Most Helpful Customer Reviews
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6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:
3.0 out of 5 stars
The Card Player, April 12, 2006
I love horror movies...just can't get enough of them, so when The Card Player became available on dvd, and being a Dario Argento film I had to add it to my collection.
It was not as much of a horror, but a thriller. There was much more implied horror/gore, than visual effects.
The movie is about a serial killer who taunts the police by an on-line poker game, known only as "the card player"...you lose the game the victim dies, pure and simple.
There are some twists to the plot and a couple of gore effects but these are few and far between.
If you are looking for the blood and gore of horror you will fall short in this movie. If you are looking for a thriller in the Hitchcock flare then I would highly recommend viewing this one.
For the die hard Argento fans you really should add this one to your collection if not rent or borrow from someone.
"Argento outdoes himself! A very tense thriller...highly recommended!"-DVD TImes
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11 of 13 people found the following review helpful:
1.0 out of 5 stars
sorry but no dice, January 29, 2007
I'm very surprised to see some of the positive reviews this has gotten and I feel it's a duty to offer an honestly negative counterpoint for anyone considering spending money on this who might have high expectations based on Dario Argento's reputation (though I expect some uncritical fans will consider this sort of thing sacrilege and hit the not helpful button immediately). Argento's best work from the 70s in both the giallo and the supernatural horror genres is truly some of my favorite filmmaking of all time, which makes the undeniable decline in quality of his work since Opera all the more painful. I actually, despite their failings, do like certain things about Stendahl Syndrome and Sleepless (and the subsequent Do You Like Hitchcock?); the Card Player, however, just falls short in too many different ways to ignore and make any excuses for.
There are very few striking visual flourishes here, almost none of the amazing camerawork and staging that mark Argento's classics; the look of the film is strangely generic and undistinctive, without the strong personality and drive Argento used to convey through his material. The violence here lacks the truly inspired perverse qualities that characterize many of the classic murders and extreme outbursts driving earlier films. The acting by the female lead is compromised by her obviously limited abilities with English, which extends to other members of the cast; the dialogue is not particularly well written but far worse when rendered badly by non-native speakers (though the guy who I think is actually English doesn't actually fare much better). There are numerous scenes throughout that are even poorly staged and ineptly exected and only two that strike me as genuinely suspenseful in any way; where other Argento films have a hypnotic dreamlike rhythm, this film just feels clumsy and meandering. The ending is weak and the cumulative impact of the film on the viewer is about none at all. As a police procedural by anybody, this does not compare favorably with other much better films in a fairly crowded field; if anything, it feels like a made for TV production or an extended R-rated episode of a routine cop show.
Like many people, I keep hoping for a return to form from Dario (Terza Madre anyone?). With almost every project, rumors fly that this one is the one. Well, the Card Player definitely was not it. If you are a fan of Argento's past work, better to skip this completely.
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7 of 8 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Come on!, August 27, 2005
How can anyone say that their an Argento fan and no like this movie. I was actually surprised at how good this is. Dario strays from the norm with this one but unlike others have said it is still recognizable as an Argento film especially in the scene when the killer shows up at the main character's house...in the dark. That whole scene was very Argento. Also the music is an electronic score because of the internet theme and Dario wanted to have a connection between those. It's actually pretty good but not his best. Don't listen to these other reviews, just get it, you shouldn't be dissapointed. That one guy doesn't know what he's talking about with the whole not revealing the killer thing, he must have watched a different movie than I did!!
All in all a good movie from Argento but not his best. I think some people will like the change in style on this movie because it shows that Argento can do a movie way from his usual style and pull it off.
***** to off set the 2 star reviews
Next for Dario: 3rd chapter in the three mother's trilogy!
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