Reviews by rifraf

rifraf says "Laughingly bad acting and over the top imagery...just a waste" about 300

rifraf — Sun, 18 Nov 2007 05:32:07 GMT

The spouse and I watched this and can only say that was a couple hours of our life we'll never get back. The acting was so bad and the lines so over the top that it was a terribly funny film, even when it wasn't trying to be. Led to a lot of jokes around our house that began with "Spartans!" drawn out loudly with extra phlem in a bad British accent for appropriate drama.

While the imagery was interesting to watch for a short period of time, the whole overly CGI/ comic booky feel prevented us from being even the slightest bit sympathetic to the characters. Even the overly sculpted bodies of the men seemed to be artificial to the point they looked like overgrown boys wearing last year's Halloween muscle costume. The movie did try to include actual tidbits of historical fact, but they were masked by such ridiculously contrived surroundings and delivered in such grandiose inflections that they seemed equally unbelievable. And don't get me started on the overly bedazzled professional...

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rifraf says "Fast, Fun, Cool and Well Acted! Better than the original by far" about 3:10 to Yuma

rifraf — Sun, 18 Nov 2007 04:57:10 GMT

I really can't find anything bad to say about this movie except that I would have preferred a little change in the ending, but I can't go into that without spoilers so I will let it be. The writing and acting are wonderful. It's surprisingly funny film but still you get to care for the characters. I know westerns are expensive to produce and are considered a little cheesy in the overly pretentous hollywood scene, but I really love them and wish they would make a few more if they would make them like this one. By that I mean we need more westerns where it looks like the actors actually have sat on a horse for more than 5 minutes in their lives before the filming started. Seeing one of the current crop of Hollywood pretty boys (yes, you Brad and Matt) trying to handle a horse with "Stop horsey...STOP PLEASE!" written all over their faces during a scene completely blows a film. Russell Crowe rides like he's had a lifetime of using equine transportation and the other actors...

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rifraf says "Fun but too prone to break" about VTech V.Smile TV Learning System

rifraf — Sun, 18 Nov 2007 04:39:24 GMT

I would like to give this system a good review...really I would. My boys liked it and it seemed to be good fun and a little educational also. However, we have had such bad experiences with the machine that I just can't give it high marks. Our boys received our first one about two years ago for Christmas from a relative and the boys played with it for about 7 months on and off before it developed a "short" in the on/off button and would only turn on sometimes after you jiggled it a little. Finally it refused to start all together. After a few months without one, our boys talked us into buying another one. This one literally lasted about 3 months and then it got some short where it wouldn't recognize the cartidges anymore so it was history too. We didn't have the receipt so we chalked it up to a lesson learned and gave up on the V-smile.

Despite the fact that I have boys, they were not rough with these machines but they did accidently drop from the side of the coffee table...

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rifraf says "An obsolete dinosaur in the scrapbooking market" about Sizzix Die Cutting Machine

rifraf — Sun, 18 Nov 2007 04:25:42 GMT

I've owned the Sizzix for more than 4 years now and own over 100 dies, plus the "tag-a-long" and many sizzlits dies. I purchased the system when there were not a lot of other alternatives to obtain die cuts. It does make good cuts and has some really cute dies that I use all the time with my Kindergarten Sunday School class, tags for gifts and my sons' teachers borrow some dies frequently. It is really good if you want to cut multiples of one thing or the same things over and over.

However the drawbacks are as stated previously. It is VERY heavy and the dies are very heavy too and take up huge amounts of room. There is no good storage system for them. They are not well tagged to make it easy to find the one you are looking for in a big box of them. Buying the machine is just the start of very high costs as the dies are expensive also and not very well designed. On many of the dies I have the design takes up only about 50% of the die and there is room for more items...

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