Movie & Video reviews

Ben Dugan

1/12/2006 - Starsky & Hutch (2004) – The recent trend of popular sitcom remakes continues with the effort of the Starsky and Hutch program we all remember from our days of yesteryear. Who can forget the cool red car with the white stripe that goes over the top and sides? This film is funny almost from the beginning. It stars all of the current funny-men: Will Ferrell, Vince Vaughn, Owen Wilson, and Ben Stiller. Ben Stiller’s character is a little weak, but it still works as a comedy. Most of the popular sitcom remakes are entirely awful and the original actors often say they walked out it was so bad. This was true with Robert Conrad and Wild Wild West; and I don’t think any one was too proud of McHale’s Navy or Leave it to Beaver, both made in 1997. Next they’ll make Fantasy Island and Love Boat or The Andy Griffith Show (that would be kind of hard to make without Andy Griffith).

  Starsky and Hutch is a genuine surprise and a clever and funny send up of the popular TV series from the 1970s.
  Starsky and Hutch has a great time poking fun at the clichés of its genre. It does a fine job satirizing the fashions, trends and music of the 1970s in all of their tackiness. A clever “in-joke” in the movie has Hutch (Wilson) singing an acoustic version of "Don't Give Up On Us," the sappy number-one hit recorded by the original Hutch, David Soul, in 1977.

  The plot is predictable and funny and yet serves its purpose.

  This film is recommended for entertainment value and is one of the better television show remakes made in recent years. The original actors who played Starsky and Hutch even had a cameo in the movie, proving that they supported the effort.

  It serves as fun entertainment and I will be adding this one to my DVD collection as well.

Flight of the Phoenix (2004) – The level of how bad this movie is--it's below contempt and is insulting to one’s intelligence. This remake of the great 1965 film Flight of the Phoenix was completely awful. Jimmy Stewart starred in the original and did a much better job.

  Dennis Quaid plays Capt. Frank Towns, a hardnosed cynic who has been paid to fly a group of newly unemployed Mongolian oilrig workers back to civilization. He doesn't really care much about his human cargo; he just wants to get them out, so that he can get on with things. The drill site's chief operator (Miranda Otto) argues with him, telling him that she's confident she can get oil pumping, but he won't hear of any dissent. The rest of the crew is a mish mash of characters: including a one-eyed, beefy African-American guitarist (Kirk Jones), a Mexican-American chef (Jacob Vargas), a spiritually minded Saudi (Kevork Malikyan), a stuffy corporate executive (Hugh Laurie), and a nerdy mechanic (Giovanni Ribisi).

  All the main characters give a fair representation of the original. Most of the cast just seem to be window dressing for a younger audience. If you have insomnia or can't get to sleep one night, rent this movie. It's better than Tylenol p.m. or Unisom. 

The Perfect Score (2004) - This is an MTV film and comes across as a mix between Ocean’s Eleven and the Breakfast Club. It is a coming of age movie and enjoyable.

  The plot: Six unlikely friends band together to break into the Educational Testing Service (ETS) building in Princeton, NJ in order to steal the answers to the upcoming SATs. The plan begins with Kyle (Chris Evans) and his best friend Matty (Bryan Greenburg). Kyle is an aspiring architect who dreams of going to Cornell University in Ithaca. He needs at least a 1430, but he got a 1020 on his first crack at the tests. He's afraid that he's too "average" for the SAT. Matty wants to go to the University of Maryland for one reason--his girlfriend Sandy goes there--and unfortunately for Matty, he's not too bright. The duo soon realizes that a fellow classmate's father owns the ETS building, so they ask Francesca (Scarlett Johansson) to help them out. Francesca is a rich punk girl who would love nothing more than to stick it to her father, who pays more attention to his 20-year-old girlfriends than to her. Kyle also tells Anna (Erika Christensen) about the plan because he has a "feeling" about her. Anna is second in the class and is an overachiever who is trying hard to fulfill her parents' expectations, which include getting into Brown University. Anna secretly has other wishes. The first time Anna took the test, she froze after reading a story problem about a woman on a subway in New York. A high school basketball star, Desmond, comes to Anna for help. He is a great ball-player, but his academics aren't quite up to par, and he needs a 900 to get into St. John's College. Each student had a reason for stealing the SATs, and yet, each of them found a reason not to as well.

  This was a movie made for teenagers, but works as a cheap rental as well. It is enjoyable for all ages.

The Toy (1982) – This is a charming movie. This movie was the big thing when I was in high school and it made its rounds on cable. I think I watched it every time it came on. The late Richard Pryor was at the top of his game when this film was made. Jackie Gleason also stars and is at the top of his game as well. He only made a couple more movies before he died in 1986. This is a movie for all ages.

  The young son of a rich business tycoon comes home from military school to visit and decides he wants Jack Brown (Richard Pryor) as his new toy. Richard Pryor plays an unemployed journalist who wants a job on U.S. Bates’ (Gleason) newspaper. There is no job available for him. Jackie Gleason hires Pryor to be a Toy for his son for the week he is home. The plot allows Richard Pryor to be Richard Pryor, having him involved in all sorts of pratfalls and various predicaments with the kid.

  This is a family movie that teaches us how important family values are. Gleason’s character neglects his son and does not care what he does, until he realizes that he is ignoring his son. This movie is entertaining and was very big back in the day. If you can find it on the rental shelf, I would recommend the rental.

Seven

Review by Travis Lavan 

  Most people aren’t very good at acknowledging their own flaws. Nobody likes to be wrong, everyone wants to be liked and many of us feel that once we admit to being less than perfect, we lose the respect of others.

  It takes a lot of effort to become the type of person who can face up to his or her own flaws, and it takes even more effort to realize that not all flaws are necessarily inadequacies. By understanding and being able to cope with what makes us human – warts and all – one can grow into a self assured, confident yet truly compassionate individual.

  This is the type of man Detective Lt. William Somerset (Morgan Freeman) has become. Many years as a police detective and many more years of thoughtful self examination have transformed him into the sort of philosophical, intellectually centered person you generally only see as the wizened old master in Sunday morning kung fu movies. Somerset applies the same measured, thoughtful approach to his detective work that he does to his own life.

  Up to the point where we meet him, this has worked out pretty well for him.

  On the other hand, his partner David Mills (Brad Pitt) is the far more brash and idealistic type--who became a police officer to right the wrongs of the world and has let society’s seemingly insatiable appetite for self destruction turn him into a cynical, doubting young man. The one thing in his life that gives him grounding and happiness is his lovely young bride, Tracy (Gwynneth Paltrow). If David’s existence is all too clouded by resentful uncertainty, Tracy certainly seems to provide him with his sole source of guiding light through it all.

  So when the two detectives are assigned to investigate a grisly string of killings by a madman with a messiah complex (Kevin Spacey), it promises to put their competing philosophies and personalities to the test. Is William all talk? Will his nuts-and-bolts analysis of the human condition play out in real life, or will he turn out to be a fraud who is indeed governed by his passions? Will David’s idealistic notions about humanity – coupled with his inherent disbelief that humans will ever live up to this ideal – push him over the edge and be his undoing?

  The killer in question had concluded that society is too sick to survive, and that he alone can expose the vile wages of sin to a seemingly agnostic society through his own actions. His modus operandi involves recreating the seven deadly sins one by one, sacrificing along the way one innocent victim after another, leaving them behind as grisly calling cards of his personal crusade against society.

  In the killer’s mind, only the virtuous are innocent, the wicked deserve to die, but murder itself is not wicked when performed in the name of God.

  Fertile ground indeed. Just as a word cannot define itself, one has to wonder if the same rule applies to sin. Is it logical, let alone ethical to use sin to define and expose sin? Our killer seems to think so, and over the course of their investigation the fraternal bonds of brotherhood all police share will be strained between our two detectives and their core values as human beings will be challenged in a way neither of them could have predicted. In the end, the very definitions of right and wrong that govern the two men will be pushed to the limit - and then some.

  Seven is a movie that makes you wonder about what is right and wrong with society, what your own levels of acceptance are and what you may or may not be willing to accept from yourself. We’re all guilty of hypocrisy and of justifying inconsistent behavior by inventing creative personal exemptions to our own values – but rarely do we have the mirror before us as we attempt to deceive ourselves.

  And no matter how many times you see Seven, the ending will shock and sadden you. What is often the weakest moment of any film is the defining moment of this one. It suggests to us that the mere recognition of evil is not an accomplishment - understanding its motivations is a big part of remaining on the right side of things; often the only thing separating good and evil people from one another is their motives, and their decision whether to act on them.