Epinions Recent Reviews for Lagavulin

Cameron Crowe’s Sweet Fountain of Youth, Say Anything …

Thu, 15 Feb 2001 06:46:22 GMT

rating: 5/5 by: Epinions Author Lagavulin - Twenty-two summers ago, in the days following high school graduation, I was so alive. I had a busy network of friends and acquaintances. That summer, we jam-packed some wild parties, which burned on all night. God, I loved a girl that summer, and no...

Charting the Essence of Humanity: Steven Pinker's The Language Instinct

Tue, 13 Feb 2001 06:19:55 GMT

rating: 5/5 by: Epinions Author Lagavulin - Language is the central defining characteristic of us, the species that dominates this planet. We are uniquely able to share detailed information, work in teams to solve problems and make plans, and pass accumulated knowledge onto succeeding...

More Hopkins, Moore Hobbles, in Hannibal

Sat, 10 Feb 2001 05:50:02 GMT

rating: 3/5 by: Epinions Author Lagavulin - Hannibal is an audacious roller coaster ride, called “Into the Pit of Madness”. You strap yourself in. The ride accelerates rapidly. It is fast and smooth throughout. Several times it pulls you up to a dizzying crest, then with a determined...

B-Movie Actor Led Me to Paranormal Romance: Rex Harrison in The Ghost and Mrs. Muir

Wed, 7 Feb 2001 01:29:39 GMT

rating: 4/5 by: Epinions Author Lagavulin - Long before Patrick Swayze haunted Demi Moore in Ghost, and Alan Rickman haunted Juliet Stevenson in Truly Madly Deeply, there was The Ghost and Mrs. Muir. When my young son and I sat down to watch the The Ghost and Mrs. Muir...

Cast Away's Two Horrors: Human Isolation and the 143-Minute Commercial

Sun, 28 Jan 2001 21:38:41 GMT

rating: 3/5 by: Epinions Author Lagavulin - I know, I know, this is the 10,000th Epinions review of Cast Away, and it is probably going to say the same things as all the others do. But look, I am the parent of young kids and so we get out to the movies maybe twice a year, and last night...

The Not-So-Great Escape: John Carpenter's Escape from New York

Sat, 20 Jan 2001 20:35:10 GMT

rating: 3/5 by: Epinions Author Lagavulin - Up here in Canada, stores hold their best sales during the week after Christmas. They call them Boxing Week sales. (This peculiar custom – its genesis, evolution and nonsense – is deserving of its own review.) This year’s Boxing Week shopping yielded...

How to Fall in Love on a Weekend in Copenhagen

Sun, 7 Jan 2001 18:04:41 GMT

rating: 5/5 by: Epinions Author Lagavulin - I first went to Copenhagen on a business trip in 1989. At the end of that visit, I remarked to a colleague, “I could live here.” In the years since, I have spent about a fifth of my time on the road, including a dozen more short visits to Copenhagen...

Michelangelo's Pietá

Sat, 6 Jan 2001 02:22:48 GMT

rating: 5/5 by: Epinions Author Lagavulin - To cross the Square at St. Peter’s Basilica is to feel the mighty power of the Catholic church at the time of the Renaissance resonating across the centuries. I felt humble and insignificant walking through the square’s imposing colonnade toward its...

Combat Mission: Beyond Overlord: Lead WWII Troops in Realistic 3D Battles with Superb Game

Mon, 1 Jan 2001 17:25:56 GMT

rating: 5/5 by: Epinions Author Lagavulin - The camera races across the landscape, rising and falling with the rolling land. The chirping of birds and the rustling of leaves are interrupted by the distant sound of artillery fire. The camera finds Lt. Steel’s platoon. We track past Cpl...

Good Looking Space Opera is Unoriginal, Inhabited by Dopes

Wed, 27 Dec 2000 03:49:52 GMT

rating: 2/5 by: Epinions Author Lagavulin - What do these movies have in common? Mission: Impossible, Raising Cain, The Untouchables, Body Double, Scarface, Blow Out, Dressed to Kill. I will give you one point if you said that they were all directed by Brian De Palma. I will pour you a...

Gags Instead of Wit, Cute in Place of Character

Sat, 23 Dec 2000 04:58:46 GMT

rating: 2/5 by: Epinions Author Lagavulin - Of all forms of popular movies, romantic comedy has to be the most challenging to create successfully. A romantic comedy must do three difficult things: make us laugh, sustain the laughter for a couple of hours, and develop a believable romance. That...

Babylon Translate: Reduce $10 Words to Their Anglo Saxon Equivalents

Thu, 21 Dec 2000 02:18:17 GMT

rating: 4/5 by: Epinions Author Lagavulin - Crepuscular? Recidivists??

I encountered the above two dillies in a recent review by lobstergirl*. Most epinions do not test my literacy. (Many test my patience. But that’s another matter.) Yet I must admit the elusive...

If Your Instinct is to Avoid Fight Club, Fight Your Instinct

Sun, 17 Dec 2000 04:08:22 GMT

rating: 4/5 by: Epinions Author Lagavulin - I avoided Se7en for a long time, in spite of the rave reviews, because I was fed up with the sensationalizing of serial killing by movies. I avoided The Game because I dislike stories that mislead for the sake of misleading, and because I...

Altavista Search: Bring Your Homemade Greeting Cards to Life

Sat, 16 Dec 2000 10:52:55 GMT

rating: 4/5 by: Epinions Author Lagavulin - When I need to search the web, I use DirectHit or Copernic. It has been a few years since AltaVista was my tool of choice for that task. Recently I found good reason to put AltaVista back into service.

Being the...

A Mess of a Movie

Tue, 12 Dec 2000 13:29:07 GMT

rating: 2/5 by: Epinions Author Lagavulin -

Norman Jewison directed one of my favourite movies of all time, Moonstruck. But outside of that one, he is responsible for a long line of interesting failures, including Rollerball, Ice Man, In Country and January...

Lidan Download Accelerator: Utility Relieves Download Tedium, Adds Other Conveniences

Sat, 9 Dec 2000 11:17:09 GMT

rating: 5/5 by: Epinions Author Lagavulin - Download Accelerator Plus 4.0

There are a variety of utilities that claim to assist you with the process of downloading files. What distinguishes Download Accelerator Plus (DAP) from the others – including GetRight and Real Download –...

Powerful Alternative to Windows Explorer Has Noble Roots

Thu, 7 Dec 2000 08:54:56 GMT

rating: 5/5 by: Epinions Author Lagavulin - In the beginning …

Not so long ago, when you turned on your PC, this is what you saw:

C:>

And that’s the way it was, for many years, until the Win-tel solution matured enough to become useful. And in those...

Cirque Smart Cat Touchpad: Easy on the Wrist, Easy to Set up, and Elegant

Wed, 6 Dec 2000 01:57:42 GMT

rating: 5/5 by: Epinions Author Lagavulin - I have been using a Cirque touchpad for about four years, and I have enjoyed several benefits:

One, most vitally, I have suffered much less wrist and hand soreness using it than I did when using a mouse. I first tried a trackball as...

Reflections on Seeing It for the 2nd Time, A Year Later

Tue, 5 Dec 2000 01:53:39 GMT

rating: 5/5 by: Epinions Author Lagavulin - I just watched American Beauty again on DVD, a year after having seen it in the theater. Some things were even better than I had remembered them. What a brave and honest performance by Kevin Spacey! Alan Ball's script is so bright and funny in its...

Strong Performances and Direction Overcome Awkward Moments

Mon, 4 Dec 2000 02:58:39 GMT

rating: 4/5 by: Epinions Author Lagavulin - If you devoured action hero comic books as a kid, and if you were hooked by The Sixth Sense, then you will enjoy Unbreakable. If either one of those conditions is not true for you, then I suspect this movie may do nothing for you. Fortunately, both...

Pulls You Into Its Vivid Harrowing Dream

Mon, 4 Dec 2000 01:27:10 GMT

rating: 5/5 by: Epinions Author Lagavulin - There are lots of things you can nit-pick about: Leonardo DiCaprio's (Jack's) thoroughly anachronistic behaviours and expressions; the predictable love story; the stereotypical characters (spoiled arrogant rich guy, devil-may-care salt-of-the-earth...