Who isn’t excited to see Jake LaMotta and Rocky Balboa go at it in the ring together? Sure, they’re really old… but it’s still those same awesome boxers we knew from long ago. Robert De Niro and Sylvester Stallone.
You may have seen Ms. Kim Basinger in Charlie St. Cloud or in the upcoming ‘Third Person’ by Paul Haggis. She is going to be playing the ‘woman in the middle’ which is often seen in films with two men who have a rivalry.
The film is about two retired boxers with a rivalry who are pushed into the ring for one last fight together. Sounds like the plot of Rocky 6 but times 2 ehh?
Peter Segal is set to direct, Doug Ellin writes, and Kevin Hart is also set to be the promoter for the fight who sees good money involved.
‘Grudge Match’ is expected to begin shooting sometime in 2013.
Story: This was AMAZING. I did not expect it to be this good. Nobody really talks about this movie. But I guess Inception overshadows this in the year of 2010. Sure, it’s not as good as Inception to me, but it is amazing. Such a complex story that twists and turns and makes you think one thing, when it really isn’t. We’re seeing through the eyes of Teddy Daniels, which is pretty crazy itself. A horror film that does scare in it’s flashbacks and it’s views of the whole island.
Visuals: Look of the film was beautiful. Amazing cinematoraphy, great way to capture the horror of the asylum. The people in the asylum looked scary, everthing was great.
Music: Some odd choices of music I didn’t feel fit perfectly with the scene. Scorcese doesn’t seem to like to get a composer and settle down into some good score music. Nevertheless, it was pretty good.
Characters: Leonardo DiCaprio is good as ever, Mark Ruffalo plays a convincing Marshall. Everyone at the asylum looks to be insane and crazy, giving scary performances. When DiCaprio cries, you feel his sadness and anger. Great performances across the board!
Rewatch Value: I’m watching this one again in a couple days to make sure I absolutely understand everything. 😀
I’m sorry people, but this DID NOT live up to my expectations at all. I was very disappointed. It’s about the mob, Las Vegas, and sheriff’s from the mind of Nicolas Pilegii. The third god of Goodfellas and Casino with Martin Scorcese and Robert De Niro. So what went wrong?
First of all, CBS is taking a huge gamble here. Last fall proved that period shows do not go so well with the straight off cancellations of ‘Pan Am’ and ‘The Playboy Club’. That’s two shows. Not one, but two.
So why would CBS take this gamble? They are putting this whole show on the line advertising Dennis Quaid as the star and god here and there along with Michael Chiklis. To be honest, I don’t find Dennis Quaid all so cool. He’s nothing special really. Sure, he’s a good actor. But the only thing I find of him to be memorable is ‘The Parent Trap’. And Michael Chiklis? He’s trying so hard to be tough but just like ABC’s ‘No Ordinary Family’, he fails to be a tough guy even though he tries so very hard. As a side note, No Ordinary Family was cancelled after its first season with a huge ass cliffhanger.
The beginning was kinda lame. Dennis Quaid comes to the airport pissed since Vincent Savino’s plane flew in and disturbed his herd. Then Quaid just beats everyone up.
As the episode went on, we saw that the blueprint of each episode is going to be ‘case of the week’ style. The case for this pilot episode was extremely boring and not interesting at all. No twists, no turns, just a plain case to solve.
I REALLY REALLY REALLY want to like this one. It’s Nicolas Pileggi as the writer for crying out loud. I do hope it picks up a lot as the season progress.
Story: This was a real good one. Before seeing this, I know lots of people compare it to Goodfellas all the time and stuff, since it has Robert De Niro, Joe Pesci, and Billy Batts (Frank Vincent) in it. Now lets get this over with, Casino was not better than Goodfellas. Although it is a lot lke Goodfellas with the same actors, freeze frames, a De Niro stare, Mafia, etc, etc. Goodfellas is different, there’s just something about the storyline and Henry Hill we all love.
I found the narration by De Niro and Pesci to be way too much at parts. Mainly, the first 30 or 40 minutes of the film. Then I got used to it. But it was like, “Is this gonna be like I’m being read a book?” The parts where it was too much kind of needed that since it was introducing the characters and the Tangiers hotel. but still, I think that was just lazy writing.
The ending was a bit bland. Sure, I was blown away when De Niro said what happened after the explosion in his car, but still, the very ending was Ehhhh for me. I expected something better, like Goodfellas.
One of the things I also realized was some very lazy edits that were very noticable. In the opening scene when De Niro gets into the car and it blows up. If you look closely at De Niro, right before it blows up, a dummy is switched in instead of De Niro, then the car blows up. he other lazy edits were just skipping frames, weird angles, etc.
Music: The music also, did not live up to Goodfellas. Sure, it had some pretty sick choices at parts, classics, you know. But there were not many favorites in this one.
Characters: As they always were Robert De Niro and Joe Pesci were amazing. There’s something about De Niro smoking a cigarette and his walk with that New York accent that is absolutely perfect for these kind of movies. Joe Pesci did the usual psychotic, awkward, and provocative guy who kills people whenever he wants.
Sharon Stone was amazing also. Throughout the whole movie, especially the middle, she really changed. She went from this nice girl, to this brat that was depressed, angry, and miserable. And De Niro really didn’t do anything to her. It was her love she still had for James Woods (who also did great for his role even though it was small) instead of De Niro and the lust for money that dr0ve her to be like that. We all knew it wouldn’t work out well in the end for her.
Rewatch Value: High
Verdict: Although not as great as some of Scorcese’s other works, Casino is a classic of the 90s and one of their best performances from the duo of Robert De Niro and Joe Pesci.
Story: This is an amazing story of “God’s Lonely Man”. A story that anyone can relate to. Loneliness, the blurs of the lines of good and evil and doing the right thing, the evil in the world. Paul Schrader did a FANTASTIC job in the writing of this film, which is one of the three major parts of this film. The story is phenomenal. Travis Bickle just wanting to find someone. Someone who is like him, but he is a rather unique person. He is one of those people who needs to take time in order to find someone special. He’s a troubled man that wants to do the right thing, but does the right thing the wrong way. That might not make sense to some, but that’s how awesome Paul Schrader was for writing this film. I love that guy.
Visuals: Amazing depiction of New York with the scum and slime of it all. One of Martin Scorcese’s greatest works, he knows how New York works, exactly. And the shows of De Niro driving in the taxi at night look so awesome. When we see De Niro’s eyes in the rearview mirror or lights out of focus in the rear view mirror is just mesmerizing. All of the bright and colorful lights. Just amazing cinematography and direction here.
Music: There only seemed to be literally one track that played throughout the whole film, which was the theme song. But either way, I loved it. It didn’t need anything more or anything less.
Characters: Robert De Niro. This is one of the films I saw that established Robert De Niro as my most favorite actor of all time. He is brilliant in this film. You didn’t think I would leave out the talking to the mirror scene did you? You talkin’ to me? I say this all the time in real life as a joke, it’s just not many people have seen this movie so they don’t realize this. De Niro was improvising too! Just like Dustin Hoffman in ‘Midnight Cowboy’ with the “I’M WALKING HERE!” Jodie Foster played a nice young prostitute. She should go pro… nahhh, I joke. Cybill Sheperd was also real nice too, looking like an angel with that elegant walk, she played a convincing performance too.
Rewatch Value: A great film that will live on forever. Phenomenal story and acting.
Lets make this a little Scorcese week, shall we? Taxi Driver on Friday!
Story: To be honest, I was a little dissapointed by this one. I heard this was ‘the Goodfellas of the 2000s’, and it even won Best Picture of 2006.It wasn’t anything too special. Sure, it was a good film. But it was predictable.Yeah, the ending was a little out there, but it was good. It got better towards the end of the film when the tension was building higher and higher and we didn’t know if he was going to get out or not.
Visuals: With the cinematography, I really felt the Goodfellas feel to it. The only thing is, they didn’t bring the awesome story of Goodfellas with it. Look of the film was great and was probably the best thing.
Music: Some weird and boring music choices at parts, since Scorcese seems to not to like usings scores. And if he does use a score, it’s a one track score that plays through the whole film (Taxi Driver).
Characters: I think one of the things that might also be bringing this film down is the many characters. Too many perhaps. The casting choices for these roles were great. But I don’t really believe someone like Matt Damon could be in a crime family. I don’t know. It’s just me. DiCaprio did excellent, as well did Nicholson.
Rewatch Value: Maybe I”ll like it better a second time? That’s what happened with me and Goodfellas. And now Goodfellas is in my Top 10 favorite movies of all time.
As I was just doing some research and trivia on my favorite movies, I came across the Raging Bull page and began reading. A related search was ‘Raging Bull II’. WHAT???? A Raging Bull Sequel? My first thoughts were “Old Robert DeNiro? Martin Scorcese?” But to my suprise, none of them were listed as anything, cast or crew, in the movie. So I did some more research.
Apparently, Martin Guigui directed Raging Bull II already and it is in post-production. Well, MGM heard of this news that they were making a sequel to their 1978 hit movie, and were angered by this news. So they filed a lawsuit against the company and producers. When MGM bought the rights from Jake LaMotta himself to make his memoir into a movie, they also bought the rights to his unwritten sequel. So because of this, the producers and director of the so called ‘Raging Bull II’ changed the name to ‘The Bronx Bull’ and cut any ties of it being a sequel to Raging Bull or a continuation of the 1978 hit.
The director even spoke on the matter,
“I understand because it’s such an iconic, beautiful and amazing first film, one of the great films maybe of all time. But our story has a lot more heart and I think it’s a beautiful depiction of who Jake really is.” -Martin Guigi, director of ‘The Bronx Bull’
Martin Scorcese also talked about if a sequel was possible for him earlier this year.
“I don’t think I could revisit the material, as they say. I think we said what we had to say at that time. All of us moved on. Different aspects of the same story basically keep making the rounds. […] Rise and fall and self-destruction and the suffering and somehow coming through, in some cases. Coming through the suffering so that you change in a way. I don’t know. It’s dealing with yourself, really. Ultimately, at the end of ‘Raging Bull,’ he’s looking in a mirror and he’s at comfort with himself, to a certain extent. He’s not fighting, he’s not beating himself up. That’s all. So, I don’t know where they’re going to go.” -Martin Scorcese, director of ‘Raging Bull’
How can you just claim to be making a sequel to someone else’s movie? That’s pretty stupid. That’s like me saying I’m making Star Wars Episode 7. I mean come on, lets be real now.
‘The Bronx Bull’ is set for a 2013 release starring William Forsythe as Jake LaMotta.
Retrospect Realm 