The Crow

Cast: Brandon Lee, Rochelle Davis, Ernie Hudson


Synopsis: A hipster goth-like musician and his girlfriend are killed in a brutal needless murder but luckily for goths everywhere a magical crow decided that it would be cool to bring back the lanky hippy from the dead to seek revenge on his killers (apparently every other horrific murder in history doesn't matter to the magical crow and only people who look cool in white make up and a trench coat can be brought back from the dead.). Madness ensues.


Review: For years random people have been astounded when I tell them I haven't ever seen The Crow. Their heads fall back on themselves, their eyes bug out and some have even melted into a pool of their own self-loathing right in front of me. The reason, I always assumed, is because I used to have long vaguely curly hair, wear a big ol' leather trench coat and could be found occasionally wearing dark make up and leaping from building to building seeking my revenge on criminal underworlds so it seemed like a surprise when I hadn't seen the movie on which it might have seemed I based my entire existence... or so I thought! Until at work, where I wear a uniform and am not allowed to wear make up or kill people, a co-worker who hasn't seen me out of work expressed the exact same exasperation that I "of all people" had not seen The Crow. Thinking there must be something to this I decided (Was given a copy of The Crow by said co-worker and told if I didn't watch it he'd hunt me down and kill me) to finally get around to watching The Crow.

Having now seen it I realize now that when people said that I "had to see The Crow" what they actually meant was "You look like an obnoxious prick who likes shitty vaguely dark over-hyped movies that are only popular because someone died during filming".

Bummer.


In Short: Between this and Reservoir Dogs I realize that when everybody in the world says you need to see a movie it actually means "This movie sucks but everyone likes it because it's edgy without being close enough to the edge to be interesting!"


Biggest Positive: Heath Ledger clearly took some notes from this film, threw out all the shit and amplified the few decent parts a billion times to play the Joker. Then he died too, so it goes to show you should never ever do anything to associate yourself with this film, ever.


Biggest Negative: The hype behind this film is it's hugest flaw. I hope my review paints a picture of a truly awful film so that if you haven't seen the film and you finally do you'll maybe finish saying "Well, it wasn't that bad..."


Trivia: In an inronic twist of fate, exactly one year after his death Brandon Lee was still dead.

The Crow's Loft - fan page

No Country For Old Men

Cast: Tommy Lee Jones, Josh Brolin, Javier Berdem


Synopsis: Josh Brolin find a stash of money amongst a bunch of dead Mexican drug lords, meanwhile Javier Bardem is killing people with an air powered cattle-killy thing, meanwhile Tommy Lee Jones is mumbling incoherently about nothing in particular, meanwhile Kelly MacDonald is talking about something I can't quite listen to because I'm too busy thinking "You're Scottish. Where has your accent been in the last 2 films I've seen you in?", meanwhile I just discovered that the guy that played the Deputy Sherrif (Garret Dillahunt) was Krug in "The Last House On The Left" who incidentally, in that film not this one, looked a bit like Josh Brolin, who in the meantime is sort of meandering about his business trying to hide with the money while meanwhile, Javier Bardem kills more people. Somehow all these people's plots are all about the same thing in the same movie...


Review: Why is it that every Coen brothers film I've seen has a plot that if you were to tell it to someone (e.g. "There's Mexican drug lords and Josh Brolin steals their money after they all die in a mass shoot-out but Javier Bardem plays this guy who needs that money and will stop at nothing to kill everyone in his path to get to it! Then a hired assassin shows up to kill either Josh, Javier or both! And the cops are hot on Javier's trail the whole way but can't quite get him as he gets closer and closer to catching Josh Brolin!") they'd think the film would be full of car chases, epic gun battles and multiple budget-busting explosions (There is one in this film but it's hardly Bay-esque!) but in reality the Coen brothers tend to make the film just about a bunch of slightly eccentric ugly people saying weird shit?


In Short: Too much romance, not enough human killing


Biggest Positive: "Would you hold still, please, sir..."


Biggest Negative: Not enough on screen violence. Is that wrong?


No Country For Old Men website


Trivia: 50 people died of boredom in early screenings of this film so the Coen brothers has to trim a half-hour long sequence of Josh Brolin watching an entire episode of Jeoporday in real-time and complete silence.

Summer Of Sam

Cast: John Leguizamo, Adrien Brody, Mira Sorvino, Michael Badalucco and a hundred other people. 

  Synopsis: In the summer of '77 New York City was plagued by the notorious killer known as "The Son Of Sam" who targetted young girls and couples in their cars with a .44 caliber pistol. Meanwhile, a bunch of things happened in the city which had no relevance whatsoever to the killings. 

  Review: This was an excellent look at the lives of a group of Italian-Americans living in New York City during the summer of 1977, the same summer in which David Berkowitz (The Son Of Sam) shot and killed at least 6 people. The film seems to try to get an everyday view on how the killings affected the regular people of New York City as Leguizamo's character goes from almost falling victim to the killer, to not giving a shit about the killer, to throwing a temper tantrum out a window at the killer (Who isn't outside the window at the time, or ever), to not giving a shit about the killer again, to forgetting that the film is supposedly about a killer for a good portion of the film, to becoming convinced by his wannabe Mafia type buddies that they know the killer and going on a viginlante hunting mission, to finally not giving a shit about the killer again. A visually impressive film, no doubt and the story of Vinny and his buddies as they come to terms with Adrian Brody's ridiculous British accent is indeed a compelling and intriguing tale however aside from the occasional mention or fleeting conversation it bares no relevance to the killer who, it would have been implied by the title of the movie, the film is seemingly about. Yes, there are glimpses into the killer's life but at no point do they cross paths with Leguizamo. 

  In Short: If all the moments in this film that bared no relevance to the Son Of Sam were removed it probably would have been a reasonable 90 minutes long but Spike Lee being Spike Lee it was instead a sixteen hour epic. 

Biggest Positive: After watching this you can make any regular household activity, like watering the lawn, seem amazing by pretending an epic Who song is playing in the background and Spike Lee is directing it by doing things like giving off-center closeups of the water spraying and bouncing in slow motion off the plants and making nauseating camera motion shots of the background slipping away and spinning while you stand stationary. 

  Biggest Negative: Jon Lovitz should have played the Son Of Sam, and done him in a comical slap-stick style. IMDb page 

  Trivia: Leguizama only agreed to do this film on the condition that Spike Lee release his wife and kids unharmed.