Ridley Scott's ALL THE MONEY IN THE WORLD brings back the 1973 J.P. Getty III kidnapping

Overlong, ham-fisted, tiresome and melodramatic, ALL THE MONEY IN THE WORLD is but the latest in a long line of Hollywood product that takes an ugly and sensational real-life incident and turns it into schlock entertainment. As directed with his increasingly heavy hand by Ridley Scott and written by David Scarpa (from the book by John Pearson), the movie gives us the kidnapping and lengthy imprisonment of the grandson of the then-world's-richest-man, John Paul Getty and lets us wallow in it, even as the young Getty's mom does all she can to convince the kid's grand-dad to cough up the ransom money.

As per usual -- of late, at least -- with his woeful returns to the Alien franchise (Prometheus and Covenant) and his hugely overlong The Martian, Mr. Scott (shown at left) dawdles and extends when brevity and crispness are most called for. His new movie, which lasts 132 minutes, could easily have dispensed with twenty or more of those and turned out all the better for their loss.

Most annoying, however, are the melodramatic touches that dot the film -- note the early morning scene outside the Getty estate with the delivery of those newspapers -- culminating in a supposedly exciting will-he-survive? finale that simply reeks of this-never-happened Hollywood contrivance.

Random moviegoers, who pay any attention to those reams of trailers thrust upon audiences prior to the movie we've come to see, may recall a particular trailer for this film that starred Kevin Spacey as the older Getty. Gosh: How come Christopher Plummer (above and below) is up there on screen in the same role now? Well, even though the movie was ready for release earlier this year, once the current sexual predator scandal engulfed Spacey, a series of reshoots -- probably the most lengthy and expensive in the history of modern Hollywood -- was done so that the film could be released without any "taint." Which simply adds a new layer of sleaze to the whole enterprise.

Does anyone else out there find this idea of "disappearing" a performer seem like something out of Stalinist Russia? Sure, Spacey, the man, ought to be pilloried for his actions, but his terrific array of acting over decades now ought to remain untouched.

All the Money in the World is certainly not a complete loss. Plummer is very good, as the man of the year that moviegoers will hate the most. And as young Getty's mother, Michelle Williams (above) gives yet another of her wonderfully lived-in, every-moment-real performances. She's a pleasure to watch, as always. Mark Wahlberg (below, center right), more tamped down than usual and in a much less "heroic" mold, proves adequate, too, though audiences expecting more action out of him may be disappointed.

The story itself is interesting and fraught with enough tension to keep most viewers occupied, even if the cannier among them may do some eye-rolling at the coincidence that pops up now and again. The movie sticks at least somewhat close enough to what happened in this kidnapping to keep those of us who remember it semi-satisfied. (It certainly makes Italy of that day look like a heap of criminally connected sewage, including even certain small town police departments.) Charlie Plummer, below and consistently beleaguered, is as good as he's allowed to be in the role of victim. Overall, however, this movie seems very nearly unnecessary.

From Sony/TriStar Pictures, All the Money in the World opened nationwide this past week and is probably playing in your area. Click here to find the theater(s) nearest you.

Avi Nesher's PAST LIFE offers up a load of melodramatic, post-Holocaust schlock

The original story, said to be a true one, upon which the movie PAST LIFE is based, may indeed be truthful. But the manner in which writer/director Avi Nesher (below) has cobbled together his third-rate filmed version hits every possible melodramatic note so hard and so often that he turns this tale of post-Holocaust trauma into mostly schlock.

By the end of this sour and silly movie, I was left with a feeling I have rarely encountered: This would have been one Holocaust story better left untold.

TrustMovies was a fan of Mr. Nesher's earlier film, The Matchmaker, and he hopes to be of others down the road. But this current one is a clinker that, I suspect, only those who will accept anything Holocaust-oriented will be able to love. Nesher seems to thrive on melodrama, and there's nothing wrong with that (take a look at the work of Douglas Sirk). But running with it and letting it run away with you are two very different things.

The tale here tells of two sisters and two families who've suffered through and from the Holocaust and are continuing in this vein -- though the families' younger generation seems to understand this only cursorily.

The plot hinges on exactly what the father of those two sisters did during the Holocaust, and the movie jerks us back and forth as to his presumed guilt regarding some heinous crimes, as the sisters -- one a talented music student (Katie Holmes look-alike Joy Rieger, above), the other an aggressive journalist (Nelly Tagar, below, left) -- take it upon themselves to investigate.

The movie moves from Israel to Germany to Poland and back (some of the architecture and visuals are fun) and takes in that other troubled family -- mother, brother, and a son who happens to be a successful composer with eyes (and ears) for our musical sister -- all to little (or, depending on your tolerance level, way too much) avail.

The biggest problem with the movie is the character of the father (played with a My Cousin Rachel array of is-he-or-isn't-he? nonsense by Doron Tavory, above, left), who consistently lies (either outright or via omission), has been physically abusive to his elder daughter, and keeps trying to sweep everything under the carpet, as does mom (Evgenia Dodina, of One Week and a Day, above, right).

By the time all this is finally sorted out -- and, gosh, so easily via "forgiveness" -- things are beginning to border on the absurd, thanks to the constant melodramatic flourishes and the needlessly ratcheting up of would-be suspense (the scene of the two composers searching the archives for the diary is particularly silly). Performances all around are as good as the overwrought material allows.

Yes, to counter those "denialists," we must keep the Holocaust stories coming. But, come on: We're certainly able to do better than this. From Samuel Goldwyn Films, running 109 minutes, and in English, German, Polish and Hebrew (with English subtitles as necessary), Past Life, after opening on the cultural coasts, hits South Florida today, Friday, June 16, in Miami at the AMC Aventura 24, and in Boca Raton at the Living Room Theaters and at the Regal Shadowood.

Schlock done right: PIRANHA 3DD--from Gulager/Dunstan/Melton/Soisson--on disc

Once in awhile, there is nothing like a piece of utter, irredeemable schlock to make the evening's Trader Joe's three-buck-chuck go down more smoothly. (That's our house wine these days, and, yes -- I know -- on the West Coast, it costs only $2.) So, the other night, over dinner, we watched PIRANHA 3DD, which a kindly PR rep had sent me to cover (it's out now on both DVD and Blu-ray), and we had 83 minutes of sleazy, silly, schlocky fun -- of which at least twelve of those minutes were devoted to credits, outtakes and further Piranha evolution (the next one looks to be even schlockier!). This proved exactly what the MD ordered.

There are boobs here aplenty -- most of them big, bountiful and utterly fake looking. What hath breast augmentation wrought, kiddies? It's ain't pretty, and it ain't natural, neither! (Most of the breasts on display look much more fake than the movie's special effects, which are creepy, goofy fun. And if the film seems to exist solely to outdo the first Piranha remake's use of Jerry O'Connell and his prosthetic penis, let it be said right now that this 3D sequel absolutely outdoes it. TrustMovies is not going to tell you how or why; you'll just have to see for yourself. But it's a lulu of bad taste (though the piranha does seem to be enjoying that taste), something of which Lloyd Kaufman might be proud.

Speaking of bad taste: In this movie -- along with its cast of cutie pies of both genders, with Danielle Panabaker and Chris Zylka (that morning hard-on from Kaboom) among the cutest of the cuties -- appears a certain David Hasselhoff (above) making what just might be the most embarrassing "playing himself" set of sequences ever put to film (or in this case, I am sure, digital). Mr Hasselhoff proves so extraordinary adept at walking that nearly nonexistent line between "Omigod, he thinks this is a real role!" and "Nah -- he's just making fun of his own image" that you will have to pinch yourself many times to make certain you haven't died and arrived in Schlock Heaven.

How does the film manage to levitate to the upper echelons of goofy bad movies? It must be the ever-careful crew of filmmakers, including director John Gulager, (who gave us the terrifically scary/smart Feast and its sequel), and writers Marcus Dunstan and Patrick Melton (Feasties who also gave us The Collector and its upcoming sequel), along with Joel Soisson. Clearly these guys are all slumming here, making some money while having a good time. And so will you, I expect (the good time, not the money), if you're a fan of this very special kind of movie viewing.

Piranha 3DD, god love it, takes no prisoners: Not even little children are safe from these evil fish.  From Dimension Films, the movie is available now for sale or rental on DVD and Blu-ray (in quite the nice little transfer, too). Bon Appe-teat!