Archive for Reviews

Introducing the “7-Point Review”: Match Point

In an effort to get people writing/reviewing popular culture, I’d like to introduce a hopefully fun little idea that I’m calling the “7-Point Review” — a quick way to review movies, books, music and other art forms. The idea is to convey a few main thoughts on whatever you’ve just seen, read or listened to. Since full-length reviews take time to write, this hopefully will inspire us to write more often and cover a wider variety of subjects. Of course, if we feel like it, we can go back and “flesh out” one or more of the bulletpoints later to make a more traditional review (my personal goal is to do one of these for every movie I see).

So without further ado, I’ll begin with a 7-Point Review of Woody Allen’s latest film, Match Point:

Match Point

  1. I liked it better the first time when it was called “Crimes and Misdemeanors.” As Megan said, it’s a younger, sexier version of that film.
  2. It revisits themes of guilt/conscience and luck/chance.
  3. It has an interesting ghost-visitation scene a la Macbeth.
  4. Humble recommendation to the legendary director: When you have a scene in which the detective wakes up in the middle of the night with a “I know who did it!” revelation, it’s much better if it’s really a revelation rather than something that was explicitly already known to the audience (perhaps a sign that Woody Allen is losing steam).
  5. A Woody Allen movie just isn’t a Woody Allen movie without Woody Allen in the movie. As Megan said, Woody Allen appearing in it “would’ve ruined it,” which is kind of my point: It only felt like a WA film at the beginning (with the Woody Allen font in the opening credits — hat tip: Megan) and the end, when we hear some good philosophical dialog about how people justify their actions and how “chance” affects people’s lives. The other 90% of the movie is a self-serving, drawn out — if passionately drawn out — affair of two beautiful, selfish people; not exactly compelling art unless you’re interested in the eye candy of wealthy, young, sexy British people.
  6. All the same, it’s got some classic WA touches: Riverside scenes, matinee movie scene and scratchy-quality opera music overdubs but too few philosophical or intellectual considerations and too little humor.
  7. Recommendation: Go rent Crimes and Misdemeanors instead.

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