Growler_Griz

The acting isn't all that bad. These actors look and talk about like real people look and talk. The expressions on their faces are approximately what people really do in surprising and stressy situations. When your business looks like it will fail, what do you do? Moan and thrash around, or do you go off somewhere and just sit there and think, stare into the distance? When the TV News says there is one exception to their findings, and shows Jay Austin's car lot, what does he do? What would you do? I'd just sit there. I wouldn't scream in amazement, nor would I put my hands in front of my face. But in a movie you've got to have the guy do something; so he leaps to his feet and stands in front of the TV and continues to watch, with his mouth partly open. Completely shocked, surprised, astonished - the standing up is a little extreme but it's obviously an extreme situation. It's played exactly right. What we call good acting is actually just slick Hollywood styling. Real people act more like what we see here. When people say bizarre things to them they might not speak right up - they often sit and think a second before they respond. At least people in healthy societies do.

You see a related thing in The Electric Horseman. Sonny asks Hallie what her real name is, and she admits it's Alice. What a dumpy, ordinary name. Yet, he calls her that, because it symbolizes total honesty, total lack of insincerity. From then on they share a relationship based on abandonment of insincerity. The people in Flywheel seem to me to be doing about this throughout. Just living their parts about like most of us live our lives.

All except Max. He just stands there. Will James wrote about this. Some cowboys were hired to be extras in a cowboy movie, and they wondered why a real cowboy wasn't picked to play the cowboy hero part. It was explained that they bring in this actor because the real cowboy would have about the same expression on his face whether he were proposing to Greta Garbo, or feeding his horse. Well, Max has about that same expression on his face throughout.

It appears to me that the makers of Flywheel didn't do Hollywood acting because they basically didn't care what the folks in Hollywood might or might not do. Which is very tight with the message of the film.

The movie really suffers from two problems: 1) the starvation budget, which it pretty deftly overcomes, and 2) an incomplete knowledge of Christianity, altho this is realistic for the Bible Belt. The story of the man's repentance is about as good as it is possible to get. John the Baptist never preached a more effective, more penetrating sermon. So what if they pray a little strangely, at least they are praying.

I saw the video one late night. I know/care nothing about marketing and timing, only the art of movies. This movie is not perfect. I would say it has a charming amateurishness but it falls a wee bit short of that. Yeah, it speaks to the heart, but there are some problems which keep it from really singing.

There's too much time spent just waiting for something to happen next. A bit of creative cutting to eliminate some dead seconds here there and everywhere would be my first recommendation.

Second, go over the script and just generally improve it. It bothered me that these kids are trespassing, and there's no explanation as to whether the owners don't mind or what. The adults don't seem to have a problem if two teenagers of the opposite sex are spending a lot of time alone together in a far isolated treehouse. It's not explained, and it's kind weird, how these kids manage to imagine the same visions almost always in total synch. The big girl goes from bully to sobbing in like one frame with no real reason why. Most of all, there's just something unsettling about Leslie. She reminds me of Pippi Longstocking. I fully expected to learn that she lived alone in that house next door, and ate imaginary food, and her father was a pirate, missing in the Caribbean.

I wouldn't volunteer to see it a second time but I guess I am better for seeing it once.

Instead, go to the zoo, buy some peanuts and feed 'em to the monkeys. Monkeys are funny. People with amnesia who don't say much, just sit there with vacant eyes are not all that funny.

Black comedy? There isn't a black person in it, and there isn't one funny thing in it either.

Walmart buys these things up somehow and puts them on their dollar rack. It's labeled Unrated. I think they took out the topless scene. They may have taken out other stuff too, who knows? All we know is that whatever they took out, isn't there any more.

The acting seemed OK to me. There's a lot of unfathomables tho. It's supposed to be a city? It's supposed to be a big lake? If it's so hot in the church people are fanning themselves, why are they all wearing coats?

The new king is a fop, and a London cabbie, who is a gem, looks just like him (the old king used to come to London for recreation) so the cabbie is hired to stand in for the king. While assassins try to kill him, the pretty lady sees him for what he is - and falls in love with him. I cannot give away the ending, it's too amazing.

This movie is full of jokes of all kinds, from subtle funny looks, to hilarious switcheroos; I think Peter Seller's very best movie. He's very funny, from the slapstick to the dumb looks in strange situations, etc. He was abused in the Pink Panther movies - having to do the same jokes over and over. Here we see some different ones, and quite good too. "She did an owl!!!" "He did a chicken!!" "What are you doing?" "That's my secret chicken signal." "You can't do that; that's my secret chicken!!!" "Whooo whooo!!!" "Bok bok bok!!!" The principle actors do their parts very well. I find myself cheering for the valiant cabbie, what a dude! and disgusted by the foppy prince - and have to stop and realize, it's the same actor! The actresses are one thing they certainly should be: gorgeous. And some of the minor parts are really nicely played, too. "Take this." "What is it?" "It's a ring, stolen from the Hapsburgs. It's priceless." Jailer squints at it trying to decide if it's worth risking his life over, and drops it in the sewer. "Ow... got anything else?" The look on his face is perfect.

And there are themes of vast import behind the story. We are all fops and gems, rolled into one; the gem part of us is a prisoner inside, and the fop is what the world has cultivated.

I haven't seen much of the other movies based on this same book, but this one does the story justice, and adds the funny element. I'd say it well improves the book, which was a little too baroque for my tastes.

This movie has the one flaw that it looks like it was made in the 40's or 50's: the special effects are cheap, like the king falling down the well - these people could have gotten those effects looking better, but they chose not to for some reason. Let's assume that it was because they loved the old time movies with those fake-looking special effects. I just think of it as quaint and relax and enjoy the show. Maybe they spent their budget on sets and costumes - a lot of them look pretty elaborate. My copy is a VHS I taped off of WKRP or somewhere one night - the music sounds like it's been thru the grinder - and I still watch it occasionally and enjoy it for its immense merit as a story, and the acting and the jokes. Actually the fights aren't all that bad. I actually like the one on top of the carriage. Pretty amusing... "We're driverless!!!" "Not while I'm here you're not!"

This movie is little known. I picked it up in the bargain bin for a dollar. I'm going to assume that no one will read this except the people that made it, and confine my comments to them, for hopefully their education and improvement.

The movie has two flaws: first, the script just needs more oomph. You could get this movie by taking a really, really good script, then letting Curious George mess with it before running off copies for the cast and director - there are little disconnects here there and everywhere in the plot and dialog. Second, it all moves a little too slow. All they had to do was sit down and go over the script with some friends for a few hours, red-line it, fix it, repeat this process about three times. Then later in the editing room, remove about 20 to 40% of the footage - just a few seconds here, there and everywhere that don't help tell the story. Then it would have been a VERY charming movie about a partly deaf girl who does good on the b-ball team because of some coaching by her brother on individual skills, and how proud her dad is of her. It could have won all kinds of awards! I have a daughter that I've coached just this way and the basic theme here is absolutely true and very beautiful. Everything else about the movie PROVES that you don't need a big budget or sets or sound stages or expensive casting or special effects or certified crew. These are tools to help tell the story but just use whatever tools you have - just use them well. What does it cost to rewrite a script? Very little.

When I'm reading a book, if it hasn't scored a point by page 40 I give up on it. For a movie, I do the same about 30 minutes in. So I did.

The plot is really slow and dull. It's British, what more to say? It starts in the middle and goes nowhere from there. And it's full of boring nonsense. The main girl is miscast. She's about six rocks short of a hamburger (makes about as much sense as the story flow) In short, it could have been filmed by a high school student group and maybe it was. Here's the plot, from screenit, corrected by me: PLOT: The two meet on the flight over where Kat warns Nick that her family is a bunch of sickos, but that doesn't faze the smooth Nick. For some reason Kat is having a problem because her "ex" is the Best Man. They meet them including the "ex". Why would that give anyone a problem? If it was his wedding or her wedding, I could see a problem, but... oh whatever. Kat pays Nick 6 thousand bucks for some reason plus expenses! And some other nauseating gal thinks Nick is hot. Mom then puts Nick in the same bedroom with Kat - the twit doesn't even ask her own daughter if she wants that!!! Then Nick shows Kat his goodies. She's disgusted, he's bored. Then some more scenes take place, then some more scenes, then some girls think he's a dreamboat, then it turns out Nick is a male hooker, then just when you thought the plot had died, it vomits - Kat has him copulate with her in a boat, even tho they agreed they weren't into that. At least I assume they do, I turned it off at this point. I felt like I wanted to fling this fece into the fire, but I wasted a dollar to rent it, I didn't want to pay a ten for destroying it.

screenit has a beginning paragraph that explains the plot: this was not in the movie I saw. The plot really does begin just where I began!! You have to piece it together, the writer and the director were apparently unable to.

Note: Why does Kat tie up her shirt? Why does she pour water on it, she missed any serious parts of it. Are they playing cricket? Why then are they running around "bases" (poles) arranged like in baseball? If they show it at a party, protest strenuously, and if they still show it, stick a gooey popsickle in the DVD player.