Dinner For Schmucks

Hello again,

This is my first blog entry where I speak about a movie I didn’t actually see (and I don’t think I will ever see it). The reason is that the movie is a simple copy of an earlier French movie called “the dinner game”. I don’t’ know if you ever saw it but it’s basically the exact same story: executives bored with their lives that invite dumb people to have dinner just to laugh at them.

For those who saw “The dinner game” you will agree it was a huge success. Everybody will remember Jacques Villeret’s brilliant performance. Unfortunately, after reading the Sydney Morning Herald review about “Dinner for schmucks”(1), the author let ‘s us know it will be a waste of a time.  This assumption is also sustained by its 6 out of 10 rating on imdb.com, one of the largest online movie review websites.

Concerning the SMH movie review, published on September 28, 2010 by Jim Schembri, the author starts explaining the universe of the movie. He describes what is a real schmuck and why you might like the actual story.  If you are too lazy to read the entire article, just read the introduction, it’s really funny.

Later on, Schembri informed us that the movie is a remake of Francis Veber French film The Dinner Game and “which this film totally fails to emulate.”(2) During the rest of the review, the author seems to be quite persistent of how bad the movie is. He uses strong words such as “Very strange” and “Very painful to watch”. (3)

To conclude, it is often said that the three secrets of a good movie is a good story, a good story and a good story but it seems that “Dinner for Schmucks” might be the exception to the rule…

(1), (2) & (3): http://www.smh.com.au/entertainment/movies/dinner-for-schmucks-20100928-15vok.html

Salt

The highly anticipated movie turns out to be another typical Hollywood movie.What is even more frustrating is to see all the promotions they made months in advance. I mean, who didn’t see a bus covered up with Ange’s face? The marketing was sure good but the movie itself was just disappointing…

The article review (1), written by Darren Bevan and published in tvnz.co.nz on the 17^th of August 2010, briefly explains why. 
I choose this article because it was bizarrely a mix of good points as well as bad points.

The first good point is the correlation the author makes with Salt and James Bond. Not that Salt is like James Bond but the fact that Salt is something to see when there’s an absence of James Bond movie.
Another good point relies in the middle of the article. The author gives (in a single sentence) a very fine foretaste of the movie: “Salt is a thriller which doesn't thrill as much as it could”(2). That says it all!
Unfortunately, those are the only two positive points I could found. The rest of the article (when you have a global look at it) seems to be a basic summary of the movie. Which, I found sad because when you read a review, you expect something a little more detailed and subtler than a simple summary. You want to be convinced whetter the movie will be good or bad.
Movies, in contradiction with books, can’t be rated just by the quality of the script; it’s also the image, the sound, the music and the actor’s performance.   
To conclude, I think that the author is a good writer but he doesn’t give the readers what they want. He concentrates himself too much on the content while he should also talk about the form.

(1) and (2): http://tvnz.co.nz/entertainment-news/salt-movie-review-3709380