POMO

In filmmaking terms, The Order is solidly made darkness for a very narrow range of (dark) viewers. Its plot is similar to that of Stigmata, but less focused on form and more on content. A film with minimal chance of commercial success.

Tiresia is a French intellectual espresso with an interesting story and tiresome dialogue. Despite the sadness and cruelty of the story, the filmmakers keep the typical “artsy” distance in emotions and they express the dramatic nature of the film with symbolism – Bach’s music with footage of flowing lava. A festival affair for private company. It was okay, but I don’t really need to see the Q&A session with the filmmakers.

A Christmas movie gift in which everyone who has ever been in love at least once will find something for themselves, whether they’re 17 or 40, black or white, good looking or not so good looking. Four stars for the fact that I didn’t completely identify with absolutely all of the characters (which is natural) and a secret 20 stars for the one segment that left me petrified and speechless. And also for the overall good-heartedness and love that everyone involved put into making this film.

The initial immersion in the plot and the growing mystery surrounding the killer’s identity are amazing. But in the last third of the film, when the cards start to be laid on the table, the endearing tribute to Hitchcock’s Psycho becomes a muddled cliché-ridden attempt to be as shocking as possible. Initially a strong four, cut down to an embarrassing two stars after the final interpolation.

An energetic young Tibetan man decides to leave his small Nepalese village for the land of his dreams – America. Along the way, however, he meets a few locals and, mainly, a pretty girl... There’s enough material here for a five-minute short story, stretched out into a two-hour film. Travellers and Magicians isn’t deliberately drawn out and slow because it wants to be “hypnotic”, but because it lacks a dramatic arc, which makes it exceedingly boring, with only a minimum of bright moments that endearingly bring together Tibetan and Western culture.

Bad Taste was imaginative and original, so one could ignore the ridiculous effects and garage music. Actually, it was these cheap features that gave it its particular charm. But the Australian jackasses known as the “Spierig Bros.” just mix zombies with aliens (what kind of combination is that?!) in one absurd mishmash with almost no original ideas, making the eccentric amateurish result almost unwatchable. For more than thirty clichéd killings (grinder, shovel, rifle, etc.), there is only one original (with an airplane propeller). I’m giving this only one very weak star for the certain amount of enthusiastic playfulness I felt from the film.

The key to Underworld is your level of tolerance for the screenplay that pretends to be serious but is actually naïve and unintentionally funny in places. Len Wiseman may have fulfilled a childhood dream, but he’s either forgotten about the more mature audience or he still has a pimply face himself. Even so, I can’t give this less than three stars, which is thanks to the spectacular production. The childishness is justified by the fury of the action scenes, the sets and mainly Kate Beckinsale’s sexy costume. If you’re not an admirer of Federico Fellini, the visual and aural aspects of this film will appeal to you more than its content will annoy you.

On Cate Blanchett’s part, Veronica Guerin is a superbly acted one-woman show which, however, leaves a somewhat flat overall impression, though the last ten minutes don’t leave a dry eye in the house. That the screenplay tried to remain as complex and faithful to the actual events as possible is fine, but in order for this to work as a truly compelling film, it needed to settle more comfortably into the personal lives of the protagonist and the two main bad guys (instead of familiarizing the audience with the other five insignificant ones). From Veronica’s investigation, which doesn’t come to any point (so it is not as important as in sophisticated fictional thrillers), only what is essential for the build-up of a film should have been used. After all, a film is constructed according to different rules than television journalism. Joel Schumacher made Veronica’s story into an honest, cold deposition. Ron Howard would have made it into a fine Hollywood tear-jerker. I would have preferred something in between.

Everything that made the previous two films amazing is twice as powerful in the third one. A perfect drama and fantasy in one.

Though Bringing Down the House is formulaic, it is still a very likable comedy with an ideal amount of all of the necessary ingredients.