POMO

Al Pacino invigorated by Viagra in a brothel with a Russian prostitute? Why the hell not... Stand Up Guys is a nice chillout flick with classic cars and jazz music in the background, phlegmatically dragging its feet forward with an occasional funny episode. Pacino and Christopher Walken are entertaining to watch even in a movie that’s not going anywhere and whose ending is completely predictable, despite its screenwriter’s best efforts to the contrary. It probably wasn’t him who came up with the best gags (he still has a lot to learn in this respect), but the central duo.

Arbitrage was conceived as a thriller and raises expectations of a surprising or super-clever conclusion. But that fails to materialize and the film instead wagers on a noir-like idea (in the style of European art films or Academy Award-winning American movies) and its message remains rather superficial. It remains highly entertaining, however, because the audience’s attention and curiosity is maintained from the first minute to the last. Nicholas Jarecki, making his feature debut, was able to secure a sufficient budget and excellent actors for his quality screenplay. Richard Gere delivers what might be the best performance of his career.

The Deep is a technically well-made intriguing film about a guy who managed an impossible feat thanks to unheard of physical predispositions. Flashbacks that tell us more about him, the lead performance and the wide-angle and filtered environment of the Icelandic location are not enough to dispel the impression that it should’ve remained a quality documentary. The audience, spoiled by Perfect Storms, expects a denser story from a feature film.

A four-sided relationship film about love, trust, passion and unfaithfulness, precisely and sensitively depicted, and with excellent acting performances. The music by Clint Mansell is genius. If this topic is close to your heart, you’re in for some emotional gutting.

The Disney version of Sleeping with the Enemy, starring the handsome marine from Transformers, a likable but generic blonde and a villain who looks like Cole Hauser and fails to gain any respect as a drunk psycho. Safe Haven fails as a thriller and can be watched as a romantic film, the likes of which people watch on daytime TV to kill some time on a slow Sunday.

When watching Joseph Kosinski’s sci-fi worlds, it’s impossible not to forgive them for any plot shortcomings, if there even are any shortcomings to speak of. His vision of technical and design excellence and the ambient feel of the “sound of reality” are so unique that the need to guide the audience through the story almost disappears. Kosinski goes beyond our dream imagination. Living in his world means not needing the sense of smell. In addition, Oblivion moves forward not through shootouts, but through unexpected twists, and the atmosphere is fantastic, given the minimalist set designs (by which I mean the beautiful, barren exteriors of Iceland and California, where nothing flashes or shines). The sound and music arrangement in the pool scene, and the pool scene itself, made this movie what it is and almost gave me an orgasm. Recalling the dressing scene in TRON: Legacy, I begin to hope that Kosinski is laying the cornerstone of a new sub-genre of transcendental erotic-sci-fi (i.e. something that would make your brain come). Once Google (and FilmBooster) take over the world, it will happen with M83 playing in the background.

Call Girl is slightly tense and disturbing while terrorizing its audience with a 1980s electronic soundtrack (which would fit somewhere between an Italian horror B-movie and James Horner’s Commando). The film really gets going only in the last fourth, until which time it is unnecessarily lengthy and the main character’s prostitution is shown in way too many examples. However, the atmosphere, acting and climax are all very good. With a 20- or 30-minute shorter runtime it would’ve been great. And I would also add more tension and sex.

Great potential undermined by low IQ. The film’s characters repeatedly behave like naive idiots and deal with situations by taking unreasonable steps, just like in the worst horror B-movies. However, plenty of positives outweigh this shortcoming (literally): violence, blood and gore are deliciously elaborated, many scenes are very intense even for hardened horror fans, the pace of the film is killing (!), the bloody rain in the climax is impressive and the siren sound, subconsciously causing panic in the audience, is just perfect. One of the better remakes of the horror classics we grew up with.

Hit and Run is a fun silly flick that entertains with comical and well-played characters (everyone here is a nutjob), the anticipation of their upcoming conflict (which can’t end well) and the number of car chases, which (especially due to the environment) are reminiscent of Death Proof (the filmmakers obviously like Tarantino). There’s about one funny joke for every unfunny one, and the movie holds together thanks to the incredible chemistry between Dax Shepard and Kristen Bell, who are impossible to dislike.

Tom Cruise proves that he knows how to be a cool agent not just in eye-candy blockbusters with suicidal stunts, but also in a clever and inventive crime thriller that is not afraid to take itself less than seriously.