TRANSCENDENCE

Poffy The Cucumber

Blandcendence. Johnny versus JARVIS in a battle to the terabyte. Johnny Depp is artificial intelligence scientist Will Caster, who is on the verge of creating the ultimate A.I. computer, when he is gunned down by an anti-tech extremist. Before Will dies, his wife Evelyn (Rebecca Hall) and their scientist best friend Max (Paul Bettany aka Iron Man’s Computer J.A.R.V.I.S.) transfer … Read More

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THE LONE RANGER 2013

Poffy The Cucumber

 A stranger Ranger. The Lone Ranger (in radio, television and film) has made Gioachino Rossini’s galloping theme so famous that the term “intellectual” has been defined as “a man who can listen to the William Tell Overture without thinking of the Lone Ranger.” — Wikipedia. No one’s a stranger to the Ranger. Popular in entertainment media since the 1930s, if … Read More

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BLACK MASS

Poffy The Cucumber

In the Name of da Fahder, da Son, and da Hollywood Spirit… The thing is… you’ve got the wrong Bad Guy. BLACK MASS is supposedly a tale about “the most violent criminal South Boston has ever known.” But when all the slogans say this, they’re looking at James “Whitey” Bulger. Even whilst adding that Bulger worked hand-in-glove with the corrupt … Read More

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PIRATES OF THE CARIBBEAN: ON STRANGER TIDES

Poffy The Cucumber

Yo ho ho and a bottle of Rum Diary. Here we are now! Entertain us! — Nirvana, “Smells Like Teen Spirit.” So I’m sitting there wondering how another PIRATES movie could have the audacity to rear its skull and crossbones, let alone Johnny Depp reprising his transvestite role yet again with any shred of interest from either him or the … Read More

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THE IMAGINARIUM OF DOCTOR PARNASSUS

Poffy The Cucumber

The Distractionarium of Heath Ledger. Color-screaming and wonder-dreaming, Terry Gilliam’s adventure fantasy THE IMAGINARIUM OF DOCTOR PARNASSUS might have been one of his better characteristically surreal dark comedies had his star Heath Ledger not been claimed by that darkest of comedies – death. We watch this MUNCHAUSEN-like parable unfold with the constant distraction in the back of our heads that … Read More

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GONZO: THE LIFE AND WORK OF DR. HUNTER S. THOMPSON

Poffy The Cucumber

Where the wave finally broke and rolled back… I’m really in the way as a person. The myth has taken over. — Hunter S. Thompson. He was the rock star of writers. So it is fitting he graced the cover of Rolling Stone Magazine when he died. Hunter S. Thompson (1937-2005), the pill-popping, alcoholic, gun-toting, womanizing, self-proclaimed doctor of Gonzo … Read More

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PUBLIC ENEMIES

Poffy The Cucumber

Small time crooks painted larger than the criminals in any given corporation. An insipid telling of the fast life and crooked times of America’s first Public Enemy Number 1, John Dillinger. PUBLIC ENEMIES makes all the right moves, with all the right stars wearing all the right hardguy overcoats, but it somehow lacks grip. Set in the 1930’s Chicago crimewave … Read More

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PIRATES OF THE CARIBBEAN: CURSE OF THE BLACK PEARL

Poffy The Cucumber

Shiver me fey timbers. Johnny Depp as some kind of transvestite, in a swinging, swordfighting fey-quest over the high seas of The Caribbean, with Orlando Bloom as his blacksmith girlfriend, and Geoffrey Rush as a grumpy old man in a Halloween pirate costume. Keira Knightley’s square man-jaw causes untold distraction; Jonathan Pryce gads about in a wig slightly smaller than … Read More

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SWEENEY TODD: THE DEMON BARBER OF FLEET STREET

Poffy The Cucumber

Slashing Singing Scissorhands. Edward Scissorhands is all grown up! Never more apparent than when Johnny Depp (as the eponymous demon barber, Sweeney Todd) holds aloft a gleaming razor and boldly affirms in song: “At last! My right arm is complete again!” (My Friends.) Violent, gruesome, blackly hilarious, deliriously entertaining, director Tim Burton’s vision of SWEENEY TODD: THE DEMON BARBER OF … Read More

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PIRATES OF THE CARIBBEAN: AT WORLD’S END

Poffy The Cucumber

Jack-ing the Sparrow. PIRATES OF THE CARIBBEAN: AT WORLD’S END: a whole lotta something that ends up a whole lotta nothing. Director Gore Verbinski puts so much effort into this summer blockbuster that it boggles the rational part of the brain – look at that cinematography, look at that set dressing, look at that costuming and attention to detail on … Read More

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PIRATES OF THE CARIBBEAN: DEAD MAN’S CHEST

Poffy The Cucumber

Captain Jack will get you high tonight… PIRATES OF THE CARIBBEAN: DEAD MAN’S CHEST is pure ham and cheese. Lots of sauce. Lots of dressing. Hold the onions. Director Gore Verbinski‘s sequel to his PIRATES OF THE CARIBBEAN: THE CURSE OF THE BLACK PEARL (2003) is a spectacle to behold, a hedonistic bombast of swashbuckling high-sea hijinks, sun-seared tropical environs, … Read More

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