A self-described movie geek, Jeff Walls majored in Film Studies at the University of Utah. He also studied at the Seattle Film Institute, where he worked on short films in every capacity from lighting and acting to writing and directing. For several years, Jeff ran seattlemoviecritic.com, and is now an official DVD-aholic. For more of Jeff’s writing, also see his full archive of reviews at Past the Popcorn, and his extensive archive of pre-PtP work at AllMoviePortal.com. He also blogs about movies for The Seattle Post-Intelligencer.
ABOUT US: HollywoodJesus.com was registered in October, 1997, and has been live since February, 1998. Hollywood Jesus exists only by the grace of God and the vision of writers like Jeff Walls, whose latest work at HJ is listed below. Also see the profiles for our other staff members, listed at right.
Sometimes a “spoiler alert” warning at the beginning of the trailer would be helpful. In this case, it’s not that the trailer gives too much away. It’s simply that the trailer is just too much darn fun and the movie can’t quite live up to it.
It could have been strange to see a grown man beat up on a bunch of kids. But Chan instead turns the boys’ aggressiveness on each other, and manages to fight them off without even throwing a punch.
Some of the creature effects that show up in the second half of the film just add to the weight that brings the film down after a promising first half. It’s not really a serious scare-fest, but not over-the-top enough to enter so-bad-it’s-good territory.
The movie goes for a couple of big laughs, but the result is more awkwardness than humor. A ritual birthing scene walks the tightrope between funny and disturbing and I can see audiences falling on either side of the fence.
I suppose the original Death at a Funeral is technically a foreign film in terms of Hollywood, but that foreign country was Great Britain and the movie was in English. Right now, the question is, was it worth remaking so soon?
A self-described movie geek, Jeff Walls majored in Film Studies at the University of Utah. He also studied at the Seattle Film Institute, where he worked on short films in every capacity from lighting and acting to writing and directing. For several years, Jeff ran seattlemoviecritic.com, and is now an official DVD-aholic. For more of Jeff’s writing, also see his full archive of reviews at Past the Popcorn, and his extensive archive of pre-PtP work at AllMoviePortal.com. He also blogs about movies for The Seattle Post-Intelligencer.
