Wednesday, November 29, 2006

Movie: "I'll Sleep When I'm Dead" 2003 1/5 stars

I like Clive Owen and Jonathan Rhys Meyers - they almost always pull out good performances. This is no different - they were both interesting and well portrayed characters.

The thing that killed this movie is the plot. When you get to the end, there are these huge, massive, gaping (I need another word for big!) plot holes, even entire threads of the story just dropped on the floor.

Until the very end of the movie, I thought it was going to be possible to salvage it into being an ok movie, but no, it didn't happen. It felt seriously like they ran out of budget and just dropped it. I'm pretty sure I wasn't missing any subtle bits of this one, it just stops.

I wouldn't bother with this movie, despite the ok first 95% of it.

Movie: "The Lake House" 2006 3/5 stars

I wasn't sure what to expect with this movie. I haven't seen Keanu Reeves and Sandra Bullock together since "Speed", and wasn't sure what to expect. This certainly isn't "Speed", but that's not necessarily a bad thing.

The premise is that there is a mailbox that can move stuff through time, and Keanu and Sandra are actually living 2 years apart and writing letters back and forth. They gradually fall in love.

Once you get past the premise and put it behind you, I find that the story is lovely. It's unabashedly romantic and I enjoyed it. Sure it's a chick flick, but a chick flick done well is still a good movie.

There is real chemistry between the two leads and I found myself saying, "Hey - that's the best acting I've ever seen Keanu do!".

I found myself enjoying the bits and pieces of architecture talk about lighting, settings and what the building is trying to say. I'm not an architect, so didn't notice anything fishy about the discussions and found myself more interested in architecture after that.

If you are in the mood for a romantic story, this is a good movie for you.

I rate it three out of five stars.