ottfried

Time Travel, in the category of "2nd chance".

The number of "2nd chance" plots seem to be on the rise. The reason could be that it's at the core of the idea of time travel: What would any one person do with time travel, if it was actually possible? Go back and correct something, of course.

In the mythos of Time Travel there are two results of traveling back in time: One is that nothing changes, because it has already happened. The other is that future-brought causality will create a different time-line from the one departed from. In this story there are no speculations about causality, except in the most narrow sense: That which benefits the protagonist.

The protagonist is given the opportunity to go back in time - as way of earning some extra cash and because "he's that kind of wacky person, who would do just that." No other clues are given as to why any government institution able to do so would send an unprepared civilian volunteer back in time. And since causality is not a real issue here, there is no debriefing or interview to discern if the person traveling back in time would not f*** things up for all and everyone - even if the reason for traveling back in time in fact IS to change the future from the past.

But, hey, it's not a deep story - it's a comedy. In fact it's like most "2nd chance" plots: It's about lost love, regrets, life not turning out the way it should have. So, trying to make time travel plausible is just a waste of the audience's time. The protagonist, an emotional retarded 40 year old named Petr Kovár, badly needs to go back in time to fulfill the plot's purpose for going back in time: To correct a mistake, so life becomes worth living again! And that is exactly what will happen.

6/10 says it works on many levels, irrelevant science and all. In fact it is quite interesting that Petr goes back twice - because it didn't quite work the first time he was there.

Will it work the second time? Well, love always needs to win. Except in French movies - but this not a French movie.

It takes place in modern day Czech Republic and 22 years previous to that, when the country was still under Soviet rule and everyone voicing their discontent were in danger from Communist party members and sympathizers. The depiction of Communist regime everyday life in school, at home and on the streets queuing up to buy clothes and amenities may have been toned down to fit the comedy's framework, but still feels genuine. We get an actual idea of, what it was like - the western clothes and music that young people dreamed of, and how hard it was to be in fashion and stand out as an individual.

Petr Kovár has 22 years of knowledge of the future, and even if he is trying to keep a low profile and not reveal that he is a 40-year-old man in an 18-year-old body, he cannot quite keep his mouth shut about what will happen. His self-assured amusement - with the knowledge that everything the Communists are fighting to keep under wraps will be over 6 months later - gives the plot content. But otherwise the story is mostly about whether or not he will get the girl of his dreams, and in that respect there is hardly anything at risk.

Everybody wins: He gets the girl and a better future (as in: Now that he knows better, as an adult, he stands up for his beliefs and his heart...), his friends get their partners, as he knows they will, the ardent Communist teacher will come to lead the school (rather than be ousted, when the Soviets loose their grip), the Czechs don't have to co-exist with the Slovacs (an actual line in the film, which leaves me wondering about the actual extent of discontent in the time the two countries were one) and we all end up with the image that love is all. Even in times of occupation.

1st Moral: Be brave, when you see, what you want. In the film: Go for the girl you are in love with, when you have the opportunity. As underlying moral: If occupation ever hits again, fight for what you love.

2nd moral: Normalcy is the price and prize of all human struggle. Not a bad one. It's worth fighting for, if and when you lose it.

Finally: Stressing a slight quirk, which creeps in to most 2nd-chance-plots: When the older consciousness arrives in the younger body, sex invariably will ensue. And even if Petr Kovár IS depicted as an emotional superficial 40-year-old, he still IS 40 years old, when he has sex with his 18 year old sweetheart - except she doesn't know. The morality is obvious: It's not what you are on the inside that counts - it's the body's age that decided, whether or not a sexual mating is socially acceptable. That is very old lore. And not as easy fare today, as it used to be.

"Over time it became less of a question of what I put into it than what I got out of it." says the protagonist about his project to make it possible to enter into a person's mind and extract memories. The problem most people face, who are not acknowledged for their wish to aid humanity.

The question of the movie: What is the difference between memory fact and memory rehash/programming?

The theme: Much upbringing is just (bad) programming.

The big thematic issue is kind of circumvented in order to focus on the personal story, make the problems human, but the avoidance of that larger story is our loss: The philosophy of memory is what constitutes our belief in personal and shared reality. The philosophy of memory is everyone's personal definition of what it takes to survive - remember or forget or gloss over or drollify; the handling of lived and experienced events makes the person.

In this film the antagonist, who has volunteered for experimentation with his memories in order to prove his own belief - that he knows himself well enough to not have committed murder - turns out to in fact be a benevolent helper with a central core of integrity.

This makes it a humanistic movie, a movie to build belief in humans and as small opposition to the US justice system as an institution caring more to use motive and opportunity to convict and even out scores than to find out what pulled the trigger - because such a search would imply a need to soul search the nation. Humanistic here means "on the side of humans" rather than on the side of rationale, since apparently the 70's liberal evaluations of people's motives and actions ("he wasn't responsible, your honor, as he was beaten every day as a child!") has "proven" to everyone that everyone is responsible for his own actions, no matter what programming he or she was exposed to.

The movie doesn't succeed in quite convincing me its premise is worth 90 minutes of life, but its good to remind people that we are in fact programmed, and our memories are changed every day. And it does leave the question open at the end:

Will the public continue to supports science in its attempt to rationalize people to fit into the collective "singular winner's story" or will it finally look for other means than a generalized response to the lower classes breaking laws? Will you, the viewer?

A glimmer of hope, which is the possibility of every new understanding to change things for the better. For humans as ones and as flock; not for the system herding humans in a specific direction.

Why would I give 9/10 to a movie, where nothing really heartfelt happens?

It is very much an indie movie, in the sense that it is smallish production - a one house set, plus a street view - but the message of the story is not in the movie in the relations between people, it IS the movie, in the way everyone arrives at this point for themselves. The message is a song for the choir.

It could be displayed by rocks on a beach to be viewed from a plane, or by synchronously turning on street lamps at night nationwide to spell the message to the night sky. An easy enough message, and quite simple.

The content is the affirmative defiance that got us all here in the first place. It's the reason we grow older and older, just because that's possible. it's the reason we colonized all those other continents. The reason why we make inventions and wars and diplomacy and bake sales to collect for the needy, and fill all working hours with work to put ourselves and family though education, and why we stay alive waiting for relatives to arrive at our death bed; why we get a new dog even though we're possibly too old to follow it through to the end; why we take evening classes in philosophy in old age, and why we invest in the most unlikely projects and ideas, and live to do it again, and to write books about losing it all as well as winning, and why we fall in love at any age - it is that, which makes us human. And I really mean that literally.

See 'It's a disaster' for yourself. You'll have fun, and be uncertain about the reality of things, and recognize characters you know, as well as traits inside yourself. And find yourself ultimately united with everyone else alive, and all who has lived to take everyone to where we are. For good and for bad, this is what we are.

This is as close to spoilers, as I will take you. Enjoy.

I did. I give it 9 - just for this message. The rest is fine, fine, fine, but the message!

I thought that maybe, just maybe, this would be different. Why, could you ask, why would this be different?

I projected credibility and honesty into the main character, because he played a similar role - dedicated to get his job done - as he did in Battlestar Galactica.

Now we are approaching the halfway mark for the series, and I am sorry to say... You've lost me. I will not follow the series anymore.

The reason? What began as an interesting story about a cop becoming head of the union of copes, not in uniform, not legally a cop, but still in soul and dedicated to both helping his many colleagues and do occasional police work... There is a lack of realism in the series. He doesn't grovel to anyone. This is realistic in any world. I have no faith in a union boss having ultimate say over anything - even if this is portrayed as very tough deals with his commissioner, to who he also loses once in a while. He is simply too strong, played, portrayed too strong. I would say it's a miscast.

I am fed up with the police world, talking about anybody as if they are citizens or scum, no in-between, or hero or coward... grow some hair on your chests, scriptwriters and watch some The Wire. But you had to accept the job that demanded action. Bang Bang, people dead, heroes here, witnesses her, victims here, and scumbag stupid motherfracker here. It is tedious, we want people. Feeling, not bleeding. No, I want - I want cost, consequences, real consequences, everything that interacts with a job like the one a policeman has. Like the one the criminal has. People.

The Bridge tries. It tries to be The WIre, and CSI and Heroes without superpowers at the same time. Strong man leading the flock. Strong man can admit his mistake Strong man has unbridled libido. It hints at feeling and human interaction, but is constantly interrupted by strategic talks, where the support actors feed the main character. ABit tiresome tiresome tiresome.

It's not even BG. It deserves new writers, or it deserves to die. It is beginning to stink of mediocrity. That is waste of bandwidth. And support.

Way to NOT go Disney XD! Because it absolutely did not go anywhere. I absolutely did not enjoy this movie. I can't believe how much I actually did not enjoy it.

I thought the actors they cast were okay. Tyler (Joey Pollari) is a slick kid, and the job they did on his change was surprising, and not a bad idea, but it was only to make him interesting to girls! Nick (Kelly Blatz), his big brother, was also okay as an actor, playing super brain dead! But the "hot" girls - they were more like an adult's wet dream of a teenage girl than any real girl anybody of that age has ever seen or dated. You keep the sex-industry alive, Disney - good work!

The FX ware lame! Even for TV it was like seen better in movies from the 90's! And the romance bit was ultra lame - I mean, do we really have to be exposed to male-female stereotypes from the 50's with adult fantasies thrown in to cover our civilisation's fear of sex? Get real - sci-fi fantasy or not - there is nothing as demeaning to a teenager as being told that females only suck up to men with power and dexterity! Yeah, find a super power and you will get all the chicks! Be strong and manly, and you will be noticed and popular! Thanks for clinging to all the clichés of going to school!

The plot was so un-surprising that it amazed me it did not come apart at the hinges - I almost fell asleep a few times and wished I could fast forward. What makes scriptwriters believe their teenage target audience still lives in the 70's - grow up yourselves, you!

And then there's the weapon's bit - aren't you getting sick and tired of always combining masculinity and growing up with BIG GUNS - which we all know what you think stand for!

This piece of muck should be wiped from the annals of movie history, not for its low standards in FX or for its acting, but for its admission to setting the bar so low that the scriptwriters' and producers' tiny inner children are the only ones, who can really get into it. Or better ever: Used as an example of how NOT to think of teenagers of today. Get real, Disney! Shame on you!

And then there is the ending - the pre-ending with the cheering of the heroes, the winning of the girls, the waving of the American flag - and the real ending, right set up for an equally boring Skyrunners 2. Hey, there's an idea! You could totally call it "Children of yesterday" and have them travel back in time by going backwards around the Earth like Superman to totally mess with the antagonists, before they get a chance to become, what they become...

Yawn...

saw this at a friend's house, but it was not that easy to stay focused.

What a load of cramped, un-original metawhores leaching off of the universe of intelligent storytelling.

I suppose if I HAD seen any SG-1 episodes apart from the very first, I would know what the hell anybody was talking about! But as trivia on this piece says: Should 'ave been final ep in season 7... - sure thing! Anybody being introduced into the universe of the SG-series at s07 would expect to feel left out at least some of the time. Or, as the case was for me, ALL of the time! Why is it that anything bad just goes on and on and on, while good stories are killed in mid-flight: Firefly, Surface, Invasion etc etc etc? "The lowest common denominator" is not a valid explanation. It HAS to be a conspiracy, TV-network-bosses secretly meeting to pool information about their teenage children's progress in the are of independent thinking - if they collectively show an increase in self awareness, TV-mommies and daddies will automatically cancel shows their children like and commission extra seasons of the ones that bore them. To keep them dull and witless...

Hot damn, I am annoyed! This pile of garbage does not even satisfy the cravings of a feverish rainy Synday.

Even if it was pleasant to reacquaint oneself with Mr and miss Farscape. But the director killed their few and funny lines with Humpty-Dumpty off-beat editing, and the scriptwriter obviously did not care about anything but the main story lines and just employed a few stereotypic remarks from the great and unfunny book of one-liners to make it seem as if anyone but the set designers and the stuntmen had anything to do one this show...

No, please - I'm not done yet. There was one good thing about it, yes, most definitely. No, two, actually: The initial flight in-between mountains lasting some 3-4 minutes with no speak or anything was pretty, and... everything was done in colour. Yes. I believe that's it.

This is one of these movies that linger.

Following the total annihilation of the human race only one person appears to be alive. An old soldier, close to retirement, when the bombs start falling, escapes across the sea and finds himself on a deserted island, filled with derelict motor vehicles and empty military barracks showing a history of both chines and Japanese occupants.

Loneliness creates an illusionary friend, whom he can be responsible for (and boss around), and by mistake he also makes a woman, who turns out to despise him. When his friend and the woman couple, he evicts both from his house (his mind).

Then he makes a boy, and in quick succession more children, a whole school class, and education system and a graduation day, where he sends all of his students out to (re)populate the earth. But it soon turns out they make a mess of things - rather than coming to him, their teacher, for advice, they just squabble and murder one another. So he lays down simple rules - basically the stone tablets of Moses, but voiced as the simple man he is. But his children pay him no heed.

From then on everything just goes downhill - his creations recreate all that went before his arrival to the island; the final third of the film sees The Noah, as his first friend called him, marching around the island trying to bring control at least to his illusionary military troops, while the recordings of global warfare and unrest rack his mind to the point, where he COMMANDS the silence be.

He retracts to his bunk in the barracks, and silence falls on his world, the minute he closes his door. Here he discovers that the radioactive warning tag that he carries on his uniform has gone black. The rain was radioactive, and now he has no other mission but to wait for death.

THIS is a brilliant movie! Forget the Biblical allegorical stuff and view it in a larger perspective: Whether messages came from a Maker or not, men translated the messages into words. I.e. Men made the world in their image - they made what they already were. The singular human being will always create the world in his own image - his loves, his fears, his longings, his desires, all that man makes is himself.

The Noah tries to make a new world, and tries to take control of this new world, because this is how he is brought up - he tries to delegate responsibility and is disappointed; he tries to take full control, and is disappointed; he relinquishes responsibility and is disappointed; he closes his door on his creation, his fellow men and all their disappointments, and all he gets from all and everything he did, is death.

A very poignant and eternal message: You are what you are, and so is your world. All changes must then come from within. We are human beings from how we deal with the perception of our world. The perception is the world - that is the weak and the strong point. There is no one reality, no right reality - only different views of wild wild nature.

If you are not well versed in Roman languages, or the imagery of WWII and the Cold War, you'lld do best in getting a subbed version, so as to enjoy the cultural commentating embedded in the use of German, French, Italian, Spanish and other war commentators as well as people on the street in wartime.

This is not an anti-war movie, as some might think - it's a film about reality.

7/10

SHOULD I, like my good friend and an astonishing number of reviewers here at IMDb, deride this movie on the grounds of what it lacks?

Could I have made it a better movie? Most certainly not.

SO, my comments ought to be centered around what is actually CAN do:

It was a FIREWORKS display of well-choreographed cartoon reality. Cartoon reality is, as we know, often at liberty to twist facts to suit the story. Why this is so with cartoons, and not to the same degree in singularly font-based storytelling, I do not know. But I accept it as a pretext.

I watch movies with my feelings. If a movie manages to convince me of its story - the logical framework being whole, and by this I don't mean not having plot holes, but the story in its entirety - it bypasses my head. This mechanism is not unknown to creators in any line of work. "I buy it". Which is the sole purpose of any product. "I buy into it" - I accept the reality of it.

I am not well educated, and know next to nothing of the ancient history. Am also well aware of the illusion that those who know not their history are deemed to repeat it ( - "illusion", because I see this upholding of History as not keeping anyone from aggression and greed. On the contrary it takes people away from themselves and the moment... Excuse the digression...) And I am aware that what takes place on the screen is a rendition of reality. Of one man (or a small collective of men) 's perception of leftovers from an era long gone, albeit analyzed over and over by academics, but still only one man's version or vision.

That I feel the impact of the movie is due to the fact that this man manages to portray a wholeness. Do I believe it to be true? I do not. It is a version. Am I fulfilled? On some levels, yes - but not like with a Tarkovsky or Coppola (to draw from very different movie-making expressions). "300" works. It completes its mission to persuade me to come closer and believe in the story - not as truth, but as movie. BEWARE THE DISTINCTION.

I couldn't care less if this was far from or close to the truth. It takes place in an altogether different universe from the one my forefathers lived in, and had their fun on the battle fields and in the subjugation of the weaker, because they could.

300 is a vehicle for messages about an impression of a or the human condition. Freedom, honour, glory - these definitions need dusting off from time to time in order for us to see something to believe in, which is not controlled by religion or money. What we would term "inner value". Okay, so "300" defines it as well worth dying for, in order to defend a way of life. Funnily this mechanism is what everyone uses in order to define the term "human".

The mechanism. Not the content. Very big distinction. We all put something inside of our definition of human, if we *need* to define it, rather than just be our own best example.

300 is not an altogether bad way of stating an opinion about what is needed.

Okay - bright people can work on pretexts. They can assume a position and argue from that POW. Without being there. And as such be opportunists, who will give the receiving end what the receiving end believes it needs at the moment - without themselves acknowledging anything but the fact that "these mechanisms work".

THIS is what I should look for, if in a criticism of this movie I should venture beyond my instinctive reaction. "Do they themselves believe in their words?" What say my instinct?

6/10

12 people sent out to populate a distant star wake up after hyper-sleep to find themselves yet too weak to prevent an alien life form from breaking into their 12 chambers to devour them, one by one. They can hardly move, only wonder who will be next! And they have an estimated 5 hours between each of the creature's meals.

In an attempt to become strong enough they begin to exercise. Yet another woman is abducted. Why are only the women taken? They speculate it's because of moment - that the beast goes after those that react to its presence.

they get out of their cages, and have momentary respite in an adjoining room. 4 of 6 women are gone, eaten. They are way off course, the planet they landed on, is nothing like their intended destination. They are of course in serious trouble...

Oh, the acting... so devoid of genuine feeling that you need smaller shoes afterwards, the script has no characters, but only functions, the special effects are... well, one has to lower all expectations:

When they finally kill the creature and venture outside their battered ship, they find their whole ship surrounded by an impenetrable see-through wall - as if they are in a zoo.

They are still being killed, though. Now by little men with pointed heads.

Do I offend anybody when I say it begins to feel like one of those arcade games or early computer games, where certain decisions in an action play is left to YOU, the Hero of Subjective POW? Well, it does come to an end. Like in the arcade.

Must be a fan movie. But what a lame ending! All aliens killed, and there is the promised land anyway! How come so many B-movies have bad scripts? Because, if they had good scripts, they would attract more investors.

But the whole beginning sequence should have grabbed someone - and helped fuel professional editorial of the remaining script. And subsequent more funding. Too bad.

7 for brilliant beginning, minus 5 for acting and script, plus 1 for effective night goggle scenes, and 1 for understanding and respecting the bare necessities principle.

Go again, Mike.

• but we all have our parts to play.

this is a very fine piece of Soviet culture (communist belief), produced as a children's movie, but definitely for adults too.

The symbolic imagery is abundant - the boy violinist trying to impress little girl violinist outside the music rehearsal studio, the girl first refusing the apple he gave her, but when she heard him play, she ate it; the boy being impressed with the mechanics of the steamroller; the steamroller driver longing for the pleasure of music to lighten up his monotonous day, which the boy can provide; the woman steamroller driver longing for the male steamroller driver; the envious street brats teasing the boy violinist; the boy violinist being taught to stand up for a smaller boy by the steamroller driver; the shining new Moscow building appearing behind the old being torn down; the adult, who has lived through the 2nd world war, helping the child over the puddle of water in the street; the adult worker chiding the child for not acknowledging his talents as musician; the well educated mother chiding the child for forgetting his initial promise for the evening and in stead on a whim having promised to meet the steamroller driver for a movie; the steamroller driver being stood up by the boy at the movie theater and the next day he will have to go work somewhere else and never see the boy again; the woman steamroller driver "accidentally" bumping into the male driver at the theater and he reluctantly goes with her and "leaves the music behind"...

a very moral story, but with the twist that everybody must do, what they are good at, at any given moment. If the society recognizes a need for musicians, we MUST have musicians, and if we need workers, we MUST have workers. But we can dream, we can always dream, of being someone else - and it is this longing that gives us the desire to do and be. Eg. when the boy is in the practice studio, he is chided for having too much imagination, i.e. he should just fulfill his part, which is interpreting the music to the best of his abilities. But the reason for his lack of concentration is that he is thinking of the girl outside the room, whom he gave the apple. Later, he plays to the musician, and now he is good, now he is concentrated - because in this instant he recognizes the differences between him and the steamroller - he recognizes that he has a responsibility to perform to the best of his abilities, and he does so with knowledge and humility.

I don't care for what communism became or was, but there is a valuable lesson learned in this gem of a movie: We must do, what we do best, and do it to the best of our abilities. And, yes, we dream - but we will always dream - of something else, BECAUSE NO ONE CAN DO EVERYTHING THAT HE HIMSELF NEEDS. Thus - in spite of the frame of reference - it becomes a film of how a society is structured.

8/10

it brings to mind the writings of Stephen King and the remembered childhoods filled with terror from stories like IT - as the exact opposite. There is no terror in these childhoods that any of the friends - who are still friends 20 years up the line - remember or seem to suffer from. Up the line all is described as friendly jostling, maybe periodically described as "picking on" one or more of them, but all is forgiven. There is no *angst* embedded as the film and the participants in later life describe the relationships - all we see are young people having grown up to be basically the same persons. More mature, but basically still the same people, and the same power structures.

Totally amazing! Not just for the fact that people can in fact grow up relatively unharmed by social conventions - but also that friendships can in fact last. In this respect this movie is a tiny Pearl - as one assumes this has been the intent of the film: A portrait of unforced emotions binding people together. Which, when seen in opposition to films of later years portraying the dark sides of childhood - the violent inhibitions in Bowling for Combine is what easily springs to mind, but since mid 80'ies along with the growing adoration of children and childhood (accompanied by 1000s of commercials, animations and series directed straight at children) several movies and documentaries have had success with portraying the dark sides of growing up - the abuse, the loneliness, the push to excel - resulting in adults with dark and twisted minds.

And here comes a film, that says: It IS possible to have a happy childhood, look'a'here!

Thank you for that. OR the counterweight illusion ...

8/10

Very far from the awful exploiter "movie", "reeefer madness", "keep off the grass" is still an attempt to discourage youth from taking up the habit of smoking pot, marijuana, hash, the child with a host of names.

Made in 1969, at the height of the "rebellion of youth" against the establishment, the Vietnam war at its peak, Nixon president, and the world needing a boost of something to level out the fear of things escalating, pot had found a home with young "rebels", who needed to assess the world in a different way from their parents - and found in the (still) illegal drug a different feeling from the aggression-inducing alcohol of 'before'.

The movie documents a youth, discovered by his father to be a recent convert to pot, in rational search for information about the drug and consequences of using it - in fact the whole of the movie is based so much on rational thought, that one could get the impression somebody was actually concerned with the hysteria from the media - "jumped from 16th floor high on marijuana" and similar headlines - and from the FDA and FBI, who needed another focus, after the end of alcohol prohibition, and found it in the pot, smoked by jazz fans and Negroes alike, to prevent massive unemployment in the 16.000 men strong police force ...

The basic idea of the movie - that the young man search for confirmation of information - is in fact rather good, and at that time, quite novel idea, if only superficially rational, when all conclusions are based on observable, but partial 'facts' - loss of coordination, redness of eyes, "loss of dignity", obsessive mono-focus, humorous outbursts over 'nothing', overrating of personal achievements, pot leads to crime or heavier abuse etc. And the young man to no great surprise has all the 'facts' confirmed at various hip parties, visit to the local hip dope influenced artist loving his new doodles, watching the courteous police arrest a friend, who could not resist trying to buy his dope at the wrong place, and end up getting ripped of at night by three youngster spouting the 'right' lingo to tie them in with the rest of the pack!

A very educational movie, which has no doubt helped with its mission in its own time - but today seems only a step removed from the hysterics of 'reefer madness' and the like. Personally it seems to me that use of marijuana never had quite the impact on culture as was feared and prophesied in the script. But one should never discount the parental generation's attempt to warn the younger. And as such it comes across: Observe the signs, and think for yourself.

A great many comments compare the film to the book. I have not read the book, and judging from the comments here I do not doubt it has sparked in as many minds as it has readers - but rarely a movie comes to the heights of The One Reader's inner images. As it should be. So one can wonder why it is that a reader wishes to see another put images to the very strong inner imagery of written and read storytelling - is it a desire for the story to become more "real" - with CGI and blue-screens, models and masks? Why IS that - when every strong character and every landscape and every moment of action and pain and love before the inner eye is so compelling that it cries out for more? Isn't exactly this compulsion to feel more what should motivate us in life? Is life of so little value that we cannot bear it when the book ends? Or when the movie deviates from our own vision?

I liked the characters I saw. John Malkovich is beginning to seem overrated, growling with arrogance not the role's but his own ... but had no real lines to work with, so he may be excused. Again. In contrast Jeremy Irons' function as tutor and role model fit his words and he filled the character with more than bravado - I would say he re-wrote the role, what ever was in the script, and put it on; a very fitting re-appearance into the dominion of the fantastic for this versatile actor. And the young Eragon, Edward Speelers, was a fitting hero - clean, never dirty, unblemished, heroic, brave, and fashionably foolhardy ... to fit a certain audience. But ...whoever lingers upon trivialities such as performance and SFX misses the point.

Every one has a fate. Becoming aware of it, putting it on, living it, paying dues and suffering with it, and learning to respect oneself for what one can do and cannot yet and may never be able to, is the humility that breeds compassion. It can be told in a simple way, like this movie, or it can be told with greater dexterity and complexity and insight into the pains of life and living. But told it must be. For any age. This is who we are, and wish to be.

8/10

Nothing in life itself tells you how to live life. No clues. Maybe there is a certain hardwiring - the famed genes - directing or conducting certain behaviors or characteristics, or maybe the stars have an influence or ARE influenced, we do not know. But what we do know is that people and events influence people and make events. And from such influences spring clues, directions, pointers to leading life, to living life, to being to others.

But when both of your parents die on you within a few days of each other, leaving you to fend for yourself? And your 10 year old life has been spend assisting them in their vices, your guides may then as well be the voices of dolls. Some people listen for advice in the past - some even worship the past - but being 10 years old, you don't have a past yet good for anything. And your future is just like one big untended corn field stretching in all directions.

People hanging on to the past, as forefather-worshipers or, like in Gilliams' film, hanging on to the actual corpse for advice, consolance, fear of loneliness, respect, are regarded as savages, primitives or even psychos by modern society, and they soon learn that modern society is so self absorbed and focused on making the next buck that history as a continued presence for most is not much of anything besides the dead on the wall in gilden frames. But in this fine film Gilliam takes the people out of the future of most of his and your and my neighbours (that is you and me), and by placing them in the hands of dreamers shows the dreadful price to pay for not taking the now seriously: The one great tool for survival, mental survival, when one is unable to cope with the now, is imagination, fantasy, play.

This movie makes a horrible reflection back on modern society - or much more precise, the human being alive any where any time are the train that is the shark that needs to be killed, which the brain-operated epileptic wishes for so much that his wish becomes true, in that instant (possibly) taking him along to be liberated from his wretched life: The humans of the future travel alone on the train and are only stopped by fantasy, as imagination prevents those, who wish to escape past or future, from either dying or being forced to change in order to fit circumstance.

The escapists, the dreamers, those who play to stay alive, they are not changed by circumstance - they CHANGE circumstance. They Fantasize. They dream dreams with open eyes. And all and everyone around them are changed along with them.

A lot of things have been said about this film. Some people say "cult" films are for people with "bad" or "no" taste, I suppose, as opposed to the by-products or off-springs of classical breeding, but strangely a lot of B- or C-movies become just that by having (too?) high aspirations based on knowledge of the classics and then-recent scientific findings and too little contact with the main stream audience, who do not acknowledge references to classics and could not care less about where the future is going.

why would anyone shoot a film entirely in Esperanto, then thought of as the coming universal language? Why would anyone have a brilliant stills art-photographer shoot a moving picture? Why would the total context of the movie be a feeling of mythological "always"? Why have the leading man be a (private) person so clearly caught up between classical hero - set everything right by acting - and thinker - the inner seeker of truth?

The concept of the "autor"-movie, the not-so-slick-but-honest-depiction-of-a-necessary- story, is what does it for me. And this is one of them. If you look for faults, that's what you'll find. Look for meaning...