Raven Reviews’ Rating System

This is for the voracious readers of my blog and even the casual observer (read it more). You may have noticed that at the end of every review I list the number of stars I give a film. Why do I do this and what does each star mean? Well, officially I do the star system because I hate assigning a grade (A, B, F, C-) for a movie. Now what are my criteria?

Generally, if I give a film four stars (such as Rio, Kill Bill Vol. 1) it means that I have no negative criticism for it or, if I do have negative criticism it is so minimal that it doesn't detract from my love of the rest of the film. On the flip side if I give a film zero stars (The Hottie and The Nottie, Freddy Got Fingered, Friday the 13^th: The Final Chapter) it means I have nothing but criticism for it. Either I find the subject matter approached in deplorable manner or just hate the film. Rarely do I hate a film enough to warrant zero stars and even more rare is a "No Star Rating". My reasons for this are more often because I just couldn't make it through the whole film (remember when I reviewed Hangover Part II?) or the star system is unsuited for something as was the case for The Gingerdead Man. That hardly was a movie at all so I guess it doesn't matter if it was worth zero stars or I just wanted to not assign a rating. This is important: A zero stars is not the same thing as a no star rating.

This is about how it breaks down:



Zero Stars

This means I hated everything about the movie

½ ★

This means I only found a ridiculous redeeming quality like the font used for the credits

★

This means that there is something that really turns me off to the rest of it (case in point, the gloomy and gray animation in Once Upon A Forest)

★1/2

Overall not really watchable but features at least one or two things I did like.

★★

Movies I probably would only watch again if I was really bored.

★★1/2

This means that only one or two things are of special significance and near perfect (Like Javier Bardem's performance in Biutiful) but are surrounded by basic slop (like everything else in Biutiful)

★★★

This one is kind of tough to explain. The ratio is rather reversed from two and a half stars

★★★1/2

Sometimes it is something seemingly small that drops a four star film to this rating like the last shot in Thelma and Louise.

★★★★

Every once in a while I am pleasantly surprised and my rating reflects that (Our Idiot Brother). Usually this is reserved for films that are, just like Mary Poppins, practically perfect in every way.



Above all I must warn that the purpose of the stars should not be taken out of context of the review itself. You can't compare two completely different reviews and say that only the stars matter.

This post is dedicated by My Idiot Father who for whatever reason doesn't get my system.

Kill Bill Vol. 2 (2004)

The film could be judged to be one of the best sequels in recent years but it's really not a sequel anyway. So I won't say that. I don't believe it be quite the masterpiece that the Kill Bill: Vol. 1 is but it is a great film nonetheless.

Vol. 2 picks up almost exactly where Vol. 1 left off. The Bride (Uma Thurman), having killed O-Ren Ishii and Vernita Greene has only three more people to take revenge on. They are Bill's younger brother Budd (Michael Madsen), his latest flame Elle (Daryl Hannah) and Bill himself (David Carradine).

Like I said in my review for Vol. 1, Quentin Tarantino is a master at genres. This film is more spaghetti western than kung fu but there is nothing wrong with that. Tarantino's dialogue has never been better than in the final act of the film. The last twenty minutes or so feature some of the best read/written dialogue I've seen in a film. David Carradine has a fifteen minute monologue where he explains his position and why he did what he did to The Bride. Instead of simply saying, "You made me feel bad" he goes into rather fluid analogy connecting Superman to the life of an assassin.

We don't get an extended fight between the Bride and Bill like we did with O-Ren in the first film. Frankly I didn't need it. His death in the film (I'm not responsible for that spoiler since it's in the title) is handled tragically and is incredibly sad which one would not expect given the build-up to the last twenty minutes. David Carradine showcases some great character work in this film and I would have loved it if he recieved an Oscar nomination (Golden Globes suck) for his work.

Now I feel I must explain the reason for not giving the film four stars like I did with Kill Bill: Vol 1. Admittedly it's because I just liked the first more. Not because this one isn't as good but since I know I enjoyed the first more I cannot in good conscience give them both the same rating. I'm almost half-tempted to use three stars and three quarters of a star for it but alas I fear change.

★★★1/2

Paranormal Activity 2 (2010) Review

This movie isn't so much a sequel (like the title would suggest) as a prequel. It's an inferior film that, considering how much I liked the first Paranormal Activity, was a major disappointment.
Daniel Rey (Brian Boland) and his wife Kristi (Sprague Grayden) have just brought home their infant son, Hunter. They live in a large house with Daniel's daughter Ali (Molly Ephraim), their nanny Martine (Vivis Colombetti) and their German Shephard Abby. As it turns out Kristi is the sister of Kathie who you might remember as the victim of a haunting in the first film. Both Kathie and her boyfriend Micah make several appearences in the film. One night the Reys return home to find their entire house vandalized. Furniture is thrown across the floor, the television is smashed etc. Assuming they are the victims of a break-in (interestingly there was nothing stolen and no signs of forced entry) the Reys set up video survellience cameras around their house. As the cameras record strange things happening night after night Ali, after a extensive amount of research on the internet, assumes that their is a demonic entity in the house that is after Hunter. Bet you wouldn't have been able to guess that she's right.

Like I said this was a major disappointment. Basically this how almost all the events transpire. Nothing happens, nothing happens, loud bang, nothing happens, nothing happens, louder bang, nothing happens, things move around by themselves, nothing happens, demon attacks and it's over. The subtleties and illusions utilized so well in the first film have, for some strange reason, been replaced by cheap jump scares. For those who are unfamiliar with jump scares allow me to elaborate. Often there will be silence which is suddenly interrupted by a loud noise or fast action with a sharp musical chord. If you have ever been sitting in a room by yourself with your attention on something interesting and someone comes in to the room and causes your shoulders to leap up suddenly in brief terror. Well, you have been jump scared.

A major issue is the camera angles which are all too far away or too fuzzy to really see the characters faces when they are scared. As a side effect of that we are not scared because we cannot empathize with them. The characters are like faceless mannequins so who cares about their plight? I certainly don't and I really don't think you will either.

★

Boondock Saints (1999) Review

Nearly everyone I've spoken to about this film says things such as "It's incredible" and "You'll love it!" and the like. What I got upon viewing is a film that I didn't love nor hate, in the strictest sense.

Fraternal twins Connor and Murphy Mcmanus (Sean Patrick Flannery, Norman Reedus) are two Irish-born Catholics who live and work in Boston. After they kill two Russian thugs in self-defense and being released as heroes they decide that it is their mission from God to rid the world of evil men. Risking their lives for their beliefs of Veritas (truth) and Aequitas (justice), the Boondock Saints are hyped by the public, for they are doing good, which only few dare to admit. Even FBI agent Paul Smecker (Willem Dafoe), who is assigned to follow their trail of bloodshed, admits that what Connor and Murphy are doing is what he has always wanted to happen. The boys are joined by their friend and former mob "package boy" David "The Funnyman" Della Rocco (David Della Rocco) as they slowly work their way through the underworld killing men they judge to be evil. No vigilante story can be complete without the bad guys hiring a perfect killer who's only known in the film as Il Duce (Billy Connolly).

Possibly the only good things in the film are the strong performances by Dafoe and Connolly who both manage to make the most of their limited screen time. By contrast Flannery and Reedus stay oddly wooden in their readings.

The film itself seems more interested in finding interesting or original ways to stage the executions of the villains instead of presenting the internal choices made by the main characters to choose vigilantism. Sloppy editing of action sequences leave me wanting more. I've been told that the original cut received an NC-17 rating after the Columbine massacre but the chaotic editing to gain an R makes you realize that all the other aspects of the film are just as poor. That feeling runs from the direction by Troy Duffy to the Tarantino-wannabe dialogue (also by Duffy) to the hammed up role of Rocco. All the way up until we get to the miscasting of Ron Jeremy as a mafia underboss.

Who knows? Maybe I really did hate it.

★1/2

La Belle et la Bête (1946) Review

One of the best French films in existence, La Belle et la Bête (Beauty and the Beast), begins in the home of a half-ruined merchant (Marcel André). The merchant, whose name is never mentioned, has four grown children. Three daughters and a son named Ludovic (Michel Auclair). His first two daughters, Adélaïde (Nane Germon) and Félicie (Mila Parély), are superficial, selfish and spoiled. They exploit the third daughter, Belle (Josette Day) as a servant and squander every cent their father makes on themselves so that they can be beautiful and sophisticated. Ludovic despises both Adélaïde and Félicie but is highly protective of Belle, particularly from the advances of his scoundrel friend Avenant (Jean Marais). One day the merchant leaves on a business trip. Before he goes he asks each of his daughters what he can bring them as a present. Adélaïde and Félicie naturally ask for lavish gifts while Belle asks for only a single rose. On his way home the merchant gets lost in the forest. He comes across a castle and enters to seek accommodations. No one appears to own the castle and the merchant sleeps well. The next morning the merchant sees a rose bush and, remembering his promise to Belle, he picks a single rose.

Out of the shadows steps the Beast (also played by Jean Marais) who demands retribution for the loss of his precious rose after he allowed the merchant to stay in his home. The merchant begs to see his family one last time and the Beast gives him a choice. Either he must return and stay in the Beast's castle forever or one of his daughters must take his place. As she feels she is the cause of her father's predicament, Belle sacrifices herself to the Beast. Upon arriving at the castle, Belle finds that the Beast, whose grotesqueness she cannot deny, does not want to kill her, but wants to marry her and lavish her with riches. He does not force her, but he will ask her every night to marry him, these times the only ones when he will appear to her. She vows never to say yes. As Belle resigns herself to her mortal fate and looks deeper into the Beast - whose grotesque exterior masks a kind but tortured soul her thoughts begin to change. Meanwhile, Belle's family, who learn of her situation, have their own thoughts of what to do, some working toward what they believe is Belle's best welfare, and others working toward their own benefit.

The original story by Jeanne-Marie Leprince de Beaumont is essentially a story about two characters having dinner. Writer/Director Jean Cocteau manages to flesh out something with less than six-thousand words into a film of near perfection. It's a picture that does not age. Every time I watch the film I see something new. Purely poetic, fantastical and translucent. The film is not hindered by my inability to speak French. The Beast, in all his incarnations, is one of the most tragic heroes in literature. Jean Marais and Jean Cocteau give him an elegance that is absolutely mesmerizing. His appearance has an odd similarity to animal-human creatures from the Universal legacy. Cocteau decides to play up the Beast's eyes so that we are not only sympathetic to his plight but also empathetic. Jean Marais plays a total of three roles in the film but it is his interpretation of The Beast that is his best role and has only been matched by Robby Benson's.

★★★★

Keeper of the Flame (1942) Review

1942-1946 was an irregular time in Hollywood. The US was engulfed by World War II and Hollywood was forced to support the war effort by creating more or less propaganda pictures. Perhaps the audiences wanted a way to escape the realities of the war so the Three Little Pigs took on Adolf Wolf in the Tex Avery short Wolf Blitz and Batman was fighting to stop a Japanese criminal mastermind in the cliffhanger series. Oddly enough this era also produced some of the best films ever made. Keeper of the Flame is no exception.

As the second of nine films that Katharine Hepburn and Spencer Tracy made together Keeper of the Flame begins with a car racing down a storm-trodden road. The car, driven by someone we don't see, careens of a broken bridge and crashes into a ravine. The killed driver we learn is Robert Forrest. He's somewhat of a hero among the American people. He spends the majority of his time speaking out against fascism in Germany and giving hope through rousing speeches and essays. The entire country mourns his death like they would a president. Newspaperman Steven O'Malley (Tracy) is motivated to write a biography on Forrest. First though he must get through to Forrest's widow Christine (Hepburn) who has become a recluse following her husband's death. As Steven probes the story of Robert's life, with the help of a lead secretary named Clive Kerndon (Richard Whorf), he finds that not all about Robert was as it seemed and his death may have not been an accident.

You won't ever see me say that Katharine Hepburn gives a bad performance because, quite frankly, one does not exist. Her role as Christine is one of her best. We don't see Christine until nearly a quarter into the film so we wonder who she is or what she feels. There's no dialogue when she first appears. A lesser actress would have required a long speech to convey what Hepburn does in very few facial expressions. Spencer Tracy is equally brilliant in the film and has a remarkable ability to create a fully realized character based on Donald Ogden Stewart's screenplay.

The story is one of the best mysteries that Hollywood has put out. Until the last ten minutes we wonder what the truth is. We know that there is a secret that Christine and Clive are keeping from Steven but are not sure what and we naturally attempt to come to our own conclusions. Was he having an affair? Where was he going when he crashed his car? The whole film has a wonderful atmosphere surrounding it. It's a film that is horribly overlooked by so many people today.

★★★★

50/50 (2011) Review

Every few years Hollywood churns out a film about terminal illness. Most of all of them have one or more moments in the film where they nudge the audience saying, "Are you feeling emotional yet?" instead of hoping you do. Terms of Endearment, Beaches and the like are all guilty of this severe turn-off. 50/50 is not. What you get is a film that doesn't focus on the dark sides of an ailment. It's not an overly dramatic film nor is it an overly funny sitcom.

Adam Schwartz (Joseph Gordon-Levitt) is by all accounts a good guy. He's 27 years old, has a beautiful artist girlfriend named Rachael (Bryce Dallas Howard) and works as a writer of radio programs in Seattle with his best friend Kyle (Seth Rogen) who messes up Adam's life in more ways than one. Suffering from back pain Adam decides to get checked out. It turns out he has a rare form of spinal cancer which he has a fifty-fifty chance of surviving before Metastasis (after that his chances are less than ten percent). Left with no other options Adam begins chemotherapy and starts seeing a 26-year-old medical student/therapist named Katherine (Anna Kendrick). With the support of Katherine, Kyle and his overprotective mother (Angelica Huston), Adam manages to come to terms with his illness and starts to appreciate his life more, especially the things he previously took for granted.

Gordon-Levitt gives a particularly transparent performance that runs a great, wide range of emotions. At some points he is laughing with two other chemo patients and at other times silently contemplating his current situation and, in one particularly perfect scene, screaming at the top of his lungs and punching a dashboard. Here Rogen is quite good as well but is somewhat type cast into his role. I'd love to see him do a serious drama. Anna Kendrick's performance is a bit underdone but it's possible that she isn't given much to do with her role besides being the therapist.

It's not a "laugh-out loud" film but is actually quite dramatic with a lot of humorous dialogue, mostly from Rogen, thrown in. I get the feeling that the film was terribly marketed for what it really is. Don't misunderstand that. I'm not saying it isn't funny. It did have me laughing enough to be satisfied but, much like Woman of the Year, I see it as tragic above funny.

Good performances and (thankfully) few dirty jokes help to flesh out a poorly marketed film.

★★★1/2