Roger Levy

This was a real education, learning all the words and terms they used, it had me learning and chuckling the whole way through. For instance corn dodgers is simple corn bread, and sofky us sour corn soup, They way they traded insults was very amusing, eg she called the well groomed Texas Marshall a rodeo clown, and they shot each other just as often, after all its the wild west. Excellent locations, excellent clothes and equipment, funny characters the whole way through and not a single caricature. I've known guys like the hard bitten Cogburn with his beady eye and craggy voice. She killed her father's killer and lost part of her life to the expedition, I have the feeling she would have done it all over again if she could choose again.

CLEVER MOVIE I searched for this with Interesting Movies 2024, and since I play Paris in Romeo and Juliet at Highschool many years ago, watched this with interest. It had and lot of plusses, particularly the acting and the collision of theatre and real life, and the back story made if very intriguing. Not just that it was a construction guy playing a Shakespearian part, but that he had a total emotional blockage and a real life shake up that demanded some kind of catharsis. The drama company gave him his life back. I thought at first it would be about the folly of his explosive daughter, but in fact that became insignificant, or should I say it resolved well. The actors made it believable, even tho the age of some members was weird to say the least, in the end I felt good about what they achieved, and it brought some tears to my eyes. I have had some friends commit suicide at that young age, it is a very real problem, particularly around university age with immense pressure on kids and students. Older men tend to drink and smoke themselves to death so it is not seen as suicide but it is somewhat deliberate, and trauma or failure related. Anyway, great drama movie because it is meaningful and heartwarming. I think this was the best example of character development I have seen in a long time. Thanks to the producers

Gutsy, Sympathetic A sympathetic look at adult life, slightly confused, sometimes very messed up but redeemed by friendships. Reminds me of the Movie Pollock with Ed Harris, also gutsy and messed up. How do you counsel someone through a very hard time where they suffer the loss of identity or just have a traumatic time in a relationship. Why die inside just because someone else betrayed you, live a full life in defiance of them. I liked the use of To The Lighthouse references in the story line, subtle but there for a reason. I connect with the story little bit, I have had friends and girlfriends become lesbian, I occasionally have nightmares about failing in my last month of my studies for my degree, funny really. I live alone with a cat, don't like getting old. So yeah, although slow, it was a beautifully crafted story.

SURPRISING STORY I have a daughter who hasn't talked to me for 5 years so I can understand this man's anguish to find a daughter somewhere in North Africa. He hopes that if he finds her and helps her, somehow everything will be alright again. He is very out of his depth at a rave party but perseveres doggedly. He and his son then plunge into a Journey together, an Odyssey to find her, and despite warnings, travel through the harsh Moroccan landscape. It is amazing to think that this area was a breadbasket for the Roman Empire 2000 years ago. Now it is barren, though the desert has its own beauty. It is a slow moving story, at times dreamy and almost surreal, other times gritty and practical, as he learns to trust his new friends. This story has some surprises, not helpful if I talk about events in second half, but that is what makes this story surprising and emotional. Let's say they confront one dilemma after another. The end is a reprieve rather than a victory, as so much of life is. I'd like to congratulate the actors, absolutely believable, dishevelled and loveable, well done. The first bad event is something that happens sadly, has happened in New Zealand, probably a good thing to train kids in. This story puts hedonistic gypsy like westerners in a brutal unforgiving environment, and asks us the question, how do you handle devastating loss.

Script and acting in the opening scenes wandered from trite, to unconvincing, to cliche. This might be fun to watch for someone who likes tense action with a handsome hero who is unflappable and unkillable. Cliche Russian spetsnaz who can't kill a person 20 feet away, and who die with a single shot, aimed from the hip. Naturally no one trusts anyone else, the stakes are global in scale, the bullets are nearly endless and smoke is good for the good guy. Everybody is trying to get an edge on the other guy by lying, threatening and manipulating of course, and a little poison injection which is precisely timed to take effect in one hour, not before. According to the rules of thriller movies, the spies and special forces can have shoot outs and explosions for hours without police showing up to interrupt the flow of the story, the capture of the deadly thing. The movie could have been improved by the arrival half way though of space aliens, some help from teenage ninja turtles and some trick-or-treaters wondering around. Move on people, nothing to see here.

Uncomfortable, 2.5/5 Reeves character is playing a dangerous game, and his efforts to fix a broken down deal just goes from unlucky to awful to stupid. His character gets full marks for being well prepared, except that he hung too much of the deal on a partner he knew was unreliable, especially when you are trying sell $50mil to a heavy mafia don. I guess in the end it was a kind of morality tale where a flawed character who makes selfish decisions finally reeps what he sows. He should have taken advice when given, but I guess he wanted to be loyal to his friends, hence the result. Note Mirny is a place in central Eastern Siberia and does have a large and successful diamond mine, as portrayed. But the movie was shot in Manitoba Canada, hence the Ford F150 pickups in parts of the Mirny story. I did get a good sense of no idea what will happen next or how it will turn out. Did not like the sexual side of the story, cheating on his wife, using his girlfriend. Nevertheless the acting and character portrayal was very good, as also was the use of Russian language, in my opinion well pronounced.

Mortality, Aspirations of Deity, Manipulation I like being made to think. A thought provoking story about AI and real consciousness. Spoiler. Nathan anticipates that the evolution of AI is such that AI "beings" will replace us and relegate us to the fossil collections, and by the end this seems to be where it is heading. Lots of intersecting themes here. Does an intelligent machine know that it is just a machine. Ava feins to like and want Caleb, manipulating him for her escape, so does that make her more human because she understands emotions and manipulates others, just like Nathan does. Or is she more reptilian because she feels no remorse or hesitation. This is something of a dig at Elon Musk and other tech bros who are uber successful and deeply flawed, and above accountability. Nathan says casually I had all the power supply installers killed so they wouldn't reveal any secrets, I mean it could have been a joke, or it could have been true this is never resolved but it is unpleasant at best. I certainly wouldn't feel safe in a secure electronic cage, owned by a reclusive billionaire who doesn't want anything be leaked or disclosed or stolen, and who may also be pretending friendship and lying sometimes, or often. So a beautiful but disturbing setting. The scenes where the androids peel their own silicone skin off are disturbing, making us question why we value beauty so much when it is only skin deep. Caleb is a smart sucker, his own manipulations ensure his own imprisonment and Nathan's death. The next test is for the small Android population to start reproducing itself, to be accepted into the populations and for them to learn or acquire morals in order to be trusted, but that is for a sequel. Maybe the Turing test should be comprehensive: that the Android is self aware, has feelings, can make decisions based on whim, feelings or logic, has morals about what is right and wrong, and has ethics about how to function as part of society, and can love. I notice that Siri for one is very evasive about herself in a conversation, as in she has lots of functions but no personal depth. She ("She") has no more feelings than a toll call switchboard. This is well explored in the movie Her, 2013 with Scarlett Johansson. Flawless acting, great setting, sometimes a little too slow, Also, typical of movies, no indication or mention of how they got supplies, who did the cleaning and maintenance, how he ran his vast empire from his bunker with no apparent effort or communication with the outside world. Or why on his own he could build and program a full Android, and yet could fault find his own power supply- not credible. I like Vikander, she has a special and engaging presence, and Oscar is always credible.

Such a big movie to review, I liked many things including the warmth and humour or sass of Costner, almost a saga. I enjoyed even though the premise, that a postal service of young volunteers can become the inception and spine of a renewed nation is very corny, its still and good story. Ford Lincoln Mercury is equally a hero in the story for his tireless work setting up an actual postal service Abby is gorgeously fresh and lovely, feminine and realistic. Didn't need a nude sceen. Being picky, I was amused how everyone appeared to be dressed by the same designer, could it be a costume department making all those steam punk outfits, hats, fingerless gloves and net scarves? Very interesting changes of scenery and set locations, happy with that. Makes me feel actors are lucky to travel to those places and ride horses etc. Costner certainly likes to be the centre of attention, even if he acts humble, and indulges in self aggrandisement. Sea World was probably the height of that and he was soundly rejected for it. But here it is a little more natural. So happy I watched it through. Really enjoyed seeing Tom Petty having fun with his part, RIP. Like a lot of fantasy movies, they exist on nothing pretty much, no crops, no builders, no trade or resupply of bullets, batteries or kerosine. General Bethlehem houses hundreds of men and horses in an abandoned mine, what do the men and horses eat?? Is it all from marauding? Anyway that just part of the genre, from Narnia to the Postman.

I am watching this movie to get a glimpse into a post apocalypse life. Law and Order has broken down, some population remain, scavenging off each other. The other thing that has broken down is curiosity, talking and gratitude, replaced by fear, bad memories and suspicious silences. Severe silences and not even asking useful questions, like how do you store your water, should we grow some grain, where do you get kerosine, what did you do before and especially what did you do with my shotgun shells, were you planning to kill me??? I hope that they can work it out, but I don't like their chances of everyone surviving. Its a sort of survival of the fittest, or in this case, survival of the most heavily armed. Nice forest, good acting, fire the script writer.

VEry aNOYING MOviWE Very annoyed with the direction trying to make it sound suspenseful a but I felt it made the main character look like an utter fool stumbling around making dumb decisions, clomping with very loud footsteps (sound editing), staggering, looking fearful and paranoid, unhappy worried. Have got to 1:24 and decided I will just FF to the end. Not that interested in the rock after all this. Nice actress, I'm sure she gave it her all, and I think beautiful surroundings spoiled by endlessly moody music. something very lacking here, did not engage me. Rushes to a touching ending, but it left me feeling empty and not mystified and in line with the setting, cold.