Innocence

Starring:Julia Blake, Charles 'Bud' Tingwell, Kristine Van Pellicom, Kenny Aernouts, Terry Norris, Marta Dusseldorp, Robert Menzies, Chris Haywood, Norman Kaye, Joey Kennedy, Liz Windsor, Dawn Klingberg, Peter Berger, Kate Roberts, Michaela Cantwell, Kyra Cox, Carmel Johnson, Rory Walker, Mary Bleby, Tommy Darwin (II)
Director: Paul Cox
Studio: Sony Pictures
Product Type: DVD

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There have been few better movies in the history of the planet than The Third Man, and fewer still as brilliantly directed from second to second. Orson Welles played the title role, and his legend has tended to engulf the film. But it was directed by Carol Reed and written--except for a Wellesian riff on the Borgias--by Graham Greene, and the credit for this masterpiece is properly theirs. Theirs and Joseph Cotten's; for awesome as Welles is, his Citizen Kane second banana is onscreen about six times as much, and Cotten uses every minute to create one of the most distinctive--if also forlorn--of modern heroes.

You know the story. Holly Martins (Cotten), a writer of pulp Westerns and one of life's congenital third-raters, arrives in post-WWII Vienna only to learn that his old pal Harry Lime, the guy who sent him his plane ticket, is being buried. Everybody, from a cynical British cop named Calloway (Trevor Howard) to Harry's Continental knockout of a girlfriend (Alida Valli) and his sundry absurd/Euro-sinister business associates, feels that Holly should get on another plane and go home. He doesn't. Things come to light. Other deaths follow. The world lies in utter ruin.

The Third Man completed a sublime hat trick--an international critical and popular smash following upon the success of Reed's Odd Man Out ('47) and The Fallen Idol ('48). Although other filmmakers had begun to use war-ravaged Europe as a great movie set, The Third Man is so vivid in its canny mix of gray semidocumentary and insanely angular, Expressionist/Surrealist chiaroscuro that it seems to have imagined not only the postwar thriller but also postwar Europe itself singlehandedly.

What great movie moments: The throwaway details like a mourner who forgets to drop his wreath on a newly dug grave. The sly editing whereby thick-headed Sergeant Paine (Bernard Lee, once and future "M" to 007) goes on leafing through a magazine, knowing just the moment he must rise and subdue the nervy Yank who would take a punch at his boss. The way Anton Karas's legendary zither score seems to jangle in the very guy-lines of a bridge where, far below Robert Krasker's Oscar-winning camera, the Third Man calls a war council. The shadow of a dead man towering, big as Europe, over the nighttime streets of Vienna. --Richard T. Jameson

Studio description

Cynical pulp novelist Holly Martins arrives in shadowy Vienna to investigate the mysterious death of his old friend, black-market opportunist Harry Lime, and thus begins an ever-thickening web of love, deception, and murder that adds up to one of cinema's most immortal treats, as well as one of its trickiest. Thanks to brilliant performances by Joseph Cotten, Alida Valli, and Orson Welles; Anton Karas's timeless, evocative zither score; Graham Greene's razor-sharp dialogue; and Robert Krasker's haunting deep focus shots, off-kilter angles, and dramatic use of light and shadow, The Third Man, directed by the inimitable Carol Reed, only grows in stature as the years pass.

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Right On! Government Sucks! Oh Wait, Poo?
This movie does have a point.
definitely oddball but worth it
A favourite
But it makes no sense

Sweet Movie (Criterion Collection)
Starring: Carole Laure , Pierre Clémenti , Anna Prucnal , Sami Frey , and Jane Mallett
Director: Dusan Makavejev
Manufacturer: Criterion Collection
ProductGroup: DVD
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WR: Mysteries of the Organism (Criterion Collection)
If... (Criterion Collection)
La Jetee/Sans Soleil (Criterion Collection)
The Two of Us (Criterion Collection)
Vengeance Is Mine - Criterion Collection

ASIN: B000OPPAEM
Release Date: 2007-06-19

Description

Pushing his themes of sexual liberation to their boiling point, Yugoslavian art-house provocateur Dusan Makavejev followed his international sensation WR: Mysteries of the Organism with this full-throated shriek in the face of bourgeois complacency and movie watching. Sweet Movie tackles the limits of personal and political freedom with kaleidoscopic feverishness, shuttling viewers from a gynecological beauty pageant to a grotesque food orgy with scatological, taboo-shattering glee. With its lewd abandon and sketch-comedy perversity, Sweet Movie became both a cult staple and an exemplar of the envelope pushing of 1970s cinema.

Customer Reviews:

Right On! Government Sucks! Oh Wait, Poo?.......2007-06-20

Dusan Makavejev's 1974 film Sweet Movie is an indictment toward all forms of authority and convention. It does not obviously or even wittingly perhaps come from an honest political standard itself, but it instead exists to attack all that rules us. It skewers capitalism, communism, and absolutely everything in between. Perhaps it is a call specifically for some sort of Anarcho-Primitivism? Perhaps Sweet Movie is simply a celebration of life in its own sick and twisted way?

Sweet Movie follows two different stories and both feature a female protagonist. The first follows a contestant of the 1984 Miss Monde pageant. She wins and her prize is her marriage to some big corporate dude. She is shocked by how he degrades her in their first meeting and she runs away. Her rejection is met with displeasure by his cronies and she ends up getting pretty severely humiliated and then stuffed into a suitcase and shipped off to France. After that she gets stuck to some Latin guy and enters a commune and some pretty wacky things happen. This story operates as a criticism toward capitalism and consumerism at the beginning and the conclusion, while it seems to attack communism in the middle. The second story follows a young woman who is leading a boat down a river. The boat is full of candy and has a statue of Karl Marx on it. She seduces all who encounter her with sex, candy and propaganda. Then she kills them. Obviously it is a direct attack on communism.

There are some pretty shocking things in Sweet Movie but that shouldn't be a surprise when taking into account the time period and some of the subversive and surreal counterculture names involved in the film (e.g. Otto Muehl, Roland Topor and George Melly). The film captures a cultural movement in some respects and the significance is there but overall Sweet Movie was too obscure to have an impact. Only now does it resonate but for very different reasons. It stands out for its visual shock alone.

There is a very strong emphasis on bodily functions in Sweet Movie, more so than anything I've ever seen or even want to see again for that matter. I can't pinpoint why but it's more than likely Dusan Makavejev's attempt to compel us to revolt against all of our societal institutions by directly desensitizing us to his perspective that we are all just gassy and disgusting animals. Spend a few days resisting your normal cognitive functions or spend some time with dementia patients and you'll get a good smell of what Makavejev is trying to get at here...I think? I'm not sure I agree with him in those sorts of details, but in spirit I like where he is going with Sweet Movie. We all could use a good smack away from the restraints of everyday society.

Keep in mind; it is virtually impossible to get anything out of Sweet Movie if you take it too literally. It is designed to surprise the viewer and club them over the head with shock. The problem with that is Sweet Movie was so shocking for its time that it was hardly even seen. People were not ready then, but maybe the world has grown sicker since. Criterion may have picked a more accessible release date for Sweet Movie than Makavejev did. Asking ourselves the questions that this film might produce may be more important now than ever.

This movie does have a point........2003-09-26

To all those who said that this movie has not point I am sorry but you are wrong. The purpose of this movie is to basically give us a wake up call. The sugar represents how everything is sugar coated. All of the evil things that are done such as the children was sugar coated as if to make it less evil. Also the actual footage of the babies and the dead bodies, anyone know the significance here? It is real, this is not horrible things done by actors to make a movie. This is REAL LIFE but yet that does not phase us. Rather what freaks us out is people puking IN A MOVIE. The director reminds us at the end that this is a fictional movie because the children come alive, but the train in the background....any idea where that goes? It is a train to Aushwitz (dont think that is spelt right). The sailor that is picked up is the last suviving sailor from the ship that started the russian revolution(look at his hat). The rich man or Capitolistic america pisses and tarnishes all that is pure and innocent(his wife) in this world. There are so many connections to the real world. SO what he is saying is that actual footage of the true evil that has happened in this world should be more offensive to us then any finctional movie should be.

definitely oddball but worth it.......2002-09-13

An Icelandic reviewer remarked on the Norwegian censorship of this film. One of the interesting factoids about this bizarre film is that it had many versions - different countries edited it according to their (in)sensibilities. More interestingly, the director thought this very amusing rather than insulting.

Another reviewer remarked that he took a first date to this film which I find hilarious. Rather than demanding to leave however, I might have married him.

In any case, take it as you might any hallucinogen - expect both the expected and unexpected.

A favourite.......2002-03-23

I saw Sweet Movie in 1978, and twice at Reykjavík Film Festival 2000. In 1978 I was twenty and it went on screen in Laugarvatn High School as a part of Reykjavík Art Festival. The newspapers were full of noisy protest that the sweet movie was ugly and horrible. As youngsters we liked it in particular due to the uproar. We found the exchange of bodily excrements very funny. Next to me sat the school's prettiest girl. She found the chocolate bath at the end of the film beautiful, a different reaction from what Sidneysider describes below (Robert of Ashfield). She died of a terrible illness five years later, the same year Sidneysider saw his 10 minutes of Sweet Movie. In 1978 it was kind of fashionable to be open minded, and being old fashioned and prudish was very out. In 2000 Sweet Movie had got on well, though it was almost impossible to find a copy. It is a bit of a slide show of different ideas. I don't care about symbolism, it is just very beautiful. But it touches on various subjects. It even touches on sexual abuse. NOTA BENE: I should like to promote Sweet Movie as a music experience. Some of the music is quite strange, some indeed interesting, and all of it very pleasant. And the film is full of it. So, listen to the music. - I seldom watch films, but this one is a favourite, to be ranked with Orson Welles' The Trial, Kurosawa'a Dersu Uzala, and Tarkovski's Stalker. A grotesque world, but somewhat enviable ....

But it makes no sense.......2002-01-09

I bought this movie a while ago after having seen it several times on TV!!!! in Europe (unedited, by the way). I bought it so that I could let different people I know watch it- I'm just a little twisted that way. Some people find it interesting, some find it unwatchable. It's definitely not for those with weak stomachs. Basically, it's an art-house flick that's meant to shock- this movie most definitely could not have been shown in the US after 1979. Yes, the movie is filled with symbolism and emotion, but in the end, it fails to make a point- unless that point is to show how utterly disgusting a film can be. The story simply doesn't make sense. This is a movie for those who think they've seen it all....

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Full Metal Jacket
Starring: Adam Baldwin , Bruce Boa , Tim Colceri , Vincent D'Onofrio , and Peter Edmund
Manufacturer: Warner Home Video
ProductGroup: DVD
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Platoon (Collector's Edition Steelbook)
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ASIN: B00005ATQF
Release Date: 2001-06-12

Amazon.com essential video

Stanley Kubrick's 1987, penultimate film seemed to a lot of people to be contrived and out of touch with the '80s vogue for such intensely realistic portrayals of the Vietnam War as Platoon and The Deer Hunter. Certainly, Kubrick gave audiences plenty of reason to wonder why he made the film at all: essentially a two-part drama that begins on a Parris Island boot camp for rookie Marines and abruptly switches to Vietnam (actually shot on sound stages and locations near London), Full Metal Jacket comes across as a series of self-contained chapters in a story whose logical and thematic development is oblique at best. Then again, much the same was said about Kubrick's 2001: A Space Odyssey, a masterwork both enthralled with and satiric about the future's role in the unfinished business of human evolution. In a way, Full Metal Jacket is the wholly grim counterpart of 2001. While the latter is a truly 1960s film, both wide-eyed and wary, about the intertwining of progress and isolation (ending in our redemption, finally, by death), Full Metal Jacket is a cynical, Reagan-era view of the 1960s' hunger for experience and consciousness that fulfilled itself in violence. Lee Ermey made film history as the Marine drill instructor whose ritualized debasement of men in the name of tribal uniformity creates its darkest angel in a murderous half-wit (Vincent D'Onofrio). Matthew Modine gives a smart and savvy performance as Private Joker, the clowning, military journalist who yearns to get away from the propaganda machine and know firsthand the horrific revelation of the front line. In Full Metal Jacket, depravity and fulfillment go hand in hand, and it's no wonder Kubrick kept his steely distance from the material to make the point. --Tom Keogh

Description

The story of an 18-year-old marine recruit named Private Joker - from his carnage-and-machismo boot camp to his climactic involvement in the heavy fighting in Hue during the 1968 Tet Offensive.

Fast Times at Ridgemont High (Widescreen Special Edition)

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Fast Times at Ridgemont High (Widescreen Special Edition)
Starring: Sean Penn , Jennifer Jason Leigh , Judge Reinhold , Robert Romanus , and Brian Backer
Director: Amy Heckerling
Manufacturer: Universal Studios
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ASIN: B00029RTCG
Release Date: 2004-11-02

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Before he became an overrated filmmaker, Cameron Crowe (Jerry Maguire) was a reporter for Rolling Stone who was so youthful looking that he could go undercover for a year at a California high school and write a book about it. He wrote the script for this film, based on that book, and it launched the careers of several young actors, including Jennifer Jason Leigh, Judge Reinhold, Phoebe Cates, and, above all, Sean Penn. The story line is episodic, dealing with the lives of iconic teen types: one of the school's cool kids, a nerd, a teen queen, and, most enjoyably, the class stoner (Penn), who finds himself at odds with a strict history teacher (a wonderfully spiky Ray Walston). This is not a great movie but very entertaining and, for a certain age group, a seminal movie experience. --Marshall Fine

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Almost Famous
Starring: Fairuza Balk , Philip Seymour Hoffman , Frances McDormand , Noah Taylor , and Anna Paquin
Director: Cameron Crowe
Manufacturer: Dreamworks Video
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ASIN: B00003CXMG
Release Date: 2001-03-13

Amazon.com

Almost Famous is the movie Cameron Crowe has been waiting a lifetime to tell. The fictionalization of Crowe's days as a teenage reporter for Creem and Rolling Stone has all the well-written characters and wonderful "movie moments" that we expect from Crowe (Jerry Maguire), but the film has an intangible something extra--an insider's touch that will turn the film into the ode to '70s rock & roll for years to come. We are introduced to Crowe's alter ego, William Miller (Patrick Fugit), at home, where his progressive mom (Frances McDormand, just superb) has outlawed rock music and sister Anita (Zooey Deschanel) has slipped him LPs that will "set his mind free." Following the wisdom of Creem's disheveled editor, Lester Bangs (Philip Seymour Hoffman in an instant-classic performance), Miller gets on the inside with the up-and-coming band Stillwater (a fictionalized mixture of the Allman Brothers, Led Zeppelin, and others). A simple visit with the band turns into a three-week, life-altering odyssey into the heyday of American rock. Of the characters he meets on the road, the two most important are groupie extraordinaire Penny Lane (Kate Hudson in a star-making performance) and Stillwater's enigmatic lead guitarist (Billy Crudup), who keeps stringing Miller along for an interview. From the handwritten credits (done by Crowe) to the bittersweet finale, Crowe's comedic valentine is an indelible, heartbreaking romance of music, women, and the privilege of youth. --Doug Thomas

Description

Audiences and critics alike are raving about this larger-than-life rock'n 'roll favorite that Roger Ebert calls "one of the best movies of the year!" The guys of Stillwater have the sound, they have the look and Rolling Stone Magazine wants their story. For young reporter William Miller, it's the opportunity of a lifetime as he hits the road with his favorite band and discovers the price of fame, the value of family and the limits of friendship.

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Scent of a Woman
Starring: Al Pacino , Chris O'Donnell , James Rebhorn , Gabrielle Anwar , and Philip Seymour Hoffman
Director: Martin Brest
Manufacturer: Universal Studios
ProductGroup: DVD
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ASIN: 0783226845
Release Date: 1998-04-29

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Hoo-hah! After seven Oscar nominations for his outstanding work in films such as The Godfather, Serpico, and Dog Day Afternoon, it's ironic that Al Pacino finally won the Oscar for his grandstanding lead performance in this 1992 crowd pleaser. As the blind, blunt, and ultimately benevolent retired Lieutenant Colonel Frank Slade, Pacino is both hammy and compelling, simultaneously subtle and grandly over-the-top when defending his new assistant and prep school student Charlie (Chris O'Donnell) at a disciplinary hearing. While the subplot involving Charlie's prep-school crisis plays like a sequel to Dead Poets Society, Pacino's adventurous escapades in New York City provide comic relief, rich character development, and a memorable supporting role for Gabrielle Anwar as the young woman who accepts the colonel's invitation to dance the tango. Scent of a Woman is a remake of the 1972 Italian film Profumo di donna. In addition to Pacino's award, the picture garnered Oscar nominations for director Martin Brest and for screenwriter Bo Goldman. --Jeff Shannon

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Stand By Me (Special Edition)
Starring: Scott Beach , Marshall Bell , William Bronder , John Cusack , and Dick Durock
Director: Rob Reiner
Manufacturer: Sony Pictures
ProductGroup: DVD
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ASIN: B00003CXIP
Release Date: 2000-08-29

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A sleeper hit when released in 1986, Stand by Me is based on Stephen King's novella "The Body" (from the book Different Seasons); but it's more about the joys and pains of boyhood friendship than a morbid fascination with corpses. It's about four boys ages 12 and 13 (Wil Wheaton, River Phoenix, Corey Feldman, Jerry O'Connell) who take an overnight hike through the woods near their Oregon town to find the body of a boy who's been missing for days. Their journey includes a variety of scary adventures (including a ferocious junkyard dog, a swamp full of leeches, and a treacherous leap from a train trestle), but it's also a time for personal revelations, quiet interludes, and the raucous comradeship of best friends. Set in the 1950s, the movie indulges an overabundance of anachronistic profanity and a kind of idealistic, golden-toned nostalgia (it's told in flashback as a story written by Wheaton's character as an adult, played by Richard Dreyfuss). But it's delightfully entertaining from start to finish, thanks to the rapport among its young cast members and the timeless, universal themes of friendship, family, and the building of character and self-esteem. Kiefer Sutherland makes a memorable teenage villain, and look closely for John Cusack in a flashback scene as Wheaton's now-deceased and dearly missed brother. A genuine crowd-pleaser, this heartfelt movie led director Rob Reiner to even greater success with his next film, The Princess Bride. --Jeff Shannon

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Training Day
Starring: Raymond J. Barry , Tom Berenger , Nick Chinlund , Raymond Cruz , and Scott Glenn
Director: Antoine Fuqua
Manufacturer: Warner Home Video
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Traffic

ASIN: B00005JKED
Release Date: 2004-06-01

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A powerhouse performance by Denzel Washington fuels this brutal urban police drama, in which a rookie narcotics cop learns the hard way that even good cops can go very, very bad. Washington plays veteran detective Alonzo Harris, a self-proclaimed "wolf among wolves," eager to teach his rookie partner Jake (Ethan Hawke) that normal rules don't apply on the mean streets of Los Angeles. Caught in a web of deception, Jake watches with escalating horror as Alonzo uses his badge (and the support of his superiors) to justify a self-righteous policy of corruption. In stark contrast to most of his previous work, Denzel unleashes his dark side with fearlessness and fury, and the result is excellence without compromise. Director Antoine Fuqua (The Replacement Killers) won't score any points for subtlety, but gritty details (including actual L.A. gang members as extras) and Hawke's finely tuned performance are perfectly matched to Washington's frightening volatility. --Jeff Shannon

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Oklahoma! (50th Anniversary Edition)
Starring: Gordon MacRae , Gloria Grahame , Gene Nelson , Charlotte Greenwood , and Shirley Jones
Director: Fred Zinnemann
Manufacturer: 20th Century Fox
ProductGroup: DVD
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ASIN: B000AP04NI
Release Date: 2005-11-15

Amazon.com

The hit Broadway musical from the 1940s gets a lavish if not always exciting workout in this 1955 film version directed by old lion Fred Zinnemann (High Noon). Gordon MacRae brings his sterling voice to the role of cowboy Curly, and Shirley Jones plays Laurie, the object of his affection. The Rodgers and Hammerstein score includes "The Surrey with the Fringe on Top," "Oh, What a Beautiful Mornin'," and "People Will Say We're in Love," and Agnes DeMille provides the buoyant choreography. Among the supporting cast, Gloria Grahame is memorable as Ado Annie, the "girl who cain't say no," and Rod Steiger overdoes it as the villainous Jud. --Tom Keogh

Description

Set in the Oklahoma Territory in the early 1900's, this joyous celebration of frontier life is a story of tender romance and dangerous passion. Gordon MacRae is Curly, a sunny, good-natured ranch hand, and Shirley Jones is Laurey Williams, the farmer's daughter he loves. Rod Steiger is he menacing Jud, who tries to comes between them. The first Rodgers and Hammerstein collaboration, this Academy Award winner for Best Score features the classic songs "Oh, What a Beautiful Mornin'," "The Surrey With The Fringe On Top" and "People Will Say We're In Love."

Almost Famous - The Director's Cut (Two-Disc Special Edition)

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A Review of the Theatrical Version - please view the Director's Cut for a fuller experience
Robbed of a Best Picture nomination
Do I really need to review this?
Over-rated, ego driven "true story" of Rolling Stone
Rock 'n' Roll through the eyes of an average teen

Almost Famous - The Director's Cut (Two-Disc Special Edition)
Starring: Billy Crudup , Frances McDormand , Kate Hudson , Jason Lee , and Patrick Fugit
Director: Cameron Crowe
Manufacturer: Dreamworks Video
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American Beauty (Widescreen Edition)
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ASIN: B00005OM4Q
Release Date: 2001-12-04

Amazon.com

Customer Reviews:

A Review of the Theatrical Version - please view the Director's Cut for a fuller experience.......2007-06-02

I truly enjoyed this film, over-enjoyed it in fact. There are far too many wonderful scenes, great joints of dialogue, and an overflow of brooding young men and women. I felt like I had no character on which to focus my sympathy. I wanted to focus on the perspective of the young writer, William Miller (played expertly by Patrick Fugit), but the film wouldn't let me. I wanted to envision Russell Hammond (played genuinely by Billy Crudup), but I couldn't decide if he was a rock star, a little boy trapped in a man's body, or a surrogate father to William. I didn't understand Kate Hudson's Oscar nomination, but I understood Frances McDormand's. And why the hell Philip Seymour Hoffman wasn't nominated, I'll never understand. Something was going on in this movie that confused me.

I think the greatest flaw in this movie - the theatrical version, at least - is that there are simply too many great performances and too many fascinating characters for the film to center itself. I'm positive that the director's cut is the version to see. The theater cut was pieced together with an air of sadness in order to meet a marketable time limit. I felt like I was missing a lot of back-story, supporting roles, and important moments. If you have never seen this movie, avoid the theatrical version. It is severely dismembered, and it's clear that the director (Cameron Crowe) had more to show the viewer. The director's cut is over forty minutes longer, and I look forward to seeing it.

I probably should at least attempt to place this movie. The film covers the 1973-74 tours of the band Stillwater. There were an actual band back then, but the majority of their representation is fabricated for the sake of the movie. Most of the music in the film is representative of the time period and not so much from the band. Thus, this is not a true biopic, but an imagined biopic, a movie about a band that was, as the title states, almost famous.

Robbed of a Best Picture nomination.......2007-05-25

Uplifting coming-of-age stories generally don't do it for me. That is, unless they include great dialogue, comedy and drama, top-notch performances and a fantastic soundtrack. And that's exactly what multiple Oscar nominee "Almost Famous" has going for it. Of course, the fact that the main character lives out my dream of touring with a rock band doesn't hurt, either.

"Almost Famous" takes place during the early '70s, an era when rock legends such as Led Zeppelin, Black Sabbath and The Who were in their prime. It's into this milieu that William Miller (Patrick Fugit), an earnest 15-year-old, finds himself thrust when he scores a Rolling Stone magazine assignment to cover a rising rock band called Stillwater. Against the odds, Fugit works his way into the inner circle of the band, initially winning their respect through his knowledge of their music.

What begins as a short assignment turns into a multiple-month odyssey during which Patrick follows the band as it tours and grows from a second-tier rock group into superstars. Several compelling relationships develop along the way, including a unique friendship between William and the band's guitarist, Russell Hammond (Billy Crudup), and a touching bond between William and Penny Lane (Kate Hudson), a Stillwater groupie who prefers to be referred to as a Band-Aid. As dissension brews and excess rages within the band, Patrick is faced with a difficult decision: tell the band's real story and sell-out its members, or write a powder-puff boring article that might end his journalistic career.

If the characters and their relationships with one another seem startlingly real in "Almost Famous," that's because director/screenwriter Cameron Crowe ("Say Anything," "Jerry Maguire") based the story on his own experiences. As a result, Crowe gets every little detail right, from the band interactions to family dynamics to the music itself, to the point where you may start wondering whether this Stillwater band is real or fiction. Was "Almost Famous" robbed of a Best Picture nomination? You bet your a--.

The brilliant ensemble cast wonderfully compliments Crowe's razor-sharp writing skills. In the lead role, the underrated Fugit is utterly believable. Academy Award nominee Hudson gives a performance that's simultaneously sexy, strong and vulnerable. Crudup is by turns obnoxious, kind, egotistical and funny. And Jason Lee again showcases his fine comic touch as Stillwater's lead singer, especially when he attacks Russell for hogging too much of the limelight: "I'm the frontman, and you're the guitarist with mystique!"

The best movies often draw you into their world and allow you to share their characters' fears, loves, sadness and joy. In "Almost Famous," we share William's exhilaration as he lives the life of a rock star, and his sadness as he experiences the darker side of life and love. Ultimately, William loses his innocence, but manages to maintain his hopefulness. "Almost Famous" is the rare film that earns its feel-good sentiment by showing us the humor and heartbreak along the way to achieving it.

Do I really need to review this?.......2007-04-29

Just buy it. Yeah, it's unreal expensive. What do you care anyway? I dare you to count all the useless crap within ten feet of you that you never use and tell me it costs less than this DVD.

You're really missing out if you miss this.

Over-rated, ego driven "true story" of Rolling Stone.......2007-04-28

writer on the road with typical big ego's rock band of the 70's, stupid groupies/with/or without veneral disease, and assorted hangers on/drug dealers. With all this "glamour" to deal with can a 15 year old boy cope without getting involved with all these "bad" people? It's amazing how Kate/Goldie Hudson/Hawn "act" exactly alike, it's almost scary. Notice how equal everything isn't for the "free wheeling anything goes generation". These are the people in charge now, who want to ban everything and can't think up laws fast enough to take our rights away. Scary isn't it???? You ain't seen nothin yet!!!!!!! Peace and love generation, ha, more like they want a piece of everything and love being greedy.

Rock 'n' Roll through the eyes of an average teen.......2007-04-13

Cameron Crowe's (Jerry Maguire, Vanilla Sky) light hearted comedy drama about a young teen spending months traveling around with a bunch of big-ego rising rock stars really hits home.

The beginning of the movie starts off with a very creative way of listing out the credits via William (played by Patrick Fugit). From the start you know that music - more specifically rock 'n' roll - is very focused upon because all the ticket stubs from rock concerts and stickers as well. You next get to see how William's mom (played by Frances McDormand) is very controlling and strict...and Crowe likes to make point of that as often as possible throughout the movie.

After his older sister leaves with her boyfriend, and he also figures out that he is eleven years old in the seventh grade while everyone else is thirteen the movie skips four years until he's fifteen. But, before the flash-forward, William is instructed to look under his bed from his sister. He goes to find a collection of (what we now know) as some of the best rock albums of all time. He puts on The Who's "Tommy" and then flashforward 4 years.

Anyway, William becomes incredibly interested in Rock 'n' Roll as you next see him as a fifteen year old high school student sketching the hot rock bands of the time on his notebook. He then gets a little job offer from Lester Bangs (Phillip Seymor Hoffman) to write a small editorial on Black Sabbath because they were playing a show that night. At the show, William runs into Penny Lane (Kate Hudson) along with Stillwater (The blooming rock band) and hooks up with them. Afterwards, the movie picks up and the story starts to unfold.

As the movie goes on, you really get to see Kate Hudson fill in a role that was so made for her its scary...actually, she was made to be Penny Lane. Billy Crudup really shines as the "hey, I'm the good guy who'll befriend everyone" but who really has a lot of issues of his own. William Miller is the kid in all of us as we watch - very relatable to the viewers. Cameron Crowe really makes William a solid character as the only solid member of the whole tour. He is what a lot of us are like, at least I really relate to him. He is an innocent fan in a world of drugs, sex, and rock 'n' roll - all foreign to him. The way he really grows up in the movie is awesome, and one of the most enjoyable character developments I've seen.

I really enjoyed this film overall. The acting was so dead-on, It was like watching a documentary. The soundtrack tops most all other soundtracks in recent memory. Led Zeppelin is the highlight band in the soundtrack, as songs like Tangerine and That's The Way are played a few times throughout. Actually, its been said that Stillwater (the fictitious band in the movie) is actually somewhat molded after Led Zeppelin. This is Crowe's best achievement to date - topping Jerry Maguire. I have to say that anyone who is a fan of classic rock, or is someone who has always been the odd man out...watch this film.

5/5 Stars

I'm Will Black, and that's my review of Almost Famous.

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