Yikes! Who thought this was a good idea? Michelle Rodriguez stars as as professional hitman Frank Kitchen who, after killing the wrong person, is given a sex change against his will and released back into the world. Don’t you hate it when that happens? Rodriguez plays both versions of the character offering her some interesting acting challenges but this translates to almost nothing of interest on-screen.
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I don’t know that I’ve ever watched a more beautiful but empty film than Nicolas Winding Refn‘s 2013 thriller Only God Forgives which throughout every immaculately staged shot and beautifully lit scene feels like marionettes dragged around the screen by a director who refuses to let his actors, or their characters, have any agency of their own.
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Whether or not 1996’s The Arrival works for you or not will likely boil down to whether or not you can accept the premise of Charlie Sheen as a scientist who stumbles into, and becomes lost in, a vast conspiracy of aliens on Earth altering the planet for their own ends. It’s B-movie sci-fi to be sure, but it’s held up fairly well over the years even if the film struggles at times balancing the higher-minded scientific ideas with the rampant paranoia.
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1963’s Charade was an attempt to cash-in on a Hitchcock-like thriller with more than a dash of screwball comedy thrown in similar to North by Northwest. It may not match up to one of Hitchcock’s best films, but Charade (despite some murky plot points) succeeds by throwing interpreter Regina Lampert (Audrey Hepburn) into an uncertain world of spies and thieves after the sudden death of her husband who was in possession of something worth killing him, and her, over.
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I’ve tried to like The Jacket, but, despite the film starring one of my favorite actresses, I’ve never been been sold on its unusual premise which I’m not sure even screenwriter Massy Tadjedin complete understands.
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