[net.movies] NEW

moriarty@fluke.UUCP (Jeff Meyer) (07/19/84)

Mini-Review: Another bloody Aussie postcard movie -- don't see it unless
endless shots of horses racing in slow motion turns you on.

------------------------------------------------------------------------

I a) saw this movie for free, and b) had nothing else to do that evening, so
I'm not sure I have anything to bitch about.  It's just that this movie is
not worth any money, as far as I can see.  It is the (embellished)
recounting of the career of Phar Lap, an Australian Race horse with a
phenomenal track record.  It tells the horses history from its purchase by
the crotchety old trainer who has faith that the horse can win, to the
mysterious death of the horse in the United States.  It tries to be Chariots
of Fire, The Man from Snowy River (one of the main characters also played in
that movie), and Rocky at a very slow pace, and fails miserably; which is
unfortunate, considering the track record (absolutely, positively no pun
intended) of the Australian Cinema, which produces more good (O.K., good in
MY opinion) movies (by percentage, unless all their bad ones are stopped at
the border) than the USA.  There is just very little substance to this
movie, except pretty photography and a incredibly stupid soundtrack.

I could not fail to notice that more people were crying at the end of this
movie than were upset at the end of Ghandi; apparently people find the death
of an animal that can run fast more tragic than a man who brought peace to
his country (or tried to, anyway).  Bah, Humbug!

			"Nun-beating? Good Lord, man, I can't condone THAT!"

					Moriarty, aka Jeff Meyer
					John Fluke Mfg. Co., Inc.
UUCP:
 {cornell,decvax,ihnp4,sdcsvax,tektronix,utcsrgv}!uw-beaver \
    {allegra,gatech!sb1,hplabs!lbl-csam,decwrl!sun,ssc-vax} -- !fluke!moriarty
ARPA:
	fluke!moriarty@uw-beaver.ARPA

knf@druxo.UUCP (FricklasK) (11/02/85)

>The nice thing about the -4 to +4 scale (or the 1 to 10 scale, for that matter)
>is that it is not tied to some unit of measure (how many miles you'd drive, how
>much you'd pay, etc.).  This makes it:
>	1) more durable (a $5 movie in 1934 would be very different from a $5
>		movie today)
>	2) more versatile (you can apply it to movies, books, TV shows, etc.)
>	3) more objective (Scrooge, as Mark pointed out, is probably a lot
>		stingier than most people, so his ratings would be influenced
>		by that)
>
>					Evelyn C. Leeper
>					...ihnp4!mtgzz!ecl

How about a conversion scale:

   +4) Name your price. $6.00, plus an two hour drive to the theater.
   +3) $5.50 First run city.
   +2) $4.00 See it at the Mann Centiplex.
   +1) $2.00 See the matinee, or rent it.
    0) $1.00 Wait for it to show on campus, or at the buck movie house.
   -1) $0.00 See it on cable
   -2) $0.00 See it on cable when its the only thing on other than Dick Clark's
             Celebrity Bloops and Blunders.
   -3) $0.00 Use it as background noise when you're doing the dishes.
   -4)-$5.00 You pay me.

OK? Is every body happy now?

    '`'``
     Ken
    '`'`'
 

mjc@cad.cs.cmu.edu (Monica Cellio) (11/02/85)

Some reviewers at CMU have been doing something like this for a while; I don't
know where they got it.  The rating is usually of the form:
	1st $x 2nd $y 3rd $z.
This refers to the amount the reviewer would be willing to pay for his first,
second, and third viewings.  (Obviously the first has to be estimated after
the fact...).  The numbers are kept open-ended.

By the way, the standard rate in Pittsburgh is $4.25.

						-Dragon
-- 
UUCP: ...ucbvax!dual!lll-crg!dragon
ARPA: monica.cellio@cmu-cs-cad or dragon@lll-crg