Tomorrow Never Dies (1997) Review

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(More customer reviews)This review is for the TOMORROW NEVER DIES Limited Edition Gift Pack on VHS (ASIN: 079283965X). It is a 2-tape set. It contains the video "Highly Classified: the World of 007" hosted by the late Desmond Lewelin as Q as well as TOMORROW NEVER DIES in full-frame. This video is completely different from the "Secrets of 007" found on the TOMORROW NEVER DIES DVD! As far as I know this is the only place you can get this great featurette. "Highly Classified: the World of 007" (VHS) is a good complement to "Secrets of 007" (DVD). This set comes in a metallic colored box with a raised 007 logo and also contains a copy of the script and a set of stills. No matter what you think of TOMORROW NEVER DIES this is a great set just for all the extras. I happen to like TOMORROW NEVER DIES very much. I think it is one of the best films of the series and has been maligned because it went in a completely different direction from the popular GOLDENEYE. It takes the best of the Bond formula and adds a new dimension of realism that really enhances the confrontation between Bond and the villains. Bond is not the superman or comic hero in this film. Bond is flesh and blood and very vulnerable. There is a true sense of menace and danger in this film that takes it several notches higher than many of the other films in the series.

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Pierce Brosnan leaps into action as Agent 007 in this spectacular thrill ride of death-defying stunts and amazing high-tech gadgets. In the most electrifying Bond film yet, the unstoppable action hero must prevent a tremendous disaster ripped from tomorrowÃ"â??s headlines.Someone is pitting the worldÃ"â??s superpowers against each other Ã"â?" and only James Bond can stop it. When a British warship is mysteriously destroyed in Chinese waters, the world teeters on the brink of WWIII Ã"â?" until 007 zeros in on the true criminal mastermind. BondÃ"â??s do-or-die mission takes him to Elliot Carver (Jonathan Pryce), a powerful industrialist who manipulates world events as easily as he changes headlines from his global media empire. After soliciting help from CarverÃ"â??s sexy wife, Paris (Teri Hatcher), Bond joins forces with a stunning yet lethal Chinese agent, Wai Lin (Michelle Yeoh), in a series of explosive chases, brutal confrontations and breathtaking escapes as they race to stop the presses on CarverÃ"â??s next planned news story: global pandemonium!With powerhouse action sequences, including a wild motorcycle pursuit through (and over!) Saigon, Tomorrow Never Dies is a thrilling action-adventure Ã"â??that roars from start to finish with the throttle wide open (Gene Shalit, NBC-TV)!

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Reilly - Ace of Spies (1983) Review

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(More customer reviews)At a time when the James Bond films were still novel and going strong, as were their imitators, British television viewers were watching a 10.5 hour, 12-part miniseries called "Reilly, Ace of Spies." Based on the biography by Robin Bruce Lockhart, this intriguing series is now available in a boxed set of 4 A&E DVDs (AAE-71748) and makes for some really gripping viewing.With Sam Neill in the title role, we follow the career of the man who taught British intelligence that if ruthlessness gets the job done, then ruthless spies are what they need. Sidney Reilly, an assumed name as is learned later, remains loyal to friends but not altogether to his employers and casual acquaintances. And if he treats his wives questionably when his job gets in the way, he makes up for it by treating all the other women with great feeling and tenderness.Having little patience with incompetence on any level, he gets a huge contract for battleships for Russia away from a British firm and to a German firm for which he works, he gets oil concessions, he steals plans by posing as a fire expert in Germany, and he finally tries to make himself head of a provisional government that will overthrow the Bolshevik regime. And so on.Along the way he runs into two great villains: Basil Zaharov (Leo McKern, who can say more with a look than most actors can with a page of text), and the icy head of Soviet Intelligence Felix Dzerzhinsky (Tom Bell), who has set up a phony organization that pretends to be against Stalin and rakes in millions from rich anti-Bolsheviks all over the world. A frightening moment comes when Stalin (David Burke) orders all in the group to be shot, because even following orders to appear disloyal "is no excuse"! Which is what happens when personal power is far more important than human beings.Other major characters are Reilly's boss Cummings (Norman Rodway), his fellow agent Hill (Hugh Fraser), and an astute oriental police officer (David Suchet). Like another two series about spies, "Tinker Tailor" and "Smiley's People," the story is complex, you never quite know at first who is who and who is lying more than the others. Except for some possibly supernatural business towards the end, you watch with both fascination and a vague disgust that this is what many people are really like-and that, from what we see, it is not the meek who are doing any inheriting.Fascinating and provocative viewing on a definitely "adult" level (i.e., lots of violence and a lot of naked flesh, the latter of which is pretty gratuitous). Neill does a marvelous job of portraying the complex and highly ambiguous main character.

There is an interesting documentary of the real Reilly as a bonus feature, which should be seen after the series, not before.


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At the turn of the 20th century, one remarkable man single-handedly tried to alter the course of history. Cold, ruthless, enigmatic, this Russian-born British agent radically transformed modern espionage techniques and set the mold for a new kind of secret agent-the super spy. REILLY: ACE OF SPIES is the thrilling, suspenseful dramatization of the real-life adventures of Agent ST-1, aka Sidney Reilly, the inspiration behind Ian Fleming's James Bond. Shot in glorious period detail, one heart-pulsing mission after another captures the arc of Reilly's brilliant career. From stealing top-secret Russian oil information to a near overthrow of the Bolshevik Revolution to his final capture by Stalin's forces in 1918, Reilly's exploits are at times so daring and reckless it's hard to believe it's history and not fiction. Starring Sam Neill (Jurassic Park, The Hunt for Red October), REILLY: ACE OF SPIES includes all 12 original episodes on DVD for the first time, and features a bonus documentary examining the final, mysterious days of this legendary figure. DVD Features: "Life of Reilly: Superspy" episode from A&E's acclaimed Vanishings series; Interactive Menus; Scene Selection

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The In-Laws (Widescreen Edition) (2003) Review

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(More customer reviews)Why? Why why why?
Well, there are positives to get out of the way first. Albert Brooks is an inspired choice to recreate Alan Arkin's role from the original "In-Laws". He brings to every movie a fully-formed nebbish ready to let loose 6 or 7 really memorable zingers, and this was no exception. Michael Douglas has played a very wide range of stock characters, if not necessarily deep. And the original "In-Laws" certainly wasn't technically perfect: it suffered from atrocious film editing. Why not spruce it up with some CGI submarines, more expansive stunt sequences, and a Paul McCartney soundtrack?
Most of the changes in the remake, however, don't make sense. Brooks is playing a Chicago podiatrist, not a Manhattan dentist. Michael Douglas has been saddled with a female sidekick, the likes of which Peter Falk didn't need. There's considerable more emphasis placed on Brooks's daughter and Douglas's son... so they can argue at length about his pre-marital flings. Candice Bergen has a strenuously unfunny cameo as Douglas's ex-wife (Falk was happily married in the original, albeit to a wife who had no idea what he did for a living).
Most noticeably, the witty humor of the original is all but gone, save for a few Brooks gags. That's all been replaced by a wide variety of warmed-over sex and toilet jokes, which have been funny in a hundred other movies since "The In-Laws" came out, and which are so familiar here that you'll laugh at the joke before it's even finished. Indeed, with the main character being a nebbishy Jewish medical professional from Chicago, and his co-star an over-the-top CIA agent, you'll quickly realize that this is a remake of "Meet the Parents" more than anything else.
The accomplished David Suchet shows up for a pointless role only faintly evocative of Richard Libertini's in the original. I'm sure that blatant gags about repressed gay terrorists are still funny somewhere, but it is possible to do a movie without them. Right?
I wasn't expecting a carbon copy of the original "In-Laws". However, I was expecting something lively and original. And this movie isn't it.

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Family matters. Laughing matters. They're all a matter of laugh or death as Michael Douglas and Albert Brooks play opposites thrust together by their children's wedding and by CIA agent Douglas' involvement in an arms-smuggling sting operation, plunging mild-mannered podiatrist Brooks into the world of international intrigue.

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The Manchurian Candidate (Widescreen Edition) (2004) Review

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(More customer reviews)I'd held off for a bit on seeing this; the original Manchurian Candidate is an all-time favorite movie, and, well, you know...
At the end of this film I scooted over to my bookshelf and grabbed the DVD case of the original. My guess was the remake was no more than 90 minutes and the original must have been at least two and 1/2 hours in duration. Good Lord! They were both exactly 129 minutes long!
There's a profound lesson here. The first film, in that wonderful 129 managed to tell a great story, travel a lot, freak me out repeatedly, stun me with novelty (the playing cards, the whole Republican/McCarthy/Lincoln shtick, the "flower show' interrogation, the "jump in a lake", getting drunk with Shaw, and on and on) work in a great love story, work in a tragic love story, work in a pathological love story, and develop a host of intriguing characters, and thrill me with what seemed to be an unending sequence of marvelous performances. The equally lengthy remake stirred little sympathies and seldom got off the ground. As storytelling, the film spun its wheels. You'd think if you remake a movie, ignore character development, ignore any relationship development, ignore any complex and intelligent commentary on modern goings-on (it was just terrorism and corporate involvement in war handled in the most superficial way)--ignore a whale of a lot--you could bring the thing in at about 48 minutes, maybe 60 with commercials. If I watch it again (not likely) I'll have a stop-watch handy and I'll take notes. It was like some magic trick.
So what happened in that 129 minutes anyway? I'm honestly not sure--Denzel Washington sweats a lot and communicated none of the subtlety and complexity that Sinatra managed, Meryl Streep brought on the heretical thought that maybe she's overrated and maybe Angela Lansbury was underrated, I missed Janet Leigh who delivered the same lines splendidly, I missed the black humor and irony and ambiguity, and who the heck was that bad Lawrence Harvey impressionist? Motivations were lost, the WHOLE POINT that everyone hated this guy but parroted their adoration for him wasn't presented clearly, and the motivation for the entire brainwashing venture was muddled up by the script after first stating that it was all about control. What a mess. Every time the film tried to echo the original, it'd already gone so far off track that it just confused matters even worse.
My serious suggestion is that some professor (and not necessarily a film professor) have a class watch both versions, note what went right in 129 minutes in the original, and what went horribly wrong in the 129 minutes of the remake and then have the students try to explain why. My guess is the answers will be fascinating.
It's a one-star movie but I give it two because it was up against impossible-to-beat competition.

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Serving together in the Persian Gulf War, Captain Bennett Marco and Sgt. Raymond Shaw were part of a platoon of soldiers kidnapped and brainwashed. Ten years later, Shaw gears up for his vice presidential campaign while Marco eventually remembers being kidnapped and discovers Shaw's powerful mother played a big part in that scheme. Determined to reveal the truth behind everything, Marco must first convince Shaw that the brainwashing really happened.

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The Russia House (1990) Review

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(More customer reviews)Like the other movies originating from the unchallenged master of the intelligent spy thriller John LeCarre, this one is a really a sophisticated thriller exposing the hidden, complicated, and conflicted corners of an individual's human heart. "The Russia House" represented a formidable new challenge for LeCarre, so suddenly deprived of the spy-thriller heaven of the cold war he had built his career describing. But here he has mined fresh new tunnels of insight into the cunning, deceit, and betrayal that is the stuff of real-life espionage. At the same time, this movie also weaves a quite memorable love story in the spaces squeezed between the two sides.
Barley Blair (Sean Connery), the failing boozehound scion of a collapsing British publishing house with a love for everything Russian, happens by drunken though eloquent happenstance to inspire a famous Soviet scientist into attempting to sneak his manuscript detailing the real sorry state of Russian ICBM capabilities into the hands of the West in order to foster a recognition of the folly of the arms race and to end what he calls "the great lie". The scientist attempts to contact Blair, but through a series of mishaps rivaling the deeds of the keystone cops winds up landing the manuscript in the hands of the British Secret Service. So they soon want Barley to intercede with the Russian contact point (Michelle Pfeiffer) to find out who the author of the manuscript is and thus determine its authenticity. So Barley pursues the beautiful but conflicted contact, an idealistic angel of mercy who soon sparks Barley's love interest and paternal concern. The game is afoot.
The movie is gorgeously photographed on a number of locations throughout Russia, and the travelogue-like tour through Moscow, Saint Petersburg, and Minsk is spellbinding. Likewise, the acting is top notch, with Roy Scheider, James Fox, and a whole welter of distinguished British actors lending presence and gravity to this intelligent thriller. As is usual, the plot takes off slowly but builds to a mind-boggling series of intertwining activities one has to pay attention to understand. Before long we recognize the familiar murderous games set into motion with deadly earnest by the Brits, the Americans, and the Russians, none of whom give a rattler's damn about Barley, the contact, or the scientist.
This is a stunning, suspenseful, and somewhat rueful tale of what unfolds when we discover that there is a real possibility that the so-called Soviet ICBM threat is a sham, that the missiles cannot escape their silos, that their ability to achieve trajectory or destroy targets with any accuracy is vastly over-rated. And as one can expect from LeCarre's shadowy and complex geopolitical world of espionage and power, there are no simple answers or easy foregone conclusions. This is a wonderful movie, which in my opinion is quite under-rated. It has the ring of more real-life veracity and worldly wisdom than one can easily find on the non-fiction side of the movie theater aisle. Enjoy!

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A filmmaking tour de force and 'the year's most sophisticated, suspenseful and sexy entertainment(Cosmopolitan), The Russia House stars OscarÂ(r) winner* Sean Connery and OscarÂ(r) nominee** Michelle Pfeiffer as two people caught in a web of spies and politics, whose love could prove fatal to them both. When Katya (Pfeiffer), a beautiful Russian book editor, attempts to send British publisher Barley Blair (Connery) a manuscript written by a noted Soviet scientist, she unwittingly draws them both into a world of international espionage. The manuscript, which contains information that could alter the balance of world power, is intercepted by the West's spy-masters who then send Blair to Russia to gain more information on the mysterious document. But when Blair meets Katya, he finds himself torn between his mission and the woman whose passion for her countryand for Blairknows no bounds.

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Austin Powers: The Spy Who Shagged Me (1999) Review

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(More customer reviews)For those of you who thought another Austin Powers movie would become nothing more than a forgotten sequel, I have two words for you: Fat Bastard. The Introduction of another character played by Mike Myers only makes this sequel better. You must remember that Jay Roach and company are working with whatever they please; as long as Mike Myers goes along with it. And as long as Mike likes it, it'll be good.
In this laughable comedy, we are introduced to more new and great characters such as: Mini-me (played by Verne Troyer), Felicity Shagwell (Heather Graham), and a younger version of Number 2 played by Rob Lowe. There are so many laughs in the movie I don't even know where to begin. How about Mustafa's reappearance or maybe Fat Bastard trying to eat Mini-me. They just never stop. Again, we have a similar storyline along with a similar ending: 30...29...28... you get the idea. I have a feeling that Mike's not done quite yet in producing laughs. I'm really looking forward to Austin Powers 3. It'll be smashing, baby!
Anyway, that's enough of that. If you liked the first Austin Powers movie you'll definitly like this one. Heck, you might even enjoy it more. Otherwise, if you didn't like the first movie you won't like this one either. Give it a shot, it's worth it.
One more thing, make sure you watch to the very very end of the credits to find out what actually happens to Mustafa. It's too good to miss.

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First he fought for the Crown, now he's fighting for the family jewels! Mike Myers returns as the world's grooviest superspy who must return to the Swingin' Sixties to recover his ''mojo'' and stop Dr. Evil from liquidating the world.DVD Features:Audio CommentaryDVD ROM FeaturesDeleted ScenesFeaturetteMusic VideoTheatrical Trailer

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Shining Through (1992) Review

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(More customer reviews)This has always been one of my favorite films. Apparently it's supposed to be a guilty pleasure. I can't imagine why though. It's not a deep or socially important work of art, but it doesn't pretend to be. It's just a glorious, old-fashioned piece of entertainment, gorgeously shot on location in Germany, with one of the best scores the late Michael Kamen ever wrote.
Alright, so Melanie Griffith convinces Michael Douglas to send her as a spy into Nazi Germany because of her phenomenal streudel baking skills. It's that kind of movie. Either you let yourself be swept away by the storytelling, or it's just not for you.
The big news, however, is that this great movie is finally on DVD in the US. And it's in widescreen, a vital piece of information that was left off the listing here. I was really afraid I'd walk into Tower today and see a Pan and Scan atrocity and have to leave it there unbought. Worry not, the film is presented here as it was in theaters in 1992.
The makers of this DVD have also kindly left the original burned-in subtitles for the sequences in German, instead of replacing them with those ugly player generated ones you see so often. I always liked the font the filmmakers chose, so this was a pleasant surprise.
It would have been nice to have a director's commentary, or some of the approximately half an hour that was removed from the version that was shot. However for under $10 what we get (two trailers) is fine.
It took long enough, with the US just about the last country on earth to get "Shining Through" on DVD, but it's here at last, and looking as good as I could have possibly have hoped.

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In this romantic espionage thriller set against the backdrop of World War II, a secretary from Queens is transformed into a government spy. After discovering her attorney boss and lover is actually a secret agent, she convinces him to let her go undercover. With the help of a fellow operative she penetrates the Berlin home of a high-ranking enemy official, and works swiftly to accomplish her mission.

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