Word Processors Movie Reviews

The story is cute and our daughter loves it. I like how they dissect different words to make other words. There are a number of jokes that are funny for adults, so watching it with your child is not annoying. We have it on DVD and play it in the car or on the plane during long trips - it's been a lifesaver! I also like that my daugther is learning while she is being entertained.

We own several Sesame Street videos and this is by far the best one. It is fun for our 18 month old daughter and for her parents! It has a Muppet Show feel to it and the songs are very catchy. It is a great introduction to the use of words as well. Enjoy!

This DVD is set up under the premise that Bert & Ernie, under the direction of Prarie Dawn, put on a play about words. You see both on-stage antics, and the chaos that's backstage. The backstage stuff is reminiscent of the Muppet Show: Grover delivering a singing telegram, people rushing around to get props ready, slipping on banana peels. It's really cute, and my son thinks it's hilarious. During the on-stage scenes, Ernie and Bert introduce different words (cookie, sticky, go, fun, etc.), and then show how new words can be created by switching the letters around. And there's a cool machine that throws pies whenever anyone says the word "Go" (of course, Bert gets hit with more than his share of pies). There are some great old-school clips, but mostly new stuff. Lots of songs, and not too much Elmo. I really liked that the focus is on words, not just the letters used. It's a fun, educational video.

I cannot stress how amazing this DVD is. There is no rating high enough for this DVD. God has changed my life through every song. At getting to watch it makes me feel like I'm actually there. I've grown so much closer to Him. Now I worship Jesus with these songs every day and not just on Sundays. Be prepared to actually feel His Spirit saturate the room. Totally saturate. From the fast, rocky "My Best Friend" and the the latin sounding "all around the world" which will keep you on your feet to the slow worshipful "Irrisistible" and "worthy is the Lamb" you'll be transformed into a life more like Him. You're be begging for more and will want to take it everywhere you go. That's why i got the cd as well (although the cd has fewer songs on it). The best wittness tool you could ever use. It's amazing to watch Darlene jump around like she does being pregnant and all. The picture quality being digital looks crystal clear on the screen and the stage and lights and sound and everything is totally profesional. They have lots of cool extra features including interviews with Darlene Zschech and others and A really cool sneak behind the scenes. This is a must get! A totally must get!! God is Great and He's My Best Friend so let everything that has breathe all around the world praise the Lord!

The first week I owned this DVD I fell asleep to it every night. Not that it will put you to sleep, but I simply cannot get enough of it. With each new Hillsongs release I think that they just cannot do any better, but they always amaze me once again. I bought my Mom this DVD for Mother's Day. She fell in love with mine while visiting. This treasure will truly take you into personal time with the Lord.

YOU ARE MY WORLD is the best album that Hillsong Music Australia has yet released. Musically it continues the slow evolution that past projects have shown, with more of a modern edge on tracks like "God Is Great." For the most part, however, it stays in the familiar musical vein that Darlene Zschech usually travels in. Most of the songs fall more in the power-ballad-to-mid-tempo range, with some nice exceptions like the driving "Everything That Has Breath." The songs are all quite melodic in the best sense of the word. It should be noted that Zschech hands over the lead worshiper reigns quite a few times here, to excellent results.

What makes YOU ARE MY WORLD stand out so much, though, is the superior writing. Lyrically the album has no misses, with choruses that are utterly worshipful, instantly catchy and memorable. These writers know how to pen songs that can immediately take you into the presence of God as well as stick around in your head for hours afterwards. The majority of these songs should easily become church standards in the coming years; in particular, "Worthy Is the Lamb," which is one of the most powerful worship choruses I've ever heard.

The DVD for YOU ARE MY WORLD deserves its own recognition. The production values for this service/concert are head and shoulders above anything we've seen from a Hillsongs video before. Everything from the sets to the lighting create an ambiance that is warm and inviting and though that should be irrelevant to worship itself it's still nice to see from a critical standpoint. It all just LOOKS good and very professional. The DVD also includes music that is absent from the album release: "Glorious," an extended version of "Your Love Is Beautiful," and two acoustic reprises done at the end of the service. There are a few special features which are worth viewing. The making-of feature gave good insight on how this album was a new experience for the church, thanks to a change in venue, and the interviews were also interesting if not a bit too short. Production notes were short. The animated menus were nicely done.

I've never enjoyed the Hillsongs videos but YOU ARE MY WORLD successfully removed all of the small things which had caused that feeling. There's something a little strange about watching people worship on TV for me, but in the end this service was so genuine in its heart that I was drawn in and my small objections were quieted. In short, YOU ARE MY WORLD is an outstanding worship experience, and the DVD only makes it that much more so. Highly recommended. FIVE STARS.

This band actually had a motorcycle flying over their heads as they filmed the Use Me video! Motorcycle daredevil, Bubba Blackwell jumps ramp to ramp over the performing band.
These guys really rock! There are 7 videos on this DVD. 4 of the videos feature each band member performing, and 1 video features the "Bubba Cam" with motorcycle stunts by Bubba! Also includes interviews by the band. You must see this DVD! I also can't stop listening to their new "Out Of My Mind" CD!

I've scene Ray Boltz in concert 4 times so I'm no stranger to his work. I lost the audio CD Concert of A Lifetime so I got this DVD to replace it. The picture and looks are beautiful and the sound is great. It was shot in a small group setting but you can see that the crowd and even the musicians are, in Chrsitian parlance, caught up in the Spirit. Ray Boltz is one of the greatest Christian singers around and is sincere in his ministry of music which ranges from foot tapping to putting you into tears over the scacrifice of our Lord Jesus Christ.

The DVD also contains some of Ray's music videos such as One Drop of Blood and Pledge Allegiance to the Lamb. Also there is a section of music that looks like could be played in churches with just bibical scences playing with or without Ray singing and with the option of putting the words on the viewing screen as well. Needless to say, this is quite a bonus! For example, I watched Ray's song Watch the Lamb without any cuts to Ray in person singing. Most of Ray's hits are here which makes this DVD an absolute value at any price.

Recently I met someone at a film class who was involved with the production of this movie and some rather interesting information was revealed about this movie. Prime of which, what you see in this movie now is not what the director had planned. he had apparently wanted to do a more in depth story about the Sean Connery character and a bit less on the Rob Brown character. There were also apparently a lot of footage shot that showed the support characters in better defined roles but for some political reason, the suits at Colombia Pictures had that end up on the cutting room floor. Rob Brown was apparently so uninterested in playing the role, that he has streed clear of acting ever since.
The sloopy editing of this movie is most apparent when the Rob Brown character shows his love of writing and reading while working in the apartment where the Sean Connery charecter lives, but is cut shot to go back to the college where he is attending. Where's the motivation here? Where's the purpose of the movie? Anyway, it certainly shows that Colombia Pictures sure can make bonehead decisions that can ruin what could have been good movies. I'm sometimes amazed that Spider-Man has turned out as good as it is.

A great story showing what can be achieved when race is put off to the side.

To me, a classic is something that you can watch and watch again no matter when without the story, the setting, the dialog, and the theme becoming tired and aged. This one fits my criteria completely.

The ending, although conventional and without surprises, is still extremely uplifting and leaves you with a good feeling afterwards.

The haunting mood of the sound track - hope among the hopeless - fits the movie hand in glove.

You have to be an extremely cynical person not to like this movie.

It was an ok movie....with some steamy scenes. Not very gripping story though

This movie had great actors who all did a great a job, but the holes in the plot were very distracting. Namely, 1) How did the bad guys know the girl had a six-digit number in her head that they needed? Weren't they in jail after the subway incident? 2) How did they install all those cameras everywhere? 3) Wouldn't the drugs the doctors were giving the girl have incapacitated her at least a little? 4) What did those bodies they found floating have to do with anything? 5) Why was the deadline 5 o'clock? What was so urgent about them getting that number after they had waited 10 years? If anyone has any insight, please share!

I think the rule for a Michael Douglas film has to be if he plays a bad guy (as in, for example, A Perfect Murder 1998) or when the film's director has enough prestige to actually direct Douglas (e.g., Traffic 2000 directed by Steven Soderbergh) the movie might be worth watching, otherwise forget it. Here Douglas is Dr. Nathan Conrad, god's gift to psychiatry and the good life, with a beautiful wife, a darling eight-year-old daughter, an opulently-decorated apartment, and a thriving practice--so much so he does some "pro bono" shrinking. In short he is an all-around good guy, fabulously successful, admired by all.

Of course in a movie these fantasy-world advantages might be a little hard to overcome. Usually heroes like this are the sort of pablum fed to artistically unsophisticated middle-aged execs so that they will have something to fall asleep to in front of their hotel room TV. I think this would have worked better if Douglas's character were a little compromised, maybe make him a womanizer or somebody who abuses his practice or at least cheats on his income taxes.

The subject of his pro bono work is the catatonic Elisabeth Burrows played fetchingly by Brittany Murphy. In addition to being catatonic she is also quick with the multiple personalities and can job the shrinks to distraction. Enter the complication: the girl holds some numbers in her head that some crooks want. They give Conrad until five p.m. to shrink it out of her or they will kill his daughter whom they have kidnaped. Right, this could happen. Meanwhile they have magically installed cameras in Conrad's apartment and at the asylum lock-up, god only knows how. Furthermore, Conrad's wife (Skye McCole Bartusiak) is temporarily bed-ridden because of a skiing accident. Every time either she or Conrad makes a move a phone rings and it is the bad guys (led by Sean Bean) on the other end saying Big Brother is watching and if you don't behave we will kill your daughter.

Aside from the absurdities of the premise, there is the direction by Gary Fleder to consider. He might have made a passable made-for-TV kind of production if he had just played it straight, but no, he wanted to be creative (like Christopher Nolan of Memento fame, perhaps) and so chopped up the time sequence. Perhaps this was an attempt to camouflage the fatuous plot. No doubt Fleder and the clueless producers liked this because it allowed them to begin the movie with an inane action/adventure scene including a fire-balled vehicle and some "authentic" football-betting talk. After about twenty minutes of "Huh?" action, Fleder then allows the players to talk the plot and we realize that there are two time lines ten years apart. No doubt he also reveals how Bartusiak broke her leg, but I didn't stick around for that.

Bottom line: there are at least a thousand movies better. Pick one.

Don't Say A Word is a "modest" thriller, that aims high, but ultimately ends up off its target.

Dr. Nathan Conrad (Michael Douglas) and his wife (Famke Jansen) are shocked, when their daughter Jessie (Skye McCole Bartusiak) is kiddnapped. She is taken for ransom the Conrads are warned by her captor (Sean Bean) that they must do what he wants quickly, or she will die. The Doctor's only hope for her safe return, rests with a troubled mental patient named Elizabeth (Brittany Murphy), and a six digit number.

The film is based on the best selling novel by Andrew Klavan and directed by Gary (Kiss The Girls) Fleder. The problem I have with this film is that, quite frankly, it plods along too much for my tastes. The suspense is muted by a lot of atmosphere and long dialogue-heavy scenes. By the time any payoff comes, you can spot what's going to happen, before it does. The acting is ok, but as usual, Bean stands out as a great bad guy

My problems with the movie not withstanding, I still enjoyed most of the bonus material, included on the DVD. Director Gary Fleder's audio commentary is pretty good. But even better are the actor insights on specific scenes by Michael Douglas, Sean Bean, Brittany Murphy, Famke Jansen and Oliver Platt There are three deleted Scenes and a comprehensive series of featurettes. Broken down into three parts: preproduction, filmming, and post production, give you more than just a passing look behind the scenes. Some stuff is repeated but I can let that slide if it doesn't happen too often. Rounding out the disc's extras are
storyboard-to-screen comparisons and an ad for the Wall Street DVD, starring Michael Douglas, but no theatrical trailer for the film itself.

Recommended as a rental only if you must

This movie had great actors who all did a great a job, but the holes in the plot were very distracting. Namely, 1) How did the bad guys know the girl had a six-digit number in her head that they needed? Weren't they in jail after the subway incident? 2) How did they install all those cameras everywhere? 3) Wouldn't the drugs the doctors were giving the girl have incapacitated her at least a little? 4) What did those bodies they found floating have to do with anything? 5) Why was the deadline 5 o'clock? What was so urgent about them getting that number after they had waited 10 years? If anyone has any insight, please share!

I think the rule for a Michael Douglas film has to be if he plays a bad guy (as in, for example, A Perfect Murder 1998) or when the film's director has enough prestige to actually direct Douglas (e.g., Traffic 2000 directed by Steven Soderbergh) the movie might be worth watching, otherwise forget it. Here Douglas is Dr. Nathan Conrad, god's gift to psychiatry and the good life, with a beautiful wife, a darling eight-year-old daughter, an opulently-decorated apartment, and a thriving practice--so much so he does some "pro bono" shrinking. In short he is an all-around good guy, fabulously successful, admired by all.

Of course in a movie these fantasy-world advantages might be a little hard to overcome. Usually heroes like this are the sort of pablum fed to artistically unsophisticated middle-aged execs so that they will have something to fall asleep to in front of their hotel room TV. I think this would have worked better if Douglas's character were a little compromised, maybe make him a womanizer or somebody who abuses his practice or at least cheats on his income taxes.

The subject of his pro bono work is the catatonic Elisabeth Burrows played fetchingly by Brittany Murphy. In addition to being catatonic she is also quick with the multiple personalities and can job the shrinks to distraction. Enter the complication: the girl holds some numbers in her head that some crooks want. They give Conrad until five p.m. to shrink it out of her or they will kill his daughter whom they have kidnaped. Right, this could happen. Meanwhile they have magically installed cameras in Conrad's apartment and at the asylum lock-up, god only knows how. Furthermore, Conrad's wife (Skye McCole Bartusiak) is temporarily bed-ridden because of a skiing accident. Every time either she or Conrad makes a move a phone rings and it is the bad guys (led by Sean Bean) on the other end saying Big Brother is watching and if you don't behave we will kill your daughter.

Aside from the absurdities of the premise, there is the direction by Gary Fleder to consider. He might have made a passable made-for-TV kind of production if he had just played it straight, but no, he wanted to be creative (like Christopher Nolan of Memento fame, perhaps) and so chopped up the time sequence. Perhaps this was an attempt to camouflage the fatuous plot. No doubt Fleder and the clueless producers liked this because it allowed them to begin the movie with an inane action/adventure scene including a fire-balled vehicle and some "authentic" football-betting talk. After about twenty minutes of "Huh?" action, Fleder then allows the players to talk the plot and we realize that there are two time lines ten years apart. No doubt he also reveals how Bartusiak broke her leg, but I didn't stick around for that.

Bottom line: there are at least a thousand movies better. Pick one.

Don't Say A Word is a "modest" thriller, that aims high, but ultimately ends up off its target.

Dr. Nathan Conrad (Michael Douglas) and his wife (Famke Jansen) are shocked, when their daughter Jessie (Skye McCole Bartusiak) is kiddnapped. She is taken for ransom the Conrads are warned by her captor (Sean Bean) that they must do what he wants quickly, or she will die. The Doctor's only hope for her safe return, rests with a troubled mental patient named Elizabeth (Brittany Murphy), and a six digit number.

The film is based on the best selling novel by Andrew Klavan and directed by Gary (Kiss The Girls) Fleder. The problem I have with this film is that, quite frankly, it plods along too much for my tastes. The suspense is muted by a lot of atmosphere and long dialogue-heavy scenes. By the time any payoff comes, you can spot what's going to happen, before it does. The acting is ok, but as usual, Bean stands out as a great bad guy

My problems with the movie not withstanding, I still enjoyed most of the bonus material, included on the DVD. Director Gary Fleder's audio commentary is pretty good. But even better are the actor insights on specific scenes by Michael Douglas, Sean Bean, Brittany Murphy, Famke Jansen and Oliver Platt There are three deleted Scenes and a comprehensive series of featurettes. Broken down into three parts: preproduction, filmming, and post production, give you more than just a passing look behind the scenes. Some stuff is repeated but I can let that slide if it doesn't happen too often. Rounding out the disc's extras are
storyboard-to-screen comparisons and an ad for the Wall Street DVD, starring Michael Douglas, but no theatrical trailer for the film itself.

Recommended as a rental only if you must

This Australian film is the kind of film I usually like. It's fast paced and action filled and has to do with an outrageous caper. The plot is about three brothers, one of whom is Guy Pearce. They are all in prison and, because their lawyer is in cahoots with the warden, they get released occasionally to do a heist. Their lawyer is a sleaze and out to have them murdered. He's also having an affair with Rachel Griffiths, who is cast as Guy Pearce's wife.

There is one large problem with this film. I don't know if it was the Australian slang or the sound quality, but I just couldn't understand it. I actually had to put on the English subtitles, which were created for the hard-of-hearing and included things like "sound of car door opening" or they gave the name of the person speaking as well as the dialog.

Also, the story just got sillier and sillier and I found myself bored and falling asleep. I actually saw only about half of it, but couldn't bear to rewind and continue watching. I therefore can't recommend this film at all.

"The Hard Word" is just on o.k. film. I've seen better, seen worse. It's a crime caper wrapped around a love triangle, and neither storyline works altogether well. There are problems with the script, and it is my personal feeling that Rachel Griffiths, a fine actress in her own right, is miscast in the blonde bombshell role, and instead looks like a man in drag. Sorry, but that's the way it looked. And that threw-off much of the love triangle aspect for me. As for the crime caper element, much of that seemed a little off, as well.

"The Hard Word" starts off with the release from prison of three men: Dale, Shane and Mal. Some cast listings I've seen has the trio as being brothers, but then in a segment with a prison counselor, Shane describes his family life growing up, and it doesn't sound as though he had any brothers. So go figure. Once the guys are free, their crooked lawyer, Frank, has them set-up to do a robbery. They do this, but it lands them back in prison. Frank finds a way to get them out again, but they have yet another heist waiting in the wings.

Guy Pearce ("LA Confidential" and "Memento") plays Dale, the head of the trio of criminals. He turns in a good performance, but is stuck with an uneven script. Joel Edgerton and Damien Richardson, as his co-horts Shane and Mal, are good in their roles, but their characters are bizarre. Shane has had an admittedly bad childhood, and has anger management issues. He even seduces the prison counselor in a particularly ludicrous sub-plot. Mal fancies himself to be quite a good chef, and his specialty seems to be blood sausages (a favorite of Shane's). I'd never heard of blood sausages before this film, and believe me, I never want to hear of them again. As mentioned earlier, Rachel Griffiths stars as Carol, Dale's wife. She has been dilly-dallying with lawyer Frank on the side. Frank is quite enamored with her -- why, I don't know. That's part of the problem with this movie. Dale is a con who is in and out of prison all the time, and has apparently never come across a shaving razor. Carol is hardly a bombshell, although she is blonde, and instead snorts cocaine and sleeps around with whatever available man she can find. And she looks like a man in drag. Did I mention that already? Frank (played by Robert Taylor) is a double-crossing, back-stabbing person who is only out for himself. These people are three peas in a pod, but they do not inspire any real interest from the audience as to their plight. A mistake, when a good part of your movie is supposed to be about this love triangle.

As far as heists go, "The Hard Word" features two, but it seems like more. The trio of ex-prisoners commit the first heist once freed from prison, and they will supposedly be given a free pass because there are crooked cops in on it, but I could see the writing on the wall regarding this, yet these three seasoned professionals were totally surprised when events conspired against them, and they were hauled back to prison. Once they are released (again) they commit the 2nd heist and, of course, things go wrong (don't they always in these types of films?) Things stay interesting for a little while afterwards, but eventually I felt worn down with the whole excursion. Everyone came across as bumbling and inept, if not downright unlikeable. Finally, after going through at least two possible ending points, I just wanted the movie to be over with, already.

"The Hard Word" tries. It really does. It thinks it has got a good premise -- a heist/crime caper and a sultry love triangle --- but it in the end it has almost nothing. The heists are so blatantly set-up to fail that the suspense is barely evident. We know things will go wrong. We can even tell *what* things. We know people will be double-crossed, and we know by whom. We do not find the blond bombshell desirable, because she isn't a blond bombshell. The film has such little point and meaning except to exist for its own sake that in having no real substantive suspense or points of interest, "The Hard Word" is simply "The Dull Word".

THE HARD WORD (or words, meaning no one gets hurt) is a dandy little Australian film that tells a entertaining tale about three brothers who are periodically let out of prison to do 'jobs' for an outsider (in fact, a lawyer who is sleeping with the girfriend [Rachel Grifiths] of one of the brothers [Guy Pierce]). Each of the three brothers has a distinct personality which is well played by the generally excellent cast: this comraderie of the brothers makes the story clever, very funny at times, and warmly engaging. The film seems like a low budget romp but the cast and director and writer play it to the hilt. The main problem is with the exceedingly heavy Australian outback accents which, when superimposed on a musical score and soundtrack that is far too loud, are nearly undecipherable. Turn on the subtitles option on the DVD and you'll have a much better time enjoying this caper.