ld8t
Lifetime Total
1+
IMDb Member
18 years
Reviews
The Ghost Writer (2010)
Oliver Stone never did anything this dopey
Basically, what we've got in "The Ghostwriter" is a lame, lax script based on an overcomplicated, ultimately meaningless plot. We've also got a bad, intrusive score that starts blup-blupping along as soon as things start to drag -- which is often -- trying, but failing, to give the impression of story movement. The characters are stereotypes -- all of them -- and they have almost no good lines to speak. The acting is characaturish. Polanski's directing is just okay, but there is basically nothing to direct.
I don't think I have been as disappointed in a film in the past five years. And the most disturbing thing of all is not the film itself, but all the good reviews it has garnered since it first came out. What were those film critics thinking? The SEEM to have been thinking mainly about how much they despise (perhaps deservedly) George W. Bush, Halliburton, the CIA, and the rough treatment the :"squares" have given Polanski since (detested, war-mongering) California/USA ordered his extradition from (beloved, peace-loving) Switzerland.
The bottom line for me is that Oliver Stone never did anything this paranoid/conspiracy- theory dopey -- and never got a free pass for his paranoid/conspiracy-theory dopiness by the critics the way Polanski got with "The Ghostwriter." In fact, the critics have raved "The Ghostwriter," whereas it is actually not quite as good as the WORST of Stone's ideologically similar films. The Stone film it is most like in its politics and in its manichean black 'n white worldview is "JFK" -- which for all its manifestations of its creator's silliness -- is a cinematic masterpiece. "The Ghost Writer" is the product of a similar creative take on the political world, except that it is an endless, childish, rain-sodden bore.
Oscar Wilde once said of the main character in Dickens' "Old Curiosity Shop" that "One would have to have a heart of stone to read the death of little Nell without dissolving into tears...of laughter." The same thing is true -- in spades -- of the heard but unseen death of our blah protagonist pal The Ghost in the last scene of "The Ghost Writer." When I heard the WHUMP and saw the hundreds of manuscript pages start to blow away into the street after the CIA has run over him with one of its big, black cars, I just broke up in tears of laughter. So did everybody watching in my living room.
I don't think I have been as disappointed in a film in the past five years. And the most disturbing thing of all is not the film itself, but all the good reviews it has garnered since it first came out. What were those film critics thinking? The SEEM to have been thinking mainly about how much they despise (perhaps deservedly) George W. Bush, Halliburton, the CIA, and the rough treatment the :"squares" have given Polanski since (detested, war-mongering) California/USA ordered his extradition from (beloved, peace-loving) Switzerland.
The bottom line for me is that Oliver Stone never did anything this paranoid/conspiracy- theory dopey -- and never got a free pass for his paranoid/conspiracy-theory dopiness by the critics the way Polanski got with "The Ghostwriter." In fact, the critics have raved "The Ghostwriter," whereas it is actually not quite as good as the WORST of Stone's ideologically similar films. The Stone film it is most like in its politics and in its manichean black 'n white worldview is "JFK" -- which for all its manifestations of its creator's silliness -- is a cinematic masterpiece. "The Ghost Writer" is the product of a similar creative take on the political world, except that it is an endless, childish, rain-sodden bore.
Oscar Wilde once said of the main character in Dickens' "Old Curiosity Shop" that "One would have to have a heart of stone to read the death of little Nell without dissolving into tears...of laughter." The same thing is true -- in spades -- of the heard but unseen death of our blah protagonist pal The Ghost in the last scene of "The Ghost Writer." When I heard the WHUMP and saw the hundreds of manuscript pages start to blow away into the street after the CIA has run over him with one of its big, black cars, I just broke up in tears of laughter. So did everybody watching in my living room.
Elizabethtown (2005)
One of the Worst Movies of my Long Lifetime
Hell, I'm even FROM Elizabethtown (Kentucky), where most of this dog takes place, and even that fact couldn't keep me awake. Doggedly slow pace, mind-numblingly boring characters (especially the flight attendant played by the leading lady), hideous writing, no conflict, no nothing. Just two hours of dumb. My wife and I (she has also spent some time in Elizabethtown, or "E-Town" as it's known in Kentucky) can't understand how such an execrable movie got some good reviews and some good WOM. The positive comments on this site mystify us further. I don't think further words are necessary, but the IMDb just bounced my review for not being long enough -- minimum of eight lines, it said. I can't even imagine any way "Elizabethtown" could merit eight lines of criticism, but here are some tries. Thumbs down! Blech! Sheesh! Enough?