lamps

Mickey Rourke is OK and easily carries the entire film on his shoulders, while the investigation is quite interesting with an atmosphere matching the best crime thrillers. And yet, I can’t rate it higher than what you see. The script, as it has been mentioned here several times, failed to reach me, to draw me into the plot or to shock me in any significant way. And the ending, full of supernatural and mysticism, was okay from the director's point of view and, like a few other scenes from this film, uncompromisingly and thrillingly delivered, but it rather spoiled the whole view of the film for me. That said, a very decent thriller and a must for the fans of the genre.

Quite a good horror film with a gripping and scary atmosphere, but with a very mediocre and unsurprising script.

I was really looking forward to another great animated movie, but what I got was a huge and ambitious disappointment. The story overall is interesting and original, but the director didn't quite pull it off in my opinion. It doesn’t have enough pace, the oddly conceived animation didn't appeal to me at all, and I found the drawn-out dialogue desperately angsty and unfunny, with the main characters sometimes solving problems trying to be as close to humans as possible. I really hate to slag films like this, but in this case, unfortunately, after the first viewing, I have no other choice.

This is a spectacle that will surely delight all younger audiences with its beautiful effects, impressive production design and of course a lot of cute talking animals, but their dads and moms will probably have their eyelids droop a bit while watching it.

This pleasant rom-com is clearly dominated by Adam Sandler's boorish style of comedy, which makes me happy to turn a blind eye to the classic ending full of clichés; and for the heap of effective humour, the more than likeable Winona Ryder and that pleasant hour and a half I give it a full rating... With hindsight I'm taking away a star, five-star films look different after all.

If the first part was aimed exclusively at book lovers and Harry's most die-hard "followers", the final part was made for the masses. Nothing that takes place in it is wrong in the context of the literary legend and the atmosphere set by its predecessors, and the Battle of Hogwarts looks simply amazing – is exactly how I imagined on my repeated readings of the book. But the film lacks any added value, any deeper depiction of fate or the distribution of motives among the many characters, which would add even more emotion to the action. The last episode has the shortest runtime of all, which is a testament to popcorn fans and relentless action build-up, but is somewhat lacking in the tried and tested Potter essences, the interactions between the heroes and the mental anguish of young people in the face of pure evil (like the third LOTR). On the other hand, the direction is great, there are some enjoyable and non-distracting jokes, a brilliant Pensieve sequence, an over-the-top Alan Rickman, stunning effects, and of course Hogwarts, the most magical place in book and film history, where I partly grew up and thoroughly enjoy every shot of it. It’s a pity that this time it was only 120 minutes :))

A narratively and emotionally artistic spectacle that cleverly adapts the classic needs of historical cinema to the insatiable Hollywood mainstream, whose greatest asset, the overblown and expensive audiovisuals, is so phenomenal that it almost overshadows its great weakness, namely the script. I don’t give a shit about historical accuracy, but with more viewings I'm mostly annoyed by the superficial, half-baked message, served on a disproportionately stretched plot. I love this film, and the coliseum scenes are iconic, but Scott was more of a craftsman over the details than a builder of riveting heroic destinies, which was sorely needed.

A crazy comedy with an original and excellently crafted premise. The central duo Clavier-Reno, who were given the most turbulent look by the make-up artists, deliver unforgettable acting creations throughout and the story as a whole is conducted at an incredible pace. I didn't have nearly as much fun as I did with, for example, Shut Up!, and there are a few weak scenes, but just for the idea, the great actors and the completely different view of the contemporary world that this film offers, 4* is a must.

Everything bad is good for something. Joel Schumacher knew this well when, after the colossal failure of his big-budget Batman films, he turned his attention to more modest, psychologically solid projects in the late 90s, crowned by this famous depressing thriller. The plot, however simple, powerfully draws the viewer into the sordid world of perverted pornography, underpinned primarily by the perspective of the shocked main character, portrayed more than convincingly by Nicolas Cage still in his golden era. The pacing is perhaps a little too brisk given the seriousness of the premise and the psychological ambitions, the production design could occasionally push the envelope in terms of darkness and violence, and there are a few cheesy motifs (Cage finds immediately a diary that the police have been searching for in vain for God knows how long), but the atmosphere is nonetheless suffocating from the opening moments to the last shot, and the terrific actors (especially Phoenix and Stormare) raise the authenticity and sense of revulsion to highly satisfying heights. The ending admittedly dissolves that authenticity in favour of action satisfaction (this is the most significant difference from Se7en, also by Andrew Kevin Walker), but fortunately it doesn’t feel overstuffed and the filmmakers surprise with ideas that you simply won't see anywhere else (Cage's phone call and request for permission)... Definitely one of the most interesting and ultimately best thrillers of the nineties; where are those golden times…

I can unashamedly call The Mummy one of the seminal films of my childhood, and I'll try to capture its magic as simply as possible: a fearless and likeable hero in Brendan Fraser, a really cool and scary bad guy played by Arnold Vosloo, plus a lot of great one-liners and tons of catchy and dynamic action – or how little it takes to make kids happy.