Our film reviews
Link to the Film class that Deb teaches at Holland Christian High School, Holland, MI Links to our favorite web sites and film reviewersFilms we've been watching
During our Southeast Asia trip, we had lots of free time on our hands. And, in some places, the lure of free videos to accompany our dinner or late night drinks was more than enough to get us to stay. Unfortunately, the bulk of the films we saw weren't great and though it gave us opportunities to lambast "typical Hollywood garbage", we did wish on more than one occasion that we were back in the States with the ability to choose better films to watch.Films we don't recommend
The Beach (Danny Boyle) - read the book. We justified watching it because we were in Thailand (the opening scene did portray the Kao San Road experience quite well), but soon lost interest in it.
Panic Room (David Fincher) - Foster didn't pick a winner with this one. See her other stuff.
Spiderman (Sam Raimi) - If you just want to see what appeals to "the masses" in today's society, check it out. If not, see something that does more than merely entertains
Murder By Numbers (Barbet Schroeder) - Not much to it other than some fairly good suspense. An interesting attempt to create a "strong" female role (Bullock's character), but of course, she has to get saved by a guy in the end.
Films that we could go either way with
The Red Violin (Francois Girard) - some creative parts, some gaps in character and development
Heaven and Earth (Stone) - we read the book and it's better, but Stone does a good job of showing the conflict between cultures and circumstances
Films we recommend
Black Hawk Down (Ridley Scott) - good realism even if a bit propagand-ish
Spring Forward (Tom Gilroy) - an excellent character study
Amelie (Jean-Pierre Jeunet) - fresh, funny, creative. Go see it
My Big Fat Greek Wedding (Joel Zwick) - a comedy we actually liked and, we laughed aloud while we watched it! Makes us wonder what a film about the Dutch-Canadian.American subculture would be like.
The Two Towers (Peter Jackson) - what can we say, we're Jackson and Tolkien fans