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pamelaowen
Reviews
Daddy-Long-Legs (1919)
A great first silent film to watch...
One evening my daughter and I were at home - I was cleaning in another room, but after a time, I realized the program my daughter was watching had no words. So I went into the living room and promptly was entranced. It was our first silent film (thanks A&E for showing it) - we were hooked. I didn't find myself treating it like a film with subtitles...reading and missing the scenes - instead it was appropriately sub'd prior to a scene, then the silent film told the story all on it's own. It was a great plot of an orphan (back then, that was a social climbing status killer) who broke the ranks and found herself. She had a bit of fun along the way (the scene in the garden when she was young was hilarious!) and eased past the social-highlife land mines. A great family movie for sure.
Brainstorm (1983)
all-time Sci Fi Classic
This movie is what began my like of Christopher Walken, and sadly a realization that I should have already been watching more of Natalie Wood. There was no dramatic wardrobe (can you say lab coats?), no love scenes, but a dedicated plot involving work-aholic PhDs (one chain-smoked - something you probably couldn't put in a movie today) who were chasing the aged old plot (but with a fresh twist) of the Project Management being told "don't turn my G__D__ project over (to the military)" - cloak/dagger and fairly intense exploration into cataloging the afterlife. In the midst, some docs get a grip and find out what's important after all...If you like pondering the Here-After, this is no documentary, but it is definitely something to think about...
The Adventures of Buckaroo Banzai Across the 8th Dimension (1984)
One of my movie library Classics...
No matter how cheesy the sci-fi plot sounds, some great actors & acting make this a cult winner...Peter Weller, Jeff Goldblum, Ellen Barkin, John Lithgow, and Christopher Lloyd - who else could successfully mix neurosurgery, 80's clothes (the only cliché characteristic of the movie) and a Rock Band into a Sci-Fi plot? I like it because it's a good balance of using a bit of science brain cells, a bit of budding FX stunts...It goes further to reassure those of us who believe you can still have a great movie without bad language or skin. The writer had some fun with names too - just enough to make you smile and not take away from anything. Who knows? Maybe Yoyodyne Propulsion Labs is THE precursor to Star Trek-dom?