Monday: Michael Ritchie
Tuesday: Andy & Lana Wachowski
Wednesday: Chris Columbus
Thursday: Mel Brooks
Friday: Alfred Hitchcock
All posts by Beau
Stanley Kubrick
Kubrick’s career spanned many decades, averaging about two to three movies per decade. He started off slow, then starting with Paths of Glory, pretty much everything he did turned to gold. His camera work is usually stunning. Four of the five movies below I’ve seen only once, and I have sharp visual memories of all of them, even the parts I don’t particularly care for. Apparently he was a bear to work with, as he obsessed over the smallest details and required an insane number of takes for most shots. However, it seems most of his actors held a deep respect for him.
2001: A Space Odyssey: There are certainly timeless aspects of this film. The chilling relationship between Dave and HAL holds up very well today. The special effects are still pretty good and unlike most movies that take place in space, it was pretty scientifically accurate (e.g. there is no sound in space). However, the grand philosophical theme of the movie did nothing for me. “The Dawn of Man” part that opens the film literally made me fall asleep, and the ending left me cold and uninterested, or rather, wishing I was high so I could really enjoy it. Still, the middle part of the film is brilliant everything.
Grade: B-
Paths of Glory: French soldiers in WWI refuse to continue with an attack that is hopeless, but their superiors decide to make examples out of them in order to keep control over their army. Kirk Douglas shines as one of the sympathizers for those that mutiny. Very dark film, both visually and emotionally. Some of the shots are very chilling. My main quibble is Kubrick went for satire at times rather than pure horror; for example, the evil people are a little too evil (much like the communists in Orwell’s Animal Farm).
Grade: B
Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb: A U.S. general gone mad orders the bombing of the U.S.S.R., which would set off a doomsday machine on their end that would destroy the world. Most of the movie takes place in the war room in D.C. as they try to avert disaster. Laced with obvious satire “Gentlemen, you can’t fight in here! This is the War Room!” but also some great subtlety as well. Peter Sellers is great, playing three different characters who are all trying to stop the bomb. A little too off-beat for my tastes, but I have fond memories.
Grade: B
The Shining: Jack Nicholson takes his family to a remote hotel in Colorado to be the caretaker for the winter. In the book, he slowly goes mad as the hotel takes over his psyche. In the movie, he’s pretty much of a psychopath from the beginning, just under control of his violent tendencies. That’s my main criticism of the movie. I don’t really believe Nicholson’s character is anything but a mean drunk who just needed a slight push to go completely mad. Shelly Duvall’s character is pretty believable as the meek wife of an abuser. The kid is downright terrible, no surprise there. At least Scatman Crothers is excellent. Where the movie shines (sorry), is the atmosphere and the genuinely creepy sense of isolation and terror that builds throughout. Kubrick has some superb shots, including one long one following Danny moving through most of the hotel on his tricycle. Also, the young girls and the bleeding elevator was brilliant. The Razzies nominated him for worst director for this movie and I don’t get it. I think they just really hated Shelly Duvall.
Grade: A-
Full Metal Jacket: Two movies in one, with the first half being the brutal nature of Vietnam War boot camps, and the second half being the brutal reality of being in Vietnam. The former is simultaneously hilarious and scary, while the latter is truly horrifying with some biting satire thrown in for good measure. A bit uneven at times, but very powerful.
Grade: A
Other Stanley Kubrick Movies You May Have Seen
Eyes Wide Shut
Barry Lyndon
A Clockwork Orange
Lolita
Spartacus
The Killing
Killer’s Kiss
Paul Verhoeven
Verhoeven seems to really like exaggeration, both in visual effects and story elements. Directing actors does not appear to be his strong suit, but each film has a definite vision and consistent atmosphere. I’ve enjoyed everything I’ve seen by him, though none of it has out and out wowed me. I also haven’t seen Showgirls, which is wowing in that it’s considered one of the worst movies of all-time.
Robocop: Peter Weller, police officer, gets killed during an arrest. Well, almost killed. The Detroit police force is able to turn him into a cyborg who kicks some royal justice ass, makes witty remarks, and struggles with faint memories of his former life. Lots of fun.
Grade: B-
Total Recall: Arnold Schwarzenegger is a construction worker who’s having trouble memories about life on Mars, so he visits a memory implant corporation to investigate if he’s currently living out implanted memories. Naturally, a bunch of shit goes down and there’s a lot of questions over what’s real and what isn’t. Like Robocop, some over-the-top situations that are mostly fun, as well as the witty one-liners. I love the visual and philosophical representations of late 21st century Mars colonization. Loosely based on a Philip K. Dick story.
Grade: B
Basic Instinct: Michael Douglas is a detective investigating a murder. The prime suspect is a socialite author (Sharon Stone) who recently released a bestseller which details a murder that is virtually identical. Did she use the book as an alibi or is there a copycat killer? The movie sets up both possibilities really well. Sharon Stone is really good, playing the sexy but emotionally cold psychopath role to a tee. Michael Douglas, unfortunately, never quite comes across realistic. Some will hate the ambiguous ending, though I’m a big fan. Graphic sex scenes broach gratuitousness, but sex is a heavy part of the plot. Your mileage may vary.
Some LGBT supporters were very angry when this film came out, as every suspect in the movie is gay or bisexual, while all of the “good guys” are straight. I have a hard time getting worked up about that, since there is little in the way of emotion in the movie (and I never got the feeling that the sexuality of any character was being judged) and all of those involved, even the “straight” characters, have loose sexual morals.
Grade: B+
Other Movies By Paul Verhoeven You May Have Seen
Hollow Man
Starship Troopers
Showgirls
Black Book
Flesh+Blood
Soldier of Orange
Turkish Delight
The Fourth Man
Stephen Herek
Stephen Herek’s has had an interesting career. Most of his early movies were well-known and widely disliked, or at best tolerated. Most of his recent movies have been straight-to-video. But then he had one masterpiece in the middle of his career that doesn’t belong with any of these movies. I don’t know what to make of that. Did he luck into it? Does he have the talent but is content with doing safe and forgettable movies?
Bill and Ted’s Excellent Adventure: A pretty cool movie when I was nine years old, but the humor has little depth now as an adult. Keanu Reeves and Alex Winter find a phone booth that travels through time and with the help of George Carlin, get a bunch of historical figures (including Genghis Khan, Abraham Lincoln, and Napoleon) to come back to the future with them to, I don’t know, vouch for their bodaciousness. Yeah, totally bogus.
Grade: D
The Mighty Ducks: Cheesy and ridiculous, but at times charming and funny, The Mighty Ducks is the one movie where nearly every Minnesotan knows somebody who was in it. Emilio Estevez, a workaholic, gets a DUI and as his probation, must coach a rag-tag bunch of kids who play hockey poorly. Similar to The Bad News Bears in that the bad kids become serviceable, and the coach lands a couple of ringers that do most of the work. Not as good as that movie, as there are more caricatures, including the sneeringly evil opposing coach (who, incidentally, starred in the Bad News Bears sequel). Also, the heartfelt moments are too choreographed. Despite this, I enjoy it whenever I come across it.
Grade: C-
Mr. Holland’s Opus: It’s funny to go from a movie that does the dramatic moments so poorly to a movie that is absolutely superb and evoking genuine, non-manipulative tears. Richard Dreyfuss plays a well-liked high school music teacher who struggles on the home front with having a deaf son and on the work front with the reality that the school is going to cut the music program. Nearly every moment of this movie feels real and Dreyfuss puts in possibly the best performance of his career. I’ve seen this several times now and cry like a fool every time.
Grade: A-
Other Stephen Herek Movies You May Have Seen
Critters
Don’t Tell Mom The Babysitter’s Dead
The Three Musketeers
101 Dalmatians
Holy Man
Life or Something Like It
Man of the House
Picture This
Dead Like Me: Life After Death
Into the Blue 2: The Reef
The Cutting Edge: Fire & Ice
The Chaperone
Irvin Kershner
Robocop 2: Just a brutal sequel that I don’t think any director could have saved.The last movie Kershner directed, and I may have given up too after this trash. Awkward, poor dialogue, confusing character motivations. Most sequels don’t need to be made but few are as miserable as this.
Grade: F
The Flim-Flam Man: A fun con-artist movie starring George C. Scott. Nowhere near The Sting in terms of plot or acting, but charming and funny through and through.
Grade: C+
Star Wars: Episode V — The Empire Strikes Back: Right before he wrote the script for Raiders of the Lost Ark, Lawrence Kasdan wrote the script for Empire. It was his first script and a pretty good debut. Lucas gave the reins to Kershner and he directed the best movie in the series. The love triangle between Han, Leia, and Luke is a bit uncomfortable, but the action is one creative scene after another. From the imperial walkers to the asteroid belt to Cloud City to Luke’s showdown with Vader, there is little time to relax. Yoda makes his first appearance; he could have been a complete disaster but the puppeteer does an excellent job of giving the Jedi master pathos and an aura of wisdom. The end of the movie is a series of powerful cliffhangers. By the time I was old enough to watch this, the sequel had already been made. I couldn’t have imagined waiting three years to see how this wrapped up.
Grade: A+
Other Movies by Irvin Kershner You May Have Seen
Never Say Never Again
Eye of Laura Mars
Raid on Entebbe
The Return of a Man Called Horse
S*P*Y*S
Up the Sandbox
Loving
A Fine Madness
George Lucas
Lucas isn’t too bad of a story creator. After all, Raiders of the Lost Ark was mostly his idea, though no doubt having Spielberg and Kasdan around helped. But the guy can’t write good dialogue and other than the occasional special effect, the guy can’t direct a scene very well either. Granted, Lucas has almost no experience with directing outside of the Star Wars movies. The guy is obviously very skilled at surrounding himself with the right people, creating a multi-billion dollar cash cow. But when he takes full creative control of anything, it’s usually bad news.
Star Wars: Episode II — Attack of the Clones: The awfulness of this movie can be proven by one of the worst lines in movie history, also written by our friend George Lucas. “I don’t like sand. It’s coarse and rough and irritating and it gets everywhere. Not like here. Here everything is soft and smooth.” Yes, an adult wrote that line. I’d be willing to wager that 90% of the Star Wars fan fiction has more competent writing than this movie does. A terrible bridge between the other two prequels, Attack of the Clones is cringe-worthy when it’s not boring your synapses into a coma. The only thing that saves this movie from an F rating is some fairly well done battle scenes, including a kick-ass one-on-one fight with Yoda.
Grade: D-
Star Wars: Episode I — The Phantom Menace: My expectations were actually pretty low when I went to see this as I had already heard the blah reviews coming in. Those expectations were met and then some. Jar-Jar Binks is a problem, but he’s barely more annoying than C-3PO. The problems lie in the directing and the awful acting of Jake Lloyd who got to play kid Darth Vader. The casting wasn’t all bad, as I quite enjoyed Liam Neeson and Ian McDiarmid. Even Ewan McGregor plays an okay Ben Kenobi. But Natalie Portman is wooden, though I’m not sure how much of that is her versus how her character was written. George Lucas ain’t exactly strong with character depth.
Grade: D+
Star Wars: Episode III — Revenge of the Sith: A mild improvement over the previous two films, if only because of the improved story. Much like the second movie in the original trilogy, nothing much good happens to any of the annoying heroes. Perhaps Lucas is better at writing dark than happy. Fairly solid connections to the fourth movie in the series, with only a couple of annoying continuity things.
Grade: C
Star Wars: Episode IV — A New Hope: For the record, this review is for the original version, not the retrosuck updates Lucas made in the 90’s and ongoing. The pantheon of space operas, this movie mesmerized me as a child and I still enjoy watching it today. If I’m flipping channels I’ll almost always stop. The story is very simple, with clearly divided lines of good and evil and fairly flat characters. The dialogue is as terrible as anything Lucas has done. “My name is Luke Skywalker. I’m here to rescue you!” is pretty lame stuff. Princess Leia’s lines are nearly universally cliche. The directing of the actors is also obviously flawed. Now Carrie Fisher and Mark Hamill aren’t the world’s best actors, but they’re better than they are here. What helps Lucas out is that the actors, especially Mark Hamill and Harrison Ford, really appear to be enjoying themselves. And, naturally, Alec Guiness is fantastic as Ben Kenobi. I know he was upset that he was most remembered for this short role and not the rest of his career, but he was really good here and if it weren’t for this movie, I may not know who he is.
What Lucas did do right is direct some pretty incredible special effects. It still amazes me how realistic the spaceships look for 1977. There are some glitches, but nothing too distracting. And, of course, John Williams’ score is epic. The opening trumpets still give me chills, and the sound effects are solid. Finally, the confrontation with the death star is wonderful. “All right kid, now let’s blow this thing and go home.”
Grade: A
Other George Lucas Movies You May Have Seen
THX 1138
American Graffiti
Next Week on the Director Series
Monday: George Lucas
Tuesday: Irvin Kershner
Wednesday: Stephen Herek
Thursday: Paul Verhoeven
Friday: Stanley Kubrick
Wes Craven
A prolific horror director whose movies have never lived up to the weight of his name, at least from the movies I’ve seen. I really like good horror, but it’s really hard to spook me on the big screen. I’ll give him credit for some cool ideas, but the end product has never kept me awake at night, nor talking to my friends about that awesome scene.
The Last House on the Left: Somewhat commendable, I suppose, for it’s pornographic depiction of violence and gore, but that doesn’t make it good. Production values are awful with the exception of the realistic gore, and the acting is even worse. There’s nothing exciting about the plot either, with a group of rapist/murderers unwittingly taking refuge in the house of the parents of one of their victims. Not much in the way of suspense, mostly revulsion.
Grade: F
A Nightmare on Elm Street: A unique and engaging premise: Freddy Krueger was killed by a lynch mob, and finds himself able to enter the dreams of his assailants’ children and kill them there. Some freaky scenes, but I saw this when I was young and didn’t really find it scary. Johnny Depp’s film debut, and he’s fun.
Grade: D
Scream: Another cool premise, where teenagers are being offed by a serial killer who is really fond of scary movies. Nearly everyone is a suspect, and there’s some cleverness throughout the script. Ultimately unsatisfying, with a bunch of mediocre performances by mostly mediocre actors.
Grade: D+
Red Eye: One half of a fantastic movie, Rachel McAdams is taken hostage on a plane by Cillian Murphy, who reveals to her that he is involved in a plot to kill the Director of Homeland Security and needs her help (while on the plane) to make it happen. If she doesn’t help, something even worse will happen. Very suspenseful first half; Cillian Murphy is a fantastic villian, and McAdams is also a believable victim. But when the plane lands, the movie devolves into cliche horror movie tropes and an irritating ending.
Grade: C+
Other Movies By Wes Craven You May Have Seen
Scream 2, 3, & 4
Swamp Thing
The People Under the Stairs
Wes Craven’s New Nightmare
Vampire in Brooklyn
Music of the Heart
My Soul to Take
Cursed
Curtis Hanson
Curtis Hanson had some popular movies but nothing really acclaimed until L.A. Confidential, which was really acclaimed. Wonder Boys and 8 Mile were also well-received, and he hasn’t done much of notoriety since. I really don’t know what to think of him as a director, as he’s had movies that were worse than they should have been and better than they should have been, if that makes any sense.
The Hand That Rocks the Cradle: Rebecca DeMornay is a nanny who is seemingly perfect, and of course her plan is to destroy the family. Over the top, obvious. Fantastic death scene, at least. Bad, but somewhat entertaining.
Grade: D+
The River Wild: Meryl Streep is an expert river rafter, which makes her the target of a couple of armed criminals (Kevin Bacon, John C. Reilly) who want to use her (and her family) to escape the country. The acting is pretty good, but the script is really underwhelming. The rafting scenes are also not nearly as exciting as they should have been. Mildly suspenseful at times, which is not a compliment
Grade: C-
L.A. Confidential: Film noir about a three cops from a corrupt 1950’s L.A. police force who all try to solve the same brutal murder in three different ways. Guy Pearce, Kevin Spacey, and Russell Crowe are all good, as is Kim Basinger, who won an Oscar. Beautifully shot, captures film noir perfectly, oozing cool and suspense.
Grade: A-
Other Curtis Hanson Films You May Have Seen
8 Mile
Wonder Boys
In Her Shoes
Lucky You
Chasing Mavericks
Bad Influence
Martin Brest
Despite directing some pretty successful movies, Martin Brest has had a relatively small career, directing only six movies. His last movie, Gigli (2003) is considered one of the worst movies ever, but it was reportedly butchered by the studios (who forced it to be a rom-com), so how much blame Martin deserves is questionable. From the rest of his movies, he seems to be a competent director who has difficulty making cuts as they tend to run on the long side.
Meet Joe Black: A remake of sorts of the 1934 movie Death Takes A Holiday, where Death (Brad Pitt) strikes a deal with a multi-millionaire (Anthony Hopkins); the millionaire can live a little longer if he gives Death a tour of mortal pleasures (one of those being Claire Forlani). Well-acted, and a somewhat intriguing premise, but at three hours is about ninety minutes too long. My most significant memory of this movie is how bad I had to pee when it was over. At least I felt it was good enough to stay in the theater until it was over.
Grade: C+
Beverly Hills Cop: Eddie Murphy at his best in a only slightly dated comedy about a rogue Detroit cop solving crime in Beverly Hills. Judge Reinhold is fun and Bronson Pinchot’s cameo is fantastic.
Grade: B
Scent of a Woman: Al Pacino, a blind former colonel, takes a desperate-for-cash college student (Chris O’Donnell, who thought he’d just be babysitting an old person) to New York City for one crazy weekend filled with many antics and some predictable moral lessons. Pacino won an Oscar for his performance. He was electrifying for sure, a bit of a caricature, but still entertaining.
Grade: B+
Other Martin Brest Films You May Have Seen
Going In Style
Midnight Run
Gigli
Death By Troggles 
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