Mentaculus
Celluloid Junkie - 3438 Film Ratings
Member Since: 30 Jun 2007
Location: Los Angeles, California, USA
Bio: After a fairly Lynchian childhood in an American suburb, I moved to Japan at 13, saw foreign film, and it destroyed my fragile little mind. Now forever damaged, I live in LA, have degrees in Cinema and Religion, a Masters in Information Science, and watch too many films in between writing projects. Life goals: direct a film, and see a UFO.
Featured Reviews
Check out Mentaculus's...
| 94 T10 |  |
Late Spring (1949) - 08 May 2020
"It's fitting the film begins with a tea ceremony. This is equally delicate: People leave frame yet linger; speak in the absence of language. It balances social harmonies against the textures of the ingredients and the temperatures of the climate of its time. I've attended a Japanese tea ceremony myself and, to quote another author, "If a mere cup of tea can bring us closer to God, we should watch out for all the dozens of opportunities that each ordinary day offers us." That is Ozu."
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| 84 T9 |  |
The Player (1992) - 02 Feb 2020
"I once interned in a major studio development office and it's pretty much this film: celebrity cameos and rampant blackmail and execs asking me to check their suits for bloodstains. Don't ask questions you may get answers. This made me remember that time I got out of a parking ticket by claiming to be a Scientologist. You may think I'm making that up but it's Hollywood, baby. All the world's a stage and we're... not making another Shakespeare - costume pictures aren't in right now."
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| 76 T7 |  |
Heaven Can Wait (1943) - 29 Nov 2010
"Lubitsch's use of ellipsis is intelligent to the point of being profound: it really is like grasping at the wind of life to catch only the most important bits. Still, I get the distinct impression that Lubitsch is looking back on his own life - and his distinct gender politics, marrying love and polygamy - and hoping Satan is just a heck of a nice fella. There is a very peculiar melancholy there, creating a different level of dark comedy. And I truly hope that worked out for him, really."
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| 90 T9 |  |
Kuruizaki sanda rodo (1980) - 02 Jun 2015
"One can easily name off the film's clear progeny: Miike, Otomo, Kitano, Anno, Tsukamoto, Sono, Kurosawa, Yukisada. And it's easy to see why. From its opening moments, its raw, unrestrained, angsty energy is viral, and ultimately, its primary theme. Yet despite the pedigree it inspired and left in its wake, Crazy Thunder Road is its very own stray and rabid dog, and ultimately a sensation, requiring Western rediscovery."
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| 40 T2 |  |
The Wizard of Gore (1970) - 04 Dec 2020
"The same plot as The Last Temptation of Christ, but way less controversial."
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| 97 T10 |  |
Twin Peaks (1990) - 05 Jun 2017
"The Death of the American Dream: or, Society in retrograde. The Pilot episode is utterly magnificent - the way death is both like a thunderclap, and an inevitability, is clearly what enraptured America to Lynch and Frost's hallucinogenic Soap from hell (and kept interest when this Soapier side started to foam at the mouth). To me, though, TP is about society regressing back into a primitive - and spiritual - state that was always there, obscured by picket fences, damn fine coffee, and apple pie."
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| 83 T8 |  |
Kingsman: The Secret Service (2015) - 23 Jun 2015
"Like the best satires, it's slyly written, and in absolutely terrible taste. A dizzying pastiche of Bond and modern actioners with a vicious populist message that is as wacky and culturally primed as Cooper's Behold A Pale Horse. As nasty and unrestrained as this film was, I immediately wanted to rewatch it. I think there's more being said here - in script, tone and especially its self-aggrandizing violence - than is immediately let on. Just like the best conspiracy theories."
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| 84 T9 |  |
Jacob's Ladder (1990) - 12 Jan 2010
""It is easy to go down to hell; Night and Day the Gates of Dark Death stand wide; But to climb back up again, to retrace ones steps to the open air, there lies the problem, the difficult task." -Virgil, The Aeneid, Book VI. Yet, "The mind is its own place, and in itself Can make a heaven of hell, a hell of heaven." -John Milton. The film's pluses and minuses lie in the contradiction."
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| 42 T2 |  |
Noah (2014) - 11 May 2015 |
| 91 T10 |  |
The Other One (1946) - 26 Nov 2017
"A masterpiece of cinematic perversion. One (good?) twin murders her (evil?) sister to take her place, a place full of security and luxury - only to fall victim to her sister's lifestyle of sex and violence. Her slow debasement is difficult to watch - rightly so - but del Rio gives a nuanced, empathetic performance, the twists come quickly, and the inky cinematography is shockingly beautiful. An underappreciated noir classic."
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