rcltasman Reviews

Secret Window (2004)

Standard, predictable story with an unoriginal theme.

[5/10 · 31 January 2005]

The movie has some issues. One of them is Depp's character, a person you just can't sympathize with. From the beginning of the movie, his continuous sarcastic remarks, his talking alone, his pleasure in isolation (common for certain writers, we could say), all point towards the possibility that something is very wrong with him.

Then there's the story itself. The movie begins slow -- very slow. We see Depp's character lying all day on his couch, only being interrupted by the strange character played by Turturro. Then Depp goes back to sleep, and we wait. Then the housemaid interrupts him. Then, slowly, the movie begins to change its pace. Fortunately, it starts to move a little faster.

As usual, when watching a thriller, the point is trying to discover the mystery. A good thriller will have you constantly reinventing the ending, and even then it will manage to surprise you with something you just didn't expect. In Secret Window, however, it is interesting that just after about 40 minutes into the 90-minute movie we all came to the same conclusions about who Shooter, really is - or better yet, what he isn't.

If you have already seen David Fincher's Fight Club (a very good movie, in my opinion) or movies with a similar theme, it is possible you won't enjoy this movie. This is just more of the same - only not as complex, and just adapted to be yet another "log cabin" story with a very thin cast.

Final Voyage (1999)

Below-average among bad movies

[2/10 · 18 July 2003]

If you have noticed, until now (July 2003), this movie doesn't have a "Goofs" category. The only reason I can find for this is that it has so many that it is pointless to list them. The movie alone, along with its ridiculous story and characters, is a goof.

Everything in this cheap movie is so "goofy" that it is possible that the larger part of its "budget" was spent on the cruise ticket and rented filming equipment. Obviously, a lot of effort was invested into making a movie this bad.

1.5/10

Say It Isn't So (2001)

One of the best..

[2/10 · 3 February 2003]

comedy flops of this century (so far), this movie lacks everything that it should have in order to be a good comedy movie: Understandable dialogues, any logic in the screenplay and good gags. Instead, the result is a collage of absurdly mixed scenes and dialogues that are more disgusting than they are funny.

After performing in "Bowfinger" (a satire on B movies), Heather Graham has finally managed to act in a movie that is actually bad.

• 3 out of 10 -

The Interview (1995)

Good start, mediocre end

[2/10 · 30 March 2001]

The movie starts very interesting, as a kind of adventure-thriller with a journalist who is ready to give anything just to get to talk with a Father Stephen. However, once he finds the Father, it seems as if the director didn't know what to add next to the movie, and thereby changes the story of the movie so many times that in the poorly composed end you just don't know anymore what the movie was really about.

Added to this, some of the people who acted in the movie did their part so bad that it just leaves a lot to wish for.

This movie is maybe just a victim of a low-budget production, but I am sure that much more could have been done with much less, and the movie would have been better than this.

Interlocked: Thrilled to Death (1998)

A regular plot with a bad cast

[23 March 2001]

Even though I think this movie doesn't deserve more than a 4 out of 10, I'd say that with just a little more dedication from the director and a better-chosen cast (maybe real actors instead of soap opera stars), this movie could have been saved to become at least somehow entertaining. Yet some of the actors seem to try so hard to play their roles as well as possible that they overact it. Others, in exchange, act as if they were reading every line directly from a script. And not to mention the goofs -like the birth of a baby that is evidently more than three weeks old, just as an example- and plot holes that a good director would have never left in a movie.

If you try to look over those details, I think that you could enjoy this 90-minute movie, as the story is nonetheless interesting.

Breakdown (I) (1997)

One of the best parts of Kurt Russell

[14 September 2000]

I have never seen Kurt Russell do his part so good as in this movie. It is totally different from the old roles he's played in the two "Escape From..." movies. In this movie he no longer plays the Rambo-type super-hero, here he's just the normal Joe who's become, along with his wife, the victim of a group of relentless kidnapers.