RMG

IMDb member since July 2000
    Lifetime Total
    1+
    IMDb Member
    24 years

Reviews

Finder's Fee
(2001)

Not as good as cracked up to be.
I totally disagree with the first commenter. ALL of the characters in this movie are annoying to the extreme. There isn't one sympathetic character except for Avery in the surprise at the end.

(At one point in the show the exasperated lead character shouts out some garbage to his doting timid neighbour lady but even though I replayed the scene multiple times I could NOT make out the words that so abruptly stop everyone in their tracks. Only by turning on the sub-titles could I figure out what he said -- how the other characters involved in their own worlds figured out what he said is beyond me. More care towards the enunciation and editing of the dialogue would have helped ESPECIALLY since this was a KEY moment in the plot.)

This show is an interesting attempt at exploring human greed, selfishness, guilt and the ability to lie/conceal using a poker game as the vehicle for moving the story. Everybody is bluffing, everybody is lying, and nobody is likeable. Friends cheat friends, strangers cheat strangers, out-of-place violence ensues and a gruff crooked cop pops up throughout the show.

The secondary story of the lead character coming to grips with his feelings for his girlfriend was worked in partly as an excuse for his "antsy" behaviour during the poker game and partly to reveal that this guy is on the knife edge, teetering on which side to fall on. Does he love this girl or not? Her ultra demure and insecure attitude to their relationship is reflected in the lead's inability to make a commitment.

*** SPOILER ALERT ***





Why the surprise ending tacked on at the end? Can you say CHEESE?

So now I guess the moral of the story is that even though you struggle with your conscious and your good side eventually wins, life throws everyone for a loop to steal and make a mockery of any good deeds you do. So what is the point? Better to be selfish and take it while you can before someone takes you to the cleaners. SICK SICK SICK

Fail Safe
(2000)

Unique and hackneyed version of the classic
So it has a unique twist at the end instead the pilot jumping out and riding with the *weapon* we have a righteous president bombing NY to prevent GTNW... B&W because of its "live" medium - the movie tries to relive the worst fears of the cold war and ends up only numbing our senses with "our audience is incredibly unsophisticated and we have to tell them everything" to the grade 4 language skills embraced by entire cast.... Rent the original -- pplleeaassseee!!!!!!!!

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