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Blackmail, Murder & Mayhem

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Diabolique

Diabolique

List Price: $9.97
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Rating: 1 stars
Summary: Should award this movie a gobble instead of a star...
Review: ...because it is a TURKEY!!!!!!!!

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: good as new
Review: better than befor

Rating: 4 stars
Summary: Thumbs Up For Diabolique
Review: Despite criticism that the film is monotonous and boring, I rented the video and was pleasantly surprised. Sharon Stone seems to be getting better every film she does. The chemistry between Stone and Isabelle Adjani is great. Chaz Palminteri is the perfect bad guy and Kathy Bates was a great detective. Listen close, Bates has some of the best lines. I really enjoyed my first viewing. I liked it enough to watch a second and third time!! Big thumbs up to the entire cast for a job well done. I would recommend this movie to anyone.

Rating: 4 stars
Summary: Stone is Splendid
Review: Don't listen to those critics who are still so in love with the ancient French version they can't see the merits of this brooding, sexy remake. Yes, the plot has holes (Who shot those crucial photographs?) and a blooper or two (someone who's supposed to be making a U-turn ends up on the same side of the road, heading against traffic). Nonetheless, it's well worth watching for its clever plot, top-rate performers, haunting atmosphere, and most especially the glorious Sharon Stone. She's like a modern day Joan Crawford here: forthright, vampy, alluring, and not to be trifled with!

Rating: 3 stars
Summary: Watch the original instead
Review: First of all, Diabolique is not a bad movie, it just doesn't deliver the suspense and atmosphere of the original masterpiece (Les Diaboliques).

The story is about two women, Mia and Nicole (Sharon Stone and Isabelle Adjani) who plan to kill a sadistic guy, Guy (Chazz Palminteri), who is the lover of Nicole and the husband of Mia. Mia owns a boarding school which she wants to keep and she wants to get rid of Guy and the only way of keeping it seems to be murdering Guy (divorce is not an option here). Without giving away anything, the women drown Guy in a bathtub, put him in the swimming pool of the school, but the corpse vanishes. From here on the story has many twists and turns till the shocking ending. The story also features Kathy Bates as a detective.

However, the movie falls flat many times as the pointless direction simply can't hold it in its shape. Jeremiah Chechik tried to concentrate on 'atmospheric settings' and film noir techniques. I'm sorry to tell you that they don't work. Instead of atmospheric settings we get cheap horror tricks. The director seems to concentrate on absolutely unimportant things and the otherwise tight script simply can't create suspense. Hadn't I seen it on TV I would have pushed FF many times. Instead of concentrating on 'art direction', Chechik should have concentrated on his characters.

The direction is a shame also because the story is great and the actors are good, too. I liked Sharon Stone as the stiff-upper-lip mistress and Isabelle Adjani was completely believable as the innocent yet enraged and persuaded wife. Sadly, Chazz Palminteri is miscast here and Kathy Bates doesn't deliver the somic relief she's supposed to bring.

All in all, it's not that bad, but the original works much better. So if there has to be a choice, you should choose the original. It's available now as a director's cut and though it's B&W and the subtitles are somewhat bad, it's a much better movie than this.

Rating: 1 stars
Summary: Chechik's Diabolique diabolically useless
Review: Hollywood version of the french masterpiece 'Les Diaboliques' is a disaster. Both actors and production are awful, the movie is full of cliches and Chechik tries to save something from the wreckage by a useless bloody end. There is no suspense of psychological tension in it, Clouzot's version was built on a subtle climate of anxiety and terror. Here there is only a bad mixing between buffoons characters (like the female inspector) and sentimental situations that could fit into a Reader's Digest dramatic story. This movie (can we really call it like that ?) is representative of the Hollywood (Holy-money) remake industry trying to make money on classics masterpieces (the remake of Psycho is another example). Don't even waste your time to see it, go directly to the original version of Henri-Georges Clouzot. 'Ce film est un vrai navet !'

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: Are we reviewing the soundtrack, or the movie?
Review: I have no idea why on earth Amazon sees any reason to combine reviews for the movie (I never saw it, I have no idea if it's any good, and I don't even care) with reviews for the soundtrack (It's great music). Are they unable to realize that a soundtrack CD can be appreciated on its own completely apart from the movie, what the movie was about, or if it was any good? The soundtrack is good, I'm reviewing the soundtrack and not the movie. Pay attention and don't let the bad movie reviews here reflect AT ALL on the reviews of the soundtrack (aside from Amazon's averaging system which in this case is messed up).

Rating: 1 stars
Summary: fine
Review: I haven't seen diabolique movie coz it's too late for me to decide to watch that movie but i found out that is very nice as what my friend said to me

Rating: 1 stars
Summary: Diabolical
Review: One of the most fun, clever and effective scary movies to be found is Henri Georges Clouzot's "Les Diaboliques". But there is a madness around in Hollywood that says it is always a good idea to have a go at remaking a masterpiece. Why? If it ain't broken, surely, don't fix it. Do these people somehow suppose that "Les Diaboliques was a bit of a failure, nice basic idea prevented from great movie status only by the absence of the great cinematic ideas present in this? Sometimes, in fairness, it must be said, the misguided attempt to remake classics has decent enough movies as a result. Think only of well known retreads of "Cat People", "The Thing from another World" or "Scarface". However this is emphatically not one of those movies. It's only possible value might be as am object of study to student filmmakers in how not to make a fun, clever and effective scary movie.

One distinguishing feature of the glorious original was it's remarkable lack of any attempt at naturalism or realism. It is set in a vividly imagined a nightmare dreamworld of shadows and violent emotions This tries to be more naturalistic and convincing. Tries and fails as the writer's and director's idea of naturalistic and convincing is a useless hodgehodge of tired Hollywood clichés. If it has a saving grace it is Kathy Bates as the annoyingly persistent cop (in Clouzot's film an unmistakable template for Peter Falk's Columbo: changing the sex to escape from looking like a tame takeoff of that TV icon was almost the only sensible idea in the movie). And while Bates is a class enough act to rescue many a bad film, she cannot rescue this. Sharon Stone is on autopilot, sleepwalking her way through a reprise of her standard evil and conniving act from countless better (if generally pretty terrible) films. Isabelle Adjani as the wife is an illustration of the film's imaginative cowardice: the film is transposed to the contemporary USA but they make her a Catholic/European type presumably just from a misplaced hope that that will get them a bit of the magical atmosphere of the original. Dream on. The direction, writing, cinematography and, Bates aside, acting, is wooden and hopeless. Given the wonderful ideas for dramatic tension thrown up by Clouzot, it is almost preposterously lacking in suspense and about as scary as "The Waltons". Most depressing and cynical of all is the lamentable changes to the ending to make it a bit more feel-good, a bit less dark, and infinitely, sorry, stupider. It is as if, knowing they had a turkey on their hands the makers felt they could throw it to the focus groups without shame. It remains just close enough to the ending of the original to constitute a massive spoiler if you should ever see the latter (as you should go out of your way to do) and are unfortunate enough to encounter this first. So if you have not seen the original you have that reason, above all, to avoid this like the plague. And, even if you have seen the original, there are loads and loads and loads of other reasons. Life is just too short.

Rating: 4 stars
Summary: Darker Edelman music
Review: Randy Edelman, usually noted for his light and more upbeat music, does a 180 here and delivers a darker and more melancholy score and considering the film he wrote the music for, it makes perfect sense. The main theme is good and contains those typical Edelman trademark sounds in it. The theme, performed by Edelman on piano, can be found in almost every track, so it is not hard to miss. The rest of the music consists of everything you would expect to find in a thriller score: dark and ominous strings, pianos, and blaring brass notes here and there. "Desperation", "Missing Persons", and "Two Females and a Guy" contain some exciting action sequences, while "A Stimulating Bath" and "Searching Through Drawers" contain frantic percussion. The rest of the tracks are very similar to each other and the end cue, "In the Arms of Love" by Sherry Williams, is a dumb blues tune that should have been left off the soundtrack altogether. If you are a diehard Edelman fan or enjoy Bernard Herrmann-like thriller music, then this soundtrack should satisfy you. Otherwise, watch the movie first and then make the judgment.


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