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sylvanian
Reviews
The Lobster (2015)
Just a poor movie
The movie has some good ideas and intentions, but it is just a poorly done boring movie. You could have ideas AND shoot a great movie at the same time, this is not the case.
The Expendables 2 (2012)
Chain of fighting scenes with little else
An amazingly empty movie. A primitive and naive plot seems to be created with one goal - to chain a number of fighting and shooting scenes. The scenes are realistic in the sense of blood and gore, but completely unrealistic in the number of bad guys easily shot with no wounds for the protagonists. The rest is rather a a not-so-logical action it in a hard-to-believe context.
The lack of belief is in everything from the main line to details. Take for the start the escape of the team in the starting scene where they rappel along the electric wire easily passing many poles on the way as if they go along a cable line. Or their complete unprofessional behavior when they fall in a trap... Or loads of plutonium in a mine in Albania. The creators did little to make everything at least a little believable like good action movies do.
In its bare-action approach, it reminds me some old Chuck Norris movies.. well and Chuck Norris is, of course, in the movie too. And this is the only thing in this film that justifies watching - all macho heroes or Hollywood, together in one movie, cracking jokes and their usual phrases like I will be back. This turns some part of the movie into a parody and make it bearable. Having it all more like a parody would be a winning move, but most of the movie is to serious and doesn't look like a parody, so it doesn't work.
Okhota na Piranyu (2006)
James Bond with Russian Soul
A fun to watch action movie, which falls somewhere between James Bond and Chuck Norris movies (well, indeed, with a bit of Die Hard and Rambo accent). A Russian super-agent with bare hands (at the start) against a band of heavily armed hunt party lead by an arch-villain Prokhor, a sole survivor of an accident in a secret weapon facility. As you can guess, at the end the hero kills them all (a-la Norris), saves his girl (a-la-Bond) and the world as well. With all similarities to the major agent-saves-the-world series, the movie has a lot of Russian specifics and as a result could be interesting to watch for the lovers of the genre.
Just do not dig too deep. Some parts of the plot are rather naive and some do not fit together well, but it was not made to think about it. Use it as prescribed - to relax after a long day of work.
Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince (2009)
From bad to worse
I find it hard to trust IMDb ratings nowadays. The only way for this movie to get almost 8 stars is to get a lot of reviews sponsored by the producers. And if you look at many positive reviews, they really look artificial, just like advertising.
The movie is not horrible, it is simply mediocre, but I rated it 4 instead of 5-6 because it is much worse that it could be. HP5 was an easy book to make a nice movie. It is not Tolkien's Two Towers. Just get a set of most critical and interesting episodes, chain together, and here we are. The problem is that one HP film after another, the selection of episodes is getting worse, moreover, as if there is nothing happening in the book, the screenplay suggests more and more things, which never happened in the book. And these "extras" looks not only alien to any reader, but mostly plain naive and stupid. Like burning of the Burrow in this movie. I guess, to match the quality of added episodes, the screenplay selected many less interesting episodes (leaving out many really important ones) and, in addition, tried to play down the excitement replacing it by cheap attempts to catch some laughter in the audience. So, it looks like the centerpiece of this movie is Lavender-Ron romance, which gives both actors a lot of chances to look stupid and to catch some laugh. And to make sure that everyone will get it and can laugh, it is filmed in an oversimplified comic way. As a result, the movie become not just a set of illustrations to HP5, which is interesting, but only makes sense as a book companion (if would not be that bad), but rather mix of fragments, caricatures, and plain fantasies. Why all that? It could be such a nice movie... I do not know whom to blame. This movie has the same author behind the screenplay - the one who gave us excellent HP1. I guess, the director has to be blamed, but it is too late to do anything about it. Most of the actors play really well, camera and effects are also good. But nothing can save the movie.
So, if you are a book fan, do not come to this movie in theaters. I guess, you will still need to see it, at least to have a chance to write a bad review. But wait until it is on DVD to rent it cheap from Netflix.
Ne boysya, ya s toboy (1981)
A hidden gem
It is one of my favorite Soviet movies. Unusual combination of good actors, nice music and songs, and some mystical spirit turn a relatively simple plot a nice movie to see again and again. It is hard to imagine a movie, which brought together people from very different walks of life such as great Russian actors Durov and Jursky, a famous stunt man and circus actor Kantemirov, and a composer/singer Polad Bul' Bul Ogly. But it was done and it appears to be great. Add to it nice mountain scenery, interesting historical context, and really great songs.
What else you may wish?
Premonition (2007)
Good idea, poor implementation
I like the idea of the movie where main actor somehow lives through a week of her life in non-sequential order desperately trying to stop the death of her husband. Well, but the scriptwriter and the director should make it at least reasonably plausible and consistent to let people who get used to a somewhat consistent plots to enjoy the movie. The implementation has several inconsistencies - most well commented are the scars that appear while the husband still alive, yet not there in the first day after his death. For a movie, which pretends to be something by getting popular actors, it is hard to excuse. The end contradicts the rest of the movie too. Pity. Such an interesting idea - with good actors. What a waste of time. Well, I was in the plane. US Airways choose to run this movie for half a month. I wish US Airways too to be more attentive to UMDB movie ratings.
Beloe solntse pustyni (1970)
One of the best Russian films of all times
An unusual combination of humor, whiz, and lyrics that appeals to almost everyone. Great actors. Great songs.