s.g.miles

I enjoyed this movie when it was released I enjoy it even more now for different reasons. In my teens it was fascinating and focused on decisions I would be making in a few years. In my 40s there's a poignant melancholy as I remember very similar situations faced by my own group of hometown friends. All of the individual components of the film are solid with my only negative criticism being the slightly overblown intensity of some of the relationships. It's all very much a 6 out of 10 experience, but what elevates to a 7 for me is one particular scene that still resonates powerfully... In the film the characters have a regular table at their favourite bar. The last scene of the movie sees them standing outside the bar looking at a younger crowd at 'their' table. The characters linger for only a moment as they explain they each have various reasons for not going for a beer. I had exactly this experience the week before I left home to work overseas and start my career. This scene punches me hard, I miss those days and 'our' table in that bar

I've watched the first 4 episodes of this series that I really want to like. Every Saturday I've sat down and told myself 'this is just good, clean, family fun...enjoy it'. But every week I find myself horrified by the woeful acting, abysmal choreography, horrendous costumes, Politically correct drivel of a storyline, lamentable directing and most shocking of all.............the horrible horrible script.

This could have been a great nod to a great British story, concentrating on history, moral courage and Britain's rich folklore. Instead we have a disastrous car-crash of a show, driven by PC-correct (A black noble with a Norman name in 12th Century England, please!), topically-correct BBC employees with all the talent of a 1 armed, blind snooker player.

Great Soundtrack, well acted, graphically brilliant.

Factual history is of course almost completely ignored.

My one, but almost overwhelming problem with this film is the horrendously choreographed Battle of Stirling. Armoured English infantry are absolutely torn to bits by unarmoured Scots. Honestly they're portrayed like killer robots against marshmallow men, not a single scot is bested in combat, all we see are Wallace and his mates slicing and dicing English soldiers....Conan the Barbarian style.

Gibson seems to enjoy portraying the English as incompetents and he does a good job of it in this film.

Superb. An evening of swashed buckles and derring do in the finest tradition of the Hollywood Pirate epic Depp, Bloom and Rush are all excellent, the locations perfect, the script amusing and intriguing, the score rousing and the special effects delicately supreme. Even the Redcoats and their officers turn out to be heroic (thank god Mel Gibson didn't get a role in this film or he'd have joined the crew of the Black Pearl and slaughtered the redcoats one and all). Love the ending.

Go and see it, it's an experience.

10 Jolly Rodgers and a bottle of rum

So much has been said about the script, acting and CGI defficiencies that I need not mention them again. But something that hasn't been touched on and is for me the most frustrating factor in this who nostalgic mess is this.

Lucas has obviously made an effort as the years have passed to portray the Star Wars galaxies in a scale that is more and more epic. A galaxy with thousands of inhabited worlds and Millions of Billions of People and Aliens. Why is it then that Lucas insists on linking all of the main characters together in unbelievable chains?

Count Dooku just happens to be one of Yoda's ex-apprentices, Qui-Gon-Jin was Dooku's apprentice, Obi wan was Qui-Gon-Jin's apprentice and of course Anakin is Obi-Wan's. Why is this necessary? An epic order of knights keeping peace across the galaxy? Or a small fraternity living in a box?

One of the villains just happens to be the father of Boba Fett. How many bounty hunters are there in the galaxy? What are the odds that this same son of Jango fett should be the bounty hunter that stumbles across Luke, Han and Leia in episode 5?

One of the secrets of Star Wars original success was that everything seemed fresh and new, not recycled! And the epic setting was only hinted at while concentrating on the characters. Lucas is now creating a story for a setting instead of a setting for a story, and boy does it show! As for the rest of the movie:

Likes- The Clone Troopers. The fight choreography. Anakin's character. The excellent end sequence following the battles.

Dislikes - John William's bland score. the script - deary deary me. The whole coruscant opening sequence. The truly horrible scene where Anakin is in bed muttering about his mother! Lucas' inability to direct well. Jar Jar Binks. the wise Yoda stating the obvious over and over again.

Roll on the Two Towers

I love the Indiana Jones movies. Raiders of the lost Ark is my favourite film. And I like most of the features of Temple of Doom; the cast, the sets, the costumes, the story, the script and the John Williams excellent score. But there's one thing that relegates this movie to the back of my video cabinet, and oh how it ruins the film.

Continuity!! I simply can't believe that a film-maker of Spielberg's experience could cobble together Temple of Doom in such an amateurish fashion. Time and time again seconds worth of footage seem to have been cut from scenes.

Fantastic. I really, REALLY enjoyed this film. Having been so disappointed so many times at the cinema I braced myself for yet another let down........I needn't have bothered. The film was quite simply flawless in my opinion. Others have already summed up the experience far more eloquently than I could, so I'll skip that and just point out just one of many things that made the film meet and in some cases surpass the book. The relationship between the members of the fellowship. Such an obvious bonding. The trust, reliance and companionship is evident and develops so effortlessly.........in particular I loved the scene in which Boromir was training Pippin and Merry, whilst Aragorn threw in useful tips. So simple but it added so much. A wonderful film that lived up to my expectations (which were immense). I can't wait for the next one!

This movie is both intensely moving and beautiful. The artwork and animation are fine, though certainly not ground-breaking, even for it's time. The strength of this movie comes from the tragic beauty of the story and the haunting score.

I typically consider myself something of a cold-hearted realist, and watched The Dog of Flanders safe in the knowledge that it was a fictional and that my masculine facade would be uncracked by the emotional story unfolding on the screen before me. It was, I'm happy to say, a misplaced confidence. Throughout the story there are light and dark moments but overall there is a slow decent into gloom. As the film passes the halfway point I felt myself sinking deeper and deeper until totally submerged in the atmosphere. And as the snowstorm in the penultimate scene roars around Nelo there I was on the road side watching him pass by, and as he sits in the freezing church I stood amongst the pews observing. It's an almost ghostly experience, I felt as though I was with the boy and his dog in the later scenes, I wanted to break the silence and say something reassuring to them, offer them solace against the cruel world, but they could neither hear or see me and the drama unfolded through a wafer thin layer of reality.

And when the film was over I sat and watched the credits, wiped the tears from my eyes and tried to decide what it was that was making me so emmotional. I thought about it for almost 2 days solid, and 6 months on I'm still not sure what it is that's quite so captivating. The story is a much trimmed down version of a long-running Japanese series but that doesn't take anything away from the contents of this wonderful film.

I urge you to watch this film (only the subtitled version though), and draw your own conclusions, and if when you too are sitting in that cold dark church in the penultimate act, you hear a sniffle from the next pew along, apologies in advance because it's probably me.

I went to see this film (Dragged along after a few beers at the pub), expecting a mediocre action flick with the odd piece of Roman imagery thrown in for good measure, and a storyline savaged by the usual gang of Hollywood butchers. Instead I was presented with top-class acting, characters with character (so rare these days), visual splendour, an easy to follow and intriguing story, choreography of the highest caliber and a soundtrack of genious. The most appealing feature of this film for me was the characters, in particular Commodus. How refreshing to watch a villain who displays so many emotions outside of those specified in the Hollywood standard template for bad guys. I enjoyed this film very much and think all involved should be commended. If you haven't seen it.......please do.

Quite simply the worst film I've ever seen! Imagine all of the corniest moments from film history all presented together as one film, and voila! You have Armageddon. From the absurd shooting rampage undertaken by Mr. Willis' character onboard an offshore gas production facility (and this character is supposed to be an experienced professional), to the stomach-churning, cliche-ridden ending, the whole experience is one that was truly painful to behold.