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Yesterday, Today and Tomorrow, a review by Danae Cassandra

Where We Are:  Italy
wikipedia



Ieri, oggi, domani  (Yesterday, Today and Tomorrow)
Year of Release:  1963
Directed By: Vittorio De Sica
Starring: Sophia Loren, Marcello Mastroianni
Genre: Comedy, Romance

Overview:My Thoughts:
This was a lovely, entertaining, sometimes funny, sometimes sexy anthology film. The first story concerns a poor family in which the wife is the breadwinner as a seller of contraband cigarettes. She finds out after she is caught at it that she cannot be arrested while she is pregnant, and thus she and her husband keep having children to keep her out of prison. Much more amusing than it sounds. Loren is beautiful and plays her part superbly, but Adelina so completely dominates her poor husband (Mastroianni is also superb as the henpecked hubby) that she can be a bit unsympathetic. Of course, not nearly as unsympathetic as Anna, the rich snob Loren plays in the second story. The second story is very lackluster, concerning a rich woman on the cusp of an affair with a writer, and Loren's character is really nasty in it. The third story swung the film back up, with Loren playing a high-class prostitute and Mastroianni one of her clients. While I feel like the first story was the most fully developed, I liked Loren's and Mastroianni's characters in the third story the best.

The film has a lot to recommend it - great acting, good cinematography, a sexy striptease by Sophia Loren, and it's not without something to say, even in the second story that I didn't like as much as the others. Recommended.

Bechdel Test: Fail

Overall: 3.5/5

(From Around the World in 86 Movies on January 18th, 2014)

Let Me In, a review by Achim

Original Title: Let Me In
Year: 2010
Director: Matt Reeves
Rating: R
Length: 115 Min.
Aspect Ratio: Widescreen 2.35:1


Stars:
Kodi Smit-McPhee
Chloe Grace Moretz
Richard jenkins
Elias Koteas

Plot:
This is a remake of the Swdish film LET THE RIGHT ONE IN.

Twelve year old Oskar Owen is an outsider, struggling to fit in at school and left alone to fend for himself at home whilst his mother works nights. One evening he meets the mysterious Eli Abby. As a sweet romance blossoms between them, Oskar Owen learns to overcome his tormentors and discovers Eli's Abby's dark secret and the connections to the gruesome events occuring across town. Together they must help Eli Abby be gone and live, or stay and die.

Brutal, bloody and tender, LET THE RIGHT ONE IN LET ME IN weaves friendship, rejection and loyalty into a disturbing and darkly atmospheric, yet poetic and unexpectedly tender tableau of adolescence.

The Good
This is a very faithful remake of the original film. They did not turn it into an action horror of some sort and he dark, almost depressing atmosphere is in tact. All important moments of the original are repeated (minus that one shot of Eli/Abby in the bathroom, which wasn't unexpected). Only deviation I noticed was (but I just might remember this wrong) the role of the policeman (Koteas), which is slightly more prominent here; neither improvement nor making it worse though. The acting from all involved is very good. Smit-McPhee and Moretz show good ability to convey the emotions and except a few awkward moments are excellent. Jenkins and Koteas are up to their usual quality.

There is a scene with a car accident that looks great! I may rememeber this wrong, but I felt the swimming pool scene near the end was slightly better executed (mainly technical) here than in the original.

The Bad
This is a very faithful remake of the original film. So, why do it? Well, yes, I know the answer of course. But I was surprised to find myself, knowing the original, hoping they'd do something a little more different just to give the whole excercise a bit of a point.

The biggest disappointment came from my favorite scene of the original, when Eli enters Oskar's appartment without being invited first. It is really poorly executed here, with a crescendo of music leading up to a reveal  The orginal played this so much better...

I felt the music was rather irritating, not mixing well in many scenes, making me become aware of it (not a good thing for a score).

The Ugly
*******MILD SPOILERS AHEAD IF YOU HAVEN'T SEEN THE ORIGINAL*******

I have no idea why they could have possibly thought it would be a good idea to use CGI when Abby is in rage-mode (which looks obviously fake) or show or face being almost a monster grimasse while feeding. (Did the original do this too?)




It's a "4" because it's based doing a good job of recreating the original. However, if given the choice one should always pick the original over this one. Personally, I am glad I watched this but am not intending to buy this on DVD/Blu-ray (shame, really).

(From Achim's entirely random reviews on October 15th, 2010)

Pete's Pilots, a review by addicted2dvd

The Comeback
For fallen star Valerie Cherish - former B-list sitcom actress desperate to revive her career - no proce is too high to pay for clinging to the television spotlight. Valerie agrees to be the subject of an intrusive reality television show, with cameras following her every move as she lands the part of "Aunt Sassy" in a tedious new sitcom, Room and Bored.

Lisa Kudrow stars in this uncomfortably funny and insightfully biting comedy series from writer Michael Patrick King (Sex and the City).
In the spirit of reality television, there seems to be no end to the humiliating circumstances Valerie Cherish will endure, all in the name of fame.

The Comeback (Pilot)
Faded television starlet Valerie Cherish attempts to land a role in a new sitcom.'Room and Bored', by taking part in a reality show dhronicaling her somewhat mortifying "comeeback."

My Thoughts:
I watched this when it originally aired on HBO. I remember that I enjoyed it somewhat... but that I wasn't overly impressed with it. But when I found the DVD set on sale for less then $15 I decided to add it to my collection. That was almost 2 years ago now... and until now I haven't watched the DVDs at all. Watching the pilot episode again today I felt pretty much the same way I remember the first time around. It is one of those shows... while decent... I wasn't surprised when it was canceled.

My Rating:

(From Pete's Pilots on November 23rd, 2009)