it all going here.

I Heart Huckabees is the story of Albert Markovski's (Schwartzman) search for the meaning in a string of coincidental meetings with a stranger. He believes this coincidence may hold the key to his workplace rivalry against Brad (Jude Law). Albert goes to an existential detective agency (a married couple played by Hoffman and Tomlin) and they tail him, bug him, interview co-workers and subject him to a sort of hypnotic psychoanalysis, in an attempt to uncover the connections that are influencing Albert's life. Their efforts are threatened by former student turned nihilist author Caterine Vauban (Isabelle Huppert), whose newest devotee (Mark Wahlberg) is inadvertantly (coincidentally??) matched with Albert in a buddy-system arrangement. Confusing? Amazingly, no.

What Russell did do with aplomb, was pull together a cast who was up to the task. I loved the hell outta Jason Schwartzman in this. There's something about him that is off the beaten path. I am a HUGE fan of Lily Tomlin, so seeing her doing her thing always makes me grin. These characters were great, all of them. Hoffman's nurturing little persona was a great contrast to Wahlberg's angry fireman. Jude Law was the prettiest pretty boy ever (eyeliner notwithstanding), but he also brought humanity to the character that was refreshingly committed.

My favorite thing here was the one-liners. "There is no remainder in the mathematics of infinity." heh!! There was much that was really thought-provoking. I recommend this one, provided you're going in with a basic understanding of existentialism and pop psychology.

Thanks for the review Delila, it sounds interesting

thanks for the review...right now this film is in the city...i'm just waiting for it to come out here...and when it does i plan to see it...

I want to see this movie. It looks like it's right up my alley.

Thanks for the great review!

Great review, I have yet to see this, but your review has bumped it up on my list.

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I want to see this movie, but its not playing around me.

Great review sam!

This is a much bigger story (pun not intended) than I originally thought. It's animated and a story about a young boy who befriends a giant robot. Seems safe, right? Not too emotionally rough? Don't. You. Believe it. I won't spoil it more than that may have, but since it looks like a kids' movie I will say: it should have a warning on the box. I wouldn't show it to kids under age 10 unless you're willing to hang around and talk to them about it, after. That said, this movie is positively wonderful.

The Iron Giant is set in 1957, the year of Sputnik and the growing Cold War. Pride in the country vies against paranoia of things "foreign". The film looks at the propaganda of a byegone age with modern eyes, but the viewer can't help but notice that those old issues are our issues, today. Though not a traditional "war movie" in that there aren't armies battling, it definately makes statements about the cold war, and the assault of propaganda on what was once an unsuspecting public.

The story is a weaving together of several familiar stories: Frankenstein, The Elephant Man, Superman, Osiris, King Kong... not new material, but they're combined with such grace and skill that we get sucked in, anyway. Directed by Brad Bird, the animation itself is lovely - particularly the gestures, which made the more emotional scenes incredibly touching. The comedy is timed to perfection.

The voice work is spot on, in every role; totally honest, invested and compelling. Hogarth, the young boy who finds the Giant, is voiced by a young theater talent from San Fransisco, Eli Marienthal. Opposite him is none other than Vin Diesel as the Giant, in a brilliant use of his talent. Jennifer Anniston is the voice of Hogarth's mom, and Harry Connick, Jr. is the local beatnik artist with a good heart. The military men are voiced by John Mahoney and Chris McDonald, who is awesome as the meddling FBI agent.

Underscoring by Michael Kamen, and the Czech Philharmonic, provide a darker-than-usual score that affirms the depth of the themes in tihis "kids' story".

The film is based on the novel The Iron Man by Ted Hughes, and was made into a concept album in the 80's by Pete Townshend, who's the exec producer on this animated film as well. Townshend's story featured a rangey plot riddled with Freudianism, and this story is considerably more cogent and a-sexual but I found it interesting that the story itself has been through so many incarnations. (Thanks, Tacitus for the info!)

Bird says he pitched the story to Warner Brothers with the tag line, "what if a gun had a soul?" He answers that question without a lot of sugary frip, but with huge emotional impact.

Rating: 5 kleenexes out of 5.