DVD Collectors Online

GoldenEye, a review by GSyren

Title	GoldenEye (Disc ID: A615-EDE8-2C76-C31E)
Director	Martin Campbell
Actors	Pierce Brosnan, Sean Bean, Izabella Scorupco, Famke Janssen, Joe Don Baker
Produced	1995 in United Kingdom
Runtime	130 minutes
Audio	English DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1, Spanish Dolby Digital 5.1, French DTS 5.1, German DTS 5.1, Portuguese Dolby Digital 5.1, Commentary Dolby Digital Mono
Subtitles	Commentary, Danish, Dutch, English, Finnish, French, German, Norwegian, Portuguese, Spanish, Swedish
Overview	The effortlessly suave and sophisticated Pierce Brosnan makes his acclaimed debut as Agent 007 in this rip-roaring espionage thriller featuring the most eye-popping opening sequence yet! When an MI6 agent (Sean Bean) turns rogue and plans world domination with a terrifying satellite-borne weapon, Bond must pursue his former ally to Cuba, Monte Carlo, Switzerland and even Russia, all whilst dodging a sexy, deadly femme fatale (Famke Janssen) who will stop at nothing to put the 'squeeze' on the intrepid spy!
My thoughts
My rating

(From Reviews and ramblings by Gunnar on October 13th, 2014)

Zatoichi in Desperation, a review by Antares

Zatoichi in Desperation (1972) 72/100 - One has to wonder if the title of the 24th film in the series is meant to describe the feeling in its star, that the end is near in this long franchise. After the lackluster offering that preceded this film, Katsu decided to take the reins of director upon himself and he makes a very striking film from a visual standpoint. Although at times, his framing dwells precipitously close to art school overindulgence. A lot of people consider this a weak sister when compared to the long extended family of films of the blind masseur, but I thought it was quite entertaining, and only in brief moments, did it lag. What I liked the most was that Katsu kind of returns to the roots of the franchise, when it wasn't all about action and comedic segments, with a bleak storyline and setting. Katsu also tosses in a few MacGuffin side plots, one which seems to pay homage to Kenji Mizoguchi's Sanshō dayū. One of the highlights of this film is when Ichi finally gets a bit of trim from a prostitute, whose mother, through a kindly act from Ichi, is accidentally killed in the beginning of the story. Alas, the prostitute is merely setting him up for his assassination. Finally, the climactic battle in the end is made more suspenseful when Ichi has his hands stabbed by whaling spears in exchange for the prostitute's life. The yakuza boss gives him back his cane sword and Ichi awaits his execution by the yakuza's brigands in the morning. But Ichi has one surprise left in his bag of self defense tricks, and although wounded seriously, he lives on to make the final film in the Toho run. It's not a great film, but it's worth a look if your a completest and dare I say, I'd probably watch this one again in the future.

Teal = Masterpiece
Dark Green = Classic or someday will be
Lime Green = A good, entertaining film
Orange = Average
Red = Cinemuck
Brown = The color of crap, which this film is

(From Antares' Short Summations on December 20th, 2014)

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

2x10 Strange Things Happen at the One Two Point
Synopsis: The three-dot symbol leads Sarah to a company with a surprising connection to Andy Goode's Turk. Riley becomes a liability to John.
My Rating:

This is the first time I'm ahead. Yay me!!

As usual I will talk about the events in the episode fairly open and without spoiler tags. Achim, if you haven't seen the episode yet, you may want to postpone reading this.

I really wish I could give another 5-star rating here, because there were so many great things in this episode. The Riley story was terrific. The Ellison story intriguing. There were big reveals. It was all wonderfully done. But. The main story about Sarah and Dakara systems had such a weak run-of-the-mill, done-by-the-numbers plot; it unfortunately drags the whole thing down a notch.

I initially thought the three-dot thingie was a distraction, or even a meta joke, like, solve the problem, connect the dots. But as everyone kept insisting it was just that, I became less sure. BTW, nice that John continues to be supportive towards Sarah, even if he has his doubts.

So Sarah and Cameron play dress up as potential investors, there are business meetings and business dinners and small talks and a chip which is a fake chip and the Connors get conned and... yawn. Still, there are a few nice bits in-between, such as Cameron's sudden remark about the hair, the colors of Sarah and Cameron's outfit matching the black and white of the Go pieces, or Cameron's gun posing during the raid on the impostors (doing nothing while Sarah and Derek beat up the guys).

That the plot is so boring is even more of a shame, because Lena Hadey is great showing both Sarah's longing for a past were everything was normal and her growing obsession with the three dots. When she almost loses it and beats the hell out of Akagi, it is a very intense scene. Later on, she looks in the mirror and discovers three small splashes of blood on her face. Is she going crazy? As she smashes the mirror in frustration, the camera pans down to the shards in the sink, reflecting two images of Sarah. Wonderful shot.

Derek finally discovers that Jesse has an agenda of her own. What she tells about Future John might be exaggerated, but we know from S1 that he was heavily shielded. Derek decides to trust her, but we know that she still keeps secrets. How ironic that later it is Derek who tells Sarah she got played.

And Riley. Leven Rambin took the character to a whole new level in this episode. The scene as John visits her and she talks about the bear/fish poster completely blew me away. Then, in another terrific scene, we find out she is connected to Jesse, who once more becomes creepy as hell in the way she manipulates Riley. And as Riley returns to her foster home, she finally has her breakdown too and channels T2-Sarah in her you're-all-gonna-die outburst. All this remains beyond powerful, even on rewatching and without being floored by the surprises.

Meanwhile, Ellison finds out that Weaver's AI accidentally caused the death of Dr. Sherman during a blackout. Weaver encourages him to investigate. And while the writers managed to make a con plot boring, they also manage to make Ellison "interrogating" the AI a very intriguing scene. As he comes to the conclusion that the AI needs to be taught ethics, Weaver again takes him up on it. It is still hard to say what Weaver's agenda is, but her elevator talk with Ellison surely provided some interesting clues. But what he sees when both go to the AI lab again will probably give him another nightmare.


(From Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles: The Complete Second Season marathon on February 9th, 2010)