Freddy Love's Oasis of Real Film Reviews

Roger Waters: The Wall---classic docudrama about the Classic Wall album and its ground breaking concerts.

2015-10-19T00:28:00.000-04:00

Roger Waters: The Wall

I've now experienced Pink Floyd's The Wall in 4 different ways. First on album, then through the 1982 movie. Then in concert at Madison Square Garden, back in October 2010. And now in a docudrama concert film. This way was my favorite. It was the deepest connection I've yet made to the material, and I finally see it for the immense work of art it truly is. It's probably the greatest and most complete Rock opera ever recorded.

The movie opens with Roger Waters driving to a cemetery in France where his grandfather was buried during World War I. I knew Waters father was killed in World War II before he had a chance to meet Roger, who was in the womb, but I did not realize that the same fate happened to his grandfather and father 30 years earlier. What a horrible coincidence.

It's late fall or winter and the sky is more colorless than gray. With the white tombstones all around and the pale skin and silver hair of the 71 year old Waters, the whole scene is almost as white as the cover of the 1979 album. Standing before his grandfather's name, Waters removes a trumpet from a case he was carrying, takes a few deep breaths and blows the opening chords of "Outside the Wall". It's a haunting beginning to an amazing film.

We go back and forth between a concert that seems to be filmed in a soccer stadium in France and Waters trip through the cold European countryside as he tries to deal with the loss of his father and grandfather and his own twisted upbringing caused by it. Seeing him with one of his oldest friends and seperately with his grown children brings out his happy side, but we don't see it too much otherwise. He's haunted. The music plays it out and seems to be his best way of dealing with it. But seeing the background and watching the man drown his sorrows in a small French hotel bar, brings new depth to the music for me as a fan.

Reading the background of the album and of the band at the time, revealed to me how Waters felt disconnected from his audience during the tour for the Animals album. I had no idea they were playing football stadiums already by then and I guess the fans wanted to hear just the hits and Floyd and particularly Waters had other plans. So mentally he built a wall between himself and the audience and it took writing The Wall album to help bring it down. His performances now are much more happy than back in 1980. He loves his audience now.

The music on stage and the tremendous stage show that goes with it are even more breathtaking in the film, than when I saw them live. Maybe because I was sitting to the far left of the stage and couldn't appreciate it as much. Seeing it dead center, you sit with your mouth open as images come flying at you with regularity, but don't bombard you. The pacing is remarkable. Maybe my favorite moment of the show/film is when animated planes are seen dropping bombs of famous symbols. Keeping up with all of them becomes a fun game, look there's a cross, there's a Mercedes symbol, there's a hammer and sickle and there's the Golden arches.

The musicians are all exemplary and the singer who performs David Gilmour's parts is tremendous. When the film ends, just as you are about to leave, you realize there is a 15 or 20 minute Easter egg added on. It's Waters and Floyd drummer Nick Mason sitting at a kitchen table reading questions from Floyd fans and answering for each other. It is warm and very funny, watching these old friends laugh about the good and sometimes not so good times. One question to Waters: "Do you have any regrets about your time with the band?" Waters shakes his head and smiles saying "no." Mason looks up a bit shocked and says "really, none?" LOLOL

For a Floyd fan this is an absolute must. For a rock fan with a deep appreciation for Floyd, this is an even more important film, as it truly reveals why this band is so great. Even though Floyd is not in the film, other than Waters. It's their work represented down to every last note. In 100 years, people will be listening to the best rock and roll live, like they listen to Mozart now, with an appreciation for the artist Loooooonnng after they are gone.

This movie receives 5 Bananas out of 5 according to the NoMoreStinkyMonkeys.com website.

To See ALL New Writing, Please Click Freddy Love's Oasis for a Crazy White Boy's Blues

2008-10-15T23:32:00.002-04:00

Freddy Love's Oasis for a Crazy White Boy's Blues

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As Always, Thanks for all your Continued Support.

The Freditor

Paul Newman--Great Man, Great Actor, Great Loss

2008-10-06T23:42:00.001-04:00

Fred's YouTube - Paul Newman Obituary

The Freditor

An American Carol looks Horrible, Director David Zucker seems to have lost it

2008-09-21T16:45:00.003-04:00

'American Carol' Theatrical Trailer on Yahoo! Video

I heard about this movie for the first time the other night. A spoof of Michael Moore-type documentaries with a Christmas Carol bent. Chris Farley's brother Kevin would play the fictional Moore and be a total anti-American, complete with a rally to end the 4th of July. It seemed like a funny idea and the cast was top notch: Kelsey Grammar, Dennis Hopper, Jon Voight and Leslie Nielsen. Airplane/Naked Gun/Kentucky Fried Movie vet, David Zucker would direct.

But as I read about it, something seemed off. Was it a good-natured spoof or a conservative response to supposedly Liberal Hollywood? Certainly Moore is a big enough target for a genre spoof, but sometimes if these things aren't gone into with the best intentions they turn out wrong. And the fact that I have seen every major comedy this summer and not one had this movie in its mix of trailers struck me as odd. It's coming out October 3rd and I'm hearing about a Zucker film two weeks before by accident? What's going on here? The last movie he directed was the awful Scary Movie 4, but that made a ton of money.

In fact, the only people who I spoke to who did hear of it, were regular watchers of the FOX News Channel. And they and FOX complained of a Hollywood conspiracy to sabotage this film's release. That might be true, certainly Hollywood tried its best to sabotage The Passion of the Christ, but that was more about the movie's perceived anti-Jewish sentiment. Could Hollywood be so afraid of a film coming from a conservative point of view that they would jeopardize turning away all the money its constituents might spend on it?

Well from viewing the trailer, that might be the case, but I'm guessing they are squelching it because it is an embarrassingly unfunny, amateurish production that would not see the light of day without its director's pedigree. My friend still wants to see it and if the reviews are better than what I experienced then I might go too, just to see what all the fuss is about. But even if it is roundly panned, the conservatives might still spin it as conspiracy by the nation's film critic elite. The same people who think the Blue Collar Comedy Tour is actually funny.

The Freditor

Hamlet 2 Review--Now on Funny or Die.com

2008-09-21T08:42:00.000-04:00

Review of Hamlet 2 from sprnstn84

Frozen River earns its excitement with story of tough women in unforgiving climate

2008-09-15T21:00:00.002-04:00

* * * * 1/2 (out of 5)

Fred's YouTube - Frozen River Movie Review

The Freditor

Fred's First Video Movie Review-Hamlet 2

2008-08-31T22:21:00.001-04:00

Hamlet 2: Better than the first

* * * * 1/2 (out of 5)

YouTube - Hamlet 2 Review

The Freditor

2008-08-31T21:52:00.000-04:00

Hamlet2Review

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2008-08-31T18:45:00.001-04:00

Aliens vs. Predator--Requiem: Decent horror/action flick filmed without LIGHTS!!

2008-08-17T14:23:00.000-04:00

* 1/2 (out of 5)

I would add a star if I could have seen what was going on.

A few months ago, I pulled the wires out of the back of my DVD system for a reason I'm not sure I remember. I didn't mark them, thinking I could remember where they went. I didn't. I criss crossed some wires and while I have a picture and good sound, I don't have color. Not a big deal to me, because I grew up watching TV in black and white, but it does take something away from the movie once in a while.

I am too complacent to fix the problem so I just live with it, but it does get confusing sometimes. Last night, I was watching the 6th movie in the Alien saga and the 4th in the Predator story, while reading the early edition of the Sunday paper. I started watching it last week with my wife and fell asleep around a half hour in. So I got the basic idea of the story, but I started it again to refresh myself. A boy and his father are hunting a deer, which means they have to be killed. A man is coming home from prison, which means he must be heroic. And a woman is coming home from Iraq which means she has to gently emasculate her husband. I got it the first time, now on to the Sports section.

But like last week, I said to myself, oh boy, I better fix those wires, the screen is so dark I don't have a freaking clue who's getting killed here. Then I read the Netflix viewer reviews and it turns out my player is fine, that it was actually filmed this way. Who's "bright" idea was that, pun intended. Half of the beginning of the movie takes place in the woods and sewer, but can we pretend there is some light in these places? Expenses were not spared regarding explosions and effects, so I'm guessing that this was an artistic decision. Artistry was lost on the Alien series, 4 movies ago and Predator never aspired to them. Let's get a grip here.

As these movies go, it's not boring. Well, it's not slow. All the killing does get a little boring after a while and the repetitive Terminator 2 "action" music gets very old when it is used throughout the entire movie. Does every scene have to be heightened dramatically. And this film is a little more nasty than usual. I thought it was harsh to have the alien jump out of a little boy's chest, but that was before the aliens embark on a maternity ward. When they were looking through the glass at all the infants I wasn't sure if the alien was excited about all the future implanting prospects or just looking at it like a buffet, but if he had harmed one of those infants I would have hit the Stop button on my DVD remote.

Twentieth Century Fox must use these movies as a testing ground for some of its lesser known TV stars. Steven Pasquale (Rescue Me), Reiko Aylesworth (24), John Ortiz (The Job), Johnny Lewis (The O.C.) all lead the cast. It reminds me of the old studio days in Hollywood where no one leaves the nest. All their acting is fine, but someone needs to write a better script.

The Freditor

Hellboy II: The Golden Army: Way Better than the first. More heart, humor, FX

2008-08-06T22:15:00.000-04:00

* * * * (out of 5)

When I saw the trailer for Hellboy II, I said this looks amazing. The trailer had dozens of creatures like you've never seen before on the big screen. It was like the Tattoinne bar scene in the "first" Star Wars, but it seemed like it would be like that throughout the whole movie. The only problem was, I couldn't remember a thing about the first Hellboy.

So I recently rented it out on NetFlix and was pleasantly surprised. It was a much more entertaining film than I first gave it credit for. The always great Ron Perlman (TV's Beast in Beauty and the Beast) was very funny and had some great wordplay with several actors within. One touch I loved was when the nerdy chief of the U.S. Bureau for Paranormal Research and Defense, Tom Manning (Jeffrey Tambor) showed his thanks for Hellboy rescuing him. As Hellboy lit his cigar with a lighter, Manning stopped him and lit it for him with a wooden match, explaining, "you always light a cigar with a wooden match, it helps bring out the flavor." Hellboy was shocked by Manning's sudden humanity and by the fact that his cigar did taste better.

Here in Number 2, Hellboy and Manning are back at each others' throats. Hellboy longs to be a hero celebrity in New York and Manning is determined to keep his and the other identities of the BPRD secret so as not to alarm the public. Hellboy is caught on camera in a number of instances and this just boils Manning. But there are bigger fish to fry here. Apparently, an ancient sect of gods made an agreement with humans several millenniums ago to rule the forests while the humans ruled the cities. But the gods are angry and feel that man has reneged on the promise and vow to take it all back. Hellboy and his group are in charge of stopping them.

Having just seen the original, I can truly appreciate this film more. As has happened so many times in comic book film history, the first movie is the warm up and the second movie delves deeper into characters and does a better job of presentation for the audience. Superman II, Spiderman II, Dark Knight and X-Men II have all proven this and Hellboy continues the tradition. The interplay between Hellboy and his wife, Liz Sherman is fun, but more so he and his old buddy the alien/psychic Abe Sapien. An odd couple to be sure, but they both appreciate what the other brings to the table. Abe putting in saucer-sized contact lenses to impress a lady was a nice touch.

The villain Prince Nuada is impressive, played by former English pop star, Luke Goss, but the new boss of BRPD is even more so, Johann Krauss. Krauss is merely a gas who embodies a robot suit, but the powers he has with his gas are something to behold. In the coolest bit of casting, Krauss and his German accent are voiced by Mr. Family Guy himself, Seth MacFarlane (voice of Stewie, Peter and Brian the dog). He's very German in his harsh tone and demanding ways, but his role is just as important as the rest of the team, something Hellboy refuses to see.

Writer/director Guillermo del Toro elevated his game two years ago with his brilliant Pan's Labyrinth. A Spanish war drama/fantasy that introduced us to a world of characters we've never seen before. That inventiveness carried over to this film and it really has energized the franchise. On a smaller scale this is the most visually stunning of all the comic book films. The fights scenes might not be too spectacular, but it's who's doing the fighting that will enthrall you.

The Freditor

Step Brothers-Funniest Ferrell movie since Elf. Will and Reilly are a comedy Plant & Page

2008-08-03T23:02:00.001-04:00

* * * * 1/2 (out of 5)

I can't oversell this movie. It had me in stitches right from the opening quote. George W. Bush's infamous: "Families is where our nation finds hope, where wings take dream." In George W. Bush we find where Will Ferrell and John C. Reilly get their inspiration for retardation.

I cracked up at the quote and a lady next to me said to her kids, "I still don't know why that's funny." What I got from that was that this movie is good enough that people are seeing it a second time.

I'm sure you know the premise. Two guys who are at or near 40 live with their single parents and when the parents decide to marry each other, these "boys" are forced to move in with them. In the same room. And they hate each other, just because they feel they should. But one of the early priceless moments comes at dinner when Ferrell makes fun of Reilly and Reilly says something along the lines of "that's so funny I forgot to laugh", but he butchers the comeback and STILL Ferrell gets so upset that his face breaks down on the verge of tears. There are a few moments in this film where grown men crying is played for Huge laughs.

The man-child is a growing phenomenon in this country and I certainly know enough guys who come close to this category. A therapist in the film likens the ideal of grown men living with their parents and not supporting themselves to an addiction and the parents are enablers. The parents are well intentioned, but are crippling their children by not forcing them to grow up and sprout their own wings. But these are heavier issues than this film cares to deal with. Instead they prefer to watch as two grown men sleep walk like 8 year olds and tear the house to shit when they get in their fights. Tossing the decorated Christmas tree on their parents' bed was one milk snorting surprise.

If the movie is 92 minutes long I'd say there are at least 110 good jokes. When the father is so fed up with the "boys" that he threatens to sell the house, Ferrell asks quietly, "Why? Is it haunted?" Sometimes in films like these the lead actor is so funny and everyone else is just fodder for his humor, but there is plenty of funny to go around here.

Reilly is very much Ferrell's equal. He's a truly great actor, who's been nominated for Oscars and gotten tons of street cred in Hollywood, but people love him most for his dopey role in Ferrell's Talladega Nights. TN is good, but can't hold a candle to Step Brothers. Reilly and Ferrell are now so in synch, it's the comedy equivalent of Robert Plant and Jimmy Page on Led Zeppelin II.

Richard Jenkins (Ben Stiller's disinterested psychiatrist from There's Something About Mary) gets funnier with each movie, this time as Reilly's father, Dr. Robert Doback. When Reilly good naturedly asks if they could double team the new mom, Doback looks like he's going to have a stroke. Adam Scott as Ferrell's super successful brother Derek is like a post-Oprah Tom Cruise, filled with nutty narcissism and needs a punch in the face good looks. At Christmas dinner he brags in front of his kids about blowing a ".079 on the breathalyzer," thus beating the cop at his own game. His wife is played by Kathryn Hahn and her scenes with Reilly are both priceless and borderline disgusting.

But the straight person in the whole stew is the woman playing Ferrell's mother, Oscar-winner, Mary Steenburgen. She played Ferrell's step mother in Elf and does a great job acting as his loving mother here. As she gets older she still radiates charm and beauty and gives the movie a dose of class that it is missing on all other fronts. When she drives him to their new home, he's still in the backseat and talks trash like a kid suffering from Tourettes. Discussing his new step brother, "He better not get in my face cuz I'll drop kick that mother f***er." Several times in the movie you can see Steenburgen wanting to bust out laughing.

Oh, Warning. I saw tons of kids in the theatre, but this movie is rated R for a reason. The language is as raunchy as Goodfellas. But if you want to be a cool parent, your kids will have the best filthy comebacks to throw at their classmates in the schoolyard this Fall.

The Freditor

Does The Dark Knight have a shot at overtaking Titanic as Hollywood's biggest moneymaker?

2008-07-27T20:50:00.001-04:00

$600 Million. Has a nice ring to it, doesn't it? That's what Titanic made at the end of 1997 and the first half of 1998 in North American ticket sales. They didn't even make $602 Million, they made $600 Million even, like as if they waited for the 1 Millionth customer at the local grocery and closed the store after he made his purchase. Did the producers pull the movie from theatres after breaking this milestone? I wonder. Director James Cameron is a pretty nutty guy.
While we all know this is a lot of money, to give you an idea of how much it is for a movie, NO OTHER MOVIE HAS EVEN MADE $500 MILLION. The closest was the first Star Wars, which made a combined $461 Million between all its releases over the years. But Star Wars was made for kids and mostly boys. Girls saw it to see what all the fuss was about, adults saw it because they took their kids. Not like now, when many adults are still kids.

But Titanic had a huge potential audience. Women from 8 to 80 wanted to see this movie. Young women and especially teen girls wanted to see it many times. And boyfriends and husbands took their significant others to see what all the fuss was about and to see half a great disaster movie.

In the 10 years since, a challenger comes out of the gate it seems every year, to lay claim to Titanic's throne, only to come up short. The Spidermans and Shreks seem to give it a great ride, but are hurt by all the matinee and children tickets that are sold. When you are looking for the big prize you have to sell Twice as many $5 tickets as you do $10 tickets to come up even. But in this our most interesting hour is there a hero who can come to slay the mighty Titanic beast?

Perhaps, The Dark Knight? It's broken every record it's crossed so far. Biggest Opening Day Ever. Biggest Opening Weekend Ever. Fastest to $200 Million, fastest to $300 Million, now $314 M. It's AVERAGED $31.4 Million a DAY in 10 days. Step Brothers made $30 Million in its Opening Weekend and that's considered a hit.

I read a very interesting statistic. Women made up 49% of the audience for The Dark Knight, it's opening week. And on the same weekend Mamma Mia came out. That's an incredible number for a comic book movie. Comic book movies have very loyal customers, males 7 to 35. If you want women to go you have to have a great love story attached, but The Dark Knight doesn't. At least not with Bruce Wayne. But it does have two matinee idols in Christian Bale and the deceased Heath Ledger. I bet you even in creepy clown makeup, Ledger is pulling in these female fans.

I know Ledger's death has some ghoulish appeal to certain people, but it's his performance that should make you want to see him. Everyone is right. His Joker is the best madman since Hannibal Lector in Silence of the Lambs or at least the bad guy in No Country For Old Men.

But as for the money. Can it keep up this level of dominance? Other than WALL-E, it is the best reviewed movie of the year. It's getting Huge word of mouth. It's getting all sorts of Oscar attention, which is the most amazing thing of all considering it's the 6th Movie in a movie franchise that George Clooney left for dead back in 1997. It made $75 Million in its second weekend. What's coming out to beat those kinds of numbers? The Mummy?

I looked at the movies coming out the rest of the summer and The Dark Knight should end up in the Top 5 every week until the kids go back to school. $286 Million to Tie in 7 Weeks. $287 Million to win. Sure ticket prices are much more than they were in 1998 and thus it would lose on pure ticket sales, but Titanic isn't even close to being the winner on ticket sales.

That prize belongs to one other behemoth. Gone With the Wind.

The Freditor

The Wackness: Bittersweet romantic comedy with a lot of heart & a Great Ben Kingsley

2008-07-27T01:59:00.000-04:00

* * * * (out of 5)

Even great actors have to remake themselves sometimes. Ben Kingsley won an Oscar early on in his movie career as Gandhi and seemed to take on Gandhi's mantle of seriousness as well. But great actors need not always play stern, upright, serious parts. Sometimes the best acting comes from playing a goofball or a carnival barker. When Kingsley was named a knight, there were rumors that he insisted that everyone call him Sir Ben after that. That kind of behavior pushes fans away.

Plus, the kinds of movies that Kingsley was known for started to become rare and his parts started drying up. So he took on a very funny role playing himself on The Sopranos and something must have clicked for him, because he's been in more comedies recently than any other time in his career. After playing a Polish hitman from Buffalo in You Kill Me, he's now playing a pot-smoking, ex-Deadhead Manhattan psychiatrist named Jeff Squires. I'm not sure it was intended, but I found the name Squires funny, since a squire is a knight in training.

Dr. Squires is addicted to pot and feeds his addiction by having free sessions with his teenage dealer Luke Shapiro. For a quarter gram Shapiro gets an hour with the doctor to apparently make up how he's feeling. Through his half-lies the truth does sneak out and Squires gives him some therapy that's half helpful and sometimes contradictory. Shapiro is not really "depressed, you're just sad," as Squires puts it and Luke has a reason to be. His parents are always fighting and acting like teens themselves while his father is doing something that is costing the family fortune and jeopardizing their home.

Since the story is sort of told from Luke's and Dr. Squire's point of view we're never quite sure what this father is up to, but it's not good. So Luke sells pot around Manhattan to "help his family", but really he's stashing the cash. And he is doing well. Using an old Italian ice cart to haul his pot around town, he's a favorite to a lot of depressed yuppies and younger types. As his new friend says, he is either "the most popular of the unpopular kids or the most unpopular of the popular kids." Whatever he is, he's alone and is focused on Squires' stepdaughter, Stephanie.

Stephanie is played by Olivia Thirlby (Juno's best friend Leah) and she's a real find. She's only been acting for two years, her first part was in 2006's United 93. I thought she was so cool as Leah, acting every bit like a fun teenage girl. Here she seduces Luke as much as the audience. Like Luke we never know where we stand with her. Is she a great girl, is she a bitch, is she some combination of the two? Her mother is played by Famke Janssen and she has that same quality, so the parts are written well.

I've never seen Josh Peck (Luke Shapiro) before, but he's quite good. He's apparently a child star having had his own TV show called Drake and Josh. It's a lot to ask a young actor to put a whole movie on his shoulders, but he carries the load and is almost as interesting as Kingsley. Well almost. Kingsley does bong hits in this movie, tags (graffitis) a store window, makes out with a girl old enough to be his granddaughter and speaks in Ebonics. Peck does all this too, but it never draws the laughs that Kingsley does.

For some reason it takes place in the summer of 1994, but for no other apparent reason than to take many jabs at Mayor Guiliani. Hey if Rudy made it harder for drug dealers to do business that's a good thing.

Anyway, after half a summer of watching things get blown up, it's nice to see a movie about friendships that pays attention to the little things.

The Freditor

Space Chimps is a fun, adventurous animated sci-fi comedy

2008-07-27T00:55:00.000-04:00

* * * (out of 5)

Puddy from Seinfeld is fast becoming the Mel Blanc of his time. It's becoming hard to find an animated movie his voice is not in. But unlike Blanc, he never changes his voice. It is always that alpha male, aggressively confident, but less than intelligent voice that made us love him as Puddy and makes kids love him in various animated roles. Here he is again as the commanding chimp in the space program, Titan. He's not the star of the movie, but he certainly thinks he's the star of the NASA chimp squadron.

Space Chimps is a cute story that plays off the first "manned" space flight around the Earth. On January 31, 1961 a chimpanzee named Ham was secured in a Project Mercury capsule and launched into space. He died in Africa in 1983. Now in 2008, Ham III his grandson, plays off his family name to be a "human" cannonball in a sideshow circus. The chimp who still lights the fuse for him is his grandfather's old partner, Houston.

When an unmanned space probe gets caught in a wormhole, there's a possibility that it landed on a planet that might sustain life. NASA wants to send a search party after the probe to see if this is true. If there is another planet in the solar system that is habitable, we might be able to colonize it in the future, or as one NASA engineer thinks, place another NFL franchise. "Just think of the possible T-shirt sales."

For such a dangerous and unknown mission NASA doesn't want to risk human astronauts, so they tap into their reserves. A group of chimpanzees that have been training for some time. The only problem is they feel the monkeys need some kind of star power to gain the press' attention, so they turn to Ham III for assistance.

Ham III (played by SNL's and Hot Rod's Andy Samberg) is a traditional goofball in Looney Tunes fashion. At times he's pretty funny, and sometimes the jokes fall flat, but overall the movie is an enjoyable ride if you don't go in looking for Pixar-type quality. The children in the screening I was at were laughing a lot and seemed to be having fun. But one little non-chimp character might have a future ahead. Kilowatt (Kristen Chenoweth) is one of the cuter animated characters in a while.

It's a shame this movie didn't find its audience. The critics ripped it apart, but I found it just as funny as Kung Fu Panda if not as artistic.

The Freditor

Mamma Mia is an ABBA Yabba Good Time

2008-07-20T14:40:00.001-04:00

* * * 1/2 (out of 5)

Can Pierce Brosnan sing? Whew, no. But neither can some of the other cast members in this
high energy tribute to the music of ABBA. But that doesn't stop them from throwing themselves wholeheartedly into their performances as a wedding party on a Greek island.

A young American girl is the daughter of a single woman who runs a hotel on a picturesque island in Greece. Twenty-plus years ago, the mother had three affairs in one summer and any of those men could be the father of her girl. Now the girl is getting married and has sent invitations under her mother's name to all three hoping to find her father and the man who can walk her down the aisle. The men are unaware of who really sent them the invite or the reason they are really there. The mother is oblivious to the whole charade and is more worried about her daughter being too young to marry.

Stories used to mean more in musicals and carry more weight (like The Sound of Music), but a frivolous story doesn't matter when the music is this good. ABBA is often called a guilty pleasure, but I think that's unfair. Their songs are joyous and why should something that makes you feel happy and doesn't hurt anyone else also make you feel guilty? I don't own their records and I don't play them in jukeboxes, but I'm happy when someone else does.

That said, this movie is an interesting way to make a musical. Unlike the old days when musical performers were trained to become actors, like Fred Astaire, now the movie musical is such a rare phenomenon that you have to hope that traditional movie stars can also sing and dance. Sometimes it works (Chicago) sometimes it doesn't (Painted Wagon). This movie leans a little bit more toward Painted Wagon. There are several songs where I winced when the lead actor was singing and was looking desperately for the background players (the local Greek workers) to join in as the chorus. The chorus of no-names saved many a song from being butchered. Meryl Streep is a decent singer, but in this movie she sounded like Beverly Sills. When Pierce Brosnan starts singing S.O.S. on his own, I heard some chuckles in the audience but muffled my own, in hopes that this was going somewhere. Streep saves him in the duet.

But this movie is obviously not about musical proficiency but the joy of the music. Which you can see in the exuberant way the cast members belt out their songs and dance gayly. And I mean gayly. When women are dancing in such a flighty way that you say to yourself, "that's even too gay for them," you know you are going to have to pull the shirt out of your pants. Why? Because when things start to become too embarrassing for me my butt scrunches up and sucks the shirt tale right up with everything else. I saw this movie by myself and was able to enjoy it in anonymity, but if I was with a friend there were times when the waves of Douche Chills would have hit me like a tsunami.

But this movie was not made for me, but for young girls and their 50+ year old grandmas who took them. I heard them singing along, so I'm sure they've seen Wednesday matinees of the Broadway musical in the city together.

The Freditor

Here are some of the songs, some of which I never heard of before:

1. Dancing Queen
2. Knowing Me, Knowing You
3. Take A Chance On Me
4. Mamma Mia
5. Lay All Your Love On Me
6. Super Trouper
7. I Have A Dream
8. The Winner Takes It All
9. Money, Money, Money
10. S.O.S.
11. Chiquitita
12. Fernando
13. Voulez Vous
14. Gimme! Gimme! Gimme! (A Man After Midnight)
15. Does Your Mother Know
16. One Of Us
17. The Name Of The Game
18. Thank You For The Music
19. Waterloo

Vantage Point tells story of assassination from 5 different points of view

2008-07-16T00:27:00.001-04:00

* * * (out of 5)

After a great buildup and some layered story telling, done in Rashomon style, the payoff is too quick, a little inconclusive and kind of ordinary. The first time director, Pete Travis, mixes in these really cool visuals like a big terrorist bomb going off and a great car chase that rivals The Bourne movies, but then has a script that seems like a throwaway from "24".

Some of the surprises are dulled by the fact that the bad guys look like bad guys and the good guys seem to be good. There was one big surprise in the second half, but I don't think I bought it. Not since the '70s have I have seen this many good, big name actors in a movie that was beneath them. Dennis Quaid, Forrest Whitaker, Matthew Fox, Sigourney Weaver and William Hurt. This was the 21st Century version of Airport '75. Are all these people that hard up for work?

The Freditor

Great Praise for the Blogs

2008-07-07T22:01:00.000-04:00

HEY FRED,

I think it is very very good. You give good background information about your life and share your interests. I GIVE YOU 4 GOLD STARS. I LOVE THAT MONKEY. Looks kind of like the Ralley Monkey the L.A. ANGELS used in the 2002 season.

SEE YAA NICK

Two Trailers to Movies I Think I'm Gonna Love--fred

2008-07-02T21:45:00.000-04:00

Bolt Trailer and Videos

Beverly Hills Chihuahua Trailer and Videos

I Know Who Killed Me-Wish Someone had Burned the Negative to This Movie

2008-06-30T19:28:00.001-04:00

1/2 * (out of 5)

The first five to 10 minutes were good, when the suspense was building over a potential serial killer preying on young women near this high school. Once Lindsay Lohan is grabbed and the torture begins the movie starts going downhill at a precipitous speed. The plot made no sense at all, something about Lindsay (playing Aubrey) not being the girl kidnapped but her body double, who the other Lindsay dreams about in her fiction. Believe me, it's not worth your time. I like Lohan, I think she can be a good actress, but she was given nothing to work with here and it's a tribute to her performance ability that she makes at least the first hour watchable. By the second hour I was counting down the minutes.

The Freditor

WALL-E: Sweet, Funny, Lovable. One of the three Best Pixar films

2008-06-28T18:49:00.004-04:00

* * * * * (out of 5)

WALL-E is tied with Iron-Man for Best Movie of the Year, so far

(Equals Toy Story 2 and The Incredibles for Pixar Greatness)

Make sure you get to this movie early so you can see the hysterical opening cartoon--"Presto," about a mean magician and his magic rabbit.

Pixar scares me. The animated division of Walt Disney consistently makes some of the best cartoon movies of all time. It has never had a clunker in its 13 years of moviemaking. Even the films that fall short are still technically excellent. But I was nervous that they had lost a little something after Cars and Ratatouille. Both movies were fine, but left me feeling a little less than full. Like eating Chinese food.

Well, Pixar has come storming back with WALL-E. A beautiful, magical, funny, sweet, imaginative effort by the class of the business. From the man who wrote and directed Finding Nemo (Andrew Stanton) comes this little film with Huge ideas. WALL-E is a trash-compacting robot put on Earth for 700 years to clean up the atmosphere-killing mess we left behind. In the film, it is now about 2700 AD and man has left the planet for an unending cruise around the stars. It was supposed to be a 5-year mission for the cleaning robots--"Waste Allocation Load Lifter – Earth Class"; but it became a project too huge in scope to complete.

The opening sequence is both dark and moving, as the "camera" flies helicopter-style over the ruined cities, with its Venus-like atmosphere and daily dirty sand storms that punish the landscape. I worried a bit that the animation might be too much for children, but once WALL-E shows up the squalor seems less threatening. But even then the humor can be dark. When the camera shows a clear vision of the city you realize that some of the high-rise buildings we've been looking at are just towers of garbage made from the compacted blocks by WALL-E.

It seems that WALL-E is the last of his kind and only has a cockroach to keep him company. That and his huge treasure trove of toys. Whatever bits of garbage WALL-E finds that interest him get packed in his trusty Playmate cooler and come back with him to his storage container hideaway. WALL-E doesn't speak, so the gentle laughs come when he tries to figure out where a spork should go, with his collection of spoons or forks? He's intrigued by a fire extinguisher, but when it knocks him on his back he throws it high on the trash pile.

This sweet creature with the inquisitive mind, loves to watch romantic musicals and keeps a tape of Hello Dolly in his front compartment to play while he does his work. When he gets home he takes his tractor treads off to rest his tired wheels. I'd say the best way to describe him is part ET, part cute puppy and part Charlie Chaplin as the tramp. As with all Pixar efforts there is more Looney Tunes-type humor in this movie than classic Disney fun. But WALL-E's world is forever changed when he meets a modern probe sent down by the Floating Earth's mother ship. The machine's sleek design and the wondrous way it flies through the air during its missions at first scares and intrigues our hero, but when he notices some kindness in its decidedly feminine lazar eyes and her giggle when tickled by his roach, he falls in love. She's obviously way smarter than WALL-E, completing his Rubik's Cube before he has a chance to show her his next toy. And is as intrigued by the singing and dancing humans on the Hello Dolly video as he is. You are drawn in by this mechanical romance and cheer these two would-be lovers on. The movie removes you from your theatre seat and plants you in this less than Brave New World and doesn't let go until the final credits.

As amazing as the opening half hour is on earth, things really take off literally when WALL-E stows away on the probe's transport vessel back to the mother ship far into space. That's when we get to meet human beings circa 2700 and finally hear dialogue. The depiction of the future of the human race is both hysterical and dead-on. How we let the machines take over our lives is less 2001 or Terminator than just real life.

Funnyman Jeff Garlin, Larry David's sidekick from Curb Your Enthusiasm, plays the ship's easy-going captain. His voice is already animated so playing a cartoon character is a natural for him. Cheers' Cliff Claven, John Ratzenberger, is back as a secondary character in a Pixar film. He is the only actor who's appeared in all of them. And in a stroke of genius, Sigourney Weaver voices the ship's computer, turning the tables on her role as Ripley in the original Alien.

When judging a movie you always have to ask yourself, "Is there any way this movie could have been made better?" And the answer here is emphatically, "No!" If only all movie studios were as creative and entertaining as Pixar.

The Freditor

A Freditor Prediction--Love Guru will become stronger, faster

2008-06-28T01:56:00.003-04:00

Prediction: Like the original Austin Powers, The Love Guru will find a second life on DVD. People will watch it for a second time (or a first time) and realize what fun it is. I'm already looking forward to the DVD, to see if my perception of the initial half hour changes after experiencing the whole thing. Just the idea of having a knob on a Voiceover Box that turns to Morgan Freeman's voice is genius.

The Freditor

Very suspenseful 7 minutes--Great Israeli short film

2008-06-25T09:58:00.000-04:00

YouTube - strangers- short film

The Love Guru starts slow, But Picks Up Speed, Laughs and Points for Originality

2008-06-21T00:29:00.002-04:00

* * * (out of 5)

I won't oversell this movie. It is not for everyone. Half the audience was cracking up and the other half were sitting silent. You have to be a Mike Myers fan and more importantly an Austin Powers fan to appreciate this film and its very silly humor. But my friend Harry and I are were part of the laughing half and we had a great time. We saw the "1 Star" reviews in all three New York tabloids, but except for a few critics, you can't trust reviewers when it comes to comedy. For those with short memories, the NY Daily News gave 2 Stars to Caddyshack, Airplane and The Jerk when they came out. It gave Stripes and Meatballs 1 1/2 Stars. Obviously all five are comedy classics. How's that for getting it wrong almost every time.

The first 15 minutes of The Love Guru are a little rough to get through. It's like watching an experimental comedian and he's just not catching on. Myers makes a joke about putting a penis on a table that thuds so bad, Harry and I looked at each other, like "Oh my god, what are we in for?" But once he meets the coach, played by Mini-Me's Verne Troyer, the jokes starts flying higher and landing much better.

Myers might be the most adventurous of all the great Saturday Night Live alumni. He makes his characters charming and silly at the same time. His new role as Guru Pitka is a funnier Deepak Chopra. People, many of them rich and successful, come to this guru with their problems and issues and listen to his words of wisdom to try and make sense of their lives. When a Toronto Maple Leaf hockey player loses his wife, he also starts to lose his way on the rink and the team's owner, played by a stunning Jessica Alba turns to Guru Pitka to try and get the player's mind back in the game and his wife back in his life. 40 Year Old Virgin's Romany Malco is pretty good as the wounded player, but his nemesis, the goalie Jacques "Le Coq" Grande is played for big laughs by Justin Timberlake. His dancing alone is hysterical, especially the "Water Sprinkler."

Myers throws out about 100 double entendres and some miss and others hit big. The gross out humor is extra gross. But some of the best moments come in the broadcast booth of Hockey Night in Canada with Stephen Colbert as a recovering drug addict and of course, Myers' brilliant songs on the sitar. His version of "9 to 5" was an unexpected treat, especially with the Bollywood-style dancing maids. In fact, all the Bollywood scenes are winners. The success of Mike Myers is that you don't often get his comedy the first time, that's why repeat viewings help him gain success and increase his box office receipts. This character and movie might become another Austin Powers for him, or it could be another "So I Married an Axe Murderer", a funny movie that only his true fans appreciate. Be at Peace, Mariska Hargitay!

The Freditor

How to Comment on a Story in Fred's Blog

2008-06-14T02:50:00.000-04:00

Apparently there is some confusion about how to comment on the various "No More Stinky Monkeys" Blogs. At the bottom of every story, there is a line that reads something like:

"Posted by The Freditor at 6:15PM 0 Comments" (and then a Letter symbol)

If you would like to send me a comment, you click on the Letter symbol and a page will come up.

Next to Friend's email address, put your email address and then in the comments field write whatever you want. If you WANT me to Post it into my Blog, just mention that at the top. Otherwise it will be just for my eyes. Thanks for reading my stuff and your continued support.

My birthday is one month from today, I've had 1300 hits so far, I'd love to get to 2,000 by my Bday.

The Freditor