kate545
Lifetime Total
1+
IMDb Member
23 years
Reviews
Entropy (1999)
self indulgent tale wrapped with gimmicks
Obviously, director/writer Joanou thinks the events depicted in Entropy are world-class crazy. Personally, I've had crazier weekends.
Married someone you didn't know in Vegas? Trite. Get caught getting a blow job on a plane? You know the response. Losing your girlfriend because of your brain-dead reaction to her pregnancy? Hardly the first time. Climb out of a window to escape? Who hasn't done it?
Secondly, don't you get the feeling poor old Jake sees himself as the victim all the way through?
Joanou seems to be so literal about some things in his story when he shouldn't have been and glosses over the things he should be deadly truthful about, such as his relationship with Stella.
At the beginning I wonder why Stella is interested in him unless, of course... and she does reveal she knows he is directing a film in their first meeting. Ah, but no, her original love-at-first-sight motive is left to stand.
And even in the end, am I supposed to think Stella hasn't found anyone else(presumably because Jake can't be replaced), that they are truly star-crossed lovers, doomed to live on opposite sides of the Atlantic because of something weird and un-translatable in Stella's brain?
Married someone you didn't know in Vegas? Trite. Get caught getting a blow job on a plane? You know the response. Losing your girlfriend because of your brain-dead reaction to her pregnancy? Hardly the first time. Climb out of a window to escape? Who hasn't done it?
Secondly, don't you get the feeling poor old Jake sees himself as the victim all the way through?
Joanou seems to be so literal about some things in his story when he shouldn't have been and glosses over the things he should be deadly truthful about, such as his relationship with Stella.
At the beginning I wonder why Stella is interested in him unless, of course... and she does reveal she knows he is directing a film in their first meeting. Ah, but no, her original love-at-first-sight motive is left to stand.
And even in the end, am I supposed to think Stella hasn't found anyone else(presumably because Jake can't be replaced), that they are truly star-crossed lovers, doomed to live on opposite sides of the Atlantic because of something weird and un-translatable in Stella's brain?
Rikugun (1944)
The most amazing ending I have ever seen
After nearly twenty years, this movie still haunts me. I remember only a few flickering black and white scenes, but wow, to this day, tears well up in my eyes when I think about it.
I saw it as a historical curiosity, having no expectations for it as a cinematic experience. It is a propaganda film with lots of stilted "party line" dialogue the audience laughed over, myself included.
Little did I suspect that the last 5 minutes of this "joke" of a movie would leave me drained and in tears. The actress who played the mother(Sugimura Haruko, I salute you) reached across time and space and pulled me into the private and secret world of her character. And it was a place I had never been before. What more can you expect of a movie?
To put this kind of ending on a movie called "Army" in 1944 took a lot of courage and decency. Thank you, Kinoshita Keisuke.
If the opportunity comes your way to see this movie, I urge you to see it.
I saw it as a historical curiosity, having no expectations for it as a cinematic experience. It is a propaganda film with lots of stilted "party line" dialogue the audience laughed over, myself included.
Little did I suspect that the last 5 minutes of this "joke" of a movie would leave me drained and in tears. The actress who played the mother(Sugimura Haruko, I salute you) reached across time and space and pulled me into the private and secret world of her character. And it was a place I had never been before. What more can you expect of a movie?
To put this kind of ending on a movie called "Army" in 1944 took a lot of courage and decency. Thank you, Kinoshita Keisuke.
If the opportunity comes your way to see this movie, I urge you to see it.