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NeliaQ
Reviews
El laberinto del fauno (2006)
like a delicious meal with no desert
Had the director polished the movie a little more, it would have been just magnificent.
There are little sillinesses like a woman familiar to war not knowing she must drop to the floor when shots are flying around her, and a man surviving an attack even after the enemies have wasted (!) bullets shooting at all already fallen men.
But what I mean is Del Toro could have at least linked both stories together. There is the story of real stomach-turning war, and the story of fantastic adventure. I was expecting to see when the fantasy story would finally intervene in the reality chaos, when the girl finally had her childhood imagination validated, and turned the line of events for better. But none of that ever came, which is sad. In the end, it all turns out to be mere childish shows on her head, invisible friends. She was indeed smart enough to poison the bad guy's drink, and rescue her brother, but again none of that changes anything in the sequence of events. Nothing she did made any difference. In fact, her character, and her fantasies, are completely redundant. And that is disappointing.
Fishtales (2007)
it just makes no sense
It is entertaining, yes, comic, made me giggle a few times. And the mermaid actress, Kelly Brook, is dead gorgeous. Her tale is a magnificent prop. And that is about it. This accounts for the two stars.
None of the characters makes any sense. They are all collages of different personalities. And with them, the plot keeps flipping randomly as well.
Amber Savva, the little girl, is such a bad actress it is annoying. Her character is a good swimmer, and yet makes no attempt at all to rescue her drowning father. She has a security-blanket bracelet she fondles with constantly in the beginning, but she doesn't notice it is lost till half a day has passed. There is a visible attempt to make her pass for a mature girl, but all the inconsistencies flunk this.
Her father is such a confused and weak-willed fellow I don't know how he survived high-school, let alone become a professor near an intellectual break-through.
This old Greek servant, if she doesn't live in the house, why was she there one time at night? Why don't people leave their clothes and wallets on a safe place at the beach instead of practically under the waves? This book on the mermaids is said to be really really very old, and yet there are Art Nouveau paintings on the pages. And etc.
There is a strong hint that the mermaid is the lost daughter of the elderly professor, and that he knew of mermaids and had mated with one, and yet, nothing comes of it. There is a strong hint that the bad fisherman (played by the director Alki David himself) drowns and his good son will be adopted by the heroes, but no either. There is claim on the tail's jewels, and yet we hardly see them. There is no reason for a special breathing shell for swimming underwater if the wonder-cave is a few meters from shore and above water level. And etc.
With all these reality flaws, I seriously doubt there is any fundamental truth or logic in the professor's studies on the Classical Greek spells and poems. I mean, the actors don't even look in the correct direction at times...!
It is sad: the story could have been really pretty, but the characters and the plot were so ill-developed you can't but wonder which fourth-grader took over David's mind.
...I have just noticed: the movie is from 2007! Fancy that? I thought it was some twenty years old. Mr. David, get your story straight, and film it again properly. It will make a lovely movie.
August Rush (2007)
oh. my. god.
Did you see the one little painful star I gave it? So you are probably expecting me to tell you to never ever.
Ever.
Waste your time watching this movie. But I shan't. Instead, my friends, I am going to tell you to please, use some of your time watching this movie, so you can come back here and rate it with this one little painful star, as I did. And maybe together, drop by drop, we can lower the average rating on this title. Because a 7.5 star compliment on it is INSULTING. Are these voting people really our neighbours, and leaders, and doctors?? Com'on, ye people of sense and sensibility, join me and suffer this movie and be merry you found the strength and then give it the only rating it deserves.
...
PS: I am not going to elaborate on the "oh-you're-so-mean!" side characters and the sanctified trinity of the main characters and their ridiculously hollow "deep" emotions within their hearts of jelly who have no backbone to ever efficiently stand up for themselves and all they do is cry and moan and dream under the moon and hope that their sorry lives will be solved by cosmical deliverance because they sure won't do a thing since they are made of childish fairy-jelly glow, ...nor on the plot and dialogue silliness, and such, ...because you can read all about it on other reviews.
You know?: Just go watch it. If you cry, please may it be from insult.
Les triplettes de Belleville (2003)
stereotypes? yes, please!
I guess this movie is just culturally boxing. I read many reviews from haters, and I understand what made them hate it. I, however, loved it.
I am Portuguese myself, and have travelled about, and the depictions in the movie are what a foreigner will first unavoidably perceive of a new people. They are not meant to be offensive, but rather to be amusing, exactly because they are so raw and placeable. There are stereotypes of even the creating crew: if they can be self-critic, we can take the joke too. And none of the characters gets ostracized based on their origins, and they find it to team up despite their differences.
There is little to no dialogue, and yet you do get the language of it all, if you pay attention. There are subliminal, intentional messages in every sound you hear. You could be an illiterate 100-word goat-shepherd anywhere in the world and still grasp at what is told, simply because you can see and you can hear.
So, this movie is a humouristic play with human xenophobia, which separates nations, AND with wordless communication, which unites nations. Surely you will appreciate the irony!
Furthermore, the love this granny feels for her detached grandson is admirable and endearing. He rarely acknowledges her, and yet she is completely dedicated to him. What greater devotion is there? (And no, I am not a cheesy chick at all, trust me.) But I admit I may be too biased here: Souza is so much like my grandmother, and the boy so much like my little brother, and the dog so much like one of mine (go ahead, call my family a stereotype).
I advise you to watch this on a cinema or any large screen with a good sound system. The movie thrives mostly on unusual visuals and audios. It has its little bads, but it always makes my spirits dance!
Illicit Dreams 2 (1997)
soft-porn with a decent context-story
If you are looking for old-style nudity and near-porn, but still care for a decently amusing plot, you can't go wrong with this movie. It must have been pretty obscene at the time of its release, but now it should be no more than regular for the current nude-fan. If you are looking for a great, memorable movie, this is not it. But then I guess you knew that already. I didn't.
I started watching this movie with no expectations whatsoever. I knew none of the actors, nor ever heard of the previous title. I found it amongst my roommate's stuff, and having nothing to watch, put it on. Well, at the first inexplicably long, gratuitous and counter-plot sex scene, I understood the kind of movie this was...
Now, considering that the movie's purpose is to hump the viewer's leg, which lowers any intellectual expectations, the plot is decent enough actually, and the acting not that bad. So I watched on. There is just enough of character depth and development, story realism, and suspense, to justify the time lost watching it. Even when one of the characters does some weighing on life and death, flash-backing on events known to us (including, of course, sex scenes), which feels too fake and forced in the story, you tolerate it, because you know the movie isn't trying to pass for a master-piece.
Needless to say I skipped all the annoying sex scenes. These go on for minutes at a time, completely irrelevant, and a couple of them difficult to place in the plot (are they mere fantasies or did they really happen?).
So, this is an honest, "nice" movie: it will be evident soon enough that it is about soft-porn, but it comes with the bonus of a minimally entertaining context-story.