Here are just some of the films Leonard Maltin did not like. Try to keep from falling out of your chair. If you are a witch and would like to put a curse on Leonard Maltin, I am not stopping you.

Wong Kar-Wai's Fallen Angels

From Leonard Maltin's Movie & Video Guide
Slickly made but emotionally uninvolving (and practically narrative-free) portrait of cultural alienation, which like its predecessor, CHUNGKING EXPRESS, focuses on two sets of characters: an assassin and the beautiful colleague who desires him; and a mute ex-con and the woman he covets. Dazzling cinematography, camera angles, and editing aside, this is mostly meandering and confusing—and as emotionally distant as the characters it portrays.

Wong Kar-Wai's Happy Together

From Leonard Maltin's Movie & Video Guide
Polished production overshadows a predictable, paper-thin chronicle of a deeply troubled relationship between a constantly bickering Hong Kong gay couple in Buenos Aires. The filmmaker won a Best Director prize at Cannes for this, but pointedly the script did not.

Fletch

From Leonard Maltin's Movie & Video Guide
Chase plays a smart-ass undercover reporter (with a penchant for disguises) who goes after major drug ring. Good mystery absolutely smothered in wisecracks, some funny, some tiresome; if you're not a fan of Chevy, stay clear! Watchable but never credible. Screenplay by Andrew Bergman from Gregory McDonald's novel. Followed by a sequel.

National Lampoon's Animal House

From Leonard Maltin's Movie & Video Guide
Spoof of early 1960s college life is only sporadically funny, depends largely on Belushi's mugging as frat-house animal. Not nearly as roisterous or amusing as any issue of the Lampoon, but it became a tremendous hit—and spawned a number of truly terrible imitations—as well as a short-lived TV series, Delta House.

Terry gilliam's Brazil

From Leonard Maltin's Movie & Video Guide
Dazzlingly different look at bleak future society (kind of a cross between 1984 and A CLOCKWORK ORANGE) where one hapless clerk (Pryce) clings to his ideals and dreams, including his Dream Girl (Greist). A triumph of imagination and production design, full of incredible black comedy... but also a relentless film that doesn't know when to quit: second half is often redundant and ineffectual. Gilliam cut film from 142m. for American release. Screenplay by Gilliam, Tom Stoppard, and Charles McKeown.

Above comments were all copyright© Leonard Maltin, 1998-2001, used not by arrangement with Signet, a division of Penguin Putnam

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