DVD Collectors Online

The Girl Who Leapt Through Time, a review by Critter

The Girl Who Leapt Through Time



Anime Type: Movie

Year: 2006

Director: Hosoda, Mamoru

Plot:The power to travel through time... It can be used for the good of humanity, or just selfishly abused. While many may fantasize about obtaining such a power, it has become nothing less than reality for otherwise-normal schoolgirl Konno Makoto.

After a fated event, her life takes a turn for the extraordinary. Though she initially uses her power to literally "leap" into the past and change little things in order to make her life easier, she soon has to face the fact that changing the past can have drastic consequences.

My Thoughts:
This was a very entertaining and enjoyable film. I loved the contrast within the storyline of quite dark and gritty scenes as well as many light-hearted and often quite funny scenes. The clean and simple character animation worked well with the fantastic and largely detailed backgrounds which gave the film a strong atmosphere, and indeed, some scenes (one in particular) were eerily beautiful. The storyline of this film was one of many twisting paths and was quite complex, for that matter I feel it is a film I will have to watch more than once to really understand it fully. The Japanese voice acting in the film was very relaxed and suited all the characters well which gave them all believable personalities.

My Rating



(From Critter's Animated Film/Anime Marathon on January 14th, 2010)

Revenge of the Rats, a review by addicted2dvd

Title: Revenge of the Rats
Year: 2003
Director: Jorg Luhdorff
Rating: PG-13 : Scenes of Peril
Length: 104 Min.
Video: Widescreen 1.78:1
Audio: English: Dolby Digital Stereo
Subtitles:

Stars:Plot:
As the city faces the worst heat wave in 150 years, the municipal workers go on strike and the garbage begins to pile up. As it slowly leaks into the street, rats begin to crawl out from under the concrete and the shadows, searching for food. But this is a new, faster breed of rodent, and soon, they are everywhere - creeping out of toilets, into beds and over tables. And if the infestation of fat gray masses isn't terrifying enough, it's soon discovered that the rats are carring a horrible virus, which makes then almost impossible to exterminate - and deadly to humans.

Extras:
Scene Access

My Thoughts:
This is a movie I got very cheap on sale ($3.19) back in October when I was buying movies for my October Marathon. I never got around to this one at that time. Luckily I didn't pay too much for this one... as I really didn't care too much for this one. It just didn't keep my attention very much. I don't know that it is... but it felt like I was watching a TV Movie. While there was a couple good scenes in it... this movie is so slow that I really struggled to keep my attention on the movie. But it really wasn't meant to be. About an hour into the movie I was so bored I had to turn it off. For those couple good scenes I will give this movie 1 star... but I can't bring myself to do any better then that as it was just too boring.



(From Weekend Movie Marathon: Anything Goes on January 22nd, 2010)

Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles: The Complete Second Season marathon, a review by Achim

5. Goodbye to All That
Derek leads John on his first mission in defense of a military school cadet with a vital future role in the Resistance.



My comments:
I found the first half of the main plot quite boring. The setting in the military academy where John and Derek "did their thing" just didn't spark with me until the action started. Dealing with this week's problem was eventually resolved satisfyingly. John, for once allowed to lead the mission, was clearly enjoying the change of pace and in his new found position almost happily gave in to his fate.

The side plot, involving Sarah kidnapping a young boy to protect him from harm's way, was much more fun all the way through. The young actor gave a good performance and everything came together quite nicely between him and Lena Headey.

The other side plot with Agent James Ellison (Richard T. Jones good as always) was not advancing enough; lame excuse to show off the T-1000 (or is it a T-X...?) again.


(mainly for the Sarah story line)



(From Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles: The Complete Second Season marathon on February 1st, 2010)