Adi's Reviews

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seeing as how i'm not very good at writing long ass reviews of movies and still want to share my opinion of them this is what i've come up with....short and concise reviews that you won't get tired of reading....

Abril Despedaçado ( Behind the sun ) - Walter Salles
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This film is based on the Albanian novel, Broken April by Ismail Kadaré, but it takes place in the brasilian outback.

After his brother Ignacio is shot dead by their neighbour, it's Tonio's turn to protect the family honour and continue the fude that has been going on for longer than any of the two families can remember, a fude about land, a fude that has lost it's prupose over the years but who's participants cannot abandon it. Tonio is unwilling to continue with it, but under the pressure of his authoritative father, he ends up taking a life back, an eye for an eye. And now, he is the next target. But then he meets a girl, and realises he doesn't want to die just yet. His younger brother also realises this and decides to save his brother. And when the blood stained shirt of the latest victim turns yellow in the scorching sun, another tragedy is to take place.
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This a very realistic portayal of life in the brasilian outback, with all it's hardships and misery, and the vendeta culture back in the early years of the 20th century.But somehow a semi-western movie set in brasil just didn't sit right with me, didn't really grab me emotionaly. Maybe it was the landscape that seemed so out of place ( a half desert set in Brasil? i dunno, it doesn't look right ) , maybe it was the crude and spartan dialogue that kept me at bay. Something was off, it just didn't sit right.However,it's still Salles, and worth watching...



The football factory - Nick Love

a fun way to spend 87 minutes, fast pased movie about footy thugs, fights and doing drugs, in my opinion , it exaggerates reality a bit but still, it's fun to watch the brits curse and fight, i think they were trying a bit too hard to make a new trainspotting ( with the narration of the main caracter, which should have been a bit less hyper, it was a tad annoying )

3.5/5



Tae Guk Gi: The Brotherhood of War - Je-gyu Kang

a story about two brothers being forced to fight in the korean war, this movie starts of with a cliche begining that almost put me off of watching it ( the classic scene of two brothers and how happy and innocent they were before the shit hits the fan *vomits*), still, be patient,soon it will turn into a very good display of what happens to people during the war, the changes they go through, one might call it a korean version of saving private ryan with very brutal battle scenes....worth the watch....

4/5



Cheers, i've been looking forward to Brotherhood, though i think i can wait now and buy something more entertaining instead.
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great reviews my croatian brother
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"A good film is when the price of the dinner, the theater admission and the babysitter were worth it."
- Alfred Hitchcock



Vera Drake - Mike Leigh

Let's see if i can recreate the vera drake post , because it's a damn good movie and i'd hate to let it fall through the cracks.

So, it's set in the early 1950's post war England and deals with a woman that does illegal abortions. We see her as a devoted mother and wife, a darling and most lovable person, but at the same time, this woman doing something that at the time was considered highly immoral and definetly illegal. It's a movie that you just can't take your eyes from. As i said before, i couldn't wipe the grin from my face for the first hour of the movie,incredibly adorable, innocent characters which radiate with so much positive energy despite the difficult life they lead. The entire cast of the movie did such a wonderful job at interpreting the characters . Deeply moving film . A must watch.

5/5



All or nothing - Mike Leigh

Another brilliant and incredibly moving film from mike leigh. It's a film that makes you laugh and brakes your heart. it's set in the english projects and deals with disfunctional families that breed disfunctional kids, it's about apathy and depression, about people who, despite the fact that they live in claustrophobic flats in the modern bee hives that are housing estates, are ultimately very lonely, and it's about love that often gets lost in the midst of every day problems and the struggle to get by. Filled with fantasticly ordinary but lovable characters and with a score that sets an incredible tone to the film, it's a modern masterpiece.

5/5



La stanza del figlio ( Son's room ) – Nanni Moretti

I had high hopes for this movie, it won Cannes in 2001 and certain critics seemed to be very fond of it. it's about a regular family ( the father is a psychiatrist ) with 2 kids, one of who ( the boy ) dies in a scuba diving accident. It seemed to me that unlike Leigh , who seems to be really familiar with the subject of his films , that Moretti is really not familiar with death but is only trying to imagine what it must feel like, and does a pretty weak job at it. The braking point of the movie ( the boys death ) was done very poorly in my opinion, without actually showing how the boy died, he jumps through the initial shock of the news very quickly and also, in my personal experience, the way the characters reacted to the boys death is simply not the way real life people react when they lose a child and brother, very bleak reactions from all of them, it was as if they had lost an acquaintance, not their son/brother. After that, it was as if he was trying to compensate for their weak reactions , the characters start to behave very erratic which simply didn't seem believable at this point. I'm sure that in the hands of a much better artist/director, this movie could have been better. Or maybe my standards were raised too high by seeing two brilliant Leigh films two nights in a row. Rent it and judge for yourself.

3.5/5



Mies vailla menneisyyttä (The man without a past) - Aki Kaurismäki

much celebrated movie for reasons that are lost to me. it's about a man that gets beaten up by a group of thugs and as a result loses his memory and starts a new life as a hobo. this is a strange art flick with actors who are either amateurs or purposely act in a very strange manner and with dialogues that remind me of Sodebergh's Schizopolis, or maybe it was just the bad translation, in any case it was annoying and made little sence, that's why i don't like to watch movies that are not in spanish, italian or english because i'm sure they don't translate half the dialogue.....to sum it up, a strange film and a boring viewing experience, maybe the message and it's artistic value went over my head, in any case, i wouldn't recommend it to my friends.....

2/5



The People's Republic of Clogher
I liked it. Didn't love it. But I liked it.

Oh well.
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"Critics are like eunuchs in a harem; they know how the Tatty 100 is done, they've seen it done every day, but they're unable to do it themselves." - Brendan Behan



Bully - Larry Clark

Based on a true story, this movie is about a group of friends that decide to kill one of their buddies,a closet homosexual who is into abusing his friend ( hence the title *wink wink* ) and raping. It starts off very similar to Kids, shocking displays of sex, drugs and more sex, then sort of changes tempo whilst the kids plot the murder, which i thought dragged on a bit too long. also , i was bothered by the camera's movements at certain points. His insistence on using actors from his previous films ( namely Leo Fitzpatrick, the star of Kids...sorry dude, you simply cannot act ) nearly ruined the film, all i could focus on was his bad acting. Excellent performances from Michael Pitt ( the star of Last days, glad to see his movie career take off ) and Brad Renfro. All in all, shocking and tense, a good portrail of the screwed up lifes of bored american kids .The last part of the film and it's climax really saved it (oh and the fact that it's based on a true story helped me overlook certain annoyances, like some bad ,pointless and stupid dialogue ) so i'm going to give it.... ( drum roll please ):

3.5/5



Der Untergang ( Downfall ) - Oliver Hirschbiegel

This is one of the most powerful and disturbing films I have watched and it will haunt me for a long time. I was hesitant to see it at first , the theme of the film seemed too disturbing, but finally I decided I had to see it. The film has been deemed one of the best war movies of all times, and that's exactly what it is. Based on the book by Hitler's last secretary, it tells the story of the last days of the third Reich, right from Hitler's trench. It's difficult to single out what disturbed me the most, the fanaticism of the people around him which resulted in mass suicides ( the scene when Mrs. Goebbels kills her own children is extremely chilling ) or the fact that evil has been given a human face ( for example, the shot of Goebbels waiting outside the room while his wife kills his children because he simply couldn't bring him self to watch it, or Eva Braun, Hitler's wife, who was displayed as a cheerful, pleasant woman and friend ). The director of this film was faced with an unbelievably difficult task and he did a fantastic job of it. It is absolute perfection. Bruno Ganz as Hitler is simply amazing. A classical film which few people will want to have in their DVD collection.

5/5



Thanks for the reviews, i really enjoyed them, I am a big Mike Leigh Fan I am glad you like him
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Originally Posted by nebbit
Thanks for the reviews, i really enjoyed them, I am a big Mike Leigh Fan I am glad you like him
thanks, it's nice to know someone actually reads this....