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| BITCHSLAP STATS |
| Movies Listed: |
17196 |
| Total Ratings: |
209565 |
| Total Reviews: |
21113 |
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Do you like us? Prove it and be our friend at MySpace! (EFC and HBS)
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| CHRONICLES OF NARNIA: PRINCE CASPIAN, THE |
"A sequel that actually improves on the original."
Mel Valentin says... ""The Chronicles of Narnia: Prince Caspian," the Disney Studios/Walden Media produced adaptation of the second book in C.S. Lewis’ series for children (2006’s "The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, The Witch, and the Wardrobe" was the first), arrives in multiplexes two weeks after Jon Favreau’s 'Iron Man" adaptation and just one week after the Wachowski Brothers’ "Speed Racer" (with next week bringing the much anticipated "Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull"). That doesn’t give "Prince Caspian" much time to win over the hearts and wallets of the moviegoing public, but even if they don’t, fans of C.S. Lewis’ series will be (or should be) pleased with director Andrew Adamson’s ("The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe," "Shrek I and II") improvement both as a visual stylist and action set piece choreographer." (more)
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| CHRONICLES OF NARNIA: PRINCE CASPIAN, THE |
"Don't Forget To Have Your Deities Spayed Or Neutered!"
Peter Sobczynski says... "In recent years, when a well-known commercial property is chosen to be adapted for the screen, presumably in the hopes of jump-starting another lucrative film franchise, the people in charge have tended to make the initial entry as conventional and unsurprising as humanly possible in an effort to avoid alienating viewers--both long-times fans of the property in question as well as newcomers to the fold--and dooming those all-important sequel plans before they ever have a chance to get off the ground. (In other words, they don’t want another financial misstep like Ang Lee’s trippy “Hulk,“ no matter how good of a film it turned out to be.)If the initial film is a big enough hit, however, the producers might allow the filmmakers to take a few more artistic chances with the follow-up installments on the assumption that they already have a base audience that will turn out in droves no matter what appears on the screen. This is why films like “Spider-Man 2,” “Batman Returns” and the later Harry Potters episodes were so much more intriguing than their relatively square predecessors." (more)
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| WAR, INC. |
"Martin Blank goes to war."
Rob Gonsalves says... "The adventures of the Bush administration have, it seems, driven John Cusack a little crazy, just as they drove Richard Kelly far enough around the bend to make his much-maligned epic "Southland Tales." Perhaps these men have found a workable response, if not the only one, to current events: broad satire sprinkled heavily with glitzy disgust." (more)
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| STRANDED: I'VE COME FROM A PLANE THAT CRASHED ON THE MOUNTAINS |
"Thoughtful, thought-provoking documentary. One of the best of its kind."
Mel Valentin says... "SCREENED AT THE 2008 SAN FRANCISCO INTERNATIONAL FILM FESTIVAL: On October 13, 1972, Uruguayan Air Force Flight 571 left Montevideo, Uruguay for Santiago, Chile. The passengers, students and alumni from the Stella Maris College, and their coaches, friends, and family, were on their way to Chile for a friendly rugby match. Hours later, Flight 571 crashed in the Andes Cordillera on the Chilean side of the border. Out of the forty passengers and five crewmembers aboard Flight 571, twenty-nine initially survived the crash. Of that twenty-nine, five were injured and soon perished. Another eight lost their lives when an avalanche left the survivors living in the remains of the fuselage buried in snow. After ten days, the survivors did the unthinkable and turned to cannibalism. Seventy-two days after Flight 571 crashed, two emaciated survivors, Roberto Canessa and Nando Parrado, emerged from the Andean mountains." (more)
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| TOE TACTIC, THE |
"Here's a short story about this flick: no."
Mel Valentin says... "SCREENED AT THE 2008 SAN FRANCISCO INTERNATIONAL FILM FESTIVAL: Written and directed by Emily Hubley, an animation veteran making her live-action, feature-length debut, "The Toe Tactic," a drama that leans heavily on whimsical animation interludes for its charms, is a case study in how not to make a character-centered, narrative film. A chore to sit through, "The Toe Tactic" comes off as the self-indulgent, navel-gazing meanderings of a filmmaker-wannabe who has little idea about dramatic structure or character development. Given the evidence onscreen (or, to be blunt, lack thereof), "The Toe Tactic" will probably end up as Hubley’s first and last film as a feature-length filmmaker." (more)
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| ENCOUNTERS AT THE END OF THE WORLD |
"Places as strange as Antarctica demand guides as unique as Werner Herzog."
Jay Seaver says... "SCREENED AT THE 2008 INDEPENDENT FILM FESTIVAL OF BOSTON: A couple years ago, Werner Herzog made a peculiar little film called "The Wild Blue Yonder", with Brad Dourif as an alien who has been marooned on Earth for some time. Herzog used photography taken under the ice shelves of Antarctica to create the alien's apparently unearthly home, and it was effective enough to make the audience wonder why some movies spend tens of millions of dollars on special effects. Now Herzog has gone to Antarctica himself, looking for and sometimes finding a land as strange as those where his fictional films have been set." (more)
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| BABY MAMA |
"When good comics go bad."
David Cornelius says... "With its paper-thin characters, cheesy sitcom plotting, and lamebrained punchlines, “Baby Mama” seems like the movie actors as smart as Tina Fey and Amy Poehler would want to ridicule. Yet here they are, both starring in a comedy that’s as forgettable as it is idiotic. Were both sold on the idea that a stale, safe, middle-of-the-road comedy was exactly what they needed to boost their careers? Were they tired of performing intelligent material, the urge to dumb it down becoming irresistible? You can’t help but wonder: just what were they thinking?" (more)
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| SPEED RACER (2008) |
"Project it on the back wall of a club and you've got something."
Rob Gonsalves says... "Who says relations between the U.S. and Japan aren’t solid? Anime is trying to look more and more like live-action Hollywood films (see the "Appleseed" movies), and live-action Hollywood films are trying to look more and more like anime (see just about any summer movie). "Speed Racer" arrives as a go-between, the missing link." (more)
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DVD REVIEWS FOR 5/16: START SPREADING THE NEWS--FRANK'S ON DVD
by Peter Sobczynski |
| "This week's roundup of releases includes everything from a couple of western classics making their DVD debuts to Leelee Sobieski running around in fetishwear. However, Ol' Blue Eyes dominates the proceedings with a plethora of box sets dedicated to his long screen career." (more) |
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INTERVIEW: THE FATHERS OF "SON OF RAMBOW"
by Peter Sobczynski |
| "Fillmakers Garth Jennings and Nick Goldsmith--better known by their collective name Hammer & Tongs--sit down to discuss their new project, the delightful family film "Son of Rambow."" (more) |
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'EITHER I'M DEAD RIGHT, OR I'M CRAZY!'
- Jefferson Smith, Mr. Smith goes to Washington
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