Rating: 
Summary: Blow Up
Review: Michelangelo Antonioni's 1966 film is his best. The images of 60's mod London are wonderful. The camera's eye during the park scene and nat sound is some of the best filmmaking ever. This is a beautiful film.
Rating:
Summary: Relax & Enjoy It!
Review: The successful fashion photographer (Hemmings / Antonioni?) is trapped in a world of mirrors. He's expert in making things seem sexy & glamorous. But he feels less and less satisfied with appearances. The girls don't do it; his pictures are formulaic. He thinks he's found something special in a mysterious woman -- but then finds (or does he?) that she isn't what she seems either. What did happen in the park? A few grains of image (a few pixels) really are not reality, just a suggestion. OK, the ending is just plain stupid -- driving home the needle point with a sledgehammer.
But the movie is beautiful, sexy, mysterious and interesting. What more do you want?
Rating:
Summary: The Sublime
Review: In the same way "Moby Dick" is about a whale, this film is about "swingin" 60's London. The words sublime, tedious, enigmatic, mysterious are used by others to describe both. In short, the film is a carefully crafted assemblage of symbols used to confront the viewer (and protagonist) into the unreality that lies (subtlely, quietly) within the surface of this world and the decidedly unknowable behind it. This "Reality and Illusion" theme is a well worn path. In fact, it has been with us since the Beginning. "Blow-Up" is a subtle, quiet and finely crafted film waiting to be discovered by those who "get" it. It is tedious for those who care not to. It truly does touch the sublime. Like the universe, it is a wonderful, horrible ritual, waiting. You need only try.
Rating:
Summary: Unusual story enhanced by brilliant cinematography
Review: "Blow Up" was a sensation when it was released in 1966. Critics and moviegoers hotly debated its enigmatic story. Three and a half decades later, its meaning is no clearer. I have seen it several times, and I remain clueless. The movie has fallen into relative obscurity, and, so, the few people I've met who have seen it have been unable to offer any satisfactory insights. If you are looking for pop entertainment, you certainly want to avoid this one because the plot is so puzzling. Why, you may ask, do I rank it so highly? It's because it is one of the most visually stunning movies I have ever seen. Every single shot is composed with the utmost care. The framing is amazing. The colors are beautiful. The sound, too, is meticulously constructed. Although the sound technology back then was primitive compared to today's, the movie manages to make background noises very much a part of the whole. The story revolves around a bored but brilliant London photographer, played by David Hemmings. He is a genius at his craft, but his life is an empty place. One day he wanders into a lovely park, where he spies two lovers. He follows them and photographs them. The girl [Vanessa Redgrave] sees him and demands he give her the film. He refuses. When he develops the photos, he sees a blurred image, which, when blown up, looks like it might be a body. He also blows up an images that looks like a hand holding a gun. He has accidentally photographed a murder. Or has he? The girl finds his studio. She seduces him. He pretends to give her the negatives, but later finds his studio has been vandalized. By the girl? By an accomplice? And for what reason? Who will believe him? Or is there anything to believe? It's left to the viewer to supply the answers. The lively and unusual music tracks are by jazz great Herbie Hancock. The movie was directed by Michelangelo Antonioni, an Italian. To the best of my knowledge, his only other English language film is "Zabriskie Point" [1970]. His Italian films include "La Notte" [1960], "The Eclipse" [1962] and "Red Desert" [1964]. Brian De Palma's 1981 movie, "Blow Out" was inspired by "Blowup". Highly recommended to those who believe movies can be an art form.
Rating: 
Summary: If you love this movie, forget this version
Review: As a great fan of this movie when it first came out, I thought that the scenes in London's green park would last forever. Alas, the video has no color. What Antonioni worked so hard to acheive in visual delight is all mush....
Perhaps the DVD can restore what's faded, but this is worthless.
Rating:
Summary: Classic Film from the 1960's
Review: This is a classic film about two days in a fashion photographer's life in London in the 1960's in which a mystery occurs. For those of us who are fascinated with photographing various subjects that we encounter, posed as well as candid, and have some appreciation of the process of how the image goes from camera to paper in a darkroom, this film is very interesting. However, one aspect of the tape version is very disappointing. There is a scene in approximately the middle of the picture when Hemmings is wrestling with two girls in his studio. This scene has obviously been censored. In the original release of the film, this scene was much longer and had additional action occurring. The censoring in the tape version is obvious because for a brief period, Hemmings has a different hairstyle and hair color. Very disappointing! Perhaps if it were put on DVD, the original version of the film could be included. Even with this most unfortunate censoring, the film is still a classic and I am likewise surprised that it is not yet on DVD.
Rating:
Summary: what's it all about, Alfie ?
Review: In the middle of my researches, I was fortunate enough to find this quote : "I have just seen Antonioni's BLOW UP. These Italian directors are about a century ahead of me in terms of technique. What have I been doing all this time?"
-- Alfred Hitchcock, 1966 .... any questions? (If THIS doesn't get you to finally watch Antonioni's classic, I don't know what will.)
Rating: 
Summary: Slightly Overrated, But There Deserves to be a DVD Release
Review: I liked this film overall; although it moves very slow [for a 1960s film] and if you are not in the mood, can be boring, especially to younger audiences. I appreciated what seemed to me to be deliberate "low-key" acting styles to simulate a realistic movie-watching experience, but at times certain characters' actions seemed inappropriate to what was happening around them.
Although it was filmed in England, Blow-Up feels very much like a foreign language film. It's almost peculiar at times that the dialogue does not require subtitles, beacuse it often feels as though it should, even though the characters are English. The film is extremely well cast. David Hemmings is brilliantly cast in the role of a free-lance photographer and swinging Londoner about town. He's the right age, he's got the right look, and he's so believable in his role as to make it almost impossible to tell where the actor's true identity ends and the character acting begins. Yet he's totally believable in this role, he's good-looking, but also unique looking enough as to seem like a "real" person in a "real" environment living "real" scenarios. I will give big points to a genuine effort to make a unique film here. This is definately not one of your typical "formula films" of today! It did manage to hold my interest throughout, although I'm still not entirely sure what this film is about, and I have a hunch that some of it is another example of "The Emporer's New Clothes", which is why I can only give this movie 4 stars. This film was highly influential in it's day and I do recommend it to any fan of 60's culture and art films in general; especially for a rare chance to see both Jimmy Page and Jeff Beck performing together in this short-lived lineup of the Yardbirds. This film is usually considered Michelangelo Antonioni's best film, although I disagree. I feel that "L'Avventura" is his masterpiece. But I must ask - why is this film not available in a DVD version yet? I can't believe that. C'mon Criterion - get on it!
Rating:
Summary: BALLS!
Review: Memories of David Hemmings astride the statuesque Veruschka, Gawd! This ground-breaking thriller [?] by Antonioni views like a 'Who's Who?' of Beautiful People circa 1965/6. Superb art direction and color choices from brilliant vermilion to the seductive and so dangerous velvety black 'midnight park' tones. It's beautiful child David Hemmings as the pop photographer spying on loved ones in the park and finding something sinister in the underbrush, perhaps .... a body? Spectacular Vanessa Redgrave as the slightly neurotic mystery woman in search of 'those negatives' from Hemmings 'shows' what's it's all about [still does!] AND that odd ending - aaah, it's all in the eye of the beholder!
Antonioni imitators abound - but there's only one master! Tennis anyone?
Rating: 
Summary: Not aging well
Review: I think this is a more pretentious than Antonioni's other films-full of Austin Powers sets and human props. In films like La Notte the pace is sullen and slow but there was a humanity to the stories. There's a central event driving this story, but who cares about the murdered guy? Why should we? But the absolute worst part of the film is the ending, summing up the film with an invisible tennis ball.
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