Jordan Hoffman Dot Com

I didn’t like it as much as I did the first time.

“Did you do any fornicating?” Oh, that wacky Nixon!

Any movie with Colm Meany as a bad guy already has a strike against it.

This movie is very well shot and well acted, but the minute it is over you think – my God, this is about intra-British soccer. . . from 30 years ago! Who cares?

It wants to be Amadeus, but the gravity just isn’t there. And it may be the least colorful film about working class Brits I’ve ever seen.

Still, Michael Sheen is (as always) fantastic. Worth seeing for him alone.

I wanted to like this. And I kinda did. But, also, in a more truthful way, I did not. It’s no Limits of Control.

Read my full review at UGO for further insight.

They’ll never, ever make a movie version of Gravity’s Rainbow, and that’s just fine, but there are moments in Youth Without Youth that definitely reminded me of vague memories I have of that book I read but didn’t understand.

…..And there were stretches where I didn’t understand Youth Without Youth, if not on a plot level than on a “what can this mean, man?” level.

Youth Without Youth, a history-skipping, genre-bouncing trip through Central Europe (and a little bit of the Dawn of Time) is nothing if not heavy, and certainly is beautiful. The cinematography, camera moves, set design and music will leave you thunderstruck right there on your couch – all the more easy for the unconventional and unpredictable screenplay to try and knock you out with its many head-fakes.

More than once I said, “wait, what? Really? That’s awesome!” I didn’t expect shots of Tim Roth center frame speaking into a microphone babbling in an invented language. Wait, what?

For some strange reason my parents took me to see this when I was ten years old. I can’t say I understood it all but it left an indelible mark on me.

Looking at it now (and I’ve seen it many times since) I can’t ignore there are some moments of overacting and trite dialogue – and maybe the Law & Order section at the end drags a bit – but if this isn’t exhibit A on how cinema can be magic, well, I just don’t know what is.

It’s a big movie, but a very intimate one as well. And sad. Emotionally, this is closer to Lean’s Brief Encounter than, say, Lawrence of Arabia.

Any time I’ve been in a foreign country and I’ve seen indigenous people working for Whitey I’ve thought of this film.

Mrs. Moore!!!

I used to think the most absurdly drawn-out fight scene was in They Live. I was wrong.

This movie is ten times more idiotic than Every Which Way But Loose, a film that, I truly feel, has cultural significance. This is just junk. But, at times, fun. Like when Ruth Gordon’s head appears on Bo Derek’s body. What’s not to like about that?

Before anything: I know this movie is awful. I mean, it’s just stupid. It’s stupid. But, as a cultural artifact, it is altogether fascinating and, I think, important, in that it is a time capsule not only of blue collar living in in forgotten crannies of urban 1978, but it represents a now extinguished brand of product that really doesn’t exist for this particular demographic.

This is a movie for a blue collar audience that revels in its blue collar universe. It does not aspire, in any way, to a white collar existence. (What’s targeted at trailer parks today? Keeping Up With The Kardashians?)

EWWBL presents a world completely isolated from a white collar/blue state way of life. Biker gangs, beer-in-cans, underground bare-knuckle fighting circuits, lawns with car parts, country music – and everyone is in on it and that’s all it is. It’s practically sci-fi, or, at least, some sort of opposite to Sweet Sweetback’s Badasssss Song.

EWWBL takes advantage of this world of fantasy to support its paper-thin, almost stream-of-consciousness script. What is the relationship between Philo, Orville and Ma? Does Clyde actually understand Philo, like Chewie and Han? What exactly do all these people do for a living? How do they always go to the bar, but not pay for anything? How does the quasi-Nazi biker gang just “find them” when they are in Santa Fe and Denver? Same with the bumbling cops. Same with Philo and Sondra Locke – who looks a little bit like a strung-out Penthouse Pet and a little bit like Mom’s Apple Pie. Apparently, the state of Colorado has only one street, and everyone will eventually see one another on it.

Or maybe it does, and I just don’t know about it, because this isn’t my world?

By they way – the Orangutan is a frickin’ scream.

I’m still not ready to review Enter the Void, which, when it is all said and done, might be the only reasonable response when asked, “what’s the best movie of 2010?”

Then again, it is manipulative, pretentious nonsense.

Okay, this isn’t a review. It is just a warm-up. Fittingly, then, here are the opening credits.

I’m really not fond of this model of releasing films on VOD then in theaters a month later.

I’m not averse to same-day releases, but this VOD-first thing just feels like cinematic premature ejaculation.

With that – I saw Centurion what feels like a lifetime ago. It came out in theaters this past friday. Here is my review on UGO.

In an effort to get more Marvel into my diet, I watched the Blu-ray of Planet Hulk.

Sometimes, when my wife sees me watching something like this I’ll say, “Oh, I’m watching an animated film.” This time, I couldn’t fool her or myself. “I’m watching cartoons,” I said.

This wasn’t terrible, but it doesn’t aspire to much other than Hulk bashing people around a stadium. There’s an attempt at some sci-fi outer space mythos but it is just muddled in brawn. Maybe the books are better.

Oy vey iz mir.

What’s worse, making a bad movie or making a bad movie and trying to graft it onto a successful franchise?

The moments of “fan service” are repugnant (and numerous) and yet there are whole other elements of the mythos that are just ignored.

Then there’s the fact that this movie is horribly paced, boring, meandering, pointless and features a dreadful lead performance.

The costumes look great, though.

The series goes out with a long. . .slow. . . .bang.

Are there wild inconsistencies in canonical logic, or can time alter and morph, such that a mere grandfather paradox is hardly worth a discussion? I dunno . . .all I know is that Paul Williams and John Huston wear Orangutan makeup.

This is, perhaps, the most important of the five APES films – the one you can write the most essays about – but it isn’t that great of a movie. It has some major dry patches, and some really dark moments as well.

It may be sacrilege to say this, but the end battle goes on for far too long.

The most ridiculous of all the Apes movie – and in some ways the most fun.

Cornelius and Zira come to the 1970s, become celebrities – then eventually get machine gunned down on a boat.

I respect the complete nuttiness of this movie but, man, it is a bit of a mess.

Still, Heston does blow up the Earth at the end. That’s fun.

One of the few science fiction film my mother will give the time of day, POTA is generally accepted as an important benchmark of 60s unrest and the discussion of civil rights. And that’s all great, but it is also a good movie.

Perhaps most interesting is just how much of a dick Charlton Heston is. We identify with him because we’re human – but he’s definitely not the good guy here.

Goro? More like BORE-o!

Read my full review of this cure for insomnia at UGO.

Ha! I just realized that I never blogged about The Expendables, which I saw months ago.

Shows you how much it stayed with me, huh?

You can read my full disappointed review at UGO.