Lima

A very rough film indeed, very close to Hopper's classic The Texas Chainsaw Massacre in its rawness and unrefined conception. Dynamic direction and a lethal pace, and for me personally one of the best horror films of this year. PS: And it stars Leoš Suchařípa!

For a person who is not interested in history and confuses Husák with Hitler, it is certainly a meritorious and interesting piece of work, but for someone with an interest in history, it is a modest account that does not bring any fundamental new information and not even the controversial view of one human being that is so much proclaimed in the press. In any case, the performances were excellent, including Bruno Ganz, whose role was tempting to overact, which fortunately did not happen. Overall, I would see it as a three and a half stars, rounded down this time due to the high expectations.

In terms of its formal execution (and the crazy script, too, Macourek must have been on mushrooms), it was a rather unique affair in the history of Czechoslovak cinema at the time. After all, in what other film of that era of politically minded cinema, when nudity was still relegated to the realm of very subtle shots and graphic violence was almost taboo, could you see a film with crowds of people walking around with undisguised nudity and with brutally severed heads in plates of soup. And all of this, please, was shown as part of the then Workers' Film Festival. Had this film been re-released years later (it has never been shown on TV) so today's audiences could become more familiar with it, it would be a minor cult classic today. The only minor problem for me is how to actually rate such an obscure affair with muddled direction in a meaningful way, which is why I choose a cautious two stars.

I like Verhoeven, but he couldn't have been serious about this pseudo-medieval piece of schlock. Or maybe it was a parody (especially from the second half onwards) and I didn't get it. Paul, you better stop writing scripts and stick to what you do best. And by the way, the brutality wasn't so hot either.

As always, the great Kevin Bacon gives such an impressive performance that his character of the paedophile Walter evoked not only rejection, but also a need to empathise with his feelings and, surprisingly, a certain participation in his uneasy integration into society. But I guess it only works like that in the movies. In real life, if I found myself face to face with a real paedophile, I would probably behave like most of the people who condemn Walter, sort of along the lines of a statement that wasn't in the movie, but was tangible: "O.K., kid, you're coming back from prison, you want to start a new life, but I don't trust you, and I don't want to trust you, and nothing is going to change that in the future." This, of course, taking into account the fact that paedophilia is a hard-to-treat deviation (practically incurable without medication or castration) and the recidivism rate, quite obvious in the film, is high. The intelligently written script and low-key cinematography allows the actors to shine, which I love, and once again I have to reiterate that Kevin Bacon was an acting titan here, at least for those 80 minutes.

Greengrass's account of the memorable Bloody Sunday of 30 January 1972 is remarkable not in the facts he presents to the viewer (after all, this painful blemish on British politics is widely known in Western Europe and many documentaries have been made about it), but in the form in which it is presented. Greengrass's evocative direction, backed by nervous, jittery camerawork, successfully gives the viewer the impression that they are not watching a film reconstruction, but a documentary recording of one of the participants in the demonstration. I would argue that the main idea of the film is the words of the organiser of the demonstration at a press conference on the same day that 27 people stained Irish soil with their blood: “I just want to say this to the British Government... You know what you've just done, don't you? You've destroyed the civil rights movement, and you've given the IRA the biggest victory it will ever have. All over this city tonight, young men... boys will be joining the IRA, and you will reap a whirlwind.” 4 1/2 *.

There are certainly a few scenes that get under your skin and make you shudder, but as a whole it’s too contrived, too "for effect" (in this respect I experienced the same feelings at the turning point in Haggis's other film Million Dollar Baby), too many coincidences that I found hard to accept, unbelievable behaviour of some of the characters. I didn’t buy it...

The professional experience of a cop and the talent of a filmmaker (bravo Marchale!) combine to create a compelling crime drama that reminded me in its mood of the old Delon movies and the crime films made in France in the 1970s. The film stands on an engaging plot, the excellent performances of two of the most prominent personalities of French cinema today (I like Auteuil more and more from film to film, and Depardieu is very believable as a villain) and a raw realistic atmosphere starting with solidly shot action scenes and ending with the production design. French cinema as I like it is still alive!! Fuck Besson’s disposable production prefabs :)

I swear on the holy relics of David Hasselhoff that if more work had been done on the script, i.e. if a lot of those promising scenes had been more wittily resolved, I would have thrown in the fourth star. It wasn't far from it, mainly thanks to a few biting glimpses of the cult of the body that rules the States, a couple of funny cameos (Lance Armstrong rulez!), and the quintessential douchebag Ben Stiller. I just don't understand what others find so interesting about Vince Vaughn's lackluster acting.

It's not satisfying as a classic crime drama, but it is as a psychological drama. The film flows at the slow pace of a lazy river, there are no camera exhibitions, Clint directs artfully, giving a lot of space to actors who can show a lot of their range, and that's how I like it. Tim Robbins in particular dominates the performances, and here the Oscar is in the right hands. On the other hand, I would question the second award-winning actor, because Sean Penn, in truth, overacts in places. The intelligently written story manages to draw you in and not let go, although there are a few distracting elements, namely, the wife's strange silent phone calls to Detective Devin (played convincingly by Kevin Bacon), which have no connection to the plot and take it nowhere, and the poor symbolism in Robbins' character's reasoning – I didn't get the "vampires" (= pedophiles?) thing. Nevertheless, great satisfaction, also thanks to the unconventionally closed story. They don’t make many films like this in Hollywood today.