Interstellar

Interstellar, 2014. A wormhole is explored while Earth is dying.

Directed by Christopher Nolan. Written by Jonathan Nolan, & Christopher Nolan. Starring Matthew McConaughey, with Anne Hathaway, Jessica Chastain, Bill Irwin, Ellen Burstyn, Michael Caine, & Matt Damon.

Concept: A
Story: D
Characters: C
Dialog: C
Pacing: Rushed. It could easily have been 10 or 12 hours long, as a TV series maybe. C
Cinematography: A
Special effects/design: A
Acting: B
Music: A
Enjoyment: One of the crappiest of all time crappy endings. It's on par with "And it was all a dream," undermining the movie's entire plot. C

GPA: 2.8/4

"Speaking of the Weather"

"Speaking of the Weather" (short), 1937. Characters come out of magazines.

Directed by Frank Tashlin. Starring Mel Blanc, & Billy Bletcher.

Concept: F
Story: F
Characters: F
Dialog: D
Pacing: C
Cinematography: C
Special effects/design: C
Acting: C
Music: B
Enjoyment: I don't get why this type of cartoon was so popular. It's just references, and nothing else. I also don't get why the people who put together the Looney Tunes DVDs felt the need to include so many of this type of cartoon. One is the same as the next. D

GPA: 1.3/4

Satellite in the Sky

Satellite in the Sky, 1956. The first manned space flight carries an experimental bomb.

Directed by Paul Dickson. Written by John Mather, J.T. McIntosh, & Edith Dell. Starring Kieron Moore, with Lois Maxwell, Donald Wolfit, Bryan Forbes, Jimmy Hanley, & Barry Keegan.

Concept: C
Story: F
Characters: F
Dialog: D
Pacing: D
Cinematography: B
Special effects/design: B
Acting: D
Music: D
Enjoyment: An incompetently written mess. F

GPA: 1.2/4

Birdman

Birdman, 2014. An actor who used to play a superhero produces a crappy Broadway play.

Directed by Alejandro González Iñárritu. Written by Iñárritu, Nicolás Giacobone, Alexander Dinelaris, & Armando Bo. Starring Michael Keaton, with Emma Stone, Zach Galifianakis, Naomi Watts, Andrea Riseborough, Edward Norton, & Amy Ryan.

Concept: C
Story: C
Characters: C
Dialog: C
Pacing: C
Cinematography: One long take. It would be pretty cool and impressive if this were a suspense film. In a comedy, it's a disaster. B
Special effects/design: B
Acting: A
Music: A two hour drum solo. My head still hurts. D
Enjoyment: For a movie that has so much to say to criticize the artlessness of Hollywood movies, it has very little to offer itself. The characters are cliches, with no development worth mentioning. The big dramatic moments have no emotional weight. And, despite being advertised as a comedy and having a very funny cast, it has less humor than most good dramas. C

GPA: 2.3/4

"Porky's Railroad"

"Porky's Railroad" (short), 1937. Porky Pig drives a train.

Directed by Frank Tashlin. Starring Mel Blanc.

Concept: D
Story: F
Characters: D
Dialog: C
Pacing: C
Cinematography: C
Special effects/design: C
Acting: D
Music: B
Enjoyment: It's not funny, and it barely even seems to try. D

GPA: 1.5/4

"Night and Fog"

from my 100 Popular Movies Marathon, part 42 of 100

"Nuit et brouillard" (short), 1955. A reflection on footage of the holocaust.

Directed by Alain Resnais. Written by Jean Cayrol. Starring Michel Bouquet.

(Scoring not applicable.) This is footage every human being needs to see. And watching it is probably the worst experience you will ever have watching a film.

Survivor: Season 18

Survivor: Season 18, 2009. A reality game in the South American wilderness.

Created by Charlie Parsons. Starring Jeff Probst.

Concept: C
Story: C
Characters: C
Dialog: B
Pacing: C
Cinematography: C
Special effects/design: C
Acting: n/a
Music: C
Enjoyment: There are a couple good characters, but they don't really get to play much. Most of the season is just watching people in positions to do well self destruct, week after week, which gets old pretty fast. And there's "Coach," who is absolutely insufferable. C

GPA: 2.1/4

Big Hero 6

Big Hero Six, 2014. A boy genius creates a team of superheros.

Directed by Don Hall, & Chris Williams. Written by Jordan Roberts, Daniel Gerson, & Robert L. Baird, based on a comic book by Duncan Rouleau, & Steven T. Seagle. Starring Scott Adsit, & Ryan Potter, with Daniel Henney, T.J. Miller, Jamie Chung, Damon Wayans Jr., Genesis Rodriguez, James Cromwell, Alan Tudyk, & Maya Rudolph.

Concept: C
Story: C
Characters: B
Dialog: B
Pacing: B
Cinematography: B
Special effects/design: A
Acting: C
Music: B
Enjoyment: Fun. The story arc is a paint-by-numbers superhero movie, but other than that there are no real faults with it. B

GPA: 2.8/4

"Feast"

"Feast" (short), 2014. A dog's meals change with his owner's life.

Written & directed by Patrick Osborne; story by Nicole Mitchell, & Raymond S. Persi.

Concept: C
Story: B
Characters: B
Dialog: n/a
Pacing: B
Cinematography: B
Special effects/design: B
Acting: B
Music: B
Enjoyment: It emulates "Paperman," and does a pretty good job of it. A

GPA: 3.0/4

Snowpiercer

Snowpiercer, 2013. The last surviving humans are on a train for some reason.

Directed by Joon-ho Bong. Written by Bong, & Kelly Masterson; story by Bong, based on a book by Jacques Lob, Benjamin Legrand, & Jean-Marc Rochette. Starring Chris Evans, with Kang-ho Song, Ed Harris, John Hurt, Tilda Swinton, Jamie Bell, Octavia Spencer, Ewen Bremner, & Ah-sung Ko.

Concept: It doesn't quite end up making sense, but there are lots of great ideas in it. B
Story: B
Characters: C
Dialog: C
Pacing: B
Cinematography: I'm glad we didn't see it in the theatre; even on a TV, parts of it are unreasonably dark. D
Special effects/design: C
Acting: B
Music: B
Enjoyment: They don't bother to explain the absurd set-up (Why are they on a train?) until half-way through, by which point it's far too late to take the movie as seriously as it takes itself. (And anyway, it's not much of an explanation.) C

GPA: 2.4/4

Red Dwarf: Series Three

Red Dwarf: Series Three, 1989. The Odd Couple in space.

Written & created by Rob Grant & Doug Naylor. Directed by Ed Bye. Starring Chris Barrie, Craig Charles, Danny John-Jules, & Robert Llewellyn.

Concept: C
Story: D
Characters: C
Dialog: C
Pacing: C
Cinematography: C
Special effects/design: D
Acting: C
Music: D
Enjoyment: There's one funny joke per episode. It's weirdly consistent. I think we are done with this show. C

GPA: 1.7/4

Survivor: Season 17

Survivor: Season 17, 2008. A reality game in the African wilderness.

Created by Charlie Parsons. Starring Jeff Probst.

Concept: C
Story: D
Characters: D
Dialog: C
Pacing: C
Cinematography: C
Special effects/design: C
Acting: n/a
Music: C
Enjoyment: A disaster of a season. Not only is there no one to root for, there isn't even a single player that knows what they're doing. C

GPA: 1.8/4

St. Vincent

St. Vincent, 2014. A grumpy old dirtbag gets a babysitting job.

Written & directed by Theodore Melfi. Starring Bill Murray, with Melissa McCarthy, Naomi Watts, & Jaeden Lieberher.

Concept: D
Story: C
Characters: B
Dialog: A
Pacing: B
Cinematography: B
Special effects/design: B
Acting: B
Music: C
Enjoyment: Very funny. And, while I can see why critics complain that it's contrived, I thought it did pretty well on the emotional side of things. It could have been an awful movie with a different cast, but it works. B

GPA: 2.7/4

The Cosby Show: Season Three

The Cosby Show: Season Three, 1986-1987. The day-to-day life of a large, wealthy family.

Created by Ed. Weinberger, Michael Leeson, & Bill Cosby. Directed by Jay Sandrich (18 episodes), Tony Singletary (6), Carl Lauten (1), & Regge Life (1). Written by Gary Kott (6 episodes), Matt Williams (5), John Markus (5), Carmen Finestra (5), Chris Auer (2), Matt Robinson (2), Susan Fales (1), Margaret Beddow Hatch (1), Matt Geller (1), Janet Leahy (1), Elizabeth Hailey (1), & Oliver Hailey (1). Starring Cosby, with Phylicia Rashad, Sabrina LeBeauf, Lisa Bonet, Malcolm-Jamal Warner, Tempestt Bledsoe, & Keshia Knight Pulliam.

Concept: B
Story: C
Characters: A
Dialog: A
Pacing: B
Cinematography: C
Special effects/design: C
Acting: B
Music: B
Enjoyment:  There are some exceptionally low low points this season, and some stereotypical sit-cominess is starting to seep in. But overall, still hilarious. A

GPA: 3.0/4

[update of a previous post - original is here]

A Few Good Men

from my 100 Popular Movies Marathon, part 41 of 100



A Few Good Men, 1992. The Navy wants a murder case to be ignored.

Directed by Rob Reiner. Written by Aaron Sorkin. Starring Tom Cruise, with Jack Nicholson, Demi Moore, Kevin Bacon, Kiefer Sutherland, Kevin Pollak, James Marshall, & Wolfgang Bodison.

Concept: C
Story: "We have no evidence, but maybe if I make a witness angry he will confess." That is pretty much the entire story. I suspect that seeing this as a kid is the reason I thought for years that courtroom dramas were crap. D
Characters: D
Dialog: B
Pacing: C
Cinematography: C
Special effects/design: C
Acting: Nicholson is great. Cruise does well (but he's nowhere near interesting enough carry the film, which he has to do). B
Music: D
Enjoyment: You could cut this down to about 30 minutes - just Nicholson's scenes (and the bare minimum of the rest of it to give them context). That's all that's there. C

GPA: 1.9/4