Fistful of Dollars (1964) *****

Up until 1964 westerns were the same formula over and over again (with exception to The Searchers). A hero on a moral plateau, a villain that even though they were evil, would never go over the edge totally, and a damsel in distress. This was how you made a western.
It was in 1964 that Sergio Leone not only introduced us to the cinematic Clint Eastwood, he introduced us to a western that was dirtier and harsher. This was not Shane. This was Leone's west.
Eastwood's character is not motivated by morals. He's motivated by money- pure and simple. His main goals is to play the two families in San Miguel against each other. Even though he shows a little compassion that raises him above the scum of the town, he is still on the same level of the antagonists in the movie. Gian Maria Volonte portarays Ramon, the borderline psychotic leader of the Rojo's clan. Ramon breaks more western taboos than Eastwood, mainly the the films final thirty minutes. There is also a damsel in distress, but instead of being rescued by our fearless "hero" she is used as a pawn so that he can make even more money.
Fistful of Dollars represents a landmark in westerns just as Stagecoach did a generation before it. In a way, Leone gave westerns a pair of balls. He also gave us Clint Eastwood as The Man with No Name, a character that Eastwood would return to every ten years or so until Unforgiven put him to rest. This is Leone's first masterpiece and ironically, in Leone's world its running time would make it a short subject.

The Last Picture Show (1971) *****

The Last Picture Show is Peter Bogdonavich's adaptation of Larry McMurtry's novel about life in a small, dried up Texas town in the 1950's. Sam the Lion (Ben Johnson) is the pulse of the town of Anarene, owning the pool hall, the diner, and the picture show as he bestows fatherly advice on a group of young men who don't seem to have any fathers (none that are of importance enough to appear on screen anyway).

If Sam is the center of town then Sonny (Timothy Bottoms) is the focus of the film as he goes through the trials of becoming a man in a town that should have an obituary written for it on its welcome sign. But then you have Duane (Jeff Bridges) who is set to marry his girlfriend Jacy (Cybil Shepherd)whom he believes he was meant to be with only to lose her and end up losing everything he actually cared about in town. Jacy's life isn't a picnic either as she watches her mother whore it up, encouraging her to do the same.

This isn't the Donna Reed show or any kind of nostalgic ride back to the 1950's. The Last Picture Show is like the American Grafitti of the poor, middle American kids who could afford the suped up cars that Lucas' creation drove up and down the street all night. These kids had more problems than the adults and no real way to get out of them. The director using black and white only adds to the blah despair of what life was like in this sleepy Texas town. This is a film where you actually feel for all the characters and you just want them to get out of that dreadful town, but it was never meant to be. The Last Picture show is a piece of Americana, painting a picture that the 1950's wasn't the poodle skirt parade that has been depicted adnauseum for all these years.

Dawn of the Dead (1978) *****

Eleven years after Night of the Living Dead stormed onto drive in theater screens George Romero gave us the incredible Dawn of the Dead, which is the first epic horror film. The zombie epidemic is sweeping the nation as society slowly descends into chaos. Two SWAT team members and two employees of a television devise a plan where they'll steal a traffic helicopter and fly to "safety". Where they end up is a shopping mall that on the surface seems like a paradise: everything you could ever want. But it soon turns into a hell as they continually have to deal with the living and the living dead throughout their ordeal.

Romero's main comment with DotD is about commercialism. I've often walked through stores, usually at Christmas time and had the hokey tune from the end credits pop into my head. Even as zombies we wnat to go to the mall. It also examines what happens when you get what you want. Are material goods enought to make you happy? Romeros answer is a big, dead no.

DotD features some of the goriest effects of its time, delivered by effects guru Tom Savini. This film is not rated, so if you're easily gagged tread with caution as Romero goes balls out '70's style. It's a potent film. If David Lean had directed a horror movie this would have been it.

Dawn of the Dead is a legendary film that sealed Romero's legacy even more so than Night of the Living Dead. The tag line says it all: When there's no more room in hell, the dead will walk the earth.

Dog Day Afternoon (1975) *****

Al Pacino followed up the legendary Godfather Part II with this film that tells the story of a botched bank robbery and the flaws committed by all parties in the mayhem that followed. Pacino plays Sonny, a Brooklynite who is robbing the bank to cover the expenses of his lover Leon's (played incredibly by Chris Sarandon who you kids may remember as Lord Humperdink in The Princess Bride) sex change operation. John Cazale plays the second robber, Sal, as a man on the edge- not as a raving lunatic, but a silent time bomb just waiting to go off.

Sidney Lumet had worked with Pacino a few years previous in Serpico, but this isn't the depressing drag through the mud that Serpico was. Dog Day Afternoon plays as a black comedy with the characters displaying humor and wit in a hostile situation. Most of the film takes place inside and just outside the bank that Sonny and Sal are attempting to rob which gives the film a theater-like feeling. In Sonny Pacino found one of his many trademark roles. Who can forget him just yelling "Attica! Attica!"

The only real tragedy in Dog Day is sitting there wondering what John Cazale could have been if he had survived beyond the 1970's. I've got a feeling you would have had a name that would have been equal to Pacino and DeNiro if cancer hadn't of cut his life short in the late 1970's.

Dog Day Afternoon is another one of those 1970's cinema masterpieces I like to throw out for everyone's consideration. It's one of those normal guy breakdown films that Scorsese would dive into full tilt in Taxi Driver. A real classic.

Fight Club (1999) *****

I've been hearing about Fight Club for about 10 years now, but have never actually sat down and watched it until tonight.

Wow.

Fight Club is the Taxi Driver of Generation X. Taxi Driver expressed the anger of one individual who felt disillusioned in the urban society that had left him behind. Fight Club takes that idea and puts it upon an entire generation of fatherless "boy-men". Travis Bickle would have been a member of a Fight Club.
Since the first two rules of Fight Club are not to talk about Fight Club I won't waste your time with what you already know. Everyone knows the plot. There's no sense wasting time on it. It's the message that's important.

Fight Club is a film that represents what happened in the 1990's. Corporations slithered in and started naming everything from male enhancement stock cars to Colon Blow ballparks. This stuff exploded in the '90's.
The question is: Did people get angry about it?
Woodstock 1999 fell to shit a few months before this film was released (and three years after the book it was based on). If that wasn't the same kind of bellow against the corporations that this film was, I don't know what is.
No, Fight Club is not Kick Boxer. It's much more than that.

Once Upon A Time In America (1984) *****

Sergio Leone's final film is another enormous epic, but it's not a western. It's a look at four guys that grow up to be gangsters and the way that their lives have been affected by their chosen path. This is the final chapter in Leone's second trilogy (the other films being the magnificent Once Upon a Time in the West and Duck, You Sucker) chronicling what he thought we turning points in the history of the United States.

Robert De Niro stars as "Noodles", a Brooklyn street tough that befriends Max (as an adult played by James Woods) and together with two other friends they begin the ascent into the mob from being street thugs to running a speakeasy to pulling hits and robbing diamonds. There is also a love story thrown in along the way between Noodles and Debra (played by a young Jennifer Connelly and Elizabeth McGovern). The story is also intercut by flash forwards of Noodles as an old man attempting to solve a mystery.

The film is your typical spacious Leone film. He shoots it like his westerns- it's a wide veranda even though it mainly happens in Brooklyn. Only Leone could make The Godfather feel like a short mob movie. Once again Leone uses his trademark close ups to tell a lot of the story without dialogue and it still works, especially when combined with a haunting score from Ennio Morricone. Mossicone's music for OUATIA is one of his best and tries to be a little more urban while still keeping the trademarks of a classic Morricone score. The acting is, of course, first rate with a cast like this.

When this film was released in the United States in 1984 it was trimmed down to a little over two hours causing Leone's final film to crash like the Hindenburg. The four hour cut is simply a masterpiece of cinema and is one of the greatest mob films ever made. Amazingly Leone still wanted another 45 minutes of footage in the film that he felt was needed to tell the story (much of it having to do with Joe Pesci's character which seems to disappear from the film). Once Upon A Time in America stands as an epitaph for a man that created his own style and redefined a genre in such a way, everyone starting copying him. This is Leone's swan song.

Heat (1995) *****

I remember back in December of 1995 looking through the paper looking for a movie to go see during the weekend and stumbling on a film called Heat. Being not in the loop as much back then I started to read the review and was sold on the film by the first six words:

"Al Pacino and Robert DeNiro star..."

And that's all it took.

Heat is the story of two masters of their craft. Neil McCauley (Robert DeNiro) is a lifelong criminal who is extremely professional in his execution and Al Pacino is the unorthodox robbery/homicide lieutenant Vincent Hanna. Heat is a cat and mouse tale about the chase between these two men and their respective crews as McCauley attempts the heist of his life and Hanna deals with other crimes and issues in his personal life.

The supporting cast is a who's who of great Hollywood talent. Val Kilmer, Tome Sizemore, and Danny Trejo round out Neil's crew. John Voight makes a stretch as a low talking, mullet wearing impression of L.A. crime legend Eddie Bunker (yes, the same Eddie Bunker from Reservoir Dogs). Natalie Portman makes an early appearance as Hanna's troubled teenage step-daughter while Ashley Judd plays Kilmer's character's unfaithful wife. The casting is Grade A.

Michael Mann directs the film with Los Angeles as a character as well. The lights of the city are used as a backdrop several times throughout the film, but what's amazing is that Mann can even use a shot of the ho-hum L.A. freeway as a set piece and make it look beautiful in some weird way. Mann uses the city as a way to get across to us that L.A. is a city unto itself and it helps considering that when you think of Pacino and especially DeNiro you think of New York City. It's great to see a crime drama not set in New York for once.

A person can't discuss Heat and not talk about the action sequences, mainly the bank heist which is the most stylized and realistic I believe has ever been filmed. The slightest detail has been taken care of in these scenes with sound effects that don't sound canned for decades as standard machine gun fare and the realistic portrayal of a real police shoot out. Yes, the good guys wear kevlar not as a plot device but because that's what they would really do. And sometimes it doesn't work. It's these scenes that have certainly influenced the action in The Dark Knight thirteen years later.

Heat is the greatest cop and robber film ever made. It's that simple. The story is multi layered like an onion and its various plots help the story by making us look deeper into the characters than the basic these are the good guys and these are the bad guys mentality. You root for both sides when watching this film because in the end they're all fucked up. DeNiro and Pacino were still on top of their games at this point, though the bottom seems to have fallen out since Heat. The few scenes that the pair appear in together are simply amazing and even though they're the names that will sell the film it's the supporting cast, great story, and superb direction by Michael Mann that have made this film a legendary piece of police work. September 13,

All The President's Men (1976) *****

All the President's Men is a political thriller. Unlike typical political thrillers this one is based on a true event- the burglary of Democratic National headquarters at the Watergate office complex. The film shows the long road that Bob Woodward (Robert Redford) and Carl Bernstein (Dustin Hoffman) traveled to get from a simple botched burglary to one of the greatest government conspiracy in U.S. history.

Redford and Hoffman were at their peak and not doing crap back in 1976. Their performances are riveting, especially since most of the film they are on the phone. They keep the film alive while showing some of the ho-hum life of a newspaper reporter. The best portrayal is Jason Robards as Ben Bradlee, the editor of the Washington Post. Robards won the Oscar for this role and he gives it the old school life and charm and no bullshit attitude that you would expect out of this character (Robards has been commended for nailing Bradlee even though they never met). A stellar performance.

Most people associate the Watergate break-in as Nixon's folly and that two reporters toppled a Presidency because of it. This film gives the details of how long and wide the road was to Nixon quitting in 1974. There was more to this than a simple burglary. All the President's Men shows this while not boring the audience by dryly going through the facts. The characters have life breathed into them and that's what makes the film so great.

The Shawshank Redemption (1994) *****

When the main theme of a film is hope I usually expect a gooey mess that just makes me want to heave for the two hours of the film that's touting it. It's the movies that have hope as a main theme, yet don't throw it at you every five minutes that stand out as great films.

The Shawshank Redemption is about a banker (Tim Robbins) who is convicted and is sentenced to two life sentences in Shawshank State Prison. While there he builds a relationship with the other inmates and prison administration through ways that are not necessarily orthodox in prison society.

The funny thing about Shawshank is that you go in thinking it's Andy's (Robbins) story. It actually becomes Red's (Morgan Freeman) twenty year slice of life in the prison, though most of that time is directly affected by Andy. At the end of the day Red is afraid to have any hope and that's all Andy has to hand out.

Directed by Frank Darabont from a story by Stephen King (King's allowd one good film a decade) The Shawshank Redemption is a truly great movie that with Pulp Fiction was screwed out of an Oscar in 1994. Yes, I'm bashing Forrest Gump again. You can look to that movie for sappy sentiment. Shawshank is a stronger film that doesn't depend on the novelty of its star mooning Lyndon Johnson to keep the audience entertained.

Ed Wood (1994) *****

Ed Wood is about the worst director ever (not Uwe Boll) and his odyssey to give us another Citizen Kane. What Ed Wood gave us was Plan 9 From Outer Space, which some call the worst film ever made (I have to argue that I've seen much worse in the last 6 months with bigger budgets and bigger stars).

What's great about Ed Wood is that it feels like a cheesy B movie with over the top dialogue from most of the stars. It's almost as if their lives are a B movie. Depp is awesome as Wood, a man who is so removed from reality that he doesn't realize how much his films suck.

The breakout is Martin Landau as Bella Lugosi. Landau accomplishes a feat that's difficult for an actor: he brings Lugosi back from the dead. He seels us Bella and we don't know any high pressure tactics to buy it. A deserved Oscar win for Landau.

Ed Wood is a great film that's an underdog story. Ed is a main that wants fame from his film and even though the fame he got isn't quite the same as what Roson Welles achieved with Kane there is a symetry between Woods career and Welles. Both peaked with the film they're remembered for and both faded into the obscurity of each level of their stardom. Welles did fish stick commercials and Wood did softcore porn. What's the difference?

One Flew Over The Cuckoo's Nest (1975) *****

The pinnacle of Jack Nicholson's films, One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest is about work camp convict R.P. McMurphy (Nicholson) who ends up being evaluated for mental illness at an Oregon institution. The story follows how the individual personalities interact with each other. and the staff led by the understated bitchiness of Nurse Ratched (Louise Fletcher).

The thing that makes Cuckoo's Nest stick out are the characters. You of course have Nicholson's McMurphy and Flecthers Nurse Ratched, but you also have the other patients. Danny DeVito's laidback childlike Martini and his polar opposite Cheswick (Sydney Lassick). Christopher Lloyd's neurotic Taber. And of course, Will Sampson as the "mute" Chief. It's all these characters thrown together in this situation that makes the film interesting. Everything is ritual. Until McMurphy arrives and the real drama begins.

Milos Foreman brings the life on the mental ward to life. It's not all mad babbling and catatonics. Some people are there because they want to be with their little quirks and such. A comedy and a drama all wrapped up in one.

Cuckoo's Nest is one of those lightening movies. Most of the cast were unknown at the time of the films release and they proved their talent in making one of THE great films. It's a movie you remember for its amazing characters and its great script adapted from Ken Kesey's novel. A real cinema gem.

Mulholland Drive (2001) *****

When I was sitting there watching David Lynch's Mulholland Drive I was totally confused for the first two hours of the film as it seemed to just drag into nothing with plots that ran left and right but never meeting in the middle. It's the last twenty minutes of the film that save it and give the film what can be described as an almost linear storyline.

The plot involves "Rita" (Laura Herring) being involved in a car accident on Mulholland Drive and losing her memory. She stumbles into the life of Betty Elms (Naomi Watts) an aspiring actress living in her aunts apartment. The most basic premise of the film is that it's about the quest of these two women to figure out who "Rita" is. There are additional plots intertwines with this main narrative, such as Justin Theroux's character having the ultimate bad day.

But there's more to it than that.

That's what beautiful about it. Lynch has practically made a film that you have to determine what the hell it's about. What balls! How dare he make his audience think about what they just saw. This is one of the reasons why I really got the movie in the last twenty minutes. He explains it. Sort of.

So if you're into movies where you'll say "What the fuck?!?!" for two hours this is the film for you. It's a two and a half hour riddle that explodes in the end.

Bachelor Party (1984) *** 1/2

If there was a monarchy to 1980's sex comedies then Bachelor Party would be their king. This is probably one of the crudest and tasteless films outside of the porno industry ever made, but it's still funny and entertaining as hell. Oscar Winner Tom Hanks stars as Rick, a guy about to get married to Debbie (Tawny Kitaen). His buddies want to throw him a massive bachelor party that turns into a circus featuring a stripper trying to have sex with a donkey (who's hyped up on drugs) and an excursion to Chippendales to play a prank on the bridal shower by having a freakishly large version of the male anatomy in a hot dog bun. Bachelor Party is good, tasteless humor that may offend some people out there, but most will find it hilarious. Yes, some of Tom Hanks schtick does get old after awhile buy overall the film is a pretty good romp.

The Godfather Part III (1990) ****

Michael Corleone (Al Pacino) returns to the screen, preparing to retire and enter the legitimate world, but that isn't going to happen in Francis Ford Coppola's final chapter in the Godfather odyssey tying together the Corleone family, the Vatican, and vast real estate and communications deals.

Most of the original cast returns for this installment (excluding Robert Duvall, who apparently wanted too much money) and wears their roles like an old pair of comfortable shoes. It's the new additions that tend to drag the film down a bit. Andy Garcia is good as Vincent, Sonny Corleone's bastard son, but he isn't Caan or Pacino. Eli Wallach is the last old school Don, who acts as friend to Michael, but is actually... But most of the acting wraith in this film goes to Sofia Coppola, who plays Michael's daughter Mary. All I'll say is that thank god she became a director. Seeing her in a scene with Al Pacino is like seeing a Rolls Royce next to a Chevette- it ruins it for you.

Coppola directs this film just like the others. There is a basic blueprint to all these films and if you've seen the first two you'll know what's coming along. The lighting is still Godfather lighting that's been ripped off so many times it will make your head spin, but it still works all these years later. It still feels like a Godfather movie.

The Godfather Part III is not a bad movie. It's actually a very good movie with a great cast. The problem is that it's not a great Godfather movie. It's the lesser of the three and when you compare it to the near perfection of the previous two it looks as bad as everyone believes it is. You must remember that it was still nominated for Best Picture, but this was also the year that another gangster movie was also nominated for best picture and should have won- Goodfellas. (both were screwed by dances with Wolves). Watch it as a stand alone, not as piece to a puzzle or you'll be disappointed.

Nick And Norah's Infinite Playlist (2008) ****

Nick (Michael Cera) is the only straight guy in a gay punk band called the Jerk Offs. Norah (Kat Deennings) is a parochial school girl who just happens to be a queen in the New York City club scene. Their one tangible bond that links them at the beginning of the film is Nick's former girlfriend Tris (Alexis Dziena) who happens to be a friend of Norahs and discards the unending volumes of mix CD's only to have them wind up in the hands of Norah, who loves them. The way their two worlds collide is at a club where the Jerk Offs are playing. Norah is there with her drunken sidekick Caroline (Ari Gaynor) when Tris appears and Norah fibs about being there with her boyfriend. This is when fate takes over and Norah selects Nick from the guys at the bar and asks her to be her boyfriend for five minutes and kisses him. New York City at night takes over as the pair pend an evening in the city looking for the drunken Caroline and chasing the enigmatic band Where's Fluffy. Of course during these quests they end up falling for each other. You could almost call this After Hours: The Next Generation. What can go wrong does go wrong, but instead of Griffin Dunne going through hell you get these two kids slowly going down that road that leads to love. It's a quirky little story that uses a couple of over the top characters as co-stars, but once again the main co star is New York City itself, though the director (Peter Sollett) tends to ram it down your throat at times. A city in the film should be behind the actors, not overshadowing them. In the end Nick and Norah's Infinite Playlist is a good teenage romance/comedy that doesn't use sex humor and profanity to get a laugh and tell it's story. It's ala American Grafitti. It's a good romp through the five boroughs.

Midnight Cowboy (1969) *****

The film industry changed in 1969 and one of the tides the industry felt was and X-Rated film winning best picture that year- Midnight Cowboy.

The film is basically a fish out of water story. Joe Buck (Jon Voight) travels to New York City in pursuit of his dream ob as a gigolo. He soon finds that it isn't as easy it he thought it was going to be and ends up sharing a condemned room with street wise Ratso Rizzo (a terrific Dustin Hoffman) who is a cripple and a thief.

Some of the sequences in Midnight Cowboy seem dated to the late '60's flower power crusade, but the film itself overcomes the time warps you feel when watching. Hoffman and Voight are excellent with Voight playing the bumpkin Joe Buck as the fresh of the farm rube he is. John Schlesinger delivers a gritty tale of old New York, shattering the concepts of the city seen as a clean utopia in Hollywood productions before it.

To call Midnight Cowboy a buddy picture would not do the film the justice it deserves. They're not really buddies at all. Joe and Ratso are really clinging to each other like a pair of life perservers tied together. They make each other better and they make each other worse.

Good Fellas (1990) *****

In my previous reviews of Taxi Driver and Raging Bull I mentioned that Martin Scorsese was screwed by the Academy in not receiving and Oscar for either of those films. Goodfellas is the third one he got screwed on. It's the story of a Brooklyn youth who slowly becomes indoctrinated into the Mafia and how the world of gangsters in New York City worked in the '50's, '60's, and '70's. It sounds like a simple story, but it isn't. There's a ton of threads rolling around in Goodfellas, but Scorsese is able to present them in a way that keeps the viewer entranced with what's going on before them.

The core Goodfellas are Robert De Niro, Ray Liotta, and Joe Pesci with Liotta playing the lead role of Henry Hill. These three work together so well that they become their characters and you feel like they've known each other for the three decades that this film follows. De Niro plays the sort of patriarch gangster Jimmy Conway, who isn't quite the boss (who is played masterfully by Paul Sorvino) but has a lot of pull and is feared in the underworld. Joe Pesci won the Oscar for best supporting actor for his role as Tommy DeVito, a psychotic hitman who is still pretty damn likable throughout the film.

Goodfellas is based on the book Wiseguy by Nicholas Pileggi who co-wrote the screenplay with Scorsese. There is no specially written soundtrack to this film as the director has opted to go with music from each era that's represented, which helps with the effect. The films pace is breathtaking as we go from one event to another. A lot of time and information is covered, yet you don't feel bombarded nor do you feel like somethings left out. It's perfect.

Goodfellas is probably the best gangster movie ever made. When compared to the Godfather this is a grittier film that feels more true to life than Coppola's epic. What's really funny about Goodfellas is that it's really a film about a fall from grace, but not like the way it's typically portrayed. It's a classic.

Glenngarry Glen Ross (1992) *****

Probably the best ensemble cast doing pure acting since the original 12 Angry Men. The plot is simple: four salesmen. First place is a new Cadillac. Second place is a set of steak knives. Third place is your fired. It's as simple as that and yet it weaves a complex web of what evil men are willing to do to either achieve their prize or simply keep their job.
This is the cast that dreams are made of Baldwin, Spacey, Harris, Arkin, Pryce, and Pacino are all on top of their game, but it's Jack Lemmon that really steals the movie. Lemmon's performance is golden and proved that he could still do the job after all these years. If you want to see a premium performance from Jack Lemmon, this is it.

Blade Runner (1982) *****

Ridley Scott's orgy for the senses Blade Runner is about a bleak future (notice how the future is always bleak in cinema) and the technology that man has created that has gone out of control. Harrison Ford plays Deckard, a Blade Runner whose soul job is to "retire" Replicants, man made humans that are illegal on Earth and have a life averaging four years.

Harrison Ford is great in the Deckard role, a loner who is trying to retire himself but gets pulled back in when four Replicants (played by Joanna Cassidy, Brion James, Daryl Hannah, and the incredible Rutger Hauer) land in Los Angeles. In the process Deckard meets Rachel, a Replicant that doesn't know she's a Replicant.

Blade Runner is still a visually stunning film, even with the advent of CGI and new ways of hocus pocus. What gives Blade Runner its style is the way that the film hypnotizes us with its beauty, even though the film is all night scenes and grungy exteriors. In one shot you can see the marvel of progress in the background while the past lies in decay in the foreground.
Blade Runner is one of the greatest noir films ever made. The dark tone of the film and Deckard's relationships with his superiors and Rachel is pure noir at its finest. It's the sci fi twist that pulls you in. This could be another detective story, but with the futuristic direction and Scott's fabulous direction it becomes the classic that it deserves to be.
Scott may have tweaked his project over the years (four released cuts that include his Final Cut, which is what I reviewed) due to the harsh atmosphere that the film was originally produced in (you can give him the George Lucas criticism, though it doesn't really stick since Scott doesn't pretend the other cuts don't exist ala Lucas). Over the years Scott has molded this film into a dark exploration of man kinds push for technology that backfires in its face.
Blade Runner is a film that can't have judgment passed upon its first viewing, which also depends on which cut your a viewing. It's a great film that deserves the praise it has gotten over the years. A true classic that everyone should view at least once..

Psycho (1960) *****

At the end of the 1950's Alfred Hitchcock saw all of these cheaply made B-movies coming out of Hollywood and came up with an idea: what if I made a movie on a shoe string budget that was actually good. After doing the big budget films Vertigo and North By Northwest, Hitchcock took his TV crew and started to shoot a film with the working title "Wimpy". And that's how Psycho, the masters greatest work, was born.

Psycho is about a young women who runs off with $40,000 from her employer to her boyfriend. It's a fairly simple story during the first 45 minutes until it's shattered in a way that takes the film down a totally different road becoming the story of the young inn keeper and his domineering mother.

Yes, I am actually writing this review as not to spoil the film for the three people who don't know what the big twist is.

Hitchcock steered away from the Vistavision films he had made for the previous decade to make a gritty kind of film- black and white, no Grant or Stewart, no matte paintings. This was like guerilla filmmaking for Hitchcock and it's one of the reasons that this film works so well. Another is the way that Hitchcock presents a cheaply made horror film to his audience. This isn't a film about werewolves or reanimated eastern Europeans. It could be about that deserted house down the road or the hotel near the ball park. It's centered in reality and makes you think that these could be your friends and neighbors. This was revolutionary in 1960. A tight production, it used every dollar to its fullest. It's like Hitchcock painted the Mona Lisa with a box of crayons. The only thing that Hitchcock carried over from his 1950's high end films was music by Bernard Herrmann, which probably was the final cog in the machine that is Psycho. Herrmann's score is legendary and improves a film that was perfection to begin with.

Other than John Gavin's semi-stiff performance, the rest of the cast give their roles great personality, especially Janet Leigh as the unlucky thief Marion Crane. Of course, the real stand out is Anthony Perkins. He becomes Norman Bates and plays the part to perfection. This is probably one of the best examples of acting ever captured on film. Perkins lives as Norman Bates. He conquers the role with all the mannerisms, such as knowing when to stutter the line and when to pour gasoline on the fire in his eyes. A legendary performance.

You can say that Hitchcock's career peaked with Psycho. He never produced the same kind of quality film again (excluding Frenzy) as they were always compared to Psycho. As the '60's wore on he continued to direct big budget films with big names (Connery, Newman) but none of them would come close to the greatness of that little production titled Wimpy.

The Bridge on the River Kwai (1957) *****

The Bridge on the River Kwai is a war movie without a war, but it still has a conflict between two or even three sides that makes for a great film that almost borders on cat and mouse. The film opens on a P.O.W. camp commanded by Captain Saito (Sessue Hayakawa) who has been ordered to build the bridge from the title by fresh prison labor in the former of a British squad led by Col. Nicholson (Alec Guinness). Nicholson is strictly by the book which endears him to his troops but agitates the lone American prisoner Major Shears (William Holden) and Saito himself. After a battle of wills between Saito and Nicholson the bridge which was supposed to be the Japanese commanders grand project slowly slips into the hands of Col. Nicholson who proves he can do it better and faster and becomes obsessed with the project almost to the point of what could be considered treason.

The acting in BOtRK is one of the shining points with Guinness capturing the best acting Oscar in 1957. He becomes the obsessed colonel who wants the bridge to stand as a monument of his own leadership abilities. Hayakawa's Saito is the exact opposite. He represents the reluctant soldier who actually wanted to be a musician. He wants to be a success but can't keep control of the project, dishonoring him. Hayakawa's performance is just as powerful as Guinness'.

This is a David Lean film, but it's a small intimate David Lean film meaning that in the normal world this would be a huge production but for David Lean it's just a baby. Since it's a Lean picture there are some great visuals and a storytelling style that pulls you into the film.

So when I said that Bridge on the River Kwai is a war film without a war with a war I meant that these men are sitting out the war on the outside of the jungle, yet there is an ego vs. ego war going on in that small prison camp in the jungle.

Downfall (Der Untergang) (2004) *****

Downfall takes us back to those glorious days of April and May of 1945 when we were about to declare victory in Europe. Let's kiss a girl in Times Square because the German's are toast! We all remember those images. For an American, watching Downfall is the negative side of V-E day celebrations. The film is about the final few weeks of the Third Reich as seen by on of Adolf Hitler's secretaries (Alexanda Maria Lara).

When going into Downfall you expect your basic last days of Hitler in his bunker story, but even though Hitler is the main focus of the film it digs deeper than that concrete tomb and examines what life was like for civillains and the military establishment in those final days in berlin as the Russians knocked on the Eastern door. Bruno Ganz plays Hitler in a way that's never been seen before. He isn't just the crazed mad man in the ground. He's not a split person, he's totally shattered by the faltering Reich and Ganz makes the audience feel something for his subject that probably has never been expressed in a film featuring Hitler- sympathy. There are a few moments when you actually sympathize for Adolf Hitler, though they are few and he usually does something to eliminate that feeling rather quickly. That's a true accomplishment in Ganz portrayal of the Fuhrer making it the role of his career.

What's amazing is the way that even in the end there was still a split between following the orders of no surrender and realizing that this is the end and the need to save themselves and the city of Berlin. Many fall on the sword in this one and shows the extreme views of Nazi Germany.

This is a well acted, directed, and written piece of cinema. Downfall can stand as a testament to the evil that men do and how stubborn they can be when they realize they were wrong. They all realize they're wrong. In the end it's a decision of whether pride is going to let them keep on living.

Annie Hall (1977) *****

Woody Allen seems to be an acquired taste and people fall into two camps: you either love the guy or you hate him.

The thing about Woody Allen's movies is that every one of them that I've seen are about relationships in one way or another. Annie Hall is the best of these in that it shows the history of the relationship between Alvy Singer (Allen) and Annie Hall (a perfect Diane Keaton) in a style that you can almost say that Tarantino stole for Reservoir Dogs (yes, I'm comparing Woody Allen to Quentin Tarantino slightly). Allen doesn't use a straight line in telling the story, however. You don't really know what to expect next other than that when you get to that point you'll understand what he's talking about because- Ta-Da!- we've all been there! Allen tells the story of a relationship in a way that people will understand and relate to while making it funny in an ironic sort of way. The great thing about it is that it's not some huge production piece. It mainly uses New York as its set piece, which I know is a totally new thing for a Woody Allen movie (irony). The funny thing is that as the film goes on it becomes a love/hate relationship between people and the city itself. Both lead characters represent two different coasts you might say.

Annie Hall was voted best picture in the 1977 Academy Awards, though we can't say much about that year because the only other film nominated that people will still remember or care about is Star Wars. Annie Hall is a film that represents that 1970's film making that I've addressed before except this time it's not the darkness and the violence, but it's not painted rose and blue skies either. Annie Hall is a film that's set in a normal reality with some over the top narratives. A great flick from Woody Allen

Rear Window (1954) *****

Alfred Hitchcock was used to doing films on small set pieces. Rope was a series of continuous takes shot in one apartment. Dial M For Murder was more of the same, also being shot in on apartment set. With Rear Window you can almost call it the biggest small set movie ever made- most of the film takes place in L.B. Jeffrie's (Jimmy Stewart) apartment but it looks out onto a magnificent New York apartment courtyard set.

The story follows a wheelchair confined Stewart going crazy in his small New York apartment in the middle of a heat wave. Now this was before DVD players and Ipods, so all poor Jeff has to do is stare out the window and watch his neighbors as they exist in the courtyard. It's while he's passing the time that he thinks he says a neighbor (Raymond Burr) across the way murder his wife.It becomes an obsession with Jeff and his uptown girlfriend (the beautiful Grace Kelly) to prove that the wife was killed before he skips town.

Such a simple premise, yet Hitchcock weaves a film that has more layers then you go in expecting. Take the relationship between Jeff and Lisa (Kelly). Lisa is practically throwing herself at him, trying to get him to settle down and he seems totally against the idea, even to the point of making comments leading the viewer to believe that she's too perfect. But as the film rolls along and she starts getting more adventurous in the endeavor he looks at her with an admiration that was lacking earlier in the film. There's more personality in this film than is on the surface.

For more personality just look at the courtyard and the other neighbors that aren't butchering their spouses. They all have a different personality and no two are alike. The musician, the spinster, the easy girl, the newlyweds, etc, etc, etc.

Hitchcock's real triumph is the way he makes you feel like you're a peeping tom. The way he cuts from what Stewart is looking at to Stewart's reaction makes you feel what he's feeling, be it shame, humor, or disgust. And when the killer's staring at you down the lens you get a start, even though you're just a casual visitor in Hitchcock's New York world.

Rear Window is a masterpiece from the master. It is a film that is re-watchable and like most great films, doesn't age to terribly. Rear Window is one of the best.

Capote (2005) *****

The best way to gauge a great acting performance is for you to spend the entire length of the film you're watching believing that you're seeing THAT character up on screen, not just the actor whose playing him. That's what you get with Philip Seymour Hoffman as Truman Capote. He becomes Truman Capote as DeNiro became Lamotta. It's a total transformation in which the actor gets lost inside the character and it pays dividends in the final product.

The film is basically a look at the making of Truman Capote's masterpiece book In Cold Blood, the story of two drifters who murder a family in a Kansas farmhouse in late 1959. It starts out as a simple magazine article, but the idea explodes as Capote's relationship with one of the men becomes closer and his obsession with the book grows deeper.

Capote is an emotional film, yet there are no happy endings. There's no happiness at all. The film is more a document of what Capote did to get his masterpiece and what he paid when he got it. Two sides and the demons fighting each other back and forth. And Hoffman gives us all of that in all of its detail and shows us how a sad story can become even sadder.

Finding Neverland (2004) ****

Finding Neverland is the story of one magical summer in life of J.M. Barrie (Johnny Depp) and the Davies family (mothered by Kate Winslet). Why's that summer so magical? It's the summer that the Davies boys inspired Barrie to write a play called Peter Pan.

The film is a great biopic in an era when everyone was throwing a biopic out every week, leading this one to get kind of buried under films like Ray and Walk The Line. Depp ones again proves that he's possibly our generations Marlon Brando in the role of the Scottish screenwriter and the boys play, well, boys led by Freddy Highmore as the namesake of Barrie's play.

The visuals are stunning and the take the film goes with on showing us the imagination of Barrie and the "lost boys" gives the film a more feeling that helps the viewer relate to what's going on in their heads.

Don't go into this film thinking your going to see "The Making of Peter Pan". You're going in to see a story about that one magical summer where they never had to grow up. Barrie just happened to write a play afterward.

Revenge of the Nerds (1984) ***1/2

When I was a youngster I stumbled on Revenge of the Nerds on that bastion for 1980's entertainment cable television. I came away with three things about college: 1) Everyone is well defined into cliques. 2)No one actually goes to class. 3) Everyone chants all the time. I could have put in every one's quest to have anonymous sex with multiple partners, but that was just as common outside of college.

The film is about a group of freshmen who are social outcasts at Adams College. They're the butt of numerous jokes by the jock Alpha Betas who, as I stated before, chant "Nerds!" at them whenever they appear on screen together. After securing a house and national recognition from a fraternity (one that's been all black since its inception) the nerds go to war with the jokes in order to take over a fraternity council and redeem themselves as well.

The basic story comes straight from the Meatballs playbook. A group of misfits earn their stripes and fight back. We've seen it before and we'll see it again (I'm sure a remake is down the line somewhere). It's the revenge from the title that peaks are interest. From X rated surveillance to burning jokes the nerds use their intelligence to extract their revenge. The script is average but is also helped by the amount of improv that the actors were allowed to do. It doesn't feel like the assembly line sex comedies of the 1980's. It gets a little bit of soul.

The cast has some unknowns that you would know in a few years. Anthony Edwards, James Cromwell, John Goodman, and who could forget the immortal Ted McGinley. The acting is a little better than the typical genre piece which is once again helped with the open shooting style.

Revenge of the Nerds has maintained a cult following since its release and frequently reappears at colleges and on-that's right-cable television. It's not a great movie, but it does leave you with laughs and a few grinning to yourself moments. Maybe it's because we're all nerds in our own way.

Batman (1989) ****

Let's face it. By 1989 Batman's image in the public consciousness was Adam West love handles powing and biffing guest stars every week. Batman was pure camp, not to be taken seriously. What Tim Burton's Batman does is turn that vision upside down.

Batman is an origin story, but not of the title character. It's more of a rise and fall of The Joker (played devlishly by Jack Nicholson) from a common mafia hitman to the most powerful criminal in the city. It could have easily been called The Joker. When the movie begins Batman (Michael Keaton)) is just there, it seems not for very long, but there's no real explanation other than the typical Batman mythos. After we see the initial metamorphisis of Nicholson's character the film becomes the standard Batman vs. Joker story complete with Vicki Vale (Kim Basinger) as the damsel in distress.

It's the visuals that give Batman its power. Gone are the gray and blue suits worn in the 1960's. Burton's Batman is in a suit of black, just like the entire movie. Gotham is a bleak city that's just black and blacker, with a tone that harkens back to thew days when Batman was just a brand new comic book on the news stands. You forget about biff and pow in the first five minutes. This is a new Batman. And an old one. Burton was obviously influenced by the work of Frank Miller's Batman in the comic genre in the film.

Where Superman started the entire superhero movie genre Batman injected it with a new life that has spawned into a huge enterprise that, ironically, has led to its peak in The Dark Knight. Tim Burton, like Richard Donner 10 years earlier, saw beyond the typical ideas in the public about superheroes. They are human beings. They are flawed and their worlds are flawed. It's this concept that has grown over the last thirty years. You can tell which movies get it and which movies don't. Superheroes are golden, but don't make them into gods.

A Shot In The Dark (1964)****

Shot in the Dark is the sequel to 1963's Pink Panther and in some ways is superior to that original film. Inspector Clouseau (Peter Sellers) is back, this time investigating a murder where the beautiful Maria (Elke Sommer) is the main suspect. As the film continues and the body count rises Clouseau's persistent claim that Maria is innocent drives his boss, Insp. Dreyfuss (Herbert Lom) insane.

The thing about Shot in the Dark is that Peter Sellers doesn't have to play second fiddle to David Niven. In the original Panther film Sellers was a bumbling idiot scapegoat, but in this film he's a bumbling idiot but he's funny. Sellers runs with the role and truly defines who Clouseau is. Peter Sellers turns a film that is typical '60's camp and gives us a brilliant performance that highlights the film under the direction of Blake Edwards.

Yes, the Pink Panther started it all, but Shot in the Dark is the film that cemented the persona of Inspector Clouseau.

United 93 (2006)*****

Every generation has a day that everyone remembers where they were when the event took place. For my grand parents it was Pearl harbor. For my parents it was the Kennedy assassination. For us it was 9/11. It's events like these that scar themselves into the psyche and you're able to remember the color of the carpet and the walls and which anchor broke the news that something had happened. You may not remember dinner last week but you remember that day like it just happened.

United 93 takes us back to that day, but it's a very tight view of the attacks. Of course you see the last few hours of the passengers of United flight 93 as they board, take off, and all hell breaks loose. The film also shows what was happening on the ground as planes began to change course and disappear right before their eyes. Yes, the film shows you the towers, but it's in the context that these people saw it- out of an observation tower our on a video feed. It's a tightly knit film that could have easily become a grandiose effort, ala Irvin Allen.

The cast of mostly unknowns and people who were actually in those positions on 9/11 leave you in the movie in a way that having a big name star would pull you right out. These are strangers. They're strangers to each other. The passengers aren't played as ultimate heroes, they're played as people in a panic that just feel that they have to do something. There's no heroic speech, just a discussion of what to do and how to do it.

It's not very common for a docudrama to take you back to the event it's depicting. Usually they fall flat on their face and end up filling in the gaps with mindless fluff that weakens the story. United 93 fills the gaps, but doesn't give you any fluff to chew on. It's fascinating to watch as the system fails and these passengers come to grips with what's unfolding around them. A great rendition of a tragic day.

Memento (2000) *****

I always enjoy something fresh. The problem with Hollywood in the last fifteen years is that everything is the same damn movie over and over again. What you get with Memento is a story that not only is interesting, but presented in a way that's fresh and inventive.

The story is basic. Leonard (Guy Pearce) is searching for his wife's killer and has tracked him to a small town, meeting a variety of individuals along the way. The twist is that Leonard has a condition that causes shot term memories to fade away after a few minutes. He's continually introducing himself and finds himself manipulated throughout the film.

The other twist is in the way that the film is presented. Christopher Nolan gives us the story from the end to the beginning in small pieces that represents a portion of Leonard's day before forgetting what has happened before. This leaves the viewer in the dark just as much as Leonard because we have no idea how he got in the situation he's currently in until the film kicks back again. With Nolan doing this you become more excited by seeing the beginning (at the end) than the ending (at the beginning). Nolan directs the film with great attention to detail and shows us how bleak Leonard's existence has become. The small cast also includes Joe Pantoliano and Carrie-Anne Moss who round out the core of the film as two beings that continual pull Leonard into their respective ways.

Memento is a great achievement for Christopher Nolan. It feels like a more approachable version of a David Lynch film and gives us a more enjoyable ride than the standard thriller. What really got me was the narration from Pearce makes me almost list this as film noir with the flawed hero clunking around looking for answers. You get the "condition" for two hours and makes the film even better.

The Review Site

As a way to post reviews in a more easily searchable format I'm also posting Flixter reviews on this blog. Enjoy.