Night of the Living Dead (1968)

After the disappointment of Evil Dead, I was flipping through my TiVo suggestion list and saw that Romero's classic had been recorded. I'd never had the chance to see it and, since the trick-or-treaters were still ringing my bell, I had to be in the living room anyway.

Well, it's superb. Such a simple story, told without flash. Chilling.

A-

The Evil Dead (1981)

This is one of those movies that I've held dear in memory. I was telling my older son that it's silly but scary and rented it for Halloween night in eager anticipation of sharing it with him.

Well, it is kinda funny...for a while. The problem is that we were laughing at the effects and acting rather than any intended jokes in the script. The stop-motion stuff is cheesy and the actors are more wooden than the volunteers for spiritual skits at my summer camp ever were.

If you want to see superb Raimi and Bruce Campbell action, rent Army of Darkness instead.

D+

No End in Sight (2007)

Much more even-handed than Why We Fight -- the documentarian asked provocative questions of his subjects but, for the most part, just let the people involved talk. Eye-opening, to say the least.

I got a lot more information about what's going/has gone on in Iraq over the last several years (e.g. the museums were looted despite ORHA's specific warnings that it -- and several other potential targets -- should be guarded due to their importance). I've never been a conspiracy theorist, but I'm slightly tempted to subscribe to that way of thinking now.

Much of what we were told makes me embarrassed to be American.

A-

Why We Fight (2006)

Somewhat interesting, but rather scattershot, documentary about the current war in Iraq.

I don't feel as though it really provided the answer its title implied it would, but there's still plenty to ponder. I'm looking forward to seeing "No End in Sight" -- maybe that one will be more cohesive.

C+

Mr. Brooks (2007)

So, Costner is Brooks -- a happily-married "man of the year" serial killer with a split personality who's now dealing with 1) a nutty wannabe (Dane Cook) who witnessed one of the bloody art creations and 2) the possibility that his college-age daughter shares his hobby.

There may be a few too many things going on, but it's surprisingly watchable -- the split personality played by two actors worked well, and Dane Cook's not too horrible.

B

The King of Kong: A Fistful of Quarters (2007)

Probably the best movie I saw all year.

It's amazingly entertaining -- the story of a family man without too many successes in his life deciding to go for the record on Donkey Kong and what happens along the way. And, boy, what happens along the way is bizarre.

It's dramatic, touching, crazy, and maddening -- you can't make stuff like this up. Loved it.

A+

28 Weeks Later (2007)

Starts off strong, but then just settles into a "nothing is going to go well until the credits roll" exhaust-a-thon where "yeah-right" conveniences abound. My older son watched the first two-thirds and then got bored with it.

Unfortunately, the little teaser at the ends betrays the fact that they're looking at the possibility of a sequel, this time set in Paris. Is that supposed to make it good?

C-

Leonard Cohen: I'm Your Man (2006)

We find out precious little about Cohen in this documentary, just short personal stories tucked between numbers from a Canadian concert in Cohen's honor.

There are a couple of really good performances -- Antony's in particular stands out, both Gary and I were moved to tears (you can stream a snippet of it from this page, but I can't figure out how to simply link the snippet itself) -- but most are perfunctory. Still, I choose boring over the grotesque performances by Rufus and Martha Wainwright. They both seemed to think the concert was about them rather than Cohen. Ew.

In short, Antony was great, Teddy Thompson's was really good -- the rest were either blah or downright disgusting.

D+

The Butterfly Effect (2004)

I saw this a few years back and decided to make it my pick for our thrill-a-thon. I was impressed the first time and none of my enthusiasm has dimmed. It's well-crafted and smart -- a real original.

I prefer the director's cut ending to the theatrical, but in both cases the movie leading up to the end is masterful.

Still an A

1408 (2007)

Lots of the sequences were well-done, but I couldn't get past the whole "what the HELL" aspect. Was the room possessed? Cursed? Was John Cusack supposed to be insane? I mean, really. I can just go with it if I know that's what's expected -- but I genuinely thought that there'd be something to this.

Probably my fault for looking for meaning in what was simply meant to be a never-ending queue of "Now THIS happens. Now THIS. And look out -- here's THIS." Some of it was scary, but it was also wearying and, ultimately, pointless.

D+

Scream (1996)

My annual "the guys are camping" movie marathon was almost thwarted this year by the fact that the guys decided not to go camping. The next best thing I could think of was to push them out of the house anyway so that I could have a girls' movie night with my sister and her daughter.

Since it was near Halloween, we decided to go for horror movies and thrillers -- and what better way to start than the lightweight Scream? My niece had never seen it and I was excited to see it again.

Unfortunately, this is a movie that apparently doesn't hold up to repeat viewings very well. The "whodunit" aspect is spoiled and since I wasn't trying to figure out what was going on, I was free to focus on the wooden acting (Skeet Ulrich and Rose McGowan were offenders in this category) and the pacing weaknesses.

Still, pretty fun and not bad as an "ease into them" scary movie.

B-

A Walk in the Sun (1945)

"It's a walk that leads down through a Philippine town and it hits Highway seven North of Rome..." That's an actual lyric from one of the many ballads on the movie's soundtrack. The words were so ridiculously specific that they were pretty hysterical.

The movie was stuffed with blandly delivered and unbelievable dialogue along the lines of "what are you thinking about?" "An apple." "An apple? They're pretty good." "Yep, an apple. And I don't even really like apples." "You don't like apples?" Arrrgh. I mean, are these supposed to be men taking part in a terrifying war or a '50s instructional film on polite conversational topics suitable for a quilting bee?

While watching this, bored out of my mind, I got in the mood to watch a more authentic take on the hardships of WWII -- so my son and I pulled out Saving Private Ryan. If this movie was unbearable before, finishing it up after viewing SPR made everything seem even more amateur.

D+

Saving Private Ryan (1998)

Saw this originally in the theater and it pretty much blew me away. It's not as powerful on the small screen OR the second time around, but it's still a pretty darn good war movie.

My one complaint would be the present-day bookending -- that's a device I think rarely works (another example is The Bridges of Madison County).

B+