Lost Souls

Pros: Winona and her long hair, nice visuals
Cons: Everything else

The director of this film, Janusz Kaminski, has one two Oscars for cinematography (Saving Private Ryan and Schindler's List). He has done a lot of work with the majority of Steven Spielberg's films and knows how to make a movie LOOK good. Jan De Bont...

Pros: It's entertaining to see movie stars fall flat on their faces once in a while.
Cons: It just gets tiresome after 90 minutes straight.

That's how I felt as I settled in for the Winona Ryder's latest movie, a derivative little ditty known as Lost Souls. The title itself is as nonsensical as the movie, as there is no mention of any 'souls' anywhere in the film, and the only thing that...

Pros: The cinematography is out of this world
Cons: Everything else burns in the Pit of Everlasting Despair

I must be addicted to Winona Ryder. There can be no other explanation for why I rented Lost Souls. Like a palsy-armed junkie, I must have been desperate for a fix of those melt-my-heart brown eyes, that trembling-at-the-edges smile, the...

Pros: Occasionally evocative murky cinematography. Hurt, Hall, and Koteas have to eat, so paychecks are nice.
Cons: The movie, mostly.

Cinematically, Satan has become like your crazy Uncle Pete. When you only saw him every couple years in your childhood, his magic tricks and Peter Lorre impressions seemed really cool and funny. But after Uncle Pete got laid off from the plastics plant...

Pros: Gritty, Grainy Film Evokes a Dark Mood...
Cons: About as Scary as Fabric Softener.

In movies, the Devil is pretty much portrayed as a coward. Even now, when El Diablo is making appearances in four different movies showing in theatres (Lost Souls, The Sculptress, Bedazzled and the rerelease of The Exorcist),...

Pros: eerie atmosphere, grainy interesting cinematography, superb acting, interesting story, use of black and white imagery, thought provoking
Cons: some plot holes

From the first moment that I saw the preview for "Lost Souls", I knew that I had to see this film as soon as it came out. The trailer left me breathless with anticipation. Images of a waify chain-smoking Winona Ryder shrouded in darkness on...

Pros: Some decent acting
Cons: Mind numbingly boring

The plot:
Maya Larkin (Winona Ryder) and several priests visit convicted murderer Henry Birdson (John Diehl) in a psychiatric prison. Birdson has been confirmed by the Catholic Church to be possessed. However, their exorcism goes terribly...

Pros: no dumb love story
Cons: every moment was absolutely pathetic

If only you could give 0 stars here...

Think for a moment of a list of films that you hated because they were bad. It doesn’t have to be a long list. Just the first few that pop off the tip of your tongue. For me this list includes Dumb...

Pros: Um... it ended?
Cons: Too many to count

I don’t get the chance to go to see a movie in the theaters very often, so I was hoping that my recent trip to see Lost Souls (on opening night, even…) would be good enough to make up for all the movies that I’d wanted to see and wasn’t able to. Oh, was...

Pros: None.
Cons: Many.

I write relatively few film reviews on this site. Usually, my good amigo Jerry (ZentropaJK) will capsulize my viewpoint on films that I particularly hate, as he did with The Patriot, and, actually, with this movie. But I figured, hey, I should...

Pros: The visuals; a nice ending
Cons: The visuals

The latest Winona Ryder starrer spent a long time on the shelf before it hit multiplexes last fall, but films, unlike wine, don't normally improve in cold storage. Neither, apparently, does Ryder's eye for material: Lost Souls was to mark her return from...

Pros: Chaplin ain't bad.
Cons: Not scary, bad direction, very empty.

First off, I kept hearing how this movie was supposed to be in the same vein as Exorcist. Now hearing that, you know that either a) the movie is going to be great or b) someone smoked too much crack before this nugget of wisdom came out of their...

Pros: Some nice new camera tricks.
Cons: The acting, script, direction and idea are just awful.

Historians say that Chinese water torture is probably the worst form of punishment a human can endure. Sure, you've got your racks and being nailed to a cross, but having to endure continuous discomfort is probably the worst way to spend your life. ...

Pros: None
Cons: Bad Script, Bad Acting, No Special Effects or Makeup

It's scary what passes as scary in today's "horror" movies. When Hollywood ran out of original scary themes they send up mock-horror movies more funny than scary, a la the "Scream" series--which was basically a "Murder She...

Pros: provocative issues like trust and faith versus reason and logic
Cons: incoherent plot, slow-paced direction, mediocre acting, banal dialogue

You gotta wonder about a Winona Ryder movie that was supposed to be released in 1999 and doesn't make it into theaters until Friday the 13th in October, 2000, right?

In this faith vs. reason supernatural thriller, Winona plays a...