Dark City (1998)

Directed by:  Alex Proyas (The Crow has long been one of my favourite movies, to the point where I dressed up as The Crow a couple times for Hallowe’en)

Written by: Proyas, David S. Goyer and Lem Dobbs

Starring: Rufus Sewell, Kiefer Sutherland, Jennifer Connelly, William Hurt, Richard O’Brien, Melissa George and David Wenham.

What it’s about: a man, having awoken with no memories of himself, seeks to uncover the mystery behind himself and the ever-changing city he lives in

Alternate B-Movie Title: The Strangers Come When You Sleep

Movie Mash Up: The Matrix + The 13th Floor + Memento + Metropolis

What I liked: so much of this movie.  Even re-watching it years later, I still take new things away from it.  It’s a murder mystery, but not at all.  It’s an amnesia story, but not at all.  The acting is great, very noir-inspired.  The movie is gorgeous.  Melissa George is mostly naked in it.  It’s menacing, and has a great ending that delivers a twist/answer that doesn’t feel like a cheat at all.

What I disliked: watching so much “Buffy the Vampire Slayer” recently had me convinced throughout the entire movie that Armin Shimerman was the actor playing Mr. Hand.  Turns out it was Richard O’Brien, and I disliked that.  Other than that, the movie is excellent across the board.

Would I recommend it to anyone?: Yes, it’s a great story, even better than The Matrix (which was released the following year), and criminally overlooked.  It’s a bit scary, and has a wonderful, satisfying ending.

Rating: 5 / 5

Rounders (1998)

I remember seeing Rounders in a theatre, and many times over the years because it is a good movie to provide background noise and drop into occasionally.  If you’ve never heard of it, well that’s odd, since there is no way the World Poker Tour or any of its variants would be as popular as they are these days if it weren’t for this movie.  It’s a very clichéd movie, but pleasingly so.  The lines that come out of some of the characters mouths have little to no weight to them, but they are meant to be powerful to one another.  The storyline is one we’ve seen over and over again, but again, it is pleasing and entertaining.

When I last wrote a review for Rounders, I gave it full marks, five out of five.  I can’t do that anymore.  It’s a very good movie, with decent drama and mounting tension when Mike McDermott (Matt Damon) finally gets near the end of his rope thanks to the near-crippling debt Worm (Edward Norton) has put him in, but it never feels out of control.  Kind of like the Ocean’s Trilogy, in that yes, they are constantly in danger, but they are just too cool to go down like that.

There’s some decent acting going on here as well, notably the scenery-chewing of Norton and John Malkovich as a Russian poker player, as well as the toned-down performances of Damon and Martin Landau.  Gretchen Mol also appears, and I believe this was the movie that was going to catapult her into “It Girl” status.  That never really panned out, though she certainly had a great look to her (and being completely male here, a fantastic rack), and it wouldn’t be until just recently where she started achieving any notable stardom with her role on “Boardwalk Empire”.

Very good movie, easy to watch, enjoyable performances, and easily the best Poker movie of all time.  Not that I can recall seeing enough to justify making a list of that type.  I need to upgrade my original DVD version to the Blu-Ray, because it isn’t anamorphic and looks goddamn stupid.

3.5 / 5

The Negotiator (1998)

In the interest of full disclosure, the first time I reviewed this movie, I gave it a full 5 stars.  I’m posting that review here now, and I still love the movie, but I don’t think it’s a 5 star movie anymore.  There are some beats in the film that just detract from the overall package, but I still think it’s a fine thriller, one where the director, F. Gary Gray, plays with the audiences sympathies and makes you question exactly who is good and bad.

F. Gary Gray took time out from making music videos and movies specifically targetting the black audience to direct this action / suspense / thriller. Sadly after directing this movie, he went on to underwhelm me with the Marky Mark Italian Job and the disappointing Be Cool, as well as some crappy Vin Diesel movie that I never had any desire to see. Now I’m not saying Gray is a middling director or anything like that, just that The Negotiator will probably end up being the best movie he ever made (Note: the only new feature he’s released since Be Cool was the alright Law Abiding Citizen).

Gray is certainly responsible for crafting a masterfully suspenseful police movie, but I probably never would have come across this movie if it weren’t for the two stars of it. Samuel L. Jackson stars as Danny Roman, a hostage negotiator for the Chicago police force, ironicly forced to take hostages in an attempt to prove his innocence after being accused of corruption and murder. Kevin Spacey is Chris Sabian, a negotiator from a different district that Roman requests be brought in to help prove his innocence. Problem is, Sabian’s so damned good at his job that he doesn’t care about the accusations leveled at Roman, he just wants to get the hostages out, alive and well.

The supporting cast is absolutely fantastic, featuring late greats J.T. Walsh and John Spencer, as well as familiar character actor faces like Ron Rifkin, the underrated David Morse, and good ol’ Paul Giamatti, back when he seemingly couldn’t get roles that didn’t require him to be fucking annoying. Some of them are good cops, some are hostages, all do an excellent job with their performances, hitting all the right notes. These are veteran actors and they know exactly what they’re doing, and Gray looks even better as a director thanks to them.

It says a lot for the writing team of James DeMonaco and Kevin Fox, when you’re actually wondering how everything’s going to turn out in the end. The entire premise of the movie has to be given away in the trailers, there’s no big surprises there, and that’s the nature of the beast. Throughout the rest of the movie there are plot twists and revelations that consistently keep you on the edge of your seat, leaving you wondering if there’s going to be a happy ending for Danny Roman after all.

There’s a lot to love about The Negotiator, but the chemistry between Spacey and Jackson is easily number one on my list. Their line deliveries, how they seem to be savouring every syllable, and still making their characters seem real and believable, is truly awe-inspiring and surprising in a movie that many might dismiss beforehand as a cookie cutter police procedural. Truly an excellent movie, and it makes me miss watching Kevin Spacey movies, though I don’t know if I’ll be able to buy him as Lex Luthor in the new Superman flick (Note: he was believable enough, but the movie absolutely sucked).

4.5 / 5

Can’t Hardly Wait (1998)

Here’s another movie where I had a ready-made review already written up, and my opinions of it haven’t changed.  It’s a little dated, but there’s so many awesome future big names in it, that it just surpasses any negative feelings one could have about it.  Hell, this time I noticed Jason Segel for the first time!  My old review:

Co-Directed and co-written by the crack teen comedy team of Harry Elfont and Deborah Kaplan, Can’t Hardly Wait boasts a cast list of future character actors and future bouncing “Ghost Whisperer” Jennifer Love Hewitt. It also features a soundtrack of bands that, well… nowadays you might be a bit embarassed to have in your CD collection. Can you imagine someday in the future when that inevitable question will pop up from one of your kids: “Daddy, what’s a Smashmouth?” You’ll smile, shake your head embarassingly and tell them to go exercise on their Wii.

The premise behind CHW (as its fans refer to it) is fairly simple: it’s graduation day and everyone’s going to the big insane party at the Girl Whose Party It Is’ (Michelle Brookhurst) house. Now that school hottie Amanda Beckett (Hewitt) has finally broken up with meathead football hero Mike Dexter (Peter Facinelli), everyone’s favourite nice guy Preston Meyers (Ethan Embry) plans to finally reveal his love of Amanda to her (Note: Amandas will always break your heart in the end).  Preston’s best gal pal and borderline sociopath Denise Fleming (Lauren Ambrose) does her best to talk Preston out of foolishly putting his heart on the line. Try-hard white boy Special K (Seth Green) just wants to lose his virginity, and supernerd William (Charlie Korsmo) just wants revenge on Mike Dexter.

All of these combustible elements arrive at the same party, a party the likes of which you and I have never seen before. It’s a party where you’re thankful you can probably identify with at least one character, because you sure can’t identify with the actual party (unless these parties actually happen and everyone hates me and doesn’t invite me you fucking bastards!). Future C-list celebrities populate this party, and there’s a plethora of “HEY, it’s That Guy/Girl/Buffy Actor” moments. I’m sure there has to be at least one drinking game based on CHW and those have to be one of the “Take a shot!” moments.

The movie itself is fairly entertaining, though mostly in a car crash kind of way. There’s just so much going on, so many converging plotlines and cameo appearances to take note of, that the movie fails as a cohesive whole. Most of that can be blamed on the large amount of cuts the filmmakers had to make just to get this movie a PG-13 rating, which ultimately affects the overall quality of the film. This isn’t a timeless high school comedy by any means. It’s a high school movie that is relevant to a specific period of time and will be enjoyed most by people who were pop culturally cognizant at that time.

I would go so far as to suggest that this movie would benefit from an Unrated DVD release package, hopefully for a 10th Anniversary edition in a couple years. There’s a lot of storylines that could be fleshed out better in an R-rated atmosphere, much like the American Pie movies did. Those movies didn’t have to pull any punches or make any silly cuts to preserve a rating and they did monster business at the box office. For now though, the PG-13 rated version of CHW is still an entertaining hour and a half that will probably pleasantly or horrifyingly remind you of your own high school experiences.

3.5 / 5

Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels (1998)

After watching Sherlock Holmes yesterday, I decided upon a new sort of format for this blog.  And just now I decided to not completely go with it.  I’m a flip-flopper!  I was going to say that if I had access to them, I’d watch movies in franchises and themes or directors, etc. some sort of tangential thing tying them together.  Then I decided that’s too much work, and it doesn’t necessarily give me the opportunity to still watch movies I want to watch.  And occasionally, I’m going to watch movies I don’t want to watch because a blog featuring just somewhat positive movie reviews is boring.  Which is why I’ll be watching shit like I Don’t Know How She Does It, and yes I am fully prepared to eat my judgmental words if it doesn’t suck.  Like that’ll happen.

Anyways, this is writer and director Guy Ritchie’s theatrical film debut, and much like Reservoir Dogs and Pulp Fiction did for Quentin Tarantino, the release of Lock, Stock ended up with a bunch of movies being released that were Ritchie-esque.  Mostly forgettable affairs across the pond here.  Lock, Stock wasn’t just Ritchie’s debut, as also Jason Statham and Vinnie Jones also made their acting debuts.  The premise behind the movie is that four young lads get in over their heads and lose a tonne of money to a local heavy and then resort to shady dealings to save their own arses.  There’s a vast cast of supporting characters, and everyone figures into the climatic scenes.  It’s quite well done, actually.

There’s nothing really superb about the acting in the movie, though Statham certainly stands out, as does the late Lenny McLean who died one month before the film saw release.  When you’re watching a movie with a diverse ensemble cast, it’s not the acting performances that move the movie along, it’s the story and the roles the actors play and it’s a solid achievement that with a cast as large as this movie has, it’s not a confusing movie at all.

The film was shot in what appears to be a washed-out sepia tone style, somewhat like O Brother, Where Art Thou? and it’s odd that I never really noticed it in previous viewings.  All worship the might of Blu-Ray!  It’s a fun, clever, heist romp that I would recommend to all.

4 / 5

3 Ninjas: High Noon at Mega Mountain (1998)

WHAT IS THIS I DONT EVEN

I mean, I could have just as easily left the write-up like that and it would amount to pretty much the exact way I felt while watching this movie.  Directed by Soul Surfer‘s Sean McNamara (whom should always be referred to as 3 Ninjas: High Noon at Mega Mountain director from now on), it’s hilariously terrible, even for being a cheesy family action movie.  The action scenes are like a child’s version of a Jackie Chan fight scene.  The stuntmen switch out with the 3 Ninjas almost non-stop and there appears to be no coverage shot for some of the transitions.

One of the 3 Ninjas looks like a girl, which isn’t an insult just hilarious.  Hulk Hogan, Jim Varney and Loni Anderson provide the “star power” for this movie, and I don’t know what they were told about this movie (LIES), so I can’t tell if they were all “ah fuck it” or just trying their hardest.  I pretty much hate A Fistful of Cult’s Matt Conway for challenging me to watch this movie.

Ugh, when Hulk Hogan showed up for the defusing the bomb scene, I seriously hoped he was just going to run up and legdrop the fuck out of that thing.  I would have given it half a star for that.

0 / 5

Godzilla (1998)

Ugh.  What a terrible, horrible, ill-conceived idea.  I will give you my rating right now, 1.5 / 5… probably.. I might change that, but it was not good.  And lucky You!  I collected the Tweets I made on the movie while I was watching it!  It’s better than my Source Code commentary, I promise you, because bullet points are easier to read!