The Gnat: Fly on the Wall Reviews

Lady In The Water

I'll just jump straight into this, what I really liked about the film is that it was a fantasy/fairy tale, not one of M. Night Shyamalan's pseudo horror films. This was really a pure fairy tale story set in modern time in a limited location.

That is another thing that I liked was the fact that this fairy tale was limited to only a motel complex, and it wasn't attempted to be spread all over this amazing fantasy-esque world. Having a limited location helped build up the emotion in the film as the characters were almost trapped in one place.

Also, Shamylan did a much better job of constructing a story in this film then in some of his more recent pseudo horror films. In this film there wasn't a focus on a twist coming in the film, because there wasn't one, but typically in other films he has done, there is such an emphasis on the twist that the film becomes boring to watch if you have figured out the twist, or if seeing it a second time knowing the twist.

Another thing that worked was the diversity of characters. Each character was unique in the film which helped keep it more interesting. Some of the characters were a little more cliche then I would have prefered, but for the most part the cliche characters still fit in as viable parts of the story and they didn't seem wrong for the story.

What I didn't like was the rip on the film critic and M. Night Shyamalan's role in the film. I felt like the film critic was too contrived for the story and didn't really fit in or matter in the grand scheme of the story. And Shyamalan's role was just to grand for a director to put himself into. It was extremely conceited, I felt, for him to take that role as the person who was going to change the world. I don't have a problem with director's in a film, but they can't make themselves that powerful a character, even if the power was never shown in the film and just implied.

Overall Grade: B-
Acting: C+
Story: B+
Visual/Audio: B-

__________________
"As I was walking up the stair,
I met a man who wasn't there.
He wasn't there again today,
I wish, I wish he'd go away."
-From Identity

Igby Goes Down

This film is a wonderfully created dark comedy that is as mean as it is funny.

Igby Goes Down is a typical teen angst film, where the main character, Igby is rebillious of his situation and tries to separate himself from everyone in his family. However, this film is better then most as the characters, for the most part, are very excentric and entertaining. Igby himself is such a messed up cynic that his antics and thought processes are interesting to try and keep track of. These characters really drive the story, as the story is basically Igby's "change of heart" in the film, which is rather cliche.

Another interesting part to this film is the situations that Igby keeps on placing himself/getting placed into. These situations, while not realistic to all happen to a single person, are entertaining and almost always very darkly comedic in how he handles them. Also, with these situations that Igby ends up in, it is does explain how he ends up the way that he is, and what is happening in his mind.

The best scene in this film deals with Igby's mother's death and how Igby handles it and how he handles telling to news to relatives.

The one thing that I don't like about this film is how much of a "Hollywood ending" it has. The end of the film is the predictable beginning of the rehabilitiation of one Igby. And it doesn't fit with the rest of the movie as the all the work to the point where Igby ends up, occurs in the last few minutes of the film.

Overall though, the films amazing use of dark comedy makes it a film that is very interesting and entertaining to watch.

Overall Grade: A-
Acting: B+
Story: A-
Visual/Audio: B

Accepted

This film was a better comedy then I was expecting it to be. It maintained a fair number of laughs while actually having some heart and a pseudo message, no matter if it was illogical or not.

This films premise though is so absurd, and the "bad guy" character and the "girl" character are so unbelievably predictable that it causes the film to suffer a lot. This film is chock full of cliche things, and while it does have a little heart, it can't make up for the fact that it reuses characters from every other teen/college movie ever made.

Lewis Black, however, did a very good job. Typically in a teen/college movie there isn't a type of character like his, so he added a breathe of fresh air filled with profanities and non-sensical ramblings that helped make the film somewhat watchable.

Also, fortunately for this film, Justin Long and Jonah Hill did a solid job in their roles helping with the film. They were very cliche characters, but they did a good job of playing out their jokes, much better then many of the characters did.

Overall, this ranks about average with a teen/college comedy. It is no where near the level of Revenge of the Nerds or Superbad, but it still has its moments, and it has a little heart going for it.

Overall Grade: C+
Acting: C
Story: C
Visual/Audio: B-

16 Blocks

This film, in a sentence, is a typical tough cop and "criminal" trying to take down the corrupt powers that be.

It was a very formulaic film without out much divergence, I feel, from a lot of other films in the genre. Willis plays a cop who is rough around the edges, but stands up for the right thing at the end of his career after he realizes that there is something to fight for.

Moz Def, plays a scared criminal who has to face his fears and take a risk to improve his life by trying to take down the corrupt powers.

And of course they are paired up, because Willis character finds that Def can actually help and Def's character ends up sticking with Willis and he gets to improve his life.

Overall, this film was only an average portrayal of the one sentence synopsis that I gave. There are a lot of other films that play on this same idea that do it just was well as is done in this film. Willis and Def both do good jobs in the roles that they are given, but neither of their acting performances are anything spectacular.

There is a little decent action in this film, but so much of that action is countered by cliche poignant scenes that Willis and Def have as they grow into the characters that they end up as.

Even the one twist isn't anything that is all that shocking. And while this film does entertain, if you want to see a film about corrupt powers there are tons of better ones out there. If you are huge Willis or Def (or both) fan, then you will enjoy this, but someone who knows film is going to find this rather routine.

Overall Grade: C
Acting: B+
Story: C-
Visual/Audio: B-

The Punisher

This film took superhero movies in a different direction, granted The Punisher isn't a true superhero and he has no superhuman powers, but he falls into the superhero/comic book genre. It could be said that this film, in some ways, is the basis for a film like Batman Begins, as both are very dark comic book films.

The Punisher was not well received when it originally came out, but I feel like that was because it was the first of its kind, as a dark, grittier comic book film. This wasn't a comic book film like kids watch in the Saturday morning cartoons, this one was aimed at adults, and I think that caught people by surprise.

While it isn't a great flick, I think that it deserved a better reception then it did originally. I think now that as the genre of comic book films has developed and there have been bigger failures and other dark films in the genre that this film is starting to get some of the recognition that it deserves.

What I think makes this film good, or what I appreciated about it, was how it was darker. So many of the comic book films have that cartoony feel to them, especially Fantastic Four, and I think for the generations who are in college and older now, we feel often that there could be more depth there, since these movies would make more sense to be aimed at the generations who watched them and who peaked their popularity. So, I think once the initial surprise wore off from how dark this was, this film is something that fans of comic books wanted to see.

Overall, I don't feel like the acting or the cinematography were extremely strong, not poor but nothing that was amazing, which is typical for a comic book based film, but the films story line was good, and the development of the main character in the film was good. I was very happy with the ending as it wasn't the cop out "Hollywood Ending" that so often shows up in mainstream films. Granted that might have been because they were hoping to set up a sequel, but they could have still left a open, albeit less open ending, with a "Hollywood Ending".

Overall Grade: B+
Acting: C+
Story: B+
Visual/Audio: B-

300

This is a film that I have mixed feelings about. It was beautiful to watch, but I don't feel like there was substance behind that beauty. The acting and plot didn't seem anything special to me, and while the fights were very well designed and executed, I didn't have them blow me away.

But first let me address the biggest issue that always comes up with this film, the historicity of the film. I am sure that most of the people here realize that it was based on the comic book not on the actual battle, but many people, generally the average film fan, tends to think that is actually how the battle went. There are shreads of truth scattered in the film, but not enough to make it at all historically accurate.

Now onto the good in this film. The CGI was done amazingly. So many parts of the film were fun to watch just for the use of color and the artistic feelings to the shots. The color in the film was one thing that I was drawn to immediately in the theater as I watched this film.

And the bad in the film. I have heard a lot of people saying that they thought that acting was really good, I wouldn't agree with that statement, there were points where some of the characters did a decent job acting, but for the most part it was below average acting.

And while the story was "fun" in some ways, it wasn't all that interesting. There were a lot of "cliche" lines in the film which detracted from the little that the story actually did.

This is a film that I am glad that I saw once, for the visuals and artistry in the film, but it isn't one that I want to see again because the story and the acting didn't do anything to grab me, and it is important to have more depth then purely the visual.

Overall Grade: C+
Acting: C
Story: C-
Visual/Audio: A

Nice reviews, glad someone else thought The Punisher was under-rated.

__________________

Good review. I think 300's story was a bit better than you give it credit for, but agree that it's much more pedestrian without is visuals. Then again, it is a largely visual medium, so I don't know that there's anything wrong with that. Might hurt its replay value, however.

Best. Word. Ever.

Thanks

To me the story is probably the most important part of the film, and I feel like in 300 that the story didn't really drive the film at all, and it was predominantly the visuals as compared to the story. And I felt like the story was similar to what had been done before.

The Number 23

This is another film that I have mixed feelings about, the idea for the film was a good one, and it worked quite well for a while in the film. And the scenes which were from the book were amazing film noir scenes, but the ending was just terrible completely destroying all the good work that the first part of the film had done.

First off, this is an interesting role of Jim Carrey, it isn't his typical comedy role, but he always plays a comedy role that like a crazy person, and this character is paranoid, so he pulls it off very nicely. So I was impressed him in the more serious role. He also did a very good job of pulling off the noir scenes.

The film noir scenes were definitely the highlight of the film. They were beautiful to watch as they used light and dark and very vibrant colors in the shots. All of the predictable noir characters were there, which made it a very good film. It was fun to see a critique of film noir in a recent film.

What didn't work in this film was the ending. The film reached the last 30 minutes and it tried to wrap everything up extremely nicely. They wanted to put the bad guy in a jail, make the bad guy repentant, and make him become normal again. It was what I like to call a perfect "Hollywood ending". It was so predictable that it took the fun out of the rest of the film.

And finally I will address the story. Like I said in the first paragraph, the idea for the film was very creative, however, the story was ruined by the last half hour of the film. It makes a viewer think about the number 23, a lot, and it was really funny, when I got into the car with my friends and we turned on the car it was 12:23. But it is a good film, at the beginning, as it looks into the idea of paranoia and the number 23.

Overall Grade: B-
Acting: B
Story: C+
Audio/Visual: B

Overall (minus the last 30 minutes) Grade: B+/A-

The Departed

Now let me say, I enjoyed the film. Well, that is over with, now time to make enemies, I didn't think it was that great a film though. Yeah, there were some nice acting performances in the film, but I found the storyline to be predictable, even the ending, and I felt the genre has been done to death. I was/am getting sick and tired of all the mafia/cop movies that are out and how none of them really do anything all that interesting.

With that said, DeCaprio did a good job, Wahlberg did a very good job, Damon did a very good job, and Nicholas did a great job. I know that most people prefer DeCaprio's performance, but I actually thought that the role he had to play was one of the easier roles to play. He had to act pissed off all the time, and to me, that isn't as difficult as some of the others. Don't get me wrong, he did a great job at it, but as for an extremely demanding acting role, it wasn't on the level with some of the others. Nicholas character I would say would be the hardest to pull off as he had to show a wider range of emotions.

The story itself, like I said, seemed overdone recently. It was too typical cop vs. mafia film. Yeah, the cop was mafia and the mafia was the cop, but that wasn't that much of a twist, typically there is some mole one way or another, or both ways. And the ending, like I mentioned, didn't surprise me at all. I knew what was going to happen to the characters, and to me that is a very "Hollywood ending". It wrapped up everything nicely and answered all the questions as what was going to happen in the future. To me that is a "Hollywood ending", which definitely hurt the film, in my eyes.

Now, I did appreciate the film, and compared to a lot of films in that genre it was pretty good. There was a nice storyline that ran through the whole thing, and even the "Hollywood ending" wasn't as forced as many movies have right now. So it did flow nicely through the end.

Overall Grade: B-
Acting: A-
Story: C+
Visual/Audio: B

Hackers

This is one of Angelina Jolie's first films, and a pretty enjoyable film, for that reason and others.

What is humourous in this film is the technology that they use. Very little of it is at all close to reality what technology turned into. And the film isn't set more then a year or two into the future of when it had was shot.

What makes this film fun is the humor and the stupid techology that is supposed to be cool. Angelina Jolie does a good job in her role, obviously not a great job, but she plays it well. The other actors are so eccentric in with their roles that it doesn't matter how good they acted, their characters were always going to be odd.

The story line isn't something that is all the original either, but they pull it off well. The genre where teens/kids foil adults has been around so long that this could have been very cliche, but the various characters and how eccentric they were, and probably the fact that I am looking back on it and seeing how absurd the technology was and how absurd the outfits were.

With the outfits, a little of that was the style back then, a lot of bright and loud color combinations, but some of the things in the fashion repretoir definitely weren't normal for any time period. Also the notion of high school kids meandering around New York City by themselves and hacking TV stations in New York City isn't that logical.

But this film is a good popcorn flick. It is funny to see films like this one and Tron that try and guess what future technology is going to be like. And this film also leaves the viewer with a nice happy feeling, so while nothing deep, it could be worse.

Overall Grade: B
Acting: C+
Story: C+
Visual/Audio: B

Existenz

This film, according to the DVD case, gives the movie, The Matrix, a run for its money. Now this is a vast overstatement. Existenz is a fun movie that deals with some of the same issues as The Matrix, but is no where near the same level as it.

Existenz is basically a film that asks what is reality and what isn't reality. Jennifer Jason Leigh and Jude Law star in this film giving performance that are decent but nothing the blows anyone away.

What works in this film is the fact that the story jumps around on the viewer in places. The two main characters are able to be in one place and then show up in another seconds, or less, later. Also, the creativity of the places that they go are interesting. The characters and actions that they take are very interesting and creative to watch.

What doesn't work is that this film tries to be deep, but it really isn't extremely deep. There are a line or two, including the final one in the film, but are pretty good for making someone think, but for the most part this film is a whole lot more fun then smart in how it deals with the issue of reality. I feel like it could have gone deeper into that area, but probably not tons deeper with the subject matter without it becoming extremely corny and much more cliche then it is.

Overall, this is a highly entertaining film, it isn't a great film, or one of my top popcorn films, Kiss Kiss, Bang Bang and Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow I would say are better popcorn flicks, but this film is fun to watch. It also does offer a little bit to think about, and is much more interesting for that, instead of just being fluff.

Overall Grade: B+
Acting: B-
Story: B+
Visual/Audio: B+

I like eXistenZ a lot, there's a lot of imagination involved in it and i think one the plus points in it is that it doesn't worry about looking too in depth at it's own philosophy and just lets itself play it. It's a nice turn to body horror and original working from Cronenberg.

The 13th Floor

This is a film that falls under the same category as The Matrix and Existenz. It is the sort of "what is really reality" type of film.

This film, I would have to say is worse then the two that I mentioned, but it wasn't terrible in the one viewing that I had of it, which was a little while ago.

What made this film good is how it used different times/eras in the film. There are about three different eras used in the film, and they portray them all very well.

Again, this diea of "what is really reality" is extremely interesting to me, because even the simple movies about this do end up asking some interesting questions. This film does it, and it works on a little deeper level then Existenz, but isn't as fun and entertaining.

I say this mainly because, like The Matrix it deals with control of reality and who controls the non-real reality. This is very interesting ot look at.

What doesn't work in this film is that it tries to be a little bit too much like The Matrix by allowing people to leave the alternate reality, or fake reality. However, with how they do it, it doesn't seem as possible as in The Matrix. In The 13th Floor it is much more improbable sci-fi removal from the fake reality.

Overall, this is again an entertaining movie. I don't feel like the story is as strong as The Matrix or Existenz, so it isn't as good, but it is still a very solid film, and if a person likes eithe of the two movies I have compared it to, I would recommend this film.

Overall Grade: B+
Acting: B-
Story: B+
Visual/Audio: B

The Matrix

Figure that I might as well continue the trend of posting about movies that deal with fake/false/alternative realities, so I thought I would deal with The Matrix.

What makes The Matrix such a good film is the philosohpy and thought that goes into the world that was created, and the story. This film delves into the issues about what is real, what people want to perceive as real, and if people can be content with "reality", among many other things. This discourse/commentary in the film makes it very enjoyable to watch.

Another thing that this film does extremely well is that it blends action with the philosophy. And the action that it has is extremely impressive, but unlike many films that focus isn't on the action as much as it is on the story, so while many films will ramp up the action and the effects to make the film look more impressive, while choosing to ignore story, the Matrix is willing to use many new effects and techniques, but not in a way that they become more important to the story.

Now the downside to this film is that the acting is pretty poor. No one puts on a stellar performance, even though Keanu Reeves is as solid as he always is (take that whatever whey you want to). And even the delivery of the lines typically isn't anything to talk aobut, but in this film with the depth that is created purely by subject matter this can be overlooked. However, in the sequels, where the depth of the subject matter is lost, the acting and the whole movies start to fail as anything interesting to watch.

Overall this is a very enjoyable film, it is one of few films ever made that has a very clear duplicity in that someone could watch it and zone out and watch it for only the action sequences, while other people could care less about the action sequeences and prefer to study the depth of the film and they would both enjoy the film.

Overall Grade: B+/A-
Acting: C-
Story: A
Visual/Audio: A

Pride And Prejudice

This is refering to the one that came out recently, not the five hour version done by A& E, even though I have seen that one as well. Another comment is that I do have a crush on Kiera Knightley, so that predispositioned me to the film.

With that said, I really liked this film, I thought that it had good acting performances, and while not being as true to the book as the five hour version, mainly because you just can't fit everything from a book in, into a two hour film. I thought that Kiera Knightley did a very good job with that role, and I felt like Donald Sutherland did a great job as the father in the film.

One thing that I like about this film is Jane Austen's sarcasm in her story telling. I love to see sarcasm and that darker type of humor in a story/film, and Pride and Prejudice does it very well. Donald Sutherland has some great lines that he delivers in the film, granted some of the funny lines for his character were cut out in the shortening of the film, and he delivers them extremely well.

What I found a little disappointing about the film was Mr. Collins, I would guess the reason why is because of the A&E version of Mr. Collins. In the A&E version, Mr. Collins is even worse then he is in this film version. He is creepier seeming and weirder, and that helps the dark humor in the film.

Overall I feel like this is a very solid film with some good acting performances that stays true (as possible) to the story. I realize that the general male populice isn't going to be that big a fan of the story, but if you like the dark/sarcastic style of humor, there will definitely be parts of the story that one can enjoy a lot.

Overall Grade: B+
Acting: B+
Story: A-
Visual/Audio: B-

The Patriot

It has been a while since I have seen this film, so if I don't get specific enough for you, that is the reason.

What I will say about this film is that I thought it was aweful. I thought that acting was fine, but the plot was boring and predictable. It is a story line that has been done 1000 times before, not always the same time period, and The Patriot didn't add anything to the story.

This is what I would call a prototypical Hollywood film. This doesn't even fall under the category of "Hollywood ending", the whole film is boring and predictable. It would be extremely difficult to make a movie in that genre that isn't boring and predictable, but it seemed to me like The Patriot didn't even try to differentiate itself from other films in that genre.

Mel Gibson did a solid job in his role, but being such a predictable and done role, he wasn't able to do much more then many other actors have done with that role. Same with the other actors in the film. Nobody blew me away, and I don't know if was possible for anyone to impress me that much with a role in that film because of the fact that the film has been "done" many times before in different settings with slightly different characters.

What I dislike about the setting of this film is that it falls into the, again, predictable category of eras for a film of this genre. This sort of film almost always takes place during a time period where men could be real "manly" and would fight eachother in hand to hand combat while tons of people fired shots around them. So, another setting would have helped out the movie some, but this type of revenge/war movie is so overdone that I can't really watch them any more.

Overall Grade: D+
Acting: C
Story: F
Visual/Audio: C

Gattaca

This film is one of those films that you think is trying to say something about the future and how distopian it could be. I really wonder if there is ever going to be a film that shows a utopian future, probably not since it wouldn't be as interesting to watch.

Now, I made that sound like a negative, but it isn't about the film, as the world they are in is really utopian for a sect of people who is the majority in the society, but in typical film/story fashion, the story focuses not on the utopian part of society, but that of the "underclass" and one person's attempt to leave the underclass and join the utopian society, even though class is determined at birth.

This film is definitely talking about the potentially serious risks of genetic manipulation, that while they might look good are actually working against a utilitarian society.

Now I do realize that it is the majority in this society who are in the "good" (I am talking about how the utilitarian society isn't occuring in this film), but the utilitarian theory is the greatest good for the greatest number, and with this society it seems possible, and enforcable, that there could be things that would allow for the underclass to rise without hurting the upperclass much at all, and defnitely no where near as much as the upperclass believes that it would.

So this play of ideas works very nicely in the filim, and it is interesting to watch the stuggle of one person trying to get away from this underclass into the allegedly utopian society that is available for the elite.

Jude Law, Uma Thurman, and Ethan Hawke all do a good job acting in this film. Again, no Oscar winning performances, but extremely solid job of portraying their roles.

Overall, this is a very solid movie, with a good story, great ideas, and solid acting. It definitely isn't a popcorn flick that is fun to watch if you turn your mind off while doing so, but even on the simplest level it is still somewhat interesting.

Overall Grade: A-
Acting: B
Story: B+
Visual/Audio: B+

(how does that add up to an A-, I don't know, but it does)

V for Vendetta

This film is definitely one of the stronger films that has come out in a while. It really keeps along the theme of my previous review (Gattaca) because it deals with a distopian society. Granted, this one appears to be distopian for a large percentile of the population, whether or not the populice is willing to admit it.

What works in this film is the almost theatrical style of acting that V does. He over acts everything, and is often almost like a little kid in what he does. He gets so into films that he has to act out parts of them. And he makes it fun destroying the building.

Natalie Portman also does a solid job in this film. Her performance isn't a great performance, by any means, but it is a solid performance, and I don't know that a great performance from her would have been a good thing, as it would have taken away more from the message of the film and from the performance V gives (note: V's performance isn't a great performance either, but it is the right performance).

I believe the best part of the film is the story itself though and the ideas that flow through the story. One quote from the film that sums up what the message behind the story goes as follows:
And I think that this film does a good job of explaining why this is the case.

There isn't much of anything that I can find fault with in this film. I guess if I had to come up with something, it would be that it isn't a film that I feel like I can watch often as it isn't as brainless as many films, and the action that is in there definitely isn't that important. However, that is a lousy reason not to like the film extremely well, but it isn't a purely popcorn flick, which is what I am sure some people thought it would be/should be because it was based on a comic book/graphic novel.

Overall Grade: A-
Acting: B
Story: A-
Visual/Audio: B+