You’ve heard this story a thousand times but we’re telling it to you again, whether you like it or not. Yes, that’s usually the sign we’re about to stumble on to one of the animated greats of the millennium when even jokingly we’re told that this story has been retreaded a thousand times. But we’re going to hear it anyway. “Gnomeo & Juliet” is a film that is marketed to someone but I’m not sure whom exactly. It’s too obscure for kids to understand, and too sugary sweet for the adult sector to enjoy.
Tag Archives: Foreign
Assault Girls [Asaruto gâruzu] (2009)
Wow, so Zack Snyder got the idea for “Sucker Punch” from “Assault Girls.” Interesting. Watching 2009’s “Assault Girls,” it was tough not to compile that thought, considering this film and Snyder’s upcoming film all involve gorgeous women having adventures in their imagination to stave off suffering in their own reality, all the while they’re instilled with their own individual personas as applied to their personalities that reflect their powers and weapons during battle. The only difference is, “Assault Girls” chronicles this imagination through a virtual reality system called Avalon that allows the women (whom we never see in actual origin) to become warriors. With “Sucker Punch,” it’ll be based more around fantasies and delusions.
Endhiran/The Robot (2010)
In its homeland it’s a blockbuster film and one that took years to develop to inevitably become “The Robot” or “Enhiran.” It’s garnered some rave reviews from Bollywood critics and has even scored something of a fanbase. But “The Robot” hasn’t caught on until a few years subsequent its initial release due to the internet’s capability of bringing to attention a movie very few have been aware of. Thanks to one person’s capturing of “Endhiran’s” most dazzling and over the top action sequence, this is a science fiction Bollywood film many have sought after its sensation as a web clip.
2069: A Sex Odyssey [Ach jodel mir noch einen – Stosstrupp Venus bläst zum Angriff] (1974)
There is a planet of hot women out there. They want sperm. And they’re coming to Earth for some men who have sperm. Unfortunately where they’re from men are rare, and their race may wither and die without man seed. There’s your plot for “2069” a sex comedy that’s about as stupid but arousing as all of the other porn parodies of the sixties and seventies. True, I refer to it as a porn parody primarily because of its title, but in reality it’s not even a slight spoof on Kubrick’s classic film. It merely borrows the title for the excuse to implement the 69 and is a pretty tame softcore porn and sex comedy that sets down on a group of alien women who happen down on Earth to abduct and sex up a bunch of hapless men to revive their society. What confounds me is how was their planet originally able to reproduce without men around? And are these women hoarding sperm for their planet or are they hoping to become pregnant on their own?
Last Train Home (2009) (DVD)
“You have not tasted the bitterness of life.”
Director Lixin Fang has observed with his deeply moving portrait of a working class family at the brink of destruction that often times life can presents itself a cruel irony that can sting even the kindest and well meaning of individuals, all of whom strive for something that they’ll likely never be able to grasp. Not prone to manipulating his scenery, director Lixin Fang stands back and seemingly lets a story unfold in the midst of chronicling migrant workers in China where he happens upon a small family of workers the Zhangs, all of whom are comprised of five people who struggle to be close to one another, but are hopelessly stuck in a vicious circle that will grant them misery and sadness no matter how much they may reach for a dream.
The Sinister Eyes Of Dr. Orloff (Los ojos siniestros del doctor Orloff) (1973)
Normally I’m a big fan of Jesus Franco’s work as they often border on the delightfully sadoerotic where reality and fantasy are often blurred and dissolve in to bouts of acid like dreams and flashbacks. “The Sinister Eyes of Dr. Orloff” is sadly one of the bigger bores from the Franco library and one that feels like a thirty minute premise stretched in to almost ninety minutes. Factor that in with a goofy villain relaying a hopelessly convoluted devious plot, and you have what is essentially just a glorified Spanish novella that is a take on Svengali.
F (2010)
I think in the end audiences will find the finale of “F” to be rather infuriating for the simple fact that while director Johannes Roberts doesn’t create a very conventional horror film, he also doesn’t opt for a conventional final scene. And viewers awaiting a huge showdown or some sense of comprehension to the extreme events that have occurred throughout the running time of “F,” many will find that it just doesn’t come to a close as many will be expecting. We live in a world where movies explain everything and anything they can. “F” chooses to leave most of its premise a mystery and keeps the motives of its almost supernatural legion of villains a mystery even after the credits have finished rolling.