True Believer

Amazon.com

Eddie Dodd (James Woods) is a former '60s radical lawyer who now spends his time cynically defending drug dealers for the big bucks. But an idealistic young protégé (Robert Downey Jr.) convinces him to take one case from the heart: a young Korean immigrant unjustly accused in a gang slaying. Woods (complete with add-on ponytail) fairly hums with energy once he gets cooking here. Playing the been-there-done-that mentor--not to mention legal gadfly--gives Woods plenty of opportunity to run off at the mouth with spicy one-liners and zingers. But it also allows him to do some real acting, capturing Eddie's denial and sense of disappointment in himself. Plus his vehicle is a not-too-shabby mystery by thrillmeister director Joseph Ruben (Sleeping with the Enemy). --Marshall Fine

Customer Reviews:

Contrived but excellent.......2007-07-15

James Woods is a top-notch lawyer, a former civil-rights watchdog now getting rich businessmen off on cocaine charges.

Then one day a Korean woman walks into his office and asks him to free her son, an innocent man who has spent 8 years in prison for a murder he did not commit.

Does he take the case?

You tell me.

It's all pretty boilerplate stuff, but Woods, Robert Downey, Jr and Kurtwood Smith elevate this tale, based on a true story, to art.

Great Legal Thriller!.......2007-04-12

This movie is by far among the greatest legal thrillers I've seen, not only because the writing and directing are superb, but James Woods' acting performance is nothing short of spectacular. The variations he projects in his character expressions--with so many subtle nuances--make him 100% believable and fetching as that character. And when his sense of right is piqued, he explodes in the most compelling, absorbing, credible way--one which just pulls you another foot deeper into the story, kind of the way quicksand pulls you in: you just can't get out, nor do you want to.

In this story, the Woods character is fighting not only for an innocent man's life, a prisoner doing time, but even more important, he's fighting for his own life--his sense of self-respect, honor, and decency, none of which he feels in his earlier law practice while defending and acquitting sleazeballs whom he knows should be in prison instead wrecking society with their crimes.

I watched this movie a second time the night after I watched it the first time and got even more out of it. Buy it and keep it. It's far batter than most of the John Grisham legal thriller movies.

No question about it: James Woods is one of the most underrated actors today. He performed almost equally as well in "Indightment" the McMartin child abuse case.

I've omitted talking about the plot because you can obtain that from many of the below reviewers.

i loved it.......2007-03-20

it takes all kinds, as I noticed someone thought this was boring. Wow! Clever dialogue, sharp acting, scary violence, moving innocence trodden under the heel of official corruption and cynicism, if this is boring I have no idea what to suggest.

There are more good one liners in this movie than in a Fred Allen retrospective. At the very beginning the young idealistic apprentice lawyer who has come to work with the great Eddie Dodd, mistakes the pony tailed defense lawyer for the cocaine dealer he is defending! Boy is he embarrassed.

Later, when Dodd confronts the neo nazi brotherhood about whether they were behind his street attack, the guy with the rifle standing in the house decorated with swastikas says: "if we were behind it, you wouldn't be here now".

When the dirty cop points a gun at him, fires a round past his temple and sugests he back off, he slows briefly but says, scared but resolute, "sorry guys, can't do it, I've gotta be in court."

You may not enjoy it, but i am a cheapskate with over 100 copied vhs tapes from the tube, and I am about to plunk down hard cash to buy this one. Along with Witness, Fugitive, Don Juan de Marco, One Eyed Jacks, The Sting, True Lies, and a few others, this goes in my collection of movies to watch more than once.

The unappreciated reference above was to a scene where the mother of the innocent convict says: "We asked everywhere for a lawyer to help us, and everywhere they mentioned your name." Oh? says Eddie Dodd, genuinely flattered, "What did they say?". She replies, "They all say, you work cheap."

And the brilliant bad guy DA is one of the classic hateable guys in film, the more than cold father of the kid who shoots hiimself in "Dead Poets Society". i hope this is enough, not to persuade you, but to let you decide for yourself, whether to try it.

And I hope the bored guy above donates his copy to the library. It is at least 4 stars but i gave it 5 to balance off the absurd 1 star review just mentioned.

Best Legal Drama Out There.......2006-02-17

My wife had been fed up with all of the legal dramas I was maknig her watch. Being a third year law student she always netpicks the details. But the story in this fil overrides the legal fallacies, making True Believer a great drama that centers around a lawsuit.

"A good fight is one y'win!".......2005-04-07

James Woods is erstwhile civil liberties attorney Eddie Dodd, his idealism long since forsaken for 4th Amendment violation-under-every-bed cynicism, & Rbt. Downey, Jr., is his summer intern (well, autumn intern) Roger Barron. Woods character based loosely on Frisco criminal def. lawyer J. Tony Serra.

Dodd's conscience-bending guilt submits to Roger's yuppie charm, & the two pursue the mysteries of why a young Korean gang member is serving time for murder & now's offed a member of some supremacist cult in prison. Woods's Dodd is light years beyond over the top with this, but an excellent supporting cast (Downey, Jr., ["...so we can get off guilty little pricks!"], Margaret Colin, Miguel Hernandez, & "70s Show"'s Kurtwood Smith as a D.A. with a closet full of diced-up skeletons) & brisk dialog make him seem right @home there. To the paranoid, conspiracy-soaked veteran & witness to the original crime: "Cecil, are you what heroes are made of?" Cecil: "I did two tours in 'Nam."

If you can get past the new twist on the climactic courtroom scene & the veritable litany of continuity issues here, "True Believer" is one of the most watchable flicks I've seen---meaning, I can sit thru the whole thing without once hitting the pause button or pondering my full bladder.

The great scene in Eddie's kitchenette (with the de rigueur Chinese food) is especially instructive. When Downey, Jr.'s, Roger spouts armchair activist rhetoric ("We all think it's a good fight."), Woods's Dodd lets loose with a tirade against bleeding-heart do-goodism that would make Bill O'Reilly cringe.

Paranoia Agent - True Believers (Vol. 2)

Average customer rating:

Great jam packed installment!
Opening Credits Do It All
Heady, creepy, and darkly satirical masterpiece.
Twisted as heck, Scary as hell
Kon continues mind-bending goodness

Paranoia Agent - True Believers (Vol. 2)
Starring: Paranoia Agent
Manufacturer: Geneon [Pioneer]
ProductGroup: DVD
Binding: DVD

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ASIN: B000641Z4K
Release Date: 2005-01-11

Amazon.com

As Satoshi Kon's 2004 broadcast series continues, it grows darker, more unsettling, and even more intriguing. Each scene raises more questions than it answers. Is junior high school student Makoto Kozuka the assailant known as Lil' Slugger, as police detectives Keiichi Ikari and Mitsuhiro Maniwa believe? Or is he a "two-bit copycat" who may become a victim himself? What links exist between Kozuka's fantasies of "The Holy Warrior" and the attacks occurring in Tokyo? Why were all the victims people under stress, who believed they'd been driven into corners? Kon keeps the audience in a perpetually shifting limbo, undercutting assumptions and calling what seemed to the facts of the story into question. Paranoia Agent will frustrate viewers who expect a straightforward narrative that fits conventional anime patterns. But it stands out as a fascinating, disturbing, and highly original work by a talented director at the top of his game. (Rated 16 and older: violence, tobacco use) --Charles Solomon

Description

The detectives interrogate the boy arrested for the Lil' Slugger attacks, he claims to be a "Holy Warrior" who has only begun to help those waiting to be saved. However, he also only claims two of the five attacks! Just as the detectives begin to find witnesses and think they are uncovering the truth, a rash of attacks fuel the hysteria- especially the two inside the police station! As the police begin to doubt their own beliefs, even suicidal citizens begin to believe a golden bat can solve their problems.

Customer Reviews:

Great jam packed installment!.......2006-06-14

The first DVD of Paranoia Agent spent it's time introducing you to Little Slugger and the premise of the show. At this point Little Slugger has racked up approximately 6 victims only to be unceremoniously captured at the end of the last DVD. This installment opens up with the two detectives, Maniwa and Ikari, questioning Little Slugger in the flesh. His testimony depicts his actions as a heroic, saving the characters from there problems in the style of a fantasy video game. Progressively his story becomes more confusing, as Ikari starts getting impatient and starts taking out his aggressions on Little Slugger, who proves to be a confused 8th grader who is being slowly backed into a corner...and we know what typically happens after that!

This time only a chunk of this set's 3 episodes are spent once again peeking into the lives of various characters in Tokyo while the rest of the time is spent dealing with the newly captured Little Slugger and adding further wonder into the Little Slugger case. While the first volume spent most of it's time convincing you that Little Slugger is a flesh and blood attacker these episodes aim to dispell that as the events unravel as more characters are backed into an emotional corner and characters from the first episodes are re-visited.

The ending of this DVD is a perfect stopping point and will leave you throughly confused as the Detectives quest continues and begins to cost one his very sanity. The plots various threads move swiftly and towards the end, you'll wonder how it can keep up it's break neck speed but let me assure you, it'll keep going.

Once again, the quality of these episodes is undisputed, the animation department has had some line up changes but none significantly noticeable here. The right amount of drawing ammo has spent in the right places resulting in a overall clean OVA quality look while a noticeably gloomy atmosphere perpetuates the events. Once again Satoshi Kon proves it takes more than violence, sex and blood to make a show mature but they help.

Opening Credits Do It All.......2005-08-23

`Paranoia Agent' defies most of conventional anime. No giant robots, big guns, or girls with blue hair. It takes place in present day Tokyo and revolves around the lives of everyday workers. It is also unique for being an anthology.

`Paranoia Agent' is not based around the conflict of heroes and villains. It depends mostly on style. The opening credits are arguably the most memorable in anime history. We see our many characters standing in the midst of a disaster, flood, fire, earthquake, nuclear bombing. However they are all laughing uncontrollably in an insane manner, as to make us think that these characters may have come to except the horror of their lives.

The plot: Unlike most anime series `Paranoia Agent' is an anthology, each episode seems to exist on its own, in that we are introduced to new characters whose stories begin and end with that episode, an anthology. The stories are all related in the sense that each of our characters lives in modern day Tokyo and is having trouble in life, generally work related. They all end up being attacked by boy in roller blades, Little Slugger.

The stories are very entertaining in a dark comedy way, from a sleazy reporter who owes money to the mob, a school girl by day and prostitute by night, an anime production team that's behind schedule, friends that keep failing in their many attempts to commit suicide. Little Slugger attacks them all.

As the show progresses, so does Little Slugger. It becomes quite obvious that he is super natural. It also becomes quite obvious that `Paranoia Agent' has absolutely no intention of wrapping things up or ever explaining the truth about Little Slugger or any of the bizarre events. And it doesn't.

I couldn't see this series going on any longer and it's nice they ended it after 13 episodes allowing us to remember it fondly.

`Paranoia Agent' works mostly because of its style. The animation and directing are great. It also works because of its very entertaining stories, as short as they might be.

Heady, creepy, and darkly satirical masterpiece........2005-03-11

DON'T LOOK AT THE BACK COVER IF YOU BUY/RENT THIS VOLUME. IT GIVES THE ENDING AWAY. The Shonen Bat that was arrested might be an imposter, but either way he's one hell of a nutcase. In the hilarious first episode we see what this Shonen Bat thinks. He thinks he's out on a mission from a video game to rid the world of evil, and the two detectives get sucked right into this bizarre video game world (it's a strange retake/farce of Kon's earlier film "Millennium Actress"). The second episode is a highly disturbing drama about sexual obsession that you knew was coming if you listened closely during the fourth episode, but still really manages to floor you. The third episode gets us closer to solving the mystery... only to slam us in the end with an even bigger mystery. This one also delves deeper into the minds of the characters, which serves to throw you off and make you think, "Wait, is this a dream or is this really happening?" The final episode on this volume marks a turning point, both for the series itself, and for the opinion of the people who watch it: Either you're going to like where the show is going or you'll be scratching your head. Even with the latter opinion, you're still in for an interesting experimental episode. Obviously, this show isn't meant for people used to more mainstream shows and films, but for those of us weirdos out there, it hits every mark. Watch with an open mind, and make sure you've seen "THX 1138" before you see it.

Twisted as heck, Scary as hell.......2005-03-10

Let me tell you a story.I was at Scarecrow video store one day in the anime section,wondering what to get. Nothing i had heard of was released yet so i wasnt sure of anything. One of the employees said, "Check out paranoia agent, its great," so i did. I watched the 1st disk and realy thought it was impressive. It was like a real movie. When the second one was released, i expected the same good thing. What i got, blew my mind. THIS IS ONE OF IF NOT THE BEST ANIME SERIES OF ALL TIME. Paranoia agent volume 2 creeped me out. Not just that it blew my mind. This disk beats the first in a way unthinkable. Satoshi kon has created a twisted, unsettling, and epic masterpiece. See the first disk first

Kon continues mind-bending goodness.......2005-01-23

The second volume of this four-volume series picks up where the first one left off. Writer-director Satoshi Kon is making this series a tour de force, as the three episodes on this disk introduce new characters, shed new light on previous characters and generally make the story more of a rich tapestry. There are a lot of threads in the fabric Kon is weaving: it's hard to tell where they're all coming from or where they're going, but some parts of the larger picture are beginning to emerge.

The first episode here is just fun, as the story seems to turn into a completely different type of anime, at least in the minds of a character or two. Here, as in his films Perfect Blue and Millennium Actress, Kon's storytelling consistently highlights differences of various subjective realities, as versions of truth are examined and re-examined from different characters' viewpoints.

Kon's strong writing and directing are complemented beautifully by well-done character design, strong understated animation and sound. This disk contains little in the way of extras, only textless opening and closings. It's hard to tell where Kon is going, but it's a fascinating ride.

True Believers: The Musical Family Of Rounder Records

Average customer rating:

True Believers: The Musical Family Of Rounder Records
Starring: True Believers
Manufacturer: Bmg Special Product
ProductGroup: DVD
Binding: DVD

General | Alternative Rock | Styles | Music

Gospel | Christian & Gospel | Styles | Music

General | Hard Rock & Metal | Styles | Music

Roots Rock | Rock | Styles | Music

General | Music Video & Concerts | Genres | DVD | Video

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ASIN: B00005UKIX
Release Date: 2002-04-16

Description

True Believers: The Musical Family of Rounder Records includes: Acadia A La Louisiana, Baby Now That I Found You, Bayou Nab/Back of Tow 2-Step, Beau of Jacque Boogie, Birches, Carol Country Blues, Deja Me Leeza, Facts of Life, Hey Big Shot, In My Hands, John Henry, Letter From Heaven, Little Jimmy King's Blues #1, Little Jimmy King's #2, Maybe, My Better Years, Robert Johnson, She'll Be So Fine, Tears From A Smoke Filled Room, True Love.

Average customer rating:

Contrived but excellent
Great Legal Thriller!
i loved it
Best Legal Drama Out There
"A good fight is one y'win!"

True Believer [Region 2]
Starring: James Woods , Robert Downey Jr. , Margaret Colin , Yuji Okumoto , and Kurtwood Smith
Director: Joseph Ruben
ProductGroup: DVD
Binding: DVD

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ASIN: B00005CDB3

Amazon.com

Customer Reviews:

Contrived but excellent.......2007-07-15

Great Legal Thriller!.......2007-04-12

i loved it.......2007-03-20

Best Legal Drama Out There.......2006-02-17

"A good fight is one y'win!".......2005-04-07

60 Minutes - True Believer (September 24, 2006)

Average customer rating:

60 Minutes - True Believer (September 24, 2006)

Manufacturer: CBS
ProductGroup: DVD
Binding: DVD

Description

Airdate: 09/24/06 Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice had her first brush with terrorism while still a young girl living in Birmingham, Alabama. Rice lost a friend when bigots bombed the 16th Baptist Church near her house, killing four little girls. Rice says growing up in the segregated south inspires her to work for democracy worldwide. To relax, Rice plays chamber music with friends in her Washington apartment, and she invites Katie Couric in to hear them practice.

Average customer rating:

Contrived but excellent
Great Legal Thriller!
i loved it
Best Legal Drama Out There
"A good fight is one y'win!"

True Believer [Region 2]
Starring: James Woods , Robert Downey Jr. , Margaret Colin , Yuji Okumoto , and Kurtwood Smith
Director: Joseph Ruben
ProductGroup: DVD
Binding: DVD

General | Drama | Genres | DVD | Video

( T ) | Titles | Features | DVD | Video
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ASIN: B00005B0IS

Amazon.com

Customer Reviews:

Contrived but excellent.......2007-07-15

Great Legal Thriller!.......2007-04-12

i loved it.......2007-03-20

Best Legal Drama Out There.......2006-02-17

"A good fight is one y'win!".......2005-04-07

Average customer rating:

Contrived but excellent
Great Legal Thriller!
i loved it
Best Legal Drama Out There
"A good fight is one y'win!"

True Believer [Region 2]
Starring: James Woods , Robert Downey Jr. , Margaret Colin , Yuji Okumoto , and Kurtwood Smith
Director: Joseph Ruben
ProductGroup: DVD
Binding: DVD

General | Drama | Genres | DVD | Video