Film Reviews by AM

Well paced and darkly humorous - even though you know what might happen it's way better than what you thought!

Great Fun, Excellent. 

Edward Drake must have found plenty of cash to lure Bruce Willis into this quagmire. Has this been made in the hope of cult status? It can be the only excuse for the banal cliche'd story, the abysmal direction, laughable acting (even Bruce looks bored stiff with it all) - aliens threaten to wipe out humanity and we fight them off in the 26th century with 20th century assault rifles...painful to watch as bullets fly to keep the gamers from returning to the x-box. Old factories painted and cleaned (well sort of cleaned) to represent future interiors, a bit of forest probably somewhere in Romania to represent "another planet!!" a replica 50 times life size of a germanium crystal (remember crystal sets?) to look like a bomb that can produce a black hole. I wouldn't be surprised if Star Trek doesn't sue for  the stealing of 1960's story lines - They didn't have CGI then and this rubbish looks as if Edward couldn't afford CGI now because he spent all the cash on Bruce. A complete and utter waste of my time and money...I only watched to the end so I could honestly write this. The only saving grace? Altitude provides subtitles, thanks Altitude.

A lovely absurd comedic idea. Beautiful filming, and acting bringing nuanced performances and 

naturalistic Japanese care, delicacy and composition to a simple warm story. "Turtles"

touches on aspects of Japanese life and environment familiar as small town Japan

and reveals deeper aspects of Japanese character. The restaurants, fishing festival, the need to conform,

tiny living spaces, rural architecture and infrastructure found everywhere in Japan. This was filmed

at the end of the southern Tokyo Bay peninsula but could have been in Kyushu way down south or

Hokkaido in the north or even on any of the larger islands.

A little jewel for those who relish cultures as they appear to the people who live there.

Whatever is Bruce Willis doing in this wreck of a film? More rubbish from Signature...one of the worst distributors, no subtitles, low volume (set on 100% full could barely hear dialogue) and dreadful direction, lack of cine-photography, cliche'ed lighting (i.e. copied from successful films - but very badly) you can clearly see the gaffer tape holding the sets together and nails holding the plywood bits to the walls of the interiors to add 'tech' look. There's a brilliant bit where Willis sits on his bunk which is so badly designed that he has to sit bent forward - it's too small to be sat in! In one shot you can see the chipboard floor of the space craft so badly painted and with chipped edges it looks like a student's flat after a party. Just one point...how long could you be firing machine guns in a spacecraft before the outer hull is breached? Can you put a pregnant woman into cryo-stasis? i.e. suspended animation, what happens to the foetus, does it stop growing too? What a waste of my money.

Brian Presley shows real talent in reducing an intense true story of a heroic battle against the odds to sickly sweet sentimental mush - predictable images, wooden acting, and the hope that drone shots will salvage banal photography, ill considered lighting and a soundtrack of weeping strings. Add to this a High Fliers DVD with no subtitles ( it should be illegal to omit subtitles.... many hard of hearing rely on them).

Oh dear, oh dear - never gets going, acting - non existent - not just bad or wooden, non existent.

Comes across as formulaic, cheap and barely worthy of release. No one should have to pay to watch this.

And, a lack of subtitles should be illegal.  

Not even up to the standard of a student movie. Acting - there is none. What a mess. I feel that I'm owed a free rental I would never, ever have paid for this complete rubbish

Awful - they should be ashamed to release this. Wooden acting. that would shame an oak tree, lighting - none, direction - it's

not even up to a student film standard.  I've been to Siberia and it is dirty, backward, cold beyond belief, gloomy and dour - that's just the people,

- the place is worse - and the prisons - certainly not like the four star accommodation in this place - especially in 1945-6.  A waste of my money. 

It's worth seeing the best film probably ever made "similar" to this story  "One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich" by Solzhenitsyn - Tom Courtenay as Shukhov  and directed superbly by Casper Wrede (1970).

A great and detailed story, beautifully filmed by Deakins but let down by DVD format when only blu ray could do it justice. Very poor choice by distributor.

Pretty dull overall...nothing new here. Lame storyline - rehash of Capt America. Wouldn't recommend it - wooden and lacks any real innovation...resorts to paranormal to wriggle out of plot failures.

I'm assuming this was dubbed for children - however the dubbing acting was atrocious and there should haven the option to have the original Danish with English subtitles. So bad I couldn't watch it. ALL the Japanese anime and Manga have language vs dubbing options.

In a long tradition of films which emulate dream states or states of limbo this one isn't bad.

It does get bogged down in a trudge towards the denouement and ends up being about half an hour too long...(is this a rather common factor with French films perhaps?) Good characters and well acted and not badly filmed. The story itself is muddled rather than mysterious with many unexplained devices and ultimately unexplained behaviour on the part of some of the characters.

A really worthy and intense subject, rarely tackled - the genocide of 10 million people by forced starvation ordered y Stalin in 1932.

The film however has treated this subject to cliched direction, shmaltzy musak, wooden filming; in all, a mess of a film. The actors try hard but can't overpower the lack of atmosphere or any sense of reality or even documentation. It's ended up as a sort of attempt at a stylisation failing miserably and looking more like an episode of a low budget TV drama.

Another example of how Korean cinema can teach Hollywood a thing or two about storytelling and exquisite imagery.

Beautifully directed and acted with ever fluctuating sensuality and intrigue. The story takes twists and turns and dead

ends in a sleight of hand manipulating allegiances all the way to the denouement.

Cranston at his best (award winning performance) a gentle and heartfelt monologue of someone who doesn't know who he is and where he's going slowly but surely discovering his demons and rising to face them. Lacks a sense of place - probably east coast US - and other structures such as financial sources and backstories of any substance - some of the flashbacks seem to be there as a nod to audience expectations - and misses the opportunity to use imagery in a creative fashion ( a great problem with much US cinema - poor use of the screen as a creative tool).

This DVD has no subtitling and was very difficult for us to watch as a family as we frequently had to pause to explain to a hard of hearing relative.

Not good, not good...it may even violate laws regarding requirements for disabled people.