A Chinese action comedy directed by Sammo Hung, starring Sammo Hung, Jackie Chan and Yuen Biao.
5 men go to Japan to free their friend from mobsters.
Stupid, pointless and incoherent. I watched about an hour of the 1.5 hour duration and was still lost. I have a feeling that most of the humor that may have been there was lost in translation. I didn't see much action either. In accordance with my turn off policy, I rate this shit. Do not watch!
A British American mystery comedy directed by Blake Edwards and Bud Yorkin, starring Peter Sellers, Herbert Lom and Burt Kwouk.
A bumbling and clumsy detective solves robbery and murder cases.
The title in order are: The Pink Panther (1963), A Shot in the Dark (1964), Inspector Clouseau (1968) see notes, The Return of the Pink Panther (1975), The Pink Panther Strikes Again (1976), Revenge of the Pink Panther (1978) and Trail of the Pink Panther (1982). I tried to keep this to a coherent set of Blake Edwards and Peter Sellers films, but Inspector Clouseau accidentally got in there. It was directed by Bud Yorkin and starred Alan Arkin. More on this later.
The series as a whole was mediocre at best. I had tried to start watching them before, but the first film made no sense to me. It wasn't until film 2 that things fell into place and I comprehended what was going on. What was going on was a threadbare plot punctuated with visual gags. Clouseau falls down and breaks things for most of the duration. His next favorite thing to do is to mispronounce words and be misunderstood because of it. The cinematography was alright through the series and the audio was a little low, but not overly dynamic. I liked the accidental inclusion of Inspector Clouseau (1968) the most. Having a different director and star seemed to make it more coherent to me. Maybe I was just getting used to the pattern at that point. I also found it funnier than the others. I rate the whole set o.k. and don't really know who I would recommend it to. I do know that I would rather watch the cartoon.
An American Disney animated adventure musical directed by Wolfgang Reitherman, starring George Sanders, Sterling Holloway and J. Pat O'Malley.
A human child is found in the jungles of India, raised by wolves and becomes friends with a panther and a bear. His survival is threatened by a tiger.
Inaccurate. I read the book a while ago and the only things that Disney got right were the basic premise and main characters. Everything else in the plot was fabricated and sugar-coated. Derisive comments complete, I actually like this. It was made way back when Disney made movies worth watching. The very traditional animation style was similar to their other works from this time period, but that is good. There was comedy added that was not in the book and (although inaccurate) I liked that. It doesn't hurt review points that I watched this when I was very young on VHS. Mowgli's voice sounded very much like Arthur from The Sword in the Stone (1963), but Arthur was Rickie Sorensen, Richard Reitherman and Robert Reitherman and Mowgli was Bruce Reitherman. When He fell from the branch at the end, I was expecting "woah what woah", young Arthur's oft-repeated line. I rate this awesome for sentimental value and irreplacability.
A Canadian American drama directed by Steven Spielberg, starring Ciaran Hinds, Matthieu Kassovitz, Hanns Zischler and Geoffrey Rush.
A team of assassins try to kill a list of men for political reasons.
Political intrigue is less interesting to me than watching paint dry. I didn't care about the characters or the plot. Neither was able to hold my interest at all. I only made it to an hour and 46 minutes of the 2 hour 43 minute duration because I let it play while I was writing music theory notes. The only thing that I found remotely interesting were the contraptions made by one of the team members. One of them was a pressure sensor to go in a man's bed and activate a bomb when he was laying on it. In accordance with my turn off policy, I rate this shit. Do not watch!
A Chinese adventure directed by Wuershan, starring Shu Qi.
A trio of retired treasure hunters are living in New York City. 20 years ago, the 2 men narrowly escaped from a tomb, but lost the woman they both desired. Now one of them has returned to the area to search for the Equinox Flower. The other man follows and is accompanied by their female co-worker. The first man who returned is employed by a gang of some type and all of them enter a tomb which is rife with traps.
If you can read subtitles fast enough, this is really cool. It looked like a modern wuxia film, but there was no flying or swordplay. The sets and special effects are the main attraction here. The tomb has bridges that burn with green fire, zombies, collapsing floors and mummies which turn into poisonous dust. It doesn't matter that I could tell when the characters were in front of a green screen. The main characters were moderately developed and their back-story was revealed as the plot progressed. Somehow I was reminded of the Pirates of the Caribbean series. I rate this good and would recommend it for those who like big movies with good special effects.
An American drama directed by Bruce Beresford, starring Eddie Murphy.
A cook goes to help a woman who is dying of cancer and her daughter. The daughter becomes friends with the cook and after her mother dies, she goes to college, gets pregnant and seeks refuge at the cook's house.
So sappy and repetitive. I get the sappy part and I understand the decision of having monologue lines from the beginning come back at the end. What I dion't get is the main characters being so static. It seemed to me that the main character (Charlie Brooks) was still 10 years old at the end and exactly the same as she started. Mr. Church didn't change either. Oddly enough, I had a friend named Charlie Brooks and I couldn't stop myself from thinking of him being in the lead role of this film. Also oddly enough, he was a static character. The cinematography, camerawork and editing were all great, but a lot of good it did with writing like this. I rate this bad. I would recommend it to those who disagree with all of my other reviews.
An American adventure directed by Bob Rafelson, starring Iain Glen.
Two men go to Africa in search of the source of the Nile. One of them thinks that he found it, but has no proof. Upon returning to England, they have a misunderstanding and disagreement.
What a long pile of bullshit. 2 hours and 10 minutes is too long for an inconclusive story. The adventures of the team in Africa when they meet various tribes and villages were alright. There were fights, lack of supplies, sickness and various other perils to brave. If that had been all it was, it would have been really cool. About an hour was African adventures, but then there was all of this drama crap in England at the beginning and end. I understand the need for exposition and conclusion, but those should have been shorter. If a movie is this long, it should be better than this and more worth the time. I rate this tolerable. If you have nothing else to do or watch and want to waste 2 hours, this would be for that situation.
