Welcome to GI's film reviews page. GI has written 1558 reviews and rated 2156 films.
Despite it being a huge box office flop Road House has over the years harnessed a big following and many cite is as one of their favourite films and somewhat surprisingly it's very popular with women viewers considering the women characters are for the most part just big boobed bimbos there for men to gaze at. But its the appeal of Patrick Swayze that is a main ingredient in making this so entertaining. The film is basically a western reset into the contemporary world of American clubs and the bouncers representing town taming gunfighters. Even most of the characters have names you'll find in western mythology and history - Dalton, Garrett, Doc, Wesley etc. Swayze is the aforementioned Dalton, a much sought after club bouncer who is known for his honesty and ability to clean up Clubs that are plagued by troublemakers. He's hired by Tilghman (another western name) played by Kevin Tighe, a club owner, to help him turn his dive of a place into a money making venue. Dalton trains the bouncer team but makes enemies along the way including the corrupt town bigwig Wesley (Ben Gazzara) but finds solace in the arms of Elizabeth (Kelly Lynch) and gets the help of bouncing legend Wade Garrett (Sam Elliott). The fight scenes are great fun, the music soundtrack is fantastic mostly from Jeff Healey and his band who have small roles in the film. Admittedly it's all daft and the last twenty minutes or so goes way over the top but it's still great fun. The rumour is the film was heavily cut and we lost Wade's back story, at least one big fight and various other scenes so it would be nice considering the film's current popularity if one day we get a film with those scenes restored. But in any event Road House remains an enjoyable action film and worth digging out and enjoying again and again.
A touching true life drama that tells the extraordinary story of a humble London stockbroker who rescued 669 refugee children, mostly Jews, from Nazi occupied Czechoslovakia in 1938/39, an achievement that had gone unnoticed for many years after the Second World War. Anthony Hopkins plays Nicholas Winton, an elderly retired man who is nagged by his wife (Lena Olin) to clear away the hordes of clutter he has accumulated over the years. By doing this Nicholas concentrates on an old scrap book he has kept for years but has sort of dreaded re-examining due to the emotions it may rekindle in him. The book contains the photographs and names of all the children that he battled British government bureaucracy and the fear of Nazi intervention to bring to safety in the UK, all of whom would probably have died in the extermination camps. Winton is played by Johnny Flynn as the younger man in flashback scenes to 1938 where the tensions of waiting for the trains, which have to pass through Germany and could be halted at any time by the Germans, to arrive in Britain are wonderfully created. Getting the foster families organised, raising the money and getting the visas all adds to the complexities of the task. Winton does all this out of nothing more than his own extraordinary kind heartedness and anxiety over the plight of the children. His mother, played brilliantly by Helena Bonham-Carter, is the powerhouse who fights the stiff bureaucrats at the Home Office. Winton is haunted by the last train which was intercepted by the Gestapo and never arrived and he his scrapbook has blank pages where the children's names and photographs would have been added. This will move you to tears. This story came to light after Nicholas Winton's achievement came to light in the 1980s and the BBC convinced him to appear on the magazine programme That's Life where they covertly filled the audience with the now adult children who had been rescued. This event is recreated wonderfully and if you watch the actual clip (it's on YouTube) you'll see how Hopkins has captured Winton's reaction absolutely perfectly. The film is moving, some may find it overly sentimental, but it's a remarkable story, brilliantly portrayed here with a great cast including Alex Sharp, Romola Garai and a cameo from Jonathan Pryce. A lovely film.
Writer and director Mia Hansen-Løve has admitted this is a semi autobiographical film based on her own experiences with her father. It's a very moving and rather compelling film with Léa Seydoux, stripped of any glamour, excelling in the central role of Sandra, a widow with a young daughter, who is managing the pain of helping her ailing father, a former philosophy professor who has a neurodegenerative disease. Sandra has all but shut herself off emotionally in order to cope as she juggles her professional life as an interpreter, with motherhood and worrying about arrangements for the care of her father. Then, by chance, she meets an old friend of her late husband, Clément (Melvil Poupaud), and they embark on an illicit affair (he's a married man and father). The film charts Sandra's life as she tries to deal with the highs and lows of visits to her father as he increasingly doesn't recognise her and the passionate time with Clément knowing that she will not be able to keep either man in her life. Seydoux really sparkles here in this poignant drama. Her fears, sadness and realistic expectations are all depicted so beautifully and the chemistry between her and Poupard and Pascal Greggory as her father makes this a rather wonderful film.
The Road is such a fascinating film, a bleak survival story that manages to recreate the sheer poetry of the source novel by Cormac McCarthy (a fantastic novel and highly recommended). Set in a post apocalyptic world where an unspecified event has caused the world to die. All plant and animal life has perished and the sky has become grey and dull smitten with storms flash fires and an apparent dying sun. A man (Viggo Mortensen) and his son (Kodi Smit-McPhee) are on the road travelling south in the hope of finding a warmer climate and possibly food supplies. On the journey they scavenge what they can and must avoid roaming bands of other survivors who have resorted to cannabilism to survive. It's a perilous journey and the man is desperate to protect his son who has only known the dying world but also retains a sense of human goodness. There are cameos from Robert Duvall, Charlize Theron, Guy Pearce and Molly Parker in this exceptional film with its quite original vision of a near future with the focus on the child as the hope for mankind. Both Mortensen and Smit-McPhee are excellent as the father and son and their plight is really tense and yet very emotionally moving too. The creation of the dead environment is truly remarkable with some awesome cinematography. This is a first class film and definitely one I recommend if you've never seen it.
One of Francis Ford Coppola's smaller, passion piece films also made after the trauma of Apocalypse Now (1979) and an attempt to recoup some money. This is his homage to the romantic musicals of the classic Hollywood period of the 50s and early 60s. To that end it's a strange film which for the first half or so is a relationship drama about Frannie (Teri Garr) and Hank (Frederic Forrest), a couple who have lived together for five years. On one fateful 4th July night they have a major row and begin to wonder whether their relationship is over. They individually head off into town for the celebrations and both of them hooks up with someone else. It's in this section that the film bursts into a full on fantasy musical complete with slightly clumsy dance numbers. The film was entirely filmed on Coppola's soundstage and boasts a soundtrack by Tom Waits but it's a self indulgent film with Coppola trying to recreate a film style and genre that by this time had little to attract a modern audience. Even despite a recent 4k UHD restoration it's still a bit of a trial although Teri Garr impresses in her performance as the girl with dreams.
For an American remake of a celebrated Japanese horror film, itself based on a Japanese novel, this is remarkably good. With it's dark, gothic, washed out colour palette and an overriding sense of foreboding throughout this is a very unsettling horror film even though the studio made big cuts to reduce the trauma on audiences and to get a lower classification. Even so the originality of this ghost story with an extremely vengeful spirit and the mystery plot centred around a strange videotape makes this a very interesting film. Naomi Watts plays Rachel, an investigative reporter, who starts to enquire into the strange deaths of four teenagers, one of whom was her niece, and finds they are linked to a videocassette tape. Her investigation finds the tape on which there is a bizarre series of surreal and disturbing images and there's apparently a curse that anyone who sees it will die within seven days. When Rachel's young son, Aidan, sneaks a look and begins to have visions of a strange girl she is forced to get to the bottom of the mystery very quickly. There's some really eerie stuff going on here and the story rattles along at a wonderful pace. Veteran British actor Brian Cox pops up in a cameo, along with Jane Alexander. A very entertaining and thrilling horror film that is well worth checking out if you've never seen it, and for those not normally into horror this is something quite different and one to try. I would love to see the original cut which apparently has Chris Cooper in a bookending cameo. Who knows perhaps one day it will get a release?
A silly film that shamelessly cashes in on the success of Jaws (1975) and forms part of a cycle of increasingly shoddy films that pit some animal or other against man. Here we have Richard Harris as fisherman Nolan (think Quint and you'll be close to what the character is trying to be), who inadvertently kills a female pregnant killer whale and finds he's ruthlessly pursued by her mate out for vengeance. The whole set up is thoroughly daft but even worse it has a series of poorly thought through episodes usually resulting in a death. The film is pitched at family audiences and so there's little scares or gore even though Bo Derek (in an early role) has her plaster cast leg bitten off! Indeed literally whenever anyone dangles over the edge of a boat or a harbour they die. Really it's laughable. Charlotte Rampling costars as whale expert (or in other words the Richard Dreyfuss character) who for no reason I can properly explain joins Nolan as he's forced out to sea pursued by the whale. Keenan Wynn has a cameo as a grizzled first mate to Nolan's skipper. Despite a recent restoration to 4K UHD the film does not hold up well today.
Rio Bravo is a pure, unadulterated cinematic western. There's no attempt to mix myth with history here, this is not about taming of the west or pushing the frontier, there's no fighting with Indians, no harsh journeys by wagon train, or the carving of empires on the plains, this is simply an action/adventure story with a big star doing what he does best. Reputedly made as an antidote to High Noon (1952) this is simply a thoroughly enjoyable film, a classic of the genre, unpretentious, occasionally a bit cheesy, fun and a rollicking good yarn. John Wayne is Sheriff John T. Chance of a small Texas town. When he arrests the no-good brother of the local bigwig he finds his jailhouse under siege and with only an alcoholic deputy (Dean Martin) and an old cripple (Walter Brennan) to help him. He finds some solace in the arms of the delicious 'Feathers' (Angie Dickinson) and recruits a fast draw kid for the final showdown (Ricky Nelson - sporting a very 50s 'Elvis' hairstyle). Both Martin and Nelson get to do a song, there's oodles of genre stereotypes and it's overloaded with macho posturing but you can't help just loving it because it sort of gives you what every western should all wrapped up in one neat bundle. It's also massively influential, Quentin Tarantino cites it as one of his all time favourite films and John Carpenter used it's template for his seminal Assault On Precinct 13 (1976). A film that modern audiences need to rediscover.
This epic film is a sheer delight throughout its extended running time. A film that is about adventure, history and magic as well as taking a humorous and critical look at American media controlled politics. Director Philip Kaufman has taken real events, adapted a highly readable book about them and imbued the film with high drama, laughs and some mysticism occasionally throwing in a touch of surrealism for good measure. He also manages very cleverly to poke fun at America and especially its political ideals whilst celebrating the triumphs depicted. In short this is the story of America's innovations in aircraft just after the Second World War and through to the 'space race' and the Mercury astronaut program that preceded the Apollo missions. It starts with the story of the attempts to break the sound barrier and focuses on Chuck Yeager (Sam Shepard). Set at a remote Californian desert airbase the wild country matches the wild animalistic test aircraft that the pilots have to fly often dying in the process. In this part of the film Kaufman introduces us to the family pressures involved and links to a new breed of younger pilots who go onto join the space program. The cast are mightily impressive including Ed Harris as John Glen, Scott Glenn as Alan Shepherd and Fred Ward, Dennis Quaid, Lance Henricksen and many others. There are many standout and highly memorable scenes including Yeager's walk out of the desert after a crash, Glen's first orbit of the Earth, the mystical dance of the Australian aborigines and Vice President Lyndon Johnson (Donald Moffat) having a temper tantrum when one of the astronaut's wives refuses to be interviewed with him. What an absolutely marvellous film, it's thoroughly entertaining throughout and if you enjoyed First Man (2018) then The Right Stuff can be viewed as a kind of prequel to that. If you've never seen this then I highly recommend it, it's a real gem.
This is quite an impeccably crafted drama superbly acted and directed with a gentle artistic flair by Andrea Pallaoro whose use of camera is very interesting here in creating almost still portraits of despair and sadness. Trace Lysette plays the title role as Monica, estranged from her family she now earns a living as a masseur and nighttime sex worker. The narrative unfolds to reveal that Monica was shunned by her parents as she is transgender but returns to the family home as her mother (played impeccably and movingly by Patricia Clarkson) now has a dementia induced illness. The situation at home is complex and painful and the film gently unravels the emotions at play as Monica helps her mother who no longer recognises her and reconnects with her brother and his family. An intelligent and moving film that doesn't try to resolve the main issue by confrontations instead becoming a moving story of love and devotion, almost a return to innocence about simple human connection.
One of the greatest, and indeed much imitated, crime/heist films ever made. A seminal work it has influenced a host of film makers not least Martin Scorsese, Quentin Tarantino and Michael Mann - watch Mann's Thief (1981) if you don't believe me. Apart from all these accolades it's a really riveting thriller, very risqué and ahead of its time. The story focuses on Tony (Jean Servais), a seasoned thief who has just been released from prison, his health is failing and he's decided to go straight. But when he finds his woman has taken up with a nasty gangster he decides to do one last big heist. With his friend Jo (Carl Möhner) and two accomplices they plan a break in at a big jewellery store to crack the safe. The actual crime is planned meticulously and the filming of the actual burglary is a remarkable and tense piece of cinema, with no sound and forming the main central section of the narrative. But it's the aftermath where things go awry. Filmed in sharp but dour shades of grey this has film noir overtones, some gritty violence and a fast moving plot. The final third of the film is simply fantastic. This is classic cinema at its best and a film that everyone should try.
This is an offbeat private eye film that was made in one of Hollywood's golden periods and whilst it was not particularly well received at the time it has gained critical acclaim over the years. It's a slow burning story with little action but a conspiracy vibe that offers an intriguing look at a film about greed and lust. It's also famed as one of Gene Hackman's quiet, yet compelling roles as private detective Harry Moseby. He's a former football player who likes the challenge of his mostly mundane cases. His marriage is failing as his wife (Susan Clark) is having an affair so Harry takes a missing person case to get away. Hired by a selfish former actress to find her wayward daughter the case leads Harry into the world of film stuntmen and all the way to Florida where he soon discovers there's more going on than he at first thought. Viewed today the film can be admired for the performances by Hackman, James Woods and Jennifer Warren amongst others including a first film role for Melanie Griffiths and it is a well written script although the slow burn and unconventional ending make this a difficult film for modern audiences.
This is a film that can only really be fully enjoyed on the biggest cinema screen you can find and of course it's all about the racing scenes which are fast, exciting and all embracing. This is a good old fashioned sports underdog film with a mismatched pair of protagonists and a great cast that does everything it sets out to do and that's entertain the viewer. Brad Pitt plays a former champion Formula One racing driver, Sonny, who thirty years before barely survived a huge crash, became a gambler and briefly an NYC taxi driver (a shame we didn't get a flashback to that) and now tours in his van taking race car driving spots wherever he can find them. He's only in it for the buzz of the race having long ago lost any attraction to the wealth and fame. He gets a final chance from his old racing partner Ruben (Javier Bardem) to drive once again in a Formula One car for Ruben's failing team. Sonny's age and somewhat cynical approach rubs up his teammate, up and coming young driver Joshua (Damson Idris), the wrong way. But Sonny soon brings strategy and tactics to the team that are close to reckless and rule breaking but soon bring results. But the money men are threatening to take it all away! There's a great performance, as ever, from Kerry Condon, as the race car designer of the team and a spot of romance for Pitt. But overall this is all a mix of macho cinema, somewhat melodramatic yet all presented with panache making for a surreal and exciting film experience.
Visually captivating with it's scenes of the wilderness this was made at a time when the western was undergoing radical revision and yet this is more an historical drama about isolation, survival, death and ultimately revenge and myth. It tells the tale of Jeremiah (Robert Redford) who, after a stint in the military and fighting in the war against Mexico, heads for the mountains of the Rockies to seek a life of peace and solitude in the wilderness. Unprepared for the harshness of the terrain, weather and nature he has to learn very quickly aided at one point by an aging mountain man (Will Geer). But eventually through events in the narrative he seeks revenge on a band of Indians who in turn attempt to kill him yet hail him as a powerful enemy. The film has a famous ambiguous ending that works exactly to the perfection for this story. There's a clash of cultures overarching theme that has been told many times before and yet this film still feels fresh and is quite captivating. Redford is excellent here, carrying the film almost entirely alone. It's a wonderful film that is worthy of rediscovery.
A good ol' traditional mismatched buddy action comedy that is there simply to provide a thoroughly good time. This is one of those entertaining films that has no pretensions and delivers in spades in both action set pieces and comedy between the two main protagonists. They happen to be the British Prime Minister, Simon Clarke (Idris Elba) and the American President, Will Derringer (John Cena) who find themselves targeted by the main baddie played and somewhat underused by Paddy Considine. Shot down and forced to get along the two Heads of State have a rollicking adventure as the forces of evil try to get rid of NATO. It's all over the top as you'd expect and although it starts with a quite brutal ambush scene (with a cameo from Sharlto Copley) it then moves into the main story about these two politicians who really despise one another and spend much of their time verbally sparring until they find themselves consistently under threat. It's all mad, thoroughly implausible but will make you laugh. There's nothing overly new on show here it's just done really well and is worth checking out.