DaViD´82

A disjointed collection of tele-variety singing and dancing numbers that don't quite fit together, though most of them are themselves excellent examples of Gene Kelly and Donald O'Connor skills. But don’t expect any connection or relevance to the plot is in those numbers (led by "Broadway Ballet," a segment from both a completely different film and era); Kelly simply had an idea for another lavish number, so he forcefully incorporated it in this film. There are exactly two numbers in the entire film that develop the characters or advance the plot, the rest is pure "listen and see what I can do and how I can do it, and then we'll get back to the film" – and both Gene and Donald damn sure can. And so much so that poor Debbie Reynolds is outnumbered (except for "Good Morning"). The storyline outside of "stop the movie, now let's dance for a while" is a classically constructed screwball comedy. Unfortunately, it's woefully devoid of chemistry between Kelly and Reynolds (except for the opening scenes, where they sparkle appropriately). Jean Hagen serves purely as a caricature of a joke that stops being funny already the first time, and the viewer is treated to something like 1623 more of them. As dynamic, playful and imaginative as some of the numbers are (led by the grotesquely surrendering "Make 'Em Laugh"), there's also the tedious sonata "You Were Meant for Me", which feels like six hours long, though it lasts perhaps not even five minutes. The opening is long, with two short songs, incorporated into the plot like a theatrical or party performance, or pretending to be a musical that won't violate "reality", only to be followed by a segment where one number succeeds another, distorting "reality" as if it's not supposed to. Basically, every ten minutes it's a different stylization and a different stand-alone segment. Rightly timeless in its individual parts (is hard to find a better as a showcase of Gene Kelly as a dancer, singer, choreographer, stuntman, visionary), but as a whole a dysfunctional romance/musical/holdover to the early days of sound film... Well, just like a movie.

"Thick with irony." Peak Sorkin, with backstage politics, workplace relationships, snappy dialogue, constantly in motion. It stands and falls on the dialogue and characters, and fortunately, both meet the strictest standards without any reservations, and always do so in contrast (the political baring of souls during the nightly fridge raiding, etc.). The only issue is the central storyline, which is straight from the pen of a routine conspiracy thriller, and some (read all but the leading duo and their "marriage of convenience") superfluous relationship peripeties. It doesn't fit with the otherwise very well known diplomatic principle of we're talking about something, but what's important is what's left unsaid between the lines and real politics doesn't do itself without some of the cronyism and shady compromises behind the scenes. | S1: 4/5

It's as if the script for a Guy Ritchie film had been filmed by Hirokazu Kore-eda in his "human-assertive" style. The result is a sort of crime drama about members of the criminal underworld languishing on the lower rungs of the ladder. What hurts it the most is the ending, when after all the complicated entanglement, everything unravels all too easily, if not inadequately cheaply, considering the events that precede it.

The direction and the acting brilliantly build-up a mesmerizing sociopathic decadence towards... Well, that's really the only problem with the film. Towards what?

The rumours of the worst story in the series are not to be believed. It's the height of sophistication; time travel (without any rules or logic, just as it needs to be), dinosaurs being rescued, monsters mutating, fighting in the Pacific, a cringeworthy aliens, a "T-1000 would be a ragdoll against it" android, a cyborg three-headed golden dragon, and a Godslayer on a warpath. Okay, it's somewhat bloated, but it's not unintentionally ridiculous. It's charmingly stupid in all its guilelessness. The kaiju action is very good though, it's nicely swashbuckling and there is not shortage of destruction. A B-movie with one goal: to entertain. And it succeeds brilliantly.

The Polish Norsemen meet What We Do in the Shadows, or a proud, and above all accomplished addition to the mockumentary genre. | S1: 4/5 |

A little girl from a village where beauty is a curse that reveals the true nature of individuals and society. A film that goes to the very core of the characters, traditions, times, and the village. The visuals are breathtaking, and for the entire running time they (surprisingly to me) don't overindulge. Especially when paired with Rostkowski's mesmerizing "folk-horror" underscore. Add to that the riveting performances and the flow of traditional drama. This is how to adapt an over hundred-year-old literary classic for a contemporary audience. The goal is not to be a literal transcription, but to capture the spirit and message in cinematic language. Few in recent years have managed to do this in such a compelling and engaging way.

A classic “previously in…” from the 1990s. Only it's not a minute or two, but endless dozens of minutes, because there's an attempt to fit eleven hours of footage into a feature-length form. It just doesn't have a coherent form. And so there's some recapitulation of characters, some battles, some main themes, jumping from episode to episode, from theme to theme, text interludes... No sense, no concept.

"Man isn´t a god, after all." A timeless classic and one of the flagships of anime even in/for the West. As much as it may seem at first glance to be a Japanese kaiju variation on the book “Ender's Game”, only about kids piloting giant bio-robots bouncing malevolent crap out of space, it's not. Oedipus complex, moral grey areas, coming of age, biblical themes, individual/human roles/responsibilities, playing God, metaphysics, depression studies... And many other big themes, but handled through symbolism, sophisticatedly and, like many other aspects, timelessly and loosely enough to be interpreted that even more than a quarter century after its release, the conclusion still evokes emotion and "what, how, who, why" conjecture. Moreover, it's a series that gets better and more fateful the closer it gets to the finish line. And the beginning is not bad; quite the opposite. It's not a repetitive shonen where the protagonists' and antagonists' abilities grow exponentially and the finale is in sight after hundreds of episodes. Here, the end is inevitable and the series evolves; it doesn't feature one monster in every episode. This results in the fact that not all episodes will suit everyone equally. I'm no exception to this; specially around the middle I have a few unpopular episodes. However, these are not filler episodes, beating up empty straws or bloating the running time. It's purely a clash of the approach taken and my taste. After all, genre-wise it's unanchored; from teen comedy to post-apocalyptic sci-fi to existential horror. That's why I rate the series (or actually the series and the final feature-length special, as they are inseparable) as a whole. There are still a few issues, for example, the typically 90's Japanese over-sexualization of 14 year old girls is downright cringe and definitely not timeless. It was already cringeworthy at the time of its release, much less today. And the penguin, who was probably supposed to be a cute mascot for the show, but is completely out of number and out of power. On the other hand, the (semi-)angelic EVA colossi have become the symbol of the series and of an entire era. After all, it is the representation of (not only their) scale that the series has not the slightest problem with. More than one scene is worthy of framing.

For the vast majority of the film's running time I was excitedly thinking that I must be dreaming, it can't be that good. And "I can't believe it" was also what I said during the epilogue, but in a completely different sense. After all, it's not possible that one and the same person is able to write a concept like Kaufman, direct it like Gondry, and then send the whole thing down the drain because he figured he'd get away with it (when he didn't need to) with a final 15-minute epilogue from a different cupboard, one with unused ideas from a dozen Black Mirror episodes, and he just pulled out the worst possible option on a whim. That the same creator thought “yeah, this is a good ending” still boggles my mind. A satirical mirror-setting, a family drama about the breakup of a family, a more-than-successful Freddy origin story, a pint-sized comedy working brilliantly with the awkwardness of the moment, the Jung in us and you. It works on all levels. The plot, however fanciful, unfolds on a believable ground level of "yeah, this is how it could be if it were happening". One of the films of the year diluted (read shattered) by an eye-rolling conclusion.