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N-37 2011

Title: A Little CloserScore: B

Comments: This is the epitome of muskrat love. I doubt thatfew people besides me have been to a BYOB dance hall outin the boonies. The actors have limited abilities but areadequate for this film. I like the use of the sound for aconversation going over an action scene. There are a fewother tidbits of interest. It is almost exotic for city dwellers,like a foreign film that requires sub-titles. I’ve been toVirginia and this was not my experience. So I do appreciatethe perspective.

Title: Millennium BugScore: BComments: I don’t indulge in horror films much but as Iremember them this is pretty standard. It’s standard for RobZombie. The casting choices were questionable and theirperformances were “B” movie. The make-up and effectswere great the miniatures were fantastic the sound waswonderful and the creature was innovative and original. Thelighting was good and the full moon was an excellent device,

yet the moon wouldn’t stay in the same place for four hours.It works for this film because the vulgarity is over the topand so a hawk screeching in the dark seems normal. Ithought the sets were perfect for the story. The costumeswere classic for a fifties movie; The Femme Fatale PlatinumBlonde, Granny, Uncle Joe and Big ole’ Cousin Whatever. It’sdone well enough but too silly at the same time to be scary.

Title: MorganScore: AComments: Great actors, great music and sound, sincerityand sensitivity make a good movie. It’s a love story with atwist; Boy meets Boy, Boy looses Boy, Boy admits he’s a jerkand boy just happens back into his life. It is what it is; theeffort goes into realizing that he really is a jerk to everyonearound him. I watched it with a straight man and he didn’t

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have any difficulty with the ideas or even the lovemakingscenes. He felt that it was alright in the end.

N-39-2011

Title: Confidence Man – The Hugh DeNeal StoryScore: CComments: I don’t know if this is a documentary of a

criminal and now someone (maybe himself) wants to makemoney off of a movie about his crime or is this a narrativemeant to look like a documentary. It begins with 10 minutesof opening credits for a documentary it has better than usualcombinations of interviews. The film is well put-together.

There is a montage of voice-overs and photographs that arecreative and supportive of the climax of the film, which is thedownfall of the scam. The sound goes back and forth fromgood to bad old footage of the band that requires subtitles. It

would have been just as easy to use the actual recordsinstead of the bad sound from the hardly visibleperformances. The film has a believability problem.Someone obsessed with making money would naturally atleast by trial and error know that selling something at lessthen you bought it will not make money. At least one friendadmits to saying this to him thus uncovering the scam if onlyto himself. The whole film is a testimony of innocence byeveryone around him and they say he is just crazy. It’s alsoodd that his girlfriend didn’t kiss him good bye or watch himpull off as he left for prison.

Title: Varla Jean and the MushroomheadsScore: ”A”Comments: Oh my God, Varla Jean, this movie, this movie,Varla Jean, oh my God. I actually laughed out loud this film is

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much better quality than I expected. I did not see Varla Jean’s stage show, but there are too many details in this filmthat could not be duplicated in a theater. The sound isperfect, I loved it when Varla Jean cried into the boom mike,

it was just hilarious I will have to watch it again to get the jokes they were unrelenting. Some of the other actors couldhave given better performances. The costumes wereinsanely good. The wigs were a work of art. There was somuch going on and innuendo on every level it’s almost 3-D. Inoticed there were only two writers and I have seen movieswith so much less from a stack of writers.

Title: Waiting On The WarriorScore: C

Comments: This film looks like a summer project. It needsediting and maybe some reshooting. In outdoor scenes thesunlight is like balls of glare off of anything shiny includingpeople’s hair. The sound was off in some places. The actorsare not professionals, the scene were the wife visits hermother the women in the kitchen are looking straight intothe camera. I don’t think it is attractive to many people tosee a new pastor living in a quarter of a million dollar houseriding around on a $30,000.00 motorcycle. The agenda is

questionable we know the Bible belt stance on gays, butwhen he wants to make children laugh the pastor uses aneffeminate voice and puts his hands on his hips. We have a

Jewish Sidebar there may be room for an ultra ChristianSidebar.

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N-40-2011

Title: Force of NatureScore: BComments: This is a documentary of Shaker Heights nativeEllen Ratner. It is not a full picture, just some positivecomments about how great she is. It is an uncomely self promotion that is produced by her brothers. The interviewsare mostly family members and a radio personality. Thequality of the film is formulaic there is an intro of a bust outhard working journalist, then brushes with greatness andfinally the heartwarming, loving, make a house into a home,woman. The quality of the film is great the content iscontrived.

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Title: Gray SeasonsScore: DComments: This is another documentary so it gives me theimpression that people making the films don’t know the

difference. The camera zooms in and out mid sentence it isvery unsteady through out. The background music is threechords over and over. There are endless stats and scores foryears with commentary from the coach. It doesn’t state thatthis is a student film project but it would be logical for astudent to have access to the players and the coach. And theplayers that are interviewed are not the whole team. On filmwe see other players making shots and the coach mentionsthem by name; Janisha Gearalds and Lauren Woods, thecamera only starts filming them after an hour and ten

minutes. The preferential treatment makes it less of anaccurate accounting of the team’s progress.

Title: GrowthBusters: Hooked On GrowthScore: DComments: This is another documentary that has fictionalscenes and The Colbert Report as source material. Thefictional scenes are decorated beautifully. The film consistsof a few authors and non-local politicians spewing their

opinions and sometimes contradicting themselves. A few of these authors look like survivalists living in remote areaseschewing the population in general. The person who is thesubject spouts shallow statements that are not fleshed outinto any understandable conclusive ideas. From thebeginning of the film he is showing up in unwelcome forumsso he can look like he is being silenced or victimized. Thepremise of the film is that growth is bad and the supportingevidence goes as far as a headline about penile length. Thefilm maker shows the audience his 4000 square foot homewith the three car garage and complains about not getting agrant. He tries to be humorous and smugly knowledgeable.In the end he looses an election to city council quite possiblybecause he insults the voters as not ready to step into the21st century. A quality film except for the lack of credibility,bad research, gimmicky borrowing from pop culture and too

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many belaboring presentations, instead of making a point. This film seems like an expensive lark and an attentionseeking stunt.

Title: Her Master’s VoiceScore: AComments: I’m giving this film an “A” because I can’t figureit out. It’s only an hour but it is unlike any other filmincluding fiction. It appears to be a documentary abouttaking a ventriloquist’s puppet to a museum in Kentucky.

The whole time the dialogue is disturbing because it isbetween another ventriloquist and puppets. She is actuallyin bed talking to one about celibacy. There are a fewinterviews with other ventriloquists because they stop at a

convention of ventriloquists. Some pieces are veryinteresting there is fooling the senses types of tricks. It has awarm ending

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