Lake Placid (R, 1999) ... Average: 2.0
(Bill Pullman, Bridget Fonda, Oliver Platt, Brendan Gleeson)

Chris Mal
It wasn't really boring or stupid, it was just plain silly.  A movie about a 30' long crocodile that has somehow migrated to a lake in Maine and has taken a liking to human flesh.

The movie doesn't have much substance - which I guess is apparent by the fact that it is only 82 minutes long.  I won't give away the story, but to give you an idea of the movie, here are the stereotypical characters:  Fonda plays a museum scientist who hates the outdoors and is scared of mosquitoes and ticks.  She was sent on site by her boss who she was dating but who left her for her co-worker.  As the story goes, they just wanted to get her out of the office for a while.   So she spends the entire movie acting like the stereo-typical primadonna fish-out-of-water.  

Pullman plays the Fish & Game warden - generally, his character has no depth and is there just to give Fonda someone to fall in love with.  Gleeson plays the local sheriff who has the most common sense of all the characters but is ignored and poked fun at by all the other characters.  Platt plays a wise-cracking eccentric mythology professor who shows up to help hunt the croc in his croc-painted helicopter.  Betty White is also in the movie - she plays the old lady who lives by the lake who feeds the crocodile(s) her cows - yes, her cows.

There are some funny one-liners in the movie, but sadly I couldn't for the life of me tell if the entire movie was meant to be tongue-in-cheek or if I really was supposed to feel the "intense drama" of the situation.  The end of the movie shows baby crocodiles being fed pieces of bread by White's character, leaving open the possibility of a sequel!  GO SEE THIS MOVIE NOW!...errr, just kidding.  (The movie is based on a screenplay by David E. Kelly - of Ally McBeal and The Practice fame.  Perhaps it was good he moved on to television!)

The Last Castle (R, 2001) ... Average: 2.0
(Robert Redford, James Gandolfini, Mark Ruffalo, Clifton Collins Jr., Delroy Lindo,
George C. Scott, Brian Goodman, George W. Scott, Steve Burton)

Sue Hohenadel
I always like a movie where the underdog wins in the end.  I'm not so sure about a movie where the underdogs are convicted military men, serving time for everything from murder to brutally maiming people because they "got mad."

And so goes the dialogue in "The Last Castle."

"The Last Castle" is the story of a 3 star general (Redford) who is sent to a military prison to serve a ten year sentence for "disregarding orders."  The prison warden (Gandolfini) is also a military man who seems to have spent most of his time pushing papers rather than engaged in any sort of activities that apparently make army men army men.  Redford picks up on that immediately.  Oh boy...I smell trouble!

Redford's character just wants to do his time and get out.  Unfortunately, his reputation precedes him and everyone in the prison knows who he is and what he is.  As the movie unfolds, Redford's stripes begin to usurp the warden's authority, and bad things happen.  There's that smell of trouble again, but it's getting more faint.

Sadly, Redford is almost robotic throughout the movie.  Granted, he's a career military man and has made it through horrendous situations by being devoid of emotion, but it's hard to warm up to him and what he's trying to accomplish in the prison.  Gandolfini is sooooooo weasely, it's sickening.  I expected slime to come oozing out of the screen and onto the theater floor.  Truthfully, there really are no characters in this movie that I could embrace -- even if they are psychotic prisoners.

"The Last Castle" is not overly violent, there's some foul language and a few mildly disturbing scenes that have to do with "punishment" for disobeying rules, but it's not overly offensive for a prison flick.  Actually, it's not overly anything.

And that trouble I was smelling?  Must have been a rotten Milk Dud left behind from a previous showing, because the movie never really goes from predictable and tedious to an audience cheering, foot stomping, "Good for them!" rallying ending.

This one is a rental.

The Legend of Bagger Vance (PG-13, 2000) ... Average: 2.0
(Will Smith, Matt Damon, Charlize Theron, Dermot Crowley, Joel Gretsch, Jack Lemon)

Chris Mal
I once heard a comedian say, "What's with golf?  Golf is just old men in ugly pants walking."

I actually had looked forward to this movie, probably just because of the cast.  I always liked Will Smith and, despite Dogma which was an absolutely horrific excuse for media, I like Matt Damon as well.  But I should have known this would be boring - REAL golf is terribly undramatic.  Why would I think a fictitious story about golf would be any more interesting?

OK, OK...there was a deeper philosophical meaning, I understand.  But all the metaphors between golf and getting Matt Damon's screwed up life back on track just seemed hokey to me.  "Look out into the field, find your field."  "Inside each and every one of us is our one true authentic swing."  "It's just you and the game and it's all up to you."  And on and on and on.  Pure cheese.

The story, in case you don't know, is about a golfer (Matt Damon) in the WWI era who was a teen-age golfing future legend who survived his tour of duty in WWI and returns a shell of his former self.  The Great Depression leads Charlize Theron's character, who has inherited her father's newly built golf course in Savannah after his untimely death, to stage a 56-hole golf tournament to raise money to save the course.  Damon, who has sat around lounging and drinking since returning from the war, hires Bagger Vance (Will Smith) to be his caddy and shake loose the rust.  Damon's character winds up learning more than just how to regain his stroke bla bla bla.

Charlize Theron is just the cutest thing, but it doesn't compensate for a character that I couldn't fall in love with.  Her acting - which I think was a product of the script - was a bit weak, and the character oddly unlikable and kind of uninteresting.

Damon and Smith are all that saves this moving from putting me to sleep.  I just didn't find it interesting.  It's not horrible, but I can't recommend it. 

The Legend of 1900 (R, 1999) ... Average: 2.0
(Tim Roth, Pruitt Taylor Vince, Clarence Williams, Bill Nunn, Melanie Thierry)

Chris Mal
I saw this movie during our 5-hour flight to San Diego.  I had never even heard of it, but spent the $5 for the head-phones anyway just to pass the time.  The time passed but that's about all I can say for this movie, although I admit it's hard to enjoy anything during a 5-hour flight.

The movie begins with a trumpet player (Pruitt Taylor Vince) who is selling his old trumpet to a music store.  The store owner and he begin chatting and the trumpet player says something to the effect: "Everyone has a story.  I could tell my story, but no one would believe it."  As he regurgitates the "unbelievable story" the movie unveils itself.  Do you want to know why no one would believe it?  Because the plot is so outrageous that you can't believe it.  Reasonable believability is pretty much a basic necessity for any good movie.

Tim Roth plays a man who was abandoned at birth on a cruise ship in 1900.  He is found as an infant by one of the ship's grunts who raises him in the belly of the ship.  For his entire life he never leaves the massive ocean-liner.  He steps up to the piano at an early age and immediately begins playing like Beethoven.  He becomes a mysterious piano legend, and people from all over begin hearing about him and coming to see him play - but, again, he never leaves the ship.  The greatest piano player alive (played by Clarence Williams) shows up one day and challenges him to a piano dual.  Oooooooo.

Many years later the ship is dry docked and is scheduled to be destroyed by dynamite.  The ship owners don't know that he is still on the ship (don't ask me, just accept it).  His friend (the trumpet player) comes back to try to convince them that there is still someone somewhere on the ship.  He finds him (of course, not with the people who are going to blow up the ship), but he refuses to leave his "home".  The ship is blown up.  End of movie.

Yes, I know, I ruined the ending for you, but on the other hand I just saved you a rental fee.

The good point of the movie is that the music was, indeed, fantastic - particularly if you enjoy piano that you and I could only dream of ever being able to play.  In fact, Bev plans on buying the soundtrack at her next opportunity.

Lord of the Rings (R, 2001) ... Average: 4.17
(Elijah Wood, Billy Boyd, Dominic Monaghan, Ian McKellen, Sean Astin, Sean Bean, Liv Tyler)

Michele K Carter RN
Amazing, awe inspiring and accurate retelling of the First Book of the Lord of the Rings Trilogy!

After reading most of Tolkien's works I was most impressed how closely the film followed the original storyline. The imagery was so detailed and authentic that you actually felt as if you were there, so intense that you forgot for a while (3 hours in fact) that you were anywhere but along the journey with the Fellowship of the Ring!

After even one reading of the Lord of the Rings books a reader might develop images in their mind of what "Middle Earth" and the world therein would appear like and the film produced instantly recognizable places, characters and moments. The special effects did not overwhelm the movie, but complemented it so engrossingly that you didn't want it to end. The entire cast & production team obviously poured their heart & soul into this film.

Congratulations on a triumphant piece of cinema! It is a wonderful movie that you will want to see again and again and is destined to become a classic...

Mike Capilo
This movie's like cool and stuff.

Chris Mal
I won't go into the basic plot since everyone should have read the 1954 Tolkein classic by now.

Translated onto the silver screen, it would be easy enough to write countless words praising the films tremendous stage sets, make-up and trailblazing digitally generated special effects.  The various creators were spectacular, and the scenery even better.  Even the reduction of lead actor, Elijah Woods, from his real-life 5'-6" to his character Frodo Baggins height of 3'-6" was done flawlessly.

The acting here is also of highest quality.  I was particularly taken by Ian McKellen who played the noble, subtle, wise and omnipotent magician, Gandalf.  For that matter, all of the characters are filled with genuine spontaneity.  (Although Bev did think some of the closing scenes were a bit overdramatic.)

Since it followed the legendary Hotter Potter film in the theaters it's probably worth comparing the two.  While HP deserved its acclaim as a magical tale for children, Lord of the Rings is an altogether higher adult achievement.  That said, I'm a little surprised they are marketing this so heavily for children.  No doubt in my mind that anyone under the age of, say, 13 is going to be almost totally lost.  And, quite frankly, there are a number of scenes that I think smaller kids would find a bit TOO scary.  The movie definitely reflects the book in that there are a number of scenes that are extremely violent.  I definitely wouldn't want to take an easily frightened 6 year old to see this.

The flaw in the movie for me was its length, which I suppose was necessary to mimic the original book.  But when translated to a movie, there was a sequence of events in the movie that almost felt like the same thing over and over and over again as our adventurers encountered one obstacle after another, each one with just a different monster.  There was a period where this sort of battle scene seemed to repeat itself too many times to the point of monotony in a way.

Like the book, you also had to seriously pay attention.  There were many characters, and how certain things came to be took some effort to discern.

All in all, though, the film works.  It's a good "relationship story" at its core:  The bond between Gandalf and Frodo, the camaraderie between the four hobbits, the growth of mutual respect between the various do-gooders.  Recommended.