DaViD´82

A Brit-Bollywood remake of the Czech fairytale movie O chytrém Honzovi (= Clever Jack). This could be called Clever Jamal or How a Poor Guy with Common Sense Found Happiness and it is extremely good and enlightening. But didn’t it bend the truth whenever it could (mainly in the live transmissions) for the crude purpose of wringing your heart strings? Yes, but who cares in a fairytale, huh kids? P.S.: And isn’t the book better than the movie? No, it’s not. Because Swarup’s work is something completely different. Some black humor, cynicism and a message that is the exact opposite of Boyle’s ever so sweet, naive candy cane. And I like that kind of thing more than fairytales...

"You're more than a duke. More than a king. You're a God to me!" Richard III Universal-style in its golden monster era. Nobody in their right mind would expect Shakespeare from that combination, so nobody should be surprised by how B-movie this is. Which, in view of the star-studded cast, is a huge shame. Just the main male trio alone, comprising Basil Rathbone, Vincent Price and Boris Karloff is a jackpot in itself. Too bad that Price is so criminally sidelined and Boris Karloff is just there for his pretty face too. His name plays a greater role on the posters than in the movie itself. But it has its good sides, even so. The drunken duel, for instance.

Darren probably couldn’t stand anymore of his wife’s constant teasing that she already has her golden baldie on their mantelpiece. And so he shot that type of movie which is to the critical community what a red cloth is to a bull. Seemingly a merely classic nostalgic and sad “sports" drama, heavily dependent on Rourke’s gala-performance, but he gave it something extra. Something depressing and true. And it’s really, and I mean really, not about wrestling at all. Thank god. I’m actually so allergic to that sport. This could just as well be about boxing, chess, acting or writing reviews for FilmBooster. It would work out the same, this is mainly about looking for your own “place in life".

I was expecting an experiment, not a movie. Something where the director draws all the attention to himself. I mean the kind of movie where the “how it’s done" is more engaging than the picture itself. Well, this is exactly the opposite. Brilliant ambiguous dialogs dominate the scenes, set the tempo and entertain the whole way through. Stewart is unbelievably perfect in this cynically sarcastic role. Maybe I’m alone in this, but to me it’s the best Hitchcock movie. Maybe because, thanks to the absence of his typical stylization, it’s not really a Hitchcock movie after all.

It’s a bit of a paradox, but Ondříček’s four-actor, respectful parody of “39 Degrees" on the stage of Dejvice Theatre seemed to me just a tad better than the original. Not only was Jarda Plesl even more Robert Donat than Robert Donat himself, but mainly there are the little birds. Now to the movie itself. Everything that makes Hitch Hitch is present in pretty much its pure essence (including the illogicalities – a forty mile dash with the police on their heels etc.). But it just doesn’t really work here. To be more precise – it’s just not quite working out between Donat and Carroll, she overshadows him quite a bit. Which drags down the movie as a whole, am I right sir? On the other hand, the pace is so dizzying that I only realized that after the screening anyway.

Maybe the finale was a bit unnecessarily hastily cut short and too unspoken. If such a thing can be said, um, or written, about a silent movie. It’s just a movie that clearly shows what will be Alfred’s strengths in the future. I was most satisfyingly satisfied. Especially with Hitch’s performance and despite the ever-present annoying horn in the background which was meant to simulate sound of traffic. Silent version: ?/5, Sound version: 4/5

Once upon a time there was a house and in it lived a curious invalid. And it is perfect. How I could not see it at first I do not understand and repent, greatly repent and thanks to this review not secretly.

Funny and clever opening five minute slapstick intro, drowned in an hour-long sea of boredom, nothingness, humorlessness, and snapshots from a journey around the world just like from a bad newsreel. The final twenty minutes still does not work as a romantic movie, or a comedy, but at least something happens. Thanks for that, at least.

The prolog to the War of the Roses wrapped up in a nice little package destined for express delivery to the Academy. Simply family drama of the likes of In the Bedroom. If it weren’t for the last half hour when they are playing a little too hard on that “Oscars for everybody" string too obviously, I would give it full marks. Mendes’ directing reminisces about his theatrical beginnings and Deakins’ camera holds back sensitively this time. He leaves almost everything to the actors and the realistic nature of problems like “and what now with an empty life...". And that’s good. But despite everything, this is Mendes’ weakest movie yet. On the other hand, bring on more “weak" movies like this.

♫ We lay, my love and I / Beneath the weeping willow / But now alone I lie / And weep beside the tree / Singing "O Willow Waly" / By the tree that weeps with me / Singing "O Willow Waly" / Till my lover returns to me / We lay, my love and I / Beneath the weeping willow / But now alone I lie / O willow I die / O willow I die... ♫