web hosting short URLs photo sharing

---

FILM-REVIEWS:  P

---

Package, The
Painted veil, The
Papillon
Parenthood
Patriot games
Payback
Peggy Sue got married
Pet sematary
Phantom menace, The
Phenomenon
Pimpernel Smith
Pirate, The
Pit and the pendulum, The
Police academy
Postman always rings twice, The
Postman always rings twice, The
Power
Pretty baby
Pretty in pink
Pretty woman
Private Benjamin
Prizzi's honor
Pulp fiction

Title:	PACKAGE, THE
Year:	1989
Genre:	Thriller
Director:	Andrew Davis
The players:	Gene Hackman Tommy Lee Jones Joanna Cassidy John Heard Dennis Franz
About the film:	Mediocre thriller where Hackman hunts down a dangerous villain (Jones).
Rating:
Rec.:

Title:	PAINTED VEIL, THE
Year:	1934
Genre:	Romantic drama
Director:	Richard Boleslawski
The players:	Greta Garbo Herbert Marshall George Brent Warner Oland Jean Hersholt
About the film:	A flop when it was released in ’34 that is nearly unwatchable today. Garbo plays the wife of a doctor who helps curing wounded men in a war in the Far East. He’s very occupied with his work and has no time for his wife, he doesn’t even manage to be nice to her. It’s a very shallow film, all it really has to say is Garbo’s conclusion; that her husband really does this because he’s so full of love for the human race, and how could she be so blind as not to see that sooner. Stay away from this one like the plague.
Rating:
Rec.:

Title:	PAPILLON
Year:	1973
Genre:	Adventure
Director:	Franklin J. Shaffner
The players:	Steve McQueen Dustin Hoffman Victor Jory Don Gordon Anthony Zerbe
About the film:	Superb screen-adaption of Charrière’s novel about prisoner Papillon who’s sent to Devil’s Island ("from which there’s no escape") to serve his term. He meets famous forger Louis Dega and they develop a friendship. Papi has only one thought in mind: escape. The guards, sharks, tide and the manhunters make it very close to impossible. The film is most realistic and contains some unpleasant scenes. McQueen is excellent as Papillon, the innocent convict who always thinks of new ways to escape, almost like his character in The great escape. Dustin Hoffman is equally great as Louis Dega. One of the most capturing adventures I’ve seen.
Rating:
Rec.:

Title:	PARENTHOOD
Year:	1989
Genre:	Comedy, Drama
Director:	Ron Howard
The players:	Steve Martin Mary Steenburgen Dianne Wiest Jason Robards Rick Moranis
About the film:	Amusing look at all the tragedies that comes with parenthood. With a suiting combination of warmth and humour Howard prevents the film from becoming a melodrama. Parents of three or four children should enjoy this film the most, they can probably relate many of the sequences to their own lives and laugh about it. The large ensemble makes a very good impression, Steve Martin is a terrific choice for leading role, his character is less colorful than in most of his films.
Rating:
Rec.:

Title:	PATRIOT GAMES
Year:	1992
Genre:	Thriller
Director:	Phillip Noyce
The players:	Harrison Ford Anne Archer Sean Bean James Earl Jones Samuel L. Jackson
About the film:	Screen adaption of Tom Clancy’s book. Ford plays an ex CIA-agent who combats IRA terrorists. Ok until the improbable end.
Rating:
Rec.:	Fugitive, The

Title:	PAYBACK
Year:	1999
Genre:	Action
Director:	Brian Helgeland
The players:	Mel Gibson Gregg Henry Deborah Unger Kris Kristofferson Jack Conley
About the film:	Porter, Resnick and Porter’s girlfriend rob the Japanese mob. Resnick shoots Porter two times in the back and runs with the money with Porter’s girlfriend. If I was Resnick I’d fire one more shot – in the head just to make sure he’s dead. Porter survives and is determined to get his share of the robbery - $ 70,000, no more, no less. He’s a man who’s ready to die for his principles. This film is mean, there’s hardly one nice person, one of the worst being Porter. Much sadistic violence with silly sound-effects. This is not the same level of entertainment as Lethal weapon. Is Gibson’s career taking a nose-dive?
Rating:
Rec.:

Title:	PEGGY SUE GOT MARRIED
Year:	1986
Genre:	Comedy, Drama
Director:	Francis Coppola
The players:	Kathleen Turner Nicolas Cage Barry Miller Catherine Hicks Jim Carrey
About the film:	Peggy Sue faints on a high school reunion and when she awakens she’s back to her high school years. She now has the opportunity to make everything right that went wrong. Coppola manages to really bring the 60’s atmosphere to this film. The cast looks much too old to be high school students but they’re doing their best. Turner is great as Peggy, she was oscar-nominated but didn’t win. Cage is very intense, as always, as her boyfriend. Carrey is good in one of his more discrete roles. One of Coppola’s few good films since The Godfather I & II.
Rating:
Rec.:

Title:	PET SEMATARY
Year:	1989
Genre:	Horror
Director:	Mary Lambert
The players:	Dale Midkiff Fred Gwynne Denise Crosby Brad Greenquist Michael Lombard
About the film:	Scary film based upon a novel by Stephen King. A family moves into a big house on the country, nearby an old Indian cemetary. Whatever is buried there rises from the dead, but is evil. The script is full of things that just don’t make sense. Gwynne is very good as the family’s only neighbor, a sensible man who knows what it’s like to live there. The family live just a few meters from a large highway where trucks go at a dizzying speed, it doesn’t take long before their cat is killed. Gwynne knows everything about the old cemetery, but why does he insist on burying the cat there?? He knows what will happen. The family has got a baby, how could they be so unbelievably stupid as to let the baby play around the highway?? The first thing any sensible parents would do is build a fence around the house, or keep the baby indoors. And knowing what will happen, how can Midkiff be so dumb as to bury family members in the pet cemetary?? King can’t blame the script – he wrote it.
Rating:
Rec.:

Title:	PHANTOM MENACE, THE
Year:	1999
Genre:	Science-fiction
Director:	George Lucas
The players:	Liam Neeson Ewan McGregor Natalie Portman Jake Lloyd Ian McDiarmid
About the film:	After The return of the jedi Lucas said the next film in the series could be expected when the computers had become powerful enough to make the special effects on them, which he guessed would take 20 years, it took 16. The first three are cult-films, classics and box office hits at the same time so this film could do nothing but disappoint. To see the intro, though, with the well known music was an awesome feeling, which very soon disappeared. The plot is weaker than in any of the other films. The federation is being mean to a small civilization and two jedi knights are sent by the senate to see what’s going on. It’s a fight between good and evil, but the fights aren’t as important as in earlier films where the prosperity of the whole universe often hung by a thin thread. The leading characters in this film are played by Neeson and McGregor, none of them is charismatic. McGregor basically just walks by Neeson’s side the whole film. The good characters don’t make the viewer care about them, in contrast to in the other films. The best character of the film was clearly Darth Maul and the fighting choreography was great but to let him die was one of many mistakes in this film. To make one of the most important characters, Jar Jar Binks, computer animated is a bad decision. No matter how hard they work on the computer animations, it will probably never look real. In addition Jar Jar’s clumsiness becomes tiresome after a while. The film is too intense with effects and sound all the time, the viewer never gets a rest. The Star Wars music, however, should have been used more often. The thought that Anakin built C3PO when he was about 10 is preposterous. I don’t think Lucas should direct, he concentrates too much on the special effects at the expense of storytelling, character development and acting. Still, it’s entertaining, but can’t compare to episodes IV-VI.
Rating:
Rec.:	Star wars

Title:	PHENOMENON
Year:	1996
Genre:	Drama
Director:	Jon Turteltaub
The players:	John Travolta Kyra Sedgwick Forest Whitaker Robert Duvall Jeffrey DeMunn
About the film:	Yarn about a man who gets struck by lightning and receives super-natural powers. He draws much attention not only in the village where he lives but also the doctors and military officers wanna have a look at him. I think the whole concept is cheap. Of course people pay attention if you get lightning struck and become a genius, I don’t need a feature length movie to get that explained to me. The film is obvious and overlong.
Rating:
Rec.:

Title:	PIMPERNEL SMITH
Year:	1941
Genre:	Drama
Director:	Leslie Howard
The players:	Leslie Howard Mary Morris Francis L. Sullivan Hugh McDermott Raymond Huntley
About the film:	As the title suggests this movie is a kind of remake of The Scarlet Pimpernel. Howard directs himself in the title role as archeology professor Horatio Smith who’s smuggling out prisoners from Nazi prison camps. The film was made during WW2 to keep the spirits high among the Allied forces. The film was not shown in Sweden because it is anti-Nazistic, the films look on Germans isn’t exactly flattering, they’re just violent, dumb and without any sense of humour. Smith fools them every chance he gets with his sophistication and witticism – he makes them look like complete fools very much like Sherlock Holmes contra dr Moriarty. Howard is positively brilliant, this film is not only interesting from a historical standpoint but also great entertainment. Howard was shot down in his airplane and died only two years later.
Rating:
Rec.:	Scarlet pimpernel, The

Title:	PIRATE, THE
Year:	1948
Genre:	Musical, Comedy
Director:	Vincente Minnelli
The players:	Judy Garland Gene Kelly Walter Slezak Gladys Cooper Reginald Owen
About the film:	The second of three Garland-Kelly films is a comedy taking place in the Caribbean. Garland plays Manuela, a young girl who’s to marry the mayor but dreams of pirate Macoco. Kelly plays an actor who pretends to be Macoco. The musical numbers, with one exception ("Be a clown"), are below par, but the chemistry between the two leads is marvellous. While Kelly was enthusiastic about having a chance to add ballet-numbers to the film, which he worked hard on, Garland was having a down-period. She was only present 36 of the total 135 days of filming, not very much considering that she has top-billing. This film is not as sweet as most musicals at the time, which may partly explain the fact that it actually lost money, the first Garland film to do so.
Rating:
Rec.:	Summer stock

Title:	PIT AND THE PENDULUM, THE
Year:	1991
Genre:	Horror
Director:	Stuart Gordon
The players:	Lance Henriksen Rona De Ricci Jonathan Fuller Frances Bay Oliver Reed
About the film:	From start to finish a suspense film starting out like a drama but gets more gruesome and bloody by the minute. The story takes place in Spain during the 15th century where Henrikssen plays the grand inquisitor who gets a dilemma when he falls in love with a young woman accused of witchcraft. The plot becomes too confined by the end, everything circles around what Tourquemada is going to do next. There are too few interesting characters apart from him.
Rating:
Rec.:

Title:	POLICE ACADEMY
Year:	1984
Genre:	Comedy
Director:	Hugh Wilson
The players:	Steve Guttenberg G.W. Bailey George Gaynes Kim Cattrall Bubba Smith
About the film:	Most of the films in the series may be downright nonsense but the first film is actually a lot of fun. The police academy deteriorates rapidly when admission rules are being changed. Some extreme types enlist, Hooks – a shy black woman with a weak voice, gun crazy Tackleberry, giant Hightower and Mahoney – a commanders nightmare who tries his best to get thrown out of the academy. This film keeps the slap-stick on a certain level and is at least a little bit creative. Winslow’s amazing ability to imitate sounds comes in useful in this film. The blue oyster sequence is almost a classic.
Rating:
Rec.:

Title:	POSTMAN ALWAYS RINGS TWICE, THE
Year:	1946
Genre:	Film-noir
Director:	Tay Garnett
The players:	John Garfield Lana Turner Cecil Kellaway Hume Cronyn Audrey Totter
About the film:	Garfield plays a man who still hasn’t found a job he’s content with. He stops at Twin Oaks where he gets a job at a gasstation. The gasstation is owned by a married couple; a young woman and an older man. Garfield and Turner really lights up the screen, you can feel the intensity between them. So they plot to murder her husband but of course they get in trouble. Reminds me a little bit of Hitchcock’s films.
Rating:
Rec.:

Title:	POSTMAN ALWAYS RINGS TWICE, THE
Year:	1981
Genre:	Film-noir
Director:	Bob Rafelson
The players:	Jack Nicholson Jessica Lange John Colicos Christopher Lloyd Anjelica Huston
About the film:	Remake of the ’46 version. The original version is more elegant and has more excitement in the air while this one is more explicit and lacks suspense between the two leads. The actual storyline follows the original very closely. Jack plays Frank, a vagabond who falls in love with Cora who works on a gasstation that her at least twenty year older husband owns. Together Frank and Cora plot to kill her husband.
Rating:
Rec.:	Chinatown

Title:	POWER
Year:	1986
Genre:	Drama
Director:	Sidney Lumet
The players:	Richard Gere Julie Christie Gene Hackman Kate Capshaw Denzel Washington
About the film:	It’s very unclear what the film has to say, if anything. Gere plays a PR-man who help candidates getting votes in elections by giving them a winning profile in media. He doesn’t know anything about politics but he sure knows how to manipulate media. The film suggests that elections aren’t really about politics or who is the best candidate, it’s about who has the best PR-man. I sure hope that it doesn’t work that way. But at the end it denies all this when Hackman – a candidate without PR-man, holds a great speech on election day and gets great many votes.
Rating:
Rec.:

Title:	PRETTY BABY
Year:	1978
Genre:	Drama
Director:	Louis Malle
The players:	Susan Sarandon Brooke Shields Keith Carradine Antonio Fargas Frances Faye
About the film:	Disturbing film about a young girl (Shields) who grows up with her mother (Sarandon) in a whore-house. When she is about 11 she starts trying to catch the attention of the male visitors, just like her mother do. Soon she is auctioned out to the men while her mother sits beside and watches. Sarandon ought to know better than that. I have no understanding for Carradine’s character: A grown up man who gets to know Sarandon and then decides to marry her 11 year old daughter.
Rating:
Rec.:

Title:	PRETTY IN PINK
Year:	1986
Genre:	Drama
Director:	Howard Deutch
The players:	Molly Ringwald Jon Cryer Andrew McCarthy Harry Dean Stanton James Spader
About the film:	A film about upper class contra working class among high school students. Ringwald plays a girl who comes from a poor family, she is looked down on by the richer students. One day a nice upper class boy likes her for who she is and asks her out. Dean Stanton is very good as Ringwald’s father. The young cast acts with sincerity.
Rating:
Rec.:	Some kind of wonderful

Title:	PRETTY WOMAN
Year:	1990
Genre:	Comedy
Director:	Garry Marshall
The players:	Julia Roberts Richard Gere Ralph Bellamy Jason Alexander Laura San Giacomo
About the film:	Sickly sweet romantic comedy where succesful businessman picks up prostitute and falls in love. The film’s look on prostitution is highly coloured. Nevertheless it was a hit and helped Roberts’ career reach new heights.
Rating:
Rec.:	Bodyguard

Title:	PRIVATE BENJAMIN
Year:	1980
Genre:	Comedy, Drama
Director:	Howard Zieff
The players:	Goldie Hawn Eileen Brennan Armand Assante Robert Webber Mary Kay Place
About the film:	Judy Benjamin is a young woman who has been brought up just to be somebody’s wife. No one expects her to be able to do or understand anything by herself. She has a desperate need to prove to herself and everyone else that she can cope, that she’s of some good. Therefore she joins the army. It looks as though she’s terribly misplaced, this is where most of the film’s funny sequences occur. Later on she gets a job in France and finds a new man in her life, the film loses momentum.
Rating:
Rec.:	Overboard

Title:	PRIZZI’S HONOR
Year:	1985
Genre:	Drama
Director:	John Huston
The players:	Jack Nicholson Kathleen Turner Anjelica Huston Robert Loggia William Hickey
About the film:	Nicholson plays a mobster who falls in love with a collegue. The family disagree to his love-affair and order him to kill her. The film never really takes off but the cast is tremendous. Nicholson’s wife Anjelica, John Huston’s daughter, won an oscar.
Rating:
Rec.:	Chinatown

Title:	PULP FICTION
Year:	1994
Genre:	Drama
Director:	Quentin Tarantino
The players:	John Travolta  Samuel L. Jackson Uma Thurman Harvey Keitel Tim Roth
About the film:	Big come-back for Travolta whose career had deteriorated during the 80’s. This is definitely a director’s achievement. Like Reservoir dogs the film isn’t carried out in a straight cronological order, in fact it ends approximately where it begins. The dialogue (and monologue) is what makes this film special, Jackson and Travolta are hilarious. There’s not much of a story, just a series of events that take place. There are some parallells to Faust. Faust allies himself with the Devil. The Devil takes Faust’s soul through a hole in his neck. The biggest thing a human can do is saving another man’s soul. In this film Wallace has a plaster on his neck. Travolta and Jackson save his suitcase and therefore get protection from God, a man fires three bullets from point blank range and misses them. Feet are a reoccuring subject, obviously Tarantino is a feet-fetischist, he even gave Thurman her part because of her feet.
Rating:
Rec.:	Lock, stock & two smoking barrels