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Post 0

Wednesday, September 5, 2007 - 2:50pmSanction this postReply
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Foster is coming! Foster is coming!

This movie is to be released on September 14th. I probably won't - no - I definitely won't go to see it in the theater. It hits much to close to home, and I will probably bawl like an infant and cheer like a Spartan, and get myself thrown out of the theater.



Ted Keer

Post 1

Wednesday, September 5, 2007 - 3:53pmSanction this postReply
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Oooooo!  Looks good!   Foster is soooooo cool.  She still looks fabulous, too.  Jodie must have those "you'll never look over 30" genes.  

Post 2

Wednesday, September 5, 2007 - 4:33pmSanction this postReply
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I have had a crush on Foster since I saw the classic thriller "Little Girl who Lives Down the Lane" in which she gives Martin Sheen what he well deserves.

Five sanction points to anyone who can post a clip, I found none.

The image is from http://www.jodiefosterhome.com/

Ted Keer

Post 3

Friday, September 21, 2007 - 5:57amSanction this postReply
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     Foster, like Hopkins, can do no wrong.

     Many reviewers make a point of comparing this to Bronson and his DEATH WISH movies (especially the 1st), and usually add that this movie gets way more into the dangerous-to-one's self psychological aspects of choosing to become a vigilante.

     Yes: I will make a point of seeing this one.

LLAP
J:D


Post 4

Friday, September 21, 2007 - 11:50amSanction this postReply
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A co-worker of mine who had seen the movie in the theater said it was so good that he had bought several pirated versions for his friends. I'd love to hear anyone's opinion of this movie if he's seen it.

Ted

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Post 5

Tuesday, October 2, 2007 - 4:36pmSanction this postReply
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It’s hard to believe this film has been out for several weeks now and no one else has commented on it—hard to believe, because the film is genuinely superb in just about every way.  I loved the original Death Wish with Charles Bronson, and this film is better.  The one disappointment about Death Wish is corrected in The Brave One.  I won’t spoil the film for others by spelling out what that is—I will just say that an even better title for the film--had Mickey Spillane not already used it--would be I, the Jury.  It amazes me that Hollywood had the guts to make this film.  It has more moral courage than any so-called “serious” film to come out of that cultural cesspool in a long, long time.


Post 6

Tuesday, October 9, 2007 - 12:43pmSanction this postReply
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Thanks, Dennis.   As the survivor of a murder in NYC I have decided that I will not see this movie in the theaters, hence my recent silence.  But I am very glad to hear its praises.

Ted Keer


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Post 7

Monday, October 15, 2007 - 10:25pmSanction this postReply
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Jodie Foster--NOT!!!

The thing I don't like about Jodie Foster is what makes her ideal for this picture:

a certain anomie, a teeth-gritted bleak hopelessness she projects of a very depressed, downer, unhappy person.

Of course, this could just be acting, but it's in film after film she chooses or they choose her for.

It fits for someone whose love has just been murdered. But it's very existentialist, very grim...sort of a Albert Camus - Kierkegaard - Sartre kind of intense bleakness.

i always get the sense the edgy Miss Foster is about to slash her wrists. Not a Dagny Taggart -- I just shudder when anyone wants to cast her (or Ashley Judd) in that role. Not someone joyful.

Not a sunlit way to look at the world and very alien to my sense of life.

Don't confuse intensity with happiness.

Or grimness with justice.

Post 8

Friday, October 19, 2007 - 8:08amSanction this postReply
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Phil, have you seen Nell?  It is a potent counterexample to your generalization.

Ted


Post 9

Friday, October 19, 2007 - 10:32amSanction this postReply
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I can appreciate the premise of this movie, I just don't think that I can get excited about a woman playing a 'Dirty Harry' or Charles Bronson 'Deathwish' type role.

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Post 10

Saturday, October 20, 2007 - 4:17pmSanction this postReply
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If a key role of art is to offer the embodiment of an abstraction in concrete form, Jodie Foster gives us just that in The Brave One: the embodiment of intransigent moral rectitude. Her performance was perfect for the role. A subjective, emotionalist review that informs me that neither the actress nor the film happen to match the particular reviewer’s sense of life tells me nothing.


Post 11

Sunday, October 21, 2007 - 2:16pmSanction this postReply
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I keep expecting the talk about this movie to die down, but it won't, so let me state for the record that I hated it.  The best commentary I saw was one in National Review Online (I'd post a link, but it seems to have disappeared from their archives) which cited it as an example of a genre the author calls the liberal adventure movie.  These people, he explained, enjoy seeing villains blown away as much as anybody else does, but they can't admit it, to themselves or anyone else, so they rationalize it by laying on a lot of deterministic blather.

Apart from Erica's dreary yappings to the effect that she's a product of - - of what?  These people don't believe in the Devil, so that's out, but, she's somehow a product of any old thing that happens along, and, for all her weariness, she never tires of telling us - - the only principle, Objectivist or otherwise, that gets a hearing in this movie is that we shouldn't tear down quaint old buildings.  Not only does the script lay this on us in word, but it dramatizes it in deed.  It does nothing to establish any thinking-through of ideas or any courage on the main character's part.  The only time she faces an armed opponent is by accident (in the convenience store).  Otherwise, nothing she does requires any risk or bravery.  The only other developed character, the police inspector, is introduced to us trying to talk his ex-wife into helping him cheat on the law, and when last we see him that's just what he does.  Clearly the point is that all his platitudes about principle in between are for naught.

On the level of simple storytelling mechanics, too, the movie has a lot wrong with it, like too many coincidences too far into the story.  As one example, the bar is packed, but somehow the ladies' room stays empty long enough for her to throw up and deliver another of her junk-metaphysical soliloquies.  (The scene would have been more realistic if she'd spoken her piece first and then thrown up.)  Every non-criminal in New York has known for 50 years that going into Central Park after dark is suicidal.  And even NPR isn't as dull as her broadcasts.

(Edited by Peter Reidy on 10/21, 2:54pm)


Post 12

Sunday, October 21, 2007 - 7:19pmSanction this postReply
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Not a great film, but a very good one.

Of course, as usual, the wonderful actress, Jodie Foster, nails it again (despite a purposefully sparse script).

K


Post 13

Friday, April 25, 2008 - 12:37pmSanction this postReply
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     Has anyone picked up on just what the title is referring to?

LLAP
J:D


Post 14

Tuesday, August 26, 2008 - 8:27pmSanction this postReply
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I just saw this on HBO last week. I love Jodie Foster's work, as she brings a sense of intelligence to all her characters. Don't know that I'd consider this much different or better than Bronson's original "Death Wish". Actually, I wonder why she made it.

jt

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