Marigold

The words of a classic: "He has no talent!!!" Unfortunately, Arnie needed several experimental comedy films to find this out. What's the point if Kindergarten Cop is one of the better ones, when a) it's not funny, b) it's so stupid that it's terrible? Arnie is an incredibly wooden actor and, in contrast to the children, this fact stands out very clearly. The screenplay doesn't save it, so hopefully the craftsman Reitman can avert total embarrassment...

In the midst of the repulsive detective wildness spewing out of television screens with incredible cadence, Detective Barnaby and his old-school conversations in a typically English style caress the soul. Finally, a detective story with very intricate and honestly-knotted stories with the overtones of the mystery of Albion's detective classics, with a charismatic hero whose humor and charm serve better than fists and nine-millimeter arguments. Very decently cast, well written, very sensitively directed and, moreover, the ubiquitous subtle irony delights the sore souls of fans of good detective stories.

If it weren't so excessively cool, it would be the biggest sci-fi event since the launch of Spielberg's Minority Report. Directed by Alex Proyas, the film has a suggestive atmosphere and, surprisingly, a decent (albeit reduced) idea. Will Smith was cast to ensure commercial security, so his Del Spooner makes the film a bit of a macho zodiac. I don't mind the character as a whole, but some of the one-liners seem as natural in the context of the story as Zarathustra in public toilets. Nevertheless, I pay tribute to Proyas for the ease with which he was able to balance the compromise between the action show and the impressive sci-fi spectacle with a warning undertone... How easily he was able to incorporate impressive emotions and sequences worth remembering into the veins of the film. In the end, one tends to forgive even the several exaggerated fancy "matrix-like" scenes, and if you are not one of the uncompromising fans of Isaac Asimov, then with a bit of good will, you won’t be able to help but enjoy this perfectly filmed ride. Definitely a hot candidate for sci-fi of the year.

A folk-proletarian fairy tale with a beautifully cheesy artistic stylization, a remarkably morbid story, a macabre sense of humor (when Death says things like: Cold water? Are you crazy? She could have died from it!), a tolerably engaged subtext and, of course, wonderful acting performances by Jiří Sovák, Rudolf Hrušínský and especially Standa Neumann. Martin Frič made a film that is relatively rough and realistic for a fairy tale, but in turn he also made a real story into a cute fairy tale. Anyway, it's great and pleasant fun.

Like a spa, this film also helped me a lot with regular evening spiritual hygiene. It is not exotic in form; on the contrary, it clearly refers to the traditions of European narrative film. Zhang depicts the picturesque environment of a Chinese spas with all the remarkable characters and their stories and small (but actually big) dramas. The central motif is the clash of two worlds – the new world and the world of old traditions, which is embodied by the spa and its owner, Master Liu. Da Ming's "lost" son returns from the new world and slowly but surely succumbs to the spell of the slow but wise space of the traditions of purification and human closeness. He also finds his way to mentally handicapped brother Er Ming, and despite the fact that the end of the old world is inevitable, catharsis will persevere the end of the spas (and the breakup of their staff). Zhang chooses a rather slow, yet charming and gracefully comic narrative approach, which lightens the tragic and melancholic undertone of the Chinese spa and adds a wisely humorous touch to everything. It's too bad that the film has a few dead spots, which are caused by the somewhat sharp cut to another space-time...

A remarkable vampire epic, which certainly does not rank amongst vampire horror movies, but rather, with surprising elegance, balances on the edge of drama and a relatively controversial love story. The quintessence of this spectacle is the convincing performances of Cruise and Pitt, whose homosexual relationship is hinted at throughout the film. In the end, in Interview with the Vampire, the relationships between the characters and the kind of "realistic" view of the vampire underworld play a much bigger role than any vampire props. Definitely an interesting film, which is not quite perfect perhaps only due to a lack of significant gradation and a slightly better built story. But these deficiencies are replaced by the atmosphere and some really great and powerful scenes that will stay with you.

Basically a perfect example of the current development of Kundera's myth. From a complex and dense text to a sparse and twisted story that is styled to be "user friendly" for Western audiences. The absolute artificiality of the environment wouldn’t be as important if the atmosphere just before / after August didn’t play such an important role in the original. Kaufman evokes the atmosphere like someone who is uninitiated in the classics – he inserts the emblems of Czechness everywhere – the flag, the anthem, Prague Castle, but a simple a glance reveals that in reality everything is artificial, misunderstood, twisted. The highlight is the end of the film, when the Czech countryside is depicted with unwanted irony in the same way as in Sorel paintings from the 1950s. Another problem (at least for me) is the acting, especially the lousy performance by Daniel Day-Lewis, whose character Tomáš completely lacks any of the internal tension from the literary texts and suffices with one seductive look, whilst fatigue, skepticism and internal exile disappear somewhere. Thirdly, the screenplay, unlike the balanced and masterfully styled original masterpiece, gets stuck on considerable inconsistencies in everyday speech and deeper thoughts. As a result, it comes off as extraordinarily pathetic and inorganic. Several well-filmed moments deserve praise (I would especially highlight the photography of Sabina's nudes and then the impressively edited conclusion with its great sound), which, however, did not convince me that Kaufman made a cohesive film worthy of Kundera's novel. If it weren't for the original novel, I would probably be more lenient, but this film simply wasn’t very good.

Whether I want to or not, I need to nag and criticize. The aspects of the film overshadow a certain banality and imperfection of the content... Beneath the shell of perfect visuals (the edit and camera are excellent!) and narrative magic, there is love story that is only briefly sketched psychologically and is not exceptional in any way, and it lacks depth and the hard-to-name magic that "made" Coppola's gem Lost in Translation. Carrey excels and with absolute sovereignty connects the civilian inner and exhibitionist mannerisms of his acting, and Winslet is also deeply immersed in the eccentric Clementine, but they are unable to hide the flatness of the characters and their considerable proclamation and two-dimensionality. The exclusivity of Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind is aided by the superficial memory-erasing plot that allowed Gondry to play out the audio-visual drama of an escape from the inevitable oblivion that takes place almost entirely in the main character's head. The drama of the end of a relationship between two people, painful disillusionment and an irreversible return to the beginning, which overshadows all the evil that happened after it. It's not boring at all and it warms my soul, but after the film ended I had nothing left but a handful of positive impressions and a very overdone, mundane love story in an exclusive package. Nevertheless, I can only praise the ease with which Gondry et al. work with emotional shades... But I was still expecting more.

I completely agree, Caligarim... the book is schematic and predictable, and the only thing that pushes it above average is King's decent style and work with atmosphere. From this perspective, Mary Lambert's work belongs to the better film adaptations of King's work – it sticks to the point and the original, it preserves a rather impressive paranoid atmosphere and it doesn't particularly stir up the viewer – in short, it’s a pleasant watch. I certainly don't think that Stephen King is the author of literary breakthrough books, and Pet Sematary perfectly captures both the master's literary standard and the standard of the film remakes of his work.

A very old-fashioned and gradual conversational detective story, in which Sequens managed to create an exceptional panopticon of characters from the luxury hotel Excelsior. The brilliant acting and a light perspective of Vacátek's advice make the peaceful investigation of the murder a fun, albeit slow spectacle. It’s too bad about the annoying title song, which almost made me faint by the end. But if you want to have fun with an intelligent detective story without unnecessary brutality and action, enjoy well-written characters and an enticing story, then visit the Excelsior Hotel, an island of peace and quiet...