A huge bombard of sack

[nineweaving]

sovay has asked for a roundup of all the scattered Anonymous reviews, like daggletailed sheep to the dip.

Here they are, a fanfaronade for Oxenford:

"We all, at one point or another, indulge fantasies that make the world
seem more dangerous, more glamorous and, simultaneously, much more
simple than it actually is. But then most of us grow up. Or put down

Comments

[ron_drummond]

Well, a rather helpful and often hilarious selection, many thanks! I wasn't too terribly offended by Roger Ebert's review -- he's clear about who wrote what and who didn't -- but the one true howler comes at the very end, where he displaces Pepys a full three generations into the past. Again, I intend to go see the flick and expect to laugh my head off. I note with interest that several reviewers enthusiastically panning the film are nevertheless praising the cgi evocations of Elizabethan London; I suspect it will be worth seeing for that alone. One of the film's ironies is likely that, while the writer and director are profoundly ignorant, they were able to hire costumiers and set designers who actually knew something about what they were doing. So the film may boast some accuracy at that level, even as it utterly fails on almost every other.

[steepholm]

That's very true about Pepys, although it prompts me to wonder whether Simon Foreman wouldn't have mentioned it in his diary. A curious incident of a gossip not tattling in the night?

[nineweaving]

Oh no. You see the Queen's spymasters found and burned all such entries, and so cunningly that no gaps were left in any manuscripts.

Seriously, I would love Simon Foreman's snark on Oxford. Among all his other unendearing qualities, the Oxentoad dabbled in necromancy.

Nine

[kalimac]

Parallel: Oliver Stone's JFK was a well-crafted piece of cinematic art. In fact, it got better reviews in that respect from those who recognized its arguments as nonsense than this one is getting from the equivalent camp. I eventually saw JFK, and am not sorry I did, but I'm less eager to see this one.

[ron_drummond]

The A.O. Scott review is my favorite, hands down; it elicited much hearty laughter. And at one point he writes, on a serious note, "The production design (by Sebastian T. Krawinkel) and the costumes (by Lisy Christl) are superb, blending with Anna J. Foerster’s dark and rich cinematography to produce a plausibly Elizabethan atmosphere, with interiors that often look like Holbein paintings." That, in a nutshell, is why I want to see this. Aside from the anticipated screams of laughter, that is. Will you forgo the (dis)pleasure, then?

[nineweaving]

I read that, sighing. What a piteous waste!

Maybe we could do an MST3K at Readercon? The film is speculative fiction.

Nine

[sovay]

Maybe we could do an MST3K at Readercon?

Oh, God, no. I can think of so many enjoyably bad films I'd rather watch.

[nineweaving]

You're right. Why suffer?

What would you suggest?

Nine

[ron_drummond]

And here is David Denby's two-paragraph review, at the end of a longer take on Margin Call.

[nineweaving]

Thanks! I posted that first of all, and inadvertently left it out of the rollcall. Added.

Nine

Irrelevant, but...

[much_of_a]

I so want the Hammer Horror movie of the Easter story, with Vincent Price as Jesus. Not that they'd have been able to do it, of course.

Re: Irrelevant, but...

[nineweaving]

Truly not. But it's one of the Greatest Movies Never Made.

Nine

[sovay]

I so want the Hammer Horror movie of the Easter story, with Vincent Price as Jesus.

I wonder what Peter Cushing could use to fend him off, crosses not being as popular a symbol then.

[kiplet]

I'm awfully fond of "sword-and-mustache movie," from the "10 Things I Hate" piece.

[nineweaving]

Rotten as it is, this film has been inspiring some magnificent snark. It's an ill wind...

Nine