Author: Village Vidiot

  “Margaret’s Museum,” drama, 6 December 1997 (1995), video.  Very nice little Canadian film with Helena Bonham Carter playing a rather wacky Cape Breton girl who marries an ex-miner. Still, it’s a tad soft in the pacing and writing, and much is never explained. Very much the story of the women/widows and children of the…

    “Men in Black,” comedy, November 17, 1997, video.  What a shock, I really liked this tongue-in-cheek action-comedy about aliens on earth. Lots of good laughs, really funny, Tommy Lee Jones and Will Smith are both quite fine, Tony Shaloub does a wonderful small bit, Vincent D’Norfrio is fun. The aliens are here among…

  “Crash,” drama, November 17, 1997 (1996), video.  Very weird, David Cronenberg film based on JG Ballard novel of the same name about sexual fetisihization of cars and car crashes. Well acted with Holly Hunter, James Spader, Elias Kotae, but very flat in style and presentation. Explicitly sexual, yet strangely detached and unerotic. Sex, death,…

  “Fargo,” September 17, 1997 (1996),  video.    Very funny, intelligent, scary look at a very bizarre multiple murder-kidnapping for hire tale from the Coen Brothers. Very much about the Midwest and Minnesota in particular. Fine work by all the actors, especially Steve Buscemi and Francis McDormand (an Oscar). Stylish, nasty, and fun. See this…

  “The Full Monty,” comedy, September 17, 1997, theater  Very funny, good film about 6 English steelworkers who lose their jobs in downsizing and the death of their trade in Sheffield. They turn to stripping in a wonderful little film that looks at male views of their own bodies, sex, age, race, class, gender, and…

“Booty Call,” comedy, September 17, 1997, video.    This very funny, crude black date comedy really is worth seeing despite its reliance on sex and poop jokes. A good run at self-criticism by African-American comics.

“L.A. Confidential,” 14 December 1997, theater. Good but very violent cop drama in neo-noir style about the unseen corruption in the city of the angels. Well acted with very nice work by Kevin Spacey and a cast of lesser known and very talented character actors. Good work by Kim Bassinger. The plot follows on a…

   “The People vs. Larry Flint,” biography, August 10, 1997 (1996), video.   Funny but problematic piece about Flint, the Hustler publisher. Woody Harrelson is good and Courtney Love as his wife Althea is even better. I just found I couldn’t believe the lawyer, the shift to Flint as true believer in the First Amendment, and…

“Ridicule,” drama, July 15, 1997, video, home. Wonderful French film about life in Louis the XVI’s court over issue of wit and verbal sparring as key to success. Sense of emptiness of the verbal as sport as young doctor goes to court to try to save his town from disease caused by the mosquitoes in…

  “Flirting with Disaster,” comedy, March 17, 1997 (1996), video.    Very funny film about an adopted man (Ben Stiller) searching for his bio parents. Mary Tyler Moore, Alan Alda, George Segal, Lily Tomlin, Susanne Arquette, Tea Leone, and other excellent actors. Excellent work all the way around.

  “Big Night,” December 15, 1996, in theater.  We loved this excellent film about food, Italian-American immigration, culture, love, capitalism, the American dream, language, and lots more. It’s stellar. Very well acted by folks like Stanley Tucci (he wrote, directed, and stars), Tony Shaloub (you’ll never believe he can’t really speak Italian), Minnie Driver (my…

  “Cold Comfort Farm,” October 17, 1996 (1995) video.  Too stylish and predictable for my taste. This look at British eccentrics set right by a happy go lucky girl in the twenties won the critics’ hearts but not mine. Maybe it plays better on the big screen.

  “A Time to Kill,” theater, August 17, 1996.    Well acted but predictable piece about race, law, justice and the possibilities in the south. Olive Platt is very good in a bit role. Sandra Bullock is boring. About a black father who kills the two white men who rape and beat his daughter. Trial…

  “Trainspotting,” August 17, 1996, seen in theaters.    This is an excellent, funny, cynical look at drug use and abuse in Scotland. It is a great treatment of class. Scary about the drugs, crime, and the emptiness of modern life as a consumer. A really fine film. Very rough. See this one.  Very much…

  “Leaving Las Vegas,” July 17, 1996 (1995), video.  Very depressing good film about an alcoholic drinking himself to death in Las Vegas. Nicholas Cage with Elizabeth Shue as the hooker who takes him in on his own terms. I sometimes find Cage doing lines as though they are poetry, and that’s a bit much….

“Braveheart,” March 15, 1996 (1995), VHS.   Predictable, unrealistic, ultra-violent yet satisfying old-style film by Mel Gibson about the Scots’ search for independence and freedom (whatever the hell that meant in the fourteenth century.)  Gibson stars.

“Country Life,” December 15, 1995 (1994), VHS, home.  Australian version of “Uncle Vanya,” with a nice job by Sam Neill, but essentially flat and not very interesting or exciting. Maybe I’ve just seen too many Vanya’s. (4) in one year.

“Chariots of Fire,” September 17 2006 (1981), DVD.  Very fine, inspirational film we watched with B4 although she seemed bored by the whole thing. Wonderfully acted and inspiring story of the British athletes of the 1920 Olympics, and especially the evangelist and the Jewish sprinter.   Remarkable Vangelis soundtrack.  Worth seeing regularly.