Days later & after reading 100+ reviews, I’m still not sure what I think of this film. Josh Brolin was great and some of the “imagined” scenes in the war roomaDays later after reading 100+ reviews, I’m still not sure what I think of this film. Josh Brolin was great and some of the “imagined” scenes in the war room were interesting. On the other hand, I felt it glossed over the issues, left out a lot. Most disturbingly to my brain is at the end of the movie, no matter how many gaffes they showed Bush doing, how unqualified they showed him to run the country (NO ONE at Yale gets “C”s unless they’re failing!)—I still felt the film made him out to be sympathetic. A bumbling loser out of his depth, letting forces around him dictate his actions.

It left me with nearly exactly the same taste in my brain as did the Cusack film Max (2002).

After watching Max, I felt like the message was “Hitler was a messed up guy who wanted to be an artist. If only he’d gotten to be an artist, so many people wouldn’t have died.”

After W., I kept thinking, if only he’d been more secure in his father’s love and gotten that football commissionership—maybe our country wouldn’t have been ruined (morally/financially, etc.)/our entire global economy tanked, etc. And I can see by a lot of the comments that a lot of people, had a “oh poor Bush” moment.

That doesn’t feel right. I don’t want to feel bad for these guys. They were awful human beings – who did awful things. I don’t care about the “privations” or disappointments they “suffered”. They then went on to choose to do some very bad things and no early future acts/environments excuse those later acts.

Plenty of people are frustrated artists – and don’t go on to become megalomaniacal genocidal rulers.

Plenty of people have papa issues and don’t go on to take over and ruin countries.

Both films were interesting, trying to guess at some of the issues that drove the person… but I think they ran the danger of trying to make the subject someone you pity/someone you can almost empathize with.

In trying to “humanize” these people and not just have them be symbols of evil, I felt that it somehow lessened the fact that these people are BAD PEOPLE WHO DID BAD THINGS.

Maybe that was not the intent of either picture, maybe it was just an attempt to show the forces that molded these men…but somehow it came off as sympathetic to the historical figure. And that disturbs me.

P.S.: I?m NOT saying Bush is Hitler. I’m pointing out similar portrayals in movies that explore the backgrounds of bad leaders!
were interesting. On the other hand, I felt it glossed over the issues, left out a lot. And most disturbingly to my brain is at the end of the movie, no matter how many gaffes they showed Bush doing, how unqualified they showed him to run the country (NO ONE at Yale gets “C”s unless they’re failing!)—I still felt the film made him out to be sympathetic. A bumbling loser out of his depth, letting forces around him dictate his actions.

It left me with nearly exactly the same taste in my brain as did the Cusack film Max (2002).

After watching Max, I felt like the message was “Hitler was a messed up guy who wanted to be an artist. If only he’d gotten to be an artist, so many people wouldn’t have died.”

After W., I kept thinking, if only he’d been more secure in his father’s love and gotten that football commissionership—maybe our country wouldn’t have been ruined (morally/financially, etc.)/our entire global economy tanked, etc. And I can see by a lot of the comments that a lot of people, had a “oh poor Bush” moment.

That doesn’t feel right. I don’t want to feel bad for these guys. They were awful human beings – who did awful things. I don’t care about the “privations” or disappointments they “suffered”. They then went on to choose to do some very bad things and no early future acts/environments excuse those later acts.

Plenty of people are frustrated artists – and don’t go on to become meglamanical genocidal rulers.

Plenty of people have papa issues and don’t go on to take over and ruin countries.

Both films were interesting, trying to guess at some of the issues that drove the person… but I think they both ran the danger of trying to make the subject someone you pity/someone you can almost empathize with.

In trying to “humanize” these people and not just have them be symbols of evil, I felt that it somehow lessened the fact that these people are BAD PEOPLE WHO DID BAD THINGS.

Maybe that was not the attempt of either picture, maybe it was just an attempt to show the forces that molded these men….. but somehow it came off as sympathetic to each historical figure. And that disturbs me.

NOTE: I’m NOT saying Bush is Hitler. I’m pointing out similar portrayals in movies that explore the backgrounds of bad leaders!

WARNING: MAJOR SPOILERS REVEALED

Group decides to target evil traitor. Innocent girl is forced to seduce him. He violently rapes her (which we are forced to watch). The evil guy is also revealed to be a sadisitic monster, treats her like a whore (she tells someone he f*cks her until she bleeds). She does not want to continue -wants the assasination to be over. Then evil bad guy buys her a GIANT SHINY DIAMOND…. and apparently that overcomes all patriotism, pride or self-esteem… so she tells him to run away. (are we supposed to believe she loved the sick bastard? Or was it really because it was a HUGE DIAMOND)
Evil bad guy escapes being killed and then rounds up all the conspiriters (including her) and they all die. The end.

What exactly was supposed to be the point of those 2.5 hours? We watched this poor woman whose family didn’t want her & whose friends only used her for their own ends – have sex and play mahojng and that’s pretty much it.

It gets 1 star for portraying old Shanghai which I enjoy seeing (my grandparents lived there) and 1 for Tony Leung, but otherwise it was a HORRIBLE disappointment. I have watched every Ang Lee movie and enjoyed all of them to varying degrees (not so much the Civil War one). I expected much better from a great director, great actors and even the movie had great potential! So I am especially angry to have sat through that pointless waste of my time and supposedly 4 years of this woman’s pointless & miserable life.

For someone whose family went through this, it was a very emotional film to watch. My great-grandparents and grandparents lived in Shanghai from the twenties to the fifties. Watching this imagining my family having to go through similar issues made it really hard to watch.

It meant a lot to get a glimpse of what Shanghai might’ve been like in those years, what living there as a refuge was like, being driven out by the communists, having to flee to yet another country. This was something that they did not like to speak of, so I did not have much knowledge of it.

My one problem with the film -is the way the family treated Sofia at the end. Yes, they were probably too proud (willing to live off her), very judgemental of her, ashamed of her – but I can not imagine them purposefully leaving someone behind!

I hope that others will also enjoy it. The sets, costumes, general mis-en-scene seems very realistic. It has exceptionally fine actors, Ralph Fiennes, Natasha Richardson and Hiroyuki Sanada and others. I would say it’s worth a watch for most people – though they may not get as much out of the film as a Russian descendant, it’s still quite good.

Judi Dench is fantastic at any roles she plays.
However, this movie was just disappointing at best.

Nothing but the same tired stereotypes of women.

Sad/lonely pathetic spinster with cats.
Predatory lesbian.
Prudish old battleaxe.
Emotional vampire.

Disatisfied housewife has affair, feels guilty, wants to return.
Lonley woman just wanting to feel ‘wanted’.
etc. etc.

The film is rather timeless, you could almost set this film in anytime as greed is (unfortunately) ageless.

For the Hubbards, greed is stronger than family ties or anything else for that matter. They steal from everyone (including each other) and take advantage of the working poor and the disadvantaged minorities. They think only of themselves.

Bette Davis is superb (of course) and her character Regina Giddons (nee Hubbard) is fascinating in its replulsiveness and sheer selfishness. For those who believe the cliched stereotypes that woman are naturally loving, nurturing, & selfless—here’s a good example otherwsie. Her contempt for those who are “soft”, her refusal to aid her husband (unless there was something in it for her) is possibly even more chilling than if she had made a direct attempt to end his life.

It was refreshing to see (esp. in an old film) a young woman “Zan” being encouraged by the men who love her to think for herself and to question authority. She’s being taught to think about the greater good, to break her family’s mold and to care about others.

Warning: you need to be able to deal with situations/beliefs that would be appalling today.
This is very much a movie of its time.

So if you can (temporarily!) ignore the racism of its portrayal of African-Americans as buffoons/simpletons and if you can (temporarily!) ignore the gendered assumptions that women are a bit illogical, a bit too fond of clothes/jewelry, etc. and that women should use their bodies/sexuality for gain—you can enjoy this film.

It’s incredibly silly. Don’t try to analyze the plot. The ending is ridiculously simplistic.
It’s your standard screwball comedy that tries to spin a romantic love story on the idea of “divorcing for love”. The dialogue (by Preston Sturges who also directs) is quite sharp and witty and makes the movie enjoyable (despite it’s flaws). Colbert & McCrea are good at what they do and work well together.

So if you like this sort of thing, (the genre, the actors, the director, etc.) – you’ll probably enjoy this film.

This is a sort of sequel to God of Gamblers (Du Shen) w/ Chow Yun Fat and also a sequel to Stephen Chow’s “All for the Winner”.
However 3 years later the same director made Du Shen 2 which was also called God Of Gamblers 2.

I’m not a Michael Bay fan – I think he’s all about explosions and overthetop action at the expense of plot.
But I love scifi movies & I like Ewan McGregor so I rented it anyway.
The plot was ok. Sort of a Logans Run meets THX1138.

But the constant stream of obvious pointed product placement the entire length of the film was revolting!

Additionally, any film made in my lifetime makes a joke about not giving women credit cards can not be a film I would recommend to anyone.

I’m a fan of both Gary Cooper and Fritz Lang films, and while I don’t think this film is either person’s greatest work, I did enjoy it.

I think it’s important to think about the time this was filmed and to think about how close it was to the events at the time, coming mere months after the US had bombed the Japanese.

I think it was an important step at the time to make us aware of the dangers of nuclear weapons.

I felt the film was careful not to turn into a propoganda piece trying to stir up hatred and fear.

I also enjoyed see the “average” (if we all looked like movie stars) people doing what they could to fight the enemy. This wasn’t supposed to be a trained James Bond, just someone truly concerned with helping as he could.

I think what I liked best about the film is that it actually featured strong female characters. There was a famous and respected female nuclear physicists (in a world where women are STILL discriminated against in the sciences at Ivy League schools)! There was a female spy. There was a schoolteacher turned resistance fighter. There were evil women who killed. Women were just as much a part of everything that went on as anyone else.

Spoiler warning
Without revealing too much, I’d like to say that I also enjoyed the ending! How novel to see duty was chosen over escape or personal comfort. Coming from a woman (who has probably been socialized that men/love is everything) – that was refreshing to see in a movie! No unrealistically wrapped up happy ending.

Ok, it wasn’t even that great of a documentary. I thought the editing was poorly done.

It needs to be seen just to see those actual words coming out of an actual person’s mouth.
It needs to be seen by people who think insane religous fanatics building an army and indoctrinating people doesn’t happen in the US.

I really did think it was a stereotype of the crazy Christians and that there were just a few nutcase out there – but I was startled to learn there are a lot of them out there!

This movie scared me. It angered me. I pittied the poor children being indoctrinated in ignorance and blind faith. I was embarrassed and saddened to watch children not allowed to learn science (evolution, global warming, etc.)

People like this give organized religon a bad name!

The good thing about this film is that it energized me to fight back against their anti-government, anti-science, anti-gay, anti-choice stances and attempts to infiltrate the govt and tell me how to live my life. If they’re spoiling for a fight and creating “gods army”, I think we have no choice but to stand up to them.

After seeing this movie I made a donation to Americans United for Sep. of Church & State and I’m thinking of upping my next donation to Planned Parenthood and any other group that has to fight these kind of people.