Rating: 
Summary: A Pure Comic Gem!!!
Review: The Coen Bros. have done it again! This is a fun, quirky, fresh comedy from the creators of "Fargo","The Big Lebowski", and "Raising Arizona" just to name a few. If you are looking for a remake that's better than the original...forget it! they are two different films, both are equally funny and must be "judged" seperately! Tom Hanks gives a truly hilarious performance as Prof. G.H. Dorr, a criminal mastermind who rents a room from a spunky, church-going, widowed old woman named Marva Munson (played by the great Irma P. Hall who practically steals the show!). The professor plans to tunnel a hole in her basement to steal millions of dollars from a near by river boat casino! He can't do it alone...so he recruits his "gang" of boobs...Garth Pancake, The General, Lump and Gawain (played to the comedic hilt by Marlon Wayans!)...each has his own special skill. Well, Mrs. Munson eventually finds out about the plot and the boys must decide...must they kill the old lady?...or will she make them give the money back and "engage in divine worship!"? The film is R (restricted) rated...which means there is harsh language. So, for those of you who were shocked by this, go rent something more suited for you like "Scooby-Doo" or "Passion of the Christ" (which is also "R" rated!)...for the rest of us adults with taste who enjoy and appreciate a fun comedic caper filled with great performances...enjoy!...the soundtrack isn't bad either!
Rating: 
Summary: See the original -- it's simply better!
Review: The Coen brothers are brilliant filmmakers but they are inconsistent. Fargo and Blood Simple are certainly American classics but too many of their films are simply...loopy. This is a perfect example of remaking a film that was perfect its first time around. Before you see this, do yourself a favor and see the British version directed by Alexander Mackendrick. Then see Mackendrick's other films such as "The Man In The White Suit" (also with Alec Guiness) and "The Sweet Smell Of Success". You'll have spent your time -- and money -- more wisely.
Rating: 
Summary: The Ladykillers- An Enjoyable Remake
Review: The Ladykillers, while not being a remake completely, is surely a more than fun and different spin on the 1955 original classic starring Sir Alex Guiness and Peter Sellers. This film is directed by the wonderful Coen brother, Ethan and Joel, who brought us Fargo, The Big Lebowski and O' Brother, Where are Thou?
Tom Hanks stars as Golswaitt Higgenson, Dorr, Ph.D. He's the leader of a bunch of thiers, including the hiliarious Marlon Wayans. All the stars bring something to the movie, which really is truly a crowd pleaser. Irma P. Hall plays the nice lady who offers Hanks and his band to practice in the root celler of her house, but she doesn't know that they're planning a secret heist in order to obtain nearly 1.6 million dollars.
Hanks with his southern accent makes a delightful perfomance and has a presence which resembles that of Colonel Sanders. Though I should point that his performance though it is wonderful and more than entertaining is not really oscar worthy, but I'm sure he'll rack up a nomination.
The Ladykillers is rated R for Language, including Sexual References. THe language is excessive and pretty strong, there's also some sexual language/innuendo along with deaths which are intended to be humorous. The film also has a sterotypical look, courtesy of the Coen brothers. But a more than funny film, and not a bad film to see on a Saturday night at your local theatre, if not in a theatre definitly check out when it hits the shelves at your local Blockbuster. Not a bad pick to own on Video or DVD.
Rating: 
Summary: HANKS'S BEST SINCE JOE VS THE VOLCANO...
Review: There was a time when Tom Hanks was not just an everyman (or an everyman playing a coulda-been-every-man-if-he-just-hadn't-been-faced-with-this-crippling/terminal-problem). There was a time when Hanks was exceptional. The last time we saw that Tom Hanks was in the epic Joe Vs the Volcano.
We also saw "that" Meg Ryan for the last time in the same movie--but that, my friends, is an issue for another day.
In The Ladykillers we have the resurfacing of the exceptional Tom Hanks; the Hanks willing to stake it all on a risky performance. I, for one, am damn glad to see it.
The story is so-so. This is no Joe Vs the Volcano if you ask me. However, it has its own charms. This is Comic Noir at its almost-finest (the Coens did it far better in Fargo, and came close to perfecting it in The Man Who Wasn't There).
I think both Hanks and the Coens may well have been constrained by the ghosts of the movie they were remaking. Whether one is working with or running from a pre-set pattern, it necessarily limits one's choices. Still: this is a movie worth seeing.
The ending is the strength of this movie. The Coens have a penchant for morality tales. This one's a doosy.
Irma P. Hall and Hanks are the other two reasons to see this movie. Their increasingly akward interactions drive the story and the humor. Both give if not priceless, then certainly memorable, performances.
On a scale of one to ten, The Ladykillers is a very interesting and watchable seven. Coen fans will love it. Being one myself, I give this movie a solid recommendation.
Rating:
Summary: Misfire.
Review: This pains me to write because I am such a Coen brothers fan (see many other reviews). I guess I will never understand why someone would remake a movie that is near perfect to begin with. Yes, the original Ealing studio gem is old (1950's), but that is part of its charm, much of the humor arising from that particular time and place in Britain. And yes, the Coens have updated and changed the story, also changing the setting to the South, and altered many characters and plot details. So, the Coen's movie is quite different not only in setting and characters but in tone. But is it a better movie? Not by a long mile, so why bother? It only serves to take away the audience that might seek out and find the original.
Will we need a re-make of Fargo? Or Barton Fink? Or O' Brother Where Art Thou? I don't think so. When it's done right the first time, leave it alone.
Despite how quite different the movies are in their details some comparisons are inevitable. The Alec Guinness classic is quiet, wry and droll, moves very quickly, and has subtlety and taste. Even the violent ends the criminals visit upon one another in their bungled attempts to deal with "Mrs. Lopsided" is presented with humor and taste. Alas, the Coen's movie is crass, loud, gross and crude. And, while the violence is muted here as well, it is still more graphic than necessary.
Likewise, a great deal of the humor in the first film derived from these inept petty crooks completely unequipped to deal with a sweetly oblivious, tiny, elderly Englishwoman of the Victorian age. The updated character of the black church-going landlady is a neat departure from the original, but she is hardly sweetly oblivious nor a woman of another era. For me, Mrs. Wilberforce was not just an old woman, but a woman with the quaint and simple values of the old British empire era completely undoing a pack of post-WWII English "wiseguys". They are at a total loss as to how to deal with her. Not only that, but the actress playing Mrs. Wilberforce was tiny and delicate. The modern woman is a force to be reckoned with and you believe could knock any one of Tom Hank's band cold if she took the notion. Much of the wry humor is thereby sacrificed.
The good things about the Coens movie are the changes made, in that they have made a very different film, and the performance of Tom Hanks. His "professor" is quite different from Alec Guinness and it is a richly humorous characterization. He has some nice scenes, well done. I did not care for the supporting band of crooks, however, finding the crudeness in language and behavior disconcerting rather than humorous. Whereas that type of humor has worked so well in Coen favorites of mine like The Big Lebowski, Raising Arizona, etc. I found it off-putting here. Perhaps because I could not get the wit and subtlety, the pure cleverness, of the original out of my mind.
So, I stick with the original and find nothing in this version to recommend other than Tom Hank's performance. For me, a misfire and a poor choice for a re-make. In the future, maybe such talented people would do better to re-make a movie with a good central premise that was botched, rather than a movie that has been a perfect comedy gem to movie-lovers for decades.
Rating:
Summary: Why the language?
Review: This was almost a good movie. Most of the actors did a good job, with the exception of Wayans. Unfortunately, it seems that all Wayans can do is swear. In a movie that had some excellent acting, fun quirky characters, Wayans makes the movie un-enjoyable to watch. Take the profanity out, and it could be worth watching again.
Rating:
Summary: Not nearly funny enough
Review: Tom Hanks leads a crew of misfits trying to rob a riverboat casino by tunneling to it from the basement of an elderly woman's home. There is a good cast and the movie has a beautiful look to it but this is a black comedy that forgot to be funny. Yes, I laughed a few times but not nearly enough. Also, there is one character that is so vulgar that he stands out from the rest of the movie making his scenes seem incongruous.
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