Film Reviews by Cato

The previous reviews have said it all really, but on watching Hurt Locker, which incidentally is a slang expression for the treatment room for injured soldiers in the war against Iraq, although the film was apparently shot in Amman in Jordan. Not being a war film aficionado, I found it a little ponderous in places, but there's no doubting that it was a very well crafted film.

What happens when your Japanese English POW camp is visited by a few GIs, one of whom happens to have a whole stash of eggs and coffee etc. etc. It's not right by Lt. Tom Courtenay anyway, although Flight Lt. James Fox doesn't say no to a fried egg and an American fag or two provided by Corporal George Segal, or King Rat. This is a tongue in cheek type of war film, one in which nigh impossible things happen, but it's an entertaining story of what might have gone on at the end of the 2nd world war (maybe). Interesting to see various actors from the 60's, such as Denholm Elliott, John Mills and Leonard Rossiter in their prime. A good film for a wet afternoon

I very much agree with RP's review, and can't find much else to add, except that the film is now 35 years old and beginning to show it's age somewhat. Also it has the stamp of other Stephen King's stories, i.e. rather OTT and slightly unbelievable, but perhaps I'm carping. Walken carries the film brilliantly, and it's great to see Herbert Lom again. Both top actors.

This was Eastwood's 17th film, and showed him more than capable of tackling a film somewhat more different, and some might say perhaps more difficult than his previous efforts. The story seems to become more Gothically inspired as it builds up towards it's rather graphical denouement, nothing wrong with that, and I rather liked the Pink Floydish elements in the score. It's certainly a very different film from Clint, this one. A somewhat strange film, but well worth watching.

Quite an endurance test this one. Cooper and Bergman strive very hard, and do their best, but the plot lasts for 153 minutes, which apparently was very much reduced as time went on. When you consider that the main reason of the plot was to blow up a bridge, it did take an awfully long time to press that button. However the instant love plot between Gary and Ingmar adds a bit of fire to the story, but even this seems never to have been consecrated. Yes, a long piece of cinema, a bit like this review.

A truly ghastly account of Poland in the last days of Stalinism, when women were locked up and pitifully tortured for even the slightest of so called crimes. The actress Krystyna Janda gives an incredible performance, for which she won the best actress prize at Cannes in 1900, as the woman who is incarcerated in this hellhole of a prison. Watch this film for its brilliance, but be warned, it is not nice.

The first half of the film was great. Two of my favourite actors, De Niro and Murray, were giving it their all in this tale of a shy police photographer and aspiring comedian, but somehow when Uma Thurman comes into Mad Dog's life it all goes a bit pear shape. However, De Niro shows a different side to his usual character, that of the hard man, and becomes a comedian. It comes off too, even down to the sight of him appearing quite a short man, whereas big Bill seems very tall. The end is rather confusing, but the film is well worth a watch.

I used to like the Bond films as a boy, and this one seems pretty good, with the guns and the stunts and the girls, but it doesn't seem to have changed much since Connery graced our screens. I must admit to not having seen Craig yet, but I can't help suspecting that it will be the same old things, the guns and the stunts and the girls.. Plus ca change.

Right from the beginning of the film we know just what Lucien is like, a nasty piece of work who takes great enjoyment in killing animals, albeit for eating in the case of one of the rabbits he takes to his mother. He seems to like nobody, including the Jewish girl who he seduces and her father, the tailor whom he tips off to the Germans, thus showing the malicious hatred he feels for the "enemy", although he does gain some redemption in escorting the girl and his mother to Spain, or this may have been because the Germans have been beaten and he's thinking of his own skin. But for all this nastiness the film itself is a masterpiece and Pierre Blaise is brilliant.

From the excellent review I'd read of the film, I thought I'd be watching something rather funny, but I can't say I took to the often puerile comedy that came. The acting was good, with McConaughey standing out as excellent, but the plot was obviously bound to come a cropper after an hour or so, with it's tawdry story of a young man being filmed for days on end. However, It was a prescient story from nearly 20 years ago , as to how technology might look like in the future. Look Out!

A clever film on an old subject wherein a rich man getting on in life falls for a young woman at a train station who in turn leads him a merry dance as he tries to pull her. And that's it really, except that this happens in the 70s and bombs are being set alight in Paris by nasty people (so watch out Mathieu). It's a film with a difference, in that the old man relates all of his story to a train carriage full of very interested people (including some young girls, whom I'm sure wouldn't have been allowed to listen to all the details by their mother). Well, maybe in France perhaps. I must admit that I'd not noticed that there were two actresses playing the part of the naughty girl who tempts the old Parisian. Why, I don't know, but it was a creative masterpiece, as they say.

A Turkish film is a rare treat, and this one was very interesting. It's set in a forest where a family has gone, presumably for a day out. and there are tensions among the characters, who stay until the next morning. There are some arguments, and the old grandfather relates his wartime activities, which seem to have been in the first world war. His son, a professor of philosophy, argues with his brother about the world, whilst his son goes off into the forest, and finds a tortoise, that he inverts onto it's back, even though his mother has told him that the animal will die in that position. We see the animal struggling late on in the film - this has not been a pleasant act on the part of the boy. This somehow ties in with the rather depressing nature of the film, but the fact the rather sour atmosphere that the males create in their conversations and activities has beens produced in such an idyllic natural atmosphere and the sweetness of the women surpasses the spleen of the men. A very thoughtful film.

It's good to watch these old British efforts from the past, quite a few of them B films in the days when we got two films in our afternoon at The Odeon, often with only a few of us in the audience. This one is an interesting crime thriller, and in its way was a noble effort with some good actors giving their best. This one's got Ian Hendry, Jeremy (Sherlock Holmes) Brett, and Ronald Fraser in it, and it's a valiant effort, with a rather OTT and unlikely plot , ending with a very surprising murderer, that nobody would have suspected. Never mind, it's a good nostalgic look at old British cinema in the days when we didn't watch so much TV to get our thrills.

This film is about South Africa at the awful time when the Afrikaners ran their repulsive system of punishing, and indeed killing black people because of the colour of their skin. At times the violence is awful, and I wouldn't recommend the film to anyone who is at all squeamish at the sight of blood. The acting is first rate, particularly from Marlon Brando, who plays a lawyer who defends the victims of the awful punishment. It is not a long part, perhaps only fifteen minutes,, but in that time his genius shines out. Brilliant. Donald Sutherland gives a sensitive performance as the teacher who stands up for the poor people being besieged, and pays an awful price for his struggles. Well worth watching, if only for Brando's performance.

A very good start, but the plot deteriorates as it goes along, and I can see why one critic wrote that it seems to have been made for the American market, in that they would think that this is what jolly old England is like all the time. It all gets too preposterous.