"He was a boy, just a boy, when I was a very young girl. When I was sixteen, I made the discovery - love. All at once and much, much too completely. It was like you suddenly turned a blinding light on something that had always been half in shadow, that's how it struck the world for me. But I was unlucky. Deluded. There was something different about the boy, a nervousness, a softness and tenderness which wasn't like a man's, although he wasn't the least bit effeminatte-looking - still - that thing was there...He came to me for help. I didn't know that. I didn't find out anything till after our marriage when we'd run away and come back and all I knew was I'd failed him in some mysterious way and wasn't able to give the help he needed but couldn't speak of! He was in the quicksands and clutching at me - but I wasn't holding him out, I was slipping in with him! I didn't know that. I didn't know anything except I loved him unendurably but without being able to help him or help myself. Then I found out. In the worst of all possible ways. By coming suddenly into a room that I thought was empty, but had two people in it...

Afterwards we pretended that nothing had been discovered. Yes, the three of us drove out to Moon Lake Casino, very drunk and laughing all the way. We danced the Varsouviana! Suddenly in the middle of the dance the boy I had married broke away from me and ran out of the casino. A few moments late - a shot! I ran out - all did - all ran and gathered about the terrible thing at the edge of the lake! I couldn't get near for the crowding. Then somebody caught my arm. "Don't go any closer! Come back! You don't want to see!" See? See what! Then I heard voices say - Allan! Allan! The Grey boy! He'd stuck the revolver into his mouth, and fired - so that the back of his head had been - blown away!

It was because - on the dance floor - unable to stop myself - I'd suddenly said - "I know! I know! You disgust me..." And then the searchlight which had been turned on the world was turned off again and never for one momnt since has there been any light that's stronger than this - kitchen - candle..."

Currently Watching Donnie Brasco see related

Donnie Brasco

Taking the true story of FBI agent Joe Pistone as its inspiration, the film Donnie Brasco tells the story of a touching friendship between Joe Pistone’s undercover alter ego Donnie Brasco and gangster Benjamin 'Lefty' Ruggiero. Joe Pistone goes undercover as Jewel Man Donnie Brasco to uncover the mob leader and the going ons to the FBI. He befriends Lefty who vouches for him when he enters the mobs world. As Donnie and Lefty become closer and Donnie moves further into the world of crime, Donnie is ridden with guilt as he knows that he is leading Lefty to a certain death.

Donnie Brasco may not offer anything really new, as the story of an undercover cop entering the mafia has been done countless times before, but it is a simple story wonderfully told.

The acting is generally excellent across the board. Johnny Depp plays Brasco well and really gets Pistone’s feelings of fear and confusion across to the audience. Al Pacino is even better as Lefty, bringing real emotion and some great comedy moments to the character. Sonny Black (Michael Madsen) and Nicky (Bruno Kirby) are also great characters that are well acted, although sadly not enough character development is given to these two. Anne Heche is perfectly cast as Pistone’s wife Maggie, and shows the characters upset and frustration of her changing husband superbly.

Donnie Brasco is one of the more disturbing mob films, reflecting the true brutality of gangsters. The violence towards the Japanese waiter in the restaurant is shocking, but is also probably the most defining scene, showing how the mafia really are as opposed to the alluring lifestyles other movies make them out to have. The film is full of tragic characters and isn't nearly the glamorous lifestyle that is expected by the audience.

Visually the film is near flawless, and the way in which the film is shot helps add to the characters emotions. At the beginning of the film where Donnie first meets Lefty, parts of it are shot like the camera is taking photographs. While this is mildly distracting, it also helps to remind the audience of whom Donnie Brasco is really working for, and give the scene a CCTV security camera feel.

Patrick Doyle provides a fantastic score which fits the film and serves the story well.

Although the film didn’t blow me away on my first viewing and I found parts rather slow paced, it’s certainly a film that gets better on repeat viewings. Seeing it the second time you are able to notice the little things which seemed irrelevant on the first viewing, and see just how important they are to the full story.

Some of my movie reviews. Some are recent, some were written ages ago.

One Hour Photo
A photo processer becomes totally obsessed with a family whos photographs he develops. When he finds out from a different womans photos that the husband in the family is having an affair, he goes totally insane. Absolutely brilliant, keeps you guessing from start to finish.
Trivia Near the beginning of the movie, as the Yorkin family is going over their set of developed photos while in their house, they are eating Chinese food and inside of an opened fortune cookie it reads "Someone wants you to be happy". Director Mark Romanek actually searched through 30 fortune cookies before he found one that related to the film and used it in the scene.

The Office
This is a television series that I own on DVD. It's hilarious, it's filmed like a documentry, and follows to workers of an office around. If you haven't seen it it probably sounds crap rom that description, but it's not. Ricky Gervais, Martin Freeman and Mackenzie Crook are brilliant in it.
Trivia The first British sitcom for over 25 years to be nominated for a golden globe, and the first ever to win one.

Stuart Little
I hadn't seen this since it was at the cinema, I had forgotten how funny it is. Just the cats deserve their own film, they are total scene stealers and they're the best thing in the film. "I can't believe I'm arguing with dinner" and "Snowbell, how...manly" are probably my favourite lines in the film. The film is about a family that adopt a mouse insead of a child and the cat is humiliated at having a master thats a mouse and tries to get rid of him with some alley cats. But the cats are all I watch it for, I find the rest slightly lame.
Trivia When Stuart is playing the guitar he does a duck walk similar to the one Marty McFly does in Back to the Future. Both characters were played by Michael J. Fox (just got that from IMDB, I don't know any interesting trivia about the film)

Life With Mikey
A guy and his brother run a childrens talent agency thats not doing so well until they hire a pickpocket off the street. Quite poor, I only watch it because Nathan's in it.
Trivia I don't know any. Sorry, but I'm sure you'll get over it.

Serpico
Serpico is a cop in the early 1970s, and unlike all his colleagues he refuses a share of the money that the cops routinely extort from local criminals. Nobody wants to work with Serpico, and he's in constant danger of being placed in life threatening positions by his "partners". Nothing seems to get done even when he goes to the highest of authorities. Despite the dangers he finds himself in, he still refuses to 'go with the flow', in the hope that one day, the truth will be known.
Trivia After he decided to make the film, Al Pacino invited Frank Serpico to stay with him at a house that Pacino had rented in Montauk, New York. When Pacino asked Serpico, "Why did you do it?" Serpico replied, "Well, Al, I don't know. I guess I would have to say it would be because... if I didn't, who would I be when I listened to a piece of music?"

Johnny English
Johnny English is a British secret agent who dreams of rising beyond his menial job within the MI7 organization, and is hired to protect the Crown Jewels after all the other agents are bumped off. When the jewels are stolen, he eventually uncovers a plot to replace England's monarch with what the British fear the most: a French king. Hilarious.
Trivia At one point, English mentions a singing technique to find his way through a darkness, which he states has to be in E-flat. He then starts to sing at a seemingly random pitch - which happens to be a perfect E-flat.

The Lion King II: Simba's Pride
Simba and Nala have a daughter, Kiara. Timon and Pumbaa are assigned to be her babysitters, but she easily escapes their care and ventures into the forbidden lands. There she meets a lion cub named Kovu and they become friends. What she and her parents do not know is that Kovu is the son of Zira - a banished mate of the now-dead Scar. She plans to raise Kovu to overthrow Simba and become the king of the Pride Lands. This tests not only Kiara and Kovu's relationship as they mature, but Simba's relationship with his daughter.

Brilliant story idea, badly made.

Kovu is the only decent character in this entire film, and the only character with any depth. Zira is pathetic - just an evil villian with no other side to her. Nuka's pretty cool, but is killed off in the first half hour. Simba is pathetically paranoid, and Kiara is just a spoilt brat of a kid. Also the change of Rowan Atkinson to Edward Hibbert as the voice of Zazu is about as smooth as a porcupines backside. Everyone here knows how much I adore Timon, but in Simba's Pride, Timon and Pumbaa are just lame, unneeded, unfunny, comic relief, and that is differecult for me to say about my all time favourite animated character.

Bad animation, poor character development, and embarrassingly bad soundtrack. A real shame, seeing as with the good story outline of Kovu following in Scar's footsteps only to change his mind and join up with Simba could of been as good as the original Lion King if only more effort had been put into making the film.
4/10 < I would of gotten 1 if it hadn't been for the story outline.

Trivia The son of Zira is called Kovu - Swahili for 'Scar'. 'Zira' means hate; the name of Nuka, Zira's hapless elder son, means 'bad smell'. "Vitani" was originally "Shetani." It is possible to hear characters refer to her by that name. It means "Devil" in Swahili, however, and Disney may have thought it was inappropriate, thereby changing it to something a little less offensive. "Vitani" has no meaning in the Swahili language, from which most of the characters' names are drawn.

The Tigger Movie
When feeling lonely, Tigger decides to go looking for his family, only find that they don't exist, but friends are the next best thing. Enjoyable, but not much else to it. A good chance for Jim Cummings to show off his talents as Disney rarely seem to hire him for anything else lately, which is a real shame.
6/10
Trivia The original trailer for the movie, as well as some of the TV spots, had the song "Semi-Charmed Kind of Life" by Third Eye Blind. This had to be changed because the song is about being addicted to crystal meth.

Memoirs Of A Geisha
In 1929 an impoverished nine-year-old named Chiyo from a fishing village is sold to a geisha house in Kyoto's Gion district and subjected to cruel treatment from the owners and the head geisha Hatsumomo. Her stunning beauty attracts the vindictive jealousy of Hatsumomo, until she is rescued by and taken under the wing of Hatsumomo's bitter rival, Mameha. Under Mameha's mentorship, Chiyo becomes the geisha named Sayuri, trained in all the artistic and social skills a geisha must master in order to survive in her society. As a renowned geisha she enters a society of wealth, privilege, and political intrigue. As World War II looms Japan and the geisha's world are forever changed by the onslaught of history.
I was personally disappointed with this, but maybe I was expecting too much. I had never read the book and was unfamiliar with the story, although I knew what geishas are. It's just a love story with not much else to it. It's a stunning film to look at but the story doesn't have much depth, it has bad continuity, and some parts of the story line left me confused. The sort of film I might watch if it was on TV, but I wouldn't pay to see it again.
3/10
Trivia According to Colleen Atwood, the costume designer, 250 hand-tailored kimonos were made for the film. She also said that their prints, patterns and colors are bigger and bolder than traditional kimonos.

West Side Story
American gang The Jets are angry because they feel that The Sharks who have just moved there from Puerto Rico are trying to take their street. So they arrange a fight, and both sides are angry when a member from each side fall in love with each other. It takes the death of three people for the two gangs to realise what they are doing to each other.
Trivia
The actors in the rival gangs were instructed to play pranks on each other off the set to keep tensions high.
9/10

The Addams Family
Gomez's brother Fester has been missing 25 years following an argument involving the twins Flora and Fauna. Missing him terribly, the family hold a seance every year to try to contact Fester. The Addams' lawyer Tully knows this, and when he finds himself in debt with a loan shark who's son, Gordon, is Fester's double, he devises a plot to pretend to the family that Gordon is Fester and Gordon will steal the family's dubloons. The Addams end up loosing their home and having to move into "the real world".
Trivia
Anjelica Huston drew inspiration for her portrayal of Morticia Adams not from Carolyn Jones from the TV series but by watching Grey Gardens (1975), David Maysles and Albert Maysles's documentary about two eccentric old women found living in a decaying mansion.
10/10

Havana
Professional gambler Jack visits Havana to organize a big Poker game. On the ship he meets Roberta and falls in love with her. Shortly after they arrive in Cuba, her Cuban husband, the revolutionary Arturo, is shot on the street by the military and Roberta is arrested and tortured. Jack manages to get her free again, however he can't keep her from continuing to support the revolution.
Trivia
Raul Julia chose to be uncredited because producers would not agree for him to be billed alongside Robert Redford
5/10

Guys and Dolls
Nathan needs $1000 for a venue for his floating crap game, but has no idea where he can find this sort of cash. But when he finds out Sky MAsterson is in town, he bets Sky that he can't take Sarah Brown, the local missionary to Havana with him. Sky accepts the bet. Sarah agrees to go to Havana with Sky in exchange for genuine sinners at the midnight prayer meeting to save the missionry from closeure. While Sky and Sarah are away, not only do they fall in love with each other, but Nathan holds his crap game in the empty missionary, and when Sarah returns she thinks that it was all part of Sky's plan, even though Sky is innocent. Sky keeps his end of the deal with Sarah and genuine sinners turn up to the prayer meeting. Just before this though, Sky lies to Nathan that Sky lost the bet and didn't take Sarah to Havana. When Nathan repeats this to Sarah, Sarah realises that Sky had been innocent all along, and goes in search of him. At the end of the film there is a double wedding, Sky marries Sarah and Nathan finally marries his fiancee of 14 years, Miss Adelaide. A fantastic musical comedy with amazing memorable performances by Frank Sinatra and Marlon Brando.
Trivia Frank Sinatra loathed the non-singing Brando for getting the starring role in Guys and Dolls, whereas Frank got a lesser part. Frank's nickname for the sometimes barely coherent Brando was "Mumbles." It was said that there were personality clashes on the set of the film, with the perfectionist Brando preferring to undergo retakes of shots effectively irritating the impatient one-take style of Sinatra.
After filming the scene where Sky and Nathan first meet they had to quit for the day when Sinatra had too much cheesecake. He said he could not take one more bite.

10/10

Romero
Romero is the true story of the catholic priest Archbishop Oscar Romero who lived in El Salvador during the political unrest in the 1980s. The government has launched a 'terror campaign' against the guerillas in an attempt to crush them. Archbishop Romero's protests against governments' actions is perceived as disloyalty. As an example to others, the government begins to destroy churches and murder priests. Despite persecution, Romero continues to speak out against the atrocities the government is committing against the people of El Salvador, until his assasination in March 1980. Good performance by Raul Julia, but overall an average movie. I have no trivia on it.

7/10

The Wild One
A gang of 40 motorcyclists, the Black Rebels, gatecrash a legitimate motorcycle race. They are eventually thrown out, but one of the gang steals the second prize trophy and gives it to their leader, Johnny. The gang then ride into Wrightsville, where they cruise up and down the main street, and pile into Bleekers - the local bar. The owner of the bar, the Sheriff, is happy to let the bikers spend their money, so does nothing to break up any disturbances. Johnny falls for the Sheriffs daughter, Kathie, and tries to impress her with the trophy. When a rival gang ride into town, they cause some major fights and destruction, and intimidate all of the locals. After Johnny saves Kathie from harassment by the other motorcyclists, his good intentions are misunderstood by an observer, who thinks that Johnny is the one who is harassing her. Johnny is ambushed and beaten up for a crime he didn't commit, and when he escapes a man accidently killed, for which Johnny is blamed.
TriviaThis film was banned in Britain until 1968.
The Triumph motorcycle that Marlon Brando rides in the movie was his personal bike.
8/10

Ice Age: The Meltdown
Sid, Diego and Manny have to find a boat so that they can survive the ice age melting, which will cover their land with miles of water. One their way to the boat, they meet another Mammoth called Ellie, who thinks she's a possum. Manny falls in love with Ellie.
Mediocore. No where near as good as the original. I absolotely love the original Ice Age, which is unusual for me as I usually hate that kind of animation. For the previews I thought Ice Age 2 looked good, maybe even as good as the original. It's no where near. And Ellie, Crash and Eddie are great contenders for the most unneeded and unfunny new characters in a movie 2006. If you like the original, take it from me: don't bother.
Trivia As an additional marketing ploy a special "anti-cell" spot was created with Sid complaining to the audience about a ringing cellular phone.
4/10

Kill Bill Vol 1
The Deadly Viper Assassination Squad consists of five most deadly killers. The Bride, whose name is not spoken, wanted to quit because she was pregnant. One day, somewhere in the Texas desert, The Bride wanted to marry the love of her life, but Bill and her former colleagues showed up and killed everyone there. The Bride manages to survive and is in a coma for four years. Once she awakes she realises she has also lost her baby that she was carrying, and so she goes to take revenge on the Squad.
Good film and cleverly told. Some scenes are very beautiful to look at. My problems with this film were there was way too much blood. I'm not a squemish girl, not even nearly, but the amount of blood shown was not needed, it was totally unnessiccery. Also it annoyed me that Bill informs the viewer that the Bride's child is still alive just before the movies finishes. If he hadn't I would of been on the edge of my seat and buying Vol 2 the very next day (this was my first time viewing the film), but knowing this information it makes seeing the next volume much less urgent.
Trivia Despite being bleeped out in the film, the name of The Bride is revealed on her plane tickets to Okinawa and Tokyo.

The Conversation
Harry Caul is a nationally known expert on surveillance. The Director of a large company has hired him to record the conversations of two of the Director's employees. Some years previous, Harry's work directly led to the murder of three people, and now he has reason to fear that it will happen again.
An engaging film, but slightly boring in parts on first viewing. It's defently a film that needs to be viewed more than once to appreciate all the subtle little things that add layer and depth to the storyline (I won't go on about the ones I've noticed, but if anyone's interested feel free to ask)
Trivia Originally envisioned as a horror movie with Marlon Brando.

Carlito's Way
A Puerto Rican ex-con pledges to stay away from his former drug dealing ways but finds himself being dragged back by his past connections and the naive machinations of his lawyer and best friend. Hoping to raise enough money to get away from New York, Carlito Brigante takes on the job of running a nightclub, renews an affair with a dancer but old associates and old instincts suck him back into a world of violence and mistrust.
Very enjoyable film with a very intense script and memorable acting. I know I shouldn't really compare the two as they are completely different movies, but I personally perfer Scarface.
Trivia The exterior of the hospital where Carlito visits his bedridden attorney is the same one where Don Corleone is taken in The Godfather