J*A*S*M

Honestly, one of the best comic-book adaptations I’ve ever seen (together with The Dark Night and Watchmen). Unlike the first part, X2 goes further in almost everything, has a better story and some brilliant and unforgettable scenes (Magneto’s escape from prison), and it’s excellent overall. 9/10

One of those films that I really loved in the cinema back in the day and, even though I’m basically twice as old now, nothing has changed with the years. X-Men is an entertaining comic-book film that clearly doesn’t feel very comfortable in its own clothes (it’s somewhat cautious and insecure), which affects the impression a little, but doesn’t matter because the sequel already reaches the highest rating :-) The X-Men are still a favourite: Wolverine, Cyclops… shit, I forgot about Magneto. So, Magneto, Wolverine, Cyclops, Storm… shit, I forgot about Rogue... Magneto, Wolverine, Cyclops, Rogue, Storm, ... bugger, Professor X :-D

An unusual film about usual stuff, but I can’t say I’m very thrilled about it. Even ignoring my slight personal antipathy towards Allen, I feel that this film wants to appear very original and smart, but it’s just ordinary and unsilly. Sure, writing and directing a film about traditional and unoriginal stuff in a way that a lot of people will see as a treat for the intellectual elite must be quite hard work, but Annie Hall is only pretending. It’s artificially interesting and, for me, unpleasant.

I looked forward to it and I’m not disappointed, so thumbs up, even though I felt that I’d already seen everything somewhere else, but I don’t mind. Rather than The Thing, as I originally expected, it reminded me of the X-Files episode Ice, or a serious take on Cabin Fever. The atmosphere grinds a little at the beginning, but it improves significantly after some time and, from a certain point forward, it contributes to a very pleasantly unpleasant experience. The Thaw is nice sci-fi horror that I can recommend.

Gattaca takes place in a pretty interesting setting, but its story, though original, didn’t captivate me that much. A week after watching it, the only thing I remember is that I wanted to know more about its world and that I didn’t find the hero very likeable. Otherwise, decent.

A gem that demands quite a lot from the viewer. Stalker basically transcends the boundaries of the medium, rather than a film, it’s a philosophical composition that you can grasp in any way, and no one can say their interpretation is the right one – or the wrong one, depending on how you look at it.

Well, after reading all the enthusiastic reviews on IMDB, and after the excellent scene before the opening credits, I was truly convinced that the American indie scene would deliver a great horror surprise after a long time. Unfortunately, that feeling fades quickly, yet right when I was ready to trash it, Dismal pulls itself together and becomes a solid (though in no way remarkable) movie experience. By the end, however, it stumbles again and falls flat on its face. Why, for example, do they have to use an explosion when they clearly don’t have the resources to make it look realistic? Really, that ending felt very shoddy in all respects. The script, on the other hand, is shoddy throughout. It has only one twist and they repeat it twice, and it couldn’t be more predictable, though in hixploitation that’s not something that would make me want to slash my veins. I have it exactly between two and tree stars, I still need to ponder over the final verdict.

Rating the pilot episode. A really decent start that made me very interested in the following episodes. I just hope that they won’t focus too much on the family crisis they outlined (and on relationships in general) and that they will follow on that final scene that links to a (possibly) very interesting mythology… Either way, I’m satisfied so far. Second episode: a better experience than before. The story is well balanced and in those 45 minutes it surprised me several times with an unexpected twist, and they also manage to achieve the most important thing for a mystery series: I am very interested in the answers to those mysteries. A full rating is only a question of the quality holding throughout the season. The third and fourth episodes have a significantly slower pace, and though it’s still not clear now which things will be important later, I felt they were mostly filler, rather weird for the beginning of a series. The next two episodes move between the meanings of “annoying” and “decent”, but the last episode before the winter break is finally back to great. After half the first season, it holds at four stars. The double episode 11-12 is very good. There’s less relationship ballast and they’re starting to reveal the underlying conspiracy with one twist after another… if the showrunners don’t overdo it (there are already so many characters and motifs that it’s not that easy to follow them), I will be satisfied. Episode 13 is filler, the Somalian E14 is good with an interesting cliffhanger, likewise E15. Episode 16 is alright and 17 is brilliant. The low viewership is a pity and I wouldn’t be surprised if it leads to the series ending after the first season, which would be a great shame, the events of the 17th episode leave room for a couple more seasons… The series ended pretty well and I would surely like to keep on watching, but unfortunately, my fears were confirmed and it wasn’t renewed for another season. 80 %

I resisted the seductive call of the DVDrip so I could watch this film for the first time in the cinema, and now I can say that I would have been furious with myself if I had missed it. Neil Blomkamp delivers a great science fiction film, the best in recent years (and what’s nice is that this isn’t the first time this year that I say this, and maybe not even the last, re: Moon and Avatar). I respect the radical style change between the first and second halves, but I loved the first half better because it’s something incredible and never seen before in the genre and in this form. Rather than to Cloverfield, District 9 is more similar to the unknown Japanese horror film Noroi the Curse, which keeps the documentary format uninterrupted for its entire runtime. The events of the second half could not be captured as a “documentary”, that was very clear to me. Even though it reaches its “WOW” peak somewhere at the beginning, the rest of film is so striking and breathtaking that it was a joy to watch. The occasional lapses in the script are easy to ignore – they aren’t as big as I’ve read in some reviews. I recommend it. Edit: The second viewing brings the rating down to four.

Maybe the writers of Pig Hunt were afraid that if the story was only about a murderous wild boar, people wouldn’t be interested or scared, and that’s why they wrote something that is about a pig, but only as a last minute plan. Ten minutes before the end I had almost given up hopes of seeing any hog, but it did show up (and looked great!) and suddenly became the most likeable “character”. Up until that ending, I was very bored.